How to Raise Empowered Athletes and Resilient Kids

Guest Expert: Kirsten Jones

Intro:

You’ve probably noticed it—whether or not your child is an athlete. You’ve heard the stories. Athletes burning the candle at both ends, playing multiple sports at high levels, trying to balance school and sports for hours each day while sacrificing sleep, eating well, and blowing off stress in productive ways. Parents, with their hearts in the right places, pushing their kids to edge up—work harder, get in front of the right people, get more practice, get the right positions, get more playing time—only to burn their children out, blow their bodies out, obliterate their interest in the very activities they once loved. But how could they now try? Their kid is so talented- they seem to adore it—it’s not work, it’s fun…until it’s not. You know what I’m talking about, don’t you? Let’s discuss it today with Kirsten Jones.

Bio:

Kirsten Jones, Peak Performance and Sports Parenting Coach, is a mom and a co-host of the #RaisingAthletes Podcast (with Susie Walton) as well as a motivational speaker. Her first parenting book, Raising Empowered Athletes, just launched August 8, 2023 from Triumph Books. Kirsten, a Hall of Fame DI volleyball player from William and Mary in Virginia and fifteen year NIKE executive, clients include teen athletes (and their parents), where she helps them learn how to reach their goals by releasing their limitations.

Important messages:

• You can spend; throw all the money you want, and other things. But it’s about the memories of how you guys interact and what experiences they have with you that are going to take you far beyond the pitch or the pool or the playing field.
• Six words that our kids need to hear us say: There are only six words that our kids need to hear us say on the way home from the game on the way there, “I love to watch you play.”
• Allow them to come up with the question. Allow them to give you their point of view and ask for their input. When we do that they get to process it, they get to learn.
• Things not to do with your child who is in a sports or sporting activities: Doing things for them.
• What we want is to raise children who have autonomy, who have agency, who are empowered to make and know that when I make a mistake, it’s my mistake. And when I want to really do the work, I also am going to get the credit.
• If we want our kids to be great athletes or really great at anything, don’t lean in or lean out, just lean back.
• Allow our kids to see us being real because it gives them permission to be real.
• Allow these kids to be, to be humans and understand that there’s more to them than just being on the playing field on the mat. Wherever they are, there’s a future to consider and somebody who gives up their opportunity to take the SAT because they are afraid they’re going to get in trouble with you. That that’s not a problem with them. That’s a problem with the coaching system then.

Notable quotable:

• “You can spend; throw all the money you want, and other things. But it’s about the memories of how you guys interact and what experiences they have with you that are going to take you far beyond the pitch or the pool or the playing field.”
• “If we want our kids to be great athletes or really great at anything, don’t lean in or lean out, just lean back.”
• “Allow our kids to see us being real because it gives them permission to be real.”
• “Allow these kids to be, to be humans and understand that there’s more to them than just being on the playing field on the mat.”

Resources:

• Instagram: @kirstenjonescoach
• Book: https://www.amazon.com/Raising-Empowered-Athletes-Parenting-Resilient/dp/1637272812
• Facebook: @kirstenjonesinc
• Website: kirstenjonesinc.com