As far as I can see many people have this role model thing all mixed up…A Role Model..a person who models something of value some thing that is positve for the desire outcome you would like to have, or want to be like; intellect, character, athletic ability etc..You get the point. Our children can want to run fast like Marion Jones, just not how she became fast(est) in her young adult life.
Lauryn Williams said it best to me recently while I interviewed her. “I am not perfect but I do try and do the best I can. If some one happens to be using me as a model of a good person ,honest,hard worker good athlete and intergral so be it”. Lauren (My Lauren) can’t use me as a role model as an Olympian. I never competed (darn), but she can use me and her father as character role models , a role model of service to others and people who work hard to maintain family and the values we believe in.
I am sure you all would agree, you would want the same for your kids… So why are we so surprised STILL when athletes disappoint the publics vision of nice and character filled individuals we love to see on TV.
They are just like us with a ton of problems and issues to over come and more money than most of us will every see ,that fuels in some cases more problems. People make mistakes.I get that. But why do we as the public expect them not to and act as if money and fame and fast legs should (would change the core of an individual).
I am teaching Lauren to be the best she can be. Looking to us as parents, her extended family aunts and uncles and close family friends and her grandma and grandpa as the ultimate role models. Grandma and Grandpa 50 plus years of marriage years,4 great kids of which I am one : -) and 8 grand kids that are folllowing closely in their footsteps . Tha’s a great role model.
Lauren can model running style from many great athletes like Allyson,Lauryn,Sonya to name a few but because these people aren’t in her life she shouldn’t look to the above mentioned for the lessons that will last long after her speed turns into love of a sport she participated in in her youth.
At the great youth sports parents site Your Kid Isn’t Going To Be A Pro the article “I am not a role model” really struck a cord with me. Here’s an excerpt:
“Remember when bad-boy Charles Barkley told us he wasn’t paid to be a role model? That parents should be role models? And by the way, parents, you could be great role models if you buy my shoes?
It was a controversial message in 1993 – kids look up to you, Charles, and not just because you’re tall! – but it’s been reinforced in spades these past few weeks.
First, there was Michael Phelps, suckin’ the bong.
Now there are two stories, one huge, and one developing.
The huge one, as you probably guessed, is Alex Rodriguez’s admission that he used performance-enhancing drugs from 2001 to 2003, an admission goosed out of him by an SI.com report that his was one of the 104 samples that tested positive for two anabolic steroids in 2003″. Read the entire article here
Who is your kids “Role Model”?
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