A Delicate Balance

My boys' baseball game was cancelled this Saturday. However, our Saturday was not athletics-free. Instead the athletic void created by the cancellation led to a near-frantic playing of any sport available. This consisted of Basketball and Paddle Tennis (with some catch thrown-in- excuse the pun). For the most part, my older son and I played; my younger son helped my wife with gardening. While playing with my older son, I reflected on the delicate balance that needs to be struck in any father/son competition.
The balance in question? How hard to try. Do I let my son win? Sure. He will feel good for the moment, but am I doing him a disservice by not trying harder. This is a pertinent question when I play with my son. First, he's very competitive. Like many people, he loves to win and hates to lose. Second, he is very talented athletically and wants to improve his game (and ultimately achieve his goal of having a professional sports/naturalist TV host career).
Regarding my son's competitiveness: it is important that I let him win to foster his self-esteem, but isn't it also important that I teach him how to handle not always winning? (I know this sounds self-serving because any lesson in losing for my son is an experience in winning for me.) That I'm even discussing the "experience in winning for me" point is an indication that I, too, am perhaps guilty of being a tad competitive (I can picture my wife nodding in agreement when she reads this). The cynic would say that I might want to beat my son because I want to win, not because I want to teach him how to handle defeat. The earnest father might argue otherwise, but his words might ring hollow. Perhaps I am winning just because I like to win, but I am going to avoid taking responsibility for what is surely a profound immaturity by blaming my son (and, in so doing, prove that I'm not immature?).
If he wasn't so good at sports, this whole "who should win?" conflict would never arise. When he was younger, there was no question who was better. Our games were clearly dictated by the more skilled player (the one who had been playing for twenty-five years before my son was even born). I could afford to let him win because I was confident that I could beat him if I tried. Now, I can still beat my son, but I have to really try which is troubling on a number of levels. It is embarrassing (because I am trying to defeat my son and, thus, teach him how to be less competitive?), tiring (because I am old and he is young), and ultimately frustrating because I either win (and feel guilty as I witness my son's disappointment) or lose (and feel disappointment which revolves around either my chagrin due to losing or due to my caring that I lost).
This Saturday was a good example of the quandary in which I frequently find myself. My son and I were playing a game of basketball. He quickly jumped out to a 16-6 lead. I said to him, "now I'm going to try hard and catch up, okay?" (This was kind of a cop-out; my son acquiesced, but what else was he going to do? And by verbalizing that I was about to engage in potentially immature behavior: does that make the immaturity any less immature? So, I clamped down on D and caught up. It was no cake-walk, and I was feeling faint when, at 30-26 (MY LEAD!!!!!), my son mercifully said, "I'm not really in the mood. Let's play paddle tennis."
During the tennis game, I did not play too hard. I hit balls to my son that he easily return. I was trying to allow him to gain experience and feel that he was gaining skills. Still, he was agitated. His demeanor slowly evolved from sunny to serious to quiet to sullen to near-tears. He was extremely frustrated that I was returning some of his hardest hit balls. I felt somewhat frustrated myself as I had made a point not to play too hard yet had still managed to discourage/upset my boy. Finally, he said that he wanted to quit. We went home, where my son angrily stormed to his room. At first, I was puzzled by his reaction. I had thought that I had reached the perfect competitive compromise, forcing my son to play well while not trying to win. But it is a delicate balance, and I have not yet found the proper recipe. I ended up focusing on the positive. True, my son is wildly competitive, but what champion isn't. Bill Russell, Tom Brady, Lary Bird, Paul Pierce, Kevin Garnett. I'm sure that their reactions to athletic adversity would have been equally strong as my boy's.