Here’s why and here’s what you can do about it.
“Today’s kids lack confidence more today than ever before.
It’s because not only are they comparing themselves to their peers, they are constantly comparing themselves to others highlights on the internet.
This is why positive, affirmation based coaching styles serve them best.”
-Ray Zingler on X
I understand there is a time and place to be hard on them and each kid needs and receives coaching differently.
But here’s the deal.
The landscape these kids are growing up in today is far different than any other time in human history.
And this why coaches who rest on their laurels of tenure and like to brag about how long (as if length has anything to do with quality) they’ve been coaching often end up failing in the ladder parts of their careers.
And you’re seeing it at every level from youth to the professional ranks.
It’s because they are using the same strategies they used in 1992.
In 1992 kids we’re riding in beds of trucks, drinking out of the hose, and finishing the backwash of Busch Light cans while practicing WWF moves on their younger siblings on trampolines.
It was only when the sun went down they heard the literal dinner bell to come inside to eat steak and potatoes.
In 2024, kids have “tech neck” cervical spine problems from staring downwards at their comparison devices to affirm their inferiority. Their parents are tracking every waking movement of their lives via a “Life360 App” and all of their injuries are psychological. I wonder why! Oh yeah, and during all this they are undernourished, sleep deprived, and stressed to the gills over some fucking meaningless GPA.
To treat kids who were born in 1982 and 2013 the same way, is quite literally insane.
But old heads who fail to adapt because “they’ve always done it this way” try it, fail, and then blame kids for being “soft”.
Kid’s aren’t soft or hard. They are products of their environments and what is tolerated within them.
And, at scale, their environments have changed DRAMATICALLY.
If you’re over 30, it’s so different from the way we grew up that it’s impossible to fully comprehend.
But here is what I do know.
Their environments are beating them to a pulp.
And if you coach or teach, you don’t need to beat them down any further.
Use your platform to love on them, build them up, show them they are enough.
Not only will that get the most out of them, it’ll make them feel better, too.
