Hard Things

Ella goes to afternoon kindergarten, and because of budget cuts our district has no kindergarten busing this year, so I drive her to school everyday. The kindergarteners play outside on the playground until the teachers come out, then the kids line up against the school wall and the teachers lead them inside to their classrooms. The first few days Ella needed me to walk into her class with her and she cried when I left. After that she could walk into school without me but I had to wait with her on the playground until her teacher came out. It wasn't until right before Christmas break that she told me I could drop her off in the drop-off line, and she would get out and wait by herself, as long as I parked and watched until her teacher came out, and that is what we do now. Ella likes school and when she comes home she tells me all about what she did that day. She knows all her letters, numbers and sight words and has lots of friends she talks about. The funny thing is that, even now, every day she gets out of the van with tears in her eyes, trying hard not to cry. She doesn't like that transition from home to school. Just looking at her I can see how hard it is for her to do this everyday, but even though I have offered to wait with her on the playground like I used to, she tells me she wants to do it herself. One day we were sitting on the couch together and I tried to tell her how proud I was of her for being so brave. I told her being brave meant doing something even though it's hard. She told me I was making her cry and to stop talking.

Yesterday I went to the Worldwide Leadership Training broadcast and one small comment made by one of the participants stuck out to me - they said our children need to know they can do hard things. What an important lesson to learn. How many times have I missed an opportunity because I said that's too hard? I see people living below their potential because they're scared to do anything too hard. And I've lived long enough to realize that sometimes the hard things in life aren't a choice - sometimes they come through circumstances out of our control and our only choice is how we react.

So I've been thinking about how to teach my children they can do hard things so they can take advantage of all the opportunities that will come their way, they can live up to their potential and they'll be prepared for any hardships they encounter in the future. I don't know that I have a lot of answers yet about how I'm supposed to do that, but I think about Ella going to kindergarten everyday with tears in her eyes and I'm thankful for her example. Maybe she's the one who is teaching me.