Character 101

Volleyball season is now over. I hate to admit it, but I'm glad. It's been a... trying past few weeks. Sierra has played 3 seasons now, and the character building gets harder and harder each year. Not just for her, either. I can completely understand how parents lose their tempers at games. I sure wanted to! And not just with the coach, but even with most of the girls. The subtle bullying of the girls just gets at me. So does the favoritism of the coaches. To add to that, poor Sierra shed a lot of tears.

I won't go into details. I've recently read something that stated, "Don't put online what you wouldn't say to some one's face." So, being that I don't plan on doing a lot of confronting, I'm just going to say that going by the Golden Rule, there are a lot of people I've witnessed with volleyball who wish to be left out, subtly bullied, bossed around, and ignored. If nothing else, that just made the nice, encouraging, and caring people in volleyball shine all the more.

Now, don't get me wrong. I thoroughly enjoyed watching Sierra play. She isn't the strongest player on the team, but once she gets in her groove, she does pretty good. The frustrating part was the fact that she really wasn't given enough playing time this season to prove that.

The mama bear in me wants to go on the attack. To keep Sierra home so she never has to deal with hard and unfair situations like this again. To keep her away from the rude, snotty girls.  But I know that isn't the answer. Protecting and sheltering her isn't going to make things better. In the real world, it only gets worse, and I'd be doing her a disservice by trying to keep her in a rose colored bubble. Instead, we have to see this as an opportunity to show her love, support, and comfort, and also to teach her how to deal with the tough stuff in life. Teach her Who to turn to to give her the grace and strength she needs to hold her head high, knowing her value does not lie in what mere people think, but it lies in what God thinks. He thinks she is beautiful inside and out, and treasures her more than you can imagine.

And so do I.