We have also spoken to a lot of parents that are very interested in their children becoming tougher and more confident.
Unfortunately, there has been such a push on being "fair" and "everyone being happy" that everyone was a winner and no one lost.
That is simply not reality.
It may have created higher confidence, but that confidence would get easily shattered when dealing with the unfamiliar feeling of failure.
True confidence comes from overcoming challenges learning how to get back up after falling down! A great quote that comes to mind is "Fall Forward!"
When we are playing games, doing our martial arts training or even helping with homework, when a student "Gets out" or has trouble with a subject/technique our goal is to teach them the valuable lesson of learning from their mistakes and having it fuel their drive to succeed!
Perfect example comes from my personal Taekwondo story.
Though I never went as far in competition as my father, I remember training hard for competitions. I would stay after classes with Master Bellantoni and my father to get extra rounds in and eventually drive to White Plains to train with Master Edwards at his Taekwondo School.
We would spend countless hours drilling, sparring and strategizing how to win against people that were bigger, smaller, taller and shorter.
I would go to competitions and I would lose. Then I would go to another one and I would lose. I remember going 3 tournaments in a row and being beaten every time.
When the time came for me to make the decision to keep going or stop competing, I remember thinking, "I might just not be cut out for this!" I was so discouraged because I was doing everything I can but just wasn't winning!
I owe a lot of credit to Master Bellantoni, my father and Master Edwards who inspired me to keep going when I didn't want to. The loss lit a fire to help me train harder. I trained harder which led to more confidence in my abilities.
Once the confidence was there, I started winning!
Through failure, I learned to take it as a reason to work even harder than last time.
I choose to win!
We want to help with this and we will!
We are going to make an announcement that you are going to love. You will not only want to send your children to our after school program, but need to!!!!!
