I am a great advocate for kids in sport and all kinds of physical activity. I think there is so many skills and benefits to be gained. One thing I didn’t anticipate as a child is the life long lessons I would learn.
I was still quite young when I pushed and pushed my dad to let me come on a big ride from our small community into the bigger town nearby. It was quite a ride and I made it there ok. We had some McDonalds for breakfast and jumped back on to go home. I was surviving until we started approaching a very long hill. I felt sick just looking at it. My dad, noticing my fear, said “don’t look at the top of the hill, just get to the next sign post”, when we got there he said “now the next one”, and so we went on, until we were nearly at the top and i could feel my breakfast about to come back up. Although I didn’t make it quite to the top I made it so much further than my mind would allow when I arrived at the bottom.
Then there was the time when I thought I was so cool training to enter the 5km cross country. My friend and I were powering through the bush having a great time till we got to the bottom of a hill and we slowed right down. My friend’s dad turned to us and said “everyone can run fast down hill, if you want an advantage in the race you got to get the power up hill”. Made sense, and off we went working as hard as we could up hill. It was hard but with our dad’s advice combined we got up a lot better and did quite well in the cross country.
It’s amazing as an adult how many times I reflect on those occasions. I had a pretty cruisey childhood and it was pretty much one fun run down hill. But as you get older and marry and especially as you embark on having kids, those hills can seem so unapproachable sometimes. So draining you just want to stop and rest. But each bump in the road can be conquered just one sign post at a time. And every mountain can be endured. It may not be as easy as the good times, but hey everyone can run fast downhill, if you want to do well in life, you got to get the power going up.
Written By School Mum Kristin Harmer
Hi I’m Kristin Harmer, I have a lovely husband Sam, 3 kids (Lily 8, Winter 2 and Beau 10weeks), and am a stay at home mum. I hate to cook and clean, but strangely I am blessed with a love of being a stay at home mum. I love to dance, sing (although I am not good at this), and am very involved with a local church. I am too opinionated for my own good and as you can imagine, facebook makes this very apparent! I value relationships very much and love my house to be full of fun.
