“That reminds me, I was going to ask you. What exactly *is* our team concept?”

Friends:

As the baseball season is about to begin again, I am reminded of something that the head coach said on the first day of my only week of junior college baseball.  As the group of 50 players huddled together near the pitcher’s mound of the field at Los Angeles Valley College, the fall semester having just started and practice games beginning within two days, we all looked to our fearless leader for words of wisdom and inspiration.  Instead, we received words of idiocy and absurdity which immediately reduced credibility in my 17 year old eyes. 

I am sure that on the first day of spring training, all of the teams had meetings during which the goals and expectations were set out; and each team, without fail, had one goal in mind—winning the World Series.  Maybe the players have individual goals, such as stay healthy, hit .300 or win 20 games, but baseball is a team sport and there is no higher achievement than winning the championship.  The season is a long one, a marathon not a sprint, and there are going to be good days and bad days, successful weeks and slumps.  But of all sports, the law of averages is most prevalent and controlling in baseball.  So despite the wins or losses on any given day, if you win 2 games out of every 3, your chances of going to the playoffs increase.

Being a true student of the game and understanding that any team can beat any given team on any given day, I was expecting that the goals as set out by the coach would be reflective of this.  The goal of the team should be to win the league championship.  To do so, the team has to play hard every day and play as a team and not as 25 or 50 individual players only out for themselves.

Instead of this, however, the coach offered these words of inspiration:  the team’s goal should be to go 42-0.  Not win the championship (although going undefeated surely would result in a championship); not give 100% each and every day.  Win every game you play.

When I was in high school, our coach was an ornery, burnt out man who made it known to everyone that he had many other places he would have preferred to be.  However, he made sure that whenever you made a mistake, you heard about it.  I remember one instance, an away game, when our pitcher was struggling so badly that the coach yelled from the bench that our pitcher shouldn’t have gotten off the bus.  So you can imagine the stress with which we played the game, the concern that any error or blunder that we made would be met with verbal attacks or benching.  Baseball is a game that requires relaxation—the tighter you get the more prone you are to errors and strikeouts.

The same goes with the junior college coach’s goals.  One misstep, one error, one blown game in the bottom of the 9^th and the team had failed in its only goal.  How is a team supposed to respond to that? 

Lately much has been made about the Miami Heat and their amazing win streak, up to 26 games as of this writing, only 7 off of the record set by the Lakers of 1971-1972.  I remember hearing of an interview with LeBron James from last week in which a reporter asked if he would prefer to break the record for most consecutive games won or win a second championship.  If my memory serves, James said he wanted the consecutive win streak.  A lofty goal but if the team breaks the record but fails to win the championship, won’t the season be a failure?

The goal of every team is to win the championship and anything less than that is a failure.  But the thing about a goal like that is that it requires that the full season be played.  Jokes are made that on the first day of the season teams like the Royals or the Pirates or the Astros are already mathematically eliminated from contention, but that isn’t the case; every team has just as much chance of winning the championship as any other team and you have to play every game and see where the chips fall.  The law of averages will dictate success or failure.

But back to my junior college coach:  I am not going to say that not every game is important, in fact, they are all incredibly important.  But if your goal is set based on what happens every day and every day you have a chance of failing in your goal, then you will play tight, you will stress about at-bats and you will make mistakes.  Case in point:  the very first game of the season, our team didn’t just lose; we got creamed.  And just like that, we had failed in our goal.

I have taken this to heart when setting my own goals.  The goals have to be not only specific, but also realistic.  The perfect season is an anomaly.  Sure it happens every now and again, but any team can be any other team on any given day, whether it be T-Ball, high school, college or the pros.  Basically you need a whole lot of luck, the stars to align, and still more luck to have a perfect season.  So is perfection realistic?  I just don’t see how and I certainly didn’t think so at 17 years old.

Consider the professional football season; it is only 16 games, only 10% of the length of the major league baseball season.  And there hasn’t been a perfect season in over 40 years. 

Is perfection a realistic goal in any endeavor?  I don’t see how it can be and any goal which requires perfection is a goal waiting to fail.  Instead, the goal should be more forward thinking and broad-based.  Requiring perfection every day simply allows for too many unexpected forces to push their way in and muck things up. 

I cannot tell you how the junior college baseball season ended.  After the first week I was red-shirted, told I was too young and too small, that the team had 26 year old men who had children of their own and that I simply wouldn’t get a chance to play.  So by the end of the semester, I had transferred to a new school and hung up my cleats.  But I can tell you this—the coach sure isn’t coaching anywhere nearby anymore…

Have a great week.

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“It’s the hard-knock life for us!”

My daughter is performing in a school play this week and will be playing an orphan in the production of “Annie.”  Scrolling through some past posts, in light of her performance Tuesday, this post seemed applicable.  Enjoy.

Also, just to further bombard you with media, if you are interested in my ramblings regading literature and the books I read, you can find my podcast called “Book Therapy” on iTunes or go to the website at www.booktherapy.podbean.com.

Friends:

Just the other day I heard something that perplexed me:  “18-year old hospitalized for exhaustion and malnourishment.”  My initial reaction was to think that it was just a teenager who had had too much fun in the sun, maybe got dehydrated swimming in the pool all day, maybe some sunstroke or a bad sunburn.  Nope, eighteen years old, exhaustion and malnutrition from performances, travel, and appearances.  Is this any life for a kid?

I get it, “18” is not a kid, it is an adult, she is free to do what she wants.  But with Father’s Day weekend just having passed, my question is “what was her father doing?”  How do you let your baby girl become malnourished and exhausted?  And it got me to thinking about all of these kids who are being pushed and pushed by their parents or, on the flip side, the parents who do nothing while their children run rampant.

We as parents have many responsibilities.  We need to feed and clothe our children, put a roof over their heads, and give them the tools to be productive and self-sufficient adults.  Along the way, though, we also need to teach them that it is ok to be children, it is ok to play, it is ok to have fun.  Because once they grow up and leave school and start families of their own, the times to be young and crazy will be few and far between and the stress of everyday life will be palpable.

Which is why these parents who push their kids to perform, to succeed, to compete at such young ages really concern me.  Look, I know what it was like.  I loved playing baseball and, if I could, I would have played it every day twice.  I didn’t want to go to school, I didn’t want to go to Hebrew School, I wanted to play baseball.  But this was because it was fun.  It wasn’t because I thought I could make a career out of it or because this was the only path my life could take.  I never placed all of my eggs in the one basket of “Major Leagues or Bust.”  And my parents always said that when baseball was no longer fun, it was time to stop playing.  They didn’t push me.

I heard a story that Jason Heyward of the Atlanta Braves played on like 4 different baseball teams at one time, one year playing like a couple of hundred baseball games, all while he was 15 years old.  Seriously?  When did he have time for school?  And, more importantly, when did he have time to be a kid???

So when I hear about an 18-year old suffering from exhaustion and having to be hospitalized, it really pains me.  And of course, this 18-year old happens to be a superstar, not that you could put it past me, I had no clue who she was, other than that she is dating Justin Bieber (which is a whole ‘nother Oprah.)

But it isn’t surprising.  I have been dealing with these types of parents for years because we have represented them.  The parents who are living vicariously through their kids, the parents who identify in their kids a talent that they never had and they feel the need to exploit it… for some it is a path to financial security which they so badly crave.  But do the kids crave it as well?

Let me tell you this story:  mother lived in poverty and ran her daughter from audition to audition because the kid LOVED to act.  And finally the kid got a job, and then another, and then another, and became something of a star.  So what did the mother do?  Well, when the kid disowned the mother and accused her of exploiting her for the mother’s own gain, the mother ran off and had another kid so she could do it all over again!  I kid you not… (see what I did there?)

This is real life.  You have parents who take their kids to the driving range at 3-years old so that they can be the next Tiger Woods or they privately tutor them instead of putting them in school so that they can go to auditions.

So play it out, what happens when the kid grows up?  Well, they do exactly what you would expect them to do.  They rebel, they act out, they “play.”  They get tattoos (Miley Cyrus), they drink and do drugs (Adam Rich and Todd Bridges and Britney Spears and Dana Plato) or they turn to crime (Lindsay Lohan and countless others).  They get to be kids, except the consequences of their play are more debilitating and harrowing– Jail sentences and overdoses and, when the flame of fame burns out, suicides.

At that point, it is too late.  These kids are already damaged.  My question when I see this, when I see Britney Spears shaving her head or Miley Cyrus on a stripper pole, is “Where are the parents?”  Well, by then, the parents have already lost control.  The monster they have created (or allowed be created, let’s be fair) has already run away, a la Frankenstein.

There are so many aspects of this “epidemic” that could be addressed.  We could write volumes alone just talking about the stress of being on this course of performing.  We all know it but we hate to tell our kids-the odds are against their success on the field or on the screen.  Few people actually make it, which means that along the way, there will be a hell of a lot of rejection and failure.  For what?  Our kids already have self-esteem problems because of the perfection they see on the screen.  We want to add to it by putting them in situations that will lead to failure!?!

Look, I am not arguing against child actors or playing lots of sports or even competing.  These are all important.  But the kids need to know that all of these are activities.  They are supposed to be fun.  And if it isn’t fun anymore, it is time to stop.

You don’t want to be 18-years old and hospitalized for exhaustion unless it is because you ran around Disneyland all day and forgot to grab a Mickey-shaped pretzel…

Have a great week my friends.

“The last team to check in here, may be eliminated.”

Friends:

As you know, it’s been a busy first two months of 2013 for me.  Starting a new firm, trying to get the entire infrastructure set up so that we are technically compatible with the 21^st Century, looking for new clients and networking partners to sustain the practice and on the whole just learning how to go it alone for the first time in my career.  (Although I will admit, having my wife as a partner has been such a blessing—I know I’m not alone and that is so comforting!)

But with how much running around I’ve done, it has sometimes felt like I’m a whirling dervish, always in a different location with a different purpose, goal or objective.  You can imagine the minimal time that has been available for some downtime, for calmness and serenity.  It’s easy to lose focus and forget that there needs to be pleasure and relaxation in life. 

The synagogue at which my daughters go to Hebrew School is going through a bit of a transition period; we are searching for a new Rabbi and, for one reason or another, I was asked to serve on the committee whose task it is to hire the new Rabbi.  It is a daunting task, one which is fraught with a ton of responsibility.  I believe that the Rabbi is not only the religious center of the synagogue, but is also the true leader of a community, in both the spiritual and educational senses.  But not all Rabbis are made equal and certainly each synagogue has its own personality and expectations of what its Rabbi should be like.  Thus, finding the “right” Rabbi can be challenging—a good hire can strengthen a synagogue; the wrong hire can weaken it.

The process of finding a new Rabbi is the same process as any other human resources process.  Review the resumes, have interviews, give them a tryout.  Step three was this past weekend and, because of the whirlwind tour that the auditioning Rabbi was going to be experiencing, it required me to be at the synagogue an awful lot. 

I consider myself to be an observant Jew, but not observant, if you catch my drift.  I know the holidays, that every Friday night through Saturday evening is the Sabbath, and am certainly aware of the dietary laws.  But I am certainly not orthodox.  I do not observe the Sabbath, I do not attend temple every week, I love bacon too much to keep kosher; however there is certainly no doubt in my mind that I am what would be considered a good Jew.

While it has never been my custom to be ultra-observant of the Sabbath and spend the weekend in temple, the prospect of spending virtually the entire weekend at temple was something to which I was actually anticipating with excitement.  Simply because it is on television while I am writing this, just as in “The Amazing Race,” when certain tasks have been completed, there is a mandatory rest period.  In the first chapter of the Bible, it was Shabbat and for Jews everywhere, on the seventh day we are commanded to rest.  Yet so few of us do and I found that, because of the hectic nature of the first two months of the year, I was due for that rest.  It may have been overdue, but it was much needed.

So to temple I went and allowed myself to be encompassed by the pomp and circumstance of the auditioning Rabbi, the people, and of course the meaning in the prayers.  And I think that there may have been a higher power involved.  At one point in the service Saturday morning we were reciting the prayer that is also found in the mezuzahs that Jews place on their doorposts, which includes these words that we recite in Hebrew:  “Thou shalt love the Lord thy G-d with all thy heart, with all thy soul, and with all thy might.  And these words which I command thee this day shall be in thy heart.” 

As the congregation was reciting these words, I felt a buzzing in my right pants pocket.  It felt like my phone was going off, but as I reached to my hip I remembered that my phone was on the seat beside me, far away from my pockets.  It was just a weird coincidence that I would feel this vibration on my hip at the time we recited those specific words that are so important in the Jewish religion, our commitment to G-d.  As if it was intended to remind me that, whereas I rely so much on computers and handheld devices as a means to remain connected with others, that I don’t need those same instruments to remain connected with my religion and that, for all of the stress and tumult of daily life, it is important that I take a break, rest and make sure that I reconnect with myself, my family and my Judaism. 

I am not trying to proselytize or espouse any religious theories; I am simply offering this as a reminder of the need to unwind, step away from the stresses of our busy lives and make sure that we re-center ourselves, however you choose to do it.  It may be on the golf course, or in church, or at the mall or at the beach.  It is so easy to get wrapped up in the whirlwind of life; to our responsibilities at work, to our clients, to our creditors, to everyone and everything out there that to which we owe attention and consideration.  But amongst all of those, our primary responsibility has to be to ourselves.  For if we aren’t cognizant of our own needs, then what good will we be to everyone else? 

Just like all of the legs of “The Amazing Race,” sometimes we need to take that mandatory rest period and actually rest.  It can be so rewarding…