What my son taught me at the top of the playground: name the scary part, then go anyway.
If you've spent any time at a playground with your kids, you know the yell. "Dad, look at this!" It usually comes from somewhere a little too high, at a volume meant for the whole park. You look up from your phone, or your coffee, or the sibling hanging off your leg, and you get ready to clap.
That's the yell I heard from my son a little while ago. He'd climbed to the top of the playground and he wanted to make sure I was watching before he did whatever he was about to do.
The whisper
So I watched. He walked to the edge, looked down at the wood chips, and got quiet. Then I heard him whisper, mostly to himself, "I'm nervous. 3, 2."
And he jumped. He never got to one.
I laughed, because skipping the one is such a kid move. But that whisper stuck with me for days afterward. He did something I have to work at as a grown man, and he made it look simple.
What he got right
He named it. He was nervous, and he told the truth about it, to himself, with his dad standing right there. Saying it didn't make him any less brave. If anything it seemed to help. Once the nervous part was said, all that was left was the counting.
He wanted someone watching. "Dad, look at this" came before "I'm nervous." He wanted a witness for the hard thing. I think we still want that as grown-ups. We just stop asking for it somewhere around high school.
And he went before he felt ready. He didn't stand at the edge waiting for the nerves to leave. He let them come along for the jump.
A lot of us have a reflex when a kid says they're scared. "You're fine." "Don't be scared." "There's nothing to be scared of." We mean it kindly. We want the fear gone so they can enjoy the thing. But my son wasn't asking me to fix his nerves. He'd already handled them himself. He named it, he counted, and he went. If I'd jumped in with "you're fine," I might have talked him out of the best part.
I'd like my kids to grow up knowing that brave people get nervous. But I'm not sure how they'd learn that from me, because they usually see the after. The finished thing, the calm face, the "it went fine." They don't often get the whisper at the top.
And I get why. Part of being a dad feels like being the steady one. When your kids are nervous, you want to be the person in the room who isn't. But steady and honest can sit together. You can say "I'm nervous" in a calm voice and then go do the thing, and that might be one of the most useful things they ever watch you do.
My son gave me a better picture of courage than I've given him. So this week I want to return the favour.
Try this week
Share one nervous thing at home. Pick something real that's coming up for you, a hard conversation, a big meeting, a first time at something, and tell your kids the short version at dinner. "I've got a big thing tomorrow and I'm a bit nervous." Then, the next night, tell them how it went, even if it didn't go perfectly.
That second part matters as much as the first. If it went well, they learn the nerves weren't a stop sign. If it didn't, they learn you got through it and you'd try again. Either way they got to see the whole thing, from the top of the climb to the landing.
A few ways to make it stick:
- When your kid tells you they're scared, believe them. Skip "there's nothing to be scared of" and try "Okay. Want to count it together?"
- When you hear "look at this," look. Put the phone down for the jump. It takes ten seconds, and they'll remember who was watching.
- At bedtime, ask, "Did you do anything scary today?" Then share one of yours.
Your kids are going to be nervous plenty of times in their lives. On the first day of something, at the edge of something, before something that matters. You can't take the nerves away. But you can show them what it looks like to say it and go anyway, and you can make sure that when they yell for you to look, you're looking.
When did your kid last show you how to do something scared? And when did they last see you do it?
