As this is my first attempt at blogging bear with me. My children are amused and enjoying my toe in the water approach to this. The way I understand it we are supposed to connect some of what we learned this week to something personal in our own lives or to the larger social context that impacts us. Keep in mind that I am much funnier in person and have discovered in my short computer career that the written word does not convey sarcasm or dry humor nearly as effectively as I would like it to. I guess what I'd like to talk about is kind of an expansion on the Goodness of Fit theory and how we as a society pretend that it is not important. Let me give you an example. When I was growing up you were either good at something or you weren't. It was understood that some of us were faster or smarter or more talented than others. It was not assumed that we all had an equal playing field. We knew that race gender and personal ability would impact the opportunities we were presented with and how hard we would have to work to get what we wanted. What I have noticed in raising my children is that today children are told that everyone s the same. Differences in race, socioeconomic status and base performance ability are ignored for fear of being seen as intolerant. Children are told that if they work hard enough or try hard enough they can be anything. Not to be the grinch but that is just not true. Without the innate physical ability and talent you can work hard and practice all you want and your chances of playing in the NBA or NFL are about the same as mine. Considering that I am a 42 year old female with a bad left knee your odds are not good. Devote your energy to something that "fits" your actual abilities. We are raising a generation that cannot cope with disappointment. They are told repeatedly by parents who fear bruising their little egos that they are wonderful at everything that anyone who criticicizes them constructively or not just doesn't get it. Teachers seem compelled to reinforce this, maybe because of rabid parents who can't tolerate even legitimate criticism of their precious offspring. Unfortunately in my view if we cripple our childrens ability to engage in honest self evaluation we deprive them of the opportunity to discover what they are truly amazing at. The other part of this is that do you think they don t know? If little Johny has played an entire season of baseball has  struck out every time at bat, the closest he s come to catching a fly ball is getting hit with the ball in his right eye, no matter how much you reassure him that he s the next Ichiro I think he knows. I think its important to let kids try things the path to self fufillment is strewn with discarded middle school orchestra instruments and countless piles of athletic gear. But its important for kids to experience failure, to learn to recover, to learn how to regroup and reassess when things don t go their way. This enables them to cope with life s disappointments without falling apart. Just saying.