Description
Lessons from the Sidelines is a beautifully written book by Karen R. Blake, MBA about her experiences raising two sons and the lessons she learned while sitting on the sidelines during their sporting events. The first thing I thought of when I started reading this book was, “This is the book all of us moms say we should write but then never do.” Raising kids, you never know what is going to happen on a day-to-day basis. Sometimes they say the funniest things or sometimes they do something so silly or something so genius that you say, “I should write this down so I don’t forget it.” But then we forget. Well, this mom actually wrote the book! Blake was very clever in organizing it, however, because her book actually has a theme. She gives her readers an anecdotal story and then follows it up with how we can all apply the lesson learned in each story to our everyday lives.
One of the lessons I especially enjoyed was Lesson 6. Lesson 6 states, “Learn your sport from those who have proven that they are better than you.” The story she tells is about how her two children, James and William, have increased their knowledge in anything they set out to do, including sports and academics. They have gone to camps and taken enrichment courses to learn more than the average person. The real-time application Blake states is, “Go to as many workshops and seminars that you can to improve yourself personally and professionally.” I think this lesson is a good one as so many people think they can get ahead by maintaining the status quo instead of becoming better than the status quo.
Some of the other interesting lessons include, “Whenever possible, beat your coach to practice”, “Little League is the perfect environment to try everything because everyone (until proven otherwise) can play every position”, and “There are times when it is best to make the first move.”
Lessons from the Sidelines is a short book but packs a lot of great advice into its pages. Moms will love being able to relate to the stories and it will make readers think about how they can do some of the ideas suggested in the book such as volunteering and bettering themselves. This is a book that can be enjoyed by all ages, however, and even children in their teens will enjoy it.