Climate News 25:12
The David Suzuki statements on it being too late to stop climate change (and the backlash) this week got me thinking about soccer coaching. The piece was unfairly characterised as boomer doomerism but it does highlight generational roles in responding to climate change.
As Benita Russell, Alexi Lynch and Alice Woodruff would testify, coaching young people to do things you are no longer capable of doing yourself is wonderfully rewarding. You can’t even kid yourself that it was all my brilliant planning that led to that goal. But it was something about the work put in during training as well as the culture you have created and the confidence you have instilled in players that did contribute. I know sport and environmentalism don’t always mix culturally, but it is possible to learn something from the former. For example, former England cricket captain and psychologist, Mike Brearley’s The Art of Captaincy, remains for me the best book I’ve read on human management. Coaching is also an age reflective point, realising that at some point it’s no longer about me, it’s about others and how I can support them. In responding to climate change, the bad side of this is the “well, it’s up to the next generation” statement that occasionally comes up in community workshops as well as an unwillingness to share power with younger generations. The great side is what I saw recently at a workshop in Melbourne where an older community stalwart patiently talked a young activist through what she needed to do to set up a local conservation group. We can all feel doomed, but understanding where we sit and taking the right actions to give strength to already stronger arms (or legs driving towards goal) is sometimes what we need.
|
Previous
|
