I Choose to do this because it is Hard

I think it was in 2006 that I heard Olympic Hockey player Nikki Hudson speak. In describing her journey to become an Olympian it was evident that her own narrative of achievement was, like so many others, built upon challenge, setback and perseverance. This was exemplified in her recount of training on wintry mornings in Toowoomba when westerly winds can slice through the greatest resolve with ease. Her mantra, as she laced up her sandshoes in the darkness of early morning was, ‘I choose to do this because it is hard, not because it is easy.’ Somehow that image has stayed with me. I can somehow still picture Nikki as a young athlete, donning her sandshoes on a frigid Toowoomba morning – before sunlight, in readiness for her own training regime – her extra. Her steadfastness is palpable. Her choice to do the hard thing over the easy no doubt provided the platform for her success: perhaps it was enough of a point of difference from other elite athletes vying for Olympic selection.

But, her words aren’t unique. They can be linked to President John F. Kennedy who said, in relation to the decision to place a man on the moon, ‘We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organise and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too.’ Irrespective of the source, I love those words, and I love that they have found resonance with many Fairholme girls; resonance because the sentiment has alignment with their values and those of their families.

When Tessa Pruim (Senior 2017) addressed the Commencement Assembly on Wednesday she shared her parents’ reasons for sending her to Fairholme as a Year 9 Boarder from West End in Brisbane: not our usual catchment. Both Tessa’s parents had studied at university with Fairholme girls. They saw them as ‘sensible no nonsense girls’ and wanted the same grounded worldview for Tessa. Tessa is about to enter her third year at the University of Melbourne where she is completing a major in Medieval History. In her words, ‘after four years at Fairholme and two years out of it, those qualities have enabled me to get where I am today.’ She too alluded to the importance of Nikki Hudson’s mantra in negotiating the challenges of leaving home, moving interstate, renegotiating her degree and, just recently, moving off-residence into a flat. What a privilege it is whenever one of our recent graduates comes ‘holme’ and we can share their distance travelled and marvel at their personal growth.

For many of our new faces at Fairholme, this week has had hard moments, and no doubt the challenges that have emerged have been a heady mixture of the expected and the unexpected. Big change brings with it a mixture of exhilaration and fear, and most of us move along the continuum between those two points, eventually settling at a place of comfort. At times, this requires a focused intention to persevere, rather than an innate ability to do so – although we can learn to push through that which is difficult and, when we do, it holds us in good stead for life. We need courage to do the hard thing – whatever that hard thing is. Bob Cunningham (Former Head of School at the Robert Louis Stevenson School in New York) reminds us that where our children sit on that continuum will be influenced by our responses as parents. He says, ‘I’ve always observed that kids can feed off of parents’ anxiety. Do your best to be calm and routine when preparing for back to school. Don’t make a big deal out of it.’ And although we are already back at school, the advice is relevant to a whole diversity of contexts – as parents, we need to be aware of our own responses to new or difficult situations and how they impact on our children who watch us, observe our actions, and often feed them back to us with mirror accuracy.

The year ahead holds great promise. There will be challenges to negotiate, and successes that have any meaning will be gained through meeting those challenges with courage. Before we fixate too much on mitigating against or totally eliminating anxiety or stress from our lives, or those of our children, it’s also appropriate to remember that ‘anxiety is functional – we need an amount of stress to motivate us to act, or to enhance our performance. It is [also] a normal response to something complicated or scary (Carr-Gregg, 2014, p.150).’ Thus, let us embrace that which is difficult, rather than always seeking out that which is easy – we all know that the greatest growth occurs following the greatest challenge. Let us also allow our children to manage that difficult space because, as Carr-Gregg reminds us, if we ‘really want them to succeed, [we have to] learn when to leave them alone.’

Here’s to the moon, and the achievement of that which may seem an impossible dream! We look forward to walking with your daughters, and sons, as they do so throughout the year ahead.

Dr Linda Evans | Principal

References

Carr-Gregg, M. (2004) ‘Strictly Parenting. Everything you need to know about raising school-aged kids’. Penguin Random House. Australia.

The Understood team. ‘How Can I Get My Young Child Less Anxious About Starting School?’