A new generation

Brace yourselves - this is going to be a controversial one. If you're easily offended I suggest you look away now.

Of course I'm always interested to hear differences of opinion - after all, this blog is just one person's opinion and there's nothing to say it's fact - so disagree to your heart's content. There's nothing wrong with a bit of debate on a subject.

For a while now, I've been debating whether I wanted to tackle this subject, then a news article I read today made my mind up for me. I'll link you up to that shortly, but here goes -


Does anyone else think lots of skaters - but especially young ones, tween and teenagers mainly - just love to talk about themselves? I know, I know - this coming from the girl who blogs to talk about herself....(haha!) But I am serious.

Now, I'm not talking about discussing the intricacies of elements or asking for tips or help from others, I'm talking about the ones who volunteer information purely on their own performance without being asked, but go far beyond the realms of normal, everyday conversation.

You hear this kind of thing:  "I've been practising my program. It's quite difficult and there's a lot to remember. I've always found mohawks especially hard; I just can't seem to get that edge out of it" (we're ok up to this point - this is still normal conversation) but then they add: "There's a right outside three turn then I have to step forward and do four pushes then go up into my spiral. When I come down from my spiral, I do a left mohawk cross, then a right m.....".etc etc

I'm not sure in these kinds of conversations what exactly the person talking thinks the listener is doing with that information. It's not being stored up for future use, nor are they picturing your every move for entertainment purposes.  In perfect honesty, I suspect I've been guilty of this kind of over-sharing myself. It's so easy to get lost in skating that way and I plan to make a conscious effort to curb myself!

There's also - and this is the one that's irked me a number of times - the younger generation's apparent need to put others down, seemingly in order to make themselves feel better.

Have you ever had a conversation that starts "Can you do X? I can."

And rather than just telling me you've passed your gold - to which I would reply genuinely "Congratulations, well done you" - why must you begin with "You haven't passed gold yet have you? Guess what? I have." Believe it or not, what this does is takes my "pleased for you" feeling and twists it into "Oh shut up. Your coach must be an easy one to please." No one likes to have bitter thoughts like that, but really, there are very few other reactions that conversation could naturally provoke in a human being.

Something I seem to suffer from personally, and I'm not too sure what I do or say to provoke it, is "let me help you" syndrome. Don't get me wrong, I'm not averse to the odd helpful tip if I'm very obviously struggling with something. But most of the time, I'm just learning - that's all - just practising and learning.

There's nothing that knocks confidence more than someone's - probably well-meaning - "Oh don't worry, I'm no good at those either". Just please keep in mind that if that person had actually been feeling a little bit better about that particular element, you've essentially just implied that it still looks rubbish. Being corrected all the time by anyone and everyone - however well-intended - can just serve to make people suspect everything they're doing looks appalling.

As skaters, we all complain from time to time about just not being able to grasp this element or that, and what we're looking for usually is perhaps a bit of reassurance, a reminder, that if you keep practising it WILL come.

By all means, celebrate your achievements; be proud of the things you've done, because you've worked damn hard for it, but don't do it by knocking others down.

And finally, the odd compliment doesn't go amiss either. Not everyone who's negative about themselves is "compliment fishing" -  that's just an easy assumption to make. People these days, more and more, seem to have confidence issues.

If someone's down on themselves, don't go over the top but perhaps point out that it doesn't look as bad as they assume it does, or that there were other things they struggled with previously that they can now do beautifully. Or just offer encouragement to keep trying as everyone started at the beginning. A little bit of human kindness goes a long way and costs nothing.

And on that bombshell, I'm half expecting to feel like Liz Jones of Daily Mail fame - i.e. hated for having a strong opinion - but I'm willing to take that if it makes a few people examine the subject.

And here's the article that sparked all this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2727999/Are-mobiles-making-obnoxious-Under-25s-likely-inflated-self-esteem-exaggerate-thanks-social-media.html