ASH IS MY HERO
ANN WASON MOORE
Ash Barty is my hero. It’s not for her incredible win at the French Open, it’s not for her beautiful display of sportsmanship, it’s not even for what her win means for our country, for women, for indigenous people.
Any of those examples is reason enough to elevate Ash on a pedestal, but it’s actually for what she reminds me of … that we have time.
Time to make mistakes, time to ask questions and time to choose our own adventure.
Is there any atmosphere more pressurised than that of sport? If you haven’t made your mark by your teens, it’s all but over.
Every decision in your life is dictated by its impact on your physical ability. Your body is a business and those within its employ are in it to win it.
And yet the now-23-yearold Ash turned that narrative on its head when she stepped away from the tennis court in 2014, saying “it’s too much too quickly for me ... I want to experience life as a normal teenaged girl and have some normal experiences”.
And then she played cricket for a couple of years.
And then she came back, and now she’s won her first Grand Slam.
That’s just not how it’s meant to be done. Or rather, that’s just not how we’ve been told it’s meant to be done.
The legend of successful athletes says that every moment of their young lives should be spent building up for this moment, working on their physical strength, mental strength, ignoring distractions, having a single-minded focus.
There is literally no time to muck around.
In fact, it’s not just the narrative of sports stars, but for any success story.
Which is why our children are being locked into the same stress treadmill.
They need to know at an early age what they want to do as an adult so they can be sure to choose the right school subjects that will set them ahead of their cohort. And then they better ace those subjects so they can get into the uni course of their choosing.
And then they better fasttrack their study and pile on the subjects so they can get out of there and start earning a wage so they can pay back those debts.
As parents, it’s hard not to be swept along with this stress tsunami … and we’re dragging our children in our wake.
I see it in my kids already … last week, my daughter – who is in Year 5 – was in tears after receiving a B in her maths test.
“Mum,” she sobbed, “it’s going to affect my future.” What the what now?
By all means, I want my kids to care about their grades, to want to make an effort. But I’m worried that all I’m really doing is just unloading my stress on to their little shoulders.
So what if they don’t finish school in seven years’ time with an OP of 1? (Or an ATAR of I don’t even know). Does it really matter? As Ash reminded me this weekend, they still have time.
Time to figure out just what they want to do, time to study what they enjoy and time to do the best they can without burning themselves out.
Judging by literally all of the adults that I know, where you finish at the end of Year 12 is absolutely zero indication of your future success and happiness.
So kids, take that gap year and figure out what matters to you. Get a job or take a bridging course – or take up cricket – to learn new skills to take you where you want to go.
The truth is that the more time you take to choose your life’s direction, the more likely you’ll be pointed towards your own true north.
Just ask my hero Ash.