My son - now 15 - is a pretty good student. So far, he has done very well in his studies. There has been always been a tendency to rely on his natural brightness and all his teachers have recently started saying that there can be a little looseness and rush about his work. That is something I recognise and I have said to him that as a lack of understanding is not his issue, what can be corrected - effort - is entirely under his control. So, today, a Saturday, he studied for about an hour and a half in the morning, but was going to go back to his PS4 after just 10 minutes in the afternoon. I stopped that and I felt bad doing it because I do not like confrontation.
Was I right in being tough? And I am not very often. But he has done perfectly well over the years working in his own style. I do not check his work on the basis that he has to be grown up about it. I have said to him a number of times that 'work gives us the right to play' and that if he does well, he would be doing it for himself and not for me / us - and that effort is the only thing I ask for. Now, if he ends up doing really well with minimal effort - as some people do - so be it, but that is a risk and it would be a pity to waste his undoubted talent because he has an intuitive understanding of some of his subjects allied to good memory.
At work when I have led teams, and at home over the years, all I have looked for and asked for and tried to deliver myself is a level of reasonableness. I do not expect others to do what I do not but I try not to impose and give those around me the ability to be their own selves and use their own styles. So, I have to be careful in this case also not to pressurise but have to trust myself that a little guidance will not go amiss.
