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In reality and about 50% of the time:
Kid shows interest in something and the parent leans into it and encourages them, buys them the best stuff.
Kid gets burnt out on the thing and never touches it again.
Source, my daughter who loved art, then cooking, then tennis, then.....
Dont get discouraged. Kids who sample or dabble in many interests are more likely to be top performers in their field later in life.
edit: I cant find the actual study at the moment, but it was covered on No Stupid Questions, so they will have provided a citation.
It sounds like the thesis to David Epstein's book, Range. When I read it, it was a game changer for me.
If I recall correctly, the main examples were Roger Federer (who played a lot of sports and didn't choose to specialize in tennis until much later than the typical tennis pro), jazz legend Django Reinhardt, Vincent Van Gogh, and a bunch of other less famous, but much more typical examples.
an epstine book being recommended for advice on kids?
Yeah, he did to that surname what Hitler did to Adolf.
Sampling is important, and has value beyond just the things they sampled and abandoned. The act of trying many different things is itself helpful.
Van Gogh wouldn't have become the artist he became if he didn't fizzle out of multiple career paths beforehand.
David Epstein's Range really explores this idea and puts forth a pretty convincing argument that sampling and delaying specialization is helpful for becoming the type of well rounded generalist whose skills are best suited for our chaotic world.
I agree! I have found a career that puts me right in the middle of IT, film-making and design.
All Areas where I started but never went the full mile…. Well turns out they’re all critical skills to take care of digital signage and hybrid events 😅
I was going to protest but then I remembered when I visited a friend's house and he had a couple of electric guitars gathering dust in a corner and neither I nor any of my other friends knew that he played guitar.... Because he didn't, it was just a one-off thing he never delved into lol.
it's better that they try and find out rather than regret not having done so and wonder for the rest of their lives. as long as what you're doing is encouraging and supporting rather than pressing i say that's the right thing to do.
Yep. It's why I try not to lean into anything too hard and get secondhand or minimal supplies. If she latches on, we can look at expanding, but that usually just fizzles out.
That's kinda where I expected the comic to go. Parent tries to be supportive, ends up trying to make it the kid's whole personality, kid gets burnt out.
I was like your daughter. Between like 5 and 15, I've tried so many different things. And while I sometimes had troubles admitting that I lost interest in something - especially when I knew the thing was expensive, like keyboard lessons - I am hella glad I got to try out so many things with no strings attached. It's not even about committing to something or getting burned out. It's just, man, life is short and now I am 33 and I just wouldn't have the time or energy or motivation or money to try out everything I did as a kid. Karate and ballroom dancing and hiphop dancing and tennis and drawing and violin and ice skating and crafting - some things stayed for just a tryout, some for half a year or a year, some interests stayed for years. I'm so happy that I don't have any hobby FOMO nowadays. I'm super grateful that my parents let me try out all of these things. (Also all the sports despite me sucking at sports like crazy. Except for all the dancing, that I rocked.)
That's me, I have ADHD. Your daughter might have it too. This behavior is one of the clearer indicators for having ADHD.
As a kid I went from botany, to chemistry, to pneumatics, to rocketry, and then finally landed (heh) on IT. Now I work at a research firm supporting scientists doing (almost) all of the former.