Too Cool for This
| Category: | Reflective |
|---|---|
| Notes: | Useful for older Scout disengagement or low group energy. Speak without accusation - this works better as an observation than a lecture. |
Every troop has the Scout who's decided he's too cool for this. You can spot him: arms folded, half-smiling at everything, making little comments when someone else is trying hard. He's there, but just barely. He wants you to know he could be somewhere else.
Here's what I've noticed after years of working with young men: that "too cool" posture is almost always armor. Underneath it is usually a Scout who is afraid of looking foolish, afraid of caring about something and being laughed at, afraid of trying and failing in front of his peers. It's easier to say "I don't care about this" than to care about it and fall short.
The ones who drop the armor are always glad they did. Not because Scouting is magic, but because the real experiences - the hard campout, the difficult hike, the night you solved a problem together - only happen if you're actually in it. You can't have the story if you spent the whole trip watching from the outside.
If that describes you tonight, I'm not going to lecture you. But I'll offer this: being fully here, even imperfectly, is always more interesting than being half here. The Scout who tries and fails is having an experience. The Scout who never tries is just watching other people have one.