The Ladle or the Soup

There once was a man who chose to volunteer at a soup kitchen. He arrived and was given a silver ladle. He was given his instructions and shortly thereafter people started coming in for some soup.

But this man spent all of his time thinking about the ladle ... that it was silver and not wood, no fancy etchings, it was too thin for his hand, it wasn't big enough ... and subsequently he never served any soup.

Finally another guy came over and asked him, "Dude, this is a soup kitchen. Why did you choose to volunteer if you aren't going to serve any soup?" 

...

Coaches, the purpose of coaching sports is to build young men and young women. Building virtuous men and women - that is the serving of the soup - the sport is merely the ladle, our "tool" to teach virtue.

We too can get so caught up with the X's and O's of our sport ... that we forget about virtue, willpower, character ...

Don't spend all your time on the ladle - serve the soup!