Athletic Permission Slip Girl'S Basketball 6th -8: Fill & Download for Free

With my son I was having a boy and expected trucks and cars and toy soldiers and hunting and fishing. Instead, I got a boy who enjoyed dolls music and dancing and playing dress up. I never thought of myself as a parent who would force thier child into a gender normal pidgeon hole. So when he wanted a baby doll for Christmas and was a well behaved child, he sure got one. I was appalled that I was a sexist mom, and decided to chamge that immediately!And it honestly didn't occur to me that he might not want a truck. But i rolled with it after beimg ashamed and embarrassed that I automatically assumed he’d want a truck. When he turned 6 recieved an invitation to basketball try outs. He was in tears and I asked if he wanted to play the sport with his friends. He certainly did not want to play basketball. He was crying because when his female friends recieved tryouts papers they were able to try out for the cheer squad. He wasn't invited.He decided that he would ask for a cheer tryouts paper, Instead and was refused by his gym coach who asked if he wanted to be a boy or a girl today. My son was upset and discouraged and in tears when I came to get him. When I learned what happened I was appalled. I also didnt expect that my son would be a victim of sexist bigotry at six years old. This was only 4 years ago!The school had an anti discrimination policy and anti bully policies and no tollerance for either. I called the school and asked why my son couldn't cheer. He was a boy and it was an all girls team. I countered about the young lady who took the junior varsity football team almost to state the year before as a kicker. Apparently she was old enouh to understand that this was not typically a ladies sport. I countered again about how cheer teams and gymnasts and even dancers have coed teams at all ages. Well now they don't have a boys cheer uniform. Finally I offfered to purchase one but that wouldnt be fair to the rest of the squad who were wearing used uniforms.No wonder the kid was frustrated. So was I. I circulated a petition amongst the other cheer moms asking if they would be uncomfortable with my son cheering with thier girls. I was everything from encouraged to confronted about whether i was concerned about my son being bullied. (Small mid western town and equally narrow minded people) by the time I finally got my stuff in order and had what I thought would be a good case for the principle of the school he said “well ma’am your son will have his permission slip”That very day my son had his slip. I signed it and included his wellness doctor report and money and measurements for his uniform to be ordered. (A tip on the measurements was recieved from a cheer mom who has a daughter much more petite than a normal athletic size)My son was in tears he next day because the cut off date for athletic entries and try outs was the day before and that school gave him his slip at the end of that day! I went from angry to absolutely feral. I was furious and got on my phone immediately. I asked the principal if he would like a full on lawsuit ot if I should just go to the school board and take his job in particular. Clearly I didnt expect the school to set my son up for defeat either. He was discriminated against and degraded and finally they thought paper would hush me up when he just wanted to try out.I didnt expect my son to feel and look so defeated. For days he was vey upset. Finally the school agreed to make the cheer squad coed. It took me almost 3 weeks to change that policy. And im sure alot of people weren't happy with me but I never expected my son to hug me and tell me “mom, its ok. You did your best and thats all that matters” (I said the same to him when things didnt work the way he hoped or when he didn't do as well as he thought he should. )The best things that happened in my life were things I didn't expect and my son and daughter are two of them.

There is one major downside.This is one of my cats:This is Bunny, who got her name because when she was a tiny kitten—and she was a VERY tiny kitten— she resembled a "dust bunny," one of those lumps of grey dust that you find under a heavy piece of furniture that you can't easily get under to dust. Bunny matured to a whopping 6.5 pounds as an adult.Because she was so small, she was always at or near the bottom of the "peck order" of my multi-cat household. This meant that she was always something of an elusive presence— slipping out of the way of the bigger cats, or perched somewhere high up out of the way, or just a quick flash of grey tail slipping around a corner or under the bed or disappearing down a hallway.That didn't mean she wasn't affectionate. Many mornings I was awakened by the soft "whuff, whuff" of her sniffing my face nose-to-nose as she crouched by my pillow. "Good morning, Bunster," and a hand reaching out to softly stroke her incredibly soft fur would be rewarded by a very warm purr and a soft "miaow," and she'd stay on the pillow until one of the other cats jumped up on the bed. Then she'd slip away. But she was always up for being petted as she sat on top of the cat condo or perched on a windowsill. Really a sweet, shy little girl.January of 2017, I noticed that she was losing weight. She was 13 years old, and my experience is that a lot of things can start to go wrong with cats at that age. So I took her into the vet.Nothing obvious presented, so my vet drew blood. The result revealed an elevated white blood cell count. My vet ticked off all of the possibilities, and suggested we try a round of antibiotics because the most obvious possibility was that Bunny had an infection of some kind.For all that she was a tiny thing, and her weight was about 6.2 pounds by this time, she was a tiny tiger when it came to medication."Mess with me at your own peril, human!"Twice a day we fought the battle. Sometimes it seemed more of the liquid amoxicillin ended up on me than in her. Bunny got pretty good at figuring out the signs that I was looking to give her medicine, and there was a lot of hide-and-seek and sneaking up on her to get the medicine into her. She'd hide if she could, fight if she must; but she bore no grudges. She still jumped on the bed early in the morning to say good morning. She'd let me caress her, she'd even give me a "kitty kiss" with her raspy little pink tongue, and purr. Always the purr.The antibiotic treatment ended in February; Bunny and I were both thankful. She seemed perky, her appetite was good, her eyes were bright, she was the lithe and graceful athlete she'd always been. She in no way acted like a sick cat, or a cat in discomfort.But the weight loss continued: slowly, inexorably. Back to the vet in late June.Another blood panel. The white cell count was double what it had been in January; Bunny's weight was just below 6 pounds now. The vet and I discussed the results, and in that conversation the "C" word figured prominently. CANCER.There were no palpable tumors, but the vet suggested an ultrasound. I agreed.The result was grim: there was a tumor "the size of a kumquat" associated with Bunny's small intestine and several smaller nodules. The vet told me that without a biopsy or tissue section from an excised tumor, they could not give a definitive diagnosis of cancer, but….How obvious does something unsaid need to be for it to be undeniable? When you love an animal, you don't want educated guesses, or highest probabilities, or all the evidence points that way. You want to KNOW. You want to fight.I asked the vet: What would you do if Bunny was your cat? Because at that point, even with the weight loss, Bunny was still behaving like a cat that was enjoying life: eating heartily, cleaning her fur, basking in the sun, sweetly greeting me in the morning with a purr that never changed. I didn't want Bunny to lose even a minute of whatever time we had left, not as long as she still got enjoyment out of life.Vet's answer was immediate: if Bunny was her cat, she'd operate to remove the largest tumor, which would eventually lead to a bowel obstruction. They could also observe the extent of the spread of the tumors throughout her abdomen.There was a risk; if the tumor had infiltrated her liver, she might not tolerate the anesthetic, although her blood panel showed good liver function at that point. There was also the chance that if the extent of the tumors was such that there was involvement with other organs, they might have to euthanize her on the operating table. This had happened with one of my other cats.But we would know what we were dealing with. We would know.I gave the go-ahead, and two days later we did the surgery. By this time, Bunny's weight was down to 5.5 pounds.This is Bunny just before the surgery:I waited by the phone while I knew the surgery was going on. Worst case would be the call asking for permission to euthanize.That call didn't come; instead came the call that Bunny had come through the surgery fine, they had removed the largest tumor and had documented the extent of the tumors throughout her abdomen. The pathology report would be in within the next day or so, and then we'd know exactly what we were dealing with.When can I come and get her?, I asked.Tomorrow, the vet said.We had to prepare a "hospital confinement" place for Bunny to stay until the stitches came out. Call it hospital confinement, it's a cage by another name. But we had to confine her to give her the best chance to recover, so we set up the cage.I spent a lot of time over the next days, sitting or lying beside the cage, my fingers poking through the bars, Bunny snuggled up close by, breathing into my hand, and purring quietly. She wasn't happy about the cage, we could tell that, but if I was there with her, she was quiet.The pathologist's report confirmed what we really already knew. Bunny had cancer, and it had spread; there was some infiltration of the liver, the abdominal walls had growths, but we'd cleared the biggest growth from her intestines. She ate ravenously when she came back from the vet, and aside from not liking to be caged, she was acting reasonably comfortable.Her weight, post-surgery, was just over 5 pounds.So what do we do now?, I asked the vet at the appointment where the surgical staples were removed.Steroids. Keep her eating. Enjoy the time you have left.How much time? I asked.She'll tell you, the vet said. You'll know.So we let Bunny out of the cage. Bunny was a hostage now to cancer, and every morning that she greeted me with a soft "whuff, whuff " and a purr at my pillow was a gift.She spent the summer basking in sunbeams, enjoying the special treats I fed her, spent time in my lap and in my arms, spent time doing cat things and showing no signs of the thing that was eating her insides up, except that she continued to lose weight.At the end of November, we saw a change. She had been getting visibly weaker. She had needed help to get up on her favorite perches, and we had to get a set of "kitty stairs" so she could get onto the bed to say good morning to me. But she had not evinced discomfort; her eyes were still bright, she still kept purring and though she spent more time just being quiet, it wasn't lassitude of sickness. More like she was resting, gathering what strength she had left.By the first week in December, I knew we weren't going to get another Christmas together. During the year, Bunny had passed her 14th birthday. Precious years, now the end was comingThis was 10 days before the end. I can see resignation in her eyes; not despair, but she no longer felt well and no longer expected to feel well. Quiet acceptance that this, now, was the new status quo.When you have been privileged to have such a tender, furry wraith as Bunny share her life in its entirety with you, there is one final, terminal obligation that that gift of a life brings. When you know the end is inevitable and that it will bring suffering, and there's nothing that you can do to make things better, you know what you have to do.I said my good-byes on the night of December 12, all night, with Bunny in my arms. She was quiet, her purr intermittent, sometimes she was there with me and sometimes she slipped away, to dream or to prepare, or just to pause to gather strength for one last journey, I don't know.In the morning we were at the vet's when they opened at 7:00 AM. The vet was expecting us.Right to the last, with my head close to her and my tears falling, she purred. And then, mercifully, she was gone.And that's the downside of "owning" a cat: that it ends.

When I was a kid I used to skip school, hide behind my house until my parents left, and then go off to play chess with John Nash.Not THE John Nash, the Nobel Prize winner who also had schizophrenia.But his son, who was a very strong player.We would go over to his house (where his father and mother also lived) and play all day and then I would go home before my parents got home from work.The son also had schizophrenia and I sort of could tell but we focused our days on playing chess all day. At the time, I didn't know who his father was.This was a family of brilliant people. His son was a strong chess master. The father was a Nobel Prize winner. Maybe that makes them mentally strong.Maybe not.John, the son, disappeared and we lost touch. I last saw him I think in 1988.Since then I've met a lot of incredibly brilliant people. Because of my podcast and businesses I've been involved in I've met some of the smartest people, some of the most successful people, some of the most brilliant people in the world.Maybe they are mentally strong. Maybe not.Often many of us are very good at constructing masks and it is never really known what is deep inside of us. What we keep hidden for fear of death if others were to find out.But I can tell you what is most in common with some of the people I have encountered and maybe then you can tell me if you think these are qualities of mentally strong people. I would like to know.All of these things...anyone can do. Anyone can learn to be mentally strong and change the world as a result.Wealth, health, success, strong relationships, and freedom seem to be byproducts of the traits listed below.Here's my trick:I list, for each item, 1-10 on where I rank and then I add them up. So somewhere between 0 and 100.Then every day I try to improve by 1.A) RELATIONSHIPSThe mentally strong people I know, the ones who have achieved the most in life, have ALL had incredibly strong relationships.Friends, spouses, partners, and so on. I've interviewed billionaires, well known movie directors, athletes, scientists, artists. All have believed in the saying "you are the average of the five people you spend your time with".If you build up strong relationships, it means they are supporting your ideas, adding to them, helping you execute them, and not constantly fighting you or dragging you down.B) HONESTYThis is not religious but math. The brain takes up 2% of the body's mass and burns up 25% of the body's calories each day. One in four calories you eat goes to fuel your brain.When you lie, one side of your brain has to deal with one set of lies. And the other side of the brain has to deal with the other set of lies. So to be at optimal mental strength you now need twice as many calories. This is impossible.So the best way to be mentally strong is to be honest so all of the fuel in your body can be used efficiently at propelling your brain from strength to strength instead of fighting off the attacks on your weaknesses.C) IT'S NOT ABOUT ME, IT'S ABOUT YOUWhenever a girl broke up with me, it never seemed to be about me. That's ok. That was a line to make me feel better.I guess I should be grateful for the many people who tried to make me feel better by blaming themselves.But true mentally strong people constantly are focused on others. They are solving problems for other people.They don't think, "How can I make money" since money is just pieces of paper fueled by a mythological story.They think, "What are problems in the world that I can solve?"They think, for instance, healthcare is a mess. And since we all know "prevention is the cure", how can I develop a product that helps with prevention and diagnostics.And, if you were a genius like Elizabeth Holmes, you would drop out of Stanford, make a company called Theranos, and do exactly that.That is just one example.Mentally strong people are always solving other people's problems. The problems of the individual get solved as a byproduct of solving the problems of the many.D) READINGI've interviewed over 150 people now for my podcast. Here is one question nobody ever hesitates on: What are the last books you've read?Do you know why mentally strong people read? I have my guess.We all have one life to live. But when you read, you get to absorb the curated life of another person in just a few days.So if you read a lot, your one brain can hold onto the critical points of potentially thousands of other incredible people. You can bathe in their lives and come out a stronger you.I asked Freeway Rick Ross, the largest drug dealer ever, what books he read in prison that turned around his life.He couldn't read or write before prison. But then he taught himself. He told me instantly: "As A Man Thinketh", "The Richest Man in Babylon", and "Think and Grow Rich".I asked Tim Ferriss, author of The Four Hour Work Week. He said, "Radical Acceptance", "Essentialism", and "The Effective Executive".All 150 people I have interviewed gave answers instantly. I have no doubt if I ask them again next week they will all have different answers. I have never met a mentally strong person who wasn't a voracious reader.E) HEALTHBecause the brain burns so many calories, you have to have health in other areas of your life.It's hard to be mentally strong, to be creative, to execute, to change the world, if you are sick in bed.This is not being judgmental towards those sick in bed. Sometimes we just get sick. We can't help it.But almost everyone I've ever dealt with in business or in life who has gone on to greater and great successes all acknowledged the importance of constant healthy transformation of their bodies.This doesn't mean lift 500 pounds. It means sleep eight hours a day. It means eat well (which simply means: less on processed foods, more on vegetables, and exchange your 15 inch plates for 10 inch plates), and move.Movement doesn't mean running a marathon. It might just mean walking a lot.Our paleo ancestors got their exercise from walking and climbing on their daily hunt for food. This kept them healthy enough to be our ancestors so I thank them every day for that by following their model.F) CURIOSITYIf you are talking to someone and they say something interesting but you don't understand, do you interrupt them and ask them what they mean?I often don't. And then what happens? Then, for the rest of my life, I will never understand what they mean.Sometimes I'm afraid to ask questions because I don't want to seem stupid or I don't want someone to be annoyed at me or I'm feeling shy.The only way to learn new things is to ask questions and be curious. Find the people who inspire your curiosity because those are the ones you will most learn from.Then ask them questions.The more stupid you feel asking a question, the more you HAVE to ask the question. If you feel shy asking one question, then ask TWO questions.Every mentally strong person has this one thing in common: the things they most remember that has changed their lives have been the answers to questions they asked.If they never asked those questions, their lives would not have changed.G) LEARN, SAY, REPEATWe think we learn in school. We take a class and a brilliant professor gives a lecture and we supposedly leave the class smarter.But here is the science. Within 45 minutes of leaving a class, college students have already forgotten 80% of what was said in the class. By the next day, they have forgotten just about 100%.Here's how to remember: First you hear something. If it interests you, write it down as a note (carry a notebook. I carry a waiter's pad because they are cheap).Then use it in a conversation within an hour. Then use it in a conversation the next day and then the next.NOW there is a decent chance you have learned it. Because you build various connections in your brain that have now been programmed with that nugget of information. That's how learning takes place. Mentally strong people learn how to learn.H) THE IDEA MUSCLEPeople say "ideas are a dime a dozen". This is simply not true. Ideas are "a dime for three".Go ahead and try. Come up with 10 ideas for surprises for your spouse's next anniversary. The first three are easy. But, for me, then it gets harder and by #7 I'm counting the list over and over again to see if I reached 10.Ideas are a muscle that need to be exercised.If you get hit by a bike and are stuck in bed for two weeks recovering, then when you leave the bed your leg muscles are so atrophied you need therapy to walk again.The same with the idea muscle. It needs to be exercised every day or it will atrophy.How do you exercise it? Pick a theme, any theme will do, and write down ten ideas a day. Every day.I can tell you that when I was broke and suicidal and scared I started doing this. My life has changed 100% every six months since then. It's been incredible. Like magic.I wrote this and shared this with others. Now I get emails from people every six months telling me how their lives have changed.When I was interviewing the rapper Coolio he told me he wrote lyrics down every day for 17 years before he had his first hit. A year after his first hit he had the best selling song on the entire planet.When he described that song to me he described which elements from which musicians who came before him that he meshed together to create his hit.This is called "idea sex". When you are an expert in one category and an expert in another then you are the greatest in the world at the intersection.Exercising the idea muscle, plus learning, plus idea sex, will make you be the best in the world at whatever you aim.What about execution? Execution ideas are just a subset of regular ideas. If you have an idea you want to execute on, then your idea list the next day should be, "What are the ten next steps I need to take?"Should you then take them? I don't know. Mentally strong people probably make those lists 100 times a year and only need to execute on one of them to change the world.Give yourself permission to have bad ideas. It's only through diligent mining of the universe inside of you that you find the gems that will light up the world.I) PERMISSIONMentally strong people give themselves permission.Why did the Google guys come up with the 8th search engine and think theirs was special? Why did Elizabeth Holmes think it was ok to drop out of the best school in the country to pursue a business dream?Why did Henry Ford, after failing twice at car companies, think it was a good idea to start a third car company. Why did the Wright Brothers think it was ok to make a plane with spare parts from their bicycle shop when the government was spending tens of millions?They all gave themselves permission to do something that has never been done before.They all gave themselves permission to have many bad ideas.They all gave themselves permission to risk their reputation and the forked tongues of the people who would fight them.They gave themselves permission to slip and fall and get up and dust themselves off and try again. And again. And again. And again.They gave themselves permission to love something so strong that every neuron on their brain would light up and conspire to make their dreams come true.If you don't give yourself permission to create a new world, chances are nobody else will.J) PRESENCEI regret so many things from my past. Maybe that one time I lost all of my money, I could've used it to help my father live a little bit longer than he did.Maybe I could've held onto my house. Maybe I could've been smarter about business.And all of the time I am anxious. Will I give a good speech. Will this business I invest in work out? I hope it does. I don't want to go broke again.But whenever you regret the past, or are anxious about the future, you are time traveling.Time traveling seems exciting but it isn't. You can time travel all your life and then suddenly you are dead without ever having lived in the present moment, the only moment that exists.Whenever mentally strong people find themselves time traveling they take a step back. They said, "What can I do right now to help others" instead of wasting time regretting the past or worrying about the future.Worry and regret never solves tomorrow's problems and only drains away energy from today.Presence will always solve this moment's problems.Mentally strong people solve problems, love people, are curious, stay healthy, have idea sex, are honest with you, and make the world a better place.I hope each day I can improve a little on each level. And if I run into you on the street, maybe we can wink at each other. We're on the same team.