This is kind of a pet topic of mine, the "that's life son" speech. When someone sat you down and said, look kid, I know it looks harsh, but life is hard, sometimes you have to bite the bullet, sometimes you have to experience pain or inflict pain on those you love in order to survive or protect you and yours. Life involves pain and sometimes it's just gonna hurt. Learning that lesson, kid, is important. Learning to push through that is even more important.
As a tiny specific example, a kid I know has played sports with the same 6 other girls since 3rd grade but now about 7 years later she is no longer good enough and is being replaced on the team by a better player. Sad conversation, that's life kid.
