If you’re like me, you’re probably pretty much glued to your TV set this past week, watching the Winter Olympics.  I’m especially lucky, as they’re happening right here in Vancouver.

I was thinking about the sacrifices these athletes–and their parents–make to get where they are now, when I came across a great quote I wanted to share with you.

James Southam, who is competing on the U.S. Olympic cross country ski team, told his home-town newspaper about the experience of moving back home to live with his parents when he began pursuing his Olympic dream:

“Fortunately my parents saw this [training] as a job,” he said of dad Dean, a teacher, and mom Mary Anne, who ran a doctor’s office. “It wasn’t always fun for them having their 21-year-old son living at home, but we made it work.”

It’s a great reminder on the importance of staying focused on the reason your adult child has returned home, and helping them reach that goal.

It doesn’t have to be as ambitious a goal as becoming an Olympic athlete, but for everyone’s sanity there needs to be a stated goal, preferably with a target date.

If you and your adult child can view that goal as a job–whether it’s so they can save for a down payment, work to land a new job, go back to school, or get their life in order–it can help everyone get over some of the inevitable hurdles.