Being a parent I am a part of lot of official and unofficial parents' groups, I interact with a lot of other parents and with each interaction and with each parent, I see the race
increasing, the need to prove that their child is better than your child. I am not
generalizing here I have seen this enough number of times to call this a
phenomenon amongst parents.
Children are brought forward and their each and every..even
trivial accomplishments spoken about in high pitched voices in almost all
parents’ gathering I attend these days. What happens when this happens?
Or you can ask what is wrong if this happens? If the child has
accomplished something then why not blow your own trumpet in front of the
world? I say...There is nothing wrong in doing this sometimes. I also do it and I ask every parent to please go ahead and praise your kids for their achievements which are important. But if you do it for every small thing, please pause and ask few pertinent questions.
What are you celebrating..your child's accomplishments or your
child's accomplishments as compared to other children?
If the answer to above question is that..you are not comparing
your child with anyone else but you like to talk about everything he/she excels
in, think again.
A simple poem written for the first time or the first sentence
framed on their own will also be achievements. But what if they do it after
most of their friends have done it? What if he/she is the last person in the
class to grasp a new concept? Will you still celebrate these achievements?? If
yes..please go ahead and do it for things which you think are important. Not every line drawn, not every word spoken is a milestone to be shared with the world, right?
If you celebrate each and every small thing your child
achieves, don't you think this will put a lot of pressure on your child? He/She
would be under immense pressure to perform and to excel/succeed in everything.
It creates a ripple effect. The more you will talk about their small/little
accomplishments, the more you will expect them to succeed in everything. The
more you will expect from them, the more pressure will be there on them.
Once you start shouting out loud and displaying them as
trophies..it increases pressure on them and on you because now they are
expected to perform everytime. They are expected to not fail every time.
Parents become a part of this trap, it becomes a cycle which is difficult to
break and kids become a mere prey in the game, a mere trophy to showcase.
If we continue doing this every time for every little success what
will happen when they don’t succeed?
How will we feel when every other parent is talking about how well
their child is doing in maths in their class and we know our child is lagging
behind. If you are a parent who is use to of displaying your child like a
trophy, you will put unnecessary pressure on your child to perform. The motive
will not be to make him learn and understand the concept, the motive will be to
make him win, make him come first in this ongoing race. And if you are a child
of such parent what will be your frame of mind. You would be terrified of
failures, you would be petrified to face your parents for every missed question
and every wrong answer.
Yes we should be proud of their accomplishments, yes we should
motivate them, encourage them but do we need to do it for everything and do it every time we see other
parents? Are we trying to prove that our children are better than other
children everytime? What is the need? Really?? Why?? Why do we care?
Shouldn’t we also tell them that it is okay to fail and fall
sometimes? Infact they should fail so that they learn how to stand up and
succeed through failure.
As a parent I am also tempted so many times. I know my child is
doing well and there are times I do talk about the things he is doing well but
I don’t want him to think he is better than other children in everything.
Because he is not. So I don’t do it every time. I do it for things that I know
are important for him, things that are really big to be spoken of atleast once.
When he does lags behind I do feel a little off, get a little
upset but I move on and focus on him learning the concept, even if he is
doing it last in the class. Why am I okay with it? Because I have not created
unrealistic expectations around my children.. I do talk about their accomplishments
but I prioritize. I define. I keep it under certain boundaries. I also accept
it is not easy, we love our kids and it is so nice to talk about their
accomplishments, to praise them, to see others praise them but what came as an
eye opener for me, was a look at such kids who were under a lot of pressure,
who were trying to outdo other kids, who were competing not only with other
kids but also with themselves, trying to outdo one achievement after the other.
A look at their face every time they do not succeed, every time they fail will
break your heart.
I will try my best to keep my children away from the rat race.
I don't know how long I will be successful in it but I will try. They are not
trophies, medals to display...they are my children, my champs and like me they
excel in few things and they are not good in others. I am completely okay with
it.
It is their life, their accomplishments, we are a part of it. Their life is not about me but about them.
They have to be prepared for failures, hurts and tears. And we
have to be there everytime when they fall. No we cannot fall when they fall, we
can’t rest when they rest. It is not about us when we are with them. It is
about them. We cannot make it about us, it will never be.
Children are not trophies or medals, they are not our property to
be displayed.
Image credit here
