HOW YOUR CHILD TURNS OUT IS NOT JUST UP TO YOU

How will my child turn out?  Will they be successful in life?  Will my child be happy and well adjusted?  Will they be able to deal with the challenges ahead? Will they make good choices and be responsible adults?  What are some of the things you find yourself worried about?

In today’s world with only one or two kids, we as parents have lots of time on our hands to be overly involved and overly anxious about turning out our kids.  There is a great deal of pressure on us to make our masterpiece the best it can be.  I remember when my son was not even a year old and other mothers would ask me:  "Does he know his colors yet"? " Have you started working with him on his letters"?   "I just signed up my baby to 'Music with Mar' and  'Mommy and Me Yoga', you should really come"! "Did I tell you my baby signs when she wants to say something.  it's great I can understand what she wants now!"  I barely could keep up with going to school, trying to keep our home presentable, prepare home cooked meals and make sure our child was not falling behind or missing out and still read and get all my homework done.  

I was definitely one anxious mom who fell for every criticism, comparison, judgement and expectation.  I set the bar high for being a good mom.  I was creating my masterpiece and how good it turned out was going to be a reflection of how well I was doing my job.  Even more then a job, my worth as a human being was tied up to being a good mom.  Failure was not an option, mistakes were duly noted and not to be repeated.  If I made the same mistake more then once, which by the way happened quite often, I found all sorts of great ways of making myself feel like a complete looser, even telling myself that I have completely messed up my kid’s future and any chance at a happy, well adjusted life.  I was wearing a 20-ton millstone called guilt around my neck.   Luckily the story does not end with me jumping off a cliff.  There is hope for all the “good moms” out there.  

First one must realize that one does not turn out one’s kids!  They turn themselves out!  We all operate on our assumptions, which in turn create our overall schema, by which all new information is filtered through.  So even though we do influence our kids we do not make them who they are, they choose that all on their own.  You probably have seen that picture where you look at it one way and you see a young woman and the other way you see an old woman.  We each have what Adler called, our private logic and we often look at things from our own unique perspective.  Understanding your perspective and your child’s is important in being able to make sense of what you want to communicate.  If we can do anything that is of help, it is to build an accepting and connecting relationship with our selves, our co-parenting partner and our kids. What you might consider instead of trying to turn out your kids is to work together in building a functioning family unit.  One where we help each other out, where we have an interest in each others well being and where we enjoy each others company.  When we problem solve we need to hear each other out in order to understand the other person's "private logic" and furthermore realize that this is where we often find ourselves stuck.  Just like the picture of the two women, some can only see the young one or the old but not both.

Alfred Adler a forward thinker ahead of his time, came to understand the great importance in building a feeling of community.  Without it we cannot function.  Maybe he realized it when he saw society falling apart during the take over by Hitler and his cronies.  Maybe he realized it when he saw people stepping up and taking great risks to help one another.  Or when he studied and observed the outcasts of the circus world.  Lucky for us is that he did discover it.  It is in this arena where you will see your child thrive, your own happiness grow and your relationships flourish.  

The difficulty will be in giving up the need to control, win, be in charge or all knowing.  The challenging part is to letting go of “outdated” assumptions you’ve made and allow for mistakes.  Give up perfection and ask for help, take a back seat and embrace messes as learning opportunities.   Don't live by others expectations, high standards or by what the critics have to say, even when they all turn out to be you.  Stay the course, because you will come upon those (mostly very discouraged individuals) who will try to knock you down. 

Happy trails to you.....  

".......until we meet again.

Happy trails to you, keep smilin' until then.

Who cares about the clouds when we're together?

Just sing a song and bring the sunny weather.

Happy trails to you, 'till we meet again.

Some trails are happy ones,

Others are blue.

It's the way you ride the trail that counts,

Here's a happy one for you"

By Roy Rogers and Dale Evans