Breaking News: I’m not a parent! Okay, now that we got that out of the way, let’s move forward with the fact that I can still see and can comprehend things as a non-parent. Yeah that sounded kind of harsh, but not as harsh as those who constantly bring up the notion that people without kids can’t speak on parenting skills. That’s neither here nor there. I’m here to help your child, which will ultimately help you. I want to talk about projecting your fear on your child today.
Projecting your fears on your child could look like a number of things, but here are a few examples:
– You don’t let them swim or take lessons because you can’t swim.
– You make them feel leery about doing something because you don’t like it (i.e., flying or a certain sport).
– You’ve never been somewhere, but you have nothing but negative things to say about traveling there.
– You don’t want them to go off to college because you stayed close to home.
Just because they’re kids, doesn’t mean that they can’t have likes of their own. People say that they want their kids to have and do everything they didn’t. Well, how can they when you try to make them think and act exactly like you? It’s okay for your child to go study abroad to take in other cultures. It’s okay for your child to go beyond what you did and not make them feel scared because you stopped at a certain point. The sky should be the limit and the direction you encourage them to go.
I get you have the responsibility of protecting a whole human, and you should do that. I also get that we live in a mean world. But I don’t think that kids should be so scared to get out of their comfort zone that you created for them. Encourage your kids to do things that may scare them because it teaches them to be courageous and build faith. Don’t hold onto them so tight that they can’t explore and possibly find out what drives them or their niche in life. It’s the ones who aren’t afraid to JUMP who go on to do extraordinary things. Plus, they’re the ones who make the big money…ummm, early retirement parents! Support your fearless kids and don’t plant fear so they can soar higher than you one day.
Be Sweet 