"Comfortable" Children Are Not Very Comfortable To Live

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

- Did you call? - Mom sits down opposite Maryivanna and looks attentively.

- Yes, sure! Are you Vanya's mom? I have a serious conversation with you!

- I'm listening to you attentively, - my mother smiles affably and looks at the teacher in a gray knitted sweater, clearly not new, but neat to the creak.

- You understand, I don't even know how to tell you this. Vanya sold jumpers to other children at school! The teachers saw and told me! I called Masha - she says she really bought a jumper! And other children too, - Maryivanna makes a theatrical pause and looks expectantly at her mother.

Mom, continuing to smile affably, slightly raises her right eyebrow:

- AND?

- In the sense - and? - Maryivanna was clearly expecting a different reaction to her words.

- So what? Selling jumpers. These are balls so bouncing, right? I understood. Why did you call me?

- Well, of course. That's why she called. At school, during recess …

- That is, not in class?

- uh … - the teacher is clearly confused by the question. - No. But what does it have to do with it. He! At school! Selling! Toys!

Mom raises her second eyebrow:

- Did he behave badly? Did the teachers complain about him? Did he get a deuce? Fought with someone? Stole something? In the end, he deceived his buyer and did not provide the purchased jumper?

Maryivanna freezes for a few seconds with her mouth open before continuing.

- No, but…

- That is, in his free time during recess, he showed his independence and implemented his small business plan, not to the detriment of his studies or behavior?

- Are you seriously?

- Quite. I am trying to find out the reason why I took time off from work today to come to you.

- But I told you! - Marivanna is clearly starting to get nervous.

- I apologize. Probably, I did not carefully read the rules of conduct at school. But I absolutely cannot remember that there was at least something about the ban on the sale of jumpers at recess.

- How can you not understand, - the teacher begins to boil. - You can't sell anything at school!

- Truth? Do you have free buns in your dining room?

- What do buns have to do with it?

- Well, you said that you can't sell anything at school. But for some reason I give the child a weekly money for buns.

- So. Are you serious? He sold toys to other students at school! This is a school, not a market! - Maryivanna begins to boil.

- Of course I'm sorry, but what exactly do you want from me? If your rules state that this cannot be done, just show these rules to Vanya. He is very sensitive to breaking the law.

- Do you want to somehow influence him?

- Influence? - Mom thinks for a couple of seconds. - Perhaps yes. He developed his own small business plan, identified the requests of potential buyers, found a purchase somewhere, calculated the possible profit. And all this without my help. Completely on your own. Yes, I think it's worth encouraging him. Do you think that going to the water park on the weekend is enough? Yes, and please, next time, let's resolve similar issues by phone. I have a job and time is money.

Before you is a typical collision of two realities - school and adult, modern and post-Soviet, obedient and independent, familiar and creative. For some reason, many parents want the impossible, so that their child under 18 was an exceptionally obedient, inert, quiet (and preferably dumb) excellent student, and then suddenly suddenly turned into a successful, self-confident and successful businessman. And they are very surprised - that the little girl "entered" the institute, and helped with housing, and got a job - but nothing changes. He pulls his son with office plankton from day to evening, drinks beer on Fridays and sits at the computer all weekend. He also asks for money from his parents. And he himself is already twenty-five years old … Why did we do that wrong? After all, everything is for him, darling.

And they rarely remember that when a son in the fifth grade wanted to go to karate, he was not allowed. (Traumatic.) In the seventh, they were not allowed to take a break. (Just do it blazh!) In the eighth sent by force to aircraft modeling. (What other literature? What kind of classes for a kid?) In the ninth they transferred to an English lyceum. (Just think, friends! He will start new ones!) (He will have such Katya still a carriage.) They were not allowed to enter journalism (where, where?). Sent to pay in the economic. (So what, what's wrong with mathematics! He'll learn!) They got a job with Uncle Kolya at a firm. (Where can he find a job now … such a time …)

Yes, they are still terribly surprised. There is a neighbor's son - as a child he was just a misfortune! I always walked with broken knees. At school, every year he changed the section, he could not sit anywhere. I went to study to be a political scientist. I dropped it a year later. Then he worked from about eighteen years old. At twenty, I just went to correspondence. And now we have our own company, a car, a beautiful wife, and soon there will be children. My wife and I are fond of bicycles, every weekend they go somewhere, a neighbor showed pictures. How so?

The situations are of course described exaggerated. But the general trend is this. If a child is not allowed to take the initiative at three years old and prohibit everything in a row at ten, then at twenty he will not suddenly become independent and self-confident. He will be very “comfortable” for parents, will not rip clothes, break knees and argue with teachers, defending his opinion. He will be obedient and exceptionally correct. Only parents should think about what kind of child they want to raise? Convenient in childhood or successful in life? When a child rushes from hobby to hobby, looking for himself, oh what a temptation - to shout and make him continue to go to the hated music school. Only then can you get a person at the exit who not only has no interest of his own, but also fiercely hates music in principle.

The child is the same person, just small. He must have a say and be held accountable for his decisions. Only in this way can he grow up to be a responsible adult, and not an infantile mama's son. If you make all the decisions for him, without consulting, you can make life easier for yourself now and also complicate it in the future. And both for myself and for the child.

And a separate topic is parental support. Not the one who "get a job at the institute through the nephew of my father's friend, because the direction is promising." And the one who "you decide, and my dad and I will support your choice."

Learn to listen and hear your children. Advise - not compel. Support - not hinder. Offer - not force. Explain - not prohibit. And you will be happy.