18 Years To Forever
A Message To Parents New and Old
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| 18 Years To Forever |
Little hands with little fingers. Little feet with little toes. Little hearts with lots of love. Little minds with boundless capability. Little eyes and ears to watch and listen and absorb everything around them. These are our children, with whom we have 18 years and 9 months to determine our future.
It's National Bullying Prevention Month here in America, so there's a lot of focus on children and their behavior. As a resident of one of the most violent cities nationwide, hosting everything from school shootings, mall shootings, and good ole fashioned drive-by murders, it's an issue that is splashed across my newspapers and television screens daily. Many of my friends, neighbors, and business associates have lost loved ones to senseless gun violence, usually at the hands of young people.
As with many problems here in America, we tend to focus on the effects and how to correct them, and not the cause and how to prevent them. We teach people how to deal with their diabetes, not how to prevent it. We sell drugs and diet plans to fight our battles of the bulge, but offer very limited information on how to avoid gaining the weight in the first place. We focus on bullying and how to stand up to them, how to report them, or how to stop them when we encounter them,but never touch the root cause- Parenting or the lack thereof.
Children are blank canvases on which parents paint either dreams or nightmares. That picture will be the sum of observed behavior, attitude, speech, and ideologies which parents present for their children. There is no such thing as a naturally bad child, they are created. Just so, there are no bad parents, they are developed over time.
A child is not born with a natural inclination to harm, deceive, or destroy, either physically or psychologically. These are learned behaviors. A lot parents may say at this point that, " I never taught my child anything wrong or mean." Understand the power of observation.
Did you teach your child to talk or did they observe you? Did you teach them your accent as well? Did you teach to walk or did they observe you walking and strive to emulate? Did you teach them how to laugh or have they observed you?
Did you teach them to bully or have they watched you?
As a parent, through the power of observation, you are imprinting upon your children not only speech and physical movement, but values, conduct, conversational tendencies, tolerance, patience, self esteem, societal roles, and the beginnings of gender identity. This is all done through mere observation.
But of course this is only part of the final picture; a rough sketch, to follow the metaphor.
Although much can be and is taught through observation, all navigation towards adulthood cannot be conveyed this way. This is where the second part of parenting, parenting through direct instruction, comes in.
Because we all in this Great American Experiment live in various different social context and contact, there is no master plan for how to correctly raise a child today. But there certain things that do correlate no matter where or how you live. Assertiveness, , critical thinking, empathy, personal responsibility, aversion of over aggression, compassion, selflessness, wisdom, and the ability to accept and give love, to name a few, are direct lessons which must come from parents.
I once worked for a popular lawn treatment service. I would walk door to door, trying to convince potential customers to come and look at their lawns with me. Many times I would run into customers with very thin or bare lawns. My advice was always the same for these homeowners-
" If grass doesn't grow here, something will. "
It was true. All weeds need to grow is soil, sunlight, and opportunity. The only and best defensive against unwanted weeds in a lawn is a very thick lawn , with very little, or no bare spots. A little hard work and continued care when the lawn was young could have saved months or even years of expensive rehab to the matured lawn.
Children are the same.
It is imperative that you put into your child what you want out of your child. Also, in the absence of your "filling in the spots", something or someone will, and usually it is something that is undesirable. Do you want to spend all your time "uprooting" undesired traits from your child, or enjoying the fruits of you labor of love?
Unfortunately, many parents today are like those customers I could not sell to, complacent and contented with bare lawns, opening themselves up to problems that they cannot possibly contain or correct in the coming future, increasingly letting "weeds" grow up within the personalities and behaviors of their children. Worse still, many parents are placing these "weeds" personally within their children.
Understand that observation works both ways. The same is true of instruction. Children will learn, positively or negatively from your actions and behaviors. Also, allowing different media sources to teach your children will "plant" instruction positively or negatively in your child if you are not.
Have they seen you blow up in stressful situations? Is this teaching them patience, tolerance, critical thinking, sympathy or empathy?
Are they witnessing your abuse at work, in the home, or in your community? How is this affecting their self esteem, assertiveness, or societal role outlook?
Have they ever seen you reading or learning in any aspect? Do you think this affects their values when it comes to education?
How often do you hug, kiss, smile at, laugh with or otherwise love your child? Will this have an affect on their ability to do the same with those in their lives?
What are you eating? What are you watching? What are you listening to? What video games are you playing? Are any of these things giving your children the things they need to become the adults you want them to be?
Understand that your permanent responsibility as a parent outweighs your temporary need for entertainment.
Little hands with little fingers. Little feet with little toes. Little hearts with lots of love. Little minds with boundless capability. Little eyes and ears to watch and listen and absorb everything around them. These are our children, with whom we have 18 years and 9 months to determine our future.
As with many problems here in America, we tend to focus on the effects and how to correct them, and not the cause and how to prevent them. We teach people how to deal with their diabetes, not how to prevent it. We sell drugs and diet plans to fight our battles of the bulge, but offer very limited information on how to avoid gaining the weight in the first place. We focus on bullying and how to stand up to them, how to report them, or how to stop them when we encounter them,but never touch the root cause- Parenting or the lack thereof.
 |
| Will you paint a masterpiece? |
Children are blank canvases on which parents paint either dreams or nightmares. That picture will be the sum of observed behavior, attitude, speech, and ideologies which parents present for their children. There is no such thing as a naturally bad child, they are created. Just so, there are no bad parents, they are developed over time.
A child is not born with a natural inclination to harm, deceive, or destroy, either physically or psychologically. These are learned behaviors. A lot parents may say at this point that, " I never taught my child anything wrong or mean." Understand the power of observation.
Did you teach your child to talk or did they observe you? Did you teach them your accent as well? Did you teach to walk or did they observe you walking and strive to emulate? Did you teach them how to laugh or have they observed you?
Did you teach them to bully or have they watched you?
As a parent, through the power of observation, you are imprinting upon your children not only speech and physical movement, but values, conduct, conversational tendencies, tolerance, patience, self esteem, societal roles, and the beginnings of gender identity. This is all done through mere observation.
But of course this is only part of the final picture; a rough sketch, to follow the metaphor.
Although much can be and is taught through observation, all navigation towards adulthood cannot be conveyed this way. This is where the second part of parenting, parenting through direct instruction, comes in.
 |
| Observation at Work-Part One of Parenting |
I once worked for a popular lawn treatment service. I would walk door to door, trying to convince potential customers to come and look at their lawns with me. Many times I would run into customers with very thin or bare lawns. My advice was always the same for these homeowners-
" If grass doesn't grow here, something will. "
It was true. All weeds need to grow is soil, sunlight, and opportunity. The only and best defensive against unwanted weeds in a lawn is a very thick lawn , with very little, or no bare spots. A little hard work and continued care when the lawn was young could have saved months or even years of expensive rehab to the matured lawn.
Children are the same.
 |
| A little care goes a long way. |
Unfortunately, many parents today are like those customers I could not sell to, complacent and contented with bare lawns, opening themselves up to problems that they cannot possibly contain or correct in the coming future, increasingly letting "weeds" grow up within the personalities and behaviors of their children. Worse still, many parents are placing these "weeds" personally within their children.
Understand that observation works both ways. The same is true of instruction. Children will learn, positively or negatively from your actions and behaviors. Also, allowing different media sources to teach your children will "plant" instruction positively or negatively in your child if you are not.
What are your children observing and how are you instructing them?
What are you allowing them to observe and who is instructing them directly?
 |
| Observance and Instruction Work Both Ways |
Are they witnessing your abuse at work, in the home, or in your community? How is this affecting their self esteem, assertiveness, or societal role outlook?
Have they ever seen you reading or learning in any aspect? Do you think this affects their values when it comes to education?
How often do you hug, kiss, smile at, laugh with or otherwise love your child? Will this have an affect on their ability to do the same with those in their lives?
What are you eating? What are you watching? What are you listening to? What video games are you playing? Are any of these things giving your children the things they need to become the adults you want them to be?
Understand that your permanent responsibility as a parent outweighs your temporary need for entertainment.
What will your future be?
Da Beast 10/9/12
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