“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” (Frederick Douglass)
It’s 8 a.m., and a busy mother is preparing her toddler to go to daycare. She puts out three pairs of socks and asks the child to pick the pair she wants to wear. Although this step drains three minutes of the “out-of-door time, the mother believes it is a valuable exercise. Why? This mother is introducing decision-making into her daughter’s life whenever she can. This strategy carries a vital message to the child: “You are important and capable of making essential decisions in your life.” It is a message of empowerment because the child learns to believe that she is valued, and she has the power in life to make important and not so important decisions. Who would have ever guessed that sock choice could be so pivotal in a child’s life! This short article explores the concept of child empowerment as a crucial parenting skill that helps to build strong children ready to become decisive adults.
Child Empowerment: The Role of Parents
Asking children to make decisions is the starting point for child empowerment; it is not the ending point. Children also must be helped to “live” with their choices, good or bad. If we encourage our children to make decisions, we must allow our children to accept, learn from, and respond to the consequences of these decisions. This means parents must often sit on the sidelines, encourage their children, and helpfully console them when things do not go well. Let me provide an example of this experience:
One of our sons volunteered to join his elementary school safety patrol. We were proud of him and, more important, he was proud of himself for being selected for this responsibility. We soon learned that the major challenge of this decision was getting himself ready for school one hour earlier each day to begin his walk to school. We tried to help him develop a preparation strategy to no avail, and we had to drive him to school when he was late. We announced that the late-to-duty rides would cease, and the next day he was late to patrol. It hurt us a great deal to watch him leave the door in tears, but we wanted him to face the consequences of his decisions. He was suspended from patrol for a week. My wife and I spent a considerable amount of time the next week encouraging our son to try again, develop an evening preparation plan, and give it his best shot. The safety patrol experience ended well, and our son learned a valuable lesson.
It was undeniably challenging for my wife and me to send our son to school in tears because we knew he would be in trouble with his teacher. It was a time in our son’s life when allowing him to face the outcome of his decisions was more critical than saving him from the effects of choosing not to prepare for school the night before. This experience was not easy for us, but whoever said parenting would be easy? He was mad at us, but he did allow my wife to help him re-organize and grow from this experience. In retrospect, I think the grief my wife and I felt during this experience matched the grief our son felt.
A few weeks later, I was able to positively reframe the event in my mind by using a metaphor experience during my daily walk in Idlewild Park along the Truckee River:
I noticed a grove of cottonwood trees growing near the river walk path. Interestingly, each young tree had a 5ft.stake driven into the ground next to it with a wire connected to the tree. The tree could waiver in the wind, bend to the ground and rise to the sun, but it always would have the support of the solemn stake that stood firmly next to the tree. One day the trees will outgrow their stakes, but, for now, those stakes were very vital to the young trees. I thought to myself, “Parents can be the stakes that support children as they independently learn to make right decisions and to recover from bad decisions.” I began to understand my role as a parent better.
Call for Action
Children who have choices in life are emboldened to become decision-makers as adults. We must allow these children to “waiver in the wind” as they deal with the good and bad consequences of their decisions. The important thing is that these children are empowered to take control of their lives, and they have learned that they can survive poor decisions and re-load to make successful decisions.
Give your children the chance to make decisions and stand behind them with support when they need it. This simple message highlights the vital theme of empowerment presented in this article.
Comments