Being students of our children
This is Part One in a series in which I'm taking off the Consultant’s hat off for a bit in order to let the Parent’s hat show through. Being a dad of four, it is ground I’ve covered for several years, though with no shortage of shortcomings and mistakes. As a school leader, I’ve been around even more of what comes with helping kids grow up. Here at Christmas, I’ve brought my own experience in more than usual, and that experience includes spiritual dimensions which are an important part of my own reality. I hope these posts may be of some interest, and perhaps a slight bit of help. {Part Two} {Part Three} {Part Four} {Part Five}
Let’s start with a reality check: Parenting is hard. God’s grace and guidance are essentials for doing it well. If you don’t start with that realization, a failing performance is likely just around the corner. Parenting takes us beyond ourselves on a daily basis – beyond our abilities, our insights, our patience, our energy, our selfish interests – you name it.
But if you are honest with yourself that it’s hard, and humble that you need help daily in the challenge, then it’s very encouraging to remember that it’s not a graded performance, but a grace-gifted opportunity. But no self-delusion here -- the reality is that it’s still hard.
We, as fellow parents, can be there for each other to give ‘tips’ and encouragement along the way. This is in no way intended to be a comprehensive view of parenting. Instead, it’s just a few lessons from sources of wisdom and experience which might be of a little help. And, by the way, they are things that tend to come up fairly often in a school setting.
Be students of your children. We commit to know our kids. Knowing them is a great remedy for trying to rewind our own lives and live through our children. Knowing them is a great occasion for seeing how “fearfully and wonderfully made” our gifts from God really are.
Know them not vaguely or generally or only compared to my own experience or in ways that they’re like me or unlike me or as graded by external performance challenges. Seek to know the hearts that are uniquely their own. Is my child shy or competitive or a lot like me or an A/B student? Those can be part of knowing my son or daughter, but there’s so much more.
What can I learn from Gary Chapman’s Love Languages? How does my child ‘hear’ love? Is it best communicated to my child by quality time spent together or by physical touch or by words of affirmation or by acts of service or by gifts that show my thought about them and knowledge of them?
How anxious or how peaceful is their heart of hearts? Do they see tests and traps all around them, or do they more naturally float their way through the day? To the one I speak more of the Lord’s peace and welcoming love while to the other I might offer more encouragements to see God’s purpose and call. The message is not just “relax” or “get a move on;” the message is to see God in absolutely every one of life’s challenges and opportunities.
As they’re a little older, I may come to see that my child views the world through a particular lens. He might compare life and the world to how they “ought” to be, judging by this grid of expectation. He might see each day as an occasion to perform, well or poorly. He might view most everything through the lens of relationships, always seeking to connect and be together. He might be wired to get stuff done by motivating others. He might like to see things happen and live to make a difference, sometimes for good and sometimes not. He might live much of his life in his own thoughts, delving deeply but sometimes connecting only occasionally.
There are tests and profiles to guide some of this, but the key is not getting the psychology just right. The point is to ‘get’ the person who my child is. And to ‘get’ them, I need to be listening to them and caring about them each and every day. That’s not really a bad start at all for the sort of relationships we all hope to have in our lives -- with our parents, our children and with others.