Lesson Learned.
June 8, 2007
Filed under:Out there
What kind of lessons are we teaching?
When we openly admit that you don’t really have to pay for your crimes if you don’t want to? When we let you go after we’ve passed sentence and shrug it off as if we’d at least “given it a shot”? When we let people write their own rules simply because they’re rich and/or famous?
I don’t know that I’ve ever been more embarrassed and upset by
Everybody can have their way if they just don’t want to do something badly enough. Pitch enough of a fit, chuck enough of a wobbly, and you can have what you want. It’s the biggest issue I have with “public parenting” that I bear witness to in the shops and at the schools. The people that somehow think it’s acceptable to give in if their child is simply making enough of a scene.
There is an ad on TV here, where the child begins throwing a tantrum and the mother simply beats him to it, throwing herself on the floor and flailing about with her arms and legs while screaming. The look that the kid gets is unforgettable and priceless. This behaviour is not only unacceptable, but doesn’t actually work. THAT should be our message.
There are times that it is incredibly difficult to keep the peace, I’m aware as I have been through them, but the second you waver, the second that you compromise with something that simply isn’t right, is when you have lost. And the pains to regain it again are astronomical compared to the pain of living with the resentment or possible hurt feelings that may be caused by you sticking to your guns.
My son wants an X-box. He’s a gamer. I’ve tried to gently bend and guide his attitudes, his wants and desires, in another direction, but I have realised that it’s inescapable. He LOVES video games. Oh well, I did too at that age. My inner grown-up though, has to have more say sometimes than my inner-child, and it is firmly and resolutely against having a “Game System” in this house. I believe that they are one of the major contributors in childhood obesity and spoiled rottenness. I see virtually NO benefit that they have in one’s life other than something to do to pass the time. I don’t believe that they stimulate the mind near as much as books or art, and I will do everything in my power to keep my children’s lives free of them.
That said, I find that I have overlooked that the child sees me and his mother parked in front of computers for the majority of our day. He sees fun things happen on them and associates them more with the fun that they provide rather than the work that they are necessary for. He sees that I have games on my laptop and is ever-asking if he can play them.
I don’t give up on my stance, but I know when something is serious enough to explore. When I don’t let him have video games it doesn’t stop him from seeing them at the store and asking for them for when he goes on his bi-weekly custody visitations. He knows that without a doubt they are not allowed in this house, so he brings home books from the library about… video games. No surprise that they are some of his favourite books.
I relent and let him play on my laptop while dinner is readying, reminding myself that I should be checking on the time and keeping him from being on here too long. I forget, of course, and when I finally come to check on him I find that he’s finished his game, shut down the computer, and is now playing a board game with his little sister.
My trust in him is justified, for I know who he is as a person and he is a good one. One of the best that I know, for certain. His sister can be a horrible turd, and gets a much smaller share of those kinds of considerations, as she has yet to earn any such measure of trust. Her boundaries are much firmer and intimately defined, because they need to be. The person that she is will win out but, if left to her own devices, the selfish shit will prevent the good person within from reaching her true potential.
I live with these children, these small people, and aside from my wife know them better than anyone alive. Their punishments and rewards, whenever either are necessary, are made with the considerations of what is right, what is fair, and what is going to make them the best people they can be. The lessons that are taught to them on a daily basis are carefully and painstakingly measured and analysed for fear of ever being a “bad” lesson, even with good intentions, because let’s face it, most of them end up being that way anyway.
So I’ll ask again… What kind of lessons are we teaching when the highest authority we have does this kind of thing? What kind of trust and respect (or lack thereof) are we earning?
As I sit here typing this, I can hear my oldest daughter (4) chatting happily to herself in the bathroom, a location where she is notorious for misbehaving, so I crack the office door and watch her covertly.
She sings and talks to the mirror, but refrains from touching it and smearing her messy little hands on it, as she’s been taught that it makes us unhappy to have a messy mirror and that I’ll make her clean it off (not that this is a distasteful activity, she just hates being made to do anything). She turns the tap on full blast and then corrects it down to the barest of streams, as she knows that wasting water will make us unhappy too. She carefully washes her hands as she’s been instructed to do so many times, simply because an action so simple can be trained into even a brain so defiant as hers.
She helps herself to a cup of water, as she has been told that she doesn’t need to ask us for one and is allowed to help herself so long as she doesn’t abuse the privilege, and then carefully places the cup back in it’s spot. She dries her hands on the towel without yanking it off the rack and heaping it carelessly on the floor. She then says something amusing to herself and trots happily out the door and down the hall.
This may not seem as important to others that do not know this child, but this behaviour absolutely struck me. She was being so good. Without me yelling at her to turn the tap off after I’ve heard it running for a solid 5 minutes. Without me reminding her not to touch everything in the freakin’ room when her hands are dirty/soapy.
She did everything that she was supposed to do. Without me saying a thing.
And I can’t help but think to myself, “Shee-it, it’s actually working.”
The lessons that I’ve instilled in her are actually having an effect. Granted, this is only a small sampling of our lives, and I don’t want you to think that I haven’t considered the alternatives. Would it be the End of the World if I had dirt/soap-smeared mirrors and towels on the floor? Will Mother Earth shrivel up if my child further adds to the water shortage issues? Will she grow up to be a perforated-veined gutterslut if I let her dump handsoap and deodorant into her drinking cup and splash it happily against the tiled wall?
Probably not. But isn’t this way much nicer? If bad actions get bad consequences and unhappiness, and good actions get good consequences and happiness, as opposed to a mish-mash of the two, then isn’t that the preferred? Even if our actions bring about the ultimate in negative reinforcement… indifference and apathy, aren’t we still learning that way?
Lessons are important, one of the most important facets to being human, and I strive to teach my children to recognise that they are learning them every day, as am I. My wife and I strive to remind ourselves that we are teaching lessons every day and to be careful of their nature, be they good or bad.
We’re careful not to teach bad lessons. Shouldn’t we all be?
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