When Parents Become Gods! Unmything some myths!

Remember the moral science lessons in school? Our Parents are like Gods to us and our teachers like our Parents! I wondered why complicate it, just be what you are! Parent - Parent, Teacher - Teacher... Simple! I must admit, they sounded a tad bit reassuring though! Imagine to have your God right in front of you, in broad daylight, talking to you, fussing over you, hugging you, worrying for you, lecturing you, scowling at you, threatening you, shouting at you and disciplining you... That was simple!

Now what are these Gods made up of? Certainly not of sterner stuff. They are primarily human and therefore full of faults and lagging and with developmental needs that run into hundreds of pages. A lot of them never attended to. No human, nobody, not one... can be God, even though no God is perfect! Yet every parent plays the role of God, and how?

It is a role that weighs us down to say the least. We worry and we worry ourselves down sick! The trick is for us to not be Gods and only then we can be Gods! Oh don't worry I like conundrums, trivia, puzzles and even rebuses... Don't bother with this statement yet. Let me be more specific...

I have often heard parents say these, and at times at the earshot of their children too... You would have heard these too... I may be guilty of a few of these offences too... My child is slow in writing, my child is poor in spelling, my child does not like to study, my child does not read books, my child does not understand this, my child is not good at sports, my child will NOT do this and that and so and so... When we say this, we ensure that our children pick these up as a traits... Like Gods we introduce them to newer and firmer beliefs that become true, by and by... We give them those failures just as if God would have written it for them in black and white.

And have you heard this? My child falls sick because I used to, as a kid... I don't know for sure if it is true, and even if it is, genetics is not as perfect a science as constructing of a space ship. You can have identical space ships, but never identical people. This is God's design to ensure perpetuation of life. Because if the same flaw replicated over and over in families, no one would exist by today, over these millions of years of evolution. The thing to be sure of is that, more often than not, our children are a new and genetically improved version of us, centuries of evolution is evidence in its favour. Chances of our children having the same disease as us might be really thin. And even if I am wrong by several miles, what is the point in discussing and reinforcing the beliefs about intra-family diseases? There is nothing to be gained from it.

I would like to unmyth some myths!

Child slow in writing… I read somewhere that, psychological age for writing is EIGHT! Our children are invariably introduced to writing as early as four years of age. Mind and hand coordination develops much later. So the kind of writing we do, where thoughts just flow out of our fingers on paper, is impossible for them that early. The best they do is to copy symbols as best as they can. Question is do you know of any ten year old who does not know how to write? 

Poor in spelling (read English spelling)… let’s begin with 'diarrhoea' and 'rendezvous' (there can be a major debate on how to pronounce this word) and 'psychosis'. Some of these words even have two different spellings! The good old Oxford English and the simplified American English! ‘Neighbour’ circuitous as it is, is ‘neighbor’ too! ‘Rigour’ is ‘rigor’, oh and ‘diarrhoea’ is ‘diarrhea’! No matter what you did, some spellings will always challenge you. This is what I learnt some time ago. There is a science behind how English spellings are learnt by children, there are specific psychological levels defined in term of age groups. This is because of the complexity and multiplicity of logical construct in English spellings. Just google it to know more. You will be surprised. Now the question is, do you know a fourteen year old who does not know how to self-correct spellings? Or who does not know at least enough English spellings to wade past, through their entire lifetime of correspondences?

Poor in number skills...  Probably re-looking at the teaching style will completely solve that for our kids. No one is poor in numbers, we can count, we can calculate and we can pretty much manage our lives with limited number skills. There are a host of tools. We should be creative with this problem... Montessori materials can help some kinaesthetic learners, online worksheets, can help the auditory and visual learners. And there are even games and apps to improve the skill. But if all fails, there is no reason to be talking about it. God has a design for every individual, some designs may not have number skills in it at all. That should be okay. 

Poor in languages… How is that possible? Without language there is no learning... And then again, there are dedicated materials in Montessori, mobile apps and games and worksheets and umpteen amount of material on the internet. Keep looking, something may click for the particular kid... Don't ever tell the kid she is poor in language... No point... Nothing to be gained. 

You see the point is we as parents also act as secret service agents, we filter information for our kids and pass on only that which is needed, all the rest are secured in top secret locations, never to be shared with them. Imagine yourself to be MIB and you will get the picture loud and clear.

This one is my favourite, whenever I hear it... My child does not like Hindi or Kannada or any other vernacular and pretty much, less favoured languages… This is spoken with a dint of pride! She will never like that language if we said that! Not because she does not like it, but because there is pride in not liking the language.

My child Vomits because I vomited, falls sick because I fell sick etc etc... It may be true. But as secret service agents, we have to appreciate that top secret information are not to be leaked. It is an information that our children can easily do without. Because too much information will do nothing to help them build immunity. And how do we know it is not the food habit, the late sleeping habit etc etc causing some of these problems? We don't know for sure, our child's paediatrician will make really interesting faces and remarks if we shared these details with her... but it makes for a riveting conversation over a cup of tea with friends.

In fact in our capacity as Gods we are really restricted in what we must be saying to our children, if we have any hope of not being over frantic, over indulgent, over interfering manipulative Gods, that is. Don't tell them they are poor, bad, difficult, destructive, obsessive, cranky, confused etc etc... Instead tell them the opposite, whether true in that moment or not. Tell them they are loving, caring, well-adjusted persons, tell them they care for their books and toys. Tell them they are fun people to be with. If it is God's desire it will come true! Very soon, before we knew it, they will become that. Because the child believes whatever we say. Better to say what we wish for them to be...

Sounds too simplistic? It is really simple I agree. You are what you think. If you think you are the best runner and if you lose a race, you will make sure you won the next one. If you think you can't run, you will never make an effort to win any race. 

The world out there is very hostile, everyone is criticising and curtailing everyone else, at least we as parents can choose not to help the world in demotivating our own kids!

We do act like God in our children's lives. You are a good singer and viola, the child becomes good at singing, you are a good artiste, voila she is, you are good at maths, voila she is, you are a wonderful human being, and voila that is what she becomes. And if all this affirmation does not really have a ‘voila effect’, at-least we create a positive thinker, a happy person and more than anything we will build an effective relationship with our children. Positivity will only breed positivity! Try it, it works... let’s be the God we are!

Dear Readers, these are my experiences of being a mother. They are my beliefs and thoughts, the way I saw it when I was myself a kid and the way I see it now as a mother.