Children learn through you. They replicate how you act. For example, it might be that when waiting at the school gates to pick our children up at the end of a long day, we hear one of their classmates swear, despite only being around six or seven years old. We know this feels odious because it means they, or someone they attend school with, has been around an adult who happily uses curse words or exposes them to media that has said language within it. While perhaps not the most directly harmful thing in the world, it shows a lack of parenting and care in applying standards for a child to follow.
As your children grow into teens and young adults, it’s important to keep your standards high. Perhaps you may be increasingly lax on the example previously used, but that doesn’t mean a complete lack of familial standards is acceptable. If anything, guiding your children through life demands a fair and appropriate level of conduct from yourself, so you can expect, teach and inspire them to be a better type of person.
This sounds very elitist, but it’s actually quite practical and humble in what sort of practices could be deemed acceptable, and how that might help your child in the end. Let us consider what that might be, and how you might apply yourself to this end:
Road Misconduct
There will come a time where your teens will start to learn how to drive. All they have to equip themselves in those lessons are the years of driving they have witnessed you interact with. They might not know it, but plenty of their driving intuition and responsiveness, and general behavior, will be influenced by you.
This means it is essential to both show a learning teen the ropes, and to also provide an excellent road example to them. Road rage, swearing in the car, keeping an unpleasant and untidy vehicle interior, or taking risks when they are not needed are all things that we can fall into, but that never promote road health. We would also recommend helping them find the best services and tutors for when they look for a vehicle. Showing them how to avoid dodgy second hand dealers, showcasing how to stay safe and how to find the best insurance companies, such as AssuranceAmerica can all have a massive impact on a young mind trying to learn how to drive.
Statistically, driving will be the most dangerous activity they will take part in day after day throughout their lifetime, so it’s crucial to give them the most sensible and responsible starting point. Ensure you do just that.
To Be Wise To Self-Pity
Self-pity is one of the most destructive emotions there is, because it can be never-ending, and will always find something to feed it. In fact, you might even have great reason to pity yourself, but doing so can only lead to a lower quality of life. If you teach this to your teens, they will start to grow a fortitude of mind that leads to action rather than feeling down.
This could be the vital difference between going to see a Doctor for depressive symptoms, or indulging in them and thus feeling much worse in yourself. It’s little elements of attitude like this that can define our character, and actually give us nobility even in the toughest of times. It can seem quite offensive to say this to people struggling, which is why reinforcing this lesson to your children as they grow might help them naturally accept it.
Be Kind To Yourself
Being vigilant against self-pity and being kind to yourself are not principles at odds. If you teach your children to give themselves more credit than they do, to trust that they will achieve something in the right timeframe or to feel positive and receptive to change, they will begin doing so, and find themselves much more healthy from an emotional perspective.
This has practical results, too. For example, let us revert to our first example. It might be that on a small country road, your child is being tailgated. They’re not going to go above the legal speed limit for obvious reasons, but the person behind seems to think they should. Some without the ability to keep their self esteem high might decide to speed in order to deal with the conflict behind. Someone who is kind to themselves will not doubt for a second their driving is incorrect in this situation, simply allowing the person behind to throw their tantrum.
These lessons all have incredible effects on how a personality develops, particularly the personality of a younger person. We hope this advice helps, both on a practical and emotional level.
