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Parents have an awesome responsibility. We are in charge of raising children from helpless babies into fully-functional adults. It's a long, tiring journey, for parents and children alike. Along the way, it's amazing what kind of trouble and mischief kids can cause.
Many parents feel like they spend much of their time correcting their children's mistakes. From innocent blunders to outright defiance, part of a parent's job is to help their kids recognize and correct their mistakes. The goal, of course, is that kids catch themselves before they do something they shouldn't, and correct their own behavior.
A parent invests a lot of time correcting their children's actions. That makes it easy to fall into a pattern where faultfinding is the main way a parent relates to their children. The results are negative for children and parents alike. Here are some of the things that typically occur when faultfinding plays too much of a role in parent/child interaction:
Children come to see their parents as overly critical. Kids desperately want and need their parents' approval. If the child feels that his or her parents are too critical, they will likely withdraw from their parents. They will seek approval from other sources, and perhaps do things they otherwise wouldn't.
Children feel less safe in the world. The one thing humans have in common is that we all mess up. Sometimes we do wrong intentionally, other times we just blunder into mistakes. Either way, parents either show their kids that they are lovable even when they mess up, or that they must hide their shortcomings in order to feel love.
Parents miss some great teaching moments. Many of us would agree that we have learned more from our mistakes than our failures. Children can learn a lot from their mistakes (even from their intentional bad behavior). But they are less likely to learn if they feel parents are judging them too harshly.
Parents enjoy their children less. It's nearly impossible to have fun with someone when you're waiting for them to mess up. When parents focus on faultfinding, they miss some of the unexpected joy and humor that occurs when children make mistakes. Worse, they lose the opportunity to love their kids completely, just as they are.
The solution? Find a balance between noting and correcting mistakes and looking for the great things kids do. Make a conscious decision that you will find something praiseworthy, even in your kids' biggest gaffes. It isn't easy. It will take practice, because we parents are also imperfect creatures. But it can transform the relationship between you and your child. Our next article will spell out specific ways parents can become "goodfinders" instead of faultfinders.
Labels: Parenting
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