How do we prepare for the arrival of an additional member of the family – a baby? A little human being that constantly requires all our attention during the first few years of its life. Children are tiny little beings that are open and completely vulnerable. We have to be very careful with their little brains, because they are still developing. But instead, we start filling their brains from the very beginning with all our ideas about how best to survive on this planet.
It is time for us to start using and acknowledging methods of upbringing and education that take into account both child development and the stages at which children are ready to accept different responsibilities. We must understand that we aren’t always the ones in charge and we don’t always know best: when bed time is, when it’s time for food, how much a child should eat and so on. Very young children are already capable of accepting certain responsibilities. Jesper Juul, who has worked as a family therapist for nearly 40 years, is an icon of self-restrictive upbringing and explains this concept in his books.
When we let a child be responsible for his or her actions from a very young age, we give the child a great foundation for accepting personal responsibility throughout his or her adult life too. This ability will impact his life, relationships, schooling, searching for employment and every personal interaction he or she will enter into. But of course, the most important thing we parents must be aware of is when the child is ready to make these decisions.
Just like young animals, young children know very early on what kind of food they enjoy and what they don’t like. How much they should eat to become full. How much sleep they need. All of these decisions are made completely intuitively, based on natural processes in the body. As parents, we should only be there to encourage our child. Sadly, society has forced us to abandon this and has made us follow fixed norms that rule us all. We subject our children to these norms too.
And so, we raise flocks of sheep, individuals who still need someone to tell them what to do and how to do it when they are 30 years old. But on the other hand, we expect them to be responsible and capable of self-initiative. How can we expect that of them? Where could they have learnt these skills? Though which processes? Since birth they have had to suppress themselves in favour of everyone else’s wishes – first their parents, then their kindergarten teachers and later their school teachers … How could they have ever developed their own will?
Children start learning very early on that it is important to comply with other people’s demands and wishes. When they do everything that is expected of them, they receive our love and attention. Because a child’s highest need is to feel loved by their parents, they will do everything to gain it. And slowly loose themselves in the process, by gradually adopting their parents’ habits and behaviour.
Is this really what you want for your children? Or would you like for them to grow up into independent, self-reliant individuals, who will follow their own path?
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