Parenting has a lot of expectations, some we are not fully aware of. In the world the media puts towards all, we mostly focus on the idea that parenting relies solely on providing money. Over the past few years, the media has also come to the realization that parents should also provide emotional support. This idea is true, however, the way the media goes about expectations of what emotional support is through the perspective of an immature child. People singularly expect to be praised for all actions they take. When someone is praised for being a decent individual that interacts with others, they believe that there is nothing more to be improved upon and begin to act like children. Surprisingly, acting like a spoiled toddler is not the end goal in life.
There are benefits from both parties when a parent is able to provide effective emotional support. It encourages the children to take on different perspectives in life and gain the skill of empathy. The safety needs of the child's emotions are met as the individual starts to feel more at peace with the world. When children realize they had a good childhood due to their parents' encouragement of emotional support, they become more enthusiastic about having a family of their own. The children are able to learn proper boundaries and roles given to them as well as having both parents' talents combined into one person. When the parents work together to provide for the children physically and emotionally, they are able to learn from hardship as well as having the responsibility to raise a child. When the couple works together for the same goal of raising their child, the couple becomes more united in thought and in work. Through the efforts of raising a child of their own, the adults are able to be less selfish and support their family.
We must remember that the main purpose of raising a child is to protect, prepare, survive, and thrive in the world they live in and the future that they will experience. Parents are usually worried about the present and what is best for their child in the moment, and usually forget to try to teach children that there is a consequence for every action or choice made. When we fail to give guidance to children, we will fail as parents. Most people now like to focus on giving our child independence and do not want to be controlling. In the end, that parenting style ends up hurting the child since they are looking for an authority figure rather than a friend figure. Children don’t want friends as parents. When you have children learn from their actions, they learn that the world we live in does not care about them individually.
In my behavioral interventions class, we learned that the reason that people act out can be reduced to four functions: Sensory, Escape, Attention, and Tangibles. The reason a child might scream all the time at their home, is because their parents will give them attention. However, the attention they receive is not necessarily what they truly want. In my family relations class, my professor stated that, “You can’t get enough of what you don’t need, because what you don’t need will never satisfy you.” When you offer the function that the child is looking for freely and when appropriate, they will change their behavior to be more socially acceptable. A child’s needs can be listed as the following: Contact/belonging, power, protection, withdrawal, and challenge. We often try to make these needs met in artificial ways through either social media or video games, but once we teach it to them physically, their actions will change.
We must be able to offer children's needs freely, teach them to contribute, give them the learning process of choices & consequences, assertiveness & forgiveness, breaks, and healthy skill building. When we teach children these skills, we teach them how to thrive in the present and in the future. If we always try to take away the pain immediately, we will never learn from our actions.
The youth are the future of the world. When we find value in a loving family, we can find peace in our own homes.
Until next week!
-Grace Coria
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