Friday, February 7, 2014

I Won't Compare My Kids If You Won't

“A child’s identity develops slowly as characteristics and temperament manifest themselves. Parents sometimes use their observations of these characteristics to label their child… God’s intention for your child’s future usefulness in the cause of Christ may be far beyond the seeming boundaries of his present temperament, gifts and interests. To restrict or misdirect your child’s future by categorizing him early in life can be a big mistake. Train your child to explore every potential of his or her personality, and appreciate the freedom to choose.” –Consequences of Labeling Children, BSF Home Training Lesson

We like to make sense of our world; we like to know how we’re doing. And for much of life, we are trained or encouraged to do that by comparing how we are doing relative to someone else. We dress according to trends; we are graded on a curve; even moralism is becoming relative. Parenting is something we are uniquely sensitive about—all of us care about whether we are being good parents—yet it’s hard to assess in any standardized way. So it’s no wonder that it’s particularly easy to compare ourselves as parents. To compare our kids to other kids. To compare siblings with each other.

It’s good to parent in context, in community, and that means drawing on observations of other parents and children to help us better understand and parent our own—but when observations become generalizations, or judgments, or envy, we head quickly down a slippery slope, whether we intend to or not.

One example of this that I’ve been mulling on lately is how easy it can be to label our children. I do think Ellie’s temperament is more like certain people in Dave’s family, and Eric’s is more like certain people in mine. This helps us understand that they may act out in different ways, may understand love and be motivated to change in different ways. If I’m frustrated by something I don’t understand about Ellie, often Dave can offer good insight, and vice versa about Eric. But it’s dangerous if we generalize too much about their emerging personalities and temperaments, if we compare them too much with other people or each other.

Our words as parents have creative power: what we speak over our children becomes how they perceive themselves, how they are. If we say, “she is so much like his mother,” I may be imputing all kinds of good and bad things about his mother, not to mention any personal history I may have about his mother, onto her. She may be like her in certain ways, but not like her in others. She may change. The ways she is like her may manifest differently, may be redeemed. I am robbing her of all of that potential by making generalizations and assumptions. I may be shutting off work that God can do in her life. I may be enabling generational curses without meaning to.

Our words also affect sibling dynamics. When I tell Eric he is cute, Ellie often asks, “am I cute too?” Why is this? Because our children hear what we don’t say as much as what we do. When we repeatedly praise one child more than another for a certain attribute (so artistic! so athletic! so smart! so pretty!), we need to remember that we are implying that their siblings are less artistic, or athletic, or smart. That is how they hear it, whether we mean it that way or not. All of us have probably had this happen to us in some form or another, and can probably attest that the self-perception it creates often carries into adulthood.

This is definitely something I can work on: being intentional about proffering similar praise to both kids. Not comparing my children with someone else’s in non-constructive ways, or regarding attributes they have no power to change. Not assuming that because I see a similarity between my child and someone else, they will turn out the same way or be similar in other ways. Constantly asking God to give me an open mind in discerning my child’s tendencies. Being careful in general how I choose my words, because what is spoken often does become what is true.

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