Cliched as it may sound the past 1 year has been spent unraveling the book of life. Preparing to being a parent and being a parent has been the most intense experience ever, changing so many perceptions I had about myself and others. The last 6 months were spent on getting the physicality of it all in place, from being scared to pick up my child I am today at a place where I don't get overwhelmed by the biology running that little body. I thought the learning had happened, till yesterday some discussion on pre-schools with friends happened and people presumed the kind of school I would send my child to basis some random jokes I had made. But Freud does say there are no slip ups and nothing is random.
That set me thinking what kind of parent I wanted to be, to be fair I had thought about that earlier but they were just hypothetical thoughts without an idea what the subject would be like. Now all of them seemed null and void. I definitely did not want to be the parent whose 2 year old runs havoc at a friend's place because that is me disrespecting the friend. But I did not want to be the pushy, authoritarian disciplinarian who throttles creativity, curiosity and free thinking. 12 hours of intense thinking and I have a few guidelines and intentions:
1. Teach my son to be respectful not submissive or reverential but treating everyone with the respect that he expects.
2. Expose him to as many things that I can: Sports, culture, places, people, music, art, books, horse riding, deep sea diving, puppetry etc etc etc, things I did not know existed.
3. Teach him to take responsibility of consequences: He needs to learn that every action has a reaction and there is no escaping the consequence
4. Letting him know that he is loved, that I love him more than anything else and together we can figure anything out. Building mutual trust.Having what I have with my parents, he needs to know that sharing things with me will make it better.
5. Not letting his natural curiosity get doused out because I feel lazy or under some pressure.
6. Being Courageous: This is a raw nerve he needs to learn to be courageous and stand up for what he believes in
6. Finally I am his role model, I can have all the guidelines possible but he will do as he sees me do, so everything I do and say moulds my son to be the person he will become.
Since this the blogonbooks, I am searching for a few books that may help me. Will keep this space updated on that.
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Interesting post. I spend a lot of my time thinking about these things too. In this age, where manners seem as extinct as the dinosaurs, how do I raise my daughter to be polite and nice, but not a timid doormat?
ReplyDeleteFor us this year is THE year. We need to apply to and somehow get her admitted in a school where she will hopefully spend the next 15 years happily. Oh boy!
You may find this unruly behaviour but some time out of frustration we left with no choice, can i get your attention as you are part of the same team - where member of your team are liar and incompetent
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/The_Sun_Deep/status/1421510094982762496?s=20