Featuring the ‘get-away-with’ principle
Frequently we hear a parent gratefully remark, “My kids have been so ‘good’ recently.”
To which I always want to ask, “And how many ‘good’ kids have you known who eventually self-destruct?”
You see, compliance can be a cruel illusion. Yes, the easy-to-manage child may seem compliant now, but at what cost?
Think of this: to our knowledge, none of the youth who have in recent years turned guns on their schools have a record of violence. Rather, they have usually been quiet, to themselves, and generally compliant.
Indeed, in those cases, compliance was an illusion. For, while the child complies with the directives of dominant adults, a complicated web of inner conflict can develop. Conflicts that, unexpressed or undiffused, eventually play out in inappropriate ways.
Not that every compliant child is a festering pot of resentment and anger. Rather, be aware of management styles and techniques that can be dangerous, both to children and to the adults in their lives.
So, what techniques tend to blow up in the faces of parents and other adult care providers? While a complete list is obviously impossible in a short article, here is one of the most common – but usually overlooked – offenders:
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Learned helplessness: The practice of overriding choices offered to children, leading to a condition of temporary or permanent helplessness. It happens so subtly.
A child is asked if he needs to go to bed. After all, he is fussy and obviously tired. The child says ‘no’. But, the parent knows he needs it and takes him anyway.
The point is this: even if you seem to ‘get away with’ that kind of mistake now, it can come back to bite you in the future!
Better to have simply told the child, “In five minutes I’ll be taking you to bed,” without the question. In other words, if you have already decided what the child must do, just say it in a respectful way and quietly follow through.
In other words, if you give a child a choice, honor the choice he makes. In so doing, you will avoid the growth of resentment that can eventually lead to anger and other dangerous outcomes in the future.
