I know this looks like another dealing-with-a-messy-room article, but it’s not. When I’m talking about messes–I’m talking about big life messes like botched friendships, overdue assignments, failed classes and other painful rights of passage we watch our kids get themselves into. For many of us, our first instincts as parents are to rush in and try to bail them out. We feel as though we should march off to the school, call other parents, and generally move in with our greatest “gung ho” skills and clean up the messes our children have made.
Stop. These are messes our children have made and, since we know the most intense and lasting learning comes from mistakes, we are actually robbing them of important lessons and life experiences (not to mention, setting them up for some repeat performances) if we rush in and tidy up their messes for them–even if we know we can do a cleaner and quicker job of things.
I know that watching our children wrestle with stress, pain, worry, loss, grief, and broken hearts is an incredibly uncomfortable place to be in. Boy, with three kids, I definitely know! But, I also have faith in the growing up, human nature process. I have seen the way I have learn and grown as I overcome adversity. My life has not turned out exactly as I anticipated all those many years ago–partly due to choices I made, and partly due to the fact that life is tough and unpredictable. I know firsthand that if my kids are going to thrive and survive, they’re going to need to be able to face adversity and learn to cope. This doesn’t mean necessarily learning to cope as I have, but finding ways of using their own skills and talents and character strengths to face life’s challenges and lessons. How will they learn about and develop those unique skills, talents and character strengths if they don’t get a chance to try them out and flex their personal coping muscles while they’re growing up?
I’m still in the wings, more of a coach now as my kids get older. Actually, instead of playing the role of my kids’ janitor–swooping in to deal with the “clean up in aisle five”–I’m handing out the brooms and mops and cleaning supplies, and providing moral support and helping them decipher the directions and “caution” statements on the back of the labels. But, I truly owe them the opportunity to learn to clean up their own messes.