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Today's
Meditation:
I'll
never forget the time I saw a woman leave someone's house
because her six-year-old son wanted to leave, and she didn't
want him to start acting up. I still remember thinking
what an awful thing that mother was doing to allow the child
to control her and manipulate her so. She was acting
on the urge to avoid conflict at all costs, and the child
was learning that in order to get his way, all he had to do
was present the threat of conflict.
As
I look around and experience life "these days," it
seems that many young people are learning this lesson.
I don't know if it's more than in the past, but I do know
that it involves a lot of young people. They're so
used to getting their way that if they don't, they're almost
at a loss-- they're not sure what to do, how to handle
themselves.
If
we want to bring out the best in kids, we need to help them
understand limitations. We need to help them to see
that the fact that they want something doesn't always mean that
they're going to get it. And sometimes they may get
it, but they may have to work for it. In this way,
kids learn how to deal with a variety of situations, and
they don't learn just how to manipulate mom or dad-- a talent
that usually will turn out to be quite useless out in the
real world.
There's
nothing wrong with doing things for kids or giving them
things, of course. But kids need to have a balance in
their lives, and often they need to be told
"no"-- and that's how they're going to learn some
of the most important, most valuable lessons of their
lives. That's the only way they're going to learn
about themselves and learn "to love what is
difficult." For it's only when we love the
difficult that we're able to overcome the difficult on our
own terms.
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