Some kids go along with the program and some are the canaries in the bullshit mine.
They sense when anything’s done for show. They question the intention of each demand you’ve asked them to comply with. They remind you of the stories you’ve shared from your own childhood and ask why you’re insisting they comply with the very things that once caused you anguish. They demand us to deconstruct what we believe is normal, and if we refuse, they’ll ask how we expect them to be flexible when we’re not even willing to bend enough to see their point.
But if we are willing to consider their point, we might find ourselves in a funny predicament, asking ourselves: “Why HAVE I complied with all this bullshit my whole life?”
And then, together, we can think about the possibility of shifting our expectations from the ones we’ve inherited to one’s that actually serve what’s most meaningful to who we really are.
Giving our demand-avoidant kids the skills to authentically communicate-to-be-understood and follow through with what’s meaningful to them is different than giving them the skills to mask and be compliant to earn other people’s validation.
-JLK
