Save Your Battles and Your Breath With Your Teenager
Save Your Battles and Your Breath With Your Teenager
Onlookers may find it cute but parents find it highly embarrassing when their toddlers throw a tantrum for a denied toy or candy in a crowded mall. The scene is really cute otherwise and many a times I have watched with amusement the toddlers embarrass the hell out of their parents - belly up or belly down, dressed in their weekend best, sprawled across the busy floor they are flailing their arms and legs all over... and as if that was not enough they are yelling away to heavens bawling full throttle putting lots of classical singers high pitched voice to shame for that Candy/Toy denied to them. Yes - the battle lines have been drawn and put to test even at the toddler stage. Seemingly innocuous transaction but deep down managing to shake the parents out of their skin and spoil their whole day. How to deal with it ? Undoubtedly parents should not give in to such blatant arm twisting howsoever innocently done. Aim of painting this picture was to highlight the fact that the war clarion sounds off as early as at the toddler stage of the kid.- THE BATTLE OF CONTROL !
A good thing to remember at the beginning would be to get rid of the word control and its related syndromes from our dictionaries. Though we are referring to the transactions with teenagers as battles they are actually not battles - they are normal transactions happening at every household in varying degrees. Another thing to remember is to realize that every such transaction need not be in favor of your thought process. Be happy and ready to loose some ' battles' to your teenager. To win some transaction tussles would be in fact good for your teens esteem and would help her/him in discovering their identities which is very important to grow up as a mature responsible adult.
So next time you see your teen's purple colored hair or a bizarre nail paint pattern or three earrings on each ear - do not sound the trumpet for the war - it is not worth locking horns at all. I would perhaps recommend complimenting the new look as interesting and then maybe add a bit of quick advice if at all the colors have the potential to damage the hair in the long run and equally quickly suggesting a good brand of hair color. Same goes for ear piercing saying that they look aesthetic and nice and in the same breath add that you are glad that they have not gone in for a permanent tattoo or navel piercing as that could be harmful going ahead.You may even consider telling very casually about the dangers of recycled needles used for tattooing /piercing...make sure it doesn't sound like a sermon but comes across as a genuine concern. For a total victory you can do what has been done through ages -' if you cant beat them then join them'and tell them to take you with them next time for the coloring/ear piercing etc etc. Suggest make a mental check list of such transactions which you are willing to 'loose' and if a new one comes up - pause before exploding and consider the threat to the context and then pick your battle pitch.
Now that you have saved your steam for more worthy battles - and also won the affection of your teen and their sense of your sense of fairplay....go right ahead and take them head on for topics like drugs/alcohol/bunking school/violence/theft/smoking....etc. One small anecdote here from the life of Mahatma Gandhi would be in order here before we start sermonizing our teens - Once a concerned mother came to the Mahatma and asked him to advice her teen son about the ills of having too much jaggery (a kind of a crude candy) to which he was addicted. Mahatma Gandhi told the lady to return after a week. Same request was made again when she came in after the week had elapsed. Mahatma smiled and affectionately putting his hand on the teens shoulders said - 'Son its really bad in the long run to have a sweet tooth - excess of everything is bad !' Though the lady was grateful about the advice which she thought would go a long way to help her teen son but she was intrigued as to why the mahatma had to postpone such a simple dialogue for a week....She blurted out her query. Mahatma smiled again and said - How could I have advised him last week...I had a similar sweet tooth and craving for jaggery like your son. When I asked you to come after a week... I gave up my habit and then felt qualified to tell him with a courage of conviction that what I am saying is not good for health in the long run.' So if we want our teens to do no drugs we better be clean ourselves or we loose the battle even before we have begun it - Technical Knock out - on Moral grounds !
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