Let Your Kids Fail To Teach Inner Strength
Every hero today, every single one has that moment where they have failed. In fact, success cannot be garnered without a few stumbling blocks. Read any inspirational book, look at any movie, or ask any person that is successful in life about whether or not they have ever failed. You’re going to be surprised by what they tell you. Kids today are pushed towards greatness, told they are to succeed, and in some circles are coddled when they stumble. When they aren’t the premier athlete on day one, or when their school work becomes too much, parents look at trying to save the day and make sure that they never taste that bitter defeat, even for a second. It’s bad. It’s imperative that you let your kids fail, as that will teach them so much more than winning all the time.
Learning From Falls
The first major thing that you have to consider in regards to failing is that it teaches. Experience is the greatest teacher, especially when things don’t go so well. The old adage of putting hands on a stove is a prime example. One puts their hand on a hot stove once, and then never does that again. The reason? It burns. That learning process is severe, painful, and definitely not something that you want to experience, but it’s a great educator. That’s the same for life. Sometimes children need to feel the sting of defeat, so that they can taste how great glory can become.
No One Is Great on Day One
Take a look at the greatest people in any sport. Anyone that is at the top of their proverbial field, and then consider how long it took them to get there. Children should be taught this. When they look at icons like Lebron James, consider their failures. For every championship ring, there’s hundreds of hours of practice, hundreds of missed shots, and even injuries. There is no great individual in the world, past, present, or future that will be great on their first day of doing anything. Chances are, they are going to fall short often. The difference here, however, is that they get up time and time again.
The next time your kids run into a wall, or even fail, remember to tell them that it’s not the end. It’s just time to get up, and try again. It’s in standing up, going forward, and overcoming falls, that one becomes great. The more you can reinforce that in the life of your child, the greater inner strength they will have.
Great article. As a parent I find this to be one of the most difficult things to teach your child. I have three of my own and I've struggled with not stepping in when I see something going wrong. I've learned that this is not a good thing because they seem to make the same mistake over and over again when I do help them. I guess it really is better to let them learn how to deal with situations on their own so that they can be better prepared for the future.
ReplyDeleteIt's in a mother's nature to nurture and run to the rescue of our children, definitely something that I am constantly working on with my 7 year old son. Thanks for commenting!
DeleteYeah, I agree that kids can't learn anything if they have never experienced failing. Parents who are very protective are not doing anything good to their kids. That's why I always tell myself to let my kid try. Even though some parents may not agree.
ReplyDeleteIn this age of "participation trophies" I find this article to be very refreshing. When I was growing up this was just the way it was. Parents did not need this advice because they already knew the importance of learning from failures.
ReplyDeleteThank you for sharing your insight into this Nicole.
As you said, every successful person has had their share in failure when they were getting started. Some of them even had failures after success and all they did was to stand up again and start over. This is a great approach to teach your kids about success.
ReplyDeleteThe first time my daughter got a bad score for one of the subjects (she usually performed well), we had an open talk the following day about failure and success, and what she learned from there. Experience teaches them better than words, and it applies to many other situations in life.
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