Speaker 1Hello and welcome to the How Not to Screw Up Your Kids podcast. So, pour yourself a cuppa, find a comfy seat and enjoy the conversation. This is episode 133 and today's episode, Encouraging Independence, I want to talk about why focusing on equipping our children to be independent is crucial to their well-being and success in later life. What do I mean by independence? Now, the dictionary defines it as free from outside control, not subject to another's authority and not depending on another for livelihood or substance. Now, in the context of children and this episode, it's all about our children knowing that they are separate to their friends and their parents and that they have agency over their life. Now, by separate, I don't mean that they don't feel that they're part of their friends or your family. It's just that they're free to make their own choices and not to be at the control of someone or something else. So, when we think of it like this, we can see why it would be an incredible skill to have. So, why might we want to have independent children? Well, in my view, independence, is the foundations to self-esteem and confidence. You can't be confident without feeling a sense of independence. It also allows children to feel a sense of control in times of stress, change and uncertainty. And we know that the adult world and generally life as a child is riddled with stress, change and uncertainty. So, having a child who's independent, who's equipped with that is going to be crucial. And thirdly, the research shows that it's also, independent children, it's also linked to stronger social skills, greater academic success and life outcomes. So, win-win. You know, there is nothing not to want in terms of raising independent children. So, what I want to share with you are really, how do we promote independence? What are the five things that we can do as parents that can really encourage and promote this particular skill because it's so foundational to confidence? I have not included this in the five, but I just want to begin by reminding you that children are much more likely to do what they see than what we say. So, the question is always going to be the first port of call. The first thing we need to do is a bit of a reflective piece in terms of ourselves as adults, as their parents, as their role models, as that ever-present role model and that primary role model first. Obviously, as our children get older, they're looking to us less so, but we are still fundamentally that role model. I would ask you is, what are you doing when we start looking at these five areas, what are you doing to model each one of these? So, really think about that as I talk through each one and I'll remind you, as you know, I will, just, you know, what are you doing in that regard? Because children, if you are modeling that, it also makes your work in terms of encouraging and equipping and promoting that. For your children, that bit easier. So, the first one I would say is allow your children to make mistakes. In fact, I don't like this notion of allowing in this context. The word allowing suggests that we're permitting them, but it's actually about encouraging our children to make mistakes because this way they are trying and learning. So, rather than allowing, which suggests that we're holding back, it's much more about encouraging our children to make mistakes. So, if you are listening to this podcast episode and you've got super, super young children, then it's about making sure that you maintain that curiosity in ways that allows them to see failure is a part of learning. You know, we'll have setbacks, things won't necessarily go according to plan and resist that tendency that we have as parents. Again, I say this with love and I understand that it comes from a place of trying to protect and nurture our children, is that we have to allow them to fall over, to make, big mistakes, and to understand that that's a process of learning. So, that, you know, that sort of sharp intake of breath that we get sometimes when we see our child doing something that we almost 100% can guarantee is all going to end really badly and there'll be tears, is to really ask yourself, now it's difficult to do it in the moment, but just ask yourself regularly, how often do I step in that little bit too soon? Because what we do when we do that, when we rush in too often to fix things, or when we rush in too often to fix things, is to ask yourself, how often do I or to avoid our children even trying, is that we're giving them a message, a consistent message that they should not try, that they need to be certain before something happens. And so often, in terms of encouraging that agency and that they're empowered to make choices, is then completely removed because what we're actually saying through our actions is, you can make choices when I deem them to be safe for you to do so, or you can make choices within boundaries that I have set for you. And so, I think that's a really important thing to do. And I think that's now, there will be certain aspects of making choices within certain boundaries, but what we tend to do is we expand those boundaries. And it just seems to be that we just avoid our children really jumping in, leaping in and trying things. And if we can really foster that when our children are younger, that continues as they get older, which is obviously very easy if you're listening to this podcast episode and you've got young children. But if you've got older children, if you've got teens, if you've got older children that have just stopped taking risk, they're too obsessed with getting things right and doing the right things that they've lost that natural curiosity and interest and independence to try new things, then you have to accept that what you're trying to do is there's two bits to this. When you've got an entrenched behavior, whatever that might be, is that you've got the raking old habits, because we always default to our habits. Everything that we do, all the choices that we make are more often than not, most of the choices that we make are not the same. And so, I think that's a really important a habitual they're things that we just do repeated because we've always done it that that particular way we've always it's automatic sort of decisions is that we're trying to unpick and break that habit at the same time as creating something new and that's tricky to do so it's framing it in the right context of understanding that it's going to take time it's not going to happen overnight and just being patient and really focusing in on praising the fact that our children have taken some risks that they've taken the road less traveled that they've tried something that they wouldn't ordinarily have tried and that how incredibly proud we are of them we can talk around the choices and other things and what they could do differently in the next in the next one but what we're really trying to get them to see is this link between making mistakes and learning because we only really learn when we've tried enough and we continually try new things and when we try new things we are invariably going to make poor choices and we're going to make mistakes things are not going to go to plan it's part of that slight audit that we do with ourselves and say actually how often do i allow my children free reign how often do i allow them to try new things without sort of like do you really think that's a wise decision what could happen and really sort of encouraging them to do that and of course in the spirit in which i sort of framed this right at the beginning is how often do you demonstrate that you're taking some risks that you're trying new things and that you're also making mistakes and if you're not making those in an obvious way that your children can see how often are you communicating the mistakes that you you're making regularly and what you're learning from that so that first one really is is allowing if we want our children to feel that they have agency if we want to build that self-esteem and confidence if we want them to feel that they've got some autonomy at times of stress and change and uncertainty we have to allow them to try new things and make mistakes so that's number one number two is give choices where possible at every opportunity that you can and trust me there will be more opportunities than you think there are but at every opportunity give your children the empowerment of choosing because this leads to an understanding that they have agency that they can affect an outcome and that they then get to see what happens as a result of the choices they make both good and not so good so let's not be punitive when they make poor choices but instead discuss what they might do next and what they what they've learned what might they then do differently as a result of that so often we end up with these huge battles with our children when we step back or when an independent person comes in and looks someone who's not emotionally attached to it looks at it and says i'm not going to do this i'm not going to do this i'm not going to do that and then they come up with a real simplistic sort of like well why did you not do this or why did you not give them the option to do that and of course it's easy when they're not emotionally involved in there looking at it from that observational perspective, but we can create that objectivity so readily when we give ourselves a regular practice of just, rather than pulling our hair out and being stuck in the same old frustration with our children, giving ourselves permission to not make a decision in that moment, but simply to defer and say to our children, I need to think about this. I'll come back to you about this later. And then really thinking about, have I got a real opportunity here to give my child a choice and then for them to learn from that choice? So the obvious choices are around, I've talked about this quite often about, do you want broccoli and carrots or do you want broccoli and peas? Those are real obvious choices, but there are so many other choices that we get slightly bogged down in this. Bedtime, for example, needs to look like this. We need to wash, then brush our teeth, then have a story, then go to sleep or whatever that routine particularly looks like for your family. But I would, I'd challenge you to do that. I'd challenge you to do that. And I would ask you, okay, you might have a hard stop. And I do believe that that's really important. It's about us setting boundaries for our children and children thrive around boundaries. But if that end boundary is 7.30 lights out, does it really matter what order the other things happen? Does it really? And I'm not saying that I'm giving you a definitive answer here, but I'm just simply asking you to really reflect on some of the things that are quite rigid in the same way as if, you know, the time that your children need to leave the house and leave the front door in order to go to school or to nursery, do we have some freedom in terms of the order that things happen in? There may be certain things that need to happen, getting dressed, brushing teeth, having something to eat, but do we have to dictate the order that that comes in? Can we empower our children to give choices? Will that actually reduce some of the stress in the morning because your children understand the consequences by their choices? I think that's a really good question. But actually deciding to get dressed two minutes before you leave often means that they're not dressed quick enough and that you can't knock the door and then there are natural consequences that you're then late. I don't know. I think you just need to think through. I'm not giving you a very definitive, you need to give them choices in X, Y and Z scenario. on politically, they don't have to be, this is not a about you know adding to our children's curriculum vitae adding to their cv so they could got intellectual discussion and opinions but it's just simply helping them see that they can formulate an idea and that their ideas are interesting and worth listening to so number four is encourage our children to have an opinion whatever that opinion may be and regardless of what anyone else thinks and it's not and finally but this is probably one of the more important one of the most important but it's about ensuring that our children's foundations are solid so this for me is all about our children knowing who they are what makes them unique likable lovable and someone with boundaries yeah a healthy respect for who they are what they will or will not tolerate in a friendship as you know i love the analogy that children are a building under construction and i tend to simplify that that broader analogy which i often use as our role as parents being the scaffolding i tend to simplify this for children and teens by using gender so yes they're a building under construction but most children have played with jenga you know that sort of the jenga tower and so they are a jenga tower under construction and it's really helping to see that the first nine blocks so those three base layers for jenga are their foundation blocks the you know what are the nine qualities that they possess the nine aspects of who they are and that they who they embody that are their foundations whether that's to do with trustworthiness whether that's to do with determination whether that's to do with humor whatever that is what are those foundation qualities that they may not exhibit all of the time they may not always be kind but at their foundation they are and those nine qualities they may share six of those qualities with a sibling or with us as their parents or with a friend but the it's the unique combination of those nine and then helping them understand the extra layers that they then begin to build upon so the foundations are solid even if they don't always exhibit them they're always there and they're beginning to layer their building as they as they grow older and they're as part of their development and as we layer on new blocks those qualities can be a little bit sort of not necessarily flaky but they're not necessarily as robust so sometimes we may exhibit i don't know let's say that we're working on sort of layering up so we've got our nine nine core qualities but maybe one of the qualities that we're working on is confidence and now that layer as it goes on will not necessarily be as robust as our foundation so sometimes we'll be able to be really confident in a situation and other times we won't be so it's about understanding that as we begin to layer up we have to practice a lot to then make those next three qualities part of those foundations so instead of having nine foundations we then have 12 but it's about ensuring that the foundations remain solid and that our children understand as they layer on these new layers of part of that building under construction that jenga tower that it requires practice until it then becomes another robust layer and then they start working on the next and the next but it's that reinforcement of them helping them understand that they have those foundations that if they've got trustworthiness and kindness that they don't disappear they may not have necessary evidence them in that particular situation but that they are still there and that's a really important aspect of helping our children understand that they have agency that they're worthwhile that they're lovable likable and deserving of good quality friendships that they can be independent of thought and that their friends will still like them it's not you that their opinion and who they are however similar or different they are to their friendship groups or their aspired friendship groups are what they should be celebrating rather than trying to present themselves in anything other than their true light so just as a recap the five things that we need to be focusing in on to promote independence are allowing them to make mistakes giving choices where possible giving them stage appropriate responsibilities encouraging them to have an opinion and ensuring their foundations are solid so my give this week is going to be these five qualities as a reminder we'll put them in a checklist with the gap underneath so again you can just kind of have that i would encourage you to use the gap underneath actually to really consider what are you doing to model making mistakes to model give you making choices to for you taking on stage appropriate responsibilities for you in terms of encouraging your opinion not just within the family but beyond the family and you know how often do you model that you're keeping your foundation solid so we'll give you that resource and as usual you just need to head over to the free resource library drmaryhand.com forward slash library where you'll find the link to download the resource all you need to do is pop in your email address and you will get instant access not only to this week's resource but also to the free resource library where you'll find the link to all the other free resources across all my podcast episodes as ever if you have enjoyed this episode i would love it and be ever so grateful if you could follow and review this podcast so that others can find us and we can spread the love so until next time at harmony bank we
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