Respecting Children

By Angel Apurillo

"We never know the love of a parent till we become parents ourselves."

 - Henry Ward Beecher
Most likely, you already knew that I'm already a father. And I'm trying so hard to be a (good) father to my children. I'm reading lots of articles about parenting and attend some discussions on how to be a good parent.

One time, I attended a school program for my daughter, Cielo. And from there, I learned something on how to parent a child. In this article, I want to write it for documentation purposes as well as sharing it with my readers.

Respect children. How? Let me count the ways:
  1. Individual Person. I have to respect my children for who they are. Even if I am responsible on how they grow up, they are still unique individuals.I really need to respect them as I respect other adult individual. There should be no bashing or comparing to other children. For me, the latter is hard but I'll try to not to do it. Keyword ".
  2. Individual Choice. We want something from our children, right? But they are still one unique individuals. As early as now, they need to make their decisions on thier own. At least they will learn the consequences of their decisions. For the meantime, just ask them two options.
  3. Don't Bail Them Out. They need to know the consequences of their decisions as early as possible. For as early, they need to know what is wrong and right. They are growing and need to learn what it needs to be good and bad.
We, as parents, need to control ourselves. Sometimes, we want our children to be what is right. But sometimes, we need to let them be. For them to learn it the hard way and learn from it.

Kapish!