Listening not being Right

 Today I dropped my 3 1/2 year old son off at preschool.  I walked him out to the playground where his teacher asked him;”Is that a transformer in your hand?”  He replied “Yes”.  I was seconds away from opening my mouth to correct him and the teacher.  He in fact had a toy bionicle in his hands and not a toy transformer.   But I caught myself and instead I chose to listen.  I allowed the conversation my son was having with his teacher to continue. (Plus the teacher was not talking to me and to not say anything is very hard for a person like me that needs to be right and correct people when they are making a mistake).  

The teacher then asked him which transformer it was.  If you have ever watched the movie there are different names for the transformers like bumble bee, which happens to be my son’s favorite.  To my amazement he said green.  The bionicle he had in his hand was green.  He knows the names of the transformers but appeared to draw the conclusion that since the bionicle was green that its name was green.  Then the teacher asked him what it transformed into.  Again I was biting my tongue, the boinicle can’t transform into anything.  My son answers back it transforms into a car. Wow, how cool it was to see him have this conversation and draw these conclusions.

I smiled dropped down gave him a kiss and told him I would pick him up a 5:00.  As I was walking away I thought to myself, if I had not chosen to keep my mouth shut my son would not have had the opportunity to make his own choices and have that conversation with his teacher.  If I would have stepped in and corrected I could see how he could then been tied to my way of thinking and controlling…In time I could see how he could become a victim: I’ll just let my dad handle it because whenever I try to speak up he just corrects me anyhow.  He also could have picked up on the power I get from being right and in time he too could be correcting others as often as possible.

What a great gift I received from just shutting up and not needing to be right.  So simple for us to say but so difficult for most of us to actually implement.  All I can attest to is keep telling the truth about yourself and in time you will see your getting and protecting behaviors enough that you will be able to change your automatic responses to daily issues in your life.  It is magical.

Love

Thank You for bringing an old post back....I wish I would have read this years ago because I did do that thinking I was helping my daughter because she was so shy and I didn't like feeling uncomfortable when she didn't speak.....so I did.  Guess what?  My daughter now corrects me in front of everyone when I speak.  What goes around, comes around!  Thank You again, for reminding me of this so I don't get OFFENDED when my daughter does this because I taught it to her.

As parents, our primary responsibility is to love our children, to teach them how to love other people, and to teach them to be responsible.  We teach them what's right, and when we do that, they can begin to choose to be loving and happy. Real Love doesn't say that you can't correct your children.  Obviously it's important to teach your child not to run into traffic (or to do other things that endanger them).  But the First Principle of Parenting is this:  More than anything else, my child needs to feel loved!

I'd suggest a copy of Greg Baer's book Real Love in Parenting. Children learn to speak by listening to their parents.  If parents use correct grammar, more than likely the child will pick up correct grammar. If your child is trying to tell you something, is it more important to pay attention to the message, or is it more important to keep interrupting him/her for a grammar lesson?  Love&Teach!  Consider it one word.  By stopping what you're doing and listening intently, you tell your child that what he's saying is Important and that you care! 

This is a very short answer to a complicated topic.  Hope it helped.

Blessings, KarenH, Certified Real Love Coach