Celest and Cesar were playing on the bed together for quite a while. Gian and I had our backs to them, and could only hear the squeals of delight and laughter as the two siblings enjoyed wrestling and chasing each other around.
Finally I turned around to watch, and it was so cute. But within seconds of watching, I felt a bit of a knot developing in my stomach. I noticed both kids teetering along the edge of the bed, seemingly not focusing at all on their balance and position on the bed as they tossed themselves around. I started to imagine one of them falling off, and all of the accidents and injuries that could happen.
As soon as I noticed the thoughts, the knot in my stomach and my breath shorten, Celest did a physics-defying back-bending arch right at the edge of the bed (pictured above). I jumped over with my hand in place before her bum could even hit the mattress.
Great reflexes! But the thing is - my hand did not even have to touch her. She caught herself. She was fine. She had BEEN FINE the whole time! It's only when I interfered (Enter-FEAR) that suddenly the play became 'dangerous'.
The thing is, you can have a starting point of practicality where yes - a child may fall off the bed - and so you must direct accordingly. However, most commonly and automatically, we instantly go into fear. The children, sensitive as they are, will pick up on that fear, and it will have an impact on them. It can be things like shaking their confidence, rattling their self-trust, triggering their defiance or any other such impact depending on the flavour of fear and the nature of the child.
Rather leave your fear out of the scenario all together - that is your baggage and should not be placed onto a child! Keep it practical instead - commonsense - no need to inject fear into their realities where it does not yet exist. Where there is fear, there can not be trust. Rather watch your children in Trust, and allow them to develop themselves without fear. Keep it real, keep it practical, don't be FEAR, be HERE!
#parenting #desteni #nofear #tt #technotutor
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