HONESTY IN KIDS - II
What is honesty? Is it being true or not taking others’ property or things? A boy who was caught stealing a toy in school said, “I did not steal, I did not have this toy, my friend had it and I took it.” For the child it was not a dishonest act. Sometimes your child may ask you, “Are you angry?” Even though you may be angry, you may say ‘no’.
Ask yourself if you are being honest about your feelings. For an adult, this practice of saying “no” is not being dishonest. Similarly, what is honesty for you may not be honesty for the child. So from time to time and context to context, children, parents and teachers have to understand honesty as a developmental process and not a one thumb rule to be followed.
Parents too feel vulnerable when faced with an inappropriate behaviour of the child. Feelings like fear, anger, shame and guilt grip them too. Parents need not blame themselves for not being ‘good enough’ or having failed in their wards’ upbringing. Neither is it advisable to blame the children and take them to task. At such times, some parents connect all past mistakes the child did to the current event and add fuel to the fire. These are testing moments for parents. How does one handle such situations?
We can all give ourselves permission to feel vulnerable and also remember that we need not have all the solutions. None of us have all the solutions but what we have in hand is the ability to create a climate for solutions to evolve.
In today’s world of technology and options, children face a variety of situations which are very new for the child as well as for the parents. Some actions of the child may break the rules or even the law. Many a time, children get into further trouble when they try to hide their mistakes. Parents may have to learn to step in to help the children see reality and understand what makes them do what they do and see how both can learn to co-create solutions along with ethical thinking.
Children in the process of forming their identity need to feel separate from the parental figures and will sometimes deviate from the agreed rules. At such times, children may take money from home without parents’ knowledge, lie or want to keep some information private. They may also break some rules.
Trust that they are learning from life. Don’t brand him/her as a bad person. Make the rules for honesty and draw it on sand so children can explore, play and understand the importance of honesty. If we carve these rules of honesty on stone, then their hearts too will be hardened and, in the chaotic world today, they may have very few options to live by. This can create havoc in their minds. Children are authentic by nature and when we learn authenticity from them, we will be able to build the value of honesty along with them in them.
-A Geethan is a Chennai-based psychotherapist and organisational consultant. He is the founder-director of Nibbana (Visit www.ncpc-india.com). You can send in your queries to queries.edex@newindianexpress.com.