Why Raise Powerful Children?
I am not an expert on power and society. Some people spend their lives studying power dynamics. They would be able to define and describe elements of power that don’t even cross my mind. I am, however, a mom, a therapist, and a woman who has struggled to break free of my self-limiting thoughts and behaviors, many of which were forged in the Southeastern United States. All while seeking to empower my children.
My children are all white boys. They have an inherent amount of power in this society. I don’t want them to yield that in the traditional ways. I don’t want them to seek or use power over others. Instead, I want them to seek and experience power among others. I believe this is the essence of the kind of mutually beneficial relationships our society needs if it is to thrive and reach its potential. People who are confident in their power and worth as an individualdo not accept injustice. Rather, they empower others.
Before going any further, I want to share that I am assuming most of us want to raise children into powerful adults.
What does that even mean? What I mean is that I want to launch young adults into the world who feel empowered to use their resources to get what they want and need in cooperation with others, getting what they want and need. This implies abundance: that there is enough. This implies worth: that all are worthy of meeting their needs and wants cooperatively.
Without that last bit above, “in cooperation with,” readers might think I want my children to be more potent than others. I don’t. That would mean I want them to have power over others. We achieve power over others in one of two ways: overtly, by one-up force, or covertly, by one-down manipulation.
While I experience that most parents want the same for their children, many of us still operate from a place of scarcity. Scarce environments imply that rather than having enough for both parties to get what we want, there is only enough for one. Scarcity invites one-up and one-down powerplays to get one’s way: Aggression and manipulation.
Aggressive and manipulative parenting tactics aren’t just outdated; they invite children to use their power to adapt to others. Adapted children grow into adapted adults. Adaptation, in the context of saying “yes” and “no” implies saying “yes” to what the other party wants. We can adapt in spite of what we want, discounting it at a conscious level. We can also adapt without awareness of what we want, it’s become so second nature that we discount at the subconscious level prior to even exploring what it is we want.
One of the benefits of working with adults before I started working with children is that I can say from experience that the investment in child mental health is well worth it. My adult clients often came in after years of dissatisfaction and frustration. Sometimes they came to therapy after realizing they were seeing the same qualities in their children that they were hoping to avoid. Most of my adult clients worked on changing childhood adaptations. These adaptations can be summarized by the following command-like messages they received: It is imperitive you do what you can to “please others,” “be strong,” “try hard,” “hurry up,” and “be perfect.”
There are other messages we could expore. And will. Here, I wanted to mention these because I often find the combination of “please others (please me, the parent)” and “be perfect.” When these messages are together, one usually experiences their power when they feel that they are pleasing others perfectly. This might appear to work in one’s family of origin, but it doesn’t work well out in society. It leads to increased anxiety and depression. Why? Because we can’t please everybody else. And we certainly can’t do it perfectly!
I’d like to mention another type of power that is experienced when children are required to say “yes” to parents’ desires: rebellion. Rebellion, ultimately, is an adapted behavior. When adaptation is required, children can adapt to the rules or against the rules. In both cases, they feel a sense of power. Neither is true power, for neither invites them to consider what it is they want, nor to think and figure out how to use their autonomy and resources to secure that.
This series is going to explore how to raise children in a way that offers nurture and structure while offering children age-appropriate choices. It might sound easy, but it’s not. Here are some of the sticky points:
The more we were required to adapt to our parents wishes in childhood, the more we will likely, out of our awareness, invite children to adapt to us.
The decision to adapt to or against others can feel like “life or death.” Therefore, it is scary to see our children behave in ways that we weren’t allow to behave.
When we are scared, we tend to double-down on controlling as a way to regulate our emotions.
It can be hard to change these patterns once we observe our children adapting to others in ways that concern us.
Adapted children experience their power by adapting to or against the rules. Neither option represents true power.
True power is invited by tuning in to what we want and need and using our resources to negotiate cooperatively with others. This rests on the premise that we can work cooperatively with others so that we both get what we want. In other words, there is enough for all of us to get what we want, and we are all worthy of getting what we want.
The more we work to empower young children within the context of cooperative relationships, the more they will grow into cooperative teens and adults. Developmental stages aren’t “one and done.” Fortunately, we have opportunities to re-work them. Phew! Because I certainly do it perfectly. We can offer to our children and teens—and even ourselves—now what was not offered then.
Raise powerful children so they will grow into powerful adults. Experiencing power as an adult doesn’t just happen overnight when we leave the house. The safest place for us to explore, discover, and experience our power is with the guidance and presence of a loving and protective grown-up. We can maintain our position of power as a parent while empowering our children (it’s not either/or). The best influence we can have over our children comes from their natural respect for us, which comes from our respecting them.
Two of my children are teens, and one is a young adult. I’ve been there. I’m still there, especially with my youngest boy, age 10.
Is it work? Yes. Does it take time? Yes. Does it require repetition? Yes. Will others judge you? Yes. The work is worth it!
Between now and the next part of this series. I invite you to tune in to your yeses and nos. Do you say yes when you want to? Do you say no when you want to? If you don’t, what feeling/s do you experience?