Reminding Children Where Their Value Lies
My husband and I were sitting on our couch during Christmas time, cozied up by the fireplace with the Christmas tree lights on. It’s our typical nighttime routine to relax and unwind together. We assumed the kids were also unwinding in their rooms for a good night sleep. Do they ever just relax though? Of course not, they’re children. They save up all their energy from the day and release it when it’s bed time. Turns out they were playing around in their rooms giving each other piggy back rides. All of a sudden we hear one of them running downstairs in a fit of tears.
Our daughter runs up to us and cries “I’m too heavy!”. Our hearts immediately sank to the bottom of our stomachs. She began to tell us that her sissy was unable to give her a piggyback ride. In her mind, it was because she was too heavy. Though it’s solely because she’s not baby sized anymore, it was still gut wrenching as a parent to hear those words come out of her mouth.
Society Has It All Wrong
I think we’d all agree that society as a whole has it wrong. Society believes that our value and worth come from how we look and how we perform. All that matters to others is solely what they see from an outside perspective. We recieve praise for weight loss, even if it happened in an extremely unhealthy way. We receive that same praise for making six figures, even if that means never being home with our kids. We are praised for new and improved hair, makeup techniques, cute and expensive new outfits; all things that have zero significance on who we are as a person at our core.
We believe that complimenting others on these superficial things is helpful. Maybe it’s because of the way it makes us feel when we receive these compliments ourselves, or how it makes other people feel when we share those compliments. We feel really good in that moment. They love my new outfit, my new haircut, or my makeup for the day. Whether we recognize it or not, it makes us feel as though those superficial things are what matters the most. In turn we end up believing that who we are on the inside matters little to nothing.
Compliments on our intelligence, our caring and compassionate hearts, or our abilities to love and forgive others are few and far between in this world. We have come so far as a whole in our society, but it’s things like this that remind me how far we still need to go.
Do Better
I knew after that comment my daughter made that I needed to start by being a better mom. A mom that shows her love for who she is and not what she looks like or what she does. A mom that compliments her kids on their personalities and heart more than anything else. Maybe even more so, a mom who never speaks ill of herself either.
We often think it will be helpful to tell them how beautiful they are all the time, but using that compliment alone feeds into the idea that looks matter the most. What would it look like to become parents that compliment our children and those around us on who they are rather than what they look like? If we all cared more about how our hearts looked, we would end up putting more time and energy into becoming nicer and kinder people rather than spending our time making our outer selves beautiful.
Beauty fades no matter what we do to postpone that. We all get to a point in our lives where we are going to gain weight, wrinkles or grey hair. Our outer beauty is short lived, but our inner beauty can last a lifetime.
How we love others can only get better with time. Not only our own lifetime, but that kind of love can trickle down to the younger generations as well. They can take what we have learned and continue making a bigger impact through love and compassion.
Teaching Our Kids
How do we help our kids to gain the mindset that the heart is more important than the outer beauty? We begin with ourselves. Kids learn best from the example from others, especially those closest to them. Next time they run down the stairs ready for the school day in a silly outfit, rather than questioning if their outfit matches, tell them how their creativity is so special and unique. If they go to a dance someday, remind them of how proud you are of their ability to make good choices, or how amazing it is to see them grow into amazing humans.
The more we are able to focus on the heart of our children, the better off they will be. The better off the younger generations will be. Let us love them and see them for the sweet and kind children they really are.
