We, parents, do everything that, in our opinion, will help children become happy: we teach, educate, travel with them, take them to clubs and music schools. But is it possible to be happy without being free?
Many parents speak of their desire to raise their children free. Sometimes they are compared to European children, who seem less constrained than Russian ones, and at the same time more polite. But what does freedom mean for children, what does it give them, and is it really needed? With this question, we turned to the psychologist Alexander Kolmanovsky.
Psychologies: how to raise free children?
Alexander Kolmanovsky: It is important for us as parents to raise our children to be organized, educated, healthy… this and that. These points are clear. But what the item “free” means is not very. But I think everyone agrees on the desire to raise happy children. And most importantly, what is needed for this is good interaction with people.
The higher human psyche (in contrast to its animal, natural part) is social in origin. I often ask participants in my seminars to think of a few people they like and find something they have in common that is especially appealing to them. Wherever the seminar takes place, in 100% of cases, the same thing comes out on top by a wide margin — goodwill (or its variants, for example, responsiveness).
Why am I remembering this now? At different stages of life, our different qualities and merits seem especially trump and important to us. But it turns out that always, at any time and at any stage of people’s lives, it is benevolence that attracts us. So if we want children to be happy, then we must develop it in them first of all.
There is a stereotype that all those born in the USSR are not free, they are afraid to express their opinion.
You know, the free expression of one’s opinion often turns out to be arrogance, not freedom. It seems to me that something else is important — the absence of ideologization. Freedom is an unblinded consciousness, when we fearlessly subject even seemingly familiar, traditional things to rethinking, questioning, let us then come to the same generally accepted opinion, but we come already consciously.
There are two different fears: for yourself and for the other. Fear for someone is empathy
And in this sense, by freedom I mean not some behavioral indicators, but mental ones. The more we communicate with the child with the help of postulates, without explaining them meaningfully, the more blinkered his mentality is formed, the more he gets used not only to these unshakable foundations, which is already bad in itself, but also gets used to uncritically accepting everything in a row.
We allow ourselves clichés without thinking about them. “You have to obey me, because I am a parent.” This is a postulate. An adult who has grown out of such a child unconsciously accepts many other people’s decisions as correct: since someone has decided so, then it should be so. “You are still small” is also a cliché, not a meaningful explanation. And the child gets used to such a mechanism of relations with the surrounding reality.
Any political ideology becomes similar to a cliché that restricts freedom — the same communism. Or, I’m afraid to touch someone’s feelings, religion. And any cultural construct where anything is forbidden to be questioned. Under these conditions, people grow up who, in my opinion, are called not free.
How about a meaningful explanation?
Let me give you an example: how to explain to a child that militants are bad? The usual parental texts and clichés: “The film says 18+” (answer: “Why is it written there?”), “You will not sleep well later” (“I sleep well”), “There is aggression, violence.” But there is a lot of aggression in real life, in Hamlet and Little Red Riding Hood.
How can we explain, at least to ourselves, what distinguishes violence in militants? Obviously, the fact that violence in action movies is romanticized, legalized, presented as the right way to solve relationship problems. There, a positive hero behaves like that, and not an evil Wolf.
In real life, such a “hero” is feared, but not loved. This is the meaningful explanation: “You know, it shows a deceitful and at the same time seductive example. The viewer involuntarily tries to imitate a tough hero in life and imperceptibly becomes more aggressive. The child may be annoyed that we do not let him see the movie, but he learns an important lesson in meaningful interaction.
Maybe a non-free parent should start educating himself?
It sounds nice, but completely utopian. None of us can be 100% free from our difficulties in order to “later” take care of the child. All of us, even the most perfect and progressive, remain alive and, therefore, weak people. Our fears are inescapable. But it is important to understand that there are two different fears: for yourself or for someone else. These are different feelings, they are experienced and manifested differently.
For the social «I» it is necessary to develop in them as much compassion and tolerance as possible.
Fear for someone is compassion. It feels like warm, positive empathy and manifests itself the same way. Fear for oneself is experienced as tension, irritation, protest. As soon as we hear that someone or we ourselves sound instructive, tense, it means that we are driven by fear for ourselves. Every person experiences both fears. The question is proportion.
Why should I, a parent, be afraid for myself?
Indeed: if my child is uneducated, sickly, unsuccessful, the fear for him is understandable. Why should I, a parent, be afraid? You know, in a music school where I taught classical guitar for many years, you can often see such a picture. There is an exam, the child plays, forgets notes, confuses fingers. Someone else’s teacher catches his eye, trying to somehow support, suggest. Your own teacher is furious. What is the difference?
Since my student plays badly, it means that I am a bad teacher. If my child is somehow not like that, then I am a bad parent, incompetent, wrong educator. They will judge me, they will expressly point out my shortcomings. And it is clear whose condemnation and commentary I, a parent, am especially afraid of.
Your mom or dad?
Certainly. I am afraid of those specific people who were historically dangerous to me. Those who yelled at me or could slap me on the pope or on the arm. That is why “from under” edifying parents, in turn, the same edifying parents are formed. But not just by example, as mistakenly believed. And through this intermediate factor — the fear of their condemnation.
In order for me, an imperfect, unloved in childhood, unfree parent to raise not only a free, but a child freer than me, I need to remember two different fears. We must try to imagine — at least in hindsight — what motivated me: an experience for him or fear for myself?
Even if I have already said something, shouted, once again treated the child instructively — it’s not scary. It is important to imagine at least later: what would be a really meaningful explanation, and not an irritated or tired go-ahead? The more a parent, albeit inconsistently, albeit irregularly, but still engaged in this inner work, the less restrictive will be the upbringing.
So, if I repeat the list of necessary traits that we, parents, strive to develop in children, then I would first of all clarify that any of them is not an end in itself, but a means to achieve a happy life for children. For their social «I» it is necessary to develop in them as much compassion and tolerance as possible.
For their mental well-being, for their sense of inner freedom, we, parents, should use the skill of meaningful, rather than edifying communication with children as often as possible. Both ultimately come down to maximum benevolence. Let’s be kind to each other, friends.