Let’s not rush our children!

“I have the impression that most often children hear from me the words “Let’s hurry!”, 35-year-old Lika admits. This confuses her, but she does not see a way out of the situation. Lika has three children – 11 and 6 years old, and the youngest is 3 years old. She, of course, knows why she is rushing them: the accelerating pace of life and the fear that they will be outstripped by others if she allows herself (and them) to slow down even for a little while… something is not right in this frantic rhythm, and the middle child – the slowest one – is simply frankly suffering. Such a picture is familiar to many: adults put pressure on children, and on those – the attitudes of society, forcing them to live at maximum speed and show the highest results. “We must admit that modern life does not take into account our natural rhythms,” says child psychologist Galina Tsukerman. “Adults and children suffer from this, it’s just that children have less opportunity to defend their own pace.” The reasons why parents have to hurry are obvious: they take care of the children (which takes a lot of time), they work (often both), they spend two or three hours a day on the road, they agree to overtime hours … In addition, many of them are trying to decide all the problems at once – taking their son to the first grade, they are already thinking about the institute and the army. And it would be unfair to blame them for this! “But this does not mean that we can blame everything on society, justifying ourselves by the fact that we do not have room for maneuver,” says Galina Tsukerman. It’s still impossible to do everything anyway, therefore, the psychologist continues, “it is important to learn not to be greedy and be able to give up what neither we nor the children can do now.” And for this you need to realize that you can slow down the pace of life of your own children, slowing down in those everyday little things that we can influence.

Fear of the void… and the future

Alexander is 42 years old. He divorced a year ago and now sees his 9-year-old son Arseniy once a week. “I would like to visit him more often, but this is impossible – a one-way trip takes more than an hour and a half. And if I come to him after work, he already goes to bed, and I can only participate in brushing my teeth … Usually, we leave all our favorite activities for Saturday, but it turns into a nightmare – I want to do everything in time! So the child is forced to adapt to the rhythm and pressure, not only at school. After all, parents, feeling guilty that they do not see their children on weekdays, want to catch up on weekends … “Meanwhile, it is on these days that one should not only not rush, but also seriously listen to the needs and desires of the child,” says psychologist Beatrice Copper-Royer. To do this, adults will have to internally come to terms with the fact that it is impossible to do everything, says Galina Tsukerman: “There is something that did not come true: something that you really wanted (and even had a chance) to get, but there was no time. This applies equally to what parents want for themselves and what they want for their children. It is easier to accept this given if we clearly understand what is more important to me (and my child) now; what gives us both the greatest pleasure; which is more in line with my (and also his) values. But for this you need to know yourself and your children well.

Pass the tests

• Why don’t you have enough time?

But what if the child did not even have time to do the homework? “You just need to help him finish at least part of the assignments and explain to the teacher in a polite note why it happened,” the psychologist advises. If a similar situation is repeated every day, perhaps the child is simply not able to cope with the load. And maybe he should change schools so that his whole life does not turn into solid homework. “Ask yourself: maybe you are trying to teach him something that you yourself are not strong in? — suggests Galina Tsukerman. – The son lacks perseverance – but the father does not have it either; the daughter is inattentive, but the mother often forgets important little things. In this case, it is better to seek the help of a psychologist.

Often, children are required to move faster, just for the sake of synchrony: “we are a single whole, we have a common life, we live in the same rhythm.” This (often unconscious) attitude makes it difficult to see and take into account the individual characteristics of children. “Parents complain that they have to run all the time, but since this lifestyle is accepted by them and recognized as a condition for success, they cannot help but impose it on their children,” explains Beatrice Copper-Royer. Constantly under stress, they themselves become a source of stress: parents are afraid of the emptiness of their own lives and begin to desperately invest in the future of their children, turning from mother and father into coaches.

Trust more

“Active, fast children at school have an advantage: they can be the first to answer a question, prove themselves and receive encouragement,” continues Galina Tsukerman. “And a slow child loses just because it’s harder to notice. But this does not mean that he thinks worse or is not as creative – he just comes to his results at a different pace. The father and mother are in solidarity with the school in this regard, as they see advantages for adult life in speed and activity. “A dreamy, brooding child worries them,” remarks child psychoanalyst Christian Flavigny. “Especially if they are obsessed with school success and reduce education to a sum of skills that partially crowd out the process of personality maturation.”

“Usually, children cope with a fairly high pace, but on the condition that everything they do, they do it with pleasure. A good school, a couple of circles (something for the soul, something for the body): for the majority, such a load is not burdensome, says Galina Tsukerman. – And hyperactive children even benefit from exercise. They cannot sit still for a long time, they are constantly moving and moving from one activity to another, so it is better if their whole day is filled to the limit so that they simply fall off their feet by the evening. But in any case, it is worth finding at least a few hours a week for deliberately slow classes. You can, for example, take a walk in the park, looking at all sorts of little things – bugs, tree bark, veins of leaves … But if it doesn’t work out, don’t insist, try something else: read together or listen to music.

If we do not see in time that the child is overloaded, he may tell us about it in the most unexpected way. “It always seemed to me that my 9-year-old daughter was happy with everything,” says 39-year-old Valentina. – She never objected to a music school, or to a pool and a theater studio. And English lessons inspired her … But when, just before her birthday, she told me that she wanted to receive as a gift “at least one day when you can do nothing at all”, I was dumbfounded at first, and then I thought: how hard it was for her all this time!” “To prevent this from happening, all classes should be planned together with the child, even with a 3-4-year-old,” advises Galina Tsukerman. “Not to impose on him what we like, but to offer, give him the opportunity to try and make a decision.”

common sense and play

What happens to children who have been pushed around for years? “They develop insensitivity to what they are told, or a very strong resentment accumulates,” Galina Tsukerman is sure. Some children become restless, get tired faster. Others go out of their way to please their parents and, if that doesn’t work, live with the feeling of “I’m bad.” And some people don’t want anything at all. All these are manifestations of the unformedness of their own “I”, believes Christian Flavigni: “Constantly urging children on, we teach them to act automatically, not only physically, but also mentally, instead of thinking, developing concepts, their own ideas about life.” And for this you need to spend time on the game. “Parents do not allow their child to play, citing, for example, that it is too late to play at the age of 10,” continues Galina Tsukerman. “But the game is what the child himself creates. Children who have not played well are limited in their creative possibilities, it is more difficult for them to dream and see the future. The more complete the game is at 5-10 years old, the better at 15 they have an idea of ​​what they want to be.” By allowing the child to play as he likes, we give him access to the world of symbols, to the ability to separate the real from the imaginary. He receives a variety of impressions that will help him test himself in practice, as well as those around him, and thereby advance in understanding the world and self-knowledge.

Do not rush the child to grow up, let him play enough, realize his experiences, come up with something new. “Besides playing, there are other important things that every person (and a child is no exception) should do at their own pace. For example, to have breakfast calmly and with pleasure, to dress leisurely,” says Galina Tsukerman. By allowing the child to live at his own pace, we show that we respect him exactly as he is, and rejoice at what he has already managed to achieve – at any pace. Perhaps his slowness seems like a quiet strike to us, but it may well be a good lesson for us. As the writer Andrey Sinyavsky said: “It’s good when you are late, slow down a little…”