Give Each Other Room to be Wrong

Have you as a parent ever owned your child’s mistakes? Have you ever beat yourself up because your child made a bad decision?

I have.

I constantly question myself:

“Did we talk about that enough?”

“Did she do that because she saw me do something similar?”

“What if I didn’t encourage him enough?”

“Maybe I didn’t give the right consequences for that behavior when it was smaller and more manageable.”

“I should’ve done _____________.”

“I shouldn’t have _____________.”

Fill in the blank. We’ve all done it.

We constantly measure ourselves. We think that if our kids don’t make the right decisions, then it’s because of something we did or didn’t do as a parent.

I don’t want my parents to own my bad choices, so why do I wear my children’s choices like I made them? Like I’m the one to take credit for the good ones or blame for the not-so-good ones?

I have to stop.

Yes, we can make adjustments while they’re still young and we can guide them when they’re older, but once our kids become more independent, we have to let them make their choices.

Life hands us choices–some simple, some difficult–and it hands our children choices, too.

Sometimes we make the right ones. Sometimes we don’t. The same is true for them.

We’re not robots. God didn’t create us that way. From the beginning of time, He gave us a choice.

Adam and Eve were placed in the Garden of Eden with one rule. One.

The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it.  And the Lord God commanded the man, “You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die. ~ Genesis 2:15-17

Do not eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Everything in their world was perfect and they only had to maintain it by following one rule.

If they couldn’t manage—in perfect conditions, mind you–to keep one rule, why do we have such high expectations of our children?

Give them the tools. That’s all we can do. They have to choose to pick them up.

Really, it still all boils down to one rule.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments I give you today are to be upon your heard. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. ~ Deuteronomy 6:5-7

I don’t know about you, but I’ve been known to talk my children to tears and terror.

I’ve repeated. I’ve nagged. I’ve sang songs about doing the right thing, going the right places, saying the right things, hearing the right things…

You know the one:

“Oh, be careful little eyes what you see. Oh, be careful little eyes what you see. For the Father up above is looking down in love. Oh, be careful little eyes what you see.”

I even bought the video…and the CD. (Yes, I may have been was one of those slightly obsessive moms that thought if I checked all the good parent boxes, then my children would make all the right choices. HA!)

I remember singing that song as a little girl, too.

My parents taught me the right things. They talked about them. We sang about them.

They were in my head, but I didn’t always allow them to reach my heart.

I had the right tools, but I didn’t always pick up the tool box.

I messed up.

That’s the thing. No matter how many tools are in the toolbox, we have to choose to pick it up.

Sometimes we will, and sometimes we won’t.

Our children are no different.

They may even choose to trade some tools and change the rules. I know I did.

I don’t parent exactly the way my parents did. You probably don’t either.

I’ve done some things differently, and that’s okay. My parents even agree that it’s okay. They look back and discover things they would’ve done differently, too. They’re thankful I recognize it, and they’re happy that I’m parenting differently in those areas.

My parents know about my poor choices. Just like me, they would like do-overs.

Get this though.

They don’t wish they could undo my choices, they wish I would’ve let them help me deal with the consequences of them. They wish they could take away the pain, but they know that even that is part of who I am…who I have become…because of my choices…good and bad.

I definitely don’t want them to own my choices. It’s not their fault. Why can’t I remember that as a parent myself?

There’s so much to be learned from my parents. So much they can teach us about our own children.

Let’s quit trying to undo our kids’ choices and, instead, be there to help them walk through the consequences.

Allow them to own their choices. They’re theirs.

Allow them learn from the consequences of them. We did.

Let’s give them room to be wrong. That’s what I want from them, too.

Let’s give ourselves and our children some grace. Grace that gives them room to choose. Grace that helps them through the consequences when they don’t choose well. And grace to not beat ourselves up with what-ifs and should-haves.

Let’s be a grace giver and a grace liver. For them and for us.