Living life accountable to our children
And ultimately, ourselves.
It is not enough to be accountable for the work that we produce, or being accountable for our own health, but we have to throw children into the mix?
We may not see it, but we are accountable to our children.
Not only are we responsible for their…well…survival, but we hold ourselves accountable to them in how and what we do every day.
Why must we be held accountable to them?
Well, to answer, we need to look through their eyes. Children try and make sense of what they see. They see actions and responses to how adults handle the world or others around us. They hypothesize and experiment to see what happens when they do the same thing, even if it is not in a similar situation (such as in the supermarket). Then it is up to us how we respond to what our children have done. This may be the bit where we may not be anticipating, which may lead to drastic disciplinary action in front of audiences, or walking away as quickly as we can, trying to think of how we are going to try and persuade our little ones to not do that action again.
But do we take a moment to think how they caught onto this behavior? In the end, if the behavior or action has stemmed from us, then we need to be able to explain why we did it, but why children cannot. We need to be held accountable for our actions to our children.
However, children do not always copy the parents, we have to consider other environments; school, family, friends, but the parents are the ones which (most of the time) will have to teach and explain to them, why others may have behaved a certain way as well! (This is not getting any easier to be a parent!)
Children will only understand the world, in accordance to what they are exposed to and what they are taught about.
All children are individuals, all special in their own little ways. But it is up to us to be able to guide them through the do’s and don’ts of life. Or help them to understand at least that some actions are age restricted, e.g. road rage anger.
Being accountable for making decisions
Making any decisions of any scale will always have an impact on children in the future, whether it was purposeful or accidental, or just a plain fight or flight response.
Whether you find the decision you made was the right choice or simply a bad one, we can only base the righteousness of that decision through what information we had, our immediate environment and our own ability, at that present time.
Who is to say you would have changed your mind if you were faced with the same decision now but with different information, environment and abilities?
As our children grow, we also grow with them. As they learn information every day, adults learn new information and build on existing skills and abilities.
Don’t be too hard on yourself. Life is meant for learning, exploration and loving one another despite our decision making.
Children expose us for who we really are, what we are really capable of, how we can push ourselves until we think “no more”. And then we reach beyond that limit because we need to, for their sake. This is the point where we learn so much about ourselves. Our children will help us to be better in every possible way if we let them if we really reflect on our actions. E.g. those who may have been quiet before, may find their voice and stand up for their children. Those who were anti-social, will gulp it down and allow their children to have play dates and a mother’s chinwag.
We may be accountable to our children, but it also shows that we have to be accountable to ourselves.