It is not overreaching to state that most parents want the best for their children and wish them to grow up and become successful in this highly competitive world, especially in the work place. Of course children, when they are young, only tend to think in the present and therefore need parents to guide them in the right direction so they can have a bright future. Because parents are so concerned about their children’s future well-being, often they tend to push their children to excel academically. Crocker and Carnevale write, “Pushing teens to be the best is well-intentioned. But the notion that being the best and having the most brings happiness is an illusion” (Crocker & Carnevale). Though it is not a bad thing to encourage children to follow a certain path, parents need to realize and accept that children will grow into independent human beings with their own desires for life and to push them too hard in a path they may not wish to follow will cause children to grow into insecure adults that feel they can never do anything well enough or are always striving for an elusive perfection they can never realistically reach. Therefore, parents should always encourage but never push their kids too hard in any one path or another; children should ultimately be allowed to find their own direction in life.
Pushing kids too much can often achieve the opposite of what parents wish for their children. Children who are forced to get good grades, for example, may snap under the pressure and end up failing, or worse, adopt a mindset that they can never be good enough, and this can lead to tragedy. Christopher Berland gives examples of this in his Psychology Today memoir. Berland recounts, “Looking back on my teenage years, the pressure I felt to succeed academically was only one part of the equation that pushed me to the brink of self-destruction” (Berland). Berland also explained about his cousin, Sam, who he looked up to as a model student, but also who eventually succumbed to the pressure of his parents pushing him to get into an Ivy League school. Nothing but the best was good enough for Sam’s parents, and Sam eventually committed suicide. This terrible tragedy caused Berland to rethink the “merry-go-round of traditional benchmarks of ‘success’ ” (Berland) that he had been forced fed his whole life by his parents and everyone else in his higher income community. Such experiences are unfortunately quite common in many communities and American society in general today, where expectations of parents and society can push children to the point of mental breakdown for the sake of future “success.” The pressure to succeed is so high, and though some kids can handle it, a great many others cannot. The answer is to encourage kids to succeed through providing a good learning environment for them, sans the pressure. Berland gives a first-hand account of how this method worked for him. After failing all of his tests after succumbing to the pressure, he enrolled in a community college that didn’t place a strong emphasis on grades and exams. He writes, “Once at Hampshirefor the first time, there was no pressure to pass a test or get a good grade—and I became wildly curious and passionate about learning” (Berland). Once the pressure and force is removed from the backs of kids, often they will see the importance and value of learning on their own, but this is something they must discover by themselves through subtle encouragement and not through constant pressure.
Pushing a child to be the best at something they may not be suited for may not only often end in failure, but it also impedes the mental and emotional growth of a child. Lynn Margolis explains, “Parents’ hypervigilance about teens’ grades and future success backfires psychologically and academically” (Margolis). Instead of being a source of pressure, parents need to be the main support system for their children, teaching them that failures happen often in life and that as long as their children strive to do their best at whatever they are doing, their parents will be content and proud of them. Parents also need to recognize that children have different talents, strengths, and weaknesses, and thus may not have the ability to excel in every subject or every sport. Thankfully, my parents were supportive in this way, and I greatly appreciate them for it. My older sister has above average intelligence and skipped two grades in elementary school. She knew her multiplication tables at the age of 3, and was reading at the age of 2, and had both Harvard and Yale knocking on the door for her when she was a teen. I was born with more average intelligence, but have always been terrible at math, and to this day, math continues to be my weakest subject. I failed exams in mathematics many times, other times I barely passed exams at the lowest passing grade possible. Though my parents were of course not happy about my low grades, they showed more concern in trying to discover the reason why I was failing other than the fact that I simply failed. Even then, they never criticized me, but asked how they could help me bring the grades up, and they never compared me to my genius of a sister. They listened to my frustrations and concerns and took action by getting me tutoring, extra classes, etc., and eventually the grades came up and I eventually passed all of my math courses with Bs. My parents were very happy about my improvement and kept encouraging me, and never pressured me to get As, understanding that math was just never a subject I would excel at, but as long as I studied and did my best they were content. Therefore, through their help and encouragement I never felt pressured and generally enjoyed school, and have become very self-motivated to do well in university, even in math class. I understand that it is okay for me not being the best in everything, and even have the occasional failure, and this understanding came through my parents encouraging and not pushing me.
Older teens are at the stage where they will soon become adults, and therefore they need to be given a little more freedom to make their own decisions for their lives, and therefore there is a need for parents to loosen the reins a bit. Levine writes, “Excessive worry about teens’ success can also lead parents to be overinvolved and intrusive in areas where teens should make their own choices” (Levine). Kids will never learn to think properly on their own and discover their own personalities and strengths unless they are given the chance to decide certain things for themselves without excessive parental involvement. Forcing children to comply 100% to their parents’ wishes for them will impede children’s ability to learn good judgment, independent thinking, and problem solving skills, and these are the some of the very skills young people are going to need the most when they become adults and enter a cold, harsh, competitive world. Parents need to encourage teens to make their own decisions and to be prepared to face the consequences of the decisions they make, and this can teach them responsibility and help them build personal character.
The job of a parent is to raise children to be fruitful, successful members of society, not only in the workforce but also in life. The only way to do this properly is for parents not to be forceful and compel their children to succeed in a certain way, but instead, be a pillar of encouragement, acting as a lighthouse to guide their children to the shore instead of constantly being behind the steering wheel, steering their children to land where the parents may desire. Therefore, sincere parental encouragement is the best way to ensure the academic, mental, emotional, and overall personal success of our children.
Works Cited
Berland, Christopher. “Is the Intense Pressure to Succeed Sabotaging Our Children?” Psychology Today. Mar 2015. Web. 6 Mar 2016.
Carnevale, Jessica, & Crocker, James. “Letting Go of Self-Esteem.” Scientific American Mind. September 2013. Web. 6 Mar 2016.
Levine, Madeline. “The Price of Privilege.” New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers. 2006. Web. 6 Mar 2016.
Margolies, Lynn. “The Paradox of Pushing Kids to Succeed.” Psych Central. 2015. Web. 6 Mar 2016.
