5 minute read
Lessons Learned from Kids
lessons learned from the kids
Parents are always teaching and guiding children through their lives. We can easily fall into the rut of simply seeing the adult as teacher and the child as learner. But what if we were to flip that? What if we adults pause for a moment and realize children actually have quite a lot to teach us too? International best-selling author Bryant McGill says, “Our children can be our greatest teachers if we are humble enough to receive their lessons.” Whether we are 5 or 95, we are never too young to learn ... and learning from children can be healthy for us “old” folks!
Get active. without stopping to pick it up and smell it. They can’t help but see
If you watch, you know children are constantly active. Do a bird fly by and get excited. They see mud and have to jump in they walk to the mailbox? Nope. They skip or run. Our toddler it! If there is a pile of leaves, they have to run through it or kick runs everywhere, even if it’s just to his room for a clean pair of their feet in it. I guess it’s the little things they pick up on that they underwear! stop and appreciate, which makes us stop and reevaluate what’s can benefit from paying more attention to what’s happening right important to us.”
Embrace getting older.
Adults groan and roll their eyes when their birthdays come Keep a sense of wonder and curiosity. around. Some say it is just another day. Some pretend it isn’t “One time when I was outside with my son, he said, ‘Mom, happening. But children? Children tell everyone, including look. It’s like the sun is playing peek a boo with the clouds.’ I had strangers, about their birthday or when it is coming. Our never thought of the sun and clouds like that before but wrote daughter recently celebrated her sixth it down so I’d remember it,” says birthday and was so excited she got up “You make me feel like the world is much Danielle, an Olathe mom of three. at 3:00 in the morning to whisper to me more beautiful, more fun, more interesting “Oftentimes we are so busy looking that it was her birthday and there were and less complicated than I sometimes think. down and running here and there we streamers on her door. When is the last I know that your love is sincere, just like forget to look up and remember what time you shared that much excitement your words, which sometimes don’t make God has created and all the beauty over your own birthday?! sense, but at the same time make all the there really is in this world, even sense in the world. You teach me to see when it doesn’t feel like it.” Be creative. everything through different eyes, eyes that
“My kids are so good at creating are transparent and sincere, that still aren’t Laugh. without any kind of agenda. They contaminated by the conventions and cliches Somewhere in the midst of raising never seem to think, ‘Is this useful? that society suffocates us with. With you, four young children, I feel like I Is this worth my time? Could I make everything is different, new, unexpected, lost my sense of fun and laughter. money from this?’ They just create art exciting! You live each moment intensely as Laughing bonds people together and because they enjoy creating art,” shares if it were your last, and that makes me feel can truly be the best medicine. Seek Stephanie, an Overland Park mom of renewed and alive.” out moments to laugh and have fun three. ~ from ExploringYourMind.com with your children. You’ll be glad
Be present.
Julie Gettings, a licensed clinical social worker at KC Parent- Love like there is no tomorrow. Child Interaction Therapy (KC PCIT), shares how being present “Kids have an unfiltered and genuine love that is so pure. Their is important: “Kids are so much better at living in the present love is true. Sometimes as adults, we hide from showing love like moment. They don’t yet have our adult tendencies to dwell on the this. It can make us feel vulnerable, and feeling vulnerable can past or worry about what will happen in the future—habits that be scary. Kids don’t have these same fears; they just love in big get in the way of really enjoying our lives. Kids have this amazing ways. There is nothing like the feeling I get when I see my niece ability to lose themselves in whatever it is they’re doing—playing, and nephew. Their love is genuine, and it’s the best feeling in the reading, riding a bike—whereas adults are more likely worrying world,” says Rebecca Chapin, positive behavior support specialist about a laundry list of things that need to be done. As adults we in Olathe. you did. now and letting go of our judgments about what we should be I often look at my own children, especially our youngest who doing. Multitasking is great, but not when it gets in the way of is 3, and am amazed at how simple things are, how pure joy is enjoying our life and what’s happening right in front of us.” found in the ordinary, and the wonderment of life for him. My 6-year-old skips around the house, runs everywhere she goes and Learn to say no. has endless amounts of energy and love to give. My 8-year-old
While our children love to exercise their right to say no, I can just grab art supplies and create something from nothing. My have to admit, this is something adults could use a life lesson in. 9-year-old has the best laugh (and always has since he was itty Many of us find ourselves overscheduled or saying yes to things bitty), especially if he is laughing about something inappropriate. we really shouldn’t do or can’t fit on the calendar. Sometimes less As I am writing this, I am struck with the realization that there is is more, so just say no! so much in each of them I can learn from and take with me as I tackle each new day.
Notice and be thankful for the small things.
Susie, a Bucyrus, KS, mom and grandma says, “Children Julie Collett writes from Overland Park, where many of these always see the beauty in everything. They can’t walk by a flower lessons she is constantly learning from her own four children!
