Culture Lesson #2: Parenting

Cultural lessons play out in our life on an almost daily basis.  Often I am not surprised by small differences and even some of the bigger differences aren't bad.  It's just different. The food is different but I like it (especially dumplings and beef noodles- yum!). The language is different and difficult to learn but it's a fun challenge. Sometimes people can be seen as pushy but I prefer to think of them as eager to provide advice, wanted or otherwise.

Jeff and I are involved in a faith-based parenting class to meet more local people.  We also thought it would be a great idea to provide some new insight in managing a three-year old who hits her sister because in her words "it makes me happy" and an emerging toddler who has taken to throwing herself on the ground when not wanting to do something.

During our first class, as we discussed parenting methods it quickly became a culture lesson for Jeff and I.  Most parent's number one struggle was dealing with parenting-by-shame.  Basically, a child is repeatedly and consistently admonished for not being the best at all things at all times.  That is how most people were raised and the only way most know to raise their children.  This method is so prevalent that teachers will even prepare a class listing of everyone's grades so that the lower-performing students are shamed into performing better.  Parents push their children into the best schools and compare their children with others and with each other.  By the time a child has entered middle school all youthful fun and games has been replaced with extra tutoring sessions after school.  A typical 7th graders spends the entire day and evening studying and doing extra homework. And even if a student does do well they are shamed for not doing better. It is never enough.

The worse part is that oftentimes parents push so hard not because they want the best for the child but because once their child is older they are expected to care for the aging parent.  In a sense the child is expected to "repay" the loan of a good education by providing for the parents in old age.  In its ugliest form some parents feel that if they push the child to do better, then the parent will have a better retirement essentially.

Jeff and I listened to the other parents in the class struggling between wanting to raise their children in a loving manner yet not knowing how to help their children succeed without comparison and shame.  We recognized the need all the more clearly for good examples of well-balanced families who know how to have fun yet are still able to succeed.

It seems a humbling task to raise children when others are watching your example.  I was reminded of a story my grandmother told me about always storing her cast-iron skillet in the oven.  Her mother had always kept her skillet in the oven and my grandmother did the same and so on.  Noone ever knew why the cast-iron skillet was supposed to be kept in the oven.  One day she asked her mother why the skillet is always stored in the oven and my great-grandmother replied "because there was no room for it anywhere else in the kitchen."

"Lord, may others see my warts as areas to grow and not as an example to follow."