Some weeks ago, one of the mummies I met on Facebook who is a proprietress contacted me to ask for permission to publish one of my articles in the school’s magazine (You can read the article HERE)
Coincidentally, just a few weeks after that I was in a secondary school to fellowship with the students on a Sunday morning. One of the girls that asked to speak with me after the ministration told me how sad she was. She said she had low self-esteem (her words). She told me that her classmates make fun of her because she was poor with spellings. Amazingly, this same girl was the class monitor for her class. And I sure know they don’t make dullards class monitors. She was good with other things in school but a singular weakness was greatly capitalized on.
I did all I could to encourage her to believe in herself and never to think of herself as a failure. I told her to focus on her strengths too. I made her realize that even if she came last in class, it still didn’t make her a failure. It just tells her that she needs to put in more effort.
Gladly, she left feeling relieved.
You see, parents have a lot to do with instilling the right attitude in their children.
Parents need to show their children the right lens through which they should view life. We need to make them realise that they are wonderfully and fearfully made by God and that they are not less human because they are not performing as well as their counterparts.
In the same vein, they need to learn never to look down on anyone because they seem to be doing better than they are.
Teach them what success really means. Real success is not earned by comparing your achievements with others. It is all about fulfilling God’s purpose for you. You’re a success when you live up to God’s expectations of you; not man’s.
They should strive for excellence in being the best version of themselves and not wanting to be someone else. They can learn excellent virtues from others. And there is nothing bad in them allowing themselves to be motivated by the successes of others.
However, they must be trained never to lose their identity while in the pursuance of excellence. They need to embrace and appreciate their uniqueness.
When they ‘win’, they must thank God for the grace to win.
And when they ‘lose’, let them embrace their loss with dignity as they believe that it can only get better with the help of God and due diligence.
May God bless our children!
Photo credit : thestar
