On this Mother´s Day (today here in Guate) I continue to reflect on what type of mother I pray and hope to be. I respect everyone´s right to be whatever kind of mother they want or can be, but that doesn´t mean I have to agree with all of them. So I love to learn from the best of every mother, but also want to try to avoid whatever I decide I don´t agree with or don´t think applies to Hannah. That is why I love mommy blogs! I have unlimited access to all kinds of mommy dos and don´ts. But even with all of that information, I don´t believe the saying that "Only a fool learns from his mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others" applies to motherhood. Being a good mother is subjective because every child is different, and what works for one may not work for another, so really the only way to learn what is best for Hannah is by trial and error... I´m okay with being a fool.
My biggest challenge: don´t let my personal issues turn me into a Tiger Mom. I am a "tiger cub", meaning my father (and in some degree also my mother) was a full on Tiger Dad. "Daddy, look I got an A- on my paper!" (she said excitedly after spending several sleepless nights working on it) "Why didn´t you get and A+?" (he said with a stern and disapproving look on his face). And that about sums up his parenting style. Growing up both of my parents worked from early morning to late at night, so my father would leave us extra "assignments" every day to avoid us kids "wasting" any free time left over after chores and homework on play. A typical assignment: "Today I want you to learn all of the capital cities and states of Africa, and in alphabetical order... I will quiz you when I get home". Let´s just say a tiger cub learns early on that his parent´s approval depends on personal sacrifice and unhappiness and eventually develops a full on "Have to Please, but am Never Good Enough" complex with an OCD twist that takes YEARS to overcome. I was successful, yes! I was an overachiever, yes! In fact, at age 18 I had accumulated a 1" binder full of accomplishments that my father could boast about (which btw I still have... but buried in one of the many boxes in my laundry room). Was I happy, no! Was I at peace, no! By that same age I had also barely made it out of a very self-destructive depression through the power of my personal faith and because my parents eased up on me around age 16 after seeing the emotional impact of all of the pressure they had put me under.
Was their parenting style bad? I can´t objectively say that, but I can say that it was bad for me. Like I said, I think you need to adapt your parenting style to your child´s personality and not the other way around. I was a very sensitive child and the impact of this parenting style on me was that it suffocated the charismatic, easygoing parts of my personality and augmented the insecure, perfectionist/OCD bits making Jessi very sad and miserable. I mastered my academic skills, but lost important social and emotional skills needed in the real world. Moving to Guate was God´s answer to my unsaid prayer "I want to be happy". It was here, away from the bubble my parents kept me in, in independence that I learned self reliance and confidence. Then I began to correlate my new-found confidence with invincibility and thinking I could do it all (that myth of perfect balance... perfect at everything... oh my OCD!). So another round of fateful circumstances led to much needed personal and spiritual growth that helped me subdue the last remnants of my above mentioned childhood complex and discover my Center.
Life is never perfect, but it has been my experience that the key to some measure of peace and happiness is finding your center so internal or external events won´t take you too far and/or keep you for too long from It. Besides, we are never truly in balance (even if your perfectionism convinces you it can be done) and if you try to be successful at everything, you´ll find that life is constantly stirring things up (s*&t happens, change is the only constant, and such is life) and it takes too much effort to have to keep adjusting the beam. Something eventually falls through the cracks and usually that something is You. Life Lesson: Don´t try to keep a perfect Balance (it´s quite impossible), Strive to be a Pendulum... flexible enough to swing freely with the wind or the jolts life gives you, but subject to a Restoring Force that gracefully brings you back to Center / Equilibrium to prepare for the next cycle.
I will encourage Hannah to work hard, be courageous, and patient in all of her endeavors, but regardless of whether she accomplishes or fails to accomplish, I will make sure she never loses sight of what truly matters: being grounded and centered, happy and at peace with herself and God (my Restoring Force, the one who helps me balance the weight and bear the brunt of it all).
A just weight and balance are the Lord´s: all the weights in the bag are his work. -Proverbs 16:11
Home Tiger Dad/Mom Wails of The Tiger Cub...
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