Whether you are a parent, a teacher, a doctor, a community leader; all of us want the best for the children around us. And from the moment I held each one of my children in that hospital bed; I not only wanted the best for them and was willing to do anything to ensure that, but I also made sure everything I did myself would put them first. Family has always been a number one priority in my life; especially my children.

In fact, my daughter and I still laugh today about how I was the ‘abnormal’ soccer mom because I was the one racing out onto the field with three phones, still in my high heels coming from a board meeting, and then proceeded to coach my kids’ soccer teams running up and down right alongside all of the kids. Let’s face it; it definitely amused the kids on the team that Mrs. Georgia had a different uniform on than usual 🙂 I did this not to get laughs, definitely not to embarrass my own children, but to show them that no matter what mommy was never too busy for them; they were always #1, I was always proud of them, and ultimately they were my inspiration to be a better person each day. I not only would show this to them but I wanted to make sure I told them as well.

But was that helping to lift them up OR was I adding unnecessary pressure on them? 

When you think about it, from the moment children are born; they have enormous pressure on them. Many of us have either heard jokes or said the jokes ourselves that ‘we only wish all we had to do was be a baby; to only have to worry about eating, pooping, and sleeping.’ But let’s look at it from a baby’s potential point of view.

First, the baby is forced out whether they want to be or not. Forced from a womb where they grew on their own, ate on their own when they wanted, played when they wanted, slept when they wanted, and stayed cozy-warm…you get the idea. Then BOOM-they are delivered into our world! They come out and they are cold; they immediately have a swarm of strangers grabbing at them, cleaning them, poking at them with  strange instruments every few minutes, wrapping them in unknown fabrics that although we may feel are soft, the baby has never felt a blanket before and now their hands, arms, and legs are ‘swaddled’ together tightly and unable to move about freely. Then their heads are pushed into a hat and finally handed over to at least the person they are accustomed to smelling and hearing; their parent(s). All of that in just the first 15 minutes of their life. But now, they have to try to communicate when they need to eat, when they need to be held, when they need to be cleaned, and when they need to sleep. We may think it is a disruption, at times, to our schedules but remember they did it independently, on their own, when they wanted to, in the womb for 9 months and now THEY are the ones to have to rely on US for these needs. Whew!

Moving on; we start to gauge, almost immediately, when the baby will roll over, crawl, walk, talk, run – always comparing them to when our parents told us at what point WE did these things as a baby. OR we compare them when we take them into the doctor for their check-ups against charts and compare them to other babies; other people. All from the very beginning.

Then the school age years begin. But today school age years begin long before the previous, traditional, Kindergarten. You have ‘baby classes, toddler classes, and Pre-K’ all designed to “prepare” them for what is supposed to be THE preparation for school…Kindergarten, remember? Then we add sports on, sometimes before they are even able to run. Everything from swimming, dance, karate, soccer, softball, ice skating, riding dirt bikes, to even weight lifting – ALL under the age of 5! Feeling a little overwhelmed yet because I am overwhelmed for them just typing this and I have already gone through it with my three children!

If all of that was not enough pressure, they will continue life through their elementary, middle school, and high school years, continuing to add additional pressure of more intense classes, homework, friends, peer pressure like never before, social media, bullying, more sports, hormones, consistent placement tests, trying to plan their entire future beyond high school and getting into college before they have even finished their middle school careers, and all while trying to fit in,

FIND THEMSELVES, DETERMINE WHO THEY ARE, and don’t forget ‘PLEASE’ US.

Because we have made them our world, our #1 priority, our inspiration. We have used them to drive US to be better every day of OUR lives and claim it is ‘FOR’ them. But this is where we must ask ourselves; is it truly ‘FOR’ them or for US?

Of course we want to be better people everyday, that is crucial and we should always strive to be a better version of ourselves each day than we were the day before. But that should be done BY us, FOR us; not for anyone else. Not even for our children. Why? Because do THEY really need the pressure of OUR own happiness, our own personal growth, to be put on them? To even be remotely their responsibility? Don’t they have enough pressure already on them?

We want them to grow, we want them to be the best version of themselves FOR themselves but let’s SHOW them HOW to do that by doing it ourselves FOR ourselves.

Show them how to find the tools that THEY need, that suit THEM; understanding it may not be the same things or ways that work for us. Show them, just as they were once independent at the very beginning, they have the power to be independent again and we trust that they can be. Encourage them and know you can never encourage them enough. Statistically; for every 1 word of encouragement they hear, they hear SEVEN words of discouragement. Words pushing them down; not lifting them up. So, the least we can do as parents, as teachers, as leaders of our youth is to relieve some of the unnecessary pressure and focus on empowering them instead. They will always be priorities in our lives but WE must be our 1st priority in our own life. Lead them by showing them that encouragement, empowerment and strength may be used to conquer the pressures they face everyday – as they are young and old.