When She Grows Up

It has been an interesting few months filled with ups, downs, and to-be-continueds. Such is life, there will always be challenges and obstacles to overcome. I never expected child-rearing; however, to be something I needed to constantly work hard and improve upon.

Previously, raising kids has always come intuitively. I didn't think about how I wanted to raise my kids or how to parent them. I just did. Over the past three years, however, I have noticed myself become increasingly over-concerned with my daughter's education. So much so that I have started stressing my 4th grader into tears over schoolwork, more specifically math. Perhaps it's because I believe the higher success in math translates to a higher success-rate in other subjects inevitably meaning a higher success-rate in life. Or perhaps I have gotten myself caught up in an entirely different rat race of life.

I have somehow enlisted myself into a small yet overwhelming demographic of parents who believe school grades is more important than living life itself. I have become so obsessed with the idea that my child "needs" to be a successful top engineer or Nobel prize winner in order to achieve happiness later in life, that I have essentially started robbing her of happiness as a child.

It has dawned on my this morning, that my daughter is not an idiot. She may not be a easy straight A student, but she is learning and is easily an A- student. She may not become an in-demand top Google engineer, but that is ok. She doesn't want to be. She does, however, want to be a doctor or lawyer. Possibly a famous singer.

So instead of pushing her (and myself) into misery now, I will try and help her gain the tools she needs in order to become the person she wants to be. I will listen to what makes her happy and assist her in making right decision regarding them. I promise to make her childhood enjoyable since she has the rest of her adulthood to be miserable, if she so chooses.

My daughter is a star in the sky. She is not a planet nor a moon. And when she grows up, I want her to shine at HER brightest potential, not mine.

Grant me the observation to identify her strengths, knowledge to teach her the way, and patience to allow her to walk her own path.