I’ve walked on this earth for close to half a century.  During these five decades, I’ve had two periods of exponential personal growth, when I saw myself going through confusion, struggle, exploration and pain, but emerging on the other end of the tunnel wiser and happier.

One was the four years of college.  I grew up in a high stress environment with strict discipline and high expectations.  I was an extremely stressed-out kid but did not realize it at the time.  I started my college life without a healthy self-identity.  But slowly and gradually,  through learning, reading, making friends, falling in love, breaking up, making mistakes, getting recognition, I discovered a whole new person that lived in that 1.6 meter frame.

The other one was the last two years, thanks to my daughter.

I came to parenthood within my 40s.  You would think I was so emotionally and intellectually ready I could glide into being a perfect mom with ease.  Not so.  Parenting is not a job you can get pre-trained.  You never know what it’s like to be a parent until you become one.  When I was baby proofing the house and waiting for my daughter’s arrival with excitement, my idea of parenting was me reading in the couch next to her sleeping in the crib.

Then Ella arrived.  For the next 15 months, I could not tell the difference between night and day.  Reading?  I could not even tell you how many letters there are in the alphabet.  I eventually had to hire a sleeping consultant to teach me train her to sleep.  But I survived, and even went through the terrible 2 without too much upheaval.

But things started to change when Ella was getting older.  I watched in disbelief the behaviors she started to display, the exact behaviors that I have tried to avoid in her:  low self confidence and independence, lack of self discipline, and easily getting upset and throwing tantrums. 

I may not always maintain a perfect balance between being strict and giving her enough space to explore, but I have been very conscious and intent on cultivating confidence and discipline in her.  What happened?  What did I do wrong?

I started looking for help and clues.  I read Jane Nelson’s Positive Discipline.  I studied Children’s skill training approach originated from Finland.  I turned to online parenting classes, both Chinese and English.  Somewhere along the way, something hit me, and hit me hard.  I looked myself and looked at my husband.  Suddenly I saw what happened, and I saw it crystal clear.

I saw our high expectations, our criticism, our impatience, our anger, and our overly instructive tendency.  I saw how all these have shaped her.  Her behavior is just the extension of our behavior.  It is really not my daughter that needs to change, it’s me.

Children are a blank sheet of paper when they are born.  Everything you say, every gesture you make, every tone you use, every approval, every criticism, every shouting will leave a mark on that paper.  We are the painters.  We created the painting.

Too often, we as parents end up planting the seeds of hurt and harm all in the name of discipline.  This hurt and harm, if not corrected on time, will eventually grow into behavioral problems and emotional problems down the road.

I forgot where I read this or who said it, but here is what especially jolted me:

"When you yell at your children, they will not stop loving you, but they will stop loving themselves.”

“Your language creates their future.”

Once you realize the weight of responsibility and power you hold in shaping your children’s future, it is not too that difficult to make changes.  In fact, there is really no other way.

As I made efforts in changing my own behavior and learning to manage my own expectations and emotions, something miraculous happened.  Ella started to change, slowly, without me telling her.  She even made the comment the other day: mom, you don’t get upset with me any more when I make mistakes with piano.  I smiled.

Parenting is the hardest but the most important job in the world.  Yet you need a certificate to become an electrician, but nothing to become a parent.  And babies don’t come with operation manuals.  We have no other choice but to constantly learn, change and grow, for them, and also for ourselves.

Now I understand why people say, children are this universe’s gift to you, and they are meant to be your teacher and guru.

Things are not perfect.  Parenting is still full of challenges for me, even on a good day.  But I’m glad I woke up.

Here I want to share some graphs from “Gao Tu Class”.  We can all use a little more parenting wisdom.