Honoring the YES and NO of Children

Do you remember what it was like to be five years old?
To trust yourself and to clearly know what you did and didn’t want?…

As children, most of us are incredibly aware and connected, both to our own essence and being, to our likes and dislikes to our YES and our NO. We generally come to life with confidence, trust and enthusiasm. Even if we’re timid or shy we at least a trust in ourselves and what is true for us,  we know what we like and dislike, what we do and don’t want. We don’t even know to question it.

We train children out of trusting themselves…

Over time though, we start to lose that. Why? Because it is trained out of us. Have you noticed how often and in how many ways we say NO to children? NO to their expressions… no to their natural exuberance, curiosity and way of being? No to their likes or dislike even. How much we require them, on a fairly constant basis to adapt to the adult agenda and way of being? How we override their preferences, their sense of things to insert our own? How much we make children wrong for what they feel, what they want, what they know?

There are so many places and so many ways that we override children, don’t respect their YES and their NO that I hesitate to give examples, and yet, I think it would be helpful to give a few:

• Some adult wants to give your child a hug or a kiss, but your child pulls away. So often we override this and force the child to engage anyway even though they are uncomfortable and don’t respect their boundary or NO, spoken or unspoken
• Your child is in a conflict with another child. You tell your child to “Say your sorry” even though the child is not feeling at all sorry… or to say any other thing the child does not actually feel or want to communicate
• Your child decides they are done eating or don’t want any more of what they are eating. You coax,  encourage and even bribe or threaten your child until they eat what you have decided they must eat
• You give the child the message that you HAVE TO, regardless of how you feel, or what your sense is or how scared you are or how much you protest. This is totally overriding the child’s own sense and their trust in their YES and NO.

Any time we  impose our will other than for protection from immanent danger, and a child has a different desire or sense about things that we don’t honor, engage or listen to we are overriding their sense and not honoring their YES and their NO.

What happens when we really listen to the YES and NO of children and engage with what they are sharing?

I could go on, but I hope you’re getting the picture. This is not to say that you give in to ever protest a child makes, but that you bother to engage it and understand their perspective and what might be underneath it. Just like all of us, they are acting out of some need they are trying to meet, an expression to align them with life and the truth of their being.  If children know they are considered, if they know they have a voice, have their YES and NO  honored and respected, then they don’t need to put up the same resistance and protest. They can relax and trust that their needs and perspectives knowing they matter and are being considered.

I’m not just speaking ideology and rhetoric here either. I’ve seen it happen.  I see it happen when I take the time to hear and listen to children. When they know I will hear them, when I am going to get what is going on for them and do my best to support and help them they visibly relax and settle. Families I know who engage their children this way also experience far fewer power struggles and tantrums because the children know they will be heard and that who they are and what they want matters.

Stepping into the world of children and hearing and honoring their perspectives

So what if we were to really listen to children? What if we could get curious about their perspective, their opinions, their way of seeing things and not always require them to adapt to ours?

What if you could approach the children in your life from a place of curiosity and wonder? A place of not knowing… To attempt to step into their perspective for a while and see the world from their way of seeing? What if stepping into a child’s world could be like visiting a foreign country who’s cultures and customs are entirely unfamiliar? Where it requires you to re-orient and pay attention, to observe and adjust so that you can assimilate to the culture you are in ? What would you see, what would you discover then? How would you know this child and respond differently?

What if you were to listen to them when they say NO, and to really understand the why behind their expressions? What if you didn’t push and force them into doing things they don’t want to do, but could understand the source of their resistance? What if every expression your child makes is an important communication about their alignment with life, not a  badness, wrongness or problem? What if it is giving you a clue into their world, what might be going on with them and how to support them?

What else can you do to start more fully honoring the opinions, wishes and perspectives of the children in your life? How can you more fully honor and engage their YES and their NO, helping them cultivate full trust in themselves and know that their perspectives and who they are truly matter?

Please share your thoughts, ideas and stories below!