It has struck me time and again how the genius within some of the children and youth I encounter will probably never be unearthed. So much is done for them, so much is given to them, so much focussed parenting, there’s no hunger (I don’t mean food) to be satisfied. If you want your child to discover and develop and use his or her latent genius you may want to:

• Stop solving every issue that comes his way for him. Lasting lessons are learned and skills are developed when children have real problems to solve.
• Allow “clean pain” – the kind that comes with growing up, making mistakes, and trying new things.
• Get out of the way so she can really explore new territories of thought and experience. It’s very likely your daughter will go “beyond” you and the earlier it starts, the better. Provide the platform; allow her to write the script.
• Allow him to be as different and unusual as he wants. “Well-balanced” and well-rounded” people who “fit in” are very unlikely to do great things or at least discover new things. If you see your son being “sharp-edged” and investing a lot of time in a singular area of interest you may have a budding genius on your hands.

Posted on January 17, 2018 at 10:28 am in Boundaries, Children, Communication, Differentiation, Difficult Relationships   |  RSS feed |   Reply   |   Trackback URL