The Real Thing

I'm the type of person who likes to do things herself. I like to have things to do and I like to be responsible for doing them. I like the feeling of knowing that there are people who depend on me for important things like meals and clean clothing. I also like to feel that I can do other significant things that are valuable to other people. These qualities about myself are, I'm sure, in no way unusual. In fact, I would even go so far as to say that these feelings are a common need among human beings. I noticed early in my career as a mother that children are extremely keen about their independence and desires for significant work. It is parents who discourage these qualities in their children and it's usually because they don't understand that it is a need.

From the first moment a child realizes that there is such a thing as a kitchen and that there are important things going on in it, a child is curious and desirous to participate in the action and work of this most interesting place in his world. To him it is an adventure in exploration and discovery. The child, if allowed will spend hours working with and experimenting on the tools and ingredients in a kitchen. However, as a mother who was interested in things like 'clean', 'safe', 'tidy', and 'convenience' I found it very difficult to overcome my feelings of frustration over the child's natural curiosity and desire to work at something significant. Often I would try to shoo the children out of the kitchen and away from the tools of my trade so that I could keep order and feel that I was a good housekeeper. But the more I tried it, the worse I felt.

I have known children whose bedrooms looked like a mini Toys-R-Us. The toys are so thick and so deep that it would take a week just to shuffle through them all, let alone play with each one. They are usually Christmas gifts which quickly lose their appeal after about the first 24 hours. They then get piled with the rest of the next-to-new toys that will eventually find their way to a thrift store. Parents are under the mistaken belief that children NEED toys. Every advertisement about children tells us this untruth in the most convincing ways. Even children will demand toys, saying that they need them in order to be happy, content and feel loved.

Children need one thing: usefulness. You can give a child the most expensive toy on the market today and still they will play with it for a few hours and lose interest, the same as if you had purchased a dollar store junk toy. In my opinion, most toys are an insult to a child's intelligence. They assume that a child needs and desires to be entertained. But this is a false assumption. Children need to feel that what they are doing is important to the people around them. Just like you and I, they need to have a work that gives them those feelings of self-satisfaction that come only from doing important work well. Toys are merely a distraction from life. Children need real life, not distractions.

It was the look on my daughter's face when I tried to get her to play with her toys instead of help me in the kitchen that taught me the truth about children. She was hurt beyond words when I told her that I wanted her to go out of the kitchen and play with her toys. What I was really saying was, “I will do the important work here. You are just a child. You can play with toys. You are not important enough to do something real.” The look on her face let me know that this was the message I was sending. When I understood that, I decided to put aside my personal feelings of frustration over a little chaos and let my daughter help me in the kitchen with whatever I was doing, regardless of the mess or inconvenience. The result? Well, she now cooks wonderful meals for hundreds of people, loves cooking, feels significant and important in her life as well as mine and is a happy, well-adjusted adult. She feels confident that she can accomplish anything she puts her mind to and has made her parents proud of her accomplishments more times than we can count.

Was it worth the inconvenience and extra mess? What do you think?