Thursday, September 13, 2012

Parenting And The Bell Curve


My daughter pushes herself hard. She has to be the best in her class, on her homework, in her picture taking and her environment. Tonight found her stressed, tired and unfocused. Her mother pushes her to excel sometimes beyond what is reasonable. I have Type A tendencies as well and suspect that they may also be imparted into my daughters world view. We relate to our environment molded in part by the example of our parents. There is no escape from that.

We are raised by, at best, two imperfect parents. On a typical Bell Curve most parents fall somewhere near the middle average. Others miss the mark by small deviations or come near to falling off the curve. Then as teenagers we look at the world and try to process it so that it makes some sense. We process all this data post puberty with little information and less experience.

We are fortunate if our parents raised us from the apex of the Bell Curve or if they had healthy teaching from the church or the community. If our family was crazy dysfunctional the initial framework we choose will be unsteady and easily shaken. Talking to my daughter tonight I tried to provide some reliable information framed in stability and sanity. I told her to not stress out, see the big picture and get some rest. I’m not certain if she heard any of it. So I say the same words to myself and try to listen; don’t stress, see the big picture and get some rest.

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