Friday, March 29, 2024


Self-Sufficiency: 4 Tips to Raising Stand-Up Adults from Birth.

September 26, 2015 by  
Filed under Motherhood, News, Opinion, Relationship Talk, Weekly Columns

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(ThySistas.com) While parenthood is a lifelong journey, childhood is for a limited time only. As a mother of a soon to be 13 year old daughter, I’ll be the first to admit that the gift of parenting is a blessing and trial in itself. We hold the lives of innocent children in our hands. We are to nurture, love, feed, clothe, protect, guide and uplift our seeds. We are their first teachers in life. It is us who makes decisions regarding our children’s education, religion and health habits. Our job is a big deal!

In the midst of parenting, we, as individuals must also continue to grow spiritually and emotionally. We must fulfill our purpose and mission in life as well. I hear many parents who speak on wanting to give their child everything they didn’t have in life. We focus more on the giving of material things than we do on giving our children purpose, strength and the skills to lead.

Today, we’re discussing FREE lessons and experiences we can give to our youth in the process of us evolving into even better parents & human beings.

1. Let Them Make Decisions. The majority of youth today are indecisive and look to others for help making decisions. Many youth seek the advice of their peers, feeling as though their parents or adults in general, do not understand where they are coming from. Most parents take to heart the notion that “mother knows best”. We believe that we know what is best for our children at all times, the downside is that this belief stems from experiences in which we feel we failed in our own lives on most levels. We advise our children based on the mistakes we feel we’ve made in life as if we can ‘get it right’ via their actions. Rarely do we sit down, listen to our youth and help them make a sound decision rather than telling them what to do or what we would do. Teaching our children how to think critically, put all options on the table and determine possible outcomes for each action is how we create leaders who are responsible enough to stand on their decision.

2. Share your Knowledge. Whatever skills you may have, whatever you have mastered in life, the experiences both wonderful and difficult, should be shared with your seed. We are in a relationship with our children, just as we are with our mates. You must put in time, energy and communicate effectively for the relationship to flourish. There is a disconnect between adults and youth within our community. Adults come off judgmental and oppressive while the youth come off reckless and weak minded, neither side takes the opportunity to explore the other. By communicating and sharing our knowledge and of course allowing our children to do the same, we create an air of openness, understanding and compassion. We begin to see one another as individuals rather than someone we possess, for example: my mother, my father, my child.

3. Teach them to question everything and everyone, you included. If you are seeking answers, asking questions is imperative. Sadly many of us parents shut our youth down when they ask questions. We see asking questions of why, how and what if as signs of defiance. Many of us feel disrespected, if not threatened, when we tell our children to do something and they ask us why. How so? Why is it easier to answer “because I said so” than it is to give a logical answer? For example, you tell your youth to clean their room and they ask why if it’s their room. How difficult is it to teach them about the importance of cleanliness? The goal is to raise self-sufficient adults, not blind followers who grow up to be immature adults with no understanding of why their room should be cleaned other than my mommy said so.

4. Have Fun! Teach your youth how to be light-hearted and to enjoy life. Most of us teach our youth that without money life is a struggle, life has no value and that happiness isn’t a possibility. Each time that your youth invites you to an event whether it’s a movie, skating, shopping, etc. and we respond in the negative stating that we don’t have any money we teach them that money is the ruler. Getting in the kitchen and making homemade pizzas or rearranging the living room to have a throwback movie night is free. Some of my best memories include listening to my grandmother, aunts and mother tell stories about the crazy things they did when they were younger. Go to the park, volunteer at a food bank. Teach your youth that there is more to life than chasing money.

Staff Writer; Dina Tuff

Connect with Mystic Philosopher & Inner Fitness Coach Dina Tuff @

The Magick Playhouse; http://dinatuff.blogspot.com/

Twitter; https://twitter.com/DinaTuff

Facebook; https://www.facebook.com/ClubMagick


Comments

4 Responses to “Self-Sufficiency: 4 Tips to Raising Stand-Up Adults from Birth.”
  1. Marque Anthony says:

    Self-sufficiency is a double edged sword. As a family and relationship counselor who has counseled thousands of women, I can say it can present a dilemma. Self-sufficiency is tied to independence but it is not the same thing. And independence can also be a bad or good thing. We are to be dependent on each other if we are married, largely because the roles are different and both man and woman were made to carry out different roles towards each other and the family. These roles have become blurred due to overbearing women, women with trust issues, irresponsible, broken or lazy men and homosexuality infecting and infesting the African American community. Independence can easily slip into a person becoming individualistic and developing an attitude that “I don’t need a man”. Well God says different.

    ALSO HERE IS FURTHER FOOD FOR THOUGHT:
    Today in this country African Americans want to blame everyone else for our problems instead of simply looking in the mirror. We want to blame the police for the very thing we do to each other on a much larger scale every week. We want to blame the school teachers when our children do not learn. We want to blame the white man for holding us down. We want to blame the government for failing to take care of us. We want to blame the system. We want to blame the devil. But what we do not want to do is face up to the reality of personal responsibility. And those things that were once valid reasons for our oppression have become one-sided excuses.

    In many cases the police are at fault. In many cases the teachers are not teaching as they should. In many other cases social programs have been set up as traps for us. Yes racism exists on many levels and yes there is a plan to oppress, subjugate and eventually destroy African Americans. But all that being said, we cannot and must not let things stop us. Nor must we continue to make them excuses which allow us to abdicate our personal responsibilities to ourselves, our children and our community.

    It is our African American parents who are letting their children roam the streets. It is our parents who are letting their children smoke weed, use drugs and hang out with the wrong people. It is our parents who are not checking homework or making sure the children go to school. It is the parents who are letting the children play violent video games like Grand Theft Auto, listen to degrading rap and hip hop trash like Nikki Minaj, Kanye West, Little Wayne and Rihanna. And as a result, the educators and police officers are having to confront what the parents will not. This, of course, is not true of all African American parents. But it is true of far too many. As a former detective, I saw it. As a family and relationship counselor, I confronted it. And as a parent, I speak out against these things.

    The African American community is faced with a highly implosive form of denial kept in place by blaming everybody else in order to avoid the mirror. These are excuses that keep us from ever getting to and resolving the root of our problems. Sometimes several participants are to blame for our problems, including us – yes us. In the case of Tamir Rice, for example, the police officer is to blame mostly but not solely. The officers were foolish to pull right up to a person they believed to be armed. The dispatch officer is also to blame. However, where were Tamir’s parents? Did they know where he was? Why was he out there in the Rec. Center alone? Why did they allow him to play with toy guns when guns are not toys? Obviously Tamir did not know what to do when the police came but that is all the more reason children should not have toy guns. Why did Tamir allegedly reach for the gun when confronted by police officers? Parents are responsible for our children, pure and simple.

    Before you attempt to tear apart this comment, sit back and think.

    Do I blame a child for doing what some foolish children do? No. Should he be able to play outside? Yes. But knowing what we adults know today, we have to admit there is more to it than that. And if we do not look at all sides of such issues, children like Tamir Rice who were obviously disturbed will slip through the cracks and more incidents will happen. The times of blindly sending our children outside to play without knowing what they are doing, where they are, who they are with and what they have must END NOW! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L366FP9oefQ

    Sandra Bland played a major role in her own incarceration for many reasons. If you want to know how she did, email me at brainstormonline@yahoo.com for specific details and laws.. That is the law in Texas, like it or not.

    Latausha Nedd got herself in a jam and that was totally her fault. Samuel Dubose attempted to drive off from the scene while stopped by a police officer. Eric Garner apparently did not understand that he could be detained because he resisted. None of these people should have ended up dead. But that does not mean they did not contribute to the problem. On the other hand, the deputy who threw the girl out of thee chair in school was solely at fault and should be prosecuted. The officers who let Freddie Gray were solely at fault and should go to jail. We need to look at all sides.

    Where are our protests, riots and marches when African Americans kill each other at an alarming rate every week? Where is our outrage when our children are incarcerated for things they did and things their parents never stopped them from doing? Where is our outrage when our children are having babies, smoking street weed laced with rat poison, feces and embalming fluid? Where is our anger when our young boys are saggin (niggas spelled backwards) and our young girls are dressing and acting like whores? As a whole, African Americans don’t even seem to be outraged when our girls think they are guys and our boys act like girls. Wake up!

    Do we expect more from the police, the school teachers, the “white” man and the government than we do from ourselves? The African American community expects and accepts too little from ourselves and expects too much from people and governmental systems who or which obviously do not care about us.

    Maybe that is the problem. And maybe we are afraid of what we see when we look in the mirror. Therefore we find it easier to simply blame it all on somebody else. And before you get mad at me, look in the mirror. I tell police officers the same thing and many of them listen. Are you listening? Wake up!

  2. Dina Deon says:

    Marque Anthony your presence is a double-ended sword! Who sent you? Everywhere I go, there YOU are, promoting your work. If you need assistance building your audience just ask, no need to advertise on EVERY piece I post

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