You’re just trying to get your point across. You’re just trying to teach them. You’re just trying to keep them safe.
But how do you think it feels? How do you think it feels to be them?
We talked recently about a haunting scene in Terrence Real’s must-read book Us: How Moving Relationships Beyond You and Me Creates More Love, Passion, and Understanding, about an imperious and cold father named Steve. Steve had struggled with empathy and with connecting to his kids, until one day, as he recounts, he was driving his young son home from a day of fun, when the boy started to get carsick. “He had his hand up to his mouth,” Steve says he saw when he looked back over his shoulder, “and goddamnit, he was holding in his own vomit because he was scared of me.” Admitting all this to his therapist brought Steve to tears. “I looked at my son, at the fear in his eyes. And I was appalled. I was appalled at myself.”
What Steve had in that moment was a flash of what it was like not just to be a kid, but to be his kid. To have to deal with his father’s temper and strictness. To have to deal with his father’s moods. And what he learned broke his heart and forced him to change.
It is so easy to forget what it’s like to be a kid. It’s so easy to miss how critical and harsh and scary we can be to them. It’s so easy to let our moods dictate our actions and words when we’re angry, or fed up, or exhausted.
Don’t wait for that moment. Don’t wait for them to be there in the back of the car, trying not to be sick, like Steve’s kid. Don’t wait for that flash of understanding when you realize they aren’t comfortable coming to you with a problem—that they’d sooner hide something from you than seek your help.
Reflect on your actions now. Take a good look at yourself, at your behavior towards your kids, at how it makes them feel. Do it while there is still time to change.
P.S. I highly recommend Terrence Real’s book Us: How Moving Relationships Beyond You and Me Creates More Love, Passion, and Understanding. Real is a marriage counselor who explores how our toxic culture of individualism hurts relationships. The same traits that might push you forward in your career, he explains in the book, hold you back from creating meaningful personal relationships. Us is easy to read with a lot of thoughtful, real-life takeaways that are good for everyone, whether you’re in a relationship or not.
