Your kid that just will not sleep through the night. Your kid that just cannot seem to learn how to ride a bike. Your twenty-something that’s been drifting, that doesn’t seem to have any direction.

When will they figure it out? How much longer can this go on? Is it ever going to happen?

It’s been said that the market turns around when the last hopeful person finally gives up. And in life we often get the call we were expecting seconds after we finally accept that it was never going to come. So it can go with kids, whom we have to remember, all have their own timetables and journeys.

It’s when we finally give up, it’s when we start to resign ourselves to the idea that they just aren’t interested, that they ask for you to take the bike down from the garage rafters. One day, the swimming lessons you thought were a waste, click. It’s when you literally cannot go one more night without sleep that they suddenly decide to give it a rest. One day, they come out of their room having dressed themselves…or cleaned up after themselves because someone they care about is coming over. One day, as we said recently, they will figure out their major or their career path—everybody does.

There are some things that can’t be rushed. There are some things that do not respond well to pressure. There are some things we do not control as parents. So let’s back off a little. Let’s remember that a watched pot never boils—and moreover, our kids are not pots! They are human beings who resist when they are rushed and pressured, who resent parents who make them feel stupid or like failures, and who will inevitably figure things out…if we allow them to…and support them in doing so.