Why do parents need to be “mindful” when raising their child?

From your perspective, between a “perfect” family that has both parents and a family that has gone through severe damages, which family would you think will raise their child better?

Some people may think that families with both parents will have a better and more harmonious way of raising the kids, and it is commonly thought that educating children who grow up in a complete family is easier than educating a child who has seen breakups between their parents. However, in my opinion, the important roles of the father and mother still remain the same even though the two types of families are different, and “perfect” families can also have just as many problems in raising the child, and those problems mainly come from the lack of awareness when accompanying their child.

The example below is one of the cases that I have witnessed in person. The reason why I decided to share this story is because I want to raise more awareness from and provide support to those who are parents, and no matter if you are in a “perfect” family or not, just take a moment to take a good look at the story together!

One of my friend’s family had a teenage son who lived a fairly quiet life with almost no truly close friends around him. His parents (which included his biological father and his stepmother) were very worried when they saw him having a social life like that. They encouraged him to go out with friends more, to invite the friend group somewhere, or just simply to invite them over to their house and have some good meals together. However, no one accepted the boy’s invitation to hang out or spend time at his house, and if it were to happen, it would only be one or two times the boy got to hang out with a certain group of friends throughout all of his high school years. Realising that there were problems in their son’s lifestyle, during this one time when the parents went to see their son rehearsing for a play, both of them were showing their support by buying food and drinks for the whole drama group with a small hope of being able to successfully build up relationships between the boy and his friends.

When the show was over, his parents suggested he should invite his friends over to their house to have a pleasant meal together. He was beyond happy when hearing his parents’ proposal, but unfortunately, not a single person accepted the invitation even though no conflicts or attitudes were spotted between the boy and his friends during the drama preparation.

Although the parents wanted to find out what truly happened behind the reason why the boy kept locking himself up inside his room and reduced human interactions to the bare minimum, the parents did not really think of having a serious conversation with him about this issue as they thought they needed some more time to observe the situation. Then, one day, while cleaning up the boy’s room, the parents discovered a truth: their child stored heaps of LGBT-related-sexual pictures that were hidden around the room.

A few days later, both of them knew that there was nothing else they could do besides seriously open up with him about this matter. But even when being asked, the boy still insisted that when he grew up, he would still get married to a woman just like everyone else.

His parents continued to question him as to why he would do that, and he replied, “So I can be like other normal people!” He did not want to be different, or in other words, to be a “mutant” in the eyes of everyone. Because of this thought, his father and stepmother became more worried about the situation, which later urged them to share this problem with the boy’s biological mother to find a suitable solution. However, what was even more surprising was that his biological mother did not even accept that her child is a member of the LGBT community.

She considered her son’s sexual orientation as something being “broken”, something that is opposing nature, and repeatedly made the boy feel like he was wrong by allowing himself to be an LGBT person. Besides, the surrounding environment he was living in made him deny his true inner feelings, causing him to feel even less confident to live his life and express his true self.

Not stopping there, the story continued in a direction where the biological mother always talked about finding a separate apartment, buying a car, and providing everything that would make life more convenient for him after graduating from school. Because of that, he could no longer focus on studying. Even the teachers did not agree with this way of spoiling the kid. He was also taught that if he listened to his biological mother, he would have everything he ever wanted without having to put any effort in.

Just think about it, a teenager who was in the age of dreaming and building lots of ambitions and dreams, but was suddenly “wrapped” and “protected” in such a comfort zone would simply never want to come out of that safe zone again, right?

Therefore, the boy decided to return and live with his biological mother, even though before he had chosen to live with his father and stepmother. All was just because his mother said: “I am always here to take care of you and worry about you at any time. I can do anything for you, I will give you all the best.”

When a teenager heard those “sugar-coated promises” for his future, he would certainly, and temporarily, forget the true identity inside of him. At that time, his biological father and stepmother also agreed to let him move to his mother’s place. Although it was heartbreaking for them, they still respected and understood his decision, and at the same time forgave him for all the miseries he had caused them to undergo.

At that time, the biological mother barely showed any respect to the father and the stepmother, as she thought that it was a mistake to support the child living with their true sexual orientation and nature, which also caused them to not know what they should do next. Perhaps because the boy has been taken care of so well (sometimes even too well) that until now, he can barely even do the most fundamental things that a teenager can do, since almost everything has already been done by his mother.

It seems like a good point to end the boy’s story here. What I want to focus on discussing with you today is not about a child’s sexual orientation, but the role that “mindfulness” plays in the way parents educate their child.

Why does parenting require “mindfulness”? It is because only “awakened” and “mindful” parents are capable of never destroying the life or the future of your child just because of their selfish jealousy. They would never use the name of love to not give your child a chance to be independent or to ignore the values that other people have built for their child.

Or in the story above, the more obedient, polite, and well-behaved the teenage boy was, the more opposing and rebellious he had become after returning to live with his biological mother. But for the mom, along with her envious and rising ego, when seeing that she had not done a good job being a mom as the stepmother was, despite knowing that her actions were wrong, she still continued using physical attractions like money and sugar-coated promises to silently manipulated the boy and let him build up a nest for himself. When the boy finally trapped himself in that nest, he could feel safe and become careless about life,  and perhaps he would feel enough just staying in that nest every day.

The consequences even got to the point where the boy could not even finish such small personal daily duties of his. There was only one thing which he did “good”: surreptitiously dug in and searched for information and images related to his sexual orientation behind his biological mother’s back.

If only from the beginning, the biological mother had been “mindful” enough to control her ego, selfishness, and jealousy for the father and the stepmother, she would have seen the genuine care and love of those two people for her son. If she had carefully considered things wisely, the mother would have seen that what she was doing was just taking away her child’s right to experience life and to be himself.

If only the biological mother had known how to live with gratitude and sincere treasuring, she would have been able to communicate with the father and stepmother respectfully so that they all could raise their son together and help him develop normally and happily. She should not pretend to be friendly and polite while starting to inject the thought of considering the father and stepmother as “villains” into the boy’s brain.

With a lack of “mindfulness” and a lack of wisdom, the biological mother thought that strict parenting was not an efficient solution for her child, and she always tried to “make up” for what she thought the father and stepmother had not done for the boy. Moreover, she always made him feel that being a part of the LGBT community is truly unacceptable in the current society, causing him to live such a miserable life in secret.

Being mindful is truly important when we get married and start having children. Wise parents are those who can live peacefully with their big egos without using their children as tools to satisfy their own selfishness, or more dangerously, deprive the rights of the children to be their true selves due to their jealousy.

Perhaps you have already somehow predicted the consequences of the biological mother’s wrongful parenting? After a while of being with his biological mother, the boy became more spoiled without the mother knowing until it was too late to be noticed. Soon after, one day, the son had already understood what was wrong and returned to apologise to his father and stepmother. How pitiful when at that time, his body was already covered with wounds and scars throughout his life!

I want to tell this story in hope that any parents, no matter what position they are in, no matter whether they are in a complete or broken family, will consider educating their child with true love and tolerance, with no personal ego or jealousy being added into the process which shows that we do not care about our children’s development. Consequently, this is how we are pushing our child to stray further away from us, yet sometimes these steps carry many more unknown consequences that can affect our child’s life later on.

Therefore, if we are fully “mindful” at every moment, we will be able to control the ego and the envy of the “devil” deep down in our hearts. You will know how to let go of your ego to apologise to your children for not fulfilling your responsibilities, then with all the love and “mindfulness”, you promise you will always try to accompany them no matter who they are.

Let your child live by their true values and experiences, because they always have the values and qualities that are not sure to be found in others, and because they can never duplicate someone else’s features.

Please do not turn your child’s life into your own games or bets and manipulate them with your ego and selfishness!

Always try to stay awake and mindful at any time!

Much love,
Truly Inspired