Difficult phase for any parent is when their children move to adulthood. Parents became restless with frequent parties, college trips, night-outs and late night dinners. In addition to all this, children don’t have clear future plan when transit into adulthood.
Current generation is no more the cashier, race jockeys, truck drivers or pilots that they wanted to be. It is obvious that parents will have little idea about their children’s ambitions and goals. In this article we will discuss, how to deal with kid’s transition to adulthood? What can we do to guide their children?
First thing is accepting the fact, that every child go through this phase in their life (excluding the most talented and brilliant ones) and most of the parents also go through various emotions when they realize that children lack an understanding to move into adulthood. Without making things clear, parents fill their minds with worst-case scenario & negative assumptions.
Another important thing is feeling insecure and dissatisfied. These emotions arise when we notice that other children are doing better compared our children and we tend to immediately take the blame on us for their failure & the lack of direction. Keep in mind that it is too early to take the blame on ourselves or on our children. These transitions days are happiest days and will never come back so try not to spoil their happiness. Do not judge them at this phase; failures are the stepping stones of success. Just have open communication, knows his/her dislikes and gradually pave the way which ever you feel is best for them and stop feeling guilty by comparing with peers.
Most common factor is to understand that it is normal for children at this phase to have less focus on one specific goal and to explore different opportunities. When they are in young age their emotions run high and have a solid impact so understand their likes & dislikes through transparent discussions.
We need to be active and discover about our children in this phase. Most of us set goals at this phase but there will be very few who achieve it. We would have later released that initial goals we set are not appropriate in the long run, whatever we are today it’s because of the experiences and opportunities we have gone through.
Core values that could pass on to our child which we have got from our parents are hard work, save more, spend little, being polite and leaving the rest to the fortune. For this generation we can also give our suggestions whether to upgrade to the latest iPhone and other gadgets. It all depends on the openness we share with our kids. We are not harming them by providing whatever they want as long as we feel they deserve it; of course it’s our personal choice. Be a parent that you want to be rather than being the parent that the society wants you to be.The transition phase into adulthood is all about change.
To summarize, never compare your child with others and highlight their failures but you can only guide them in this phase. Just try to share feelings and support them. At same time let them be on their own because you can’t always be there to help them. Without predicting the future, do the best you can as a parent and it is in their hands to turn out for the better opportunities.