This is parents week and my son asked me to write something. While writing, my mind went blank for couple of minutes and I started thinking of my role as a parent.
Before this, we are someone’s daughter or son, but, afterwards, we have to become this new child’s parent. This means we soon start expecting the same things that our parents used to expect from us.
In my home country, India, due to either heavy competition or a sense of insecurity, parents start planning out the future of the child from birth. We control what the child should eat, how much to eat, how to play, what to play, where to go to school and what to study.
Parents want their kids to be an obedient puppet, who will follow instructions without question. These parents aren’t bad people — they just want to fix everything in their kid’s lives.
But what a lot of parents don’t realize is that that style of parenting is really rough on their kids. Some children become rebellious, others follow through halfheartedly. Parents forget that their kids are also human and that they need their own space and freedom.
When my son Shreyas said he wanted to do sport management, a career path that is not as common in India, my husband and I accepted his choice. We knew it would be really difficult to convince other family members and the people around us, but we respected that Shreyas didn't want the same old conventional career paths like engineering, medicine or accounting.
That choice as a parent was difficult to make — sending him abroad for sport management and spending a huge amount of money to do so. Will he make it worth it or not was a huge question.
But, he proved us and all the others wrong. He progressed by leaps and bounds. He got good support from his university and his confidence increased.
I as a parent feel that we should guide kids to be better human beings and should leave their career decision to them. This generation is smart enough to choose their own path. They won’t be happy unless they follow their hearts.
Sometimes I feel proud of myself that yes, I learned from these mistakes and have grown as a parent. If there is a measurement of good parenting, it is your kids who prove it through their journey. And Shreyas is my measurement of parenting. Good or bad, I don't know, but we are very satisfied for having such a wonderful kid.