Christmas is over and it is time to take stock (for those who want) of what happened in them.
For my part I want to comment on two things. The first is that I can assure you that my son has received more toys than his mind and living space can manage according to how abandoned some of them are and for the second I want to relate a reflection (totally personal and transferable) regarding the reception and opening of gifts that I have made these holidays.
I got the fly behind my ear on day 25 and on day 6 I confirmed it. At the time of opening my son Jon's gifts, almost three years old, I surprised myself with a: "Oh it's pretty!" in the first gift I opened (Jon gives them to me to open them).
Then I showed Jon the gift and said: "Have you seen how cool?" to which he replied "cool!". He opened the gift, gave it three or four turns and returned it to me. There my mind did click. The nonverbal communication of my son did not match the verbal and with his act of return he showed me his true feeling.
He had told me “how cool” simply and simply because I had told him it seemed cool, not because he really thought about it.
We continued to open presents and decided to contemplate the scene without further ado. Every time I opened one my parents, my brothers and / or my wife exclaimed "ohhh, how beautiful!", "And look, it opens here and there is more", "ohhhh, and you can do this and this other !! ”all with a theatrical voice and overwhelmed enthusiasm.
Jon responded to all this with a prejudiced smile (before the trial), that is, before he knew if it brought him happiness, in the same way that he had told me “how cool” without being clear yet if he liked or even what It was what he had to like.
Then I thought why do we do this? With each “how cool” or with each “oh, how beautiful!” Are we not trying to transfer our often hypocritical behavior to our children before people who give us things?
Expressing our pleasure with the gifts we like is logical, but anticipating the opinion of the children and magnifying it in an exaggerated way to try to make them think the same or the less they express the same, even though they may not think the same, is it not? Is that a way to teach them to lie? Is it not, in addition, a way to extol the material and inanimate objects that come into our lives to infinity and beyond? Is not that educate in a certain way in consumerism?
Children imitate us in a lot of things and I (personally) prefer, starting today, to wait for my son to judge if he likes something or not and just say: "Look Jon, for you" and "Thanks for the gift" .
In this way I do not intervene in the opinion of my son and show my gratitude to the person who gives, so my son will learn to thank the gifts without the need to lie (or so I think). I think a "thank you, but I don't like it" is better than a "thank you, I love it" (but I don't like it).
What are you saying? Do you see him the same as me or will I be becoming paranoid?
By the way, yesterday they brought me a package that I had ordered (printer ink). Jon saw it and must have thought it was a gift because he wanted us to open it right away. I had never done it with any package, but it's normal, two days ago He learned to value excessively everything that comes hidden in paperWe adults teach him to do it.
Illustration | Armando Bastida
In Babies and more | The spiral of Christmas lies, parents lie to our children once a day
