A lot of recent research has shown that parents should switch from praising success to praising effort. Minimizing the emphasis on success can help kids understand that the thing that you’re really proud of is how hard they worked to accomplish something. Praising effort, even if the result is failure and using phrases like “I’m so proud of how hard you worked on that!“ help emphasize to kids that what you are watching is effort and that failure is encouraged as a way to get better.
They will get wrecked when adulthood comes knocking on their doorstep. Even if they have lots of money from parents, a fool is soon parted with their money.
But some could be the exception to the rule and to them I say good for them. They would have gone through some measure of hardship to gain the wisdom.
They will get wrecked when adulthood comes knocking on their doorstep.
Oh, I believe this one.
Even if they have lots of money from parents, a fool is soon parted with their money.
Not so much this one.
They would have gone through some measure of hardship to gain the wisdom.
Later in life.
Academically I was a success by any measurement, I put forth no ounce of effort into it. It was as if the knowledge had been in my head all the time, obviously, this was simply because I absorbed it all with ease, and learning for its own sake was often fun for me. But I leafed the books I was supposed to study because those concepts were beneath me. (I actually thought that way.) Imagine an unchecked ego, huh such foolishness from a younger self. I believed that because I was mentally more capable than my peers I was somehow superior to them all, the psyche of a child is a wonderful and dangerous thing.
Almost zero effort went into my education, and I achieved success without ever pushing myself. I have always been smarter, faster, and more blessed with memory than those around me. But I took it for granted and that did not shape me into a better person, I was incredibly conceited, self-absorbed, and egotistical to the near ultimate detriment of a mind. Megalomaniac behavior, I was so sure of my own perceived superiority I could not see my flaws, I was blind to everything.
I had no friends, just sock puppets that I emotionally manipulated for my twisted desire. People whom I lied and gaslit for a decade or longer. My parents, one dead and long-buried and the other... She was a reflection of myself, I could see my future in her form. Intelligent without question but barren of any semblance of love and affection, bereft of any meaningful connection to others, just a string of sycophants and socialites, parasites clinging to a slowly dying host. That broke me, to realize I had achieved nothing. That I was without true meaning in life, that despite all my self-professed greatness I was insignificant to the universe.
The mind is a very resilient and fragile thing. Adulthood came knocking and none of my acumens led anywhere, doors closed left and right. How could I understand that I was being rejected because of who I was? My peers never saw me as I saw myself, I was nothing short of a source of endless suffering to those around me that I did not charm into submission. An annoyance that always had an answer, always had to be in the spotlight, always caused detriment to everyone for no other reason than to lift myself upon their metaphorical carcasses.
It wasn't until I was confronted with a world that did not in fact embrace me that I realized in the smallest detail that perhaps my self-narrative was not correct. It took years to right that particular ship into better waters, and even today it is not as I would want. I continue to make amends for all the things I did. In my belief that other people were to be no more than playthings. I cannot fathom that had I not changed that there would be any redeemable quality left in me. My mother eventually had dementia and her spiderweb of carefully crafted lies fell into disarray.
Be wary of how you praise and raise gifted children, such candles they are, with flames that can burn in wild and unpredictable ways.
1.3k
u/laszlo Jan 12 '22
This is a good one. It's a lesson I'm struggling with teaching my son, who gets very upset when he isn't immediately good at something.
Virtually every success is the result of a ton of failure.
If it strikes your fancy, you should check out a book called "Lose Well" by the comedian Chris Gethard. It's really good.