Mom 4 Biz

Communications – Influences on Perception via Self-Serving Bias in the Parent v. Teenager

By Jan Verhoeff

 Communicating with a teenager often ends in tears, because the reality you’re trying to force your teen to see is yours. Consider a different view…

Over the years, teenagers have been an important part of communications. Improvements in technology and growth in power and position have improved teenager’s ability to communicate demanding greater understanding on the part of adults. Teenagers no longer are willing to accept the age old “rules of communication”. They want greater control over their lives.

Should they have greater control?

The dance of parental control has been an art of communication for centuries, since men stopped living in caves and determined that children didn’t come of age until after puberty. Children live through those dastardly years of learning, and begin to struggle through teen years, attempting to gain independence from parental constraints. Parents love their children through the years of toddlerhood into puberty and tolerate the struggles of teen years, vying for power with gifts of technology, promises of freedom and echoes of wisdom attempting sheer survival.

At what point does freedom for the teenager cease to be a power struggle for parents?

Perspective plays a greater point of reference than we realize during these years. If you make an effort to see life through the teenager’s eyes, you’ll see the reality of their struggle for independence. The world ahead scares them, they have no basis for understanding it and this world is a scary place. They feel like they have to get out there fast and accomplish their goals, because it may not still be there next year. Each year takes so long to get through, they don’t realize those years speed up as time passes and in ten years they’ll be 49 years old. The foundational understanding of a teenager holds no compass for passing time. Independence is the force of their world, it’s what they’re working for, and it’s their only real desire.

Parents see a different view. They want their teenagers to enjoy the time allowed for youth because they know it was just ten years ago they were teenagers and those next ten years are going to pass by before they know it (even if it’s 40 years it passes too fast). Adult parents recognize the value of youth, because they feel as if it’s gone too soon. Parents want to protect their children from making mistakes, give them time to grow up before they have to make those difficult decisions, and hope their children will make better choices than they made themselves. Parental goals are not so much to control as they are to guide their children and encourage them.

The difference is perspective. Teenagers are looking forward. Parents are looking backward.

Get a grip on communication with your teenager, and learn how you can see through their eyes.

Single parent struggles come in all forms at http://mom4biz.com including solutions and ideas to share with your teenager.

© 2009 – http://janverhoeff.com

The Mom Biz is any Business where a Mom can stay home and work from home while raising children and still have enough income to feed the kids. The delightful aspect of a Mom Biz is the kids can work with her, no matter how old they are.

Even when my kids were toddlers, they had “jobs” in my home based business.

Toddlers can do such things as pick up before clients arrive. They can stay quiet and play at their tiny kid table in the corner while Mom has a client at her desk. They can help with “trash detail” and walk out to the trash with you when you take out the trash. They can be silent when the phone rings (yes, it does take training, but there are benefits). Children, even very young children can clear the clutter and help with house keeping chores.

By age two most any child can handle folding wash cloths while mom folds towels, etc. These are easy chores to do.

But more importantly, children can begin to learn the importance of “working” as a part of the family. Give them important things to do as soon as they’re ready. If you keep your checkbook on the computer anyway, allow the kids to balance the checkbook. You always know how much you have, based on the computer entries (which you do NOT take from the flap of the checkbook), but they learn the importance of managing money.

Is it a mess? Sometimes. Will they make mistakes? You have. Will they learn something? Of course they will. Learning is what it’s all about.

The Mom Biz gives mom the opportunity to teach children about running a business from the earliest days of their lives and allow them to step into the position of working without shocking their systems when they suddenly have to do things according to a boss. Kids should be working around home helping out with Mom’s Home Business from the time they can first take a step. They can do something of value.