Teaching Our
Kids To Fail Early, Often, and Gracefully

By: Vicky Fish

  “Nurturing is the easy part. Need to talk? I’m all ears. Need help? Let me get my shoes on. Need money? Here’s my wallet. Giving my kids what they need is easy, with one exception. I have a hard time giving them the freedom to fail.”

 -         Claudia Quiggs, Illinois Public Radio Commentator
Executive Director, Baby Talk Inc.

Mother Bear

            One of the most stunning discoveries I have made as a mother is the fundamental instinct, which I call Mother Bear, to protect my children from pain, self-doubt and despair.  There have been moments - watching a joyful, bounding toddler go Splat! on his face on a sidewalk, holding a crying boy whose feelings have been repeatedly hurt by a another child on the playground, seeing an eager athlete wait (and wait) to get put in the game – when I am overcome by a powerful, physical instinct to protect, rescue and fight for my child.

            Evolutionarily speaking, the instinct to protect our children from harm is critical to the continuation of the species.   And, moreover, it is our duty as parents to keep our children safe.  However, the current generation of children may well be the most protected cohort of children in history. Neil Howe, historian and co-author of the book Generations, contends, “They came along at a time when we started re-valuing kids. During the '60s and '70s, the frontier of reproductive medicine was contraception…. During the '80s and beyond, it's been fertility and scouring the world to find orphan kids that we can adopt. The culture looked down on kids. Now it wants kids; it celebrates them." (As quoted on CBS, 60 Minutes, 9/4/2005.)

Harm versus Help

            However, despite parents’ best intentions and fears, we may be doing more harm than help for our children when we rush to their aid. As Dr. Mel Levine author of, Ready or Not, Here Comes Life (Simon and Schuster, 2005) says, "Parents feel as if they're holding onto a piece of Baccarat crystal or something that could somehow shatter at any point… Parents really have a sense their kids are fragile. And parents therefore are protecting them, inflating their egos. Massaging them, fighting their battles for them."  (CBS, 60 Minutes 9/4/2005).

In his book he says that we are depriving children of “the opportunity to learn the strategic skills of conflict resolution, stress management, negotiation and problem solving,” all of which are essential life skills. And, in fact, Levine contends that our kids may shatter, later in life.

            As parents we can be forgiven for wanting the best for our children, but sorting out what is actually best for our children is not easy. “We are confused about what we can actually protect our children from,” says Mary Brownlow, associate pastor and youth minister at the Norwich Congregational Church in Norwich, Vermont. She says we need to sort out what we must legitimately protect our children from and what we pretend we can protect them from.  “It is an illusion and a problem that we think we can protect them from failure,” she says. Moreover, life is going to be a succession of failures and successes. We are doing our children a disservice when we deprive them of opportunities to learn how to cope with this inevitability.

            “Kids should fail early and fail often in ways that are organically determined by environmental circumstances,” says Jan Scheiner, licensed clinical psychologist, Visiting Associate Professor of Psychological & Brain Sciences, Dartmouth College, and mother of two boys.  Sometimes they won’t get invited to a birthday party, or picked for a team, or they will do poorly on a test, whether or not they studied.  This provides us as parents, says Scheiner, with the opportunity to help our children assess the problem, come up with a plan to avoid the problem in the future or learn to accept that things will not always be in their control.

            Additionally, as children become older, part of our job is to get them to a place where they are able to make good decisions, to avoid truly harmful and perhaps permanent mistakes.  A few of the most terrifying mistakes for a parent are teen pregnancy, drinking and driving, stealing, drug use, and conforming to peer pressure in harmful ways, to name a few. 

Resilient Children = Competent Adults

            Resilient children are hopeful and possess high self worth, say Robert Brooks, Ph.D. and Sam Goldstein, Ph.D. (www.familytlc.net). Moreover, “They have developed the ability to solve problems and make decisions and thus are more likely to view mistakes, hardships and obstacles as challenges to confront rather than stressors to avoid.” 

            How can we help our children become resilient?

§         Be supportive and keep lines of communication open. “Making mistakes needs to be acceptable,” says Brownlow. We can’t act shocked, she adds, or our kids might not talk to us about these things.

§         Don’t always run interference.  Clearly, there are times when advocating or mediating for our children with a teacher or a coach or friend is necessary. There are times when we need to trouble shoot with our child and let them tackle the problem.

§         Help children recognize that mistakes are experiences from which to learn. “Emphasize that mistakes are not only accepted, but expected.” (www.familytlc.net)

§         Encourage problem solving.  This means that as parents we should not always tell our children what to do and how to do it. We need to engage them in the process.

§         Discipline in a way that promotes self-discipline and self-worth. Say Goldstein and Brooks, “This means being consistent but not rigid: knowing your children’s capabilities and not punishing them for unrealistic expectations, relying when possible on natural, logical consequences rather than arbitrary, punitive measures.”

§         Let go a little bit at a time, remaining vigilant, aware and open. Think ahead, says Mary Brownlow. Pay close attention to what they are doing, where they are going, who they are with. Remain aware and keep the ever fragile lines of communication open.

§         Accept your own mistakes and failures gracefully. Model for your children how to not only handle these inevitable mistakes and failures, but how to use each and every one of them as an opportunity to grow.

In The End

            Ultimately, if all goes well, my children will become adults. They will be making their own choices.  I don’t want to set them up for future failure by over protecting them now. I need to let them make mistakes and be there for them when that happens. In fact, maybe we should just take that word failure out of it all… it is a continuum, a journey, an evolution. And, believe me, I am learning in leaps and bounds along with them. I know that my “failures” as a parent are moments of intense introspection and offer huge growth for me, if I let myself see them in that light.  As Sister Corita Kent (artist, teacher and peace activist) wrote:

Love the moment. Flowers grow out of dark moments. Therefore, each moment is vital. It affects the whole. Life is a succession of such moments and to live each, is to succeed.

Vicky Fish lives in Vermont, is a freelance writer, a published short story writer, and the mother of three boys.