3 Damage Caused By Parental Obsession With Control

Many parents find it difficult to raise their children and to let them gradually take control of their lives. The goal of a good education is to convey the best values ​​and habits as children mature and prepare to be independent. But let’s not forget that the process must be gradual.

However, some parents, faced with fear of the dangers of the world, abuse paternal control to protect their children and quickly remove them from any source of risk, be it real or imagined. Fears of this type and the way to deal with them are linked to the education received at the time by the parents.

It is clear that the temptation to control children exists. After all, it is much easier to survive everyday life: it is not for nothing that they say “it is better to be safe than sorry”. But no one has ever said that education was an easy or comfortable affair, indeed: it is more difficult every day. Parents have to compete with an infinity of external agents that are beyond their control; however, developing an obsession with control is not the way to go, as we will explain shortly.

While a little bit of control is good, being obsessed with it is bad for children. Not only that: it is also a destructive attitude for parents, who carry an enormous weight, a great responsibility and, even worse, a great guilt on their shoulders.

An obsession with control can make your child rebellious

Rebellion is something almost natural, it is part of the process towards autonomy. However, there is a way and way to rebel: it is not the same thing to rebel against the world as against one’s parents; it is not the same thing to rebel against the system imposed by the state as against the rules of the house.

Children need a certain level of freedom. If you try to control all aspects of their life, they will claim their autonomy even more vehemently, in vain. If a parent undertakes to control their child’s games, the clothes he wears, the books he has to read, and the like, it will cause the child to rebel sooner or later.

It is evident that, as a parent, you need to supervise certain things and guide your child so that he or she makes coherent and appropriate decisions. But there is a big difference between this and imposing your criterion on him alone. Allow your child to make his own decisions and, if you disagree, ask him to argue for his choice. If you consider that this is a bad decision, guide him, help him choose better, consider the consequences of his conclusion, and let him suffer the repercussions, unless his health and safety are really at risk.

Their creativity will be limited

If you constantly monitor your kids and turn into their shadow, your kids are likely to be less creative. The fact that people as important as their parents do not allow them to make decisions will cause them to feel insecure and time will decide for them when there is no one to follow them.

If this doesn’t seem important to you, maybe it’s because you think creativity is useless or just for making beautiful drawings, writing amazing texts, or decorating your home nicely. In reality, being creative is much more than that.

Creativity is the ability to find different solutions to problems that arise, the ability to see those problems in perspective, in a different way. With creativity you can not only do great things, but you can also be great, very great, you can overcome problems and adversities and become who you really want to be. Do you want to deny this to your child?

Don’t tell him how things are done. Give it the opportunity to find a solution, to see the different ways to solve a problem, to reflect on it, to examine it. If he can fix it, what does it matter how he did it? The important thing is that he did it himself. Understand that children may be right from time to time and even enjoy a more advantageous point of view than yours.

Over-control will make your child nervous

For your child’s mind, over-control works like a tight cage that barely allows movement. Imagine yourself locked in a 5 square meter room from which you cannot leave, without knowing why.

How long would it take you to start walking anxiously across the room trying to get out? This is the anxiety your child experiences when you control him every minute of his day, when you organize every moment and leave no room for himself.

Don’t believe that you are in control just because you are feeding your perception of control. When the door opens and your child is old enough to walk through it, when he himself knocks it down, you will see that you had nothing under control, that the one who crosses that threshold is a nervous person, anxious to do everything. opposite of what you say, without the ability to decide coherently.