The other day, my husband disciplined my oldest daughter for fake laughing. To be somewhat fair, she had already been warned several times that day. Even so, I still had the feeling he was being a little harsh and almost interjected. But then I thought about the struggles that I've had with trying to be perfect and decided this was just one of many lessons that we strongly believe our girls need to learn.
I think we need to really take a deep look at the type of praise and compliments we are giving our children. Are your children getting more praise for their finished product or their effort? Are we complimenting our children for thinking of others or for how they look.
When my sister was little, she was a flower girl in my cousin's wedding. She heard over and over that whole weekend "she's so cute." After being home for a few days, my mom overheard her looking in the mirror and saying to herself, "I'm cute, aren't I?" Now, at the time, we laughed and thought this was such a funny story. However, when I look at it now, I think of what a disservice those compliments were to her at such an impressionable age. None of those people meant any harm by what they were saying. But my young sister's takeaway from that weekend was that people placed value on her appearance more so than her behavior, communication, listening skills, or any other character trait.
I catch myself sometimes in the mornings when we are trying to get out the door telling my kids to go change because their clothes don't match. Or asking them to do something different with their hair. Most of the time I realized this was because I felt their appearance was a reflection on me as their parent. I had to let go of that. I also needed to realize that I was putting more emphasis on their appearance than I wanted to. So, yes, my kids may appear a bit thrown together most days. We wear crocs with socks and jeans always have holes in the knees. I'm learning to be ok with that. I would rather my children hear from me, and hopefully others, that they are brave, caring, hard-working, or creative then cute or pretty.
Back to the fake laugh. Why is that even such a big deal? To us, it's all just part of raising kids that value being real instead of perfect. You shouldn't change the sound of your laugh because you don't like your natural laugh. Similarly, you do not need to feel obligated to laugh at something that you do not understand or do not find funny just because someone else is expecting you to.
Be yourself - because that is really the most beautiful version of you that there is!
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