Respect and Honor -- A Parenting Breakthrough
"Turtle!" he called her.
So, for years I have wrestled with how these principles translate into a blueprint for parenting in my house, with my children, and with my husband. D. and I both come from traditional, authoritarian parenting backgrounds. We have a similar "default mode" of parenting, one that I usually do not think carries out the principles I have in my head, the philosophy that I so love. We have discussed, argued, and agreed to disagree. I have been accused of being too soft, "too respectful," of allowing my kids to control me. I have in turn done some accusing -- too domineering, too proud of your status as adult and even too disrespectful -- a word that to me is the ultimate insult! We grapple with the question of doing something different than what our parents did juxtaposed against the truth that they were good parents who raised good children. We respect our parents and praise them and at the same time want to change things. We have bumped up against each other in the fog of figuring this all out and contradicted each other and ourselves. This work is hard! We are so far from figuring it all out.
But at a fundamental level we both agree on this basic principle: we want to raise respectful children. We want to raise children who respect themselves and others and especially their parents, for this is not just "traditional" but is right. Respect for the child and the respect for the parent cannot exclude each other. Parents cannot forfeit their right to be respected for the sake of "freedom of the child." We have both seen this happen in other families. We do not believe that this is right.
So the question is: How do we ask for respect as parents without somehow treating the child as less deserving of respect than we are?
My children ask this question of me. All of them have in one way or another. I have always struggled, against my pride, yes, but with the truth, the command, that parents need to honored and obeyed in a special way, that we must ask this of our children, and yet this does not make us, or what we say, do, or need, greater than our children in the eyes of God.
On that day as I listened to the brewing altercation between Turtle and D., a thought came to me. It felt like a little gleam of light on a problem that had appearing dusky to me for so long. I had thought of a way I could explain this dilemma to myself and to my justice-loving daughter.
"And Daddy or any man would get up to give a seat to a woman. Would that be because a woman is better than a man? No, but it is because a woman has been given a special kind of work that a man has not been given: the work of being able to grow a baby in her body. This is a big, great work that a woman does and a man does not and so he honors her.
"Mommies and Daddies have been given a great work of teaching and raising their children. This is a big responsibility and a hard work that we have been given to do. Children do not have this work to do yet. Someday they may, but now they do not. Children honor their parents, not because parents are better than children, but because they see that their parents have a big work that takes alot of wisdom. Does that make sense?"
I looked at Turtle. Her tears had subsided into sniffles, and she nodded a little.
We all talked a little more about how we honor priests, bishops, the pope, the president, and even firefighters and soldiers because of the great responsibilities they have been given. I tried to use the word "honor" as what we give to someone with a "greater responsibility or work" than us, and to keep the word "respect" as something that we give to all people equally. Then we talked about how there is a certain more courteous way that we talk with people that we must honor that we may not need to use with our sisters or friends. The girls seemed to understand. (At least Turtle did. Rosebud had gotten a little derailed at the bus seating analogy -- "Whaa? Who do we stand up for on the bus??")
I am grateful for this discussion. I am grateful for this small breakthrough in myself and my parenting and how I see it and talk about it with my children. I know that there is still work I have to do to understand how this idea of honor and respect to all plays out. I still feel like D and I are forging a trail for which we do not have any clear map. But this step forward was a good one for our family.
"What?!" she snapped, sassy and sharp.
He turned with firmness and said, "Don't say 'what' when you talk to me! Its not respectful! Say 'yes.'"
She burst into tears. "It's not fair! It doesn't feel respectful to me, that you can say 'what' to me and I can't say 'what' to you! I want to be respected too!"
She is crying, yes. But she speaks her heart bravely.
I drew a deep breath from the kitchen and waited. Often a parent doesn't like to be challenged, or doesn't know how to respond. I could feel him bristling in the next room and a power struggle coming . . .
For a while in the earlier years of our marriage there was tension in our household, in our parenting and in ourselves when it came to the question of respect. Years before I had children, I fell in love with Maria Montessori's observations about the child. I came to believe whole-heartedly in her principle of respect, even reverence for the child. She persuasively calls for adults to know, love and serve the child, to recognize the deep spiritual and creative capacities of the child, to root out pride and anger in our relationships with them, to learn to cooperate and not control, teach and not correct, to honor the great work that the child is doing to construct himself. These calls are compelling to me. To D., what he understood of them initially sounded permissive and soft.
She burst into tears. "It's not fair! It doesn't feel respectful to me, that you can say 'what' to me and I can't say 'what' to you! I want to be respected too!"
She is crying, yes. But she speaks her heart bravely.
I drew a deep breath from the kitchen and waited. Often a parent doesn't like to be challenged, or doesn't know how to respond. I could feel him bristling in the next room and a power struggle coming . . .
For a while in the earlier years of our marriage there was tension in our household, in our parenting and in ourselves when it came to the question of respect. Years before I had children, I fell in love with Maria Montessori's observations about the child. I came to believe whole-heartedly in her principle of respect, even reverence for the child. She persuasively calls for adults to know, love and serve the child, to recognize the deep spiritual and creative capacities of the child, to root out pride and anger in our relationships with them, to learn to cooperate and not control, teach and not correct, to honor the great work that the child is doing to construct himself. These calls are compelling to me. To D., what he understood of them initially sounded permissive and soft.
So, for years I have wrestled with how these principles translate into a blueprint for parenting in my house, with my children, and with my husband. D. and I both come from traditional, authoritarian parenting backgrounds. We have a similar "default mode" of parenting, one that I usually do not think carries out the principles I have in my head, the philosophy that I so love. We have discussed, argued, and agreed to disagree. I have been accused of being too soft, "too respectful," of allowing my kids to control me. I have in turn done some accusing -- too domineering, too proud of your status as adult and even too disrespectful -- a word that to me is the ultimate insult! We grapple with the question of doing something different than what our parents did juxtaposed against the truth that they were good parents who raised good children. We respect our parents and praise them and at the same time want to change things. We have bumped up against each other in the fog of figuring this all out and contradicted each other and ourselves. This work is hard! We are so far from figuring it all out.
But at a fundamental level we both agree on this basic principle: we want to raise respectful children. We want to raise children who respect themselves and others and especially their parents, for this is not just "traditional" but is right. Respect for the child and the respect for the parent cannot exclude each other. Parents cannot forfeit their right to be respected for the sake of "freedom of the child." We have both seen this happen in other families. We do not believe that this is right.
So the question is: How do we ask for respect as parents without somehow treating the child as less deserving of respect than we are?
My children ask this question of me. All of them have in one way or another. I have always struggled, against my pride, yes, but with the truth, the command, that parents need to honored and obeyed in a special way, that we must ask this of our children, and yet this does not make us, or what we say, do, or need, greater than our children in the eyes of God.
On that day as I listened to the brewing altercation between Turtle and D., a thought came to me. It felt like a little gleam of light on a problem that had appearing dusky to me for so long. I had thought of a way I could explain this dilemma to myself and to my justice-loving daughter.
"Let's say you were on a bus!" I broke in. "If an old lady or a old man came onto the bus and there were no seats, Daddy or Mommy would get up to give them a seat. You girls would too! This is not because the old man or woman is better than us. It can be because we know that they are old and that their bodies are tired and weaker, but it is more especially because we know that they have lived in the world a longer time than us, that they have worked hard to live well and to learn wisdom. We honor old people because they have done a big, great work that we have not done yet.
"And Daddy or any man would get up to give a seat to a woman. Would that be because a woman is better than a man? No, but it is because a woman has been given a special kind of work that a man has not been given: the work of being able to grow a baby in her body. This is a big, great work that a woman does and a man does not and so he honors her.
"Mommies and Daddies have been given a great work of teaching and raising their children. This is a big responsibility and a hard work that we have been given to do. Children do not have this work to do yet. Someday they may, but now they do not. Children honor their parents, not because parents are better than children, but because they see that their parents have a big work that takes alot of wisdom. Does that make sense?"
I looked at Turtle. Her tears had subsided into sniffles, and she nodded a little.
We all talked a little more about how we honor priests, bishops, the pope, the president, and even firefighters and soldiers because of the great responsibilities they have been given. I tried to use the word "honor" as what we give to someone with a "greater responsibility or work" than us, and to keep the word "respect" as something that we give to all people equally. Then we talked about how there is a certain more courteous way that we talk with people that we must honor that we may not need to use with our sisters or friends. The girls seemed to understand. (At least Turtle did. Rosebud had gotten a little derailed at the bus seating analogy -- "Whaa? Who do we stand up for on the bus??")
I am grateful for this discussion. I am grateful for this small breakthrough in myself and my parenting and how I see it and talk about it with my children. I know that there is still work I have to do to understand how this idea of honor and respect to all plays out. I still feel like D and I are forging a trail for which we do not have any clear map. But this step forward was a good one for our family.
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