Does your child possess Life Skills?

Often when I chat with friends, we talk about our children. It is only natural as children somehow become a purpose of our lives; our lives revolve around them. Most parents are busy ensuring a good quality of life to their children, often putting themselves in stressful jobs and continuing with defunct relationships.

During some of the chats, recently during the lockdown, many friends sounded disturbed with how children were waking up post lunch, demanding good food, not contributing to the house chores and perpetually stuck to Netflix or gaming sites. They live as guests in the house and that too very demanding ones.

It took me back to me own childhood days. I grew up in a small town with not too much help at home. In those days homes were couple centric. The home routine was centered around the parents, a nod of approval was required on everything that we did, there were no announcements but only permissions.

We were conditioned to start contributing to household chores from an early age, running errands for groceries including helping in the kitchen, laundry, mopping dusting, ironing etc. yet we still found time to study, play, socialize and still do the housework.

It was the normal in most households; of course we had only an hour of TV viewing in the evening on DD. Absence of smartphones gave us all abundant time to do a lot. Besides that the main entertainment was storybooks and comics, which I personally relished. Most of us went to the libraries, read books and I personally savoured that time. Reading definitely helped us all in understanding many nuances of life and areas that were not generally touched upon by our parents. We were happy and cheerful with light schedules, conversations and time spent with friends and family taught us how to conduct ourselves in society/ groups. Time was spent in human company, at school or home. Our daily lives required understanding and adjustments; friendships too were enduring and committed.

Coming back to the contribution to housework, my mom being a strict task master (slightly overt on that front) would be charitable with a slap here and there if she found us doing less than expected.

It was a household with 3 kids and only one full time help (which was also rare in our town). I often heard my Mom reprimanding us on how if we were not adept at house work, we would be not ready to face the real world.

Cut to today, the parenting style has become a synonymous with pampering and I am included in it.

Early school days of our children today are filled with few hours of schooling followed by extra classes in singing, instruments, sports, karate, play dates, birthday parties and more extra curricular activities. Television and online games are a natural filler along with smart phones. Meals are eaten in front of televisions and solitude with technology is a no brainer. As kids get into middle school, the pressure of studies start mounting, they end up spending a lot of time in tutorials at home or going to coaching classes.

Drivers and maids are at their service, and a part of managing their daily routine of academics and extras. This keeps them out of loop with the realities of domesticity.

As my daughter was growing into a teenager, I tried to encourage her to participate in a few chores at home. We did build in her a habit of reading, exercising, outdoor activities and a sanity of a disciplined routine. She saw a household of two working parents who had strenuous routines, which did bring in a spirit of responsibility towards her own work.

 However, her response was very luke warm regarding the contribution to the household as she was too used to maids at home. Actually our children don’t even get a glass of water for themselves, they are just used to being served in most upper middle class homes. Getting them to start later once they are adolescents is not easy; it has not been easy for me.

Children have found a way of living their lives with books, OTT, smartphones and ofcourse friends. Most of them have anxiety issues, their relationships are complex, minds are more complicated and interpersonal issues are plenty. My take is that they have just too much time to devote to themselves. Integration into the home routine and sharing responsibility will bring in maturity and calmness.

Most parents are dealing with this challenge. Changing habits of young adults won’t be possible, perhaps they will learn to deal with their lives once they start working and live on their own. During one of my recent chats, a friend mentioned how life skills must be taught to kids. I delved a little deeper into understanding of life skills to check how many do I have and what did my daughter learn.

Life skills are an evolved concept; many adults do not have life skills despite the experiences they have gone through in their lives.  I personally feel that the critical ones which must be inculcated from the very beginning are empathy, decision making, problem solving and managing interpersonal relationships. All these are always a work in progress for us as we deal with new situations everyday. Our experiences help us develop a basic intuitive sense that aids us in problem solving and decision making.  The process of life, the culture of our families and education teaches us empathy.

When our children serve us a cup of tea, it is a way to learn interpersonal relationships and caring for family. I often urge my daughter to serve tea to the cleaning staff in our colony and feed the poor so that she gets to understand what empathy is. If they are used to doing their bit at an early age, it will become a part of their being and will get easily extended to school, college and work spaces.

Learning to cook teaches many skills in one go especially problem solving and decision making. It helps us to focus and brings in clarity of thought.

Contributing to household chores serves a reality check. It teaches children the dignity of labour and to respect people who help us.

My friend was narrating an incident about his stint in Jordan, where his colleague was fully adept at cutting wood and starting a wood fired oven for his mom to bake delicious pizzas for family dinners. The boy would have grasped many life skills at one go while handling this complex apparatus.

I use a combination of coaxing and being firm but have been able to get my daughter to start basic cooking, cleaning, mopping , laundry and baking. Experiential learning is the sole path for acquiring Life skills. Daily practice and learning will enable children to not only balance their time but engage them productively, distracting them from their gadgets. It will also lead to a seamless integration of academic responsibility with self reliance and sufficiency.