Believe that it can be done!

When our children want to take on any challenge, be it an elocution competition or an English commentary on a Japanese movie, encourage them. This is especially so when our children themselves voiced their wish to go for it.

As parents, we ought to understand that every challenge our children willingly takes on must always be considered as a step towards self improvement.

I know there are some who would like to point out that our children may fail in the challenge. “So what?” I would say. After all, is not life always full of challenges? Are not failures a part of the learning process? And if our children are not allowed to face challenges they believe they have the opportunity to succeed in; then, when are they going to know their potentials, when are they going to know their limits and when are they going to improve? How are they going to learn everything about their capabilities when they only see the possiblities and the probabilities but not the certainty? How are they going to know themselves well?

It is not the failing that we ought to fear, for it is the attitude towards it that matters. In life, if we fear failure, then we will never try anything. Then, what possible thing can we get out of life? For, in all ventures that we ever made, there is always the chance to succeed or fail. Nevertheless, without any attempt, how are we ever to know which will be the outcome?

Take falling in love. If we do not allow ourselves to do so, how are we ever to know the outcome? Even if we fail in our first love, that should not deter us from falling in love again. What is important is the ability to face failure, take it as a part of life, learn from it our own weaknesses and go on to live another love. Those who commit suicide as a result of such a failure are those whose minds are unaware that one love does not a make a whole life-time. They have never known how to face problems and challenges in life. Maybe, they were never given the opportunity to face life's challenges. Even if love matures into marriage, marriage does not guarantee happiness forever. Marriage merely gives us the opportunity to help each other to reach happiness through love. The possibility and probability of happiness is there. The challenge lies in the sustenance of love. (I shall go into that in a future post for it's a subject I have thought deeply about.)

In every competition our children take part in, there is always the chance to fail to emerge as the best. No matter how good our children are, there could always be someone better at a particular time. However, that is not true failure!

What is failure to us? It depends upon how you look at it. For example, is being in second place a failure? What about third place? Fourth place? To me, so long as they benefit from the participation, they have won something. They have gained something. Do you agree? Please think about it.

Furthermore, being in fourth place is not being a failure. It merely means that at that particular time, three persons managed to prove themselves better. It could be they have more experience, more knowledge and longer training in attaining certain required skills. Of course, we should not make these our excuses. However, given the same experience, knowledge and training, the fourth placed person may turn out to be even better than the present best. In true life, we see it happen all the time. They move up the ranks and become the world's best in time to come.

Even if your child does not get a placing, he/she has learned something. He would have understood himself/herself better and know which field to enter in future.

The wonderful thing about challenges and activities which our children want to face in their youth is they give our children the chance to understand and know their own strength and weaknesses, their potentials and their limits. And if parents give them the encouragement by appreciating their aspirations and their efforts, they can develop great attitudes, excellent resilience and a strong character.

To know our weaknesses, limits, strength and potentials is important as with that knowledge, we know in which career or sphere of life we would be able to excel. Let us face the fact that no individual can be excellent in everything. Some cannot excel in science but are fabulous in arts. Every one of us can, with the right knowledge, be successful in many things but the chances of being successful are much better in areas where our strengths and potentials lie.

Just as a general with knowledge of his army’s strengths and weaknesses can plan a suitable strategy to win, so can our children if they understand their own capabilities and weaknesses well.

All of us have our weaknesses and limits. Some among us, I am one of them, cannot excel in singing or dancing, although we are among the best in other matters. If we know our weaknesses in singing, we can put some effort into overcoming it and thus, still have fun or be fairly good at it but we know we can never be another Elvis Presley or Cliff Richard no matter how much we train or how many times we go onto a stage.

Never mind, just be like me. I can still sing to myself to my heart's content in my bathroom. I am my own best fan!

Actually, there are many adults who do not fully know their own strengths and weaknesses or potentials and limits. For our children to have this knowledge, we ought to encourage them to try out whatever they want. This is the kind of knowledge that will indicate which direction probably leads to success and which possibly takes them to dead-ends. Such knowledge is similar to a map which shows dead-end roads as well as all the roads leading to success.

So, should we not encourage our children in whatever dreams they have?