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(First of all, apologies for any grammatical mistake I might make: English is not my native language)
I used to be seen as gifted and brilliant all throughout childhood and adolescence. I got the best grades, won local and national competitions, gained everyone’s appreciation (including my mother’s approval) and, overall, I was confident in my abilities and excited to learn new things every day. If you’re wondering whether I’m writing this to boast about how special I am, you couldn’t be further from the truth. I have also been heavily abused as a child (to be honest, I’m still living in an abusive environment, but I’m not going to dive into that), and I carry a lot of trauma that nobody cared to acknowledge because I was smart and the adults around me deemed me very wise for my age, so they must have thought I’ll figure out how to deal with my problems myself. When I went to college, at first, nothing changed: I still got the best grades, and I started forging a reputation for myself as this disciplined, bright student. However, at some point, even though I loved what I was doing, I started feeling more and more apathic and despondent, until I couldn’t take the pressure anymore, and I simply stopped studying. My grades dropped, and I was progressively being drained of all my energy. I saw my friends and peers sharing their passion and making plans for the future, whereas time seemed to have stopped for me, like I was trapped in a lifeless, never-ending bubble. I didn’t know what was happening to me or how to overcome it: it felt like dying, like realizing I’ve always been a bit dead inside, behind all that praise and success and ambition. I’m writing this as a message to all those parents who pressure their kids into becoming successful and hard-working adults: keep in mind that unconditional parental love always comes first. Never let your child believe your love is finite, not for a single moment: if they believe it now, trust me, they’ll never be able to shake away this kind of insecurity. Let them be who they want to be, because everyone deserves your kindness and respect regardless of their age. Educate yourself before educating them, and please, let them make mistakes. Making mistakes is the most productive way of learning: your intolerance to failure will only hinder their creativity and emotional growth. Let them be happy and share in their happiness whenever you can: your job is to offer guidance and support, not to exert control. Remember that if you try to remake them in your image, turning them into some kind of lifelong experiment, your little geniuses of today will become the cynical, cripplingly depressed adults of tomorrow.
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Thank you for this helpful post. I am very much against parents putting pressure on their children over their schoolwork.
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