"Oh, good. It's been a good week."
"So, I see you're empty-handed today. Did you remember to bring your music books?"
"Ugh," disdainful eye-roll, "My mom forgot to pack them."
"So, how was your practice week this week?"
"Well... It was really busy. I wanted to practice, but my parents forgot to remind me."
Sometimes (not as much as I'd like) I call students out on this inadvertent attack on their parents' not getting it right by them: "You know it's not your mom's responsibility to pack your books for piano/remind you to practice, right? That's your job."
But I get it, too. I get that it's hard to keep reminding kids to remember their stuff. Often remembering to wear appropriate clothes (including shoes) can be hard. I get that kids are often fighting their parents on practicing to begin with - they might argue that they didn't choose to go through the drudgeries of daily music practice, so why do they need to be responsible for books they didn't choose, either?
What fills my heart with fear and dread, though, is that one day "My mom forgot to pack my books," might turn into, "My boss forgot to remind me of that deadline," or, "The University forgot to tell me I was failing," or insert-other-real-world-situation here. We complain about people who do this (usually we call them Millennials, let's be honest).
But for every person not taking responsibility for themselves and their actions, there is someone not asking them to. One of my greatest fears is being a "sweet" teacher who doesn't have boundaries with students, and this is probably one of the hardest parts of my job.
I heard a great podcast episode this week called "Consequences," in which parents (who are also Al Anon members) talk about what are good consequences for children and which ones aren't really effective.
What grabbed my attention was the very common-sensical suggestion on the part of the hosts, that the best consequences for bad behavior are the natural consequences.
As a case in point, one of the hosts mentions that his daughters would not wake up on time for school. Every day, he'd get more and more frustrated, coming to her room again and again to make sure she was up. If they missed the bus, he'd end up taking them to school late, speaking to the office, etc.
One day, he decided not to take responsibility for his daughters' waking up on time. Instead, if they woke up late, they had to face the natural consequence (detention). He said that letting this happen was hard, but that once his daughters had gone to detention enough times, they realized they needed to ask for help. He offered to wake them up one time each day, and after that, it was up to them. This was enough to turn around the behavior.
Being an expectant mom now, I've been hearing a lot lately about the "Mommy wars," those subtle attacks that moms wage on other moms for not being perfect in the millions of ways perfection can be attained in parenthood. Such as, "Oh, you don't make organic baby food for your baby??" etc.
The Mommy Wars sounds like a very exciting place to be - a place where, if your kid walks out the door without their school lunch, you face the tantalizing possibility of being labeled a "Bad Parent" in other parenting hearts for not racing back to the school to deliver.
But I think there's some correlation between the Mommy Wars and moms feeling (and taking) too much responsibility for their kids. There's a constant guilt and second-guessing of getting it right, and so this whole idea of letting kids face natural consequences for their actions is quite scary... because what is, in fact, your good parenting, may likely be thought of or seen as bad parenting.
It's hard for me to know exactly what parents face in helping set and maintain healthy boundaries with kids in terms of responsibility, because I am not living it yet. But as a teacher, I do play a role in helping kids know and keep their responsibilities, and I do feel temptations constantly to gloss over those teachable moments in order not to hurt their feelings or to keep the feel of the lesson positive, etc.
One funny example from several years ago - a student just wasn't listening. She wanted to play! She ignored my several questions. I tried closing the lid, and she just kept playing away. She knew I wasn't going to let the lid fall on her fingers. I was trying hard to work with her as she was, but I finally realized there was no way to get her attention.
So I stood up and grabbed my coat, and prepared to leave the room.
She stopped immediately. "Wait. Where are you going?"
"It just seems like you're not looking for a teacher today, so I'm going to go get some coffee," I said.
"No, I do need a teacher!" she said.
"Okay, well, show me that you need a teacher."
And she did. I'd love to say there weren't any difficulties after that point (there were), but things got a lot better.
What I learned from that situation, and many like it, is that setting boundaries takes so much less emotional energy than when I let people walk all over me. I don't have to get frustrated. I can just say, "You can choose to do X, Y, or Z, and if you choose that, this is what I'll choose." I don't have to control anyone's behavior, but oftentimes the behavioral results end up better.
I am not writing this today because I've figured out boundaries and because I know how to show students how to take responsibility. Rather, I've learned that, because I have a sort of warped sense of over-responsibility (that everything anyone does that's bad is somehow my fault) I have to keep relearning how to let my students be responsible for themselves and to recognize the real consequences behind their actions. It's hard!
In that sense, sometimes the one thought that kicks my butt into gear with setting clearer boundaries mirrors that line in scripture, "woe to me if I do not preach it." Sometimes being sweet and nice and boundary-less is the best way to create monsters.
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