Are you thinking about whom I mentioned?
Can you make a guess?
Yes. I am saying about kids.
If you have read my yesterday’s article, I have mentioned that kids are creative.
Do you agree with me?
Yes, it’s an open secret that they are creative.
Didn’t you get this thought?
As kids are creative, then we also should be creative.
But why aren’t all of us creative?
Something must be completely wrong.
What is it?
I will tell you about one incident that happened with my niece.
Everyone in the home is busy with their stuff. Some went outside, and my sister went into the kitchen thinking that I take care of my niece.
Both of us, my niece and me, are in the hall.
You know what?
I haven’t noticed her presence and deeply involved in some work, thinking she is not around.
After some time, my niece is not in the hall when my sister came.
We were worried as she was just nine months old at that time, and she is just a toddler.
But to our surprise, my niece went outside, down the three steps, and playing near the plants.
Yes, she climbed those steps down!
For good, she went down carefully and played outside.
Now tell me, if you noticed her while she is stepping out of the door, what would you do?
Yes, for that matter, including me, everyone would pull her inside for her good.
Not in only this situation, but every time, we limit the kids from doing few things.
Isn’t it limiting their thoughts and actions?
Let’s go to childhood or memories
When elders are stuck with some issue and thinking a lot to figure the solution out, a kid asks what you are thinking? What happened?
How would the majority respond?
Yes, you don’t know about this. I will figure it out.
Consider one more situation.
Don’t you want to help your loved ones even in a small way?
Yes, you would love to.
Even the kids also.
Sometimes, kids want to help you with something but burden you with a lot of work to set things alright.
And you are already stressed due to your work.
What would you do?
Yes, some will scold the kids saying you don’t know anything.
Yes, you just burst your frustration, of something else, on them due to this trigger.
One more great place that kills the creativity of the kids is a school.
In the olden days, schools give equal importance to extracurricular activities as well.
But, should I mention to you about the current education system?
Everyone is giving importance to only marks and studies.
As a result, there are many introverts.
Yes, introverts are not born. The system is manufacturing them.
What is that system? We with our misconceptions of education.
I don’t want to speak a lot about introverts in this article. It is a topic for another day.
Are there any soft skills institutes back in the 2000s?
No, we are killing their skills by not letting them think, and we are sending them to coachings and all.
Here, “we” is referred to most of us.
The reasons are many. But at the end of the day, very few are creative.
What do you think is the solution to this problem? Let’s get to that in the next solution
The solution to Restore Kid’s Creativity
Photo by Neil Thomas on Unsplash
However, yesterday I focused only on the problem statement but not on the solution in my angle.
So, today is all about what we could do to save the creativity of those little ones. Yes, creativity has become uncommon as the kids grow.
If you haven’t read part 1 of this article, I recommend you to read it by clicking on this link.
Let’s summarise what I shared yesterday.
- Kids are creative. But the majority are losing their creativity due to elders’ over-protectiveness and different reasons.
- They stop thinking with the thought that they don’t know anything. Also, this is the result of some of our actions.
- Creativity also needs exercise to maintain or strengthen. But kids are not getting time to focus on their talents due to overemphasis on only studies.
Let’s get into what we could do instead.
I will focus only on the incidents I mentioned yesterday.
Incident1: Kids try to help you when you are stuck.
Never treat them like children, instead consider them as adults.
Instead of not paying heed to their suggestions, involve them in some of your discussions to know their perspective.
I am not an expert to tell you the perfect age of kids when you start involving them in discussions. But there is a guy who found it.
Though I am not an expert, I can show you what he did.
You must be thinking, who is this guy telling all of this though he is not an expert.
Yes, I learnt this from Sadhguru through one of his videos.
Watch this video of Sadhguru to know how he nurtured his daughter Radhe.
You can also refer to my friend’s blog post where she mentioned life skills for kids.
Incident 2: Kids turning everything into a mess when they try to help you.
Sometimes, when a kid does something new, elders tell him/her you shouldn’t do this but don’t say what to do instead.
Just imagine what happens when the kids face such situations n number of times?
It is Simple the weak ones give up doing anything new.
Boom! That is the end of their creativity.
You don’t be that guy.
When you face this incident where the little ones turn everything into a mess, try the steps mentioned below.
Appreciate their efforts.
Then join them and create a mess.
After that, clean everything with them.
Now is the time to show them how to do it better.
In this approach, you show them the better way instead of putting an end to their attempt.
It will not stop them from trying anything new.
Now, the last situation: Schools cutting their creativity.
I know we can’t change this situation because the system is powerful than us.
But we can create an environment to give them room for focusing on their creativity side. Also, not giving importance to only studies.
One of my friends completed his BTech, but he is a yoga instructor and fitness coach now. He is a kabaddi player also if I am not wrong. (As you know, I am bad at the memory😅)
He is living a satisfactory life instead of the successful life which we perceive.
But, you know what?
He is also a success. — Yes, success doesn’t have a single definition.
But he has bigger plans as well because he is a work in progress.
So, we should become open-minded first to help them be as they are because we can only be the best at who we truly are.
Concluding Thoughts
- Watch them when they commit mistakes.
- Let them do. — Watching is to make sure the price they pay for their mistakes is not high.
- Then ask them what they learnt from their mistakes. — This makes them think, which is a hard job. (That’s the reason most of us judge instead of thinking)
- If they are thinking, it means they are giving work to their brain. So the creative muscle becomes stronger.
- Did I miss anything? You can let me know by commenting below.
And I am no one to teach you about this subject, I shared my understanding from life. But I know someone who loves this subject and can help you with this. She was an event organiser and worked on numerous projects including govt’s as well. Becoming a mom, she has focused more on learning more about parenting and applying them. Her name is Monica Aeran and she is sharing her tips on her website PoPnMum.com. If you are looking for parenting tips, you can follow her.
Feedback is the food to a writer. So feed me your thoughts which motivates me to stay on track.
See you tomorrow.
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