Teaching Love to Children

Valentine’s Day is such a weird holiday. It celebrates romance and love, and puts unusual pressure on people to show their significant other just how much they love them. This year, it taught me a life lesson about my children, their personalities and how they feel about other people.  My kids class Valentine’s ended up being a huge lesson to me on each of my children’s characters and an opportunity to discuss their likes and dislikes of the other students in their class.

I tend to be a very cold and aloof person. I know for sure my middle child is very much like that, even though my other two are very kind and loving. As I sat down with my five year old and he looked at his list, I learned far more about his nature than I could have imagined. I also learned a great deal about my children’s diverse classes and the way they see the world. As my son went through his list, he informed me of whom he liked, whom he did not like, and exactly why. His brisk honesty was something I could relate to and appreciate. It also turned into a wonderful teaching experience about how to be kind to others even when we do not like them.  

My son spent the better part of a day arguing with me about whom he should and should not take Valentine’s to at school. The idea of taking one to everybody, despite how you feel about them was clearly a principle he was not grasping. It was very simple in his five-year-old mind: you only take Valentine’s to people you like, and you ignore those you do not.  I was slightly amused (because of my own dislike of people), but knew I had to change his attitude and convince him of the positives in being nice to everyone.

I would like to think that I hide my annoyance of other people well. Seeing my child’s reaction to people who annoy him I realize I have not. Being kind to others is natural for some people, for me, it takes work.  I know I have to instill this into my children so they do not have the same struggles. I do not intend to be mean; it is just a lack of awareness about other people’s feeling, usually because I am doing a million things at once.  I can now see my son has inherited this, and I have a long road to haul to change this quirk in him.

As I worked with him on his Valentine’s, I let him tell me what he liked or did not like about each student. This helped him open up about the reasoning behind not giving them cards. As we went through, we talked about ways to change his perception about the people he did not care for.  It is hard to be honest about your feelings, but it was refreshing the way he handled himself. We talked about ways to see the good in other people, why we should always be kind to other people, and why we should care about how other people feel.  Although I know his perceptions will not immediately change, it has opened an ongoing dialogue for us. I would love for being kind to be as natural for him as my other two children.

The greatest thing I learned, my children truly due judges others by the content of their character, and not the color of their skin. Never once was skin, hair, or eye color brought up. There was no mention about the clothes they wear, or what they look like. I have long way to go to teach my middle child about caring for others. Knowing his issues with people are genuine and not superficial makes it a little easier.