2nd day of Reading battle hymn of the tiger mother. Stay tuned for more learnings and reflections.
1. it’s definitely correct, from the perspective of the mother.
2. Good to uphold the family name, and prevent generation decline. This is bigger than us. This is for the future, and not for this second’s comfort and pleasure. And our next next next generation will remember us.
3. Depending on the kids’ behavior and ‘pattern’, us as parents have to innovate and adjust accordingly, to make them reach their goals. NOT lower our goals.
4. Others might think we are crazy, but we have to stay true to our vision and discipline.
5. The western culture is counter force to what us asians believe.
Teeth Marks on the piano : This is funny, because others don’t see these. All the battle marks are only known in the family. Sometimes close family members don’t know them.
It’s cool to have these 3 points on why westerners don’t push their kid as much :
1. Western parents want to take care of the kids’ self-esteem
2. Chinese parents believe the kids owe them everything.
3. Chinese parents know what’s best for their kids, and will override children’s choices.
The little white donkey : it’s funny, how mothers who are persistent go all out war with their kids. What’s scary are of course not the success stories – it’s the suicide cases, dysfunctional adults who managed to account for their failure to certain timeframes of their (unhappy) childhood. Too many stories have been told about those parents who fought for “let our kids have a happy childhood”. If we leave children to be children, we will never have anything done. Would they go school? Would they do ANYTHING at all?
reflections : When you’re at war with your kids, others might say it’s wrong. But you might be deluded to think it’s right true. It’s scary. What i believe is, little children are just like some adults. Without bosses, you think anyone wants to go work? Without money, you think adults will get off their asses and go work? Think about it. Children too won’t like to do what they ‘like’ to do. They would want to watch tv all day, and just eat ice-cream all evenings. They are little children – they don’t know what is good for them.
To be continued