Staying Out Of The Way Of Your Child's Creativity

Dear parent,

How would you feel if one of your relatives joined in with your parenting; they would parent your child, give you ideas and become an uninvited participant in your most cherished creation? Or, how would you feel when creating art, if someone comes and does a similar creation right next to you, or with you? If you are like most, you don’t even want someone else to participate in your food preparation or in the way you load the dishwasher. 

We cannot breath, eat or sleep for another person. Likewise, artistic expressions are personal. Most people, if someone joins their creation, quit. 

A child, unfortunately, may not quit but mold into the adult and lose her own creativity because she has no previous experience of creating on her own. She assumes that what she does has to look like the adult’s creation, or her song should sound like mommy’s. The child either become a “clone” of the parent, or, if more confident, quit altogether and lose interest. For the same reason, I teach not to praise and not to use coloring books. You want the child to stay free to create; free of needing to match anyone’s ideas, evaluations or direction. 

In a way, when we join or participate in a child’s creativity, we steal her “show.” It is very difficult for a child to create of her own imagination, when she sees or hears the creation of another who she looks up to. She must be free of such emotional pressure. She must

create from inside herself.

Here are other answers to this subject:

http://mothering.com/painting

http://mothering.com/art

Warmly, http://authenticparent.com/index.html