High Achiever Parents Low Achiever Kids

4/7/2020

The Chinese have a saying that states, "Wealth does not last 3 generations." The 1st generation is the high achieving generation. The 2nd generation is the wealth maintenance generation. The 3rd generation squanders it all.

For such a saying to make it into common parlance, it is clear that the problem of low achieving children born to high achieving parents, exists. In the course of coaching parents, I see this pattern all the time. There are many reasons for this, and I need to pull data to diagnose the root. However, one of the most common reasons is the following.

High achieving parents teach their children incompetence.

At this point, I can almost hear all these successful people scoff and roll their eyes, saying, "Nonsense! I have never taught my child incompetence. I keep telling my child to be like me. Why can't he be more like me?"

You see, telling your child to be like you, is guaranteed to make the child unlike you. Families fit together like puzzle pieces. Where you have a protrusion, your child will grow cavity. Where you are competent, your child will be incompetent. Where you are fast, your child will be slow. Where you are independent, your child will be dependent. So, in order to help my children achieve (see HERE and HERE), my most useful parenting skill was to look incompetent and stupid.

Another analogy I often use with parents is that of the banyan tree. If your branches are spread too wide, you block out the sun. The resulting baby banyan trees will never grow as big as you, let alone bigger. I was determined to have my babies grow bigger than me. To do so, I had to pull in my branches.

Sometimes, the weight of successful parents, is enough to crush a child. As parents, we cannot be less successful than we are, but there are ways to screen out much of that success from the child's space when the child is young.

During the entire month of Home Based Learning, if you are experiencing a lot of stress working with your children during Home Based Learning, please type your issue/question in the comments below. I will troubleshoot for you and post my advice in future posts.

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