Helping Your Teen Mature: Practice #2

QUESTIONS

Questions are more impactful than statements. As a parent you are smart. You have a lot of experience, wisdom and knowledge that you could very easily deposit into your teens. If only they would be willing to listen and receive what you have, right? While this is true, knowledge based statements aren’t always the best way to cultivate a healthy mindset. Statements tend to rob your teen of their journey of discovery. It’s just like giving them the answers rather than facilitating a process that requires them to figure out the answer while showing their work.

Which approach do you think actually cultivates maturity? I will tell, it is the approach that gives room to the discovery process.

So if statements rob your teen in their journey of discovery, then what approach helps foster that journey? I am glad you asked! It’s the approach of questions. Asking good, powerful and thought provoking questions fosters this journey better than only giving statements. When your teen engages a process to determine for themselves what healthy path to take, the strategy to implement and the execution, your wisdom goes much further in developing interdependent adults. Interdependent adults are those who rely on healthy community while personally contributing the best of what they have. In turn your teens are given the opportunity to learn personal ownership of their journey.

My friends, the art of questions is what facilitates this process in their lives. Using questions to facilitate their journey of discovery is the same approach as giving your teen freedom within a framework. You set the parameters, close enough to where they don’t hurt themselves. At the same time you set the same parameters wide enough allowing them to discover the greatness within. This is far from allowing them to do what they want to do, while not pushing on them what you think they should do. For many of us, this is where we may find the tension!

Be Inspired!