Children share with geniuses an open, inquiring, uninhibited quality of mind. —Chauncey Guy Suits

“My child is honestly, just SO, uniquely intelligent!”

– Said every mother, every day, everywhere in the world. truestory. Haha! And every single mother on planet earth is correct! We are all born with a unique and amazing combination of gifts at our disposal - and as a mother it is a truly amazing and on-going delight to watch these talents, gifts and skills unfolding in their lives - and ours.

Quite frankly I think children are far wiser than most adults. They are also more honest! Not always more practical, hehe, but in their defence… lessons are generally best learnt through experience and not dictation. Their uninhibited approach to life is precisely what makes them such wise little souls.

My most recent “parent teacher” meeting, in short, went something like this: Your son is an enormously friendly, caring and attentive young boy who is also very popular with his peers. He is very bright and is coping well on all academic levels… there is just one concern – he tends to be a little ‘rude’ towards his teachers.

Mom naturally hits mild >panic mode< and asks “Could you please give me an example of this, so that I can understand the context” – at which point it was explained to me that my son had interjected his teacher as she was explaining a proposed game concept which was intended to illustrate what she had just taught the class, only to exclaim “it’s not going to work”. And although he was apparently correct at the end of the day, it had not gone down too well with the teacher.

Now, I understand the whole “pupil to teacher” respect boundary and no child should ever be intentionally disrespectful, but I couldn’t help but smile and giggle internally at my proud mommy moment, because essentially - my child had dented the teachers ego because of his foresight.

90% of the time and via the feedback of other parents and teachers in general, my little boy is widely regarded as a well-mannered and very respectful young boy (except around mommy of course, haha!) – So what shall I do with the above information?

I will tell you what I will do - other than encouraging a slightly more ‘sociably acceptable’ approach for ‘verbal deliverance” – ABSOLUTELY NOTHING – that’s what.

Our children are multi-talented. They are skilled and very wise individuals! They see things from a perspective that is not restricted by most social conditioning. They say it like it is and they should be encouraged to continue to do so!

My son recently joined ‘science club’ as an extra mural and he loves it. So much so, that after his fist lesson, he requested that we do a repeat of his first experiment over the weekend. We did, and mom recorded it. Immediately after which, it was requested of me to “please upload it to my Youtube channel” – well, he didn’t have a Youtube channel, but it seemed as good a time as any – to create one for him. hehe

JUDE'S "YOU TUBE" JOURNAL

This was one of his first videos which was loads of fun to make - as well as to eat (the cake) lol

Mom was also a little out of her depth in terms of the editing side of things, but hey... I learn a little more every time haha! He is having GREAT fun with now! We have created several videos together - my two favourites being...

THE 30 DAY GRATITUDE CHALLENGE

This was our second video which was not only loads of fun to make, but also marked the beginning of another very special journey for Jude. I wont spoil the surprise of the challenge itself, I will leave that to the video - but I came up with the concept to encourage more gratitude in his little world.

From one mom to many others - I would suggest you take a watch and perhaps give the challenge a try with your kids - Jude absolutely LOVED completing the challenge!

AND

EGGSPERIMENT FUN

In fact we haven't done a video for a little while now and he said to me the other day "mommy we need to do a new video, I am losing subscribers" - hehehehe how PRECIOUS is that!!!

As any mother would agree - It is wonderful to see such confidence and courage growing within my your child!! It has been such a fun journey so far - and we are only just at the beginning of the road!

Nobody wants their child to be an over confident cocky brat, but every parent wants their child to hold a healthy level of confidence. When I was a kid, I had no problems with public speaking and even won 'best speaker of the school' once upon a time, but as I got older and life shared all its trials, tribulations and experiences with me, I lost that confidence somewhere along the line…

I have found a comfortable niche of confidence within my social and work sphere but - remove me from that, and place me in unknown territory and I completely retreat. The funny thing however, is that 99% of people that meet me, would never say that I lack self confidence. I am loud. I am opinionated and I generally always have something to say.

The fact of the matter is - people are very good at ‘misreading’ people! True story!

I see a lot of the same attributes in my little boy. He too is very talkative, energetic and opinionated and almost nobody would guess or even believe what the other side of his precious little coin looks like.

As much as he is all of the above, he is equally if not more so – very emotionally driven, sensitive and acutely aware of what people think of him. As his mother, I see so much of me – in him - and I know how much I still sit and think about all the things I would love to have done or have been in my life, yet backed away because of circumstance and lack of confidence.

Now don’t get me wrong – I am not one of those mothers that are obsessed with molding their child into 'their perfect vision' or attempting to live vicariously through them, but I would like to assist my little man to embrace confidence. I would like him to have a healthy, respectful love for who he is, thus enabling him to conquer the challenges he faces with a good spirit.

Whilst he still gets nervous in front of the camera, doubts himself, flinches and questions whether he REALLY CAN do this or not… he has done it – and he KNOWS he has! - Which surely offers him a great sense of achievement.

It is also allowing him to explore "himself" - discover who he is and what he likes.

We all want nothing less than the best for our children, and I just think that if a little more ‘freedom of expression’ was allowed, rather than so much of the ‘you will conform and you will perform’ approach, we might have a very different up and coming generation of children. (Don’t get me wrong here…) I am NOT referring to the whole ‘new age’ approach to parenting – I am simply saying, that children should be allowed to develop their unique individuality (within reason) so that they can find their true passion as adults.

“Do not train a child to learn by force or harshness; but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each.”― Plato

Until next time...

Much Love from Cape Town, South Africa xxx