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CHAPTER 16

How to Handle Your Child’s Mistakes

hen any of us makes a mistake, we must first forgive
ourselves, show compassion to ourselves, then let ourselves
off the hook. We also want our friends to forgive us,
understand we were well-meaning, and let the matter go. Well, these are
exactly the elements we need to introduce in our approach to our children
when they make a mistake.
Mistakes need to be regarded not as something to harangue and punish,
but as windows for learning. Isn’t this how we want our own mistakes to
be regarded? The reality is that we make lots of mistakes in our adult
life. We lose keys, leave the gas on, lose our way when driving, forget
appointments, get into car accidents, overlook paying our bills, neglect
to call friends when we said we would, misplace our phone, curse and
yell, throw tantrums, drink too much, come home too late, eat the wrong
foods, or watch too much television. In other words, we do countless
things we want our children, in their young state of being, not to do just
because we told them these things are wrong! Where do we come off, so
high and mighty, as to judge and admonish them for doing the very
things we do, only we don’t have anyone looking over our shoulder
waiting to reprimand us?
If you want your children to learn from their mistakes, any sense of
“wrongness” needs to be removed, so they realize that no matter how
much they mess up, they are still okay. There can be no imposing of guilt