Let Children Again Have The Liberty To Fail

2 PARAGRAPHS 4 LIBERTY: #145

   Only supervised activities for our children; safely drive them to school; don’t let them go out on Halloween by themselves, etc., etc.  As aptly stated in the December 2017 edition of Reason Magazine, “Play is training for adulthood.”  And today not only aren’t our children playing much on their own, they’re not doing much of anything on their own.  But only when children fall down and skin their knees in some “resilience moments” without parental guidance will they learn from their mistakes.  And this is virtually the only way that they can effectively grow into adulthood.

Our kids are tougher than we give them credit for.  And we should actually want them to be insulted that we feel they are too shallow and sensitive to be able to take care of themselves on their own – because that is how they learn to be careful.  Or to be unsupervised in their playtime – because that is the way they learn to be creative.  Or to take calculated risks, and sometimes fail in those efforts – because that is how they learn entrepreneurship.  Or to hear conflicting viewpoints – because that is how they learn skepticism.  Or to be devoid of “safe spaces” – because that is not the way the real world operates.  In large part we, their parents, were afforded these liberties, and not only did we “live to tell about it,” most of us learned from those situations and thrived.  So we should let children again have the Liberty to fail.  It is how we have prospered and how we have made our great country successful!

** Here’s another of the daily posts from the gasoline station in Gauteng, South Africa: “In a world where you can be anything you want, be kind.”