Introduction
The straightforward answer to this question is yes. Parents
rear not only their children, but also expectations from them. The benchmark of
expectations keeps on increasing each year. This often perplexes the children
and they are forced to strive hard to meet these growing expectations under
parental pressure. Moreover, the children don’t get a chance to express their views
on their expectations. On the contrary, children are forced to work in the
direction shown by their parents due to the societal pressure. This often leads
to the destruction of whatever remnants of creativity retained in them.
Parental Pressure on Children
Children become the race horses at the hands of their
parents. Most often, the parents bet on their wards’ future at their workplace
with their peers. In order to keep the word, parents scold or even beat the
children at home, citing the peers who are doing well in their studies. When
comparison is made, the children are forced to try hard to get nice marks. This
backfires sometimes when children fail to cope up with pressure in their
academics. In this aspect, both parents and the teachers are the culprits.
There have been reports of suicides and suicide attempts on the eve of annual
examination every year. The strong-willed children come successfully out of
these trying times and score good marks. On the other hand, not so strong
children succumb to the pressure and fare badly in the examinations. Most often,
these children fail to recollect whatever they have studied due to the mental
tension, not because they are bad at studies. The parents don’t want to gauge the
ability of their wards as they become obsessed with the competitions with the
neighbours and peers at the workplace. Due to this reason, most often children don’t
get a chance to fully blossom into a budding talent.
Way Forward
Every individual has innate qualities that need to be reared
and channeled. The parents should identify what their wards are good at by
sitting and interacting with them. The wishes of parents should give way to the
aspirations of the children. Son of an engineer need not become another
engineer. He could even become a writer. This needs to be borne in mind by the
parents. If this approach is taken, the talents of the children could be
identified early in life and properly reared to make him or her creative
individual. Otherwise, the children become too timid and more dependent on
their parents. In the formation stage itself the child needs to be given
freedom to think independently. It
cannot come in a day or two. It has to be slowly developed under the parental
supervision. If this is done with care, the children would become fearless and
independent.
