Freedom is something that people desire to have in their lives. We come into this life knowing we are free at our soul level. This freedom is meant to be experienced as the full expression to create what we want and live our highest path.

As parents, we watch our babies and our young children and we delight in their expression of freedom. They play with abandon and explore each and every experience they can find to participate in. They have no fear or boundaries that keep them from their full expression of themselves.

Ideally, as the years pass our kids should be experiencing more and more freedom as they reach adulthood to prepare them for life on their own. What happens is quite the opposite. As we experience fear for all the unforeseen things that can happen to our children, we instill in them their own sense of fear and we slowly take away their freedom. For the sake of their safety and our own peace of mind, we may instill a caution that stifles their natural sense of perfect freedom.

This is done by limiting the choices we allow our kids to make and by unknowingly giving them the message that they aren’t capable to choose for themselves.

Why do we fear our children’s freedom as opposed to fostering it? I found myself limiting my child’s freedom because I held my own ideal about them or the present situation that I felt they should adhere to.

For example: In order for me to feel secure about the “schedule,” when my daughter came home from school, I felt I needed to dictate the sequence of events regarding her homework and activities.  This limited her sense of freedom to use her own guidance on how to best use her time based on how she was feeling. If what I dictated went against her natural rhythm and desires, my request was met with resistance, which translated into her not being very happy. And there will never be value in any action that is done when we aren’t in a good feeling state. In other words, whatever I wanted her to accomplish in the time frame I wanted would not be productive for her.

Why is this true? Our own life experience will show us that when we aren’t happy we aren’t in the flow of wellbeing, which is where all of our inspiration and ideas come from. Our kids know where their own wellbeing lies and it’s not always where we think it should be or in the time frame. They gauge their wellbeing on how they’re feeling, and this translates into their productivity.

Over time I made the choice to find a new perspective regarding my child and her choices. I made the connection of knowing when and how I was most productive and I related that to my daughter. I watched her struggle with her tasks and creativity when I forced an outcome, so I made a new choice. I began allowing her to set her own schedule for completing what she needed to get done. I would often inquire on what her responsibilities were, but I left the schedule up to her. Some days she felt like diving right into her homework and projects and other days she needed to do an activity that just helped her feel more relaxed.

I noticed how much more productive she was learning to be when she was allowed to set her own time schedule and feel her own guidance. Of course there was a learning curve that we all face, which meant she didn’t always complete things on time or perhaps at all. But the natural consequences of her choices taught her that how she felt when listening to her inner guidance yielded the best results.

Please comment!

© 2014.  Sharon Ballantine.  All Rights Reserved.