Let Go to Grow

Audio By Carbonatix

Parenting is a journey with no end. Once a parent, always a parent! Early on, we may be lured into thinking that once our kids move out that we are somewhat free of the responsibility of parenting, but that couldn’t be further from the truth. It is still our responsibility to parent, but how we parent changes.

Parents go through several stages of understanding what it means to be a parent. When you have more than one child, you have to move through these various stages at a moment’s notice. When the kids are little, it’s an active stage. When they’re teenagers, it’s a trusting stage. When they become adults, it’s a letting go so they can grow stage. I have discovered this last stage can be very difficult.

When the kids are younger, we can manage their behavior by incorporating certain stipulations and guidelines that help to stimulate their growth as individuals as well as maintain their health and safety. But as they grow into adults, they become their own men and women—and that’s the way it ought to be. As parents, we have to learn to shift from a “hands on” to a “hands off” approach. Unfortunately, this does not happen naturally or easily. It comes with recognition and effort on the part of parents to accept that their children have arrived.

This was made infinitely clear to me one day when I was discussing an issue with one of my sons, who is now an adult. We had a difference of opinion on something and he said to me, “Dad, that’s the way you think and this is just the way I think.”

I had to realize that he was not wrong. His opinion of how to do something may not be the way I would do it, or how I would like him to do it, or even what I would consider to be the best way, but in his mind and because of his personality, what he chooses to do is right for him. I have grown to a point of learning to affirm even the decisions that might not be exactly the ones that I would make. It’s what I call “letting go so we all can grow.”

It doesn’t mean we can never offer our advice or counsel if we are asked, but we have to be careful not to interject our thoughts or comments in a harmful way. If you’re a parent who likes to lock down your kids (which can be my tendency), make sure you don’t snuff out their characteristics, personality, and their own God-given abilities. Be sure to keep your hands off enough so that they can spread their wings and become who they’re supposed to be.