Parents are stressed out. Recently, the American Psychological Association reported the election was a significant source of stress for 69% of adults in the U.S., up from 52% in 2016.
Our strained political climate has impacted us as parents and divided our culture. Parents have been inundated with negative rhetoric designed to generate specific political behaviors through emotional manipulation. Frankly, we either lack the concern or fail to appreciate the gravity of this exploitation to realize how this has harmed not only us but our children.
We parents, often unknowingly, do a great job teaching the next generation how to continue our societal divide. The truth is, we have most likely taught our children two things as we approached this past week’s election. One, you should disparage the other side. And two, you should be anxious about the election and the results.
What did our children learn from watching us as parents? Did our kids not handle the election season well simply because we didn’t? Is our children’s anxiety rooted in the sincerest form of flattery: imitation?
It is a sobering reality. We as parents are now trying to ascertain how to help our children get through the division we have self-righteously created while concurrently living under the weight of the anxiety we have given them. Ouch.
So how should we parent on future elections and political issues? We strengthen our children’s current and future mental health by demonstrating how to live with and through emotional distress, rather than seeking to be excused from it.
Recently, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School in New York released its “Election Day Support” plan to parents. The plan included access to psychologists, excused absences and no homework or assessments.
Ironically, the school’s response to the recent election somehow managed to positively support student’s current mental health needs while simultaneously eroding the cognitive structures necessary for them to be mentally well in the future.
So, what did the school get right and wrong, and what can we as parents learn from it?
The school did well to recognize the mental and emotional reality the election season took on their students. They are attuned enough to the needs of their student body to provide empowering resources to parents while taking administratively supportive steps to reduce the current emotional distress of students.
The willingness of school leadership to adjust the academic space so that psychologists may be available while recognizing the need for curricular adjustments should be commended. As a parent, a licensed mental health professional and an educator the school has my praise for these efforts. I want my children in such an academic environment.
But where did they miss the mark?
The school failed to see the opportunity these unfortunate political circumstances presented. The school’s decision to not simply adjust academic requirements but to remove them altogether is a well-intended and all-too-common mistake. Our children must learn how to navigate and manage the emotions that stem from heightened political seasons. Current and future political seasons that is.
Instead, the school reinforced a thought and behavior pattern where emotions reign supreme.
Mental wellness is the recognition of our emotions, not our submission to them. Learning to be aware and subsequently manage our emotions within a diverse community is a fundamental pillar of psychological health. Allowing them to drive us towards “safe” and homogenous thinking spaces is quite the opposite. In fact, it is destructive.
As parents, we need to teach our children how to think critically and develop an informed stance on important matters. We should encourage our children to engage in challenging discourse with those who hold differing views. Our children need to see how insidious it is to intentionally stoke the emotions of division simply to produce a desired outcome, and how seeking unity within disagreement is far better.
So, what do we do?
To be clear, this is all dependent upon resiliency. Parents must foster a child’s ability to cope with challenges, recover from setbacks, and learn from experiences in loving and intentional ways. Such resiliency is foundational as a child develops into a functional adult in society. Resiliency has been shown to lower rates of anxiety and depression and lessen suicidal tendencies. Without resiliency, children will not think critically or engage those who think differently from them. A lack of resiliency–what I call resiliency deficiency–leads to homogenous group-think, a dependency on others to think for them, and emotional unintelligence.
With resiliency in hand, our children are able to practice critical thinking. In short, critical thinking is nothing more than one’s ability to question. On tough topics, parents should ask their children open-ended questions, push their children towards literature and well-informed sources of information, and encourage an inquisitive spirit.
Parents, be excited when your kid asks a question, and refrain from the temptation to just answer their question, but rather view it as an invitation to teach them how to find answers and make decisions. Children engaging diverse views can be scary as a parent, and for good reason. So, join them in this process. Being a part of a kid’s informed stance reduces their risk of encountering detrimental content while encouraging critical thinking.
Follow up on these “answers together" by asking them open-ended questions about your collaborative learning.
Finally, the hard part. Parents model resilient behavior to their children and discuss how they handle the toughest decisions and moments of their lives.
Our children need to see us stay calm under stress. Our children need to see that we too experience emotions and that we manage these emotions appropriately and get through them. Our children need to see us reading, learning and wrestling with tough issues. Our children need to see us demonstrate optimism and faith in the worst of situations, love towards others who have differing worldviews, an ability to hold true to our own beliefs and conclusions while having a willingness to learn from others, and a firm belief that an undesirable result does not negate strong effort and a willingness to be involved in future change.
