Lazy parenting means intentionally allowing your child the ability to grow a sense of self-efficacy, which in effect would enhance trust, flexibility and accountability. It’s about stepping back attentively to allow your kids to fight for a minute on their own, rather than hurrying in and attempting to rescue. It’s about making your child learn just how much they can do. And they are capable of a lot indeed!
This approach to parenting will offer enormous benefits for children. If parents jump in early as a job seems to be complicated, or don’t really encourage their child to reach a scenario that may be daunting, they don’t have a chance to know what they should do.
In fact, depending on their age, they can start to internalize a perception that they are incapable of doing anything — if mom still runs in to support, it must be because she thinks I can’t. It will lead to an intensified fear when the infant starts to experience life beyond the household, where there is no mom present to support every time.
If parents keep going to assess and take care of their child’s every problem, the kid often misses out on the opportunity to develop essential life skills. Occasionally I see this in the teenagers with whom I work.
A parent has always taken the lead in ensuring homework is solved, projects are completed,and social arrangements are made. Now the youngster has moved over to college and is suffering massively. They don’t know how to get themselves together or manage their time. They struggle to make and maintain friendships. These are very bright young adults, but they have simply never been given a chance to learn fundamental functioning capabilities.
To practice lazy parenting,here are the basic steps involved
1. Separate a good space and then let them have at it
Find a spot in your home that you can set up for your child that allows them to freely explore anything and everything within it. It can be an entire room or an area of a room that you are able to contain. Fill it with age-appropriate items that do not require close supervision for safety. Then let your child explore while you step back.
Depending on your child’s personality and age, they may need you to be physically present in the space with them, but the point is that you do not direct or constrain the play. Let them do their thing! You don’t have to worry because you know they are safe. Resist the temptation to rush in if they are struggling with something—a toy they can’t figure out, or a pillow they can’t climb over.
Give them space and time to operate through their discomfort and master the obvious problem. This is the main objective: to learn that they are capable of independence.
2. Become comfortable with natural consequences
Trying to give your child obligation means accepting that times will come when they will not do what they need to do. Lazy parenting accepts this and says that children should endure the natural consequences of actions within reason.
Take the middle school child, for example, who is old enough to organize her backpack every night. Prior to that, mom reviewed to make sure that every homework task was done and ready for the next day.
Mother strolls her child through the process after lazy parenting and then leaves the child to handle the actual check-up and packing herself. It works well on the days she keeps performing the schedule, and the child expresses trust and satisfaction in her abilities.
Though mom might be tempted to save her daughter when she discovers a folder on the kitchen table but she wouldn’t. Alternatively, she recognizes that the inevitable effects will be handled by her daughter, and the knowledge will make her remember the next time.
In general, intentionally lazy parenting is the change in thought from, “I need to jump in and solve this for my child” to, “I need to stand back to see if my child can do this on his own. This might take longer and be messier, but if they can handle something on their own, they should.”
Even if you don’t eventually wind up adopting this parenting style 100 percent of the time, testing it out periodically can be empowering for you and your kid. You ‘d be surprised what they are able to handle themselves