Dare Trilogy | Book 3 Editing | ✓

3.17 | Project Parenting

Edited on August 13, 2020

| . . . C H A P T E R . . .  3.17 - P R O J E C T -  P A R E N T I N G . . . |

Aarav excitedly ran to the front door when he saw us coming and taking Lavanya's hand in right hand and Anjali's in the left, he pulled them in. "Mom. Di. Look. I finished my crafts project. Dad helped."

In the living room, on the floor, there was a sketch book where the painting was with sketch pencils and paints around it. Lavanya took one look and asked, "Dad helped, huh?"

"Yes." He answered with a grin. "Isn't it awesome?"

"Sweetheart, go pull your dad's ear for us." She asked him, and without a question, he strolled over to him. Arnav winced and took his earphones out.

"Aarav, wha...?" He trailed off his scolding when he saw the three of us standing with our arms crossed over our chests.

Anjali informed, "Aarav says you helped him with his craft project."

"Yeah, isn't it great? I didn't know our kid was a prodigy!"

I rolled my eyes as Lavanya instructed Aarav, "Aarav, now pull your ears."

"But..."

Lavanya narrowed her eyes at the protest, and it was silenced. With a pout, Aarav held his ears. She went on to scold, "What have I said about lying?" She walked over to Arnav and swatted his upper arm, "And you. You're not even ashamed of teaching him to lie? I asked you to help him with his project, not do it for him!"

"But I..." He made the mistake of trying to justify his compulsion of doing the project himself instead of guiding Aarav into doing it himself.

Lavanya held up her hand, silencing him. "Eh. Don't even try."

"Oh come on, it's not that big a deal."

Anjali walked over to them, guiding Aarav's hand off his ears and taking him to the couch, lifted him to sit on her lap. Then, she advised Arnav, "Chote, this might be small things now, but if you do everything for him, he'll expect you to bail him out of everything. He'll never learn to do things on his own, right? He won't learn to take responsibility for his own actions. We had to do everything on our own when we were kids, didn't we? Would you have it any other way? Didn't it teach you to be independent?"

"Yeah, but it's because we didn't have our parents. He does. He shouldn't have to grow up so soon." He argued and from some small angle, I did see his point, but in the long run, I also knew Anjali and Lavanya were right.

Anjali sighed, finding it difficult to explain it to him why it was wrong for him to do Aarav's homework for him. I tried, "See, Arnav, what they're trying to say is that you're his dad. You should be guiding him, let him find things he likes to do, learn from mistakes. He does have all of us, yes, but if we coddle him and give him everything, do everything for him, we'll only end up spoiling him. We shouldn't be teaching him that its alright to cheat, lie, get others to do his homework, and all. That such things don't have consequences. Instead, we need to teach him from a young age what is right and wrong and help him learn the difference. Let that be a part of his character rather than the spoiled riches. Does that make sense?"

That's when it clicked in his head. If he didn't learn that doing bad things have consequences, what difference would there be in our upbringing of him compared to what Shyam is? Instilling good beliefs in children only gets harder as they grow up, and it has to take effect from the beginning itself. If smaller things are allowed to slide by without appropriate and instant reprimand, it will only reinforce those behaviors. Doting on children and wanting to give them everything before they even ask for it because we didn't have that privilege is one thing, and giving in to every whim of theirs and telling them it's okay to do so is another.