How Mistakes Can Strengthen Our Families
I used to have a very hard time seeing anything but the ways I had failed when I faced struggles as a parent. If I was dealing with siblings fighting, I figured it was because I had done everything wrong and failed to teach the kids to get along. If one of my kids struggled to focus when doing school work, I chastised myself for not knowing the way to help them learn better.
I didn’t realize at the time that working through these struggles was actually making us stronger as a family.
Each time we solve a new problem, or make a mistake and learn from it, we’re gaining resilience. If we spend our life constantly running from struggle, we stay stuck.
Instead, as I developed more of a growth mindset in my parenting, I began to see the fertile ground that mistakes offer us. The times when things are a mess and we’re questioning everything, are also the times we have opportunities to make changes, add new tools and let go of what no longer works.
It feels messy to grow, but it’s not wrong. Part of your job as a parent is to notice when things are no longer working and change course.
This realization, that challenges are the very thing we need in order to grow, has made it a little easier to be forgiving on myself when things go wrong. It has allowed me to see these difficulties as a part of our family growing and learning together.
In the Bounceback Parenting Credo I say:
- We believe everyone can learn and grow, starting right from where they are – Choosing to look at past mistakes and current challenges not as indications of failure, but as the foundation for growth and resilience.
From my book Bounceback Parenting on shifting our mindset when it comes to struggle:
When we realize we are not doing it wrong if we struggle, it is indeed freeing. And in fact, what’s happening is that we’re moving into the growth mindset.
- Instead of believing we need to control everything to have a family life free of challenges, we can see challenges as opportunities for growing together.
- Instead of believing we have to make our kids happy, we can see opportunities for them to grow more resilient.
- Instead of believing others are doomed to fail, we can look for their strengths and see opportunities for them to build on that foundation.
Letting go of the notion that right choices create a life without challenges empowers us to stop being so hard on ourselves and start seeing opportunities for growth.
More Resources On Developing a Growth Mindset:
- Subscribe to Bounceback Texts to receive a daily dose of Bounceback Parenting inspiration.
- 10 Phrases to Help You Develop a Growth Mindset in Parenting
- Building Yourself Up – 10 Phrases to Get Rid of Negative Self Talk
64 Positive Things to Say to Kids
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Very true…such a meaningful blog..I must appreciate your work.
Absolutely true! Parenting is not a practice but it’s a daily learning experience. We make mistakes because we’re not perfect. The good thing is we learned from it and eventually make us learn and grow.
This is absolutely true; we all need to understand that to grow, we have to fail. After all, that’s how we all started out, right? Learning by failures and successes as children. Over time, as children, we learn to repress the urge to venturing out of our safe zones, because as we grow older, our failures seemingly become more prominent. We learn not to allow ourselves to fall into failure by not trying in the first place.
But the fact is, we need to go back to our child-like mindsets and allow failure to help us learn how to succeed!
Thank you so much for writing this!
Love this read! It’s so easy to get caught up in the negative perspective of making mistakes, but the truth is that mistakes can absolutely be some of the greatest lessons and opportunities for growth. If we never make mistakes, and move through them, how can we ever expect our kids to know that a) it’s ok to make mistakes, and b) there’s a lot of to be said for working through them? Mistakes are part of life, and they can be empowering at that!