Tuesday, September 8, 2015

Forbes: An Antidote To The Tiger Mom? -- Book

By SIMON CONSTABLE
There is something about the sting of asphalt on the palm of your hand when you fall off your bicycle that makes you never want to let it happen again. Of course it will happen again, but you learn, you get better and so on. That is the way millions of people learned to ride. At least they did. But not so much lately.
A couple of years ago I met a woman who had never fallen from a bicycle or seemingly had any major failure in her life. Unfortunately, she wanted me to write her life story. It was unfortunate because narrative’s with no struggle don’t work so well. Obstacles overcome, after all, make a better tale. The bigger the obstacle the better the story. A story without such tension is just lacking. And now we are learning that it doesn’t really work so well in life either.
That brings me to Jessica Lahey’s recently published book, The Gift of Failure: How the Best Parents Learn to Let Go So Their Children Can Succeed,” which addresses the issue of over protective parenting and how sometimes it’s just a better gift to let kids learn through trial and error. Lot’s of emphasis on the error, please! Read more here.


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