Guidance that brings out the best

Some of the positive traits parents and guardians are expected to give to their children and wards are confidence and the drive to succeed in life, no matter the careers the children opt for.

Parents obviously assume they know the best ways to guide their children. Their motivation and actions are triggered by personal and cultural influences which sometimes do not fall in line with their children’s abilities and interests.

There are countless stories of potentially successful careers being derailed because parents insist on their children toeing a certain direction the children do not fancy.

Job satisfaction is key to a person’s sense of happiness, and so being coerced to follow a trail not in line with one’s demonstrated talents and abilities can lead to stressful lives.

That’s why we find the advice to parents by the music student who clinched the Overall Best Undergraduate award at the 14th congregation of the Methodist University College, Ghana as extremely useful. (See page 27.)

Her point is that parents who realise their children have interest in music should not forcefully shift the children’s attention to something else, since a child who is bent on doing music will eventually turn to it, no matter the number of times anybody tries to dissuade him or her from it.

She said being a teacher, she had noticed that music essentially served the expressive, emotional, intellectual, social and creative needs of children and helped them to do well in other subjects.

She was specific about music because that is the area of study she is most familiar with. One can, however, confidently say that there are parents who are trying to prevent their children from studying a myriad of courses, all because the parents either do not find those courses prestigious enough or do not see the children making a lot of money pursuing those areas of study. 

It is fine for parents to wish the best for their children and advise them on possible careers, but such wishes should not be allowed to override the children’s own capabilities. Parents desperately wishing their children to toe certain directions does not necessarily mean the children will succeed in those arenas.

We think what could be useful for parents is for them to monitor their children’s interests and peculiar capabilities as they grow and see how to bolster their interests in those areas.

To do this calls for effective collaboration with the children’s classroom teachers and the supervisors of extra-curricular activities.

There is evidence in this country and elsewhere to show that children who are allowed to freely follow and develop their interests sometimes end up being experts in more than one area of endeavour. There are medical doctors who are also accomplished musicians, just as there are some good bankers who are also respected novelists.   

Many high achievers sometimes attribute knowledge in certain areas to the initial discipline acquired from other spheres of life. Very often, it is useful, well-considered guidance that nurtures people to bring out the ultimate in them. 

Knowledge is a flexible commodity. No individuals, not even those described as extremely brilliant, have all of it. So the best way parents can uphold their children’s interests is to be sensitive to their needs and encourage them to do their best at all times.