5 Tips for Parenting a Teenager

Sadhguru: Let me tell you a joke. A couple was struggling with the decision whether to have children or not. The husband wanted to have children. The wife wanted to get a dog instead. They could not settle the debate, so they went to a marriage counselor. They said, “We are not able to make up our mind whether to have children or to get a dog. What should we do?” The marriage counselor said, “This is very simple. Do you want to ruin your carpets or your life? You must decide.”

Like infancy, childhood, adulthood, middle age, and old age, adolescence or teenage is just a certain developmental stage. We are trying to segment it, but essentially, this is the journey of a body. Some are suffering infancy problems, some teenage problems, some are going through middle age problems, some are going through old age problems. Looking at it from this perspective, every phase of life seems to be a problem. Instead of seeing it as different facets of life, people see it as different problems.

There are various types of situations in your life, and that is all they are – situations. Some of them you can handle – some of them you cannot. Whatever you cannot handle, you call a problem, rather than seeing it is only a situation and trying to equip yourself to handle it. The moment you call it a problem, unpleasantness is a natural consequence.

#1 Be A Good Friend

If you look at it from the teenager’s perspective, every day, life is changing within you because you are growing rapidly, and the people around you are not able to grasp that. Usually, grandparents become a little more endearing than parents because they look at things from a little distance. As a teenager, you are slowly getting hijacked by your hormones. Old age means you are being released from that, so they kind of understand. Those of you who are middle-aged have no clue. Even historically, the Middle Ages represent a confused state of mind!

There are many aspects to teenage years. One thing is, your intelligence is being hijacked by your hormones. Suddenly, the whole world looks different. What were just people are suddenly becoming males and females. Suddenly, you are only interested in one half of humanity. It is a huge change. You must understand it is new to them and they are trying to come to terms with it.

If you were a good friend and they had problems, they would talk to you. Because most parents are lousy friends, they make other friends, and those friends give their own whacky advice since they are also in the same state. It would be best that if your children have a problem, they come to you. But they will not come to you if you think you are the boss. They will not come to you if you think you have ownership over their life. They will not come to you if you are “that horrible father or mother.”

They will come to you if you are a good friend, because when they have problems, it is natural for them to seek a friend. So make sure from an early age that you are their best friend until they reach the age of 18 or 20. You have to earn it. It will not happen because you delivered them. Because you delivered them, you get the title of mother and father – you will not get the title of a friend. This has to be earned by you behaving responsibly every day.

#2 Make Them Responsible

Do not deal with your teenagers. Make yourself available for them. Make them responsible for everything. One month, have the courage to hand over your monthly income to them and give them the responsibility to manage the house. You will see, things will change dramatically. If you really want to do something with your children, you must allow them to expand, because that is all they are trying to do. It is not just their body that is growing – the potential of the human being is also growing. You must allow them to expand, rather than seeing how to restrict them.

Do not bring up your children like they are some kind of nincompoops, that you have to breastfeed them till they are fifteen! That is how children are being brought up today. They are acting like little babies, even when they are twelve, thirteen, fifteen. A lot of them are becoming like this these days. It was not so in this country earlier. When people grew up in joint families, it was not so; by the time they were six, seven, they were fine. Now they are becoming totally helpless and emotionally all over the place. This idea that growing up children are a big problem must go. If someone says that they have a teenager at home, we are supposed to understand that they have a great problem at home. It is not true.

My daughter was also a teenager; people kept asking me, “Don't you have any trouble?” What trouble? Is she a bomb or something? She is just fine, because I do not treat her like a baby. I treated her as my equal. When she was four, five years of age, I would ask her opinion, “Okay, we're doing this, what about this?” Many, many times she came out with incredible solutions which most adults would have never have thought of. This does not mean that the child is some kind of special genius. If you allow it, every child is a genius. You make them into some kind of a mechanical nonsense because you want to put them into a fixed format. If you do not fix a format like that, you will see every child is capable of this.

If you try to restrict your children, you will have huge problems. If you have boys, you will have one kind of problem. If you have girls, you will have another kind of problem. Do not think restriction is a good way of controlling life. Responsibility will put them on track. As I said, hand over your money to them and tell them to handle it this month – you are on vacation. If you are afraid that they will go and blow it up – if they do, what happens to you will happen to them too. Let them go through it for a month. Of course you can keep some reserve, but let them understand if they blow up the money, there will be no breakfast tomorrow morning. It is better to learn in a protected, caring atmosphere than out on the street.

#3 Stop Eulogizing Helplessness

Your children are growing up and becoming teenagers – that should be a joyful event. But you are distressed about them growing up. Unfortunately, we have eulogized infancy and childhood, which are helpless stages of life. When children are small, they are helpless and look to you for everything. You think your children are magical because they are helpless. Suppose the baby popped out of you, stood up, and said, “Hey, who the hell are you?” you would not like this baby. But they take 14 or 15 years to ask that question. In fact, that is all a teenager is asking, “Okay, who the hell are you?”

If you eulogize childhood, this helpless phase in life where without someone else’s support we cannot exist, you will remain helpless forever. Because people get used to their children being helpless creatures, when they reach the so-called “teen” age and start standing on their own feet, people do not like it.

If you want to be someone significant to that fresh life, you must not have defined boundaries of who you are. When the child was an infant and he crawled, you crawled with him. Now when the teenager wants to swing, you must be able to swing with him. If you still want to crawl with him, he is not interested. In the eyes of young and energetic adolescents, parents, who think you still need to be crawled around with, look ridiculous.

#4 Don’t “Own” Them, Include Them

Drop this idea that your child belongs to you. If you think these children belong to you, when they come into their teens, they will tell you in their own way, “Goddammit, I don’t belong to you.” That is all they are trying to tell you – which you are not able to digest. Another life does not belong to you. If another life has chosen to be with you, please cherish that. It is a tremendous thing. Whether it is your husband, your wife, or your children – value the fact that another life has chosen to come through you or be with you. You do not own them in any sense. If you do not get it now, you will get it when you die or they die. You do not own them, but definitely, you should include them.

#5 Do Something About Yourself

If we really want to bring up our children well, first of all we must see if we can do something with ourselves. Everyone who wishes to be a parent must do one simple experiment. Sit down and see what is it that is not okay with your life, and what would be good for your life – not about the world outside because that needs cooperation from others, but about yourself. See if you can manifest that in the next three months.

Something about yourself – your own behaviour, speech, modes of action, and habits – if you can alter that in three months, then you would handle your son or daughter also with wisdom. Otherwise you will go by some consultancy from someone else. There is no consultancy. It takes observation of a particular child as to what should be done and what should not be done with that particular individual. You cannot do the same things with every child because each is a unique happening.