Life is sometimes hard. There are times we need to brace up and give another go after a fall. Giving up is not an option, it comes from a faulty mindset. Perseverance is one of the basic skills needed to get through life challenges when they come. It simply means enduring positively with every optimism and working hard towards a greater goal.
Compared to previous generations, this generation has less perseverance, grit, and determination. Research has revealed that over indulgence at home and in school is the primary cause of this. At home, parents nowadays, in a bid to support their children, to manage and fix their general well being for them, create a problem of raising children who lack the fundamental grit to handle the grind of their daily lives.
In school, teachers are at the mercy of parents. Failing, which was a normal learning process, is now abominable because parents expect their children not only to pass but to receive good grades. Poor grades are no longer a drive for students to study harder and improve but a trigger for parents to wage a war against teachers. Grades are influenced and purchased by parents and by students. Thus, students are lazy, lack determination, take little or no risk, and give up at the slightest disappointment. Determination has been traded, the wisdom to decipher wrong vanished, and the courage to fix it and move on is far-fetched.
It’s therefore safe to state that children of this generation are simply a product of their environment. An environment where children are made to believe that life is all rosy, where they live at the fallacious impression created by their parents and the society, where they are shielded from being free and behaving as children like playing in the mud, climbing trees, playing on concrete, having few scraped elbows, reasoning logically and dealing with their daily struggles. They lack the basic characteristics to take risks, solve problems, and make decisions. They fear trying something new, assessing and reassessing possibilities, and taking the basic steps to a lasting solution.
Tenacity and doggedness are one of the character traits that contribute to success, and they are products of perseverance.They prepare children to be self-sufficient and build their independence and self-confidence. They make children to practice mindfulness and stay in control of their thoughts and feelings. With them, children take greater responsibility for their actions, explore and discover their world by themselves and they understand that failure and mistakes are part of everyday life and tools for growth. They change their perspective of easygoing and hitch free life and make them realize that challenges must come and must be faced. They teach children to have a first-hand idea of their own limitations and boundaries. With these persevering mindset, children are empowered to be more gritty, persistent, resilient, and determined.
Parents should do better by not providing their children with immediate success, with constant happiness, absolute availability, and giving them a perfect childhood, some even up to adult age. These can not give a child a great future. Children need to be allowed to glide through and overcome situations independently with just the basic guides. Teachers need to engage the academic mindset of children and provide them with the psychological resources, emotional mindset, and the basic strategies needed to face setbacks and accomplish goals. Children need to desist from seeking immediate pleasure and learn to be self-regulatory and focus on long-term goals. They need to be allowed by their parents and teachers to figure out problem solving strategies on their own. They need to develop their talents and intelligence through hard work and efforts, and to persevere in event of disappointment. They need to master delayed gratification when need be.
If children nowadays can not face personal problems, how possible is it for them to face family, societal or global problems, or issues from other segments of socioeconomic spectrum? If parents sort grades for their children, manoeuvre admissions for them, take the adolescent child to school everyday, fill every form for them and even track their results for them, how would that child survive when life hits hard? It is indeed disturbing!.
There are many cases of attempted suicide in children and youths, over a mere disappointment, heartbreak, or difficulty. Parents, teachers, tutors, counsellors, and mentors need to do better to instruct, guide, and direct children more on practical and real life order than unfeasible and artificial life. They need to know the limits when it comes to managing a child’s wellbeing or fixing problems caused by everyday bump.
According to Walter Elliot, perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after the other. Wilful persistency makes the difference.
BIBLE VERSE
Galatians 6:9
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up
PROVERB
Without perseverance, talent is a barren bed. ~ Welsh Proverb
RIDDLE
My life can be measured in hours, I serve by being devoured; Thin, I am quick; Fat, I am slow; Wind is my foe. What am I?
Amara Ann Unachukwu
