The Unbearable Likeness of Being

This week on Mom.me, I wrote about some of the feelings many of us are experiencing with our kids being back to school and how important it is to recognize, as they set off for the unexplored and (somewhat unsupervised) world, that not everyone is going to love them he way we do...

And that's okay.

It’s OK to be disliked. It is a part of the human experience. 

This is hard for us parents to accept because we adore our children and are unable to see outside of our own bias most days. And we’re entirely right to feel this way. Hello. I mean, OUR KIDS ARE AMAZING and everyone should think so, duh. 

But there is a chance that people don’t. And there will be times when they won’t. And it isn’t just their childhood but fortherestoftheirliveshood...

We all want to defend our kids from the teachers who will misunderstand them and the friends who might betray them, from the boys who kick lunch boxes...but we can't.

We cannot protect our children’s hearts from breaking. We cannot keep them from the tears they will undoubtedly shed in a bathroom at some point. But we can talk to them candidly, remind them that there will be times when they won’t be liked and that it's OK. We are all capable of being loved. We are also capable of being disliked, ignored and misunderstood.

I did so many things i didn't want to do because I was afraid I'd be disliked by those who wanted me to do them. I said "yes" when I should have said "no" because I didn't want to make people angry... or come off as unlikable. It took years before I realized that I was cowering to those I should have stood up to. Why? Because my fear of being disliked had turned me into someone who had given absolutely everything away... 

You want my sandwich? Here.

You want my bracelet? Here. 

You want my body? Okay... 

It wasn’t until sixth grade when I began to care less and less. Not that I didn’t still care, because I did, but I stopped trying to impress and please my teachers, my friends, my parents. I became strong-willed, and for the first time, had real friends. Some kids liked me. Some did not. Some teachers liked me. Some did not. But it was a FAR better life than the one I led when I tried to impress everyone.

Being that this was the most important social lesson of my life (and one I am still working on), I have been extremely transparent with my children on the issue.

There are few things more dangerous than a child, a teenager, and hell, even an adult who will do anything to be "liked" and "accepted" and "understood."

One of the great secrets to happiness in this life is recognizing that there will be people at every turn who think you suck. There will be birthday parties you don't get invited to and teachers who don't understand your brilliance and friends who misunderstand you and on and on ...

After all, it is far better to have lived and been, at times, unloved than to have never lived at all. It is far better to have said "no" and lost a friend than to have said "yes" and lost yourself. 

Beyond the usual school supplies, bento boxes and new shoes, let us remember to equip our children with the knowledge that they are lovable regardless of how many friends they accumulate or who wants to sit with them at lunch. They are lovable even when they aren’t unanimously liked. We all are. 

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You can read the whole column, here. Hit it, Taylor... 

GGC