“Don’t water the plants with a water balloon. That will take forever. Go get the hose,” I insisted to my daughter as she stood at the side of the garden bed, watering the tomato plants with a teeny-tiny stream of water, flowing from a hole she’d made in a water balloon.
“Why? This is funner,” she replied.
“Because the plants won’t really get enough water.”
She put down the balloon and walked over to get the hose. I sighed, seeing the balloon on the ground, slowly leaking out its water. Sheesh. Why do I have to control everything?
Do you ever get into a mode where you just want to get things done efficiently, but in the process, you find yourself trying to control every little thing? Do you wish you could relax and enjoy life a little more? You can do this by knowing how and when to loosen your grip. Here are 4 things to let go of if you don’t want to be a control freak anymore.
1. Let go of speed and perfection.
I often want the chores and the musts done quickly and done well so we can get to the relaxing, fun part of the day. But work and fun often aren’t two separate things for kids—in fact, they naturally look for the fun in everything. And maybe the kids have it right; do we ever really get all the chores done anyway? If we want to be less controlling, we must stop evaluating how fast and how perfectly everything gets done. It might take a good 20 minutes for your child to tie his shoes, and there might be crumbs on the table, but you’ll be enjoying the natural pace of life (and maybe be relaxed enough to have some fun amid the work too).
2. Let go of impulsive answers and impulsive fears.
When I barked at my daughter for watering the tomatoes with a water balloon, I was impulsive, saying the first thing that popped into my mind. But what if I had paused to think first? I might have thought: Wait, why not let her do it that way, at least for a while? If we let go of giving impulsive answers, we give kids a chance to make decisions for themselves. And while we’re paying attention to our thoughts, we’ll notice sometimes it’s our impulsive fears that are shouting in our heads: What will people think? Will my kids get hurt? Will they be unhealthy? It’s time to stop being held hostage by our impulsive thoughts and fears and instead, pause to consider a better option.
3. Let go of preventing kids’ mistakes.
We know that learning from our own mistakes is the best kind of teacher, but it’s difficult to watch our children make mistakes. Our instinct is to reach out and stop the spill, stop the failing grade, stop the feelings from being hurt… But preventing kids’ mistakes is just another control method. With the intention of putting our kids on a “good” path, we take on unnecessary stress and prevent our kids from learning about life. If you want to stop being a control freak, you have to be willing to allow some natural consequences to happen.
4. Let go of conflicting goals.
There was a time when I wanted to host playdates all the time. My goal was to build friendships my kids and I really needed. But I also had a goal of having very little prep and cleanup for these playdates. When I became frustrated one day, my husband said, “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.” Ouch. I didn’t even realize that’s what I was doing. But he was right—I had goals that couldn’t coexist. Sometimes we need to step back and ask: What is the goal? But when we can focus on one overarching goal, we can loosen our grip on the other things that don’t matter as much right now.
What advice do you have for how to stop being a control freak?
