These days, social media is full of parenting advice. “You should do this for your child,” “This is important for development,” “Don’t miss this stage.”
The more I see these, the more I feel my mind getting rushed.
“Did I miss something?”
“Should I be doing more?”
I’ve been there too.
Feeling anxious, trying things I don’t fully understand, just because it looked like something I *should* be doing.
Expectations vs. Reality
One day, I tried a simple art activity with Fruit Loops cereal. The idea was to glue them onto paper and create something colorful and beautiful. But reality didn’t go as planned. My child was more interested in eating the cereal than creating anything. The glue wasn’t applied properly, and the colors were chosen freely, not carefully arranged. Honestly, I felt a bit frustrated.
In That Moment, I Felt Irritated
To be honest, I got irritated with my daughter. Why is she doing it like that? Can’t she just focus and make it nicely? These thoughts filled my mind. She was more focused on eating the cereal, and when she did try to create something, she would mostly pick only the red ones, almost obsessively.
I kept thinking – Why can’t she just do it the ‘right’ way?
She Was Already Creating Her Own Story
Then she said something:
“Mom, butterflies like strawberries, so we need to use red ones.”
And later she asked me “How can strawberries be inside Fruit Loops cereal?”
In that moment, I paused. She wasn’t just playing. She was already building meaning and imagination in her own way. Her own way of thinking, not mine.
Maybe I Was Looking for the “Right Answer”
That’s when I realized something. Maybe I wasn’t really seeing her as she is. Maybe I was trying to create a “perfect result” instead. A result that looks good to others, a result that fits expectations. But she was already learning, already thinking, already interpreting the world in her own way. Even if it didn’t match what I had in mind.
I Am Not an Education Expert
I am not an education professional. I am simply a mother raising one child. But in the past, I volunteered as an assistant art teacher, working with children who were emotionally struggling. I also helped with English classes for immigrants. Through those experiences, I started to understand something important:
Education is less about teaching, and more about believing and waiting.
The Foundation of Education
The most important thing in education is not instruction or control, it’s trust and patience.
A belief that the child is capable. A willingness to wait for their process. That idea has stayed with me ever since.
Living in the AI Era
In this AI era, problems with clear answers are being solved faster and more accurately than ever. But raising a child is different. There is no single correct answer, no fixed speed, no identical outcome. That is why what matters most is not how much we teach, but how much we trust and wait.
What I’ve Learned
It’s not about filling the child with more information. It’s about trusting what is already growing inside them.
It’s not about rushing outcomes. It’s about staying beside them while they explore, even if things look messy.
That is something I am still learning every day.
My Thoughts These Days
I understand the anxiety of parents, I really do. I still feel it myself sometimes but one thing has become clearer to me. Children are already growing in their own way, much more than we realize.
So these days, I remind myself:
Just trust them. And wait a little longer.