Who should read this chapter? All parents.
Summary: Understanding human nature helps parents understand their children. It helps children understand themselves and others. Peer pressure, fighting, greed, revenge, curiosity, impulsiveness, mistakes, etc., are part of human nature. This is not entirely obvious to children. Children can learn about things in life the easy way or they can learn the hard way. By explaining human nature to them, they can better understand how they decide on their actions.
Human nature is our tendency to do certain actions even though there is no logical reason for us to do these things. Mistakes are part of human nature. We have no desire to make these, yet they occur. Explain this to your children and they will have a better understanding of why they do some things that are not really good ideas.
Our brain is capable of overcoming some of our basic instincts. Those who can do this well, will generally be less impeded by our natural bad habits, and they will come out ahead. Understanding human nature, helps us control our human nature, to excel above others who succumb to human nature.
A rabbit once found a lion trapped in a hunter's net. The lion called out to the rabbit to please help him. "If you gnaw a hole in the net to release me, I will be forever grateful", said the lion. The rabbit replied, "You must be kidding. As soon as I let you out, you're going to eat me." "Now, why would I do that to the rabbit who saved my life?", said the lion. Feeling sorry for the lion, the rabbit gnawed a hole in the net, and the lion was free. The lion then pounced on the rabbit and swallowed him whole. From inside the lion, the rabbit asked, "Why did you eat me after I saved your life?" The lion replied, "Because I am a lion." You see, lions are hunters and they eat other animals. It would be very difficult for a lion to release an animal in his grasp. This is just not lion-like. Lions have "lion nature", which makes them behave like a lion. If this lion had a human brain, he might have been able to overcome his "lion nature" to release the rabbit. Similarly, humans have human nature. But there is a big difference. Because, we are smarter than lions, we have the ability to think and overcome human nature when human nature is detrimental. But for us to do this, we must think first. Unfortunately, this doesn't always happen. That's human nature.
Human instincts that can lead to trouble include revenge, curiosity, peer pressure, independence, impulsiveness, greed, etc. If youngsters can understand their human nature, they can better overcome it to make good decisions on their own. Parents must teach them this at an early age when our influence is most important. Examples of all of these human nature faults should be reviewed with them as they mature. Use their mistakes as opportunities to teach them these lessons, rather than merely scolding or punishing them over the incident.
Getting into a fight or argument is a good opportunity to teach them about revenge. Children always focus on who started the fight, but they should be taught that this doesn't matter. Once a fight begins, there is a risk for harm. The fight continues because of revenge; tit for tat. One child just wants to get back at the other one. Ask them if there is anything good that results from getting revenge. Ask them if there is anything bad that results from this. Ask them how they would feel and what consequences would result if the other child got injured in the fight. Discuss with them the degree of destruction (loss of life, limb and property) that occurs in a war. Point out to them that all wars start over a little fight that turns into a big fight between grown-ups. Ask your children if fighting is a good idea or a bad idea. It is obviously a bad idea, yet this occurs frequently because of their human nature. They should understand this so that in the future, they can make a better decision about whether to participate in a fight.
Childhood curiosity has burned down many a home. Curiosity is just one of the factors that exposes kids to smoking, alcohol and drugs. Curiosity is part of human nature. Curiosity stimulates investigation and experimentation for the scientific advancement of the human race. Curiosity is both good and bad for many reasons. Our natural curiosity is one of the ways that we learn. Some things are best learned through personal experience and other things are best learned without personal experience. For these things that are best learned without personal experience, I have taught my children they can learn about these things the easy way or the hard way. For example, the stove and oven are hot. You can get burned if you get too close to it. Children can choose to believe this and learn the easy way, or they can ignore this and learn the hard way by getting burned.
Whenever children sustain a preventable injury, use the injury as an opportunity to stress this. When crossing the street and in parking lots, we always teach our children to cross carefully and watch out for cars. One day, while I was unloading soccer equipment at a soccer practice, my son and youngest daughter jumped out of the van and ran across the street. An oncoming car stuck my son at a low speed. He was not seriously injured, but he did sustain a large painful abrasion and bruise over his entire thigh. My son chose to learn the hard way. He has now learned this lesson well. Unfortunately, the lesson was painful. I use this example a lot when I am trying to teach something to my children. They can learn the lesson the easy way or the hard way. For my other children who have never been hit by a car, I tell them that if they are curious about what it is like to be hit by a car, they should ask their younger brother. What does it feel like to get hit by a car? He responds, "PAIN."
Some things are a bit too dangerous to learn by experience. Playing with matches, diving off a cliff, sky diving, mountain climbing, etc., are generally safe, but there are some risks here. Depending on their age and maturity, these activities can be deadly. Curiosity about fire, causes children to play with matches. Unless you teach them not to do this, they may end up learning this lesson the hard way. Other things are absolutely too dangerous to learn by curiosity. I would love to experience flying like a bird. My curiosity wonders what this is like. But if I jump off a building to experience this, I will die shortly after the experience. Experimenting with drugs is likewise too dangerous to try, since addiction may follow. Parents must teach their children to suppress their curiosity when it may result in risk. Again, children should be taught to ask themselves, is this a good idea or a bad idea? Curiosity may tempt them, but if they learn to distinguish good from bad and right from wrong, children and teens should be able to ask themselves if their action is a good idea or a bad idea.
Peer pressure is a common human nature fault that youngsters and teens are particularly susceptible to. Several old sayings describe this such as, "If everyone jumps in a fire, does that mean you should jump in the fire too?" and "If all your friends jump off a cliff, will you do the same?" We obviously would not follow others to such an extreme, but youngsters and teens are particularly prone to peer pressure when it comes to trying street drugs and committing criminal acts such as vandalism and shop lifting. Instead of using the obvious and ridiculous examples of jumping into a fire or off a cliff, parents should use more realistic examples such as, "If your friends tell you to shoplift, will you follow along and wind up in jail?", or "If your friends tell you to try drugs, will you follow along and end up being addicted?"
Peer pressure is powerful. Parents should anticipate this and discuss this with their children at an early age. At an early age, children are very impressionable. Lessons taught at an early age will stick with them for life. Attempting to give them advice as a teenager will have to compete with advice from their peers. In such instances, advice from teen peers will usually win. As a parent, you are at a disadvantage during the teen years, but you have the advantage when your children are young. Use this advantage. At an early age, explain to them the normal changes that occur in the relationship between teens and their parents. They should anticipate that when they become older, they will tend to listen to their peers, and listen less to their parents. They should understand that this is part of human nature. I tell my children to anticipate this and to promise me that when they get older, they will at least consider our advice. I told them that when they get older, they will think that they know everything, while mom and dad know nothing. Does this make sense? Of course it doesn't, but all teens think this way because that's human nature. By anticipating this attitude change, teens are more likely to understand their human nature to make good decisions on their own.
The desire for independence comes at a similar time. Susceptibility to peer pressure is part of the human nature desire for independence. It's annoying and at the same time, amusing that teenagers do many things to become independent, but they don't mind remaining dependent on parents for meals, money, laundry, automobile maintenance, housekeeping, taxes, etc. That's human nature.
Impulsiveness is more prominent in younger children. This is more controlled as they mature and it becomes less noticeable. A few teens fail to mature in this regard and they tend to become difficult social and behavior problems.
Greed is a human nature fault more so of adults, but it applies to children as well. If you have $1 million, you will soon want $2 million. By nature, humans are greedy and rarely appreciate all that we are fortunate enough to have. I have heard of a person who inherited $10 million and this person was unhappy because another heir received $15 million. Now that's being greedy and ungrateful. We should try to teach this aspect of human nature to our children. Children always ask us for more toys even though they have many toys at home. This is normal childhood greed since no matter how many toys they have, they will still want more. They take for granted blessings such as good health, loving parents, clothing, shelter and food. Children often grumble about the food that they have. No matter what we feed them, it is normal for them to not like certain foods. Eating fried lizards or dog food would taste very good if I was starving. If I was forced to eat lobster everyday, I would probably get tired of this and I might grumble about it. This is normal human nature, but by explaining this to our children, they will be more appreciative of their everyday blessings and they will be less greedy.