Focus on the Family Magazine - August/September 2020

KIDS & TEENS / ADAPTABILITY
Practicing flexible thinking
We have a couple of mottos in the Huerta house.
When we face difficulties, we say, “There is always
a solution.” And we frequently ask ourselves, “Is
there another way to look at this?” Having a flexible
mindset makes a big difference in how we
respond to challenging circumstances.
Imagine you’ve caught your child in a lie, and
perhaps your child seems to be acting defiant, too.
The easy thing to do—the inflexible thing—would
be to focus on the dishonesty and disrespect, and
dispense some kind of consequence. But flexible
thinking may lead you to a different approach.
You might ask some questions about the circumstances
that led to the dishonesty. What might
your child have seen, heard or interpreted, whether
from you or from someone else, that could possibly
have motivated this lie? Is your son struggling with
a particular emotion—fear, anxiety, frustration or
anger—that might have played a role in shaping his
behavior? Is your daughter afraid of telling the truth
because she thinks it will get her into trouble?
Flexibility is the ability to see things from multiple
perspectives. It requires an open mind and a
willingness to dig deeper. It’s about leaving room
for imperfection in the midst of the pressures
and disappointments of everyday life. It’s a skill
that we all need to cultivate if we want to survive
and thrive as parents in a world of adversity and
unpredictability.
Pausing to see
the bigger picture
Busy parents often get caught in a vicious cycle
of stress and shortsightedness. Shortsightedness
creates stress because as we focus too intently on
short-term problems, we can lose touch with the
rest of the world and heighten our sense of helplessness.
Stress, in turn, can cause shortsightedness
by magnifying our difficulties and making them
look bigger than they really are. Under the influence
of stress, problems swell to the point where we
can no longer see beyond them.
To break free from this cycle, we must strive to
shift our thoughts toward the larger goals of family
life. That starts by pausing to consider how we’re
interpreting what is happening, and then trying to
see things from multiple perspectives.
When we watch movies, we sometimes have to
hit the pause button to think about what we’ve just
seen, to process a confusing bit of dialogue or plot
point. This is true in family life as well. Sometimes
we need to hit the pause button long enough to get
our bearings and think through our plan of action.
When my kids were small, I often had to pause
and recognize some basics about misbehavior. I
had to remember that very little of what children
do to misbehave is deliberately done to hurt
their parents. They’re just responding to their
experiences in life as they learn how to manage
themselves.
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FOCUS ON THE FAMILY
August / september 2020