Control is often an Illusion

Control is Often an  Illusion

There is an interesting idea that we as adults often put a lot of stock into: Control.
Control is when your personal will is what will dictate the actions or outcomes.  In parenting, we believe that we have control over our children.  On rare occasion this is true.  Our children will listen and obey exactly as we want and this produces the desired outcomes.  More often, our children do not listen and obey exactly as we want or the outcome is not what we wanted.  One of the major reasons for this is differences in perspective.
Perspective is how things are viewed.  When we have the same perspective as our children we have a much better chance of understanding them and they understanding us.  Consider this example: When you are looking at another person and say that you'd like the object on the right, the other person can be easily confused.  Do you mean your right or their right?  This is a very simple example, but it helps bring the concept out.
Another idea of different perspectives that I get all the time with my kids is what is complete or enough.  When you ask a kid to put their toy in their room, they do exactly what you ask and will usually just throw it into their room.  After several things from around the house being put in their room, I will walk by and see that there is a pile of stuff on their floor that needs to be put away.  From my parent perspective, putting something in your room meant putting it in the correct place in their room.  They were only told to put the toy in their room.  Now I have to work at a more specific level with my kids on putting away each of the toys in their proper place in their room.  After a while kids may have the same perspective on what it means to put something in their room as parents have about it, but it will take work to get there.