Telling kids to enjoy their childhood is insulting

Enjoy being controlled and monitored, I guess

Photo by Anna Samoylova on Unsplash

While on my way to a company lunch meeting, I glanced over and saw a bunch of kids playing on the playground at a local school. It looked as though they were having so much fun, and they probably were! Without thinking, I uttered that nostalgic phrase people over 18 tell those who have yet to reach the pinnacle of freedom —"enjoy childhood while it lasts".

I soon realized that recess is the most enjoyable time of many kids’ day!

Think of a couple fond moments from your childhood that you found enjoyable. Are you thinking of a math lecture at 10:49 am on a Tuesday morning? Washing dishes as your favorite show played in the next room? Doing homework, having your possessions taken, or worrying about the incoming punishment for failing a test? I’m assuming not. Those don’t describe the enjoyable moments I recall either. That made me ponder a more fundamental question: What about childhood is enjoyable?

Consent is crucial

Why is it that so many of the things children are forced to do on a daily basis aren’t things people find enjoyable? Why do people seem to enjoy times when they are able to have fun, explore interests, discover new ideas, and form meaningful relationships? What is it about the things kids want to do that make it enjoyable rather than the things kids are “supposed” to be doing?

Experiences are more enjoyable when you consent to participating. You have more fun and feel better about not enjoying it when you’re free to opt out.

Kids are rarely ever able to opt out of their schedules. When it’s time to get off the iPad and brush their teeth, the kid must give up something they find enjoyable to avoid punishment. And while punishments are typically restricted to taking possessions or keeping kids at the house for a certain duration, whatever the means used by parents to enforce rules, the goal is always the same: to leverage something the kid finds enjoyable. If we were to ask parents why they leverage things their kid finds enjoyable, they’ll likely explain that it’s to teach them about the cruelty of adulthood.

But aren’t kids supposed to be enjoying childhood?

Learning starts with interest

Father of five and medical professional Aaron Stupple explains the fundamental purpose of childhood in his book The Sovereign Child: “Childhood is a period of supported knowledge growth until a person is capable of solving life’s problems on their own.”

I don’t think most adults don’t have a firm understanding of how knowledge grows. Most seem to think if their kid is having fun, they’re probably not learning much; it’s the place where adults start being more skeptical of kids’ sense of joy. Knowledge grows by guessing and testing, trial-and-error elimination, conjecture and criticism—all in aims of solving some problem. But here’s the caveat: people (including kids) have their own problems. The process for solving them is at its most effective when the investigator is genuinely interested in doing so.

When a kid is watching YouTube, most parents think they’re rotting their brains, becoming addicted, and won’t learn the important lessons needed for success. That’s because all parents see is a kid sitting on the couch glued to the screen; it’s much more difficult to see all the joy and learning taking place!

Knowledge growth can be very subtle, and even implicit, but it doesn’t mean it’s not happening. In fact, we know something important is going on or else the kid wouldn’t be glued to the screen! The kid is focused on the YouTube video because it’s interesting, sophisticated, and helps them understand the unspoken nuances in the world. Sometimes we forget kids have their own set of preferences, interests, and problems that differ from ours.

Can you remember some of the first YouTube videos you ever watched? I certainly can—mostly because it was an enjoyable experience of discovering a new forum for interesting ideas. I’ve discovered and studied entire realms of interests on YouTube as an adult too; there is plenty of productivity to be had on the site. The only way I was able to figure any of this out—how best to use the site for my problems—was by having the freedom to explore it, whether at a friend’s parent-free home after school or as an adult in the comfort of my apartment.

Interest, curiosity, ambition, and passion will get an individual further than any arbitrary steps or rules to success.

Freedom, Freedom, where are you?

Adults jump off the ship when they realize the best environment for kids to solve problems and enjoy themselves is a free one, “where guesses and criticisms are encouraged and given a chance to work, and mistakes are never punished or shamed” as Stupple explained. Childhood should be the best time of our lives; it should be the time when “kids are free to explore things that are integral to life and to learn about and develop relationships with those things for their own sake. Kids don’t have dependents or a responsibility to ensure their own survival, so it is precisely during this time that a person is most free to engage with the world directly.”

Adults typically make it harder for kids to enjoy childhood so they can learn the hard lessons of adulthood. But if adulthood is so stressful and burdensome, why would we want kids to experience that when they don’t have to? It can’t be to prepare them for the real world because, in the real world, adults are able to opt out of most things and have the freedom to explore their interests. The conventional parenting mentality: childhood is for learning about adulthood, and kids should enjoy that disciplinary process because at least they’re not adults yet. (If you’re confused just imagine what kids must feel.)

Childhood isn’t for adulthood; it’s for discovering and pursuing passions, it is about “wasting time” playing and daydreaming. Things adults consider a waste of time can be a fully immersed experience of joy and passion by the child. It’s only a waste of time if the person participating isn’t enjoying themselves! For most kids, much of their daily lives is a waste of time. They wake up early although they’ll be working their entire lives; they go to a school similar to a 9-5 without the freedom to leave or pay for labor; they must do homework and chores just like the parents must keep up with the house; and they must spend every waking moment looking over their shoulder just like if an adult was working across from their boss 24/7/365/18. 

Adults will argue they don’t enjoy work, yet they can’t just quit. But remember, adults can opt out of almost any activity or responsibility they’re involved with. The effects stemming from that decision are called tradeoffs, and one must prioritize preferred tradeoffs, balancing duty and interests according to their individual ambitions and problems. The absolute best way to discover, explore, assign value, form preferences, and logically prioritize them is with freedom and autonomy. It’s extremely hard to do when someone is breathing down your neck, giving unwanted suggestions, and pressuring you—all with a slight underlying threat of fear and intimidation. 

Joy often comes in spite of adults

Kids forced to do homework before playing video games probably won’t teach the kid to study over notes of past lessons, but it will certainly teach them to do the bare minimum so they can get on with the fun part. It will certainly pressure them to shield grades from their parents and copy off other students. Oftentimes, adults’ arbitrary rules and limits interfere with kids’ ability to enjoy their lives as children. Adults tell children to enjoy their time as kids and turn around to teach them about the hardships of adult life. It’s gaslighting of the worst kind: from the oppressors themselves.

Adults can look back at their time as children and remember many good moments. But those moments are in spite of an incessant mandate and monitoring of compliance by adults. Kids are forced to do things they don’t want to do all the time. And while adults counter that they’re attempting to instill lessons needed for adulthood, that means kids are rarely —if ever— able to experience childhood for what it should be: the freedom to explore the world. If childhood is for experiencing adulthood burdens, if school is for college, if college is for career options, and if everything else is in preparation for life outside your career, when can kids be kids?

The conventional “enjoy being a kid” attitude no longer makes sense to me. Those kids I saw enjoying recess with friends were experiencing possibly the only aspect of their day not completely controlled, monitored, and imposed. I was witnessing one of the few times during childhood when kids are more or less free to explore, create, and collaborate—though still locked in a fixed boundary under supervision.

These kids were experiencing something they rarely ever get to experience: being a kid. No wonder they were having so much fun!