Parenting: The Dark Side

I grew up with five brothers in the house so I know the battle of good and evil that happens in Star Wars quite well. I’m not sure whom we all loved to hate (and sort of idolize – I mean, how cool would it be to make people be quiet sometimes?) before there was Darth Vader.

I was against sharing the series with my son for quite a long time, even though I enjoy it as much as I do. There are some really adult themes in the movie about good and evil, love and hate. But I love the idea of the force, I love Yoda, and every time I watch "Revenge of the Sith," I'm sure Anakin will make it this time. He won’t turn, he won’t believe the Emperor, he'll realize death is a part of life…I know it!

Oh the pain of it all…watching a good person believe lies, lose sight of the truth and give into his baser instincts.

And, as I'm sure you can imagine, the story has sparked some pretty interesting conversations with my son: questions about life, death, when to fight, when not to fight and why. What is good, what is bad, and how on earth we’re supposed to be able to tell the difference? It’s been interesting as a mom to watch him ask these questions and learn that such things even exist.

But there has been a twinge of pain for me too. I want him to stay young and innocent forever. I don't want him to know that people lie, cheat, steal and manipulate. I want him to trust, have fun and believe in people.

It's been really important for me to realize that I can’t shield him from these, "bad" rather human things. My job isn't to keep him from seeing anything that could ever possibly be bad, my job is to teach him how to trust himself, how to respond to these things and to grow into himself. And beyond even that, my job is to provide him with the guidance he needs to know that even though these things exist, you can trust, have fun and believe.

Even more importantly, I want to make sure he grows into someone that doesn't use the tactics of lying, stealing and manipulating.

And, as parenting goes, to really talk about these things with him, I have to let go of my own desire to keep him innocent. That doesn't mean I send him out in the world to get hurt, but it means I have to talk to him about the possibility of that happening, and work out different ways he can respond to it.

Oh the pain of it all indeed. Forget Anakin…this is my little boy. My baby. To let all that innocence out into our sometimes cruel world seems near impossible to me sometimes.

What is up with this parenting job we have? We're supposed to develop, train and guide our children to the point that they don't need us anymore. How on earth is that a fair deal? We have to pour my hearts, souls and love into these little beings and then set them free. We work ourselves right out of a job.

But, it is our job to teach our kids not to not need us. We have to guide them to independence, and not just from us as their moms, but from group think, from bullies and from what's "cool" out there in the world. We are here to remind them that their independence is one of the more precious things they have.

I know I can't be there all the time and I can't control every situation they'll be in. So it's up to me to teach them how to know themselves, to trust their instincts, to know right from wrong and good from bad.

But as a mom, I am both dreading and looking forward to the day that my children can declare their independence from me.

Well, I mean, they won't really declare their independence (she says crossing her fingers), but they will no longer need me to help them tie their shoes, help with math homework or answer what happens when we mix green with more yellow.

As has happened with my son and Star Wars, the questions will get harder to answer, and the concerns behind them bigger. They will grow and develop into questions like: why boys don’t return phone calls and why that company didn’t call back after a great interview; why college is important and studying finances isn’t something only people on Wall Street should do; why there is war; why do people lie; why are we here?

I think the hardest thing for me to remember is that as I arm my kids with independence, knowledge and love, my babies aren't going to need me at some point. It will be up to them to know and understand their own battles of good and evil, and choose which side they'll want to play on. I will give them everything I've got until then.

Author: Sarah

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