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Life in the modern world is complex. With that complexity comes a host of stresses that drive the typical adult mad, and children too are now faced with adult worries and concerns at a very young age. The information overload of the present world has been hard for people at all stages of life to cope with. By learning to balance and simplify your child's life, you can give them a chance to be a child a little longer and grow at their own pace, bypassing a lot of the troubling problems we are seeing with modern kids who have issues focusing or even just coping with a rapidly changing world. By slowing down their world, you can allow them to look at the world with a child's eyes as you once did.
Sometimes the fastest route to simplifying your child's life is to simply step back a little and stop micromanaging them the way you do the rest of your life. Allow them to get to know the world on their own so they can develop their own ideas and make their own mistakes. Of course, some guidelines must be given, and every parent has certain lessons they want to pass on, but it is important to let your child grow along those guidelines in their own unique way.
Take a look at your own world to find ways to simplify even further�a focus on creating a Zen home environment can have a calm, liberating effect on all members of the family. Your children do not need a million toys lying around all over the place. They do not need their lives crammed with activity upon activity�like a constant goose chase after perfection. Identify the things that are most important and set a regular schedule that is not too much of a chore to keep, but allow them the freedom to breathe and move around that schedule a little. Plan time for creativity, free play, and relaxation. Growing up need not be regimented.
You might just find that with this approach life becomes a little easier on you as well.
Another important concept for simplifying your child's life is to not worry them with every adult problem. They will have plenty of time to take on life's realities when they get older.
I remember when I was a child, we were very poor and did not have a car. We had to hitchhike to town to get groceries. As bad as things were, however, our mother didn't let the severity of the situation concern us children. For us, it was always playing and having fun and learning about the world, and we were not aware our lives were so different than the ones other people led.
It wasn't until we were older that we realized how bad it had actually been.
While this is a drastic example, and I certainly don't recommend hitchhiking with children if at all (things were a bit different those days), it still makes a good point about the world you want to create for your kids. As they grow, the more of reality you will reveal to them, and you do want them to understand the world on the world's terms, but they needn't learn it all at once.
Let your children have their Santa Clauses.
One of the great things about being a child is having blinders on and having a warped sense of time because there is nothing pressing to tend to. It allows them to focus on the overwhelming task of taking in the world, experimenting with it, and making their decisions about what is going on.
Don't take that privilege away from them.
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