What To Do When Your Child Is Easily Influenced By Others

Question Three: My daughter tries to help others and is kind. She has a cousin who’s a little younger and she influences my daughter. I spoke with my daughter about this - I said she’s younger than you and if you think the situation is incorrect and she’s taking the wrong position, you should tell her rather than go along with it. I think she may be easily influenced, but I want her to take these values into life with her. What can I do?

Sat: The whole creation is full of temptation and influence. You concern yourself with one [and] ten more will pop up. The main thing is not who is in your child's life, it’s how you are raising your child as far as foundation goes. When a child has self confidence, when a child has values, the temptation cannot penetrate. And if it does - it has to all of us that we were influenced by a friend, and then we let it go. This is a part of life. So I would say, just watch it from afar and then advise her. Say, you know, for example, “This action has a consequence.” Or something like that, without instilling fear. But every case is different. So all I can say is, the world is temptation. And so let it slide by if it's not dangerous, if it's not life threatening. And since I don't know the situation, that's all I can say as a general approach that I would take.

Questioner: Thank you, Sat. I had a question that was similar. If it brings anything else up, please let us know and if You've already covered it, please tell me:

Question Four: My 11 year old son is very likely to go along with what others are doing or be pressured into doing something he doesn’t want to do and then regret it. How do I help him to stand up for himself?

Sat: Well, this is his character. I've seen him. I know that's how he is. And to some extent, his father is like this too. Just watch - if there is something that you think is not good, sit him down and talk about what the consequence of this temptation is. Just watch it. Watch it as it comes up. You'll know intuitively what to do. It's really hard to advise.

When a character of a child is born like this, every situation is different. Some situations are really good for him to be a follower; some situations he should lead. And he learns that - he goes along by falling and getting up. We cannot, I tell you [because] I tried to, we cannot move all the obstacles and all the challenges that make our children grow and expand away from their path. It just won't happen. We will have nights of worry. We would have times where we don't know what is the solution. And then go inside. Go to your silence. Honestly, that was My Savior. I always went inside and sat in silence and said, “Talk to Me about this situation. Shed light on it. I don't know.” And sometimes it would be really clear to Me and sometimes it was not supposed to or [would come] later on. But I anchored My training with My children from within as much as I could, not all the time, but most of the time. So I highly recommend taking time and if [there’s] something you don't know what to do to get an answer from within.

Parenting Chat
August 23, 2024