Principle 3: Children’s Self-Reliance

This principle emphasizes the importance of respecting children’s need for self-reliance by allowing them space to tolerate their own anxiety. This can be difficult for parents to do because their caregiving instincts can be powerful and hard to control. No one wants to see their child struggle and be uncomfortable–it is anxiety-invoking to let this happen knowing we can easily make everything easier for our kids. However, doing so limits children’s abilities to become more self-reliant, preventing them from the profound gift of overcoming their own challenges. 

They can’t come to be confident in themselves if parents overcome their challenges for them–they need to earn the reward of overcoming obstacles by putting in their own diligent effort. It doesn’t harm children to let them learn to tolerate their own discomfort. Its actually the opposite–children can be happier and less anxious when they develop internal skills to soothe themselves and take responsibilitiy for their own happiness. They are less likely to become mentally unhealthy and insecure. Truly as parents respect children’s need for self-reliance, they are fortifying their child’s inner strength and fostering their happiness. 

Children’s Inherent Strength

Our society tends to see children as very vulnerable and fragile, however, Bowen family systems theory, a main family therapy theory, has a different perspective. It suggests that although newborn infants require an all-encompassing, symbiotic relationship due to their helplessness, they outgrow the need for this intensive level of support rather quickly–even able to meet some of their own needs within the first few months of life (Kerr & Bowen, 1988). 

This perspective is backed by longitudinal research showing that in healthy parent-child dyads, with infants as young as 6 months old, the caregivers and infants were out of synch with one another about 70 percent of the time–and during these times, the infants had many self-regulation techniques they used successfully to soothe themselves. Additionally, multiple studies have shown that young infants have many self-soothing capacities including the ability to orient attention away from a distressing stimulus, lip smacking, thumb sucking, social communication and attention, regulation through respiratory processes, tactile self-stimulation, and approach and avoidance (Crockenberg et al., 2004; Ekas et al., 2012; Rothbart et al., 1992; Sheese et al., 2009). These studies counters our societal view of young children as extremely needy and helpless, pointing instead to their inherent strength and capabilities. 

Children’s Individuality Needs

Bowen theory even suggests that learning to be self-reliant is a need in and of itself–it calls this the individuality need. It suggests that soothing and supporting children more than what they require programs them to have excessive togetherness needs, which end up eclipsing their need for individuality. 

This ends up limiting the child’s ability to become an individual in their own right and to develop a strong identity of their own. Instead, they will become relationship-dependent and unhappy when others arent’ meeting their excessive togetherness needs. They will need others to complete their “self,” and when others can’t do this, they can even become controlling and intrusive on others, unable to respect others’ boundaries. 

Additionally, they may struggle to uphold their own boundaries because this could mean that they don’t get the acceptance and approval they depend on so heavily. This makes children much more likely to end up in codependent relationships–even abusive relationships, where they could be either the perpetrator or the victim, or perhaps both. 

Differentiation of Self

Bowen theory suggests that when parents are able to step back and respect children’s needs for self-reliance, they help them to meet their individuality needs and to develop a type of emotional maturity referred to as “differentiation of self.” Being differentiated means that people can act less on their automatic emotional needs (including their immature togetherness needs) and instead to act on their best thinking. They also have a more developed identity and as a result, are better able to take responsibility for their own happiness rather than having excessive expectations of others. 

Also, their experience of togetherness is less an overriding need, and more of a natural desire for connection and interest in others. They can therefore control their togetherness urges better, helping them to respect others’ boundaries and uphold their own. As a result, their relationships tend to be calm rather than anxious and threatening to those involved. This allows relationships to be flexible, allowing each person to have their individuality and to enjoy genuine connection with one another. 

Helping Children and Parents

So when parents are able to respect children’s needs for self-reliance by controlling their own urge to step in and always smooth things over for them, it is extremely beneficial to children. It helps them to become more differentiated, which helps them to have stronger identities and to have healthier, more fulfilling relationships. 

However, this not only benefits children–it also is extremely helpful for parents. Although it may requires some initial discomfort in having to learn to tolerate your own anxiety about your children, it has great long term payouts. Not only do you get to enjoy seeing your child reach their potential and develop to be confident, healthy, and happy, but you get to release yourself from your worries about them and your guilt that you are never doing enough to make them happy. You can begin to trust that they truly can handle some things on their own, and that you truly are not responsible for their happiness. 

This can be very calming, and it also gives you space to be an individual as well–something that parents often sacrifice when they feel they need to be always doing more for their children. This of course is not healthy for parents, but is a recipe for overwhelm, burnout, and guilt. Parents deserve to get their individuality needs met as well–and when they do, it doesn’t detract from their children’s happiness. On the contrary–as parents are happier and more fulfilled they will be able to be there for their children in the ways that they truly need them to be.

References

Crockenberg, S. C., & Leerkes, E. M. (2004). Infant and maternal behaviors regulate infant reactivity to novelty at 6 months. Developmental psychology, 40(6), 1123–1132. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.40.6.1123

Ekas, N. V., Lickenbrock, D. M., & Messinger, D. S. (2012). Developmental trajectories of emotion regulation across infancy: Do age and the social partner influence temporal patterns? Infant Behavior and Development, 35(4), 437–447. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2012.02.004

Kerr, M. E., & Bowen, M. (1988). Family evaluation: An approach based on Bowen theory. Norton.

Rothbart, M. K., Ziaie, H., & O’Boyle, C. G. (1992). Self-regulation and emotion in infancy. In N. A. Fox (Ed.), The development of emotion regulation: Biological and behavioral considerations (pp. 7–23). Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 59(2–3, Serial No. 240). https://doi.org/10.2307/1166137

Sheese, B. E., Voelker, P. M., Posner, M. I., & Rothbart, M. K. (2009). Genetic variation influences on the early development of reactive emotions and their regulation by attention. Psychological Science, 20(4), 455–460. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2009.02310.x