Parenting & Family
Growing Up: Safety Versus Growth
By J. Bailey Molineux, Ph.D.
Jan 23, 2003, 13:57

Every new experience, every major change in our lives, involves a plunge into the unknown and unfamiliar, and so is potentially frightening. Whenever we go to school for the first time, for example, or graduate, or decide to get married, or decide to take a new job in another town or state, we are faced with some disturbing questions that are a threat to our self confidence. How will I do in this new situation: Will I like it? Will I be adequate, skilled, or competent enough to handle it?

Life is a continuous, never-ending series of choices, and it is the choices we make that determine what kind of individuals we are. Only by facing and overcoming the anxiety produced by new experiences will we be able to expand our horizons, develop our potentialities, and live our lives to the full.

The American psychologist, Abram Maslow, is unique in the history of psychology. He was the first to concern himself with the study of mentally healthy, creative, self-actualized people rather than emotionally troubled individuals.

It was Maslow's contention that there is within every one of us a drive to learn and to grow. But he also felt that every life decision involves a choice between safety and growth. In other words, we want to experience and master much that is new and different in life, but we are afraid. If our desire to grow is greater than our fear of change, we will opt for growth. If the dangers of growth seem to outweigh its benefits, however, we will choose safety and stagnation instead.

Consider the infant who scatters Daddy's shoes all over the bedroom floor. He wants to explore and manipulate this exciting, new world into which he has recently been born. If he is severely punished or spanked for this behavior, however, he will have learned early in his life not to be so daring and inquisitive, and thus will come to suppress his innate curiosity.

Or consider the older child who is learning a new skill. If she is taught this skill with patience, encouragement and praise, she will slowly and gradually master it and thereby gain greater confidence in herself. If taught with impatience, frequent correction, and criticism, however, she will shy away from the new task and thereby lose an opportunity to develop greater confidence.

Make no mistake about it, Maslow warns us, if given a choice between growth and safety, the child will always choose safety whenever threatened or insecure. If given a choice between his own opinion of himself and his parents' opinion of him, he will always choose the latter even if it is a negative evaluation and means denying his own interests and ambitions.

And yet the truly mentally healthy, morally strong, and self-loving adult is one who bases her sense of worth primarily upon her own opinion of herself and secondarily upon the opinions of others. She is not one who needs to follow the crowd because she can stand emotionally and intellectually on her own.

As effective, caring parents who want our children to become this type of person, we must help them to develop a sense of trust in their abilities, opinions, and judgments so that throughout their lives they will choose growth over safety. And we do this by enhancing the delights and benefits of growth and minimizing the lure of safety.

We do this by saying in effect to them: We prize and value you for what you are and not always for what you can do. We will try to accept your feelings, opinions, and decisions, and respect your human right to make mistakes. We want to create a secure, supportive environment in which you can grow and fully experience this life we have given you.

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