The following story from an unknown author is a great metaphor for teaching our kids to handle teasing and bullying by not sweating the small stuff: You have $86,400 in your account and someone steals $10 from you; would you be so upset with them that you’d be willing to throw away all $86,400 in hopes of getting back at the person who took your $10? Or move on and live? Right, you’d move on and live. See, we have 86,400 seconds in every day, so don’t let someone’s negative 10 seconds ruin the rest of the 86,390. Don’t sweat the small stuff; life is bigger than that.
When kids come home from school with tales of being teased, they are constantly told by adults to just ignore them. Too often, they give their power away by letting other people’s words and actions negatively affect them. Kids feel hurt when someone teases them or when they become the subject of rumors. Girls especially tend to ruminate on the negative and blow it out of proportion: “No one likes me. I have no friends. I’m alone.” They think about it constantly, creating a ton of angst that is far worse than the actual event.
Encourage your children to embrace the lesson above. Do they really want to waste 86,390 seconds of their day because of 10 seconds of someone being unkind? Do they really want to give someone that much power over their mood and emotions? Children also would be happier if they let go of past negative experiences such as being bullied.
There’s a Zen proverb that illustrates this point nicely. Two monks were walking down the road when they came upon a beautiful young woman beside an overflowing creek. She was hesitant to cross for fear of getting her clothes wet. One of the monks picked her up and carried her across, setting her down on shore. The monks continued on their journey, and at the end of the day, one monk turned to his friend and said, “I can’t believe you carried that girl across the creek! We’ve taken a vow of chastity and are never supposed to touch a woman.” His friend responded, “I left the girl back there. You still seem to be carrying her.”
Hanging onto bad memories, friendships or past events keeps people discouraged and stuck. Teach kids to learn from mistakes, experiences and past relationships and then to move forward. Help them make good sense of why someone might have teased or excluded them so that they don’t feel bad about themselves. (I’m not good enough. I’m weird. I don’t fit in.)
Help kids become aware of the cost when they allow other people to dictate how their day goes. Urge them to be in charge of their feelings and reactions to the words and actions of other people. Your kids will become so emboldened and confident when they take the lesson ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’ to heart.
