“I understand that my children’s unique interests were oppressed by my sinful parenting. God is showing me this so I can repent. When my children were young they were interested in Legos, adventure action figures, castle and dragon play, etc. They’re too old for these interests now (11 to 15 yrs old). With the fruit of my ungodly parenting in their lives they are bored. How do I begin to inspire them toward interests that are more suited to their ages?” ~ Wanting to Inspire
Inspire Them With Love
Boredom is caused in children when parents aren’t meeting the child’s heart-level needs and when the child has been allowed to indulge their self-centered nature. So, the antidote to boredom is meeting your child’s heart-level needs, and leading him/her to curb self-centered indulgences in their lives.
It’s true, parental repentance is necessary to reverse the affects of boredom. Repentance is much more than an apology. It’s an about face from the way it was to the way it needs to be. The answer is simple, but definitely not easy, because few parents are able to recognize HOW they are failing to meet their child’s heart-level needs, and HOW their children are being allowed to indulge their flesh [self-centered ways].
What thinking, caring parent would intentionally set out to neglect their child’s needs? And what parent would get up in the morning thinking, “Let’s see, how can I indulge my child’s flesh today?” None of us would do that on purpose, so we need a great deal of revelation from the Holy Spirit in order to see HOW we are doing these things unintentionally. Many of us are simply following the assumptions of how homeschooling life, religious life, and life in America ought to be lived. In other words, we’re following cultural assumptions and default parenting ways without realizing that following these ways is causing us to neglect our children’s heart-level needs, and indulge their flesh.
It’s impossible to list all the ways parents fail to meet their children’s needs and indulge their children’s flesh [self-centered ways]. Every parent goes about doing this in their own way while they themselves are still in their flesh [their own ways]. In order to make practical what I’m saying, I’ll list a very common homeschooling practice that produces boredom in children.
Using subject-divided curriculum that is aimed at particular grade levels to produce a school-like education for your children will produce boredom. When children are made to “do their schoolwork” each day before being allowed to have “free time”, the child’s deep need to learn, grow, and be validated according to his individuality is being ignored while he is being made (sometimes harshly or oppressively) to fulfill irrelevant-to-him assignments according to what all kids his age are supposed to know. Time that could be spent with the parent and the child coming to know who God made the child to be is instead spent on drudgery according to who the curriculum company thinks he ought to be. The child’s need to be known and to be unconditionally valued and loved is being ignored.
Then, when “school” is over for the day, mom feels her responsibility and her child’s responsibility toward education is over, and the child is released to do whatever he wants to do. During this time he/she is set free to indulge in whatever pleases his/her flesh. Children are typically free to be independent, self-focused, and often have a measure of being unconnected with their parent or their siblings. They can do this by hanging out with friends, socializing on the computer, or engaging in self-entertaining activities that actively or passively exclude family members such as closing their room door and listening to music or playing video games or texting. These things are only for example, and are most definitely not an exhaustive list.
Your children will begin to pick up their own interests as these conditions are reversed. They need you to meet their needs by coming to know them deeply, and loving them deeply. They need to learn how to lay down their fleshly indulgence, and turn their focus toward their family as you teach them how to willingly love, serve, and build heart-level relationships with each family member. It takes time, often about a year or so (depending on how old the child is; younger children are more resilient) for the children’s souls to recover from these parental behaviors that cause boredom.
You’ll need to focus a great deal of your attention, love, affection, and affirmation on your children as individuals so that you can get to know them deeply. You’ll need to woo and draw them with your love up into your activities and interests if they truly don’t recognize any of their own. You need to have them live your life with you as you make your life about your family. Do all the chores TOGETHER instead of everyone off doing their assigned chores. Do the stuff of life—the cooking and shopping and home maintenance TOGETHER. Read TOGETHER something you’re interested in reading. Then take time to play TOGETHER, and build memories TOGETHER. As you use all this together time to shower them with love and affirmation, delighting in who they are and discovering more about them by listening to them and observing them, you will have plenty of opportunity to teach them how to lovingly relate with each other. You’ll need to stop every activity in order to work out relational issues.
These two things, 1. loving, knowing and validating uniqueness coming from you, combined with 2. showing them how to lay down selfishness to love each other will bring the healing to their souls that will eventually blossom into their own interests.
Always remember, as you indicated, that it was your ways that brought them to this place. Never treat them like it is their fault they are bored and should be punished until they aren’t bored anymore. Repeatedly tell them it was your fault as you explain how it needs to be different. Communicate with them about it, encouraging them to experiment with any idea of an interest they might have. Let them change their mind and try on different ideas.
Press into the Lord for revelation for how your children’s need to be known and loved is not being met, and for how they are being surrendered to their own fleshly ways. Press into the Lord to help you see and validate your children’s interests as they begin to surface.
Inspire them with Your love.
~ Barbie Poling
I’ve read this with tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat because I am there. We are there. My family is there. We are all “there” but the more sad thing is we are all there but in so many different areas of the home. We do nothing together. My 15 year old is extremely bored with ‘school’ even though I’ve tried to make it interesting and fun. My 13 year old works harder to get out of doing school work than he would have to work if he would just do his school work. My husband works hard at his job so that we can have me at home. I work hard trying not to feel guilty that our home school doesn’t look at all what I want it to look like. I’m going to ponder these things you’ve written. I’m going to continue to pray the Holy Spirit will reveal to me where I went wrong and what I need to do to bring our family back together.
Thank you for taking time to write this article Barbie.
This message is full of beauty. I, like Oney, had tears in my eyes. The vision of this is so exciting and precious. I’ve made steps but I have so far to go! I told my sister yesterday about the boredom in the soul of one of my children and being confused as to why. I was expecting my daughter to find joy in productive activities when she was not trained to that or accustomed to it. I now see my part is admitting my wrong then pulling her alongside me. Even as I think back through it, when I’ve done this (included her with what I’m doing) her attitude shifts. Probably because she is feeling loved.
I’m amazed how God’s message keeps coming round and round and each time I take off the turntable something I didn’t see before. Thank you, Barbie for being willing to share with us. I am thankful for you and Marilyn in my life.