Have you ever wondered why we often joke that we need to find a ‘low maintenance’ better half? We usually do this when we seek suitable partners to date or marry. However, we hardly consider the importance of raising our children to live a low-maintenance life when we become parents.
Married couples often quite fear having children due to the high costs involved in raising them. They also hope to hold on to their personal freedom.
Having children seemed to be the very antithesis of the ‘Financial Independence Retire or Rewire Early (FIRE)’ millennial mindset. This has essentially caused the decline of birth rates in Singapore and many other developed countries over the years.
Why We Decided to Teach Our Son to Live a Low Maintenance Life
My husband and I started our FIRE journey in our mid-thirties. With our baby son in tow, we wondered whether gaining FIRE was just wishful thinking on our part. We wondered if we could train him to be a ‘low maintenance’ kid. He can then learn to be independent as quickly as possible. In turn, it would help us gain both our financial and personal freedom early.
There are no books out there that teach children how to live a low-maintenance life. However, we can find many books on how to be a better parent. We learned a lot from various books written by child experts. Using our worldview, we assimilated the knowledge we gained to share these tips:
Perspective and Belief Change
To train our son to live a low-maintenance life, the first thing we did was to change our perspective. Before, we held on to our deep-rooted belief that to be good parents, we need to get our children into a good university. By doing this, our children will then land good jobs and lead happy and stable lives.
Leonard Sax wrote an enlightening book titled The Collapse of Parenting. He hails as one of America’s premier child psychologists. In it, he offers a vision for what role we parents ought to take. It has little to do with making sure our children ace their GPAs, train their athletic prowess nor garner as many accomplishment so that their University entrance application will stand out. Instead, we ought to remember that our fundamental role as parents is to prepare our children for the challenges of the adult world and real life.
It is very difficult for us parents (me included) to accept the fact that a successful life does not equate to a fulfilling life. Being ordinary is not too bad so long as the child has meaningful work to do, a person to love and a cause to embrace. I have to constantly remind myself that our son should not have his whole identity ride on being accepted at top universities. If I don’t, his whole world will come crashing down when he receives his first rejection letter.
With this perspective change, we will then not spend crazy dollars on renting or buying a home near a well-sought-after primary school just to increase his chances of getting in. We also refrained from spending good money on preparatory classes to get him into well sought after Gifted Education Program (GEP) and Integrated Program (IP).
Teaching Gratitude
Studies show that gratitude has the strongest relationship to life satisfaction. It is also particularly beneficial to youngsters. Children who express gratitude often grow to be less materialistic. They also display generosity towards others and feel positive about themselves. This protects them from stress and depression over time.
In our bid to teach our son, who was 8 years old then, not to be a spoiled brat, we decided to sponsor a Cambodian child in an orphanage run by the Operation Hope Foundation. Our son helped in selecting his ‘little brother.’ His first visit to the Orphanage left such an indelible mark on him that straight after the trip, he told us fervently that he no longer wished to receive any more presents from us. Instead, he urged us to better use the money saved by buying presents for his “little brother” and the children at the Orphanage. Subsequently, we revisited the Orphanage to organise a Christmas party for the orphans.
When children enter secondary school, the peer pressure to keep up with friends with generous pocket money can be intense. Some friends do not bat an eyelid about spending a lot of money on shoes. They also do not skimp on dining in restaurants after school or taking Grab rides every day instead of commuting via public transport. Thankfully, teaching our son about gratitude help him self-regulate his emotions when the tendency to compare is very great with the rise of social media.
Travel Beats Tuition
Many books written by pedagogical experts, futurists, physicians, and psychologists advocate schools downplaying technical skills. Instead, they emphasise general-purpose life skills such as critical thinking, communication, collaboration and creativity. There is consensus that a lot of the knowledge imparted in schools today will likely be redundant by 2050. The skills needed by our children today involve learning to adapt and be mentally adept at coping with the relentless pace of change.
Some subjects like Math and Science do not figure high in the skills needed in the 21st Century. If our children are not failing in these subjects, perhaps it is time for parents to stop spending a disproportionate amount of their household income on tuition. It is true our children may gain higher marks after getting extra help. However, we believe these classes may lead to a never-ending addiction to relying on such help.
We think it is best not to give our son a “crutch” ever since he was young. We taught him to pay attention in class as there will be no fallback at home. With the savings from the “no tuition” policy, the budget was allocated to family travel holidays. We decided this because we believe travelling teaches children to navigate the unknown.
Our trips often do not go according to plan. With every hiccup, we want our son to witness how we overcome problems while on the road. It also makes our family trips more memorable. Seeing how other cultures lead happy lives despite having lesser means helps put things in perspective.
Meanwhile, whenever I feel insecure regarding my son’s grades, I try very hard to remember the wise words of Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba.
“Our children do not need to be in the top three positions in their class. Being in the middle is fine as this kind of middle-of-the-road student has more free time to learn other skills.”
Treat Doing Housework as Important as Homework
There are many articles written about the benefits of encouraging kids to do family chores. Not only will it help teach children life skills, but also helps to build their self-esteem and sense of ownership and responsibility.
We need to inculcate in our children that their role in the family does not revolve around their studies. To lead a low-maintenance life, they must learn that their lives do not centre on passing exams with flying colours.
They must also contribute to the family’s well-being by pulling their weight. Hence, we often get our son to help by participating in weekly marketing or grocery runs. We also regularly assign chores like washing the dishes or cleaning the car.
This is especially important to families with live-in helpers. Most children from these households do not need to lift a finger to help out. Many may grow up feeling entitled. When we keep letting our children off the hook with chores, it is like we are telling them,
“Your time is too valuable to be spent on menial tasks” This ends up interpreted over time as “YOU are too important to do menial tasks.”
Because of this, we emphasize doing housework as important as doing homework and that becomes the ‘home-based learning’ for our son.
Raising our son to be a low-maintenance child is still very much a work-in-progress. But, I hope some of the perspectives shared will serve as food for thought for parents who think FIRE and having children do not go well together.
[This was first published in theAsianparent.com]