Teach your children how to relate to money in a positive way

Just because we're not Donald Trump doesn't mean that we're not a success. The most important lesson you can teach your children is how to be a positive role model. You need to instill in them the concept of delayed gratification - it's okay to work hard for a goal that seems far off. Today, from the streets of Harlem to the gated enclaves of Bel Air, most high school students have jobs. However, unlike past generations, today's high school students generally are not working to help support their families. Instead, they are working to buy themselves the clothing and music that their friends have.

In addition to beginning their resume at an early age, working students learn the value of a dollar through their own experience. The problem comes when kids are working solely to buy the material items they deem essential to their peers. By doing so, they are taking precious, irreplaceable hours away from activities that seem much more boring and mundane - homework, extracurricular activities, volunteering - and that are absolutely essential. Such pastimes can make the difference between getting accepted to college and being left behind.

Let's take a look at the average week of a high school student. School days average seven hours, or thirty-five hours a week. Twenty hours a week at a part-time job brings that number up to fifty-five hours. Add in an hour each day for commuting to school and work, and we hit the sixty-hour mark. Very few adults work sixty-hour weeks.When a teenager works those kinds of hours, how much time is left over for schoolwork, socializing, or sleep? Not enough!

A part-time job can instill a good work ethic and notions of responsibility and time management at an early age. However, unless that income is unquestionably needed, you are having your child put short-term gain ahead of long-term success. Teenagers are painfully dependent on the opinions of others for their own self-esteem. It's awfully hard to convince a teenager that volunteering at County Hospital is as "cool" as making eight dollars an hour selling retail at the mall.

Money is not so important that our kids should be sacrificing their education - and their childhood. They will be adults for the rest of their lives, with plenty of opportunity to earn a living later on.We need to understand that we are not putting our children at a disadvantage simply because we are unable to provide every single toy, experience, or trip that wealthier parents can. A firm moral foundation and the knowledge of how to take care of themselves financially are far more valuable gifts than a trust fund and a Ferrari on your child's eighteenth birthday.

For most parents, it's a terrible struggle to see your kids operating on financial values that are so different from your own - and so clearly unhealthy for them. It's painful to see our kids caught up in a spiral of getting and spending. It almost feels as though their lives are not their own. Parents are often bewildered when a child feels it's so important to have a particular kind of outfit or gear.

The answer involves a bit of psychology. When children reach the early teen years, they are at a stage of development when they no longer take cues from their parents. Instead, they start taking cues from their peers, the boys and girls their own age. This represents their first step in moving out from the emotional dominance of their parents and beginning to establish themselves as adults in their own right. Parents must recognize that this phase is not only necessary, it's healthy. Unfortunately, this knowledge doesn't make it any easier to live with a teenager who is constantly criticizing his or her parents. It's no walk in the park.

This problem is further exacerbated by the way parents are portrayed in popular culture. In most families, the TV is on from early in the morning until late at night, acting as a combination of electronic babysitter and source of stimulation. The problem withTVis that in many of the shows, especially those geared for kids or lowerincome families, parents are portrayed as absolute fools. On everything from The Simpsons to Moesha, children treat their parents rudely. As a parent, you are competing for the attention of your child with a TV culture that makes you look foolish, square, and so far behind the times that you don't even know what time it is. Even though there are plenty of educational offerings on TV, by and large, kids don't want to watch them. They want to watch the sitcoms where nobody is more foolish than Mom and Dad.

If you're not ready to part with your beloved television, then you can take steps to monitor the shows that your children watch. Lay down the law about howmuch television is allowed, what shows are forbidden, and what shows you will watch with them. By instilling basic values and financial knowledge in your children at a young age, you provide them with the requisite information to successfully manage their financial assets the rest of their lives. Proper preparation for the world outside the shelter of your roof offers amuch more level playing field in the real world.

In order to help our children, we need to examine our own relationship to money.We have to investigate whether we believe it's a good thing or a bad thing.We need to eradicate the belief that being spiritual and being financially comfortable are mutually exclusive. We have to see that corporate America is absolutely thrilled to have our kids join the working and consuming classes at the earliest possible age.

Teach your children how to relate to money in a positive way

Legal Disclaimer

Related Articles