Practical Ways to Protect Your Children From Childhood Superstitions
Do you consider yourself the superstitious type? Your child might not even know what that word means but could be inundated by childhood superstitions daily. With the innocent wonder of the mind of a child, those superstitions could cause a lot of trouble depending on how much they believe them. As with all things, there is hope. Below are three of the most common childhood falsities and how to protect your child from them with practical solutions.
You’ll Break Your Mother’s Back?
How many times, as a child did you walk to or from school with your siblings or friends doing your absolute best not to step on the cracks? It’s safe to say there probably aren’t many hands that didn’t go up on that. The majority of us know the saying well.
If you step on a crack, you will break your mother’s back. While that simply just isn’t true, if you believed the saying and accidentally slipped and landed on one of those evil cracks, you booked it home to make sure your mom was ok.
Now there isn’t much you can do about public property except file a complaint, but when it comes to the cracks in your own driveway you can be your child’s hero. Every driveway needs a little tender loving care from time to time. Take this opportunity to repave your driveway and remove the possible back breaking elements.
Seven Years of Bad Luck?
It’s the cornerstone of almost every morning routine in the U.S. At some point, you’re going to have to peer into a mirror. Some will need it to apply makeup. Some need the help fixing their hair and others just enjoy looking at themselves.
We use them to back up and change lanes on the highway and they can be a great help to mechanics and dentists trying to view hard to reach areas. However, at some point, it became definite that if you broke a mirror, you were stuck with seven years of bad luck.
With this kind of consequence hanging over their heads, it’s no wonder the thought of a shattered mirror brings feelings of sadness. Want to wipe out the threat to your kiddos? Invest in acrylic mirrors. They are a little more expensive and less resistant to scratches than the traditional glass mirror, but they are shatterproof.
It Will Get Stuck That Way?
Have you ever gotten on to your child, turned your back and then turned around to find them making a face at you? Many moms, dads, aunts, and uncles have made sure to let children in on the promise that if you make a bad face and keep it long enough, it will get stuck that way for eternity.
Out of the three superstitions listed, this is the only one that is reinforced on a regular basis by a child’s authority figures. As much as we hope this might be a deterrent to the disrespectful sticking out of the tongue or rolling of the eyes, it just doesn’t seem to have the effect we hope for, at least in older children.
In our younger crew, who are much more gullible, this statement can cause unnecessary fear and insecurity. What’s the magical practical solution here? Simply stop saying that to your children. They have enough to be nervous about in life.
Children are precious and deserve all the love and protection we can offer them. Hopefully, these ideas will help you assist them in navigating through the ever-changing complexities of childhood.
