Don’t Let Your Parents’ Disapproval Derail Your Dreams
When I was 20, I made the decision to take a break from college and travel the world with a nonprofit organization — earning a very low salary. Privately, I struggled with ambivalence about my performing arts major but feared admitting that to my parents, whose dreams of my going to medical school had long faded. I hoped time abroad would help me sort things out. My father shook my hand, looked me in the eye, and said, “I just want you to know that I don’t approve of what you’re doing.”
His words stung deeply.
The desire for our parent’s approval is universal. We want to know that we’ve made them proud and that the direction our lives are taking honors their sacrificial efforts to parent us well. No matter how old we get, we never lose that craving. (Even when we try and convince ourselves otherwise.)
But in every parent-child relationship, there are inevitable clashes where our choices depart from what our parents would have chosen for us. Maybe you’re making a career change that they disapprove of or are considering a job somewhere far away. Perhaps you’re buying your first home, and they’re terrified for your financial stability. Or maybe your lifestyle choices, in their eyes, depart from the values they believe they raised you to live by.
Whatever the case, negotiating these difficult conversations isn’t easy. There are parents who navigate them with grace and intentionality. Some have a harder time loosening their grip.
A part of becoming a healthy, independent adult is letting go of your need for approval and forming your own convictions and decision-making capabilities. Stepping into your unique identity may require stepping out of the borrowed philosophies and values-structures with which you were raised – and that’s okay. This doesn’t mean you need to abandon those values. It means you need to sift through and test them to see which fit the future you want for yourself.
So, how do you navigate this messy moment of claiming your independence? Here’s what I’ve learned.
Rehearse the conversation. The ideal approach is to anticipate and address the challenge before it happens. It takes courage, but if your relationship with your parents is strong enough, it will save you worse strife later. Set aside time to let them know your intent: “Mom/Dad, can we talk about how we want things to go when the inevitable moment comes where I make choices you don’t like? How will we work through that? I know you want me to be a responsible adult, and sometimes that’s going to mean making mistakes that I have to learn from. In those moments, what I need is your support, not necessarily your approval.”
Distinguishing support from approval can be eye-opening for parents since, up until this point, they may have viewed them as one and the same.
In your conversation, set clear boundaries about when you will solicit their advice, how you need them to resist jumping in when you don’t ask them to, and the kind of support you’ll find helpful when they disagree. Explain that genuine support means giving you their blessing and practical help if needed — despite disagreeing with your choice. For even the best parents, establishing that precedent takes effort.
Laying this groundwork upfront takes foresight, but your parents will appreciate your initiating the conversation, and see it as a sign of your maturity and readiness to be more independent.
Resist defending your viewpoint. What if you haven’t had a chance to prepare your parents for the tough conversation? Or you have and they disapprove of your choices anyway? Regardless of how their disapproval manifests — passive-aggressive cold shoulders, overly harsh criticism, condescending premonitions like “It’s your life, do whatever you want, but don’t say I didn’t warn you” — it will hurt.
Your natural instinct may be to regress back to your adolescent days and become defiant and petulant. Of course, this only arms them with more evidence to bolster their disapproval. As difficult as it may be, try and remain dispassionate about their critique, using questions to figure out the rationale behind their objections.
For example, your parents may cloak their concerns in doomsday predictions: “If you do this, something awful will happen.” Sometimes the risks are real, sometimes exaggerated. Instead of defending your views and dismissing their concerns, draw out their angst. Use questions like, “Can you help me understand why you believe that will happen? What are you basing your fears on?” This will help your parents reign in any unhealthy fatalism.
Other times, their concerns might be legitimate and open your eyes to unhealthy patterns they’ve observed in you. That doesn’t necessarily mean you should change your mind. Just acknowledge their concerns as valid and offer ideas (or ask them for some) about how you plan to mitigate the risks they’ve raised. It may make it easier for them to support you.
Dig for the deeper anxieties. Sometimes parents struggle to express the real issues underneath their resistance to our choices. Perhaps they’re grieving the path they wish you had taken. (Recall, my parents wanted me to be a doctor.) Maybe they fear for your safety as you venture off to someplace new. (Most news outlets fuel this fear.) Or it could be that your “sifting and testing” their values and traditions feels like abandonment to them. Though it may not be your intention, your independent choices signal that you need them less.
Ask gentle questions to probe and surface what might be lurking behind their protestations. And be kind here – these are difficult issues for parents to face up to. They are looking for reassurances, some of which aren’t yours to give.
You can’t guarantee you’ll be safe in a new city, but you can promise to take precautions. You can’t guarantee that you’ll always need your parents in ways that satisfy their desire to feel useful, but you can commit to keeping them as a central part of your life. (Weekly video calls go a long way.) You can’t commit to living by traditions and principles you now question, but you can commit to respecting their choices.
With some distance, more often than not, you will see that their reaction has underlying causes that aren’t entirely about you.
Remember their loving intentions. From your vantage point, you parents’ overreactions and stubborn disapproval probably look unfounded and irrational. To be fair, some may be. What is almost certain though, is that underneath those behaviors lies their zealous love for you. At some point all parents fail to show that love in ways their children need. Trust me, as parents, we remember those moments too, with regret. But moments of poorly expressed love don’t mean that love isn’t there.
From experience on both sides of these discussions, I can tell you that they inevitably take both parties back in time to places where you each failed each other — making it harder to respect one another’s perspectives. And if you or your parents are carrying large inventories of those failures, that makes this moment much thornier. We’ve all heard horror stories about years of wasteful estrangement after such disagreements. So, as best as you can, try and show your parents grace and believe their intentions are loving. Trust your instincts about making the choice that is right for you, and ask the same from them in return.
I can tell you that a few years after my father expressed his disapproval, my career had begun to flourish, and the slightest specks of success were appearing. I was working in Europe and paying my own way home for Christmas. On a phone call shortly before Thanksgiving, my dad said to me with pride, “Well, looks like you’re really doing it. You’re making it on your own.” While they weren’t the perfect words of affirmation, I clung to them knowing that, though I never doubted that he loved me, I’d won back some important esteem in his eye.
As it turns out, those were the last words he would ever say to me, as he died unexpectedly a few weeks later.
Those words have become profoundly significant since, and have fundamentally shaped how I relate to my own adult children. Both of my kids made unorthodox choices after high school. Before heading to college, my daughter chose to spend a year working in Ethiopia, and my son chose to try his hand in the workforce. My experience with my dad helped me find the appropriate role of support in those choices. I realized that the best thing to do was be their champion, not their judge, regardless of my feelings about their decisions.
The relationship between parents and children is a lifelong study of what is most important in human connections. Through this relationship we learn so much about how we relate to friends, colleagues, and life partners. More than any other formative experience, this relationship shapes the best, and sometimes the worst, of who we become as adults. It’s messy, complicated, and sacred. And it deserves all the effort it takes to keep it strong, especially in the moments where that’s hard.
Ron Carucci is co-founder and managing partner at Navalent, working with CEOs and executives pursuing transformational change for their organizations, leaders, and industries. He is the best-selling author of eight books, including the recent Amazon #1 Rising to Power. Connect with him on Twitter at @RonCarucci; download his free e-book on Leading Transformation.
Don’t Let Your Parents’ Disapproval Derail Your Dreams
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