Hey Pandas, What's The One Lesson You Wish Your Parents Taught You As A Child? (Closed)

That being just yourself is enough and you don't need to please everyone around you. Also that firm "NO" is not being rude or harsh but just caring about your mental and physical self.

That taking breaks, relaxing, and having fun are an important part of self-care. My parents are incredibly hard workers and would work past the breaking point, leading them to be stressed and irritable. I know it was to give my sisters and I good opportunities, so I am thankful. I wish, however, that they would realize that relaxing and having fun is OK and something they need to do to sustain themselves. To this day, my partner still needs to remind me to take breaks.

It is 100% ok to say no to something. If someone needs a ride and you don't feel like it? You can say no. Don't want to go out tonight? Say no. No one is obligating you to do something you don't want to.

YOU CAN CHANGE YOUR MIND ABOUT THINGS.
ITS NOT ILLEGAL TO TELL YOUR FAMILY ONE THING THAT YOU THINK AND THEN CHANGE YOUR MIND
I struggled with this with my sexuality/gender, i told my parents i was bi, then i was like oh shoot i think im a lesbian. and i thought i couldn't tell them because i already came out.
REMEMBER THAT, IT"S OKAY TO CHANGE

You can learn as much (if not more) from your failures than your successes.
Never be afraid to try because you might fail.
from building relationships to rebuilding an engine, I use this advice daily.

To not handle stress the way they did. My mom would explode in anger. My dad would repress. Neither one is healthy, and I do both. I developed anxiety and depression when I started puberty and am still dealing with both more than 40 years later, and still struggling with healthy coping mechanisms.

My parents often thought that if they didn’t tell me about something that they didn’t think would be a problem, then it wouldn’t apply to me.

The one that has affected me most significantly is Financial management: living within my means, bills, debts, credit, taxes, credit scores, savings, emergency funds and budgeting… in turn that converted to being stuck in bad situations, abusive relationships, horrible jobs and endangering myself in various ways trying to numb the pain.

Money conversations were off limits and I spent my 20’s being anxious, severely in debt and ashamed that I didn’t know better. I was completely clueless and constantly stuck and couldn’t talk to them about it because they didn’t understand.

10 years (and about £100k in interest/fees later) I live debt free and frugally with the conscious aim of always having an exit plan and enough money to support the privilege of a life with options.

How to save money. Perhaps more important thing, knowing how to spend it wisely.

That they, nor you, are perfect and this is okay.

That smoking turns you into a slave to nicotine to the point where you’ll do any disgusting thing to get a hit. It is just as bad as any other drug n I’ve been addicted for about 40 years now. I showed my kid aged seven or eight at the time me making roll ups from the butts in my ashtray n told her this is the real “glamour” of smoking. I’m proud to say she never started. She’s nigh on 32 now, so looks like I got that right!

That it's OK to just be me...and that I don't need to be like everyone else.

I wish my mom would have thought me more about adult life and what to expect from it. I learned at a very young age to take care of myself, but I always wished I knew more about how the world worked.

Posture. They told me to sit up straight, but just left it as "it looks bad" or even just "because we said so"

If someone had told me "Hey, if you slouch and have bad posture, when you get into your 40s and 50s, you will have nearly crippling pain from arthritis and other issues that it will cause", then MAYBE I would have listened, and avoided some of this...

It isn’t a lesson, but I wished they would’ve stopped me from over eating/forcing me to eat healthy. I now suffer from false body dysmorphia, and have finally been seeing loss in weight after years of over eating.

A better understanding of ADHD!

Anger management.

How to manage and express your emotions in a healthy way

That is ok to fail. I was identified as gifted/talented in 2nd grade & spent the rest of my school years with the expectation that I'd succeed at everything without really trying. When I lost interest in school they treated me like a pariah & in adulthood I've struggled with perfectionism as a result.

Sex education, how it works, how to be safe and healthy etc.

How to manage money! My parents never gave us an allowance. I know that not every kid gets that...but with my son, we paid him small amounts to help us with chores that were outside his regular list. As a result, not only did he learn that you can get what you want later if you are willing to sacrifice now...but that a good days work can make all the difference in how much faster you can get to your goal.