by Barbara Leech

Created on: April 17, 2008   Last Updated: October 04, 2010

Teaching children to plan future but be open to change

Every parent does it at some point in their child's life. They ask their offspring what their plans are for the future. After all, planning is vital in creating a happy life and successful career...or so we believe. I have begun to realize that though planning is good, and something that I personally must do to feel I have control over the chaos that is life, it is often futile. Whatever I imagined for the future or the outcome of a new endeavor, it rarely ends as I thought it would and usually it is for the best that it did not. Perhaps this is something we should be admitting to our children.

Most of us planned for our own future, going to college and choosing a major which in most cases is not at all what we end up doing for a career. Statistically, the average adult will change careers at least once in their lifetime. But we enter adulthood planning what our life will be like and suddenly fate steps in, smacks us around a little, points us in a new direction and says, "No silly, this is your true path." Suddenly it is years later and we are halfway down this new path wondering how the heck we got there. And if you are lucky, such as myself, it is a very good place to be, though nothing like you could have ever imagined. So how do you encourage your child to set plans and goals while being honest enough to tell them they really have no clue what might happen.

At the end of the recently released film "Dan in Real Life", which stars Steve Carell as a middle aged relationship columnist, Dan does a voice over as the story concludes- speaking a unmistakable truth about life and his own happy ending, "We ask our children what are their plans for their future and in reality what we should be telling them is....plan to be surprised." There is no greater truth and in this quote lies the answer.

Recently my 17 year-old daughter announced she wanted to major in business management. She is graduating one year early and prior to this big epiphany her aspirations were to be a hair stylist. I had tried to guide and encourage other options, but basically anything I said was taken as an invasion of her dream. This is what she wanted and planned to do. Recently she talked to others, her boyfriend's older sister, other parents and miraculously a light bulb went off. What if she wanted to run her own salon? What if her plans changed and she needed a degree that offered other options for a career?

Hmmm...sounded like something

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