Note: To read before the wedding. Yury Gurkov
cases.
One of the options for such communication with a child you will see a little later in communication with a first-grader. From an early age children should be taught how to pay attention to the people around them. Children should know how to choose a friend. It would be a good school of life. They will figure out why this or that girl or boy is behaving like this. And this makes sense only when children care about their toys, when they speak to us openly.
How can you teach a first-grade girl to understand which boy is next to her? Just ask her why she chose him over the others. Her answers will show exactly the reasons, and if she doesn't know why, then you need to ask the simplest leading questions and teach her to identify the reasons that attracted her to him, to friendship with him. Then you need to pitch upon each argument and reason. The next stage is the friend’s actions: whether he cares about one particular girl, whether he shows affection. Is he at least constant in his choice? Or he is a good friend of all girls in the group? Does not he offend girls or even beat? Is he interested in something? How does he speak to his parents? Is he obedient? Is he rude? Is he ready to give the last candy you?
Then you should teach your children how to juxtapose actions and words, so that the child could see the roots of selfishness, stupidity, greed, pride, and other points of weakness. On this thread of juxtaposition, bright and attractive beads will be made of kindness, responsiveness, dedication and other attractive aspects of human manifestation. Having formed in the child’s mind the habit of thinking and contemplating, looking into the roots of actions, reaching for those who will not betray, who are ready to live for the sake of another, the transition phase into adulthood will not be so "terrible".
I am convinced that most if not all of my readers are ready to challenge these statements, replace them with their own, expand the list or argue with the accuracy of the wording. For example, is it possible to calculate these risks? Is it possible to fully understand the person who is in front of you in the rose and candy stage? Who by the age of 18 is ready to listen to this and openly talk about it? People of age can say: "Remember yourself, did you listen to someone in your 18–20 years? And anyway, you don't need to teach me, I will figure it out myself!"
Here is one of these answers:
"This begs the question: why did you decide that you are smarter than anyone and that you can teach someone? Everyone has their own life and their own mistakes, and perhaps only after going through them, a person will understand the most important thing and what he needs."
Firstly, I will answer the last question – about 18–20 years. I didn't listen to anyone in my 18-s, because there was no one around who could tell me some useful information. There was nobody whom I could listen to, to whom I could openly talk about my ideas, how and whom to choose, which of the girls is more interesting to me and why I like her… We will get answers to the other questions in the future chapters through examples and descriptions. But the best way is when the reader will notice the logic himself or herself and will be able to foresee possible scenarios for development.
So, are you ready for family life today? You think so? In most cases – this is not the right answer, especially if you are not 30 yet, and you have not had to reason like this. Why?
Now please try to read carefully paragraph after paragraph and learn a new kind of art – the art of foreseeing your perspective in 5, 10 or more years in a relationship with the person you are in love now. Is this at least important or even possible? I am sure that the answer is YES. This way of thinking – like who is he, why does he do it, and how is he going to change his thoughts, actions, his behavior in the relationship with me over time – is not developed anywhere. Nobody told us about such things, we did not hear such examples. Sometimes we did not hear about it so often that we can think for ourselves.
12. First-grader love experience
I have recently heard from the first-grader Sashen’ka: “I love a boy”. I asked: “Does he know about it?” She said: “No”. “Do you think he is a good boy?” She said: “Yes”. I replied: “Why do you think so?” She told me: “I don't know”.
Do not you think that conversations with adult girls, their conversations with friends are the same?
– “Why do you love me?”
– “Oh, I don't know, but I feel like I am head over heels in love!”
There are two arguments that can justify a relationship with almost any man. The first – I do not know, and it turns out, I cannot explain why. And the second – I fell in love, which few people even try to understand and explain even to themselves – why?
Further, in the conversation with Sashen’ka, while I was getting more accurate information, I managed to direct her to think: what his features do you like, how does he differ from others, etc. Then the little girl was able to find three or four correct and useful characteristics of the boy she liked: kind, beautiful, gives her candy, helps at school.
A couple of weeks later, she shared her news again about the “love affairs”:
– “…And I stopped loving that boy, and now I love another” – she told me after a while.
– “Why?”
– “That guy talks all the time. He is like a chatterbox. So I stopped loving him.”
– “So you do not like that he talks a lot and does not listen to you?”
– “Yeah.”
– “So who is the new one?”
– “Andrey, he does not talk much and gave me a candy.”
We see the girl’s first steps of evaluating the actions. She noticed that she was not comfortable when the other person was not just a bit talkative. It is really not interesting when your opponent uses the formula 90 to 10, meaning that 90 % of the time he occupies with his conversations and you have only 10 %. Sashen’ka noticed the thing that many adult girls do not always have time to understand even before the wedding. The thing is that her future husband would completely fill the space with himself. Sasha made a new choice and felt that the gentleman who talks a blue streak less is better for her. And the fact that he gave her a candy made him a prince in her eyes.
It is not a big deal when we are talking about the first-grader. She has 10 years in reserve to learn many things about boys. But if you instill in her the practice of thinking, looking for motivation and evaluating actions, their constancy, and many other things and details, then she will be much better prepared for relationships, for the choices that most people make in the strangest, least practical way, as practice shows.
SASHA MADE A NEW CHOICE AND FELT THAT THE GENTLEMAN WHO TALKS A BLUE STREAK LESS IS BETTER FOR HER. AND THE FACT THAT HE GAVE HER A CANDY MADE HIM A PRINCE IN HER EYES.
The rule ‘a new guy should be not like the last one’ works for everyone who got burned on the shortcomings of the boyfriend before the wedding. It often happens in the same scenario after the next divorce. For example, the guy was greedy and did not give gifts, so the next one who is more generous will immediately get a fat plus in the rating. And being already married to the «generous» man, the girl discovers that he is rude with his generosity and is constantly terribly jealous. Of course, here are given the most primitive examples, but the point is to give some thought provoking issue: you have to remember when beginning a new relationship what you did not like in the previous one. And, please, do not forget to get the wind of him in all other aspects before the wedding, so that, running away from one disadvantage, you will not get stuck in five more unpleasant ones.
If only most girls and boys from childhood, from Sashen’ka's age had lessons in this issue – about boys, about how she understands them. Why does she fall in love with one or the other? I am sure that most readers had not such education. It was only slightly or not at all. Parents teach their child everything they consider important: to be honest, to respect their elders, to express themselves correctly and accurately, to behave in society, not to deceive, to be accurate, to achieve goals and to perform well at school. School has also many disciplines, including some important for the