What I Learned About Parenting from the First 10 Minutesof FROZEN

If you are a mom to a little person, especially a little girl, I have no doubt that you have heard of Frozen. Probably seen it. Perhaps own it. Possibly have it memorized. Potentially watch it every day. (I don’t own it, but we youtube the clips my daughter requests.)

When we did rent it, I will confess that I watched it 3 times in 24 hours. I’m not ashamed of this. I love the music. And I was only going to watch it twice but my daughter woke up just as it was ending and she was like “Is that my princess movie?” and well, it was, so I caved. Try not to judge – sometimes I’m a softy.

So why are you here? O yes, I sucked you in with the promise of what I learned about parenting from FROZEN:

1. We need our kids to be on the same team. All my life my mom has said that my brother, sister, and I need to get along because siblings are the people you have forever. And you know, she’s right. A lot of siblings groups find it hard to be friends until they’re older and some of that competition aspect has left them. As I haven’t raised kids to adulthood, I can’t say I’m any kind of expert on getting my kids to get along long term through all of the phases of growing up. But I can tell you what I have learned from being on the same team with my brother and sister throughout the years.

The biggest thing that our kids being on the same team may mean is that they may all gang up on their parents. Whether this is in playful joking at a family event or when the hard stuff comes as parents age, we really need our kids to be on the same team. Too often as parents age, siblings are divided and just like when parents don’t parent together, kids who aren’t on the same team sometimes overlook what’s best for the parents.

As little people, we can encourage our kids to be on the same team by teaching them to play together and enjoy each other. Ask older ones (even if it’s just by a little) to help littler ones. Toys are for everyone and can be shared instead of hearing “mine mine mine” all the time. And talk about the joys of doing things together. All of this is team building for the future. (Think Anna and Elsa playing in the snow vs. never playing together again.)

2. We can’t parent from a place of fear. (Think separating Anna and Elsa and keeping secrets that divide a household.) I have heard more people say (and I’ll admit, in my teen years I thought this myself) that with as bad as the world is, why would anyone want to bring a child into it? My answer is simple but not easy – we have to bring children into this world to change it for the better. We can start and promote good and godly things in our own lives and grow that sphere of influence with our children.

Bad things will happen to our children. I’m sorry. And it scares me too. But that doesn’t mean we should shut them in a room all by themselves thinking that they are safe. They’re not safe that way either. The best thing we can do is teach our child what to do and how to be light through the worst of situations. Model that for them. And encourage them to do it for themselves.

3. We need to teach our kids healthy ways to deal with their emotions. “Conceal, don’t feel, don’t let it show.” That’s what the King teaches Elsa in the movie. She didn’t even get a chance to learn about positive emotions or how to deal with negative ones. God gave us emotions. We shouldn’t try to hide from them. They need to come out in healthy ways.

Our actions and how we deal with emotions is how our kids are going to learn to deal with them. No matter what you tell them, what you show them is what’s going to stick. And if (ok, when) we mess up, we get to teach them about apologies and forgiveness. And when they’re older, we get to model for them that with Christ, we CAN change a behavior.

4. Each child needs to know we love them in their uniqueness. My kids aren’t old enough yet to have real, set in interests that will dictate years of activities for us. But there are obvious and incredible differences between the two of them already. Would it be easier if they were the same and I could expect certain things every day from each of them? Sure. But what would be the adventure in that?

Our kids are each a unique (an unique?) gift. Right now this means my daughter wears any one of three dresses with galoshes anytime we leave the house. She spreads out all of her farm animals out to feed them or color with them on the kitchen floor. Any my son loves to explore everything so I leave safe cupboards open or dump out a new bucket of toys. We can choose to see joy in these things and as they grow and change, we can choose to see joy in those things too.

My kid may not be able to just create snow, but I have no doubt that their unique talents will come out and I look forward to encouraging them, even if I don’t understand their talents, like soccer or any out door sport really or intense instrumental skills. But I can be their number one fan.

5. Bad things will happen to our kids. Ok, I know this is part of #2 but I’m going past where they lock her in a room by herself to where her parents die. It’s horrible. Awful.

But our kids will have difficult things happen to them. Loved ones will die. Friendships will be challenging. We don’t want them at a distance (think Elsa’s curtsy vs. Anna’s huge running hug). We want them to be in a place where they can talk to us and sort through the bad things with us.

6. Our kids need to learn about love and fear but not isolated from each other. It is so apparent to me during the song “Do You Want to Build a Snowman” that Anna knows love from her parents but is protected from knowledge that would give her fear. And Elsa lives in a world fueled by fear and she doesn’t really get to experience love. The bible is clear that we need to have a fear of the Lord (Psalm 33:8) and also that we are to love the Lord with all our heart (Luke 10:27). Fear in this case is realizing that God is all powerful, all knowing, and all present. That He, as creator of the universe, deserves our reverence.

But we can’t separate the two. Or fear just becomes about being scared and we can’t see the Light of Love.

Without love, suffering increases. We have to teach our kids about scary situations where they might experience fear. And I wish it was as simple as “love conquers all”. But love pokes holes in the fear that lets light come into the darkness. Little bit by little bit, the tiny streams of light make big light.

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What could you add to this list of things about parenting, especially based on the movie? I would love to hear your feedback!

Be sure to check out The Respect Dare blogging team – Nina, author of The Respect Dare: 40 Days to a Deeper Connection with God and Your Husband and Debbie, especially for parents of teens, tweens, and twenty-somethings, and you can subscribe to me in the sidebar. And connect with me on twitter @LeahHeffner and on faceboook on The Respect Dare community page.

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P.S. Check out this video from “How It Should Have Ended” which covers a lot of what I covered in this post. Too funny!