Yes, you read that right. This post is all about how to teach your children to be more selfish; to think more about themselves and think they are the center of the universe. According to Merriam-Webster dictionary, selfishness is described as:
"having or showing concern only for yourself and not for the needs or feelings of other people."
- As all child psychologists (and most parents) know, children learn by example. If you want your child to be more selfish, be an example of selfishness! Let them know that your wants, your desires, and your time is much more important than them, their siblings, or your spouse's needs. Soon enough, they will understand that when they are an adult they can be as selfish and as self-centered as you are.
- Children can never get enough love; love will never spoil a child. So give up on love and attention if you want your children to become selfish. Instead of giving them lots of your time and attention, give them lots of toys and material things! Keep them busy in lots of activities so you don't have to give them the attention that develops empathy, selflessness, and love. Lots of money, toys, vacations and activities is what makes a child self-centered and less able to relate to the emotions and feelings of others. But how will you afford all these toys and activities that will make your child more selfish? WORK! Lots and lots of work! You must earn more money to buy all these material things.
- Next, you need to ensure that children's needs are not met. Contrary to popular belief, love and attention is a need for infants and children. Children and infants need to learn how to be human beings, and they learn the most from experienced, mature adults. However, if they do not receive the love and attention they seek from adults, children are a second best. Brilliant! If you can find a place where there are few adults and many egotistical children, you will be set! If your child still wants to communicate, learn from, and be around adults they will have to fight for the attention they crave. In that case your child might succeed and become quite aggressive and gain some bad behavior along the way, or they might become defeated and give up, resulting in a child with low self-esteem and plummeting self-worth. PERFECT! You are on the right track towards your goal of creating a selfish, self-absorbed child.
Selfishness is forced, selflessness is taught.
Why I am so sure that this will work? How can I be so confident that you can force your child into selfishness, but you can only teach selflessness by patient example? The greatest teacher and most selfless person in the world (Christ) has shown us that you can't force anyone to forget about themselves. It is a personal, conscious choice. So do your kids a favor and stop forcing them into selfishness; start teaching it by being an example and forget about yourself.
If our generation of children seem extra selfish it may be because adults are just as selfish and egocentric. It seems that adults have the inability to distinguish wants from needs, and children are learning that undesirable trait. We adults have a lot of wants, and few needs. It is important to help our children make this distinction through, you guessed it, example. Does the family really need two incomes? Do you really need a second car? Do you really need all the nice furniture and dream vacations? Probably not. I know that there are families that truly do need two incomes to barely scrape by on the basics. But I truly believe (and I'm backed by research) that infants and children need attention and guidance from loving adults just as much as they need food and shelter.
So, do your kids really need you? Do they need to know that there is someone in this world that would drop everything to make sure their needs are met? Yes, they do. Why? Because we have a loving Heavenly Father who would do the same for us. He doesn't meet all of our wants (for good reason), but he does meet all of our needs. We need his unconditional love and care, and we need to know he is available and listening 24/7. We are quite literally the center of our Heavenly Father's universe. I seriously doubt that there is anything more important than his children. That is why I'm working hard toward putting Jesus Christ and my family at the center of my universe, because that's exactly where they belong.
If our generation of children seem extra selfish it may be because adults are just as selfish and egocentric. It seems that adults have the inability to distinguish wants from needs, and children are learning that undesirable trait. We adults have a lot of wants, and few needs. It is important to help our children make this distinction through, you guessed it, example. Does the family really need two incomes? Do you really need a second car? Do you really need all the nice furniture and dream vacations? Probably not. I know that there are families that truly do need two incomes to barely scrape by on the basics. But I truly believe (and I'm backed by research) that infants and children need attention and guidance from loving adults just as much as they need food and shelter.
So, do your kids really need you? Do they need to know that there is someone in this world that would drop everything to make sure their needs are met? Yes, they do. Why? Because we have a loving Heavenly Father who would do the same for us. He doesn't meet all of our wants (for good reason), but he does meet all of our needs. We need his unconditional love and care, and we need to know he is available and listening 24/7. We are quite literally the center of our Heavenly Father's universe. I seriously doubt that there is anything more important than his children. That is why I'm working hard toward putting Jesus Christ and my family at the center of my universe, because that's exactly where they belong.
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