Welcome to an entry, dear friends of the great White Brotherhood. Today we will touch on a topic that worries many parents, especially those who are concerned about living a spiritually healthy life and building a family nucleus friendly with Mother Nature and with the well understood individuality.
I am referring to the negative influence that the influence of marketing can have on our children, which perhaps have not yet developed emotional maturity or the genuine sense of individuality that allows them to discern between what they need and what they need. which is merely a consumerist whim.
Unless we lived in a forest far from everything, it is immensely difficult to keep our children completely separated from the constant bombardment of marketing in our lives.
Although we did not have television and internet, as soon as they went out on the street they would run into all kinds of audiovisual media offering them this or that product and with an implicit promise of happiness.
First, although educating our children against the materialist and consumerist system is something that all responsible parents should do, we must be very careful not to cross the line of isolation, which, incidentally, is The easy way out for those who want to educate their children under spiritual principles, but without the burden of having to counteract the influences of the environment.
But it is precisely the way in which as a family we fight against these destructive stimuli that causes significant learning in children. It is much more nutritious on an intellectual level than their parents feel to watch television with them for a while, under the premise of analyzing what content is right and what is wrong, to simply get rid of the device.
It's not about "hiding" absolutely nothing.
But to understand that sooner or later our children will face a world that can often be cruel and hostile to those who do not want to adapt to it and lose their individualities. It is better that they know him from the beginning and know how to deal with him, always keeping his values intact.
Imagine that we raise our children away from all publicity, if such a thing is possible. As long as we maintained this isolation, we would have no problems. But as soon as we relaxed our guard, our children would have no way of defending themselves and they would feel absolutely miserable for not having this or that thing, and also, deceived by us. And somehow they would be right about the latter.
Although there are some contents and some issues that, by common sense, we must reserve until certain ages of emotional maturity, the reality is that children mostly have an ability to understand and reason that we often underestimate.
However, this involves a lot of work on the part of the parents, who will basically be full-time guides the first years of the life of a child who will question himself all the time why he cannot have this or that thing that they advertise as infinitely fun or necessary.
Some questions we can ask our children when they begin to fall into the clutches of marketing, are the following:
Why would you like to have that product?
How do we know that we can trust what the advertiser tells us if, finally, their only goal is to sell it?
Is acquiring it congruent with your values?
What is the impact for the mother nature of its manufacture?
Do you think it will really make you happier ?
Will it make you a better person?
Will it help you learn something new?
What is the economic impact that it would have to acquire it?
If you didn't buy it and save that money, what could you use it for later?
Sounds complicated, but if our children get used to asking themselves these questions before giving in to the charms of advertising, we will be making sure they become adults aware that not everything that glitters is gold.
AUTHOR: Kikio, editor in the big family hermandadblanca.org
TO KNOW MORE:
The force of the chaos of consumerism. Learn to detect it and fight it from yourself
Live without motivation. Analyzing a fundamental human requirement.
