Setting her own goals


Since my daughter was very young my wife and I have been setting goals for her. They were often small goals that for most people are just milestones like, rolling over, sitting up, crawling, climbing, walking, etcetera. Sometimes we would consciously sit down and set goals and others were just recognized as needing to be achieved. At some point, I began becoming a student of self-improvement and began to understand the importance of goals. Once I understood the importance of goals and my daughter was old enough I started sharing them with her.

The methods for sharing goals have varied over the years as her communication abilities increase with age and maturity but generally, they all start with saying, “Hey, why don’t we try this! Wouldn’t it be COOL! How fun to..!” and we get really excited together.

Well, today was a breakthrough for this technique. We decided to go swimming for the first time this summer. My daughter’s feet are always sensitive to the deck. It’s a sensory thing that is somehow related to CP. She also is very sensitive on the head and still cries more often than not when we comb her hair. Well, she came up to me and showed me her feet. I looked at her and said “What?” She says “I’m not wearing anything on my feet!” “Hmmmm” I say “Does it still hurt you?” “Well sort of but I’ve decided that I’m just going to get used to it.” “Really H, that’s awesome! I’m so excited! You just decided?!” “Yes, daddy let me show you…….”

She got the idea of how to set goals and knows how to do it! She has applied it! She knows to get the investment of someone else. She knows how to define it and she knows how to celebrate the progress toward the goal. Awesome!


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