The hobgoblin of little minds (and parents)

"A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds," wrote Ralph Waldo Emerson. I often mis-refer to that quote, dropping the "foolish" bit, when self-deprecating my own nit-picking of comma usage, capitalization, font sizes, etc, at work. But I was thinking this weekend about how hard consistency is in the realm of parenting.

I think that Pre-Parent Me did a pretty decent job of not claiming to understand the job that parents were doing. On the matter of consistency, however, PPM did claim too much. "Parents should establish consistent rules for their kids", or something like, is the guidance, which seemed obvious and straightforward to PPM. But now I appreciate how hard that can be, as any moment of the day can present a new discovery for Owen, which is a new opportunity to say "OK" or "no", ie, make a new rule. And in addition to all the new rules, there is the continual revisiting of the old ones (at least the old "noes"). So I realize over time that that spur-of-the-moment rule about not playing with the Halloween cat candle probably isn't all that important, but if I revoke that rule, then - horrors - I'm being inconsistent and - double horrors - I'm teaching Owen that he can wear me down. Yes, I know (as PPM knew) that the key is to make rules only where they matter, but I note again the multiplicity of new opportunities each day for the Young Gentleman to break himself, others or his surroundings.

I realize that there are a couple of possible rejoinders here. One might be, "Enh, Owen will live in the world, and the world isn't consistent, so don't sweat a little variability on your part." Another might be, "Look on the bright side: If you change your mind, you're teaching him that Dad isn't bull-headedly stubborn and that persistence pays off." But that's not the point of this post. The point is that, even for someone who thought that parenting looked pretty hard, it can be harder than it looks.