Mentor attitude parenting

A realization about teaching kids
They need structure. I never quite understood why. But it's like walking with my 3 year old. Ie to the restroom in ikea as we were today.

If I'm not holding her hand or touching her shoulder/back at all she veers and doesn't realize to keep going forward. She doesn't really have the concept of where we are going. What's immediately in front of her is too engaging and stimulating. If there is too much wide open area to float around within, that captures her.

You don't know where you are yet. You also aren't that steady. Not much skill. You'll get there when you get there. This is the honest essence of being young.

Now, if all I do is hold her hand and pull her along, she never has the chance to be engaged by all of that open newness. Sometimes she needs that so she doesn't feel overloaded by the possibilities - but not always. Otherwise she's just being pulled through and can't ever develop her own sense of where she wants to go, or her own sense of actual stability and confidence of step after step, and arriving where she wants to be (or realizing she didn't really want where she ended up).

She has to be allowed to wander, while comparing her result back with me to absorb the idea of purpose and destination. I have to show her where we are going and influence her, and trust her to see me and accept that I want her to find her footing and to have what is really best for her happiness. Not be dragged through a path that I think will make her happy. Just showing examples of what it means to be steady and go with purpose, being in the moment while also knowing who you are.

That's what it is, a trust interaction. The mentor trusts and reveres the young one. That's unconditional love.