Last week I took Kai, our six year old, for a Daddy-daughter day to Six Flags. This was her first time there and we were both pretty excited. She is now tall enough to go on most of the rides and I envisioned us working our way from the simple coasters up to the American Eagle or Batman. Alas, this was not to be. Standing in line for our second ‘beginner’ ride brought the girl to tears and I spent the next ten minutes calming her down from something which never even happened. Her wall of fear was then up and my annoyance grew as she was more and more unwilling to try anything.

The thing is, as harsh as it is to say, my lovely little girl is a total pussy. Anything out of her comfort zone puts her into a state of anxiety and she all but shuts down in fear. I know this, very very well. But my dumb ass still put a story into my own head of how I wanted the day to pan out. And when the day did not go as I envisioned I started to get annoyed. Happily I caught myself telling this story (with some texting help from my lovely wife), reeled it in and we had a great rest of the day once I adjusted my expectations to just have fun. I even got her on the Demon (two loop-de-loops and some cork screws), although it took a bribe of $5 and she adamantly said NO when I asked if she wanted to do it again.

This story telling is something we all do, all the time. And it can be a real impediment to just enjoying life. I tell a story to myself almost every day (even though I know I’m doing it) when I pick my daughters up from daycare. I see all sorts of happiness, we go home and they play and get along perfectly in a happy Leave it to Beaver scene. The reality is that they are tired and cranky and often in the mode of ‘I’m happy after I’ve poked my sister until she screams at me’.

My wife has this never ending story running through her head where her ‘list’ (work, home, everything) is a fixed number of items and damnit she is failing because there are still more items on the list! If she let’s the story own her, then she has a very (very) hard time just enjoying life. She is in an ongoing struggle to recognize that story, adjust her expectations and just ‘be’.

One of the most common stories I have witnessed when it comes to parenting is the one where a parent pictures their kid as one who always listens, follows rules and makes clear and logical decisions. Or maybe the story is that other kids are like that and their kid isn’t. Either way what results is a form of helicoptering, with the parent constantly correcting every little thing their child does. I find it is usually paired with an endless list of rules (‘we don’t do this’, ‘we always do this’) which the adult has made up on the spot and the kid never heard before. How a kid is ever supposed to learn anything when they are not allowed to think for themselves or make mistakes is beyond me, and it takes everything I have not to ask them to back off already.

This story like many others ends with a completely exhausted parent (who probably feels either they or their kid is a failure for not living up to their story) and a frustrated child just waiting to hear about the next thing they will do wrong. If the parent could recognize that this perfect state is just a story they created, they might give themselves and their kid a break, realize that kids are a walking bundle of imperfections and that they’ll figure things out over time.

So what’s your story? Maybe it’s the one where you turn around for five seconds and your precious angel is gone? Or the one where your aging child actually wants to spend time with you and have fun worldly discussions? It might be the opposite kind of story, where you know what little Johnny was doing outside and you don’t need to hear an explanation why his shirt is bloody and he is missing one shoe. Or like me it might be the one where you put the kids to bed, come downstairs and your wife has wine poured and candles burning (instead of wearing sweat pants and watching the f’ing Bachelor).

Whatever your story, I’m sure it’s a good tale. But if you start paying attention to your stories you’ll find that the ratio of story/reality is unfortunately not very good. Whether you are setting expectations high or low your brain will end up screwing you over and increasing your crankiness/happiness ratio. So do yourself a favor the next time you are pissed off at your kid for doing (or not doing) something and ask yourself if what they did is actually a big deal, or was it simply different from what you wanted them to do? Then go pour some wine and do not watch the Bachelor.