Teen Moment at the DMV

(Source: Google Images- charlotteareadrivingschool.com)

“My life sucks!” exclaims an exasperated 17 year old, which happens to be my child. It doesn’t matter that I’ve raised her with encouragement, a can do attitude, accountability, positive words of affirmation……that all goes out the window when the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) road test instructor tells her, “You’ll have to reschedule. Your appointment was for 3:45. I waited until 3:55.”

In teen language this translates into, “There’s NO WAY ON EARTH YOU’RE GETTING A DRIVER’S LICENSE TODAY!”

Rewind to moments earlier at home, where she was frantically hunting for her driver’s permit. Need I say more.

These are the teaching moments. And if it’s happening to you, it’s a learning moment.

“Were you expecting a different result?”

“It’s not fair!”

“How else was this going to turn out? You’re late to an appointment. She has no choice but to move on to her next appointment.”

Sometimes teens (and adults) have a way of turning a situation into victimhood. Events like these we bring on ourselves. The resulting irritation (how we choose to handle it) is also our own doing. We can create a bitter moment, or we can decide to transform it through understanding what our role was in it, and deciding what we’ll alter next time. Basically, what we’ll do different, to get different results. We can often insure a positive outcome, by how well we show up to it.

Ella Venezia
Copyright © 2011 Ella Venezia. All Rights Reserved.