Setting Limits - by Darylynn Starr Rank
March, 2007

In my creativity courses there’s a sad story I tell called The Brown Flower by Helen Buckley. It’s about a little boy in school. The teacher tells the class that they are going to draw a picture. The little boy imagines all the different things he could draw: lions and tigers, trains and boats… But the teacher tells them they’re going to draw a flower. So he starts imagining all the beautiful colours he could use, but the teacher says she’ll show them how. She draws a brown flower with a green stem. 

So the boy does it, too.

Another day the same thing happens with clay. He imagines making snakes and snowmen, elephants and tigers… She says a dish. And shows them how. 

So the little boy does it, too.

After a while the little boy’s family moves to another city. His new teacher says we’re going to draw a picture. And the little boy waits. The teacher asks him if he wants to draw a picture. He says, yes, he does and asks her what he should draw. “Anything you want to,” says the teacher. What colour, he asks. “Any colour you want to,” she answers. 

The little boy draws a brown flower with a green stem.

Setting limits for children is a really tricky business. We all understand how important it is to set limits for children’s safety, for reasonable behaviour, so they can learn to do what they have to be able to do. 

In my therapy practice I’m often dealing with adults who never got taught any appropriate limits, and they pay a huge price for it when they grow up.  They can’t manage huge portions of their lives. They simply don’t know what to do when. They have to learn how to set reasonable expectations on themselves, how to be responsible, and so on.

While at the same time, in my creativity and writing courses, I’m often dealing with adults who got taught far too many limits that ended up shutting down their creativity entirely.  Creativity demands exploration. Trusting yourself. Going where that inner voice takes you. Not listening to the external voices that tell you, “This is the only right way.”

Figuring out when to set limits on your children, and when not, figuring out how rigorous to be, and how not, is, as far as I can tell, one of the most confusing and complex tasks of parenting. I think the first step is simply knowing how difficult it is, and the second step is taking it step by step, situation by situation, and listening to that inner voice of yours again. In essence, you have know how to set limits to setting limits!

Take care, all.

Darylynn Starr Rank (psychologist/writer) works part-time for Family Services of Greater Vancouver as a group facilitator. Her articles appear bi-weekly in The Record (New Westminster) and the Richmond Review.

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