The Importance of Companionship in a Child's Life

A child needs companions not only for his personal happiness, but also for the development of his mental powers. It is futile for parents to take the place of companions, because of the authority parents impose on their children, because the two sides' outlooks on life conflict, and because of the small number of the parents — that is, they are only two, and do not represent society, which is a mixture of many people, each with his own nature and his own personality.

We often hear mothers complaining of their child's shyness and laying the responsibility on nature; in this way they find an excuse for not giving him the proper social guidance. A mother breeds shyness in her child through her attitude toward him, her words, and her dealings with him, just as she can lessen his shyness by conscious training. She should introduce him to companions to play with — and beware of confining him to a single companion who surpasses her child in strength or intelligence, for he will dominate him and prove his weakness to him.

Democracy is the principle children follow in their dealings with others, for to them there is no difference between a rich child and a poor one, a clever one and a simple one. Parents should not concern themselves with these distinctions or reflect their attachment to them onto their children — unless the companion, God forbid, is of unwholesome character, in which case they must keep him away from their child and discover the reasons that make him play with him: is it merely that he is a neighbor, or does he seek him out for some other reason?

A child usually takes age into account in choosing his companions, and this is a sound theory; for if his companions are older than he is, he strains his mental and physical powers to reach their level of knowledge and experience, and so long as he fails to reach his goal because of his young age, he may come to feel a sense of inferiority — and this feeling, if it persists long, weakens his personality. And just as keeping company with older companions is harmful to the child, keeping company with younger companions is equally harmful; for what is asked of a child of seven is not what is asked of a child of three, for example — yet the child, in keeping company with a friend younger than himself, is ignorant of this fact, and thereby lowers his own morale.