Faculty of Psychology Held a Seminar on Parent-Children Relationship

Andrew Tezuka (middle) along with participants of the Seminar 

Parent-children relationship is very complex and it doesn?t always run smoothly. Therefore, how parents maintain their relationship with their children is very important to be understood to ensure a harmonious relationship. This topic becomes the main focus of a seminar held by UPH Faculty of Psychology, which took the theme ?Teaching vs. Demanding?, and was brought by Andrew Tezuka, Ph.D., on July 21, 2017.

Andrew Tezuka himself is a USA certified family counselor and therapist who is also the founder of Life Design Counseling in Japan. During this seminar, he talked about many things about how to achieve a harmonious parent-children relationship. This seminar was attended by approximately 40 people, including parents of UPH students as well as the general public. 

According to Andrew, the problems within the teenager of this age is the amount of paradox they experience; for an example, emotionally, our children want to feel safety perfection from their parents, but they also want freedom, and then socially, they want to make their parents happy, but they also want to focus with their social peers. According to research, teenagers still don?t have a matured brain. They still can?t think carefully and thoroughly, and the part of the brain which controls judgment planning as well as their IQ is still in the process of growing. Aside from that, there is a generation gap between parents and their children, the majority of parents are the generation Y, whereas their children are part of generation Z. The difference between these two generations includes the difference in worldview.

Parents have an essential role in all aspects of life, within the future of the children, including their career, parents have great influence. According to Andrew, a child?s success in their career may be influenced by education, occupation and economy status. It is also important to emphasize that during the child growth process, parents expectations are very strong and could sometimes be dangerous.

?Sometimes parents think too much about their child?s success without realizing that getting to know their passion is even more important. Parents have to build a good communication and relationship with their children in order to reach out to them, and we should not push our expectations towards them as parents,? Andrew added.

Andre explained that there are 5 ways in educating our children. First, we have to try to give our children the proper understanding of the individual, role, and capacity of parents. Second, parents have to understand children?s passion. Third, they have to build a warm and positive relationship. Fifth, parents have to be able to empower their children, encourage their children to grow to be adaptive individuals, who have the endurance to go through their life. 

Through this explanation, Andrew hopes that parents are able to become more open minded in dealing with their children, especially those who are in their teenage years. Andrew also hopes that despite the generation gap that affects many aspects including mindset, communication style, and many more, parents should still be able to reach out to their children no matter what.

?You are the shepherd of your child?s heart,? and hold dearly to the 5L principle ?Love, Lift, Limit, Lead, and Laugh,? Andrew stated.

This seminar, which was dedicated to parents, was held by UPH Faculty of Psychology. Through this seminar, hopefully, UPH Faculty of Psychology is able to educate parents about the problems that have lately been happening between parents and children, and in this case UPH students, as well as how to cope with these problems wisely.

 This seminar has gotten positive responses from participants, as shown by the amount of questions and responses for the speaker. One of the questions was about how working parents could maintain a good relationship with their children. As a conclusion, working parents are no longer seen for their bustle, but the quality of the parents. ?Parents have to be able to make use of the quality time they have with their children when there is one,? said Andrew as he ended the session.

(left-right) Andrew Tezuka with Yonathan Aditya, Dean of Psychology UPH