Many parents unwittingly sexualize their children because they are afraid of the child having sex too young or being sexually abused, and they don’t know how to take care of their fear. This is not about trying to avoid fearful effects, it’s about healing what causes fearful effects to manifest in the first place.
The root cause of fearful effects is fear, and the only way to eliminate fearful effects is to see that their cause has no basis in reality.
Specifically, our mind is programmed with an “ego”, which guides us to project fearful feelings and then try to avoid them. When the parent dwells in fear over their child being exposed to sex, ego guides the parent to project images that effectively sexualize the child in the parent’s mind, to relate with the world as if the image they hold of the child is really true, and to make agendas to keep the child safe.
Such agendas cause conflict between parent and child at a minimum while increasing the likelihood that the parent’s fears will be played out. Once the child has been sexualized in the parent’s mind, notwithstanding all of the avoidance strategies, the parent’s mind has been programmed to see that the image they believe in is made manifest. That image and trajectory deny the child’s inherent innocence and invulnerability, which causes the child to feel guilty and react fearfully.
To avoid sexualizing your child or to undo what you’ve already made of them...take care of your fearful feelings about your child being exposed to sex.
If the child asks about sex, give them honest answers, but don't make a big deal of it, or try to control them about it.
If you find out that your child has been masturbating, watching porn or engaging in some sexual behavior, and that triggers upset feelings in you, take care of your feelings instead of justifying them, especially in front of your child. In this way, the child will not be afraid to confide in you if anything feels uncomfortable or scary to them.
That kind of confidence and freedom makes children far less susceptible to peer pressure, to playing victim to sexual predators, or to playing the role of sexual predator. It also protects them from developing a guilt complex about feeling sexual or about having sexual encounters.
If you find out that your child has been playing the role of sexual predator, take care of your feelings so that you can communicate with them. In this way, you can help them uncover and heal the guilty thought process that’s responsible for making them act out as a predator.
If you find out that your child has been playing the role of sexual victim, again, take care of your feelings so that you can communicate with them. In this way, you can help them uncover and heal the guilty thought process that’s responsible for making them into a victim.
I understand that this is a sensitive subject for people, and that’s because pursuant to the ego’s guidance, our mind is conditioned to keep fearful programs protected so that they can continue to justify feeling fearful. That’s how ego prevents us from finding out that there is really no basis for the fearful feeling and no need for ego at all.
As feeling fearful gets healed instead of getting projected, it’s our children who are getting the benefit of our mind’s protection instead of the ego’s fearful program. In addition, love gets extended and harmony prevails between parent and child.
How do you take care of your feelings? Notice when an uncomfortable or painful feeling arises in your body and just offer a little bit of willingness to admit that the feeling is a projection of your own confusion. In this way, your mind learns how to accept healing for your perception instead of using your perception to keep the cause of feeling fearful hidden from your sight.