What is your Overton window?
Have you ever heard of the Overton window? Brad was the first one to tell me about it, many years ago at this point. It’s a model of what is acceptable at any given time within a society. The term is generally used within cultural and political discussions about what is appropriate and widely accepted in a certain place. For example, the Overton window of America in the 1950’s is much different than the one of today. Over the past 70 years we have incrementally moved the window to accept things that would have been shunned within the mid century society.
This morning I pondered how easy it is to shift the Overton window of our homes, incrementally and often without realization. It doesn’t always have to be negative, we can definitely shift the Overton window to become a more positive and cooperative household. But I was thinking about my own house, and the struggles that we are currently dealing with, and was wondering if some small “OK’s” have shifted our Overton window too far.
We all do this, right? We all say yes to things we would rather not, sometimes for the sake of keeping the peace and sometimes because we just want our kids to be happy, or to fit in, or to be liked. And while one decision here and there is not going to shift the trajectory of your family or household, that same decision over and over again can. Your kids will begin to develop an expectation of what should happen— one that maybe you never intended and wouldn’t have happened without those “yeses”.
The beautiful thing is that an Overton window that has shifted too far, can certainly be shifted back. It will require hard work and discipline, and probably some big and little changes, but eventually your family will forget about the old norms and adopt the new ones. There have been so many times that I’ve thought it was likely too late to teach my bigger kids something, especially if it’s manner related or about how to put the dishes away properly (this one takes a while to stick I guess). But once I put in the work, and we make sure it is priority, it eventually just becomes a part of our routine. It’s not too late to teach old kids new tricks.
At the beginning of every summer our older boys begin their seasonal scootering around our little town. Despite all my attempts to encourage them to go to the park and play something wholesome like disc golf, they gravitate toward getting Polar Pops with their friends at the local Circle K. 44 ounces of high fructose corn syrup is my mom arch nemesis, so after a few weeks of this, I always end up limiting them to two pops a week. For a few days they grumble and complain, and ask for more over and over again. But then a week later, they know the rule and generally abide by it.
The cool thing about families is that we each have a different Overton window. Some people prioritize sports and therefore meals are in the car during those busy seasons, others prioritize piano lessons and sit down meals every night. Sometimes the norms make sense, and sometimes they can be unique to your family— like lollipops for breakfast on Saturdays and veggie omelets every other day of the week.
Families are constantly changing and shifting. One of the best realizations I came to when we were about 4-5 kids deep was that I would never get to a place where we can just set a trajectory and coast. Children will always growing, changing, encountering new problems and gaining new knowledge, and we as parents get to make sure they have the correct boundaries and borders to succeed within.
It’s not about making a perfect set of rules, but instead having your window of “normal” be what is best for your entire household. If something isn’t working, start making the shift. Before you know it, you’ll be hearing your kids tell their friends “Well, in our house we do it this way…and I like it.”
