We all know that if success breeds success, failure equally breeds failure. Nowhere is this more true than in the case of children. The reason, of course, is that with each failure, a child’s self-esteem takes a further plunge downwards, making it more and more difficult to achieve success.

This was the case with Mridu, the 10-year-old daughter of a friend. Coming after two sisters who seemed to excel effortlessly in whatever they did, she had never been very high on self-confidence. Where maths had been a favourite subject, and one in which she generally did well, scoring badly in one test was sufficient for her to develop a mental block. When, despite very determined efforts, she failed to make the basketball team in school, she lost all interest in the game. When she had to struggle to learn a simple piece on the guitar that her friend strummed with ease, she refused to touch the instrument again. Instead, she spent her time wallowing in self-pity, convinced that she was no good at anything. It was when her attitude started losing her friends that her mother realised that something drastic needed to be done.

Mridu’s mother had always subscribed to the view that parents should keep out of their children’s affairs. She did not believe, like some other mothers, that she should hover over her children making sure that they did their homework, practised the piano, read the right books and so on. She preferred to let things run their course, and let her children sort things out for themselves. As it happened, she had not needed to interfere, or prod and push in any way where her two older daughters were concerned. But she now began to wonder whether she should follow the same path with her youngest.

She had given Mridu innumerable pep talks but they had had no effect. She’d tried praise and encouragement, scolding and berating, but none of it had worked. She had read somewhere that success is like a vitamin tablet that kids cannot grow without. The only thing that would work now, she decided, was ministering just such a vitamin tablet.

But how was this to be achieved? With a visit to Mridu’s school, she finally concluded. Going against all her principles, she saw Mridu’s teachers (without her daughter’s knowledge) and explained to them what the problem was. Could they help bolster Mridu’s self-confidence? Could they use her strengths in ways that would make her feel successful and important? The teachers were only too happy to help. Two days later a buoyant Mridu came home with the news that she had been made the class monitor for the current month. Her games teacher persuaded her to take up basketball again, and in due course made her a reserve on the team. And the teachers, now aware of the problem, kept their radar on. Whenever they saw Mridu perform well in any area, they complimented her.

The effect was heartening. Within weeks, Mridu was brimming over with confidence. Now more sure of herself, she no longer feared failure. And Mridu’s mother had learned that sometimes a little healthy meddling is justified.