Tag: education

Lessons Learned Late

New parents rapidly and inevitably learn that children – much less babies – do not come with instruction manuals.

New parents try to sort out daily childrearing based on a phantasmagoric blend of memory, history, personal experience, advice from anywhere, parenting books, doctors, their own parents.

Their own common sense.

New parents’ instincts are informed by a years long steeped soup of knowledge gathered since childhood that they bring to the task.

Depending on the novice parents’ own degree of personal healing and maturity, the baby benefits. Or it doesn’t.

After the birth of my first child, the initial shock settled in that the irresponsible hospital professionals were actually going to release this vulnerable infant into our care.

The initial shocks and semi-settling in with baby hardly foreshadowed the barrage of oncoming shocks and changes that would erupt in our lives.

That vulnerable infant and his sister who followed shape med and my parenting in ways large and small. They still do.

I was only half-healed when my son arrived. Maybe not even that. My son’s arrival ushered in a whole raft of new traumas and attendant insights connected to my upbringing that were utterly unanticipated. I was living with one foot in the present and the other one firmly planted in the past.

For most of my children’s early years, I tried too hard. I was up against dynamic opposing forces. I wanted to do everything right. I had no idea how. I wanted to teach them survival skills and show them the whole world and give them the learning and knowledge they needed to protect and raise them up.

I led with my head, which I trusted more, and less with my heart. I was wrong to have done so. Yet to be fair to me, the heart wasn’t exactly firing on all cylinders.

Someone had been putting beach sand in my carburetor. I was only just coming to realize that.

I need not have done anything more for my precious babies than to let them be who they were and who they were going to become. I simply needed to love them. I didn’t know that then like I know it now.

Once the necessaries of hygiene and hunger and sufficient sleep and shelter had been tended to, the rest of figuring out how to navigate life was pretty much up to them. What kind of life they would choose to build and who they choose to build it with and how would be their work. It still is.

With all of this background, the bit of writing below spoke to me. As a hyper-vigilant and insecure parent, I know exactly why and how I tried too hard. Can’t change the past. Only beg for forgiveness and understanding and try to make up for it in the here and now.

One day, much later and when they were much bigger humans, I relaxed and let go. I realized all they needed from me – and all they ever need from me that they can’t get anywhere else – was my love and support.

Would that every parent knew that in the depths of their bones and blood.

Your own sense of self may be shaky but to your children, you are who they love and all they know.

Children develop their sense of self and security in relation to you and the family who love them. However imperfectly.

I learned that lesson late but I learned it. I hope they pass that lesson on to theirs when the time comes.

At least it keeps it all interesting, doesn’t it?

“Do not ask your children

to strive for extraordinary lives.

Such striving may seem admirable,

but it is the way of foolishness.

Help them instead to find the wonder

and the marvel of an ordinary life.

Show them the joy of tasting

tomatoes, apples and pears.

Show them how to cry

when pets and people die.

Show them the infinite pleasure

in the touch of a hand.

And make the ordinary come alive for them.”

The extraordinary will take care of itself.

William Martin

Twelve to Thrive

I fell in love with American-Italian educator Leo Buscaglia in the 80s. And not specifically because he was known as the “Dr. Love” professor.

Felice Leonardo Buscaglia (March 31, 1924 – June 12, 1998) was a professor of special education at the University of Southern California. When one of his students committed suicide, he was moved to investigate the meaning of life and the causes of human disconnection.

For Buscaglia, love and learning were the keys to a meaningful life. He was a gifted public speaker and often appeared on PBS giving his lectures on our vital need for interconnection with fellow human beings. He also deeply believed in education and exploring the many wonders of human life here on this planet.

I remember one of the funnier anecdotes from his lectures about growing up with a “demanding” father. With warmth and humor, Buscaglia recalled how every night at the dinner table, he, and then his siblings, were asked in turn, “What did you learn today?” Woe betide the sibling who had nothing to share. The shame must have been withering!

Buscaglia eventually taught a course at the University of Southern California called Love 1A. They were always filled to capacity and often oversubscribed. He was the first to state and promote the concept of humanity’s need for hugs: 5 to survive, 8 to maintain, and 12 to thrive.[4]

He wrote a bunch of books. Fittingly, his greatest bestseller was simply called Love. At one point, three of Buscaglia’s books were on the New York Times’ best sellers list at the same time.

Buscaglia explored and promoted the importance of love and loving relationships to human beings. His lectures may be deemed a little over the top in a culture where the almighty dollar is touted to be the primary source of all happiness and pleasure.

I miss him and his voice. I miss his message.

In our troubled era of mass murders, and suicide and online bullying, I miss the presence of Leo Buscaglia more than ever.

The Four Agreements: 1/4

The first agreement in Don Miguel Ruiz’s book is: Be Impeccable with Your Word

So many people aren’t. Lying is commonplace and accepted these days. Expected even. People “exaggerate for effect” and “tell white lies” to gloss over deficiencies in themselves or some product they are selling. Politicians are among the least trusted professionals on the planet. The whole smarmy George Santos fiasco (is he gone yet?) took the falsification of credentials to despicable new heights.

Ruiz examines the power of the word, how it’s misunderstood, and how most people use it to spread emotional poison. Being impeccable with one’s word means taking responsibility for their own integrity. But he advises against judging or blaming oneself when we fall short. Life is a marathon after all, not a sprint.

Following this agreement faithfully, Ruiz claims clears emotional poison from one’s life by building immunity to the negative words of others, leading eventually to a place of peace and joy. Being honest and truthful can also neutralize emotional poison in oneself by saying only what is true for us – to ourselves and to others.

I don’t know about you, but I hate hurting people. I had been badly hurt in the past by words and the bad behavior that accompanied them. I know how that pain feels and don’t want to inflict it on others. For the longest time, I had no sense of my personal power so had no sense of how my words were taken by other people. Especially those close to me. In my youth, I said the words “I love you” too often and too casually, without considering their impact.

Worse, I had no clear concept of what “Love” actually meant. The recipient wasn’t getting much value from my declaration, to begin with. But neither I nor they realized how flakey my words were until it was too late. They became emotionally involved with me as one might expectedly do when they believe someone loves them.

If I eventually withdrew my “love,” (attention, support, time, benefits), both me and my erstwhile “lover” suffered. They suffered for the loss of someone they had come to believe loved them. I suffered for having spoken important words without full respect for another’s feelings.

There was a time when words were so respected in society that “a man’s word was his bond.” Contracts were made on a handshake after a discussion where terms were mutually agreed. Was that a perfect system? By no means. But it does speak to a time when words were valued more highly than they are now? It does.

Contracts are a lawyer’s mainstay and an anchor for the involved parties to cling to when dealings go awry. But even the most well-written contract provisions can be woefully inadequate to the business at hand. In family law, court orders can do more harm than good. A judge may order a mother and father to “co-parent.” But if they have what it takes to do that successfully, they likely could have made the marriage work.

So much which is sacred has been cheapened and derogated. Sexuality. Spirituality. Life itself. And even words. I have come to see words as delicate threads like spiderwebs that keep us attached to each other within our communities. But spiderwebs are very easy to destroy. So we live in a world where cynicism and pessimism rule. We expect people to lie to us. We expect them to let us down.

Ruiz shows us that we don’t have to do that. We can train ourselves to only say what we believe to be true. We can suppress words we don’t feel will help someone. We can keep our thoughts and opinions to ourselves until they are solicited. That may be easier said than done. But I can say from personal experience, that doing so leaves a lot less hurt feelings in your wake and gives you a lot less to regret in your life. For those reasons alone, it has been an “agreement” I have happily tried to pursue.