Journey to a New Life

If I look at all the knowledge and information published on the internet, books, magazines, tv – there is so much information out there; that if you’d bring all this information together and study it as a subject, it would be just as massive, complex, and full of conflicting schools of thought as any other big subject out there, say Politics and Economics.

With any topic in these disciplines, for every ‘right’ someone states, another will claim it is ‘wrong’.

Me, being the reading type – I read a lot and am aware of a lot of the information existent with regards to many parenting topics. This makes me awfully aware of all the ‘right’ and ‘wrongs’ – and how everything which is a ‘right’ in some circles, turns out to be a ‘wrong’ in other circles.

When I was in school and a student, I wanted to do ‘right’ and ‘be a good student’, as a way to please everyone around me. At least, that was easy – simply copy/paste information from books into your brain, when time comes cut and paste on test. Making friends and being liked? Look at what the popular kids are doing, copy/paste – done deal. The expectations from my environment were clear-cut and so easy to determine what my course of action should be, to meet those expectations.

Within parenting, I saw and am still seeing this exact same dynamic play out. I am still looking to please everyone around me, I’m still wanting to do ‘the right’ and be a ‘good mother’. With parenting, this gets tricky, because there are many different types of schools, as schools of thought. What’s the right answer for one, is the wrong in another. Within my head, this then makes a ‘good mother’ to one, and a ‘bad mother’ to another. With this, I often come to a point of being really conflicted inside myself and how and what I do with my son, because I each time I do something, I trace it to ‘all the information I have read’, remember all the different views and opinions – and in the end I could be both ‘right’ and ‘wrong’. Then I wonder, shit, what’s other people going to think of me? Should I have done the other thing? But maybe that one is wrong too??

When I hold on to all this information in my head, I quickly accumulate a breakdown. Because whatever I do, whatever move I make, whatever direction I take with my child – it’s always going to be wrong in someone’s eyes. I simply can’t make everyone happy.

So then I move myself to let go of all the knowledge and information, and respond moment by moment. But then here, I notice, I am still in tension, because even though I am now listening to myself, I’d still reaaaaallyy would like to find out, as soon as possible, if what I did was indeed a proper move. Was it conductive to his personal growth and development? Which is not something I can just find out, right after the deed is done. Children grow up very slow – where animals tend to take months rather than years; children take a long time to grow and develop. The effects of a decision you’ve made and follow through on, may only much later surface to provide you feedback.

I noticed that I don’t like this; that I very much would like to know, or have someone tell me that ‘everything’s okay’ and that ‘I’m doing a good job’. Only time will tell.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to desire to be a ‘good mother’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to desire to know what a ‘good mother’ looks like, and what she does, so I can closely follow those guidelines to feel safe inside myself that I am doing good and doing the right thing

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear ‘doing wrong’ and someone telling me that I am ‘doing the wrong thing’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to desire to be right, regardless of the nature of the content of what it is I have to do, to ‘be right’

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have trained myself to follow guidelines to the T so I can be ‘right’ and a ‘good girl’ – without ever really investigating or critically going over the guidelines I am following as the content I am absorbing and implementing, what their implications and consequences are – where I did not care/bother about any of that, as long as I would be able to get my stamp of approval that I am “right” and “being a good girl”

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to only ever follow instructions and do what other people tell me to do so I can receive a stamp of approval and within that experience myself as “safe” inside myself, where I can now ‘relax’ – knowing that I am standing in everyone’s good graces and that no-one will be mad at me

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be in constant anxiety in relation to parenting and taking care of another life as myself, because no-one can give me definitive stamp of approval, because nowhere in this world have we ever really investigated what it means to bring up a child in this world in a way that is best for all, we’ve all just been following instructions as the structure of the system established, follow those guidelines no matter what, never question if our actions produce results which are best for all life

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to live in anticipation of someone calling me out and telling me I am doing it all wrong, within having made the conscious decision to not follow mainstream parenting – where I fear I made a mistake by ‘stepping out of the box’ and that any moment someone’s going to call me out and be mad at me for the decision I made

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to be uncomfortable within exploring and walking unchartered territory for myself, believing I MUST have a proper, clear cut plan, worked out to the T that I can follow to ensure NO mistakes can happen

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge myself for not having a plan

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I am irresponsible within not having a plan

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear the day that I will have to answer to ‘the world’ about the decisions I have made

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have separated the world from myself, where I have to be okay and accountable to myself – always

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to step out of doing right/wrong – as its not about doing the right or wrong as an external label outside of myself, but about checking in with myself, seeing who I am in the moment, and moving myself to always direct/move from a starting point as self and not as mind/energy

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to judge myself tor the friction and tension I face inside myself within my parenting journey

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise I have never in my life been in a position to make major decisions about myself and my life, where I merely ever did with others told me to do without question

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that I never developed personal self-responsibility inside and as myself as I only ever followed instructions given out by others as to how things are done and simply having to follow what is laid out to me

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to long for the experience of security I experienced back when I did not have to make any major decisions for myself or for another

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realise that my experience of security was not so much an experience of security but an accepted and allowed experience of ignorance is bliss

I commit myself to unconditionally walk and explore my parenting journey

I commit myself to when and as I find myself going into fear of doing the right or wrong thing, to take a deep breath and step back within myself. Instead of associating information with right/wrong labels, I look at my actions, who I am within them, what consequences/outflows they could create and asses myself and my direction based on that

I commit myself to when and as I judge myself for experiencing conflict and friction within my parenting, to remind myself that I have never been in such a position before, that I have never really walked anything for myself, that I have never really created anything for and as myself – and that within learning and walking something new, there’s going to be friction and conflict within the process of letting go of the old and inviting and creating the new

Fidelis found an old recording that was done when a visitor came to the farm with her two very young daughters. In this discussion with Bernard and Sunette as Lifi and Veno they open up points about children and parenting. I will be transcribing the interview and share in parts here. The following is Part 2. To read Part 1, click here. Enjoy!

Fidelis found an old recording that was done when a visitor came to the farm with her two very young daughters. In this discussion with Bernard and Sunette as Lifi and Veno they open up points about children and parenting. I will be transcribing the interview and share in parts here. Enjoy!

Okay, so we’re going to discuss children, parenting and related matters.
Jozien has got some questions and Lifi and Veno are going to answer them and see who pops through. Okay, your first question

Jozien: My first question is that, what I experience here, Sunette told me about Zina and Loulou – where Zina would always want to play with the toy which other kids are playing with. It doesn’t make sense for me to say to her like “It’s not possible”, she wants to play with the same toy.
Then Sunette said to me that because she wants to experience the same thing as the other kid and that actually she wants to experience the ‘equality’ if you can call it that. And that’s something that I never even considered as a parent. Because the only thing I did was trying to tell her “This is not your toy” or “you have your own toys” and just not understanding what she was actually asking. Does that make sense?

Sunette: Yes, I can see what you are saying.
Situations with regards to that is still – for example yes, the child would for example see another child play with its toy and would and they would kind of be seeing in a self-experience way what the child is experiencing with the toy and they for themselves would like to discover that experience, from that perspective. But, what that is actually revealing is how the child still at that age, is interpreting that experience to be related to or linked to the toy. It’s not yet linked to an actual self-expression experience. Meaning that, ‘who I am’ is not determined according to a toy, or the experience of me is not determined according to a toy, or the expression of me is not determined according to the toy. It’s the basic design with regards to how children are related in relationship to or towards physical manifestations of this world. Where they themselves are linked to something or where their experience of themselves is linked to something. It’s not a natural self-expression, here. However, the other side of the coin, is two perspectives. There’s two manifestations, two experiences which are happening. But the prominent one is the one where they are still linking experience to the toy. Underneath that though, what is being experienced is that particular point of self-discovery from a certain perspective, where they see the child playing with a toy, they see that experience, that expression that the being is going through and they would like to discover that within themselves. But, what is happening with the mind integration, is that it’s being linked to the toy. Not to self.

Bernard: Let’s look at the side of the coin.

What must also be understood is that the whole design of Consciousness as it exists is one of inequality. And the fact that one child plays with the toy and the other one sees it, and now desires to play with it or to experience themselves already creates a separation and a form of competition and conflict. The conflict will then manifest normally between the parent and the child, and not between the child without the toy and the child with the toy. The child will then ask the parent for the toy. They’ll sometimes try and take the toy to experience it, but they will also eventually blame the parent for not having a toy. Because they don’t understand why what is in this world is not equally available for all. And that is then simplistically slowly but surely being integrated and also the parent participates in that extensively then saying “But it’s not yours” – it’s a form of ownership and a form of separation and a form of inequality that is being taught, because we are in a system with many things but nobody can afford to have all the things and give their children all the experiences with every single thing.

Sunette: And understand, the child doesn’t see it as “It is yours / It is mine”.

Bernard: That concept doesn’t exist yet.

To be continued

I watched two of the little mermaid movies recently with Cesar, and watching it again for the first time in a very looong time opened up a cool dimension for myself.

Watching it and being a parent - well, watching it and being both someone's child and a parent to a child -- I was paying particular attention to the relationship between the little mermaid and her father while watching.

It was mostly the third movie, which was actually made after the first one but tells the story of the little mermaid when she was even more little that gave me some food for thought.

In this movie they show how Ariel's mother died, and how this broke her father, Triton, his heart. Her parents had a "special connection" which revolved around music and after the mother dies Triton bans all music: no one is allowed to make music or even sing. Then the movie fastforwards to ten years later, where Ariel and her sisters are older. Ariel is an expressive girl but the Kingdom is ruled my monotone routines where any form of fun, laughter or enjoyment set her father off in a fit of rage -- telling her to 'behave'. Stuff happends, and Ariel finds out about some underground music/dancing club and then before your know it so does Triton.

He of course blows up and gets freaking angry -- at which point the little mermaid basically has got "enough" of it and tells him 'what's what'.

I was going "Wow, she's brave!"

And then in the movie something happens.

He gets it.

And he changes his behaviour.

Cause while I was watching the movie and the ten years went by, I was think "Woah, ten years went by and nothing changed? No-one went up to him and questioned what he is doing? And now they are still living the same shitty life?"

And then it dawned to me:

"Shit, I did the exact same thing".

Growing up, my dad had a lot of anger issues and as a result I molded myself to be small and invisible to prevent any type of triggers going off to which my dad could blow. It is quite fascinating, because even the face of Ariel's father and how his face looks when he gets angry is quite similar to that of my own father.

And I did the same as in the movie. I did not once question his anger. I accepted and allowed it. I saw it as 'his right' to be angry and to not be questioned for it.

So instead of 10 years, I lived under the same monotone and miserable conditions for 18 years -- assuming that questioning my dad, or making it a point of telling him that this is not cool would result in my total oblitiration. While all the while, someone questioning him and telling him 'what's what' could have been exactly THE THING that would have snapped him out of it, so we could ALL move on and have some fun in life.

So that one decision, as the acceptance and allowance of anger within another, and so within me = determined my whole life.

Because, what is anger?
Fascinatingly enough, around the same time as watching the movie I went through my own little bout of anger and so had a nice opportunity to really look at what it is all about.

So anger -- when I looked at it, being in it -- I saw that the anger and the intensity of my anger was actually a measurement/reflection to the extent that I wasted potential, that I did not take responsibility for something or things that are in my response ability.
And more I do not actively take responsibility for things in my life, the angrier I get.
Then, anger gets used as a safety net. Everyone knows what the presence of anger feels like and how it is sooo very tempting to not 'step into' that net and set it off. And that's exactly what angry people are counting on. They count on you being afraid of this energy they are resonating, so that you would not question them and their actions, so that they can continue not changing, so that they can continue abdicating responsibility.

So while anger is this big WOOOOOOOAAAHHHH energy -- behind it hides a small person who's too afraid to take responsibility and take the steps they need to take to sort out the things in their life that are causing the anger. Meaning -- there's things playing out in their life which are undesirable, BUT which they have the power to change. Anger comes in, when that power is not being used but left to waste and then just goes towards powering their anger.

So what I have been pushing myself to do when I come into contact with someone who is in a state of anger, is to not focus on the energy of anger which is intimidating (and is what I have feared all my life), but to look at what it represents and the underlying point causing it. And what I've realised is that I cannot direct an angry person by focusing and directign the anger, as the anger is not really the point. The point is the responsibility which was abdicated. And if I can put my finger on it and show the person exactly what they abdicated and how -- then the anger simply disappears.

And man, have I really been wondering what my life could have looked like if I had realised this one simple thing.... Aaah the regret

This is a continuation to my previous blog: Day 87: Forced Learning

Another dimension I have come across as a parent in relation to learning, is that of 'Let Babies be Babies'. Where on the one side you have people who are more inclined to 'force' their babies/children to learn; there's also the opposite attitude where people are more inclined to 'let babies be babies'.

On this extreme end, anything which has got anything to do with 'learning' is pushed aside: "Babies are meant to have fun and play, why bring in this tedious topic of 'learning'?" "They will do penty of learning when the time comes that they go to school, just let them be and just this time of just fun and play."
Fasinatingly enough, there's even a dimension that parents fear they will develop a 'smart baby/child' who will be judged by his peers and they'd prefer their child to be 'normal like the rest of them'.

In this case, there's a negative connotation to the word 'learning', and whatever one believes constitutes this learning. And because you yourself as a parent had a negative experience with learning, we rather want to push it away, avoid it and postpone it.
Thing is that babies and toddlers are learning all the time, whether we are conscious of it or not. Whenever they observe something, hear, smell, taste, touch something - babies are learning about themselves and reality around them. Learning is not limited to what happens inside a school or classroom, and how things are taught/learnt at school is not the only way one can learn something.
Just as forcing your child to learn will lead them to experience learning negatively, so will the opposite of dismissing, avoiding and postponing it as your own bias towards learning will be carried over to your child.

When Cesar is learning about words, their meanings and how to read them - he doesn't access the same idea many have of 'learning' as being a negativly laden concept. For him it is simply an extension of what he is already naturally doing: exploring his physical reality, how it relates to him and how he can engage and participate with it. Learning is natural to babies, and 'letting babies be babies' then naturally implies providing an environment conducive to learning, prickling their curiosity and stimulating their natural explorative disposition.

Unfortunately we have made learning quite an unpleasant experience through limiting it to school and their factory-like setup. But it is up to us to re-create and reinvent what constitutes learning and to pass this on to our children.