It makes you think ...

"In the matter of reforming things, as distinct from deforming them, there is one plain and simple principle; a principle which will probably be called a paradox. There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say, for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected across a road. The more modern type of reformer goes gaily up to it and says, “I don’t see the use of this; let us clear it away.” To which the more intelligent type of reformer will do well to answer: “If you don’t see the use of it, I certainly won’t let you clear it away. Go away and think. Then, when you can come back and tell me that you do see the use of it, I may allow you to destroy it.”This paradox rests on the most elementary common sense. The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. But the truth is that nobody has any business to destroy a social institution until he has really seen it as an historical institution. If he knows how it arose, and what purposes it was supposed to serve, he may really be able to say that they were bad purposes, that they have since become bad purposes, or that they are purposes which are no longer served. But if he simply stares at the thing as a senseless monstrosity that has somehow sprung up in his path, it is he and not the traditionalist who is suffering from an illusion."

-G. K. Chesterton

Conformity vs. Growth: A 10-year-old's problem

When I was about 9, my aunt, uncle, and--most importantly--my cousin moved to within 20 minutes of my home. At the time I was homeschooled, so I didn't know very many people outside of my immediate family. My best friends were my siblings. I was incredibly shy around other people, but I longed to expand my borders and make new friends--I was an extrovert and didn't know it! I was so embarrassed every time someone tried to talk to me and I couldn't think of anything to say. I was embarrassed that I couldn't interact normally with other people. It hurt that I didn't know how to talk to others.

So my cousin moved into town. Since my family lived just down the road from my grandparents, my cousins would come over to play when their parents were visiting my grandparents. My cousin came over a few times, and we became friends. I was so excited! I hoped that she would be my new best friend. One of my older sisters already had a best friend/cousin, and so did two of my younger sisters. This would make life so much more fun and interesting!

I don't remember ever inviting my cousin over to my house, I don't really remember exactly why. She only invited me over to her house once or twice, so our friendship was only sustained by our interaction at church. I loved talking to her. I had finally found someone I could talk to! I was so proud of myself for finally being able to hold a conversation. The only problem was that all our conversations had to be during church. How could I behave, avoid being rude and talk to my cousin at the same time?

I couldn't.

So I talked to my cousin during Primary, the classes for children. Did I mention that I was proud of having a friend outside my family? That I was excited about holding a conversation with someone I didn't know intimately well? I want to stress that fact to explain why I would talk during class. One day during Primary my uncle--my friend/cousin's father and incidentally also my Sunday school teacher--tapped me on the shoulder and told me to be quiet. I was so ashamed. I was that child that wanted to please everybody, so I tried not to cause problems or misbehave. I hadn't realized that talking to someone--a good thing--could also be a problem.

I encountered a similar problem about two years after I started public school. At this point, I was about 13 years old and in 8th grade. I still struggled with social situations, and adults still told me that I needed to contribute to the conversation after I'd been quiet for 10 or 15 minutes straight.

I had a best friend, Jenny. She was my first best friend outside of my immediate family, and I was amazed at how similar our life experiences and our ideas about life were. We had similar morals. I had finally found someone who liked being around me! I felt comfortable around her. Jenny and I sat near each other in most of our classes because our last names were both near the end of the alphabet. We took advantage of this seating arrangement, and talked when possible. I had learned from my previous experience, and tried not to be disrespectful of our teachers, but sometimes it was hard to abstain. I remember one instance in our English class--everyone had been talking, and our teacher was fed up with us! She told everyone to stop, not say a word for 5 minutes, and ... I don't remember the last part of the punishment. I think it was write something about why we were talking. Anyway, we spent a really boring 5 minutes of it. I felt bad because I usually prided myself on being perfectly behaved (I was an unusual child).

So, here we are. I was so proud of myself for being able to talk to someone--something everyone said they wanted--but I didn't have a chance to practice in an appropriate environment. My parents didn't realize that I struggled so much with this. If they had realized, I like to believe they would have tried to help me. Would they have known how to help, though? I don't think either of them is a shy extrovert, so I imagine it would have been difficult for them to relate to my predicament.

Since everyone is different and has a unique personality, I think it must be fairly common that children go through at least some things that their parents can't immediately relate to. I'm pretty sure that my children will have different challenges than I had (and different challenges from their siblings). Since Levi's greatest challenge at this point is not falling while he's walking, I'm not really sure what he'll struggle with later, but since he's my son, I desperately want to be able to help him through anything he goes through. I hope that I can be objective enough to see his struggles for what they are and not project my own childhood struggles on him or any of my other children.

LOL! - online gaming as a woman

Austin and I recently started playing an online game together. Because of the nature of the game, anyone else that's playing it can bump into us (It's like an MMO but Austin says it's not really massive enough to call it an MMO). We're enjoying the game, and I love spending time with Austin. I never thought I'd play much in the way of video games after about my freshman year in college, but here I am playing and getting good at more than one!

After we'd been playing for about 30 minutes, Austin pointed out to me that I had some messages. I checked them, and there were several friend requests and another request to join someone's guild (meaning that we'd be more likely to play levels together). Austin didn't have any such requests. We didn't think anything of it at the time, but 30 minutes later, I had more requests of the same kind. Austin still didn't have any. This situation stumped us until we realized that my player name was "keighdee-lady" and these guys were probably interested in being my friend because my gender was almost unequivocally female. LOL!

Ugh-Books for Adults

So, seriously, do ALL novels written for adults have to have some sort of allusion to characters having sex (and how they're so casual about it) every 30 pages?! And then every 70 pages or so have a sex scene? A sex scene with intimate details I'd rather not read about? Really??? I know sex scenes have the reputation for being good for business and sales, but really. REALLY. This is why I don't read contemporary books from the adult general fiction section. Too bad for me that sometimes I get tired of the stuff aimed at people 10 years younger than me and try to read something aimed at my age group. Too bad that so much of the nonfiction that is aimed at my demographic is boring and hard to get through and I'd like a little bit of fiction. Too bad. Maybe I should just "get over myself" and read that trash anyway. UGH.


If you like that kind of stuff, fine. Or if you can read the book just for its other content, fine. I'm judging the books, not you. Just please--don't ask me to enjoy these books and don't tell me that I'm somehow less cultured or need to grow up because I can't bear to read them. And don't make me feel bad because you feel bad because I feel bad about the books that you enjoy. Everyone's different. So there.

1-2-3 ... Magic?

I finished 1-2-3 Magic: Effective Discipline for Children 2-12 by Thomas W. Phelan, Ph. D. about a week ago. Like the other parenting books that I've read, there are some things that I really liked and others that didn't really strike a chord with me.

Image from childdevelopmentinfo.com

Let's start with what I liked:

• The assertion that kids (especially small kids) don't get much--if anything--out of moralizing. E.g. 4-year-old Johnny is getting upset that 1-year-old Sally is playing with his toys. Johnny's mother tries to explain that it's important to share, while Johnny just gets more and more frustrated at Sally for the way she's playing with his things. He doesn't really 'get' the idea of sharing, and doesn't want to listen now.
• The author calls this situation--when adults try to reason with small children--the "little adult syndrome", meaning that parents are treating children like little adults.
• The 1-2-3 method: Each time the child misbehaves, count one number until you get to 3. At 3, the child has just earned a time out for as many minutes as they are years old. Aside: this method is only for behaviors that need to stop. Getting a child to do something (e.g. getting ready for bed) requires a different parenting method.
• When a child feels loved, they are more likely to cooperate with what the adult wants them to do.
• Parents need to watch out for their own temper tantrums when frustrated with a child for not cooperating.
• One-on-one time is essential for good parent-child relationships.
• Listening to children without judgement (if discipline is needed, that can come later)
• Family meeting (I think this section should've gotten a little bit more attention)
• The idea that a simple time-out--even when the child enjoys that time playing in his or her room--is enough of a consequence to make an impact on the child. The author asserts that the interruption to what the child is doing is enough in and of itself. I agree.
• The suggestion to establish routines. The author didn't go into much detail here, but if we do everything the same way every day, then autopilot can kick in and there won't be as much resistance among the kids--or so I hope!

I didn't really like the author's ideas for helping children to start good behaviors--or maybe it was his way of presenting the tactics that I didn't like. I feel that a parent who isn't really very good with children or getting children to cooperate could make the situation a lot worse after reading this section. While the author mentions the need for positive reinforcement and having a good relationship with children for his strategies to work, he didn't emphasize it enough for my taste. I feel that some parents who are used to coercing their children into doing things would just use his strategies for more coercion. That is NOT good. Not only does coercion harm parent-child relationships, it also makes the child associate negative feelings with the tasks that he or she is forced to do. I think this problem could have been avoided if the author had made his ideas for strengthening parent-child relationships a more essential part of his section on "start" behaviors. 

I think that was my main beef with the book--the ideas were good, but some of the good ideas were downplayed, while tactics that could be implemented either positively or negatively were emphasized. 

Oh, one more thing--the book is supposedly for children 2-12. I think that the tactics presented would be more effective for younger children than for older ones. It's been a while since I was 10, but I think that some of these tactics would have rubbed me the wrong way at that point in my life.