I'd absolutely have the energy to be involved in such a bold upending of the system. Peter Levine has a book about trauma proofing our kids. I feel we need to go much further. We need to be more embodied and leading from the heart, not just the head and for me, parents need to be doing their own deep, inner work to explore inherited conditioning and belief systems, otherwise these are passed on... often unwittingly. We are far too obsessed with the aspect of mind driven by the left hemispheres ways of doing (scarcity, fear, judgment, competition, linearity, for example) with far too little awareness of the whole system, right hemispheres whole system, creative, empathic wise ways of being. Iain McGilchrist talks about this in his book, the 'Master and his Emissary ". To me, we are human beings, not human doings. All the education system sets us up for is doing. It rewards doing, and punishes and stifles those children who want to just be themselves, expressing their true, authentic essence and life force. To me, each of us is a fractal and a uniquely gifted, unparalleled human, but we are, from even before we are born, being programmed and wounded. We need to teach heart work not hard work, to support lineage work, to deepen our soul connection and to support pregnant women in particular as cortisol is passed transplacentally. The healing and transmuting of intergenerational trauma is crucial as it carries forward. Most people I work with are disconnected from their body, its wisdom and intelligence. Their spark has been so muffled it is almost snuffed out. It is knocked out of us early, partly by the homogeneity of education, as Alan Watts illustrates as part of his legacy.
Undoing our conditioning, unlearning all that keeps us small, teaching how to live with the contradictions and paradoxes of life, as well as a whole system transfiguration are surely needed and it feels to me to be a much bigger picture than simply focusing on education.
Beautiful words, especially like the heart work vs hard work concept. Teaching kids themselves McGilchriist's ideas would something I would advocate for. Agree on the inter and trans generational trauma.
You touch on an implicit problem in the relationship between governments and parents. Governments want compliant citizens. Parents want their children to grow into mature, self-sufficient, interdependent adults. The two intentions do not align well. Antonio Gramsci wrote, “In the life of children there are two very clear-cut phases, before and after puberty. Before puberty the child's personality has not yet formed and it is easier to guide its life and make it acquire specific habits of order, discipline, and work: after puberty the personality develops impetuously and all extraneous intervention becomes odious, tyrannical, insufferable. Now it so happens that parents feel the responsibility towards their children precisely during this second period, when it is too late: then of course the stick and violence enter the scene and yield very few results indeed. Why not instead take an interest in the child during the first period?”
This captures what see as the problematic relationship between governments and children.
Good point, I think the hard left know this very well, and have exploited it, by targeting young kids for indoctination, and getting activists into the classroom.
Thanks, Gary. Good insights. I imagine in a genuinely human-friendly world, this kind of information would be included in education. So much has to be dismantled and rebuilt.
Or create parallael instutitions. Bret Weinstein often says "zero is a special number" - they have to suppress any other option to maintain the dominance...
the best way to teach a child is still by example. No slogan will work better than your own doing what you want the kid to do. I remember an article where parents complained to their pediatrician that the child refused all color food and only ate white food. The doc asked what they ate. Chicken, gravy, mashed potatoes... did they eat carrots, spinach, peppers? No. Only white and brown. Kid did not know other colors were edible!
I agree - and the main message of the two book I link to in the book, is just this - in particular when it comes to regulating our own Nervous Systems... "bad" behaviour in kids is often a reflection of the dysregulated Nervous System states of the adults around them...
I think it is with children like with animals. Dogs and cats can feel tension too. When my husband died, the feral cats we had been feeding for some months followed me everywhere. They were outside and I was in, but no matter what window I look out of, there they were, looking up. And my dog knows exactly when not to bother me LOL
My perspective is that there's something physical in the environment of children today that is impacting their brain health (pseudo-food and poisonous medications) and until that something or somethings is removed, it will be very difficult to "teach" health.
Eve, I agree. We are being poisoned at every level. One must be conscientious of this fact and make [often expensive] decisions based on true health rather than always trying to cut corners. The "big and cheap" mentality is part of the programming.
Agree, there are multiple impacts, and these things are all inconnected. Example: if kids are stuck in fight, flight, freeze and can't calm and relax, they can't enter the states where their bodies can detox and attend to inflammation. So without being able to manage their own Nervous Systems, the impacts of the poisons are even greater.
I agree that we need to teach children that everything begins on the mental field! Imagination is our most powerful ability!
Meanwhile, the vast majority of adults are unaware that the *wayward wizards* are manufacturing illusions all the time which they force-project into society. These adults simply accept and live out these illusions, never developing critical thinking and the concomitant *courage* that is so vital to creating individual life and communities that truly benefit US!
At least with children, we can help to properly educate them on their spiritual nature and they stand a better chance of maintaining — even strengthening — that essence. Still, we all must discover our Divinity *in our own hearts and minds*!
I love your thought-provoking articles, Gary! I sense your genuine caring through your well-chosen words.
Even if you have to embarrass yourself with foodstamps. I practiced what I preach. Our kids (all over 30)are all empathic, creative, kind, sensible smart and successful and a source of joy. And; Of course don't forget their spiritual upbringing.
I talked to a guy who stayed home with the kids after they were nursed because the mother, a lawyer, made so much more than him. He said that was working out well. So, at least one parent should stay home.
We are very much appreciating your solutions-based focus on things, while also not ignoring the gravity of the matters at hand. I am a retired acupuncturist who teaches Qigong now and advocates for holistic self-care in every way. I also work full time on organic farms, promoting local food networks. My partner teaches Forest School, an all-year, outdoor emergent curriculum, addressing such undiagnosed cultural issues as "nature deficit disorder." We don't make much money, but are well fed spiritually and physically, while offering services toward precisely those issues you descrbe in this article. We are happy to be resources in this regard and thank you for your work!
That's great. Yes, being divorced from nature is another big one. My brother takes animals and birds around schools as part of the science curriculum. The lack of knowledge about the natural world he encounters is stunning.
The contents of the dialectic behavior therapy course my troubled older youngling was mandated to take should be part of the core curriculum in public schools, along with gardening, personal finance, and how to research.
DBT was all about recognizing internal dysfunctional states and mitigating them deliberately. Was great stuff. I had to attend along with the child, the course teachers wanted comments... They got some doozies from me, since I'd already read up on a lot of what they expounded.
Of course, getting that sort of life-function core curriculum implemented would require that the schools be treated as educational facilities preparing kids for adulthood rather than just indoctrination stations getting them used to the required shut up, sit still, always attend, be on time, and bow to any stated authority in preparation for corporate work culture.
Yes, that as good examples of what we could be providing to kids. Did your youngling benefit from it? [On how to research, In Finland they are teaching kids how "to spot miisinformation" according to the Corbett Report.. unfortunately this is actually teaching them to trust everything the mainstream media says!!!![
Agree, if a kid doesn't fit the one-size fits all school model of being able to sit still, shut up and listen,. they are give labels like ADHD, put on drugs, and pathologized, when it is really the schooling model which is sick.
Diane, the wayward wizards have inverted everything, telling us that good is bad and bad is good, that harming ourselves is the way to health. It's revolting.
Good points on happy (calming) books! [I saw something the other day about Walt Disney deliberately making films to traumatize kids - Bambi death scene etc]. I would like kids to given the two books I cite in the article - written for parents, but what if we cut out the middleman and gave the kids themselves this empowering knowledge?
I still remember, to this day, sitting in the cinema watching Bambi. I was distraught... that said, I also recall Born Free and Ring of bright water, with real animals as the stars and relationships with the humans involved, that touched me most of all and were, I feel, indelibly imprinted on me. Were those experiences traumatising? I don't know. They certainly spoke to my soul. Perhaps that is why I have followed an ancient ways/wise woman, shamanic path... what I'm saying is that sure, as with many brilliant yet troubled writers, Walt Disney has gone through eras of dark programming in its movies. It has also been the source of immense creativity and joy too. We need to experience contrast. It's part of what we are here to do, I feel.
I'd absolutely have the energy to be involved in such a bold upending of the system. Peter Levine has a book about trauma proofing our kids. I feel we need to go much further. We need to be more embodied and leading from the heart, not just the head and for me, parents need to be doing their own deep, inner work to explore inherited conditioning and belief systems, otherwise these are passed on... often unwittingly. We are far too obsessed with the aspect of mind driven by the left hemispheres ways of doing (scarcity, fear, judgment, competition, linearity, for example) with far too little awareness of the whole system, right hemispheres whole system, creative, empathic wise ways of being. Iain McGilchrist talks about this in his book, the 'Master and his Emissary ". To me, we are human beings, not human doings. All the education system sets us up for is doing. It rewards doing, and punishes and stifles those children who want to just be themselves, expressing their true, authentic essence and life force. To me, each of us is a fractal and a uniquely gifted, unparalleled human, but we are, from even before we are born, being programmed and wounded. We need to teach heart work not hard work, to support lineage work, to deepen our soul connection and to support pregnant women in particular as cortisol is passed transplacentally. The healing and transmuting of intergenerational trauma is crucial as it carries forward. Most people I work with are disconnected from their body, its wisdom and intelligence. Their spark has been so muffled it is almost snuffed out. It is knocked out of us early, partly by the homogeneity of education, as Alan Watts illustrates as part of his legacy.
Undoing our conditioning, unlearning all that keeps us small, teaching how to live with the contradictions and paradoxes of life, as well as a whole system transfiguration are surely needed and it feels to me to be a much bigger picture than simply focusing on education.
Beautiful words, especially like the heart work vs hard work concept. Teaching kids themselves McGilchriist's ideas would something I would advocate for. Agree on the inter and trans generational trauma.
You touch on an implicit problem in the relationship between governments and parents. Governments want compliant citizens. Parents want their children to grow into mature, self-sufficient, interdependent adults. The two intentions do not align well. Antonio Gramsci wrote, “In the life of children there are two very clear-cut phases, before and after puberty. Before puberty the child's personality has not yet formed and it is easier to guide its life and make it acquire specific habits of order, discipline, and work: after puberty the personality develops impetuously and all extraneous intervention becomes odious, tyrannical, insufferable. Now it so happens that parents feel the responsibility towards their children precisely during this second period, when it is too late: then of course the stick and violence enter the scene and yield very few results indeed. Why not instead take an interest in the child during the first period?”
This captures what see as the problematic relationship between governments and children.
Good point, I think the hard left know this very well, and have exploited it, by targeting young kids for indoctination, and getting activists into the classroom.
Hi Gary, another thought provoking post - I need to return to my yogic roots.
Very glad I discovered your substack :)
Thanks, Gary. Good insights. I imagine in a genuinely human-friendly world, this kind of information would be included in education. So much has to be dismantled and rebuilt.
Or create parallael instutitions. Bret Weinstein often says "zero is a special number" - they have to suppress any other option to maintain the dominance...
Yes, I think that's right and is what's already happening. Thank you.
"...they have to suppress any other option to maintain the dominance"
Because everything the wayward wizards do stems from violence and their abject antagonistic hatred of us as creator beings.
the best way to teach a child is still by example. No slogan will work better than your own doing what you want the kid to do. I remember an article where parents complained to their pediatrician that the child refused all color food and only ate white food. The doc asked what they ate. Chicken, gravy, mashed potatoes... did they eat carrots, spinach, peppers? No. Only white and brown. Kid did not know other colors were edible!
I agree - and the main message of the two book I link to in the book, is just this - in particular when it comes to regulating our own Nervous Systems... "bad" behaviour in kids is often a reflection of the dysregulated Nervous System states of the adults around them...
I think it is with children like with animals. Dogs and cats can feel tension too. When my husband died, the feral cats we had been feeding for some months followed me everywhere. They were outside and I was in, but no matter what window I look out of, there they were, looking up. And my dog knows exactly when not to bother me LOL
Yes, we need good messages about what's needed for brain health. So obvious - and generally overlooked.
My perspective is that there's something physical in the environment of children today that is impacting their brain health (pseudo-food and poisonous medications) and until that something or somethings is removed, it will be very difficult to "teach" health.
Eve, I agree. We are being poisoned at every level. One must be conscientious of this fact and make [often expensive] decisions based on true health rather than always trying to cut corners. The "big and cheap" mentality is part of the programming.
Agree, there are multiple impacts, and these things are all inconnected. Example: if kids are stuck in fight, flight, freeze and can't calm and relax, they can't enter the states where their bodies can detox and attend to inflammation. So without being able to manage their own Nervous Systems, the impacts of the poisons are even greater.
I agree that we need to teach children that everything begins on the mental field! Imagination is our most powerful ability!
Meanwhile, the vast majority of adults are unaware that the *wayward wizards* are manufacturing illusions all the time which they force-project into society. These adults simply accept and live out these illusions, never developing critical thinking and the concomitant *courage* that is so vital to creating individual life and communities that truly benefit US!
At least with children, we can help to properly educate them on their spiritual nature and they stand a better chance of maintaining — even strengthening — that essence. Still, we all must discover our Divinity *in our own hearts and minds*!
I love your thought-provoking articles, Gary! I sense your genuine caring through your well-chosen words.
Mothers should stay home with kids.
Even if you have to embarrass yourself with foodstamps. I practiced what I preach. Our kids (all over 30)are all empathic, creative, kind, sensible smart and successful and a source of joy. And; Of course don't forget their spiritual upbringing.
Prof. Darcia Navaerez's work on what kids actually need from caregivers, she calls it the "Evolved Nest" would support this.
When I was raised in the 50s and 60s , Mom staying home was the norm. Worked well.
I talked to a guy who stayed home with the kids after they were nursed because the mother, a lawyer, made so much more than him. He said that was working out well. So, at least one parent should stay home.
Daycare centers can't replace that.
We are very much appreciating your solutions-based focus on things, while also not ignoring the gravity of the matters at hand. I am a retired acupuncturist who teaches Qigong now and advocates for holistic self-care in every way. I also work full time on organic farms, promoting local food networks. My partner teaches Forest School, an all-year, outdoor emergent curriculum, addressing such undiagnosed cultural issues as "nature deficit disorder." We don't make much money, but are well fed spiritually and physically, while offering services toward precisely those issues you descrbe in this article. We are happy to be resources in this regard and thank you for your work!
That's great. Yes, being divorced from nature is another big one. My brother takes animals and birds around schools as part of the science curriculum. The lack of knowledge about the natural world he encounters is stunning.
The contents of the dialectic behavior therapy course my troubled older youngling was mandated to take should be part of the core curriculum in public schools, along with gardening, personal finance, and how to research.
DBT was all about recognizing internal dysfunctional states and mitigating them deliberately. Was great stuff. I had to attend along with the child, the course teachers wanted comments... They got some doozies from me, since I'd already read up on a lot of what they expounded.
Of course, getting that sort of life-function core curriculum implemented would require that the schools be treated as educational facilities preparing kids for adulthood rather than just indoctrination stations getting them used to the required shut up, sit still, always attend, be on time, and bow to any stated authority in preparation for corporate work culture.
Yes, that as good examples of what we could be providing to kids. Did your youngling benefit from it? [On how to research, In Finland they are teaching kids how "to spot miisinformation" according to the Corbett Report.. unfortunately this is actually teaching them to trust everything the mainstream media says!!!![
The DBT had a positive effect for almost a year before behavior relapsed again. That child refuses to research anything and believes the media.
My younger researches things completely on his own and is much more open minded (takes after me much more than the older one.)
.
You'll Know A Liberal When You See One.
Because Everything Is Said In Duress.
They Are The People
That Emotional Shit Keeps Falling Out Of The Sky Around.
.
Agree, if a kid doesn't fit the one-size fits all school model of being able to sit still, shut up and listen,. they are give labels like ADHD, put on drugs, and pathologized, when it is really the schooling model which is sick.
Diane, the wayward wizards have inverted everything, telling us that good is bad and bad is good, that harming ourselves is the way to health. It's revolting.
Good points on happy (calming) books! [I saw something the other day about Walt Disney deliberately making films to traumatize kids - Bambi death scene etc]. I would like kids to given the two books I cite in the article - written for parents, but what if we cut out the middleman and gave the kids themselves this empowering knowledge?
I still remember, to this day, sitting in the cinema watching Bambi. I was distraught... that said, I also recall Born Free and Ring of bright water, with real animals as the stars and relationships with the humans involved, that touched me most of all and were, I feel, indelibly imprinted on me. Were those experiences traumatising? I don't know. They certainly spoke to my soul. Perhaps that is why I have followed an ancient ways/wise woman, shamanic path... what I'm saying is that sure, as with many brilliant yet troubled writers, Walt Disney has gone through eras of dark programming in its movies. It has also been the source of immense creativity and joy too. We need to experience contrast. It's part of what we are here to do, I feel.