Open to them

“If you don’t make the time to work on creating the life you want, you’re eventually going to be forced to spend a LOT of time dealing with the life that you don’t want.” Kevin Ngo

I do not usually like quotes that are somewhat threatening in tone, but I do like this one as it reminds me to be responsible for looking after my life. My life is in my hands and I need to give it meaning and purpose if I want us to flourish.

But looking after my daily life is just part of my personal responsibility. Another part is to make meaning out of my past.

”My mother was the love of my life.” – is a quote from Cheryl Strayed that I embrace warmly.

I adore this sentence so much for so many reasons but mainly for how well it counters our blame-oriented culture of today, the culture that seeks to blame our parents for who we have or have not become. The culture that renders us deficient in will and efficacy because of who our parents were or weren’t. The culture that teaches us to point fingers at the people whose youth, intentions and histories we cannot possibly experience. I think it’s good to work through childhood traumas, it’s good to examine our responses to them, but I do not think that we should succumb to the culture of blame. Because by doing that, we see our childhood as poorer than it actually was. I saw people being poisoned by the blame-oriented mindset more than by their actual childhood experiences. I saw people being stuck for years because of it. ”My mother was the love of my life.” – this sentence does the opposite. It gives meaning and sense to our childhoods. It shows that adults are fragile but also wonderfully capable of loving each other. Capable of loving deeply and dearly, and isn’t it what we all want? To be capable of such love for many people in our lives.

Sometimes I wonder what’s the purpose of the blame-oriented culture. To break, to divide, to render someone insecure. To cause grief? I know that many people would not be able to be so candid about their own mothers as Cheryl Strayed was. I know that for many their childhood experiences are too painful to even hear such words being spoken. But this quote is not only about the mother, right? But about the loves of our life. Beyond the question of our relationship with our parents, it nudges us to ask: What are the loves of our life? What can we do to be truly open to them?

Losing sleep and buying presents for new-to-parenthood adults

A new era has started in our house – an era of no afternoon sleep for our toddler (and no cat naps for me by the same token). It’s been on and off for the last three months but it looks like he has decided to drop it for good now. Every transition phase in a family life, even as small as this one, is challenging and tiring at the same time. A lot of miscommunication happens in transition phases – what I once understood as a sign of tiredness on the part of our little boy, now becomes a request for extra entertainment and I must admit it took me a while to grasp it, perhaps a tinge of denial clouded my parental perception, but it looks like I am now a mum of a small boy rather than a toddler. Could this be the case? So soon?

I suspect that our son is also confused by this new wave of energy that embraces him in the middle of each day. So when today, just after midday, my little companion turned into a roaring dinosaur and then into a savage shark that ferociously dived into the tormented sea of our duvet with no intention of reverting into a sweet and sleepy baby-boy the shark once was, I thought to myself that it’s probably a sign that we’re done with afternoon naps and it’s time for something else now…

More serious mothering… maybe? I noticed that there are many no’s to exchange now, more boundaries to set, new negotiations to engage in and I am slowly finding myself within this new parental landscape. But ‘slowly’ is not a word that goes well with being a mum of a 3 year-old. I have a very curious and a very fast son and I love this about him but recently I just find it really hard to keep his pace and you know, as a parent, it’s actually better if you’re a bit quicker than your child, a millisecond will suffice as long as that millisecond is there… And if you are as big a dreamer as I am, you are probably more than one zillion milliseconds behind.

There are two books that mainly helped me (and are still helping) with developing good communication habits with my son. I would not have any qualms in presenting these books as Christmas presents to new-to-parenthood adults. So if you have anyone around you with small children, do not hesitate investing in these two sources as they are really helpful and enlightening.

The first book is by Jesper Juul (2011) entitled Your Competent Child.

The second is by Janet Lansbury (2014) and is called No Bad Kids: Toddler Discipline without Shame.

Two wonderful and helpful guides. They are really kind and understanding in tone and message and I cannot help but love what they recommend and how they explain the role of parenting and honest communication between children and parents. Of course, I do not necessarily read them as gospel, but I feel that they came to my life just at the right time.

Let me know if they do the trick for you and your loved-ones too. x

The universe got it right by giving us the seasons

The wind has started blowing a bit harder and the sun escapes from view much earlier these days. But home feels so cosy and just right for staying in. I like our home. I love the books scattered around the house, the remains of our toddlers’ adventures that need scooping up towards the end of each day, the fruit and vegetables in the baskets in our kitchen, even the sink still filled with pots from today’s cooking episodes. I think the universe got it right by giving us the seasons. The late autumn and winter and the cosiness that we experience of our own homes – doesn’t it support one view? That where we are is home. That where we are now we should be now, at this given moment in time. That everything is as it should be.

I will be using this winter to grow the same level of cosiness in my heart and look for every feeling in me that sends this warmth to the world and back to myself and my family.

What do you do to cultivate warm feelings?

Follow your child’s gaze

Just before the night sets in I sit down on a bed with my little boy, we surround ourselves with a number of picture books and we look through the images and I read to him. Depending on how busy our day was and how alert we both are this little ritual of ours lasts from 15 minutes up to an hour. I love this daily encounter with different adventures, poems and stories but most of all I love this very peaceful time with my child and the feeling of unity that it creates.

Years ago I was wondering what it is about reading or rather following a particular story which creates this feeling of togetherness. I decided that the answer partially is held in our gaze. We look in the same direction. We see things together.

When we go about our days with my son I try to follow his gaze. I try to look where he looks so that I get to know him better, so that I learn what his interests are. I hope that through this he will find courage to stay true to his interests later on in life and to be sure that whichever direction he will turn to, I will be watching this with interest too.

As part of my own development I often listen to podcasts and interviews on creativity, curiosity and calling in adult life and I like to link them to how I see childhood. Over these very first years of my son’s life I have formulated a very firm conviction that at the moment, at the very moment of being and becoming, curiosity is his only calling.

I owe it to his future to respect this.

Check the podcasts that inspired me to write the post above: http://robbell.com/portfolio/robcast/

Flames of support

Last week I was fervently campaigning for lighting a candle in support of asylum seekers and refugees. The idea was warmly embraced by a number of friends and acquaintances and so on Sunday evening, at 9pm, in front of our houses, we lit up the dark and prayed for the refugees’ peaceful journeys to safety and remembered those who have perished at sea. We looked back in our ancestries and saw how each and every family had members who sought refuge and those who sheltered others.

When we gathered I thus realised that we share much more than we think. There is nothing more reassuring than seeing people who are close to you link together in this most crucial of ways. That what it means to be a human being for you means to be a human being for them. That to be respectful and mindful of others means to be a humanitarian. That to be a community means to be a humanitarian community. Nothing else builds trust as much as this.

Activism is not my strength. I am only learning to speak my mind firmly. Last week taught me one thing: that it’s only when you stop sitting on the fence and position yourself that you can seek practical solutions to problems. It’s only then that your mind starts to generate ideas that are worth implementing.

I know that last Sunday at 9pm we created a tiny little piece of history. History for our few families that decided to light a candle. History for our little toddlers who could not contain the joy of lighting candles in the darkness, who could not stop jumping up and down and laughing loudly and being totally in awe of the light and warmth. This event ignited not only the flame of the candle but also the flames of joy in these children. I am pleased and contented for myself and my friends that we’ve started creating the basis of stories to tell our children later in life. Stories of practised compassion, sympathy and connectedness. Thank you for your support Lovely People.