May 21, 2018 | Direction
A cornerstone of Child-Centered Spirituality is this conviction: We are born with the capability to connect with the divine, and this activity is centered in our soul or spirit.
New York Times columnist David Brooks adds his observations about humanity’s innate spirituality: “Of course people are driven by selfish motivations—for individual status, wealth and power. But they are also motivated by another set of drives—for solidarity, love and moral fulfillment—that are equally and sometimes more powerful.”
I’ve summarized Brooks’ thoughts below and you can read his entire column here.
People have a moral sense.
“They have a set of universal intuitions that help establish harmony between people. From their first moments, children are wired to feel each other’s pain. You don’t have to teach a child about what fairness is; they already know. There’s no society on Earth where people are admired for running away in battle or for lying to their friends.”
People have moral emotions.
“They feel rage at injustice, disgust toward greed, reverence for excellence, awe before the sacred and elevation in the face of goodness.”
People yearn for righteousness.
“They want to feel meaning and purpose in their lives, that their lives are oriented toward the good.”
People are attracted by goodness and repelled by selfishness.
“NYU social psychologist Jonathan Haidt has studied the surges of elevation we feel when we see somebody performing a selfless action. Haidt describes the time a guy spontaneously leapt out of a car to help an old lady shovel snow from her driveway.”
“One of his friends, who witnessed this small act, later wrote: ‘I felt like jumping out of the car and hugging this guy. I felt like singing and running, or skipping and laughing. Writing a beautiful poem or love song. Telling everybody about his deed.'”
Your child’s spiritual development is vital. Your efforts are neither wasted nor ignored.
One of the things I particularly like about this column is Brooks’ way of communicating the universally recognized nature of morality. We all instinctively recognize it when we see it. He captures our natural yearning for good, which still recognizing how challenging it can be to live out. It’s not easy, but it is worth it… and so is teaching it to our children. Moral teaching fits with what they already know on an instinctive level and helps them make sense of the world.
Tweetable: Child-Centered Spirituality champions balance in our efforts to guide a child’s physical, spiritual, intellectual and emotional development. Here NY Times columnist David Brooks shares observations about spiritual (moral) development. Click to Tweet
May 7, 2018 | Nurture
By guest blogger Tara Miller
Often in life, we are faced with choices between two—or more—good options, but we don’t have the time, energy or money to do all of them. We have to choose. It’s especially difficult to choose when both options seem quite good.
When the person making the choice is a child or teenager, it can be particularly tempting to simply tell them what you think they should choose. After all, you have experience and insight that they don’t. However, if you want them to truly commit to their own decision, they’ll need to take ownership of it themselves.
The “forced choice” approach
Here’s a coaching-based exercise you can use called the “forced choice” approach. In this case, I used it with my 18-year-old daughter who was choosing a college this spring, but it could be applied to any situation where there’s a choice to be made between options.
Knock-out factors
My daughter had first narrowed down her choices using some “knock-out factors.” These are criteria that would make her decide against a school outright. For a serious student athlete, a knock-out factor might be a school not having a good basketball team. My daughter had two knock-out factors: she wanted a school that was out-of-state and she wanted one where the campus felt like a positive fit on an intuitive level. One school looked perfect for her on paper, but when she went to visit it failed the knock-out test. It quickly fell off her list and she didn’t apply there.
After the narrowing process, she was left with two colleges. Both of them seemed to be equally good choices, she had been accepted to both, and she could picture herself attending either school rather easily. So how should she make this decision?
Think through the reasons
I started by asking the opening question: “What are you seeking to accomplish by going to college?” This question was designed to help her think through her reasons for going at all and to consider what she most wanted from the experience. She responded that she wanted to get a degree so she could go on to graduate school; she wanted the opportunity to make friends and live away on her own, and she wanted what she called, “the college experience.”
Criteria to evaluate
Then I asked her, given that processing, what criteria she wanted to use for evaluating a college. Here are the options she generated in no particular order:
- good opportunities to make friends
- professors who are engaged and available
- good preparation for graduate school
- good financial package/pricing
- opportunities for fun off campus
- good study abroad program
- an acapella group
Compare options: Which is more important?
Then came the forced choice part. I asked her to compare each option with each other option and ask, “Which is more important?” No ties or passing, and sometimes she found the choices very difficult, such as when I asked, “Which is more important—a good financial package or a good study abroad program?” Whichever option she deemed more important got a tally mark, which created rankings.
So she made 21 choices– comparing each item with each other item. Here are the rankings she came up with. The tally marks at the end of each item reflect how many times that item was chosen over other items, resulting in a weighting of how important each item was to her.
- good financial package/pricing (6)
- good study abroad program (5)
- good opportunities to make friends (3)
- professors who are engaged an available (3)
- good preparation for graduate school (3)
- opportunities for off-campus fun (1)
- acapella group (0)
Some takeaways
The financial package held a lot of weight for her as she was concerned about going into debt. She really, really wants to study abroad– even more so than she had thought. An acapella group is just a nice-to-have, not an essential. Off-campus fun doesn’t mean as much to her as opportunities to make friends on campus.
She can now use these criteria—weighted by importance—in order to decide between colleges. And if two schools come out basically the same even when compared, there’s always the coin flip test: toss a coin in the air, call it, and when it lands gauge your level of disappointment or excitement.
What are some choices the kids in your life are currently facing? How might you use this exercise to help them make decisions that are most in line with what they value?
Tweetable: Is your son or daughter processing an important decision? One mom shares a coaching exercise she used that helped her daughter choose which university to attend. Click to Tweet
Apr 23, 2018 | Nourishment
Decompress …. Have some fun teaching kids this all-important life skill.
1. Finger-counting breaths
“A do-anywhere exercise. Create gentle fists with your hands, and with each breath, unfurl a finger from your palm. For example, on your first exhale open your left thumb from your fist. Pause and enjoy an inhale. On your next exhale, unfurl your left index finger. Pause and enjoy an inhale. Continue until you have two open palms on your lap.” Jillian Pransky
2. Attitude-changing breaths
Change the exercise in #1 to include a word(s) as the child breaths and unfurls each finger— like peace, quiet, I’m safe, God is with me.
3. Nature walk
Get out of the house for a 15-minute walk with children. Add more calm by asking the kids to point out natural wonders as they walk.
4. 
Legs up the wall
Children find a space along the wall where they can lie down. Begin by sitting upright along the wall with one hip touching the wall and legs extended out in front of them, parallel to the wall. Slowly lie back onto the ground/floor as their torso moves to allow legs to swing up the wall with feet pressed flat into the air, as if they were standing on the ground. Close their eyes, breathe naturally and listen to their breathing. Hold for 5 minutes.
5. Shake It Off
Find a fast, upbeat song to play. Tell children that when they hear the music, they should shake their bodies (for 30 seconds) as much as possible—legs, arms, torso, feet, hands, everything! Tell children that when the music stops, they will clap their hands as loudly as possible, three times. On the third clap, they will leave their hands together and bring them to their heart, close their eyes, take three big inhales and exhales.
6. Pray
Choose a prayer and pray it slowly. Here’s a sample: Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4:8
Tweetable: Have some fun teaching children six exercises to decompress when they feel overwhelmed or stressed. Click to Tweet
Apr 9, 2018 | Attachment
“We don’t ask each other questions. Instead, we speak—sometimes tweet—statements at each other.”*
What response do we get when we assert our own ideas before we attempt to understand the other person? What tone does this set in our family relationships and in social settings? Can children show us a better way?
Reminder #1: Questions form a bond
Haven’t we all answered a 3-year-old’s question, only to be asked and answered again—and again—and again? Finally it dawns on us that the child is bonding with us. The give-and-take of her Q &A session produces dialogue and dialogue forms bonds.
Reminder #2: Questions lead to self-awareness
I find that the “Would you rather…” questions work best with most kids. I get blank stares with general questions. For example, “Would you rather take piano lessons or painting lessons?” works better than, “What kind of lessons do you want to take?” in finding out how we can develop their innate talents.
Reminder #3: Questions strengthen critical thinking skills
Ellen Galinsky, author of Mind in the Making, suggests these questions: “What ideas do you have?” and “What do you think is happening here?” Respect responses whether you view them as correct or not. You could say, “That is interesting. Tell me why you think that.” Use phrases like “I am interested to hear your thinking about this.” “How would you solve this problem?”
Ask God questions
Children relate well to God when they form an image of a personal God, one who loves them, cares about them and knows them by name. I like to say “Let’s ask God about that and see how God answers us.” I do this with confidence because years ago I added question-asking to my own relationship with God. I began to hear the world around me with new ears and to see my environment with new eyes.
Through nonverbal cues and just plain acting out, kids remind us to ask them questions and provide them with choices.
“It’s hard, because we live in a world that is perfectly comfortable with making statements. And perfectly uncomfortable asking questions.”– Douglas Estes, assistant professor at South University Columbia, SC
*Douglas Estes
Tweetable: Kids can keep us from working so hard to get our point across because they respond so positively when, instead, we ask questions and offer choices. A good practice with peers too. Click to Tweet
Mar 26, 2018 | Security
If children are hearing news reports of recent national and international events, some of them want to talk about feeling upset by the anger and tension they sense between opposing groups.
Pediatricians, child psychologists and others make available solid advice to guide us through these conversations. We offer additional ideas if you choose to bring in the moral dimension.
Sometimes groups of people are mad at each other because…
- They perceive that something is not right and, without moral concern, the world would be a dreadful place indeed.
- They perceive that nothing is being done about the wrong. An important purpose for anger is to motivate us to take constructive action.
- People are insensitive to their opinions and beliefs. Their most important opinions or beliefs are being shouted down or ignored. They’re afraid that harm is going to come to them and those they care about.
- They cannot make other people change and they feel like they don’t have the power, energy or force to produce any effect or change.
- What other reasons can you add to this list?
Know when to stand firm for your beliefs.
At times, people need to take a stand and do it publicly. They are ready to do this when they’ve learned how to remain composed when others do not share their convictions. Otherwise their public demonstrations can become belligerent and bitter and onlookers lose the message they intended to convey.
Being right can lead to being wrong.
It is possible to be so filled with good opinions that those opinions seem to justify unloving outbursts and actions. People become judgmental and rage, taking revenge, picking up weapons, or any other number of harmful acts.
Speak up with love
- Hold firmly to your convictions while refusing to enter a power struggle. True assertiveness is anchored in the positive message you want to communicate, not in what’s wrong with the other group’s viewpoint.
- Find balance when your anger is linked to a reasonable issue and you communicate it responsibly.
- Aha! Parenting reminds us that “In a democracy, through a long and respectable history of peaceful protest and civil disobedience, change was created in the face of entrenched power structures.”
Tweetable: Ideas for responding to kids who are unsettled by their perception that people are so mad at each other lately. Click to Tweet
