Do you wish the world were different for your child?
When it comes to schooling, the parents in this community are trying it all.
Many send their children to school. And of these, some love their school communities. And some really wish things happened differently at those schools.
Some unschool, others homeschool, many send their children to public schools, and others opt for private…
And as you can imagine, these choices are extremely dependent on each family's context, and involve factors such as...
How much control you have over your own schedule or not,
How much information you have regarding education, your local schools, how and why to implement alternatives to traditional schooling,
How abundant or scarce your financial, emotional and mental resources are. Or feel.
What I know to be true about most of the parents I work with, is that they wish that the world outside of their homes (including the school system) were more aligned with their values. With the principles of respectful parenting and healthy human relationships, for example.
These are values you are working hard to honor in your homes.
I get it.
I was recently blown away while volunteering at my daughter’s school recess, when a teacher approached a group of girls who were sitting and playing, and encouraged them to go be cheerleaders for the boys who were playing soccer.
Ugh.
In these moments,
Do I wish that children didn’t have to experience things like this in their schools? I most definitely do!
Do I wish that there was a way for families in my community to pool our resources together and facilitate a supportive learning environment for children of all ages? I certainly do.
Do I wish that I had the time and financial resources to lead this initiative (because usually, I am the type to say if it doesn’t exist, let’s make it happen!)? Yes, I do.
Do I wish that I was the only person calling the shots on how and where my daughter will go to school and the environments and information that she will be exposed to? Yes, a teeny part of me wishes I could control it all!
Because I know that the world outside my home is full of realities that go entirely against my values.
Like you, I work hard to cultivate a relational environment in my family, where love is abundant, where everyone is more than enough just being who they are, and where we know that even though at times there may not be enough access to a particular resource, this never means that any living being is less deserving of it, or inferior to anybody else.
When it comes to many, many things, such as…animals, diversity, beauty, gender roles, human relationships, money, material things, natural resources, sexuality and spirituality (to mention a few), my values differ vastly from the dominant narratives around these.
I cringe when, at our local “comedor” (a neighbor’s home patio where home cooked meals are served), there are two giant tv screens showing scantily-clad women, sexy-dancing next to male hosts in suits, on the 3pm afternoon talk show.
I don’t want my daughter to see these images and experience all of the insecurities that they can set off in young girls.
And let’s not even talk about social media.
But here’s the thing.
We don’t have to control it all in order to help our kids to navigate the world around them with a strong sense of self, belonging and solidarity.
We don’t have to pit them against the world, either. (World bad vs Us good)
We get to provide them with the one thing that can protect them from being overpowered by the narratives that tell them they are not good enough as they are. Loud and repetitive narratives that attribute their worth to their looks, their possessions, their achievements, etc.
This one thing will allow them to navigate this world, and keep their values in mind while seeing the humanity in others.
It will provide them with a place to come and say things like, “Mamma, my teacher didn’t help that kid when he said something unkind. She was unkind back to him. That’s not okay.”
So what is this one thing I am talking about?
Well, first let me say that it is NOT that we indoctrinate our children with our own values.
No, this thing is stronger than any form of indoctrination could ever be.
This one thing is relationship.
You see, when we cultivate connected relationship with our children, they bring us their observations, doubts and concerns about the world around them.
When we lead homes where grieving well is nurtured, our children know it’s okay to cry about the fact that animals suffered and died for their food (or someone else’s).
When we don’t avoid conflict and difficult conversations with our kids, and we are able to set sometimes uncomfortable, but necessary boundaries–they come to know that home is where they will be able to safely talk about what feels hard about the world. The things that confuse, scare or feel hurtful to them. Without shame.
I’m the daughter of Mexican immigrants, and grew up in a predominantly white, racist, conservative and wealthy area in Southern California. I can tell you that the most painful part of this experience, was not the fact that racism and classism were so prevalent. It was feeling like I was on my own with this reality.
You see, my parents loved me a lot. They were home most of the time. We were okay financially.
But in my home, hard conversations didn't happen. And I needed them to.
The moment I realized being Mexican was considered a bad thing by most of my friends, I needed to talk to someone about it. But I didn't know how.
Sometimes I wished I wasn’t Mexican, and at the same time, I felt so ashamed to feel that way. I needed a safe space to process this. But my parents didn't know how to create a space for processing such things in our home.
I didn’t know how to say that the way my friends’ parents talked about minorities made me afraid sometimes that something bad might happen to my dad who drove around in his truck as a gardener.
I was alone with these things.
My parents made a big effort to keep us tied to our Mexican culture. We spent a lot of time with our family in Mexico during the summers, and we loved it. We knew where we came from.
But we didn’t have the kind of relationships with each other that could sustain the messy feelings, the confusions, and the making sense of a reality around us that was often senseless and painful.
Over the years, parents have come to me with questions about how to teach their kids to value and respect themselves and others, no matter what the outside world says about them. They are concerned about things like race, class, gender, neurotype, disabilities, family histories. They worry about their kids having too much privilege, or too little, or both at the same time. Of course they worry. Because they care, and because all of these things matter, a lot.
And while providing a sense of pride in our family histories or unique qualities meets our need for belonging in very important ways, it simply is not enough.
The most important source of a true sense of worth and meaning, lies in our relationships with ourselves. Which is based on our early relationship with our parents.
And this relationship is what allows us to grow closer together through the challenges the world presents us with. It is where we process and heal. And where we show up with kindness, respect and boundaries. It is the base from which we venture into the world in ways that change it.
And this is why, this community is meant to support and honor, time and again, your commitment to your relationship with your child and yourself, and why the Healing Parents course includes modules like the “Systems and Values” call, where we talk about how to help our kids navigate the systems around them.
We all enjoy a certain amount of privilege and another amount of disadvantage, in a world that is incredibly inequitable and unfair.
We want to help our kids navigate these with a strong sense of self and respect for others.
And the good new is, that by building a solid relationship based on trust and our own healing, we all can.
And I’m here to support you through it.