The Path Less Taken

December 8, 2018 · 3:15 PM

A Plea To Parents This Holiday Season

Dear Parents,

As I write this, we are right in the middle of the holiday season. It is – or it should be – a festive time. A happy time. A time for loved ones and gifts and decadent meals. It’s a time for generosity of spirit, a time for setting aside differences and a time for holding out a hand to our neighbors.

It’s also a time of stress.

And listen. I’m a big girl. I can deal with stress. I don’t always deal with it well, mind you, but I deal with it, even during the holidays.

Kids though, kids are another thing entirely. Yes, they can handle stress. Some deal with way more stress than any kid (or adult!) should ever have to deal with. This much is sadly true. But how much harder it is for these young humans! Kids don’t have the life experience, the tools, or the maturity we have as adults. As parents, we can do our parts to lessen the stress our children feel, but this time of year there seems to be an overwhelming amount of added stress, doled out in generous measure by well-meaning parents.

This year, ~~I BEG YOU~~, respectfully ask you to take the following to heart when it comes to planning and navigating the holiday season with your kids:

Never tie gifts to behavior, or tell your kids that they won’t get any presents if they’re “naughty.” Don’t tell them that Santa is spying on them, or elves are spying on them, or creepy Santa cams are spying on them. Gifts should be just that: GIFTS. They should be given freely, with no strings and no expectations. Want your kids to grow up knowing how to give and receive gracefully? Show them what that looks like! If you’re giving a child a gift just because they behaved in a way you deemed appropriate, it is no longer a gift. It’s a transaction. Manipulating kids is not okay any time of year, but it’s especially not okay during the holidays, a time that is supposed to be about generosity and love… not about tricking our loved ones into doing what we want.

And while I’m on the subject of behavior…

The holidays are a great time to give your kids extra grace and understanding. Their schedules are all wacky, they’re going to parties and events, they’re likely not getting enough sleep, they’re eating all kinds of rich, sugary foods, and they’re excited one minute and cranky the next. Just like adults, all of the above is going to affect their mood, and thus their behavior. I used to work in retail, so I’m intimately familiar with how out-of-sorts the general public can get this time of year. Kids are no exception. The answer is not extra rules, punishments, or manipulations, but extra patience. Extra love. Extra deep breaths and extra hugs and extra reminders to ourselves that sometimes it’s hard to be a kid, and that it’s especially hard to be a kid during the maelstrom of holiday activity. Extend grace.

Never force your kids to hug, kiss, or otherwise show physical affection to someone else, whether it’s yourself, Uncle Tom, or great grandma. Most of us grew up with the refrain – or command – “Come give Grandma a kiss!”, and it seems innocuous enough at first glance. But if we want our kids to learn about bodily autonomy, it’s important that they know that they always have bodily autonomy, even if it’s Grandma. They get to decide who does and does not touch their bodies, and when, and how, and for what reason. This includes relatives at Christmas time. Your child doesn’t want to give Aunt Sally a hug? That’s okay. (It’s good actually, that they’re showing ownership of their body) Lightly tell Aunt Sally no thanks, and move on.

Finally, be extra respectful of your child with unique needs such as anxiety, sensory issues, or ADD. These make things like holiday gatherings ten times harder, and require mindful consideration. Don’t force or cajole when your child isn’t comfortable with something, and let them do what they need to do to keep their experience as pleasant as possible… whether that means leaving the room for some time alone, sitting quietly with mom, or re-centering with a book or a calming game on your phone. Be understanding of the fact that their experience of the holiday might not look like yours, and that’s okay. The goal isn’t to have a perfect holiday, but to have an enjoyable holiday, and that won’t happen – for anyone – if you’re trying to force something that just isn’t going to work. Having the day go according the “plan” is never, ever worth it if it makes your child miserable in the process. Listening, understanding, and respecting differences goes a long way towards ensuring that the holidays are as pleasant as possible for all involved.

I know it’s easy to get caught up in the holiday rush, to lose sight of what’s important, and to drag your kids kicking and screaming along for the ride. This year, I’m asking you to turn the holidays on their head. Change your focus and make your kids the priority. Treat them not the way you would like to be treated, but the way they would like to be treated (The Golden Rule 2.0)

Just be nice to your kids.

Please.

Love,

5 Comments

Filed under Christmas, gentle parenting, holidays, mindful parenting, parenting

November 28, 2018 · 12:13 PM

Gentle Parenting (When You Really Don’t Feel Like It)

It’s 27 days until Christmas. Maybe you’re starting to feel the stress of the holidays. Or maybe money’s tight. Maybe you’re not sleeping well. Maybe you’re dealing with health issues, or with the health issues of a loved one. Maybe you’re just plain TIRED, and when your 3 three year old has her seventh tantrum of the day, while you may want to respond with patience and understanding, your first knee-jerk thought might well be, “Are you freaking KIDDING ME??”

Now matter how committed you may be to parenting gently, and no matter how much you love your kids, you’re still a human, dealing with your own human emotions.

Here are a few things to help get you grounded again when you’re about to lose it.

1. Breathe. It’s said so often that it feels like its a cliche, but it’s not. Consciously stopping to breathe is the very best first line of defense against any emotionally charged situation, bar none. It sends oxygen to your body, calms your heart rate, lowers your blood pressure, and reduces the flight or fight response. Before you speak, before you do ANYTHING….. breathe. And then:

2. Slow down. I love this one because it seems so counter intuitive. When everything’s crazy, and you’re in a hurry, and you’re rushing around, and everything’s going wrong… slowing down seems like the least helpful thing you can do. But it’s essential to keeping your cool. Slow down, take a step a back, and regroup. You’ll be more productive, you’ll make less mistakes, and you’ll be much less likely to say things you’ll regret.

3. Focus on the current moment only. We are so, so good at stressing out about the past, and worrying about the future. So, so good! The problem is, it takes us out of the current moment, and makes it that much harder to respond with patience and calm. Breathe, slow down, and focus on making THIS moment a kind one. Just this one.

4. Put yourself in your child’s shoes. Empathy is one of the greatest tools we have when it comes to relating to other people, our children included. How is she feeling right now? What is he going through? It is HARD to be a toddler (and a preschooler and a middle-schooler and a teenager) It’s hard to be a human. Life can be frustrating. Remembering that your child is having a hard time with something goes a long way toward making it more about the person, and less about the behavior. It’s not personal. They’re not trying to annoy you. Rather, they’re trying to communicate in the only way they know how at the moment. Remember a time you felt the same way, and treat your child the way you wish you’d been treated. They need your compassion, not your anger.

5. Keep your perspective. AKA don’t sweat the small stuff (and it’s all small stuff.) In the moment, when big feelings are rampant, and people are triggered, and the situation is escalated, it often feels like the most catastrophic issue in the world. Except… it’s not. It’s not even close. In the grand scheme of things, this moment is but a little blip. Spilled milk, Sharpie on the wall, meltdowns over getting the wrong colored cup, sandwiches shoved in the DVD player…. I promise you it won’t matter later. It won’t. And nothing – seriously NOTHING – is more important than that little human standing before you, waiting to see how you’re going to react.

6. Apologize when it’s warranted. You’re going to have your not-so-gentle moments. That’s a given. Sometimes, even if you do everything “right”. Even if you breathe, and slow down, and take a step back, and empathize and keep your perspective… your frustration still comes out sideways, and you find yourself snapping or yelling, or otherwise responding in a way you regret. The positive part? Now you have an opportunity to model genuine remorse. Apologizing to your children shows them 1) That you, too, are human. 2) That it’s okay to mess up sometimes, and 3) The steps to take to make it right. And when apologies are freely and honestly given, forgiveness is a natural by-product. I can’t even think of a time when I’ve apologized to my kids and they haven’t graciously and authentically forgiven me.

The concepts of positive parenting are simple. Not always EASY, but simple. I think when it comes right down to it, the answer is that your kids want what all of us want. To be heard. To be seen. Forget the behavior for a second. Forget the frustration or the anger or the annoyance, and really SEE your child for the unique and complex and multifaceted perfectly imperfect human that they are. And then act accordingly.

I Wish That I Could Be Like The Cool Kids

Now that the song’s in your head…

I saw this meme come through my Facebook newsfeed this morning. What’s interesting is that I had to do a double-take. The person who posted it was someone who I indeed consider a “cool mom.” Someone funnier and smarter and more liked than myself. Someone who I could never fit in with, because I was too much of an outcast. Too boring. Too dorky. Too weird. Too…. something. Too anything.

I’m just not a cool kid.

I am the odd man out in every group I’m ever part of, even if it’s my own group!

I’ve done this thing. Every year, for the past five years, I’ve hosted a conference. Every year 300 to 400 people gather together to play, to learn about unschooling and gentle parenting, to make new friends, and to just generally enjoy each other’s company. Nothing ever makes me feel like less of a cool kid. There’s always at least one moment (usually there are several) where I stop and look around. I’m by myself, because I’m usually by myself. And I look around, look at all the happy socializing and I go:

Nope, wouldn’t fit in with that group.

Wouldn’t fit in with that group either.

That group wouldn’t even let me sit with them.

Wow, I’m the most lonely, uncool person at my own party.

And on the one hand, I’m okay with it. I am. I’m NOT like everyone else. I’m an awkward, dorky, unique little weirdo, and I like it that way. I like me. But, oh, on the other… what must it feel like to fit in, just once? To not be the outcast? To not be the black sheep? To not come from a social gathering berating myself for every awkward thing I said, or thought, or did, but instead feel…. confident, like I’d behaved like I actually belonged?

And then these memes come along, and my poor little outcast brain goes, “Wait. What? IT’S NOT JUST ME?!”

I think the cool kids are just a mirage.

We’re all a bunch of misfits. I think what we all have in common is that we all feel like the outcast, at least from time to time. We all suffer from impostor syndrome. We all have to fake it sometimes.

I mean, granted, some fake it better than others, but they fake it nonetheless.

And if I think about it, really stop and think about it, would I even WANT to be one of the cool kids? Well, no. Not if it meant compromising who I am. Not if it meant squeezing my square pegged self into a round shaped hole. Not if it meant doing or saying or going along with anything that wasn’t 100% authentically me.

All I can do is do me. And if I do happen to approach your group, know that it took a lot for me to do so. Know that my self-consciousness is second to none. And know that I really DO genuinely want to be your friend…. and that if you can handle someone who trips over air, awkwardly stumbles through long stories that have no point, and chokes on her own spit…. We’ll all get along just fine.

An Eye For An Eye Leaves The Whole World Blind

This video recently went viral. Now, I don’t know who Caidyn Bennett is, but this is an adorable child. Truly. Absolutely endearing. Sweet. Funny. Sassy. Everything I love.

Having said that….

Nooooo. No. No. No.

I think it’s telling that this is the second time in just a couple of weeks that I’ve felt compelled to write about bullying. Bullying is a BIG issue right now. And it’s not just in schools, either. We’ve got parents bullying kids, spouses bullying spouses, strangers bullying strangers. This is for real.

And honestly? I don’t know the answer. I don’t. I think like most things, it is multi-faceted, and needs to be looked at from lots of different angles.

I do believe… strongly, very very strongly… that it begins at home. That it begins with how we treat our children. How we treat others in the presence of our children. How we talk about others. How we talk to others. How we build each other up, instead of tearing them down. How we give our children a sense of pride, a sense of positive self-ownership, a sense of confidence, a sense of selflessness, a sense of kindness, a sense of humility …. so they won’t want to go bullying anyone in the first place.

What we don’t want to do is to teach them that might makes right.

Which brings me back to little Caidyn.

Caidyn says if little Johnny is going to punch him in the face, then little Johnny’s gonna “catch these hands. Cuz Johnny’s gonna learn to keep his hands to himself.”

So, Johnny’s going to learn to keep his hands to himself by getting punched by someone else who can’t keep his hands to himself? I don’t really expect someone this young to see the irony in these words, but as adults we certainly should. Hitting in response to hitting is the height of hypocrisy. (Much like spanking, but that’s another topic for another day) It escalates instead of deescalates. It sends the exact opposite message of the one you wanted to send: that hitting is wrong.

And make no mistake. I am not in any way suggesting that you should just sit back and let yourself be hit. But standing up for yourself, and yes, even defending yourself, does not need to involve hitting. In fact, if you’ve ever taken a self defense course, you would have learned that hitting is actually a last resort. You learn blocks, you learn holds, you learn defense. Hitting is what happens when you need to go on the OFFENCE, and it is not the answer for a one-off hit from a school yard bully. Without knowing any specifics, a simple and confident, “I don’t like that,” “That hurt”, or “I won’t let you hit me,” might be a good place to start.

So no, I haven’t taught my children to hit back. What I have taught them is that violence isn’t the answer (and that includes violent words as well). I’ve taught them to be kind, to show love for themselves and others, to live as peacefully as possible with the people around them. I feel like focusing on them, and focusing on what kind of people they are, will yield a much greater return on investment than making them practice their right hook.

And if they do ever find themselves on the receiving end of someone else’s anger? I hope they stand up for themselves. I hope they try to deescalate. I hope they start with words. I hope they remember that much like harsh words, a punch can never be redacted, and should never, ever, be used as a first resort.

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Filed under hot topics, parenting, Uncategorized

October 12, 2018 · 9:17 AM

BPD: Another Coming-Out Story

I first posted this over on my Patreon page, to see how it felt. I sat with a few days, and decided to post it here too.
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I first told my bipolar story two and a half years ago (it’s been two and a half years already!) You can read about it on my blog here. In a way, it was kind of anti-climatic. I’d known in my heart of hearts that it was bipolar for SO LONG before I had the official diagnosis. What I didn’t know, what I couldn’t know, was that it didn’t exist on its own. I didn’t know that even as I was getting better – and I was… the depression was getting shorter and less severe, and the mania was getting less, well, manic – I didn’t know that there was something else there. Something that was not getting better. Something that was in fact getting worse.

That something was Borderline Personality Disorder. Scary words, right? They’re right up there with Schizophrenia and Dissociate Identity Disorder (formerly Multiple Personality Disorder). And as an aside, you know what? People live productive lives with those disorders too.

But despite the weight of the words themselves, learning it was BPD was one of the most freeing, AHA, light bulb moments of my life. The more I researched, the more I went, “Ooooooooh.” It made sense. It made So. Much. Damn. Sense. I was reading about MYSELF. I wasn’t crazy. I wasn’t just “too sensitive”. I wasn’t failing at getting better at bipolar. My bipolar was actually under control. There was just this … thing. This thing that was still ruling my life. This thing that I had no idea had to handle. And it was destroying me.

The list of possible BPD symptoms is lengthy. In order to be diagnosed, you need to exhibit 5 of the 9 main criteria.

What follows are some of the bigger ones of which I am painfully and intimately familiar. These are the things that made me ask – even as I went through therapy (which turned out to be the wrong kind), and took my medication and did everything I was supposed to do – “What is WRONG with me? Is this supposed to be SO HARD?”

1) Fear of abandonment. Every relationship I’ve ever had, romantic or otherwise, has been marked with my severe, irrational fear that I am going to be abandoned. That I am eventually going to f**k it up. This fear made me clingy, paranoid, and overly attached. It’s made me pick fights so that there’d be some reason for them to eventually leave me, other than that I was just an inherently unlovable person.

2) Unstable relationships. This is kind of the hallmark of BPD. I am BAD at relationships. I get quickly attached, and quickly unattached. Like noted above, I have an intense fear of being abandoned. Even with this fear, I often have no problem walking away myself. I idealize someone one second, and then rapidly devalue them or get angry or hurt at the slightest infraction the next. I get irrationally paranoid. My feelings are hurt. Often. I worry that I’m hated, even by people who, in a lucid moment, I know love me. I worry that I said the wrong thing or did the wrong thing or thought the wrong thing. While lots of people can relate to some or even all of the above, I cannot overstate how extreme it is in BPD. It takes over. It rules my whole mind. I love hard. I feel hard. I hurt hard. My relationships are intense. Crazy intense. Fleeting. Unstable. I don’t know how to do relationships like “normal” people.

3) Impulsivity – Risky behavior, substance abuse, self-harm…. Check. Check. Check.

4) Emotional instability and inability to regulate emotions – This is the thing that tripped me up for a long time. I couldn’t understand why I was still having so many emotional problems even as we got my bipolar under control. Emotional instability is of course a symptom of bipolar as well (this seems a good a time as any to point out that they share a lot of symptoms, and they do often co-exist) but they’re different in the two. With bipolar, it’s like a roller coaster. Sort of swoopy, sometimes even predictable ups and downs that might span weeks or even months. With BPD it is a day to day, minute-to-minute dysfunction. I can be feeling on top of the world one moment, and then someone will say something that triggers me (I hate the word triggered, but regardless, it’s the right word), and I am sliding down a shame-filled, self-loathing spiral like none other. I hate myself, I hate the other person, I hate everything and everyone, with the fire of a thousand suns. And then I’m cool again. Over and over and over all day long. It is intense, scary, and more exhausting than words can possibly explain. It’s like it takes over, and I have no control over it.

5) Suicidality – Self-explanatory, and another one that’s shared with bipolar. Yes, I’ve been there. Boy howdy, have I been there.

6) Disturbance of self-image and self-concept – Anyone who’s read my blog for any length of time knows this about me. I struggle with this. A lot. A lot a lot.

In a nutshell, I think BPD is best described by the quote up above. I have no emotional skin. I have raw nerve endings all over my body, and everything hurts. Things that would just brush off most people’s backs are excruciating. Which is why, it never ever helps a person with BPD to be told that they’re just being too sensitive. I stand before you to tell you it actually makes it much, much worse. In fact, it probably needs to be said that in almost all cases of BPD, the person grew up in a home where their feelings were continually invalidated. And invalidation of my feelings, or feeling like I’m being talked down to in some way, has always been, and continues to be, my absolute biggest trigger into breakdown territory.

The good thing? I don’t tell you this to excuse poor behavior. I don’t tell you this to garner sympathy or to convince you you need to walk on eggshells around me. I mean, yes, it’s helpful for me if you understand a little bit about why I am the way I am, but make no mistake:

I’m working on it.

I’m learning how to handle my emotions. I’m learning how to have healthy relationships. I’m learning how to respond like a “normal” person. I’m working with my psych on symptom management. I’m practicing the principles of DBT (the gold standard of treatment for BPD)

I’m working on it.

My God, I am working on it.

And now I’m talking about it too, because it’s important. It’s important to put a face to these things. It’s important to fight the stigma, it’s important to encourage people to get help, it’s important to reach even ONE person who can say, “I’m not alone. And if she can do this, I can too.”

4 Comments

Filed under mental health, Uncategorized

September 20, 2018 · 4:25 PM

Bullying the Bully

via ABC News

bul·ly
ˈbo͝olē

noun
-a person who uses strength or power to harm or intimidate those who are weaker.
synonyms: persecutor, oppressor, tyrant, tormentor, intimidator;

verb
-use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants.

A few days ago, BuzzFeed ran an article about a mom’s “unique” parental move to punish her son. He’d been unkind to kids at school, so she made him wear a t-shirt that said, “I’m a bully”, both front and back.

(Unique, by the way, is in quotes because, Buzzfeed? This sort of public shaming is anything BUT unique. It’s – unfortunately – one of the most popular parenting trends out there, and one I’ve written about several times.)

Mom has, as expected, been widely praised for this decision, with few people failing to recognize its sad irony. The biggest problem with this type of parenting tactic (and make no mistake, there are plenty) is that it is teaching the child that it is okay to do the very thing you don’t want them to do! Read the definition of bully again. “A person who uses strength or power to harm or intimidate those who are weaker.” Or as a verb: “to use superior strength or influence to intimidate (someone), typically to force him or her to do what one wants.” This mom, by very definition, is bullying her son, for….. bullying. She is in essence telling him that it’s okay to use force, intimidation, and humiliation to make your point. She is telling him that it’s okay to negatively use your position of power and authority over someone to make them do what you want. She is telling him that it’s okay to throw a child’s mistakes in their face, chastise them for their bad decisions, and publicly shame them for their poor choice in judgment.

Is what the boy did wrong? Absolutely! But as the proverbial saying goes, two wrongs do not make a right. Mom’s bullying of the boy does not in any way absolve either one of them of their behavior.

I can’t pretend to know why this particular boy chose to bully. What I do know though, is that people have a tendency to act as well as they feel. There’s a reason why the expression, “Hurt people hurt people” is so often touted to explain poor behavior. Someone who is hurting, or feeling unloved, or unseen, or unappreciated, might lash out and hurt others. Someone who feels badly about themselves might look for flaws in others to make themselves feel better. Someone who feels weak might pick on someone who seems even weaker. Someone who’s bullied may very well turn around and bully others. People who are hurting inside hurt others. It is a sad truth, but it’s one that can’t be ignored.

And make no mistake, bullying should never, ever be excused. Unkindness of any sort should always be addressed, and discussed, and navigated together as parent and child. It’s a particularly … yucky (for lack of a better word) part of parenting, but it’s an important one nonetheless. In fact, just a few days ago, I had to help one of my children around a bullying situation – my child was on the receiving end – and I walked away with many feelings, one of which was gratitude at how it was handled by all parents involved.

Kids are still learning. Their brains are literally still forming. They’re human, and sometimes they mess up. Sometimes they mess up badly. And yes, sometimes they might be unkind. It’s not our job as parents to respond to unkindness with more unkindness! Our job is to set a boundary, yes, but to also offer unconditional love (which, in its absence, may be the very thing causing the bullying in the first place.) Our job is to show them how to treat others. Our job is to be the ultimate models of kindness to all people… starting with our own children.

And when your child IS the bully? It comes down to compassion, and understanding, and finding out the WHY. That “why” is so important! Behavior doesn’t exist in a vacuum. People aren’t unkind for no reason. If your child is a perpetrator, or for that matter a victim, of a bullying situation: look for the why, and then go from there. Responding to bullying with more bullying will only make the situation worse. Talk to your children, but even more importantly, listen. They’ll tell you what you need to know. Once you have a frame of reference, you can form a plan and move forward with a solution.

No shaming t-shirts necessary.

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Filed under gentle parenting, headlines, hot topics, parenting, Uncategorized

September 13, 2018 · 2:35 PM

I Take A Pill

Every day, I take a pill

Actually I take a few different pills, but for the sake of brevity….

I take a pill

The pill is not a happy pill, nor is it a magic pill

It’s not an “easy out”

It’s not a substitute for taking care of myself

Or for eating well, or getting enough rest, or getting out into the sun

It’s not (no matter how much others try to make you believe otherwise) a sign of my ignorance, or my lack of research

It’s not (no matter how much others try to make you believe otherwise) about blind faith in a flawed and corrupt system

Are pills over-prescribed? Yes

Do pills come with risks? Yes!

But still I take a pill

I take a pill because I value my life

I value the quality of my life

I take a pill because without it my life was the very last thing I valued

I take a pill because for some reason (or two reasons or a hundred reasons) my brain just doesn’t quite work like yours

And it’s okay! This weird, different, twisty brain of mine is okay

But not when it’s lying to me

Not when it’s telling me I’m not enough

Not worth the space I take up

Not when it’s overcome with darkness, or mania, or anxiety

So I take a pill

And the pill doesn’t fix me

But it allows me to fix myself

It allows me to function

It allows me to enjoy instead of just exist

It allows me to see colors where there was once only black and white

It allows me to move when I was once immobilized

I take a pill

I take a pill for me, but also for ALL the people who are shamed away from seeking help

Shamed away from saying it out loud

Shamed away from pills

Or doctors

Or therapists

Shamed away from putting a label on something that is NOT shameful or bad or ugly…. but just different

I take a pill because I need the help

I take a pill because all the fresh air and exercise and essential oils and kale in the world did not fix the broken

And I’ll say it again..

The pill doesn’t fix the broken either

But it allows me to fix the broken

It allows me to believe that the broken is fixable in the first place

It allows me to believe that the broken is WORTH fixing

So despite the voices

The voices from family, from friends, from strangers

Dear Lord the constant voices

The voices that yell DO NOT TAKE THE PILL

Every day, I take a pill

And every day I’m thankful for it.

There is no shame in doing what you need to do to stay well.

3 Comments

Filed under about me, anxiety, bipolar, depression, mania, mental health

September 7, 2018 · 6:19 PM

An Honest Day’s Work

Reality Check

There’s a new list (read: harsh edict) floating around Facebook, and it’s being touted as a “must-read” for every teacher and parent, particularly those of teenagers. While I’ll concede right up front that some of these are true, the entire list is steeped in negativity. It is cold and uncaring, and sounds as though it were written in anger. Honestly, lists like this kind of baffle me. I assume the goal is supposed to be to change one’s behavior…. but if life is really as terrible as this describes, what exactly would be the incentive to do so?

Here is the original list, along with my response:

1. You WILL NOT be rewarded for bad behavior.

You shouldn’t do anything, good or bad, for extrinsic rewards. Rather, I want you to do things because they align with your own sense of right or wrong, good or bad. While you may not be rewarded for certain decisions, you are a human and you are allowed to make mistakes. You will still be loved and accepted, unconditionally.

2. Being told “No” is a part of life. GET OVER IT.

Being told “no” is unfortunately a lesson that life will teach us all at some point or another. Life does this all on its own, so I will never manufacture a “no” for the sole purpose of driving the point home. Don’t ever let life’s “no’s” define you, either. Because you know what? Life will tell you “yes” sometimes too.

3. You are free to make your choice, you ARE NOT free of the consequences.

This is another one that life will in fact teach us on its own. Consequences for our actions are one of life’s big teachers, to be sure. Our job isn’t to be threatened by them, but to trust them, and to empower ourselves to learn from them.

4. Life IS NOT fair.

(This seems as good a time as any to point out that excessive use of caps and underlines doesn’t exactly command respect. Instead it conveys anger and insecurity)

Yes, sometimes life really doesn’t feel fair. And when that happens, it’s a time to be mad if you need to (you’re allowed to be mad!), regroup and move on. And when life isn’t fair for one of your friends or loved ones? Be their soft spot to land on, and their constant port in the ever changing world.

5. You are not the boss.

Not the boss of who? Yourself? Damn skippy you’re the boss!! Personal autonomy is one of the most important gifts we have in this life. You make your decisions. You forge your path. You choose what kind of person you will be. No matter what a day may be, it begins and ends with you being your own boss.

6. The world does not revolve around you.

The world doesn’t revolve around any of us. Or rather, the world revolves around all of us, working together…. which is never going to happen if we’re constantly shaming and demoralizing each other with angry “reality checks.”

7. Respect is EARNED, it is NOT just given.

I actually think it’s the opposite. I think respect should be the default. Respect should be given freely and without condition. People will show us if they don’t deserve it.

8. The world owes you NOTHING. Work for it.

Hard work is wonderful. So is being kind, to yourself and to others. So is acting with integrity, and decency, and self-respect. Who does or does not owe you anything is irrelevant.

9. Fits and tantrums will get you NOTHING. Stop wasting your time.

This made me chuckle a little bit in its irony. The entire tone of this original list is that of a tantrum. And I agree, in this particular case, that it gets you nothing.

10. You put yourself here. YOU need to fix YOU.

Not a one of us put ourselves here. Let’s just start there. To be blunt about it, we’re here because two people procreated. It’s our choice what we do with out lives to be sure, but it’s not our choice to be here. The onus on us is to live our best lives and be our best selves, not be so shouldered with so much guilt and unnecessary responsibility that we don’t even want to bother.

11. Shut your mouth, open your ears.

Here’s the thing. Even if I’d agreed with the entire list, you’d have lost me with this one. It’s unkind and unnecessary. We don’t influence behavior, win friends, or gain respect by telling people to “shut their mouths.” And on the contrary, lots of forward progress has been made in this country, and in this world, precisely because people did not shut their mouths.

Life has some harsh lessons sometimes, this much is true. But the answer is never, ever more harshness.

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Filed under gentle parenting, hot topics, life, lists, parenting

August 17, 2018 · 1:17 PM

Dear Trump Supporter: How Are You Still Defending The Indefensible?

source: Twitter

It’s 12:00 on a Friday, I have nowhere to be, and I’m laid up with a migraine. So naturally I’m passing the hours by thinking about…. Donald Trump.

In all fairness, I try not to talk or write about the president too often. It’s as frustrating as all hell, it’s not considered polite dinner conversation, and John Pavlovitz is doing an amazing job saying all the things I want to say in a more eloquent way than I could ever say them.

But this just needs to be asked, because I’m genuinely and deeply baffled.

How do you keep defending him?

It feels like that question should have been preceded with a nicety like, “With all due respect,” but I just couldn’t make myself do it. Because the thing is, I don’t respect a decision to support the president. I don’t. I know it’s not very PC to say that, and God knows I often talk about the importance of respect myself. But the fact is, while I respect a LOT of people and ideas and opinions that are different than my own, I just can’t respect unkindness.

Or misogyny.

Or bigotry.

Or arrogance.

Or name-calling.

I can’t respect a man who brags about sexual assault. I can’t respect a man who spends his days disgustingly disparaging everyone who disagrees with him on Twitter. I just can’t do it. And the thing I can’t stop thinking about, the thing I keep wondering, is: Do you, Trump supporter, respect those things? Are they okay with you? Do you find those traits to be admirable? Do you find this man to be someone to emulate?

Those (mostly) rhetorical questions are for all of you, but most especially for my fellow Christ-followers. Because I can not, not for the life of me, understand how someone who purportedly wants to live like Jesus lived, could defend and support a man who does everything but. Donald Trump is like the universe and God and the spaghetti monster all got their collective little heads together, and asked, “Okay, who can we think of that’s the LEAST Christ-like candidate out there?” And in walks Donald Trump. And they saw that they’d done their job, and they delivered him on a platter… and the people just ate him up. Lock, stock, and barrel.

And the rest of us stand with our mouths open, and say, “Wait. WHAT? What just happened?”

Because it makes absolutely no sense. It makes no sense how otherwise kind, compassionate, and reasonable people could buy what he was selling. It makes no sense how they could overlook what kind of person he is. What kind of person he continues to be. What kind of person he’s proud to be. Because make no mistake. Donald Trump isn’t just a regular flawed human being who’s made some errors in judgment but is doing his best to right his wrongs.

He’s a man who takes great pride in doing, and saying, horrible things. He’s not your savior. He’s the antithesis of a savior… a person who would not only let you drown, but laugh at you while he watches.

So again I have to ask, how can you keep defending him? Defending his actions? His words? His demeanor?

There’s a saying that goes, “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.” My friends, Donald Trump has shown you who he is. Not just once, but over and over again.

And I’m confused and I’m tired and I’m angry and I’m sad. I want to believe – I have to believe – that there is an explanation. I want to understand, but I’m afraid that there IS no understanding. There is simply no understanding the defense of a man like Donald Trump.

So I think my question is really this:

Do you truly not see the kind of person he is? Or do you simply not care? Because as far as I can tell, at this point in time, those are the only two possible explanations.