Brain Fertilizer

I just started reading the book, Raising Kids Who Can Protect Themselves, by Debbie and Mike Gardner.

It is truly enjoyable to read a book that alters your attitudes and perceptions within the first few pages. I can't wait to keep reading through the whole book (although I lack much time to do so at the rate I wish). I may read it through a second time.

In some aspects, it didn't really change my philosophy of raising kids at all. Things like, "Reward the behavior you want to see"...

But the revelation for me was that they simplify safe and dangerous situations on the basis of behavior:

Everyone should be golden, i.e., nice, friendly, living by the golden rule.
But if someone makes you feel creepy and looks like they might invade your personal space, you have the right and the responsibility to get orange (agressive, or rude) with them: look them in the eye, tell them to leave, back away to increase your space. If the person presses the issue, they are now acting red (intending to hurt, angry), and you have the right and responsibility to act red to keep yourself safe: point your finger at them like a gun, use profanity, run. If that person tries to grab you, or silence you, or otherwise enters your personal space, you strike at their wind before they can grab yours.

See, my wife thinks I'm too naive and soft, and maybe she's right. I always want to be golden, and I want my children to be golden with people. And I think my wife is orange and red too often, too suspicious of anyone and everything.

I haven't known how to teach my kids to be kind and nice, but to stay safe, and I didn't want them to never trust anyone like my wife wants to. This book kind of shows me the way to teach my kids to act golden, but to listen to their instinct on when to act orange to keep themselves safe...and anyone, peer or adult, who acts red in the face of your child's self-preservation reaction of orange is probably intending harm, justifying your child to act red to keep themselves safe.

Okay, that's way simplistic. Go read the book.

However, the main thing I wanted to get at was they want you to teach your children to have the attitude: "No matter what happens, I have the ability to figure out a way to be okay." The alternative, they say, is actually telling your kids: "I don't trust you or your judgment." The point is to teach your children to act with courage, not with fear. If they do, they probably will be okay. They will react to adversity with strength and optimism. And that will lead to confidence that increases the chance for success and safety in everything.

I think you can probably see immediately that there is a socio-political lesson to be learned here.

There is a political party that says, "I don't trust you to make decisions for yourself. If we don't provide, you won't be okay." There is another political party that says, "I trust you to work through your problems. There may be discomforts, and you may fail, but I think you can succeed if you keep trying."

The attitude of the first party encourages weakness and dependence and unhappiness and fear. They think that pain/discomfort is to be avoided. They think that being in a bad situation means you will most likely remain in that bad situation unless you get help.

The attitude of the second party encourages strength, independence, optimism, self-confidence, happiness, and peace. They think that pain/discomfort is part of the learning process, and necessary signals to tell you when you are doing something wrong. They think that if you find yourself in a bad situation, at most you may need some advice to get out of it more smoothly, but most of the time getting help just prevents you from learning why you ended up there in the first place.

I tend to be an optimistic person, but I can tell you that there are some things that I was afraid of: a chemical attack that leaves you with a lifetime of aftereffects/damage. Paralysis. Scarring. Having one of my children be sexually abused or raped.

Of course, I still don't want any of those things to happen, but now I can see that all it takes is a tiny change of attitude to dispel the fear: "No matter what happens, I will figure out a way to be okay."

If my daughter gets pregnant, I don't want her to feel she has to hide it from me, or get an abortion. I want her to tell me: "Daddy, I will figure out a way to be okay." With that attitude, I will certainly help her to make sure there are no permanent crippling experiences. She might miss a senior prom, but her experiences as a teen, unwed mother would be different, not worse. If my son gets in a car accident because he was drag racing and loses an arm, I would want him to face life with courage and say, "I will figure out a way to be okay, Dad." That's taking responsibility for your actions and taking ownership of the situation you find yourself, whether it was your actions or someone else's that put you there.

There are many types of pain in the world. There are many ways to get hurt. Some pain is chronic, and it strikes people who we think don't deserve it. Other people live lives of privilege.

I've been told I'm privileged. And if someone looked at my current situation, that might be easy to assume. It would ignore the pain and difficulty and struggle I've already been through in life, and that I learned from it.

If at any point I had given up, I would never have made it here. If at any point my Mom had decided another pregnancy was too difficult, I wouldn't have ended up here to write this. Courage always wins, cowardice always loses. I want my children to face life with courage, not cowardice. I never want them to assume that the answer to a problem should be someone's death. I never want them to think that the best answer to difficulty is to end the pain, whether through chemicals, escape, or suicide.

This book is the first step of teaching them that. And I will.

I once worried a little bit about letting my son watch the Power Rangers, but went ahead with it, deciding that if there were any problems arising from it, I could notice it and take care of it if necessary. Now I can see that silly little karate show is going to be a big key to teaching my children to have courage in life. I have the key I need to unlock the chains that bind happiness.