Instead of asking: “What’s wrong with him or her?” Ask, “What happened to him or her?” This will help you guide and have a better relationship with the children and grown ups in your life.
In a society that is in a rush to label, diagnose fix and break, be the exact opposite, be the one who slows down to notice, show compassion and listen. Just be there through the tears, through the ups and the downs. Notice and be present. Love.
We are society and we can in fact, choose love, consistency and conversations where we listen more and talk less. Slow down, listen to what children are showing and sharing. You will find out exactly what they need, don’t need and in return what you need and what you don’t need.
Slow down. Turtles have a lot to teach us in this way. Not the ninja turtles but the ones who hold up traffic as they cross the street. Taking their time. One turtle paw at a time. One paw in front of the other. There are times to be a cheetah and there are times to be a turtle. Choose wisely.
Let’s talk. Wealth. Rich and Poor. While we teach our children to value what is inside of themselves: the who of what they are. Their being. Their essence. Others from outside will influence them or try to belittle them or what they care about at times, without even knowing it themselves. It tugs at their heart and their soul. Ours, too, just a little bit until we get the jolt back into what matters most. People. Relationships. Experiences. Memories. Time. Talent. Treasure.
Our son asked, “Hey mom, is my jacket expensive?” Quite frankly, it doesn’t even matter. These things, no matter the cost won’t matter in the next five minutes or even in the next five years. If it won’t matter in the next minutes, months or even years: who cares. It’s not the jacket but the memories we make in it that truly matter. While most of society will try to convince you that your worth is determined by what you have on, in real real reality, it doesn’t. What your life depends on is who you are, who you surround yourself with and what you care about. So, take care of yourself, others and your surroundings/your space then it ripples outward and onward changing lives for the better.
So, how much does your life cost? How much value and worth? Are you living poor in mindset? Have the courage to change it before it’s far too late. Don’t live for a too die for house. Don’t live for a too die for car.
Live for a too die for life.
Collect memories. Not things. Collect the times. Spend time well. Treasure it. We all have time, talent and treasure. It is how you define it. No one else. Love life. Live it well. Make it a life well spent. Spend life well. The currency is always strong when passionately and poetically lived.
“One can only travel the long way into the heart of another: the slow work of finding common ground, the careful discernment of grounds of admiration, the disciplines of kindness, encouragement, silence, and restraint. It takes a deliberate choice, renewed regularly, to love every human being one encounters.” (Zena Hitz)
If it’s worth it, it will not be easy… something like that Bob Marley said. A monk was also quoted previously in response to this question:
“What’s the hardest part about being a monk?” He said, “Other monks”.
What’s the hardest part about life and love?
Other people.
Isn’t that funny? Other people. We do not have control. We have control only over oneself. Only of ourselves and how we respond or how we do not respond to others.
They say the highest form of flattery is gossip. If you find yourself trembling off the lips of another it’s truly none of your business. Monks do not talk much as it’s well known. There is a reason for that. Self-discipline and restraint. Choose not to judge and just respect the journey we are all walking.
Loving, guiding, whispering, petals of a flower as delicate as the work of our hands whether they are rough or smooth. Show your hands and it will show me your work.
Follow the palmar flexion creases on your hands. Your hands are your life’s and love’s work.
What you choose to do with your hands is your life’s work.
If you wreak havoc and chaos. If you choose to hit and harm, it is never, ever forgotten and permanently stored somehow, someway into the deep recesses of one’s mind. Memories are stored deep and remembered. Never forgotten. We all are patients of our own memories. Choose to love and be gentle even if someone sees it as a weakness. Because, in fact, it is strength. Gentleness is strength. If someone hurt you, you forgive them but move on. You do not have to forget. Lessons are in it. You learn what not to accept. You learn what not to do. You learn the lessons life dishes out and deals. You remember, forgive and you move on. Let it move you to dance. To sing. To read. To draw. To write. To paint. To act. To create.Scream love.
…remember while it’s a long way into someone else heart, it’s also a long way into your own heart. It is a deliberate choice to love yourself just the way you are.
It all starts at the foundation. What I like to call The Floor.
Has anyone ever experienced McDonald’s floors? You need slip resistant shoes for them. But there is always the possibility to still slip and fall. Like life. Then, you get back up. Learn the lessons. Notice the patterns. Keep moving, ebbing and flowing like the ocean. Always in a process of becoming.
Those that lie with dogs rise with fleas. Yes and no.
You do become like the people you surround yourself with.
I have been fortunate enough to be surrounded by the go getters, the people who get stuff done for their business, families, friends and for their soul.
They inspire me each and every day. I am humbled by the magnitude of their strength and their soul. We are a soul family. For real.
They didn’t choose to listen to dogma, complain or even echo the cliche: “whoa is me“, or even list their sacrifices and grievances, instead they did something about it. The trials and tribulations they took as learning lessons and stepping stones leading up to their greatness way of a whole being. in the making.
I bear witness. A dear friend turns and flips homes into Schools of Love helping to put the generational fire of addiction to ash for good. It starts with our youth. It starts with love.
Or another dear friend and soul sister who dared to open up her own school and name it after her grandmother, someone who had impacted and imprinted her childhood in a profound and endearing way. Legacy living on and on.
Another one, who from the moment I stepped foot into a classroom made me fall in love with Early Childhood Education. She had me notice the little things. It all started at a hug. A hug and a hello. She sees the humanity and the importance of relationships. That’s what it all comes down to. Love. Love. Love. Light, coupled by care and then, like alchemic magic, the rest handles itself.
Sometimes people don’t see their own value and their own worth. Another dear one, made me see my worth and negotiate to get what I deserve and continues to negotiate on the behalf of others.
Our students and children also have dreams and struggle with worth, self-efficacy and self-fulfilling prophecies. Sometimes they need a gentle or even loud reminder. A soft push to see the power in themselves. We are always in a process of becoming. Our process never ever ends even in the so-called death and dying part of it.
Another dear human who founded and runs an organization chose to empower her community and generations to follow. Breaking and dismantling poverty during and after war.
Then I met another remarkable person who on a soul level I knew she was changing lives. Discovery Center. Check it out.
I have bore witness to great ones who don’t step on the giants or on the shoes of others but walks like one in their own soles for their soul. No one likes to be stepped on. Ask ants. It messes up their whole flow.
They walk like giants.
They deeply inspired me to dig a little deeper and dance my own dance.
For real life, we’re all here walking and dancing each other home. Thank you for taking my hand everyone and dancing, singing, our ways home all while screaming love.
That’s the thing we have to keep shouting. Love. In the words of a dear one: L O V E. Wins. Every. Single. Time.
“If you can’t run, walk. If you can’t walk, crawl.” — MLK
If you can’t crawl, roll. If you can’t roll then get that tummy time in. This is the story of the stages of development and how children need caring grown ups to nurture our babies so they grow into their fullest potential. This is what to expect when you’re expecting. This is how we care for and nurture children after their basic needs of nutrition, toileting and shelter have been met. Early childhood development is impacted heavily by the mental health of the people who care for them even while they are in the womb. Care is solely based on three actions caring grown ups give: love, safety and consistency. During the early years of life, the brain is constantly and consistently growing and care should coincide with that growth. Grown ups have a mission to foster security, love and safety starting at birth which leads to toddlers establishing a strong sense of self and self-worth. Children not only want safety, love and consistency but they also need it.
Being able to build and sustain healthy relationships to consistently meet children where they are in order to secure a healthy attachment depends on the wholeness of the grown up who is caring for children. Are those who are caring for children well and healthy? A great question for grown ups to ask themselves is: “How am I feeling?” “What can I do about?”
In reality, a “healthy head start” is not always an option for babies. This is where early intervention comes in as a plan b if the family unit is broken. Early intervention such as head start, home cares and preschool improves the outlook and success of children growing into healthy and thriving adults. Caring grown ups help build a strong foundation also known as the brain. It also aids in breaking a family generational cycle of poverty. Need support?
Here are some resources and ways to support infants and toddlers in the first three years of life:
“I know what I want to do, and it makes sense to get going”. — Warren Buffet
Children know who they are and what they love to do from an early age. Families, educators and the community also discover what children are passionate about especially by paying close attention while being astute observers. When children arrive at school they get going in on the things they care about all while living out the mantra: being in the present moment. Something most of us could learn a lot from. While being in the present an idea enters the brain also know as a spark of joy that sends signals as what we’re supposed to be doing. An idea.
I had a student who had an idea. He started building a truck. More specifically, a cement mixer. In fact, he loved trucks. All kinds of trucks. His family was worried as he seemed obsessed with trucks and he didn’t like books so much. I mentioned that they just may have a builder on their hands. He gets distracted by what he cares about most because when there was a book about trucks he would study it research like and consumed by it ranging from non-fiction to Goodnight, Goodnight, Construction Site. When asked what he wanted to be when he grew up, he said a garbage truck so he could keep Earth clean. When we went to the library on Wednesdays for story time, instead of listening to the story he would instead gravitate towards the window to watch the construction workers work. He would be engrossed by the construction site across the street and name every single truck as well as what they were doing. I mentioned it to the storyteller and she prepared stories the following week in honor of my student and the site across the street. We also met the team who were building. My student’s eyes lit up and stood in awe as the team described what they were working on. He asked the most questions and even got to sit in the cement mixer he saw each Wednesday, the exact truck he was building. This came full circle and his family beams with pride as their son is an expert in building and mechanics. He drew and from what I see online still draws blueprints, creates and builds.
Our ideas are unique to only us. No one else dreams the dreams we dream. It is vital to fulfill our mission. When a child is doing something they love they don’t have to be told or rewarded to do it. Even when they grow up it is the same as they do something they love. They do it because they want to be there. They do what they love and care about. That is the greatest gift. Are you honoring your child and your own inner child?
This is where intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation comes in.
Children are intrinsically motivated to do the things they love to do. They don’t need awards or even praise. They just do. They get going.
So what is it that your child wants to get going on? How about you? Just do it.
It was raining as I stood on our front porch screwing in our registered charter number onto our Little Free Library. A beautiful sign. When the rain went to a drizzle, I carried it outside towards a tree closer to the road where people could discover a book and share a treasured one of their own.
We decided to open one up in honor of children and families who are in a crisis.
Our message is simple, do something good no matter how big or small, for someone else.
Books connect us, inspire us, help us to process, imagine and open another door to see the world through another lens. A single book has the potential to heal us and to connect us. We are all have the potential to feel and become better because of a single book.
Anything is possible, hope you join our movement by leaving a treasured book for someone else and take one for yourself or pass it along to someone else. Or open one up in your neighborhood.
A cardinal flies by. Bright ruby red. Butterflies and hummingbirds dance across the sky right before my eyes. Morning doves sing. A quarter on the ground dated 1986. Changed by so many hands. Possibly fell off of an angel’s wings in the path I was meant to stumble upon it. I stand and walk among giants as none of us is as small as we think we are. A paradox of our times. Looking out a plane window, you would think and see just how small and potentially insignificant we really aren’t. Nothing is as it seems. Littles things are big things. Just watch and study ants at work.
Looking out a plane window, you would think and see just how small and potentially insignificant we really aren’t. Nothing is as it seems. Littles things are big things. Just watch and study ants at work.
Life all around us and beyond us. Beautiful, daring and fleeting life. Life in a single blade of grass life. Life in a single fingerprint life. Life in a single sip of coffee life. Life lies even in a pesky and stubborn weed in the garden that keeps reemerging life. It hurts to tug it out of the ground. Everything wants to live. We want to live another day. Another minute.
We emerge no matter the challenge or obstacle in the words of Tupac Shakur even from concrete. We breakthrough like the stars emerging from stardust life that we innately are. Where do we go after life? That question follows me each and everywhere I turn. Where do we go? Will we see each other again?
Life is found in a single minute. One single minute matters more than you think. I stare at the sky throughout the day just to stare at it no need to have a reason. The stars. The constellations. Connecting the dots to what all of this really means. We’re all deeply connected like an infinite constellation more than anyone could possibly ever realize or conceptualize.
From the Playground 