Courage to be accommodating

IF an unschooling mom is letting her child play video games while she makes him food, and if someone else says "You're being a martyr," it doesn't mean she's being a martyr. It means the other person wants to control her. It means the other person (who is probably also a parent) wants her to be a little less accommodating, so as not to wreck the curve and make other parents look bad.

That's what I think. It's an idea I'm going to carry around a while and see whether it holds up.

SandraDodd.com/martyr
photo by Dan Vilter

Sitting, playing, learning

Playing a video game is not violent. Playing a game is sitting on a couch with a remote control.

Shaming a kid who wants to sit on the couch with a remote control, or somehow
preventing him from playing, is closer to violence than a kid causing the
character he's controlling to shoot an imaginary weapon at some pixels.

SandraDodd.com/violence
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Learning-and-living jobs

Some mainstream families press their teenaged children to get jobs, and shame them if they fail, while putting conditions on when and where they can work. The result is that getting a job was just one more "do what the parents make you do" situation, and the jobs aren't fun; they're an extension of school and of parental control.

When teens or young adults have chosen to have a job without desperation for money, and when they are accustomed to learning all the time and living joyfully, they are a different sort of employee.

SandraDodd.com/jobs/bigbook
gif by Holly Dodd

"Permissive"?

Someone asked, once:

How do you feel about the word "permissive" to describe unschooling and the lifestyle surrounding it? (I'm hearing this word a lot when trying to explain unschooling to family and friends...)

My response was:

"Permissive" is a term of insult used by and among people who feel the right and duty to control.

It was used by aristocrats of other aristocrats who were not reigning in their servants to the point that was recommended to keep them in line.

It's used by strict teachers who demand silence and obedience in the classroom, of other teachers who actually engage in dialog with their students, and unscripted dialog at that, which could lead anywhere, instead of just leading to the correct answers in the book, and preparing people for the test.

Don't look as "permissiveness" as though it exists in nature. See it as the pejorative term it is, and see the beliefs of the only people who can use it: controlling people trying to make others be as controlling as they are.

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There are some other ideas, too, at the link below, but I think the most valuable idea is to see choices rather than rules you're "permitting" people to ignore.

The original is here.
photo by Janine Davies

There was an improper word choice I've kept. A typo, more like. "Reigning" should've been "reining," but in the context in which I wrote it, long ago, I see why the error came and it makes some sense there. 🙂

Affecting emotions

A happy, good example

Deb Lewis, to a mom advocating limits and control:

If you have been fighting over chores it may be a long time before she feels like helping you. But for the rest of the time you have with her, you can be a good example of a person who happily takes care of her home and who respects and values her child above housework. That will have benefits for your child well beyond required chores.

—Deb Lewis

SandraDodd.com/deblewis/
photo by Sandra Dodd

Kindness and lightness and joy

It's very easy to control food when you have a home of young children. Most young children aren't going to question the choices you make regarding food, they will eat what they like of what you've offered. The really big challenge is when kids start asking for other things and how you choose to respond to those things.

This is a biggie and it applies to EVERYthing, not just food. Are you going to be a mom that reacts big and opinionated to these questions and inquiries and curiosities? Or are you going to be a mom who helps her kids explore their questions and inquiries and curiosities? This is the very basis on which parents build the foundation of unschooling, if that is indeed the goal.

In each moment of questioning, or inquiry, or curiosity, you get to choose how you respond. You can respond in such a way that a child's question, their learning, is honored, with kindness and lightness and joy, or you can shut that down with your own opinions and ideas. The more a parent can honor a child's curiosity, the more that child will genuinely listen to their parent's ideas about the world. It's the only way that I've seen that kids really truly are influenced by their parents. All other attempts are seen and felt as control, manipulation, coercion, unless of course you have a child that is VERY easy going. But trust me, there will come a time when even that child will challenge you, and the more easy going you've been about their ideas from the beginning, the more influence you will have when that time comes. . . . . Emotional health and emotional well-being are as important, if not more so, as physical health (from food, etc.).

—Jenny Cyphers

SandraDodd.com/eating/control
photo by Sarah S.

Calm and happy priorities

Deb Lewis wrote:

If you take care of your house happily, even if you don't ever make any real progress or feel it's getting really clean, if you look after things calmly and happily your kids will be more likely to participate in the process. If you're grumping around growling about things being out of control, how are they ever supposed to feel they could manage it? If you can't handle it, how could they?

My son doesn't have any chores but he helps if I ask for help and he does some things on his own just because his life is more convenient if he does so. I get up earlier than he does so I clean then. If he's busy with things and doesn't need me I do a little more then. In the evening if he's playing with his dad or watching TV and there is still something I didn't get to, I try to do it. Cleaning never comes before fun though, so lots of things wait until the next day.

—Deb Lewis
when her son was young

SandraDodd.com/chores/joy
photo by Tara Joe Farrell

Thought, power and freedom!

"Self control" is all tied up with being bad, and with failure. Choices, though, are wrapped in thought, power and freedom!

SandraDodd.com/self-regulation
photo by teenaged Holly Dodd,
of some of her shrinky-dink art
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The urge to control

If the "control force" is great with you, maybe use it to control your own clutter or organize your papers or rearrange your books or clothing. File your photos and negatives. Scan some stuff. Don't turn that awful control beam on people you love.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Sandra Dodd
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Less control, more learning

Some people homeschool because they think schools teach too much and aren't controlling the kids well enough. Some people homeschool because they think schools teach too little and control too much. I don't mind my kids learning things schools fear to teach, or having choices in their lives. Practicing on small things gave them knowledge and experience when they were old enough to practice on larger things. Some families homeschool to limit their children's access and freedom. For us, it's the opposite.

from the MomLogic interview
photo by Cathy Koetsier

Be sweet and soft

Once a mom came and said she was having a hard time being present with her children. She wrote:

I hate it, and feel like I'm missing out on so many sweet, little moments, but it is so hard for me to be fully present, almost like I can't control it.

I responded:

Well don't hate it. Hate's no good. And you can't "control it." It might be easier to see it as a series of choices, with lots of chances to zone out, and lots of opportunities to focus back in.

People zone in and out all the time. It's not a sin. Live lightly. That's good for your children, if you can come back as easily as you slipped momentarily away, and if you're not hardened with self-recrimination and hate.

SandraDodd.com/negativity

Be sweet and soft, for your children.

Now, 11 years later, I have a page called "positivity," though both pages are about making choices that take one incrementally toward the more positive.
SandraDodd.com/positivity
photo by Lydia Koltai

Being, in balance

Sandra, about Always Learning (the discussion list referenced):

I think finding balance is probably the hardest thing. It's easy to make an extreme caricature of "being an unschooler" rather than finding a way to live unschooling. Someone recently assured us she was "doing it," but having someone else say "that's it, you're balanced on that bicycle" is worthless if the bicycle falls over. There's doing, and there's being, and there's "it," and the reason this list exists and thrives is that those ideas (doing, being, "it") live in the realm of philosophy, of the examination of ideas, of the weeding out of error and fallacy.

Half of me says "bummer" and half of me says "cool!" and so at the balance point of those two, we continue to discuss unschooling.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Linda Wyatt

Relax inside yourself

Someone wrote once:

"I really have to be vigilant on myself and try not to control."

I was amused, but responded, in part:

Being "vigilant" sounds like absolutely exhausting effort. Relax. You do not "have to be vigilant." Especially not on yourself. That's you watching yourself. Way too much work. Let go of one of those selves. Relax inside the other one. Have a snooze. Don't be vigilant.

When you wake up, think. Am I glad to be here? Is this a good moment? If so, breathe and smile and touch your child gently. Be soft. Be grateful. Find abundance. Gently.

SandraDodd.com/battle/
photo by Denaire Nixon

Other possibilities

Being steeped in principles of peace, respect and strength has allowed me to learn that there are other possibilities. It's almost like recovering from addiction...addiction of the effects of control. Little by little, day by day, with a lot of (sometimes painful) awareness...slowly new peaceful joyful stuff replaces the old, sad stuff.

—Alex Arnott
(a.k.a. Alex Wildrising)

SandraDodd.com/recovery
photo by Brie Jontry

Dancing in the light

Joyce Fetteroll wrote:

I once described the difference between teaching and learning as where you shine the spotlight. In teaching, the spotlight is on the teacher. There may or may not be a learner taking in what the teacher is doing.

With learning, the spotlight is on the learner. The source is unimportant. There might be a teacher. There might be a set of blocks. There might just be the learner's thoughts.

If that's called "teaching" then it pulls the spotlight away from the learner. The light shines on the source as if it were the actor in the process.

I think parents like to feel like a child's learning is their project. If the teacher isn't in the spotlight, then something they aren't in control of or directing is happening.

—Joyce Fetteroll

SandraDodd.com/teaching
photo by Sandra Dodd (click it)

Trusting and close

The urge to control anything, whether it's food or learning or exactly how people sit or exactly what people wear, is bad for the relationship between the parent and the child. Anything that is bad for the relationship is bad for learning, because unschooling is built very largely on a trusting relationship and a close relationship.

Transcribed and saved by Amber Ivey, from UnschoolingSupport's podcast on Food
words by Sandra Dodd (thank you, Amber)
photo by Hinano (thank you, Hinano)
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When choices come easily

The idea of "self discipline" isn't as helpful to understanding unschooling as the idea of making mindful choices is. It's similar to the difference between teaching and learning.

SandraDodd.com/teaching/

SandraDodd.com/control

If you think of controlling yourself, and of your children controlling themselves, it's still about control. If people live by principles their choices come easily.

SandraDodd.com/self-regulation
photo by Roya Dedeaux

Control, more or less

"Unfortunately most people are convinced that when control fails it's because they didn't control enough."

—Joyce Fetteroll
(original)

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Roya Dedeaux

Peaceful choices

Schuyler Waynforth wrote some years ago:

It was hard not to turn to the quick solution that never solved anything and left everyone upset, me included, me, maybe the most. But it was amazing to have to expand into the vacuum left by not having that blunt tool in my toolbox. Both Simon and Linnaea grew to trust me. It took less time than I expected.
. . . .My raging, my approach to problems didn't help anything.

I can remember talking about it, thinking about it, it was like a switch I could feel turning. I went from calm and in control to *switch* furious in no time at all. And I couldn't figure out how to not turn the switch on, to make the switch a thoughtful process. When it flipped the other day I felt it go and I stepped away and I turned it off. Most days I stop long before the switch goes. The thoughtful process was recognizing the grumpiness earlier in the day. Feeling a shortness that isn't normally there and doing things to respond to that like going for a quick breath outside or having a chocolate milk or a chai latte or something else that just ups my energy budget a bit. Taking five minutes to close my eyes and be still helps, too. Whatever works for you to buffer yourself is good. Come up with lots of little things.

—Schuyler Waynforth

SandraDodd.com/parentingpeacefully
photo by Sandra Dodd
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