Everyday things; interesting things

We live in an everyday-thing world. People always have.

The only way to avoid the everyday world is to limit and control our children, to be separate from the world in ways that will keep our children from learning naturally about the things around them. . . . .

The more time parents spend with their children, doing interesting things together, the less they will worry about other things.

from Always Learning
photo by Sophie Larcher

More peaceful, more connected

A mom named Hannah wrote:

Unschooling has definitely changed my life for the better. Our family life is more peaceful and happy. I've stopped trying to control my husband (I had the best intentions at heart) and our marriage is more satisfying, we are much more connected and understanding of each other. I just let him be him and he lets me be me and we both work together for the good of the family.

—Hannah Brewin

SandraDodd.com/positivity
photo by Kelly Halldorson

Understanding wonderful things

One of the wonderful things about unschooling is that we come to understand that children are learning all the time. Knowing that, we can make thoughtful choices about how we'd like to influence that learning. We cannot control what is learned, but we can create an environment in which joyful learning can thrive.

—Karen James

SandraDodd.com/patience
photo by Sarah S.

Future memories

"Remind yourself that each moment we're creating memories. Think of those moments as photos in a photo album. We have no control over which pictures they'll keep. Ask yourself, 'Is this a moment I want my children to carry with them forever? Is this how I want them to remember me?'"

—Joyce Fetteroll

Techniques for Change, at Joyce's site
photo by Chrissy Florence
❖

Let him sleep

If a child is peacefully asleep and doesn't have to be somewhere at a certain time, let him sleep! If he stayed up late playing video games because it was the only time he could get a large block of uninterrupted access to the game, let him sleep as late as he needs to.

Going to sleep and waking up shouldn't be about the feeling of control the parent can gain from demanding and commanding.

from page 160 (or 178) of The Big Book of Unschooling
photo by Sandra Dodd

Connections and mysteries

You can see what is coming up, usually. Very often, you have a plan, and know where you're headed.

What comes next follows on what came before, but you won't get to write the script and control all the players.

Things happen, and schedules change. Keep your balance. If you keep your principles in mind, and at hand, decisions will be easier.

Real and good reasons
photo by Ester Siroky

Seasons, in and out

Seasons change, and yet it's the same old seasons, in the same old order.

People can change, but they're still people, who get excited about snow, and then frustrated with the same snow, and then tired of snow.

Snow is natural, and it's beautiful. It is natural for people to have short attention spans, to want to make things better, to see what could be, should be, might be, and to think about that instead of what *is*, in that moment. Accept that human nature, like snow, can be welcome, beautiful, irritating, and sometimes dangerous.

Be careful walking, and driving, and help others be safe.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Amy Milstein

Controversial topic

When a family stays together, and when the marriage is improved and solidified, it's not just good for the children. It's good for the grown children, and grandchildren. It's better for holidays and family events, for estate planning and inheritance. It's better for being able to leave photo albums out, and photos of children with their parents still out on the wall, without trying to revise history to keep from offending new wife, new husband, girlfriend, boyfriend. It's better for casual stories like "Remember when we went to White Sands?" It's less likely that a story will need to be abandoned midway or trailed away from because someone who was there, and fun, is now estranged from the family.

I didn't know, years ago, that unschooling could strengthen a marriage. I did know that a good marriage would strengthen unschooling.

---

SandraDodd.com/positivity
photo by a waiter, with my camera, 2011

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P.S. Why is that controversial?

I have been criticized, over the years, for encouraging people to be kind and compassionate to partners or spouses. I have also been thanked by people whose marriages became stronger because of those ideas, or by the use of unschooling principes in general.

Although I am sympathetic to people whose marriages have failed for reasons beyond their control, there are divorces that could have been avoided, and there are relationships still in the future that could benefit by being bathed in sweetness and patience, humor and positivity.

Discernment

Control implies one KNOWS the right answer and if he's not "out of control" or "lacking self control," there will be no choice; he will control himself.

Decision making requires lots of data and thought and freedom and discernment.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Holly Dodd

Over and over and often

You don't need to control yourself to keep yourself from being controlling. 🙂

Make generous, kind choices, over and over, as often as you can.

SandraDodd.com/battle
photo by Nina Haley

Be soft and grateful

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/
photos by Rosie Todd

Learning, not being taught

Weeding out terminology we would prefer not to mean improves thinking.
. . . .
Every time someone says "taught" or "teach" they can slip back into the whole school thing and be seeing the world through school-colored glasses. If they do what it takes, mentally and emotionally, to recast their reports and then their thoughts in terms of who *learned* something, then they can start to see the world in terms of learning.


The last holdout for some people is "he taught himself..." but maybe that should be the FIRST to go. Teaching comes from someone WITH skills or knowledge passing them on to those without them. If I taught myself to play guitar, I would have had to have known how first.
. . . .

I learned from everything around me, from trial and error, from watching others and asking questions.

The information was being sucked in by me, not pushed in by me or anyone else. I didn't PUT the information inside me, I drew it in.

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Sandra Dodd, of bricks with Florida on the other side
Learning not to teach

Arbitrary rules and limits

Arbitrary rules and limits have the characteristic that they entice kids to think about how they can get around them and can even entice kids to cheat and lie. I know a couple of really really great unschooled kids whose parents set limits on their computer use time. The kids used to get up in the middle of the night to use the computer while their parents were asleep. It is an unintended but very very predictable side effect of rules and limits that they always set parents and children up as adversaries (the parents are setting the rules and the children are being required to obey them &mash; these are adversarial positions) and can lead to kids feeling guilty and sneaky when they inevitably bend or even outright break the rules. Avoiding that kind of possibility is one really good reason for not having rules or limits at all.

Coercion creates resistance and reduces learning.

—Pam Sorooshian
(in an obscure discussion from 2004)

SandraDodd.com/control
photo by Chelsea Thurman Artisan
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Emotional well-being

Emotional health and emotional well-being are as important, if not more so, as physical health.

—Jenny Cyphers

Moving Toward Less Control, Concerning Food
photo by Janine Davies
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Much better

There are no "violent video games." Kids are sitting on a couch in their parents' home pushing buttons on a remote control. That's not hurting them or anyone else. (Or young adults are home sitting and pushing buttons, instead of being out drinking or vandalizing something.)

In every single case of real-life violence anyone can think of, wouldn't it have been better if the perpetrator had been home on the couch than out causing trouble? 🙂

SandraDodd.com/violence
photo by Sandra Dodd in 2012,
of a cool casual arrangement of stuff at Lisa Jonick's house

Learning to listen

Kids can't figure out anything if there's someone hovering and saying "Ooooh, good!" and "yuck, horrible."

If they're not allowed to decide which foods appeal to them, and what then those foods do to their body, then those children don't learn to listen to their own bodies. And it's likely that at some point they will learn NOT to listen to their moms. Then they will be eating things the mom disapproves of, and those might be things they never would even have chosen if their mom hadn't been sorting food into sin and virtue, poison and health, in extreme and sometimes arbitrary, faddish or political ways.

Though I left a few phrases out, the original is here:
food control (problems with that)
photo by Gail Higgins
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The joys that come

We can't control or contain the world, but we can appreciate the joys that come.

Gratitude
photo by Sandra Dodd

Natural growth

An apple seed grows an apple tree. No person ever born knows more about how an apple tree should naturally grow than that apple seed, if it's left to grow naturally.

I'm old enough now that I've grown trees from transplanted saplings, and from seeds I planted myself. I cannot predict or control or affect what kind of tree it will become. What I can do is make sure it's watered and protected from damage by animals, foot traffic, and lawn mowers. If it has what it needs, it will grow as it should.

If a child has what she needs, she will grow as she should. I know how to mess a kid up, and have chosen to try not to do those things. I'm trying to let them grow as they should.

SandraDodd.com/musicroom
(Follow-up page for a 2009 conference)
photo by Amber Ivey
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Moments of growth

Some moments seem more important than they are. Other moments are more important than they seem.

We can't guarantee or control much, in the world, so look for the good, and look for the growth.

A moment of peace and sweetness cannot be recreated. Perhaps new ones can be induced, though!

SandraDodd.com/gratitude
photo by Elaine Santana
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One more?

This is about love, and abundance, and trust-building. What would you pay, if you could buy love, abundance and trust?

If your kids ask for another one (potato, cookie, peanut butter sandwich) I think it's helpful if you just say "Sure!" and make another one, even if you don't think they'll finish it, even if you think they'll be too full or whatever. As long as they're not eating someone else's share (and even so, if the other person agrees), it's not a big deal. If they don't finish, save the leftover for someone else. If they do finish and they're "too full" that's how they'll learn their capacity (which will change anyway as they get older).


Moving Toward Less Control, Concerning Food
photo by Rachel Cooley Green
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