Which way?

Picture yourself at a familiar intersection of highways. Which is the best way to go?


People go all of those ways, or there wouldn't be roads. You've probably gone all of those ways yourself, many times. How did you decide?

I pictured the I-40/I-25 intersection, in Albuquerque. It's confusing from the air, so I chose another image, one in Georgia. Maybe someone reading this is in Georgia, and lives near the roads pictured above. But in my case, one goes toward the airport, south of town. One goes north to Santa Fe, and Española, where I grew up. One goes west toward the Rio Grande, and downtown. The other, though, the one that goes east, is the way to my house.

Picture yourself in a familiar situation with your family. Which is the best way to go?

It depends where you want to end up.

SandraDodd.com/choices

Boredom as an emotion

Another homeschooling mom once wrote, "It's a valuable lesson to learn to deal with boredom, just like all other emotions."

Until I read that, I hadn’t ever thought of boredom as an emotion. I liked the idea. When a child comes to me seeking advice on how to deal with any emotional state, I'm flattered and glad for the opportunity.


Sometimes the real message behind "I'm bored" is "I'm little and feeling agitated and vaguely unhappy and I don't know what I can do to get over this uncomfortable feeling. What would you do if you were my age, in this house, on a day like this?"

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The words above are straight from
"Bored No More", an article I wrote in 1998.
I just left out all the boring parts!

the photo is by Holly Dodd, of Jill Parmer

Time

When we "give someone our time," what is it we give? Sometimes attention, or service. Maybe assistance, or advice.

Instead of thinking that I "give" my child my time, it helps to think of us sharing a moment, together.


"'Being there for and with the family' seems so simple and yet many parents miss out on it without even leaving the house. Maybe it's because of English. Maybe we think we're "being there with our family" just because we can hear them in the other room. There is a special kind of 'being' and a thoughtful kind of 'with' that are necessary for unschooling and mindful parenting to work."

SandraDodd.com/being
photo by Holly Dodd

Empowering Others

Helping people learn to find their own answers is vastly superior to distributing answers on demand. . . .
Empowerment is a principle, not a rule. Learning to examine one's own life and needs and beliefs is necessary for unschooling to work.

These quotes were about unschoolers helping other unschoolers, but the ideas work with parents and children, too.
SandraDodd.com/rulebound

Younger Keith Dodd and his baby Kirby
photo by Sandra Dodd

Joy

Any tiny moment can be enjoyed: the feel of warm running water when you wash your hands; light and shadow on the floor; pictures in the clouds; the feel of an old book....

If you practice noticing and experiencing joy, if you take a second out of each hour to find joy, your life improves with each remembrance of your new primary goal. You don't need someone else to give you permission, or to decide whether or not what you thought gave you joy was an acceptable source of enjoyment.



SandraDodd.com/joy

Little Choices

We make choices ALL the time. Learning to make better ones in small little ways, immediate ways, makes life bigger and better. Choosing to be gentle with a child, and patient with ourselves, and generous in ways we think might not even show makes our children more gentle, patient and generous.


long-ago Sandra and Marty
SandraDodd.com/parentingpeacefully

An Abundance of Beauty

Helping children discover and appreciate art can be difficult when the parents' idea of art has to do with galleries and oil paintings from other centuries. School creates a limited view of art, and culture reinforces that.

There is no topic or subject or pursuit that doesn't connect to or consist of art. Here's a linguistic example: "Artificial" once meant magnificently lifelike or cunningly wrought. It wasn't an insult until fairly recently (in linguistic time, which is slower than human time, but not as slow as geological time). I find beauty in the forms and histories of words.

For flat art, you can look at paintings, photographs and graphics at art.com (and buy prints or posters if you want). For things for children to play with (children, teens or adults), there are many links here: SandraDodd.com/art (interactive online, or physical fun at home).

I hope readers will contribute to a list of places to look for art, or things to see as art. I will name five and give links. Please leave a blog comment, if you wish, and name as many or as few as you like, with or without links. If you want to create a clickable link, directions are here: SandraDodd.com/hotlink. I wrote them myself, so don't be afraid. It's pretty easy.

My five:

the dashboards of cars

water

snacks

holiday adornment

game boards

(the image above is an art card made and given to me by Erika Davis-Pitre)
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