Wednesday, 23 January 2013

Post No. 426 - Busybodies, overparenting, the self limitation of self congratulation and guns & violence

When I was a teenager, our family used to go to a regatta every August, taking advantage if the cooler weather and lack of stingers (a local type of jellyfish, potentially fatal). It was located at a place in northern Queensland called Kurrimine Beach, a place that has been largely wiped out by Cyclone Larry, as I understand it. I have quite a few stories from there, some good, some like the one I want to talk about now which is when a woman, a complete stranger, tried to stop me going sailing one day. She knew nothing of sailing, nor of me, but out of her own fear of water and boats, decided she "should" step in and do something  thereby implying my parents were incompetent.

Something like this happened recently to a friend of mine who was teaching his son to ride a bicycle, and to build his confidence. The son had a minor tumble which my friend dealt with (resilience comes from overcoming problems, and that is the truest of confidences), only to have a woman come up and try to impose her parenting style on the situation, and by repeatedly ask if my friend's son was "really" OK, almost made a non-event into a problem. This sort of interfering moron, and the assumptions behind it, are why the attitude "it takes a village to raise a child" is inanity in extremis.

Going back to the interfering bitc-er, busybody at Kurrimine, I actually had to threaten the woman with the police before she would back off.

This sort of busybody shoving their beak into other people's affairs is a far too common problem in life. (Ironically, there are times when it is necessary - for instance, in the case of children who are genuinely being abused - which does include a simple difference of parenting style.) It happens, for instance, with wills, which is where I started working on this brief post, when talking about this with a niece. Legally, wills must comply with laws (so no, say, funding of illegal groups) and make proper plans for support of dependents, which EXCLUDES most adult children (some may require care), but otherwise it is up to you. People who challenge wills when they aren't dependent (e.g. people who are adults, or are offended because the money went to the person's cats) have, as far as I am concerned, no leg to stand on. Be adults - real adults! PLAN to stand on your own two feet instead of seeking to win or inherit money! It is sad if lots of money goes to cats instead of to those who have a need for it (which may well be charities rather than adult children), but families - particularly children - do NOT have rights beyond being raised. If you are surprised when someone you know does something like this, then maybe you didn't know them as much as you thought - and if you are fighting their clearly expressed wishes, you certainly give up ALL rights to ever claim that you loved the person.

That's a good lead into the next topic I wish to touch on: overparenting. My thoughts on this were stimulated by the following articles:
"Time to cut the cord", 20th January, 2013: http://www.theage.com.au/national/time-to-cut-the-cord-20130119-2d00u.html;
and, on a good note:
"Raising kids for free: why I won't be spending money on my son in 2013", 16th January, 2013: http://www.theage.com.au/lifestyle/life/raising-kids-for-free-why-i-wont-be-spending-money-on-my-son-in-2013-20130116-2cs9a.html;

Overparenting is a problem - not only when raising your own kids, but even more so if you start interfering unreasonably in other kids' raising, as happened to my friend, and doubly so if you fail to let go when they move out. This was one of the few things I liked about Eckhart Tolle's book "A New Earth" that I (partially) reviewed recently (see http://gnwmythr.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/carren-smith-eckhardt-tolle-and-other.html), the description of parenting as a function, rather than an identity, for the purpose of being able to move on from that, just as we ultimately move on from ALL roes or functions that we take on. If you fail to do so, you are FAILING at being a parent, and are contravening the principle that Kahlil Gibran expressed so beautifully in

"Your children are not your children. ... They come through you but ... they belong not to you ... for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow".

There are other problems in the world of course, and another one I wish to touch upon is the self limitation of self congratulation. There is a stereotype (these days, as limited as any other stereotype - outside of the US military, at any rate) of the drill instructor browbeating recruits to the army. There is a point to learning about drill in the army, and it is actually about saving lives, but I wouldn't expect anyone without some contact with the military to understand that, and it is of little relevance to this point. The relevant point is, people are pushed, and as a result, they may well find themselves able to do more than they dreamed of (provided the style of pushing matches their personality - in some cases it is counterproductive, and that includes situations OUTSIDE of the military). More generally, if you stop to celebrate or acknowledge every little thing, you risk failing to achieve all that you can, and that being all you can be is a vital, often unacknowledged part of spirituality and growth. As an analogy, if you're moving house, and stop to admire how every box has been packed, maybe gathering friends to celebrate each box, you may find yourself thrown out onto the street because the notice you gave has expired and you didn't finish packing. We can limit our achievement by being too kind on ourselves, by not pushing ourselves enough, or by not being objective.

Finally, my last "other" problem I wish to touch upon is that of guns and violence. I recently heard of moronic claims that hammers kill more than guns. This is complete and utter RUBBISH!. See Snopes at http://www.snopes.com/politics/guns/baseballbats.asp.

While you're at it, have a read of this article, from someone I knew of and respected before he was elected to Parliament:
On violence generally, this article posits that rates of violence could be due to lead poisoning. I need to think about this and see more evidence before I am convinced this is as influential as the article suggests  and, even if it is the case, there are lots of other issues to consider (such as overcrowding in cities, personal behaviour, attitudes, ways of dealing with conflict, etc, etc, etc):

As always, keep your thinkng caps on, and make up your own minds. 

[1] BPF = Balanced Positive (spiritual) Forces. See here and here for more on this.

[2] Please see my post "The Death of Wikipedia" for the reasons I now recommend caution when using Wikipedia. 

Love, light, hugs and blessings


Gnwmythr
(pronounced "new-MYTH-ear")
My "blogiography" is here. I started this blog to cover karmic regression-rescue (see here and here), and it grew ...
May the world of commerce and business be recognised to be a servant, not a master, of the lives of people.
A home is for living in, not feeling, becoming or being rich or a “better” class than others.
The International Labour Organisation's definition of "full employment" is wrong, useless and misleading.
Armageddon is alive and well and happening right now: it is a battle between the indolence of "I only ..." and/or "I just ..." on one side, and perspicacity on the other.
Like fire to the physical, emotions to the soul make a good servant, and a bad master. Spiritual love is far more than just an emotion - it is a concept, thoughts, actions and a way of living.
The only prejudice should be against prejudice. 
"Do not pray for easy lives. Pray to be stronger [people]." JOHN F. KENNEDY 
One size does NOT fit all ... and don't throw the baby out with the bathwater as a result of knowing a little ... 

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good [people] to do nothing. (based on writing by) EDMUND BURKE

Your children are not your children. ... They come through you but ... they belong not to you ... for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow KAHLIL GIBRAN

We didn't inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we only borrowed it from our children ANTOINE DE SAINT-EXUPÉRY

Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR.

Those whom we cannot stand are usually those who we cannot understand P.K.SHAW

Tags: attitudes, children, family, interference, parenting, personal responsibility, perspective, society, violence,

First published: Wodansdagr, 23rd January, 2013

Last edited: Wednesday, 23rd January, 2013
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