Releasing My Expectations

 

These are the Minecraft figures we eventually built!

Have you ever had one of those days or moments where you think you know where things are going and then they just go completely sideways?

One day last week, I asked Z what he wanted to do for our morning time together. I gave him some options and he came up with his own idea – build Minecraft figures out of sculpey. WOW! His own idea and it was to make something!

While he was playing I got all of the materials out and ready – I even had a neat idea to use wood building blocks and hot glue to make the figures.

Before the conversation about building Minecraft figures, we had been exploring a book on Lord of the Rings, which was clearly enthralling for him. He told me he needed to go play Lego for a while (likely because he had some great new ideas for play from the book).

I called him, said I was ready to make the Minecraft figures.

He didn’t come down. Said he needed more time. I waited, sat there, waiting.

He still didn’t come down.

So I felt inspired to start and do some exploring without him. I thought it would be helpful for him to see what the possibilities were. So there I was, alone, gluing and painting and reading about Mine Craft figures. Fun.

Finally, I decided to grab my project journal and go up and sit with him. I plopped down on his carpet and was immediately transported into his remarkable world of creativity.

He was building armies, checking to make sure the teams were evenly matched, he had a king and had built amazing weapons and armour for each of them…all out of Lego. I turned on my voice recorder on my phone to capture his storytelling, wrote in my project journal and grabbed my camera.

I offered open ended questions – what are they battling over? who’s winning? – which seemed to expand his play and help to evolve the story a little. But mostly I observed and took photos.

I then printed the photos and summarized the story into a comic book for him. My intention was to allow him to witness his own creativity and for him to see another form of expression that is available to him.

I was pretty proud of my effort. I was proud that I let go of needing to do the Mine Craft making.

If I hadn’t let go, I would have missed out on this amazing story and scene he had created.

I was so excited to give him this comic book the next day!

This is the comic book that documents the story he created with photos from his Lego creations. 

 

And….. he wasn’t interested in it at all.

I guess that’s just another reminder to let go of my expectations. I made it for him because I was excited to, but I’m only hurting myself if I hold onto the expectation that he must be appreciative and love it just because I wanted him to.

Getting Clear on My Intentions, And Aligning My Actions

I had the urge to paint. But I also had a desire for Z to paint with me. Instead of being clear on that, I tried to pretend it was really only about me painting and was left feeling rejected when he didn’t join me.

I’ve noticed some interesting things about doing only what makes me happy. It feels self-indulgent to even talk about doing this kind of experiment. However, when I did it I noticed that what I wanted to do was more often than not things with Z. I wanted to play chess with him, I wanted to paint with him, I wanted to attempt a difficult lego build. So weird. I expected it to be a series of things that I wanted for myself alone.

Even stranger, I noticed I wanted to clean the bathroom! Cleaning is a dreaded thing for me and something I avoid. Now I’m thinking that’s just because I tell myself I “should” do it.

As I write this, I think – anyone that reads this must think I’m nuts. Just do the cleaning already, its part of life! I am a procrastinator. I don’t want to deal with the things that to me are unimportant. And generally speaking I would much rather think about things than do things. So this felt big for me.

Most interesting of all, I’ve noticed another projection.

As the week went on, I noticed that I became less enthused about doing what makes me happy and more fearful of the open expanse of the day ahead. “What if Z doesn’t know what to do with himself?” And that quickly morphed into “He can’t initiate anything, he never wants to do anything but videogames and Lego, he doesn’t want to do things”.

This came to a head Friday morning when the activity that surfaced for me as the next thing I wanted to do was chess. I casually set the chess set out and sat myself at the table.  I invited him. He resisted and chose to read a superhero book. Well, this apparent rejection set me off.

I spiraled into a state of anger at the unfairness of our situation, intense frustration with Z and (thankfully) took myself down to my yoga mat to have a much needed breather.

After lying there with smoke billowing from my ears for 5 minutes, I calmed down and had a realization. I thought back about the morning events and reflected on the feelings in my belly before my meltdown. The epiphany was that it was actually ME that didn’t know what to do – not Z!

This may not sound like an epiphany. But as a parent with a child on the spectrum that has resisted doing things outside their narrow preferred topics with them for years, the realization that it might actually be me that has the problem was somewhat earth shattering. And empowering!

Before I share what happened next, there was another insight on that yoga mat.

I realized that the way I had approached the offering of a chess game was inauthentic. I was trying to lure him in by not making it feel like a demand and just setting up an inviting space and then occupying it. This often works for us. (And if any of you are beginner RDI’ers out there, it’s super important to just not let the rejection hurt your feelings and simply try something different. I however have a desire to reflect my way down to the root problem, which is … well… a little obsessive but its me!).

Today, however, it did not work. The learning for me was to see that instead of recognizing that what I wanted was to enjoy a chess game with my son, I approached it with a mindset of “Z doesn’t know what to do with himself, I need to help him, he needs opportunities to develop”. And he sniffed it out. I’m sure of that.

When I surfaced from the yoga space, I made my intention clear. I shared with him that I really wanted to play chess with him. This was the truth for me. He joined me and we had a wonderful game of chess, with the side benefit of much learning involved and RDI objectives integrated (stopping to think and considering what will happen if we take certain actions – like if you move there my bishop is going to capture you on the next move!).

This was a beautiful discovery for me on the importance of being clear in my own intentions, and making sure that my actions reflect these intentions and aren’t sending mixed messages to my son.

I am starting to believe that Z has exceptional abilities (or sensitivities?) in the realm of detecting misaligned intentions, emotions and energies of the people around him. Regardless of whether this is true or not, he continues to be a pointer at what needs to shift in me.

I would really love to hear from you! Are there things that drive you nuts about your child (or your spouse, boss, co-worker, mail carrier, etc.) and push your fear buttons, that is just possibly, actually about yourself? Does this concept of projections resonate for you?

I Thought It Was All About Him, Turns Out It May Be Mostly About Me

Me Doing Some of My Own Creative Work

It’s interesting that so many times when I am feeling pressure to do something or change something in Z it actually ends up being me that needs to change. I am continually surprised by how many things I recognize as needing to develop in Z that at 37 I still haven’t mastered.

Perhaps more interesting is how the very thing that is bothering me about Z is the very same thing that I most need to work on at any given time. It’s like a pointer. This is often called a ‘projection’.

I have noticed over and over again that when I shift my focus to myself and work on myself, that thing in him also shifts. Like when I realized it’s often me that has the black and white thinking. Or maybe it doesn’t, maybe I just notice all of the places where he is doing that thing instead of focusing on what he is not doing.

And yet I continue to disbelieve this phenomenon. I don’t trust it. It can’t be that easy can it?

Today this concept manifested in me wanting Z to come up with his own ideas and execute them – him taking responsibility for his own development. Self-directed learning has been my ideal for him for many months now.

I turned this around to be the very thing that I need to do for myself. I realize that I don’t even know what makes me happy anymore, I don’t know what I like to do so I certainly don’t make the effort to do it. And yet I expect this from my 6 year old.

With this in mind, I woke with the intention to only do what makes me happy.

I experienced such a shift in mindset; I felt happier and like I had the power to take time to explore what I like to do.

That was wonderful, but I will spare you further details because how wonderful it was to do what I wanted is not really the point.

The interesting part is that although I was supposed to only be doing what made me happy, I found Z and I were doing more together not less.  Or maybe we didn’t do more, perhaps its just that we were so engaged in what we were doing. We both truly wanted to be doing what we were doing.

He made a movie – achieving one of my goals for him, self-directed learning! I worked alongside him but exploring designs for some clothes I would like to make.

Z Making a Movie. His own idea. He figured out what he needed, asked me for help with the camera and then went to town making his set and then his movie.

We hit multiple RDI and homeschooling objectives in a very organic way. Maybe most importantly, we were both happy and in sync and I felt …. alive.

I’m not entirely sure what my point is here, I’ve experienced this before and yet haven’t been able to sustain this joyous, fluid way of being. But I think I want to!

It can’t be that easy can it? Just do what makes me happy?

Joy in Action

This is a continuation of yesterday’s post, you can find it here.

When he was done playing soccer, I was in a gentler frame of mind and more ready to do the dreaded craft.

After experiencing the benefits of my shifting mindset in observing his soccer play, I made a quick decision to try to do this activity as I would with any other typical child. My intention was to lower the stakes for Z. I find that lately when I’m framing an activity, it becomes so deliberate (which can be good) that my energy of focus seems to stress him out. He knows that this is something important.

So my intention was to be lower key and relaxed. And if I ran into trouble I have a whole toolbox of RDI to draw from.

I glued my popsicle sticks first and then helped him do his. He chose to put six sticks on instead of four. He arranged them as he liked, and adjusted some to get a nice spacing.

Then the painting and gluing part came and I could feel him getting anxious.

I simply modeled mine. Importantly (I think), I felt excitement when smoothing the paint on the sticks. It was truly satisfying, though this must sound strange. Something about watching the paint absorb into the stick and be transformed by colour was really wonderful. I shared my enthusiasm with him.

I picked blue paint and blue sparkle glue. He picked red paint and red sparkle glue.

Then came the interesting part, the part I want to remember.

He started dumping HUGE globs of paint and sparkle glue and then sparkles into the paint tray. And then he mixed them all up so you couldn’t even see the sparkles anymore.

I felt anxiety creeping in again (for me) and a desire to STOP this MADNESS of wastefulness!

Then I remembered the goal behind the goal. I want him to find joy in activities and remember that. I don’t care if he “gets it right”, at least right now. So if the cost of that is an entire $2 bottle of paint, is that not pennies compared to what we’ve been willing to pay for therapy? Is it really a big deal?

This felt like an important moment for me. To not stop his joy of discovery and play, especially in the midst of a freakin’ snowflake activity that I expected he wouldn’t even like!

There were other beautiful moments, like when he told me he made a volcano snowflake as he globbed the paint on. And when he dusted it with white snowflake sparkles and then silver sparkles and I realized how beautiful his creation was.

Did we get any solid work done on specific objectives? There were no spotlighted moments of uncertainty, no discussion of the process.

But what there was, was joy in a new activity. Creativity. Creation. Exploration.

And photos and hopefully memories that will help us meet what our primary goal is right now – intrinsic motivation to try new things and a sense of self as an actor in life.

The End Goals

This is a rare venture for me into the creative world, an exploration of my shadow and oil pastels while on retreat this summer.

These are the things that I want for Z and that unconsciously have been driving the choices I make for him, and the continual adjustments I make to what we do together… and how we do it.

I want him to have empathy and compassion, and to experience the joy that comes from acting with compassion toward others (and having compassion showered on him) so many times while in my care that when out on his own he continues to find deep joy and meaning in doing things for others.

I want him to have many, many experiences of the joy of creative expression and being in flow in an activity that he is passionate about.

I want Z to be able to think of an idea, have the problem solving skills, resourcefulness and perseverance to see it through to completion. I want him to have the capacity to be entrepreneurial if so chooses.

I want him to experience the joy of deep friendship and conversation. I want him to know the value of being able to intuit a friend’s need to talk and the joy of being able to offer a listening, compassionate ear. And conversely the wonderful feeling of acceptance and love while being listened to deeply.

I want him to be able to keep a house, cook food, know how to manage himself and do things that need to get done; ideally I want to help him find ways to make even these tasks joyful.

I want him to be curious into adulthood; to do that I need to tip the balance by offering him more experiences that encourage his curiosity than squelch it.

I want him to be a person that thinks before acting or speaking, that a strong enough sense of self to identify what he is needing (most of the time) and to take respectful, considerate actions based on those needs.

I want him experience these deep and simple joys so that he can make an educated decision about whether to pursue riches and stuff or to follow his calling (or maybe both?) in his adulthood.

Most of these things I am not yet. But I am committed to moving towards these ideals and hopefully offering him some experiences along the way.

That’s the best I can do right now. And my journey is to find the ways that move toward these intentions instead of away from them.

The Elements of Our Future Life?

This is my recent attempt at project space for myself. The idea is to set up an environment that supports what I want to do.

My goals for our life and homeschool this year have been ever changing.

It’s silly to think that these goals would stay static since I’m learning so much each week by living in this new way that right now includes:

• Relationship Development Intervention
• Unconditional Parenting
• Unschooling / Life Learning for both myself and Z
• Project Based Homeschooling
• Loosening limits

In no way can I be sure that I will continue to honour the ideas in each of these philosophies a day or a year from now; so please read this list as a list of philosophical tenets that are influencing our life TODAY. I want to resist dogma even more than I want to follow a particular philosophy. They are each an experiment in what makes our life better and what internally feels right.

I’m feeling called to switch it up. Just as I found a rhythm that worked for us, things shifted and it no longer felt right. So I’m back to exploring and experimenting.

This is what I am thinking…

• Time for Z to do his own thing including time for him to get bored and have the opportunity to figure it out! (If you had known me 2-3 years ago you would be shocked by this statement.)
• Time for Mama to set an example of executing project work with no expectation that Z pay attention. Holy shit I get to have my own ideas? What on earth will I do???^*
• Time for Mama to support Z in his own projects.^*
• Time for Mama to encourage Z to participate in one of my ideas.^#
• Time for friends and electronics time (we already are GREAT at this!!!).
• Time for Mama to work on setting up an environment conducive to nurturing ideas and projects.

Wow – that feels AMAZING!!!

Better still, summer feels like a fantastic time to explore these ideas. More freedom, less desire for structure, more fun outside, etc.

Yippee!!!!!

*These two times feel particularly ripe to work on the new Dynamic Intelligence RDI curriculum that we are moving towards

^#The goal behind the goal: I’ve found over the years that I have to be careful about 100% following Z’s interest. There needs to be space to realize that sometimes you participate in things you’re not totally into because you value relationship. And also because its generally more fun to be with people and try something new than to do your same old same old, even if it’s a little scary at first. In RDI lingo the objectives behind this activity include: perspective taking, co-ordinating actions, experience sharing and desire for competence. Note that what I am NOT doing is trying to teach him that sometimes you have to do things that suck.

An Experiment in Screen Time

Can you tell how I feel about T.V. from our archaic set up?

I wrote awhile back about T.V. limits and whether or not to set them. We have always struggled with this in one way or the other because of exhaustion from too much asking about T.V. time or from too much talking about a specific show or just talking about T.V. shows instead of life. I want my child’s head to be full of life, not T.V. shows.

After reading a series of posts at the Project-Based Homeschooling site I vowed to take a different approach. The approach was to design the life I want instead of setting limits.

Well, now Lori Pickert has written another compelling post and is shaking me up again.

“When you set up a scarcity situation, you are always going to whip people into a frenzy to get whatever it is that’s hard to come by, whether it’s a dancing Elmo, a Beanie Baby, or a half-hour playing Minecraft. That’s just human psychology. Make it rare and people want it desperately. And when you limit what your child wants to do and push them toward something else, saying THIS is better than THAT, you create conflict where there doesn’t need to be conflict. They should be able to love books *and* TV, computer games *and* playing outside. But because you have put these things in competition with one another, they have to choose — so they end up rejecting the very things you want them to embrace.” Lori Pickert, Project Based Homeschooling

 

The challenge for us is that I actually do feel that we have followed through on the vow to design the life I want – you can see our typical schedule here. Still I wrestle with my son begging for iPad time, wanting to look things up on the computer (mostly Lego Batman) and play video games. I suppose if I was honest though, since we’ve set our life up with a fullness of things to do, he only typically will ask for those things in a moment of boredom (which are few) and when he is really tired. So perhaps we’ve already made progress.

Lori’s schedule for her kids when they were young was to do all the great things we are doing and then at 3 o’clock the kids could choose whatever they wanted to do including screen time. I’m seriously considering trying this out.

Concerns…

I’m conflicted about a couple of things.

1)   I know my son’s brain is different in some ways than typical kids. I truly believe we’re changing that through the wonder that is neuroplasticity and RDI; and everyone’s brain is different so this generally isn’t a problem for me. But he has a spectacular visual memory, which can be a strength, or a real problem for those of us that love him and are subjected to constant talk about T.V. shows.

2)   There are studies that suggest T.V. is damaging to the brain and to attention. I believe these studies and I also believe it is addictive so its difficult for me to feel good about giving more T.V. to my kid.

3)   I’ve seen the negative impacts of T.V. to our family life.

After writing this, you might wonder why on earth would she even consider more T.V. time?????

But Curious…

Here’s the catch. I don’t know 100% whether or not the problems we’ve seen with T.V. are actually associated with the T.V. or because of the scarcity of it. I have my own issues with a scarcity of time to do what I want and it’s not pretty! We’ve seen so many wonderful changes through letting go in other ways like the Unconditional Parenting approach and Life Learning that I’m really curious about whether or not this might work for us.

I’ve also noticed recently that the things he talks about most aren’t necessarily the things he watches the most. In some cases, like yesterday’s talk about transformers, he’s NEVER seen the show before. There is just something very captivating about Star Wars, Lego Ninjago, superheroes and a whole host of other things that he and his guy friends adore.

The other reason this idea of the 3 pm screen time option is that I would get some time for myself. I’m with my kid ALL the time and feel the need to regulate him by supporting him in activities MOST of the time so having some free time to myself everyday before the 9 o’clock bedtime would be thrilling.

The Experiment 

Long story short I think this warrants an experiment. I’ve talked to T-man (hubbby) about it and I’m going to go for it. I’ve decided I need to do it for at least 30 days to be sure that he gets the pattern.

I’ll keep you posted!