MY WORK ... MY PASSION

• Certified Transpersonal Hypnotherapist ; Past experiences: Dream Analysis /10 Years Experience •Psychotherapist / Use of Gestalt, Jungian, Zen, Reality and Energy Therapies /10 Years Experience •EMDR • Men and Their Journey: the neuroscience of the male brain, and the implications in sexuality, education and relationship • Women: Their Transformation and Empowerment ATOD (Alcohol, Tobacco and Other Drugs) / 21 years experience •Ordained Interfaith Minister & Official Celebrant • Social Justice Advocate • Child and Human Rights Advocate • Spiritual Guide and Intuitive • Certified Reiki Practitioner • Mediation / Conflict Resolution • “Intentional Love” Parenting Strategy Groups • Parenting Workshops • Coaching for parents of Indigo, Crystal, and Rainbow Children • International Training: Israel & England • Critical Incident Stress Debriefing • Post-911 and Post-Katrina volunteer

MSW - UNC Chapel Hill

BSW - UNC Greensboro


With immense love I wish Happy Birthday to my three grandchildren!

May 22: Brannock

May 30: Brinkley

June 12: Brogan

All three have birthdays in the same 22 days of the year ....what a busy time for the family!

"An Unending Love"

This blog and video is devoted and dedicated to my precious daughter Jennifer, my grand daughters Brogan and Brinkley, and my grand son Brannock. They are hearts of my heart. Our connection through many lives..... is utterly infinite.




The Definition of Genius

"THRIVE"

https://youtu.be/Lr-RoQ24lLg

"ONLY LOVE PREVAILS" ...."I've loved you for a thousand years; I'll love you for a thousand more....."


As we are in the winter of our lives, I dedicate this to Andrew, Dr. John J.C. Jr. and Gary W., MD, (who has gone on before us). My love and admiration is unfathomable for each of you..........and what you have brought into this world.....so profoundly to me.
The metaphors are rich and provocative; we're in them now. This world is indeed disappearing, and the richest eternal world awaits us!
The intensity, as was in each of the three of us, is in yellow!
In my heart forever.........

Slowly the truth is loading
I'm weighted down with love
Snow lying deep and even
Strung out and dreaming of
Night falling on the city
Quite something to behold
Don't it just look so pretty
This disappearing world

We're threading hope like fire

Down through the desperate blood
Down through the trailing wire
Into the leafless wood

Night falling on the city
Quite something to behold
Don't it just look so pretty
This disappearing world
This disappearing world


I'll be sticking right there with it
I'll be by y
our side
Sailing like a silver bullet
Hit 'em 'tween the eyes
Through the smoke and rising water
Cross the great divide
Baby till it all feels right

Night falling on the city
Sparkling red and gold
Don't it just look so pretty
This disappearing world
This
disappearing world
This disappearing world
This disappearing world


TECHNOLOGY..........

In “Conversations with God”, by Neale Donald Walsch, there is a warning I think of. I refer to it as the Atlantis passage, and I've quoted it a few times before." As I have said, this isn't the first time your civilization has been at this brink,"

God tells Walsch. "I want to repeat this, because it is vital that you hear this. Once before on your planet, the technology you developed was far greater than your ability to use it responsibly. You are approaching the same point in human history again. It is vitally important that you understand this. Your present technology is threatening to outstrip your ability to use it wisely. Your society is on the verge of becoming a product of your technology rather than your technology being a product of your society. When a society becomes a product of its own technology, it destroys itself."

Sunday, January 15, 2017

Cry, Heart, But Never Break: A Remarkable Illustrated Meditation On Loss and Life by Glenn Ringtved

Once I knew a man who said that most of the Caldecott Award Winning

books for children were "too scary".  I found myself doing a minute breath relaxation.  When I read this, that memory returned to my mind ... I had to giggle. 

This book is rich and poignant ... perhaps one of the best to sum up this
"feared" subject; that rather embraces it as a lesson on the cycle of life. 

I have three grandchildren who come out with some comments that have had me hold my breath, they were so insightful. That aspect of children is one which, at the least, has to be honored. Often it is ignored or, worse, maligned. One can only pray that parental and educational forces which surround them are still able to see from that level of process. That was why I chose children and adolescents as my focus during my psychotherapeutic training.  

Oh, indeed we can become exhausted with these young people who, although we are reluctant to admit it, can run rampant through so many of our adult (?) levels of cognition.  

As I progressed, I realized that the key to my success with these (as my adult daughter terms them) "short people", is to literally be in contact with ALL of our levels of perception.  Children have a penetratingly incisive way of cutting into the heart of a matter.  As adults, our best reaction is often to simply listen, inhale, and breathe into the experience.  It wasn't too far into my training when I realized the trick was simply to let go into it.  I salute Glenn Ringtved from my deepest heart for writing this profound work, and also to Brainpickings.com for posting it.
To say that it is well worth reading is an understatement of great proportions!







“Who would enjoy the sun if it never rained? Who would yearn for the day if there were no night?”

cryheartbutneverbreak“Each day, we wake slightly altered, and the person we were yesterday is dead,” John Updike wrote“so why … be afraid of death, when death comes all the time?” Half a millennium earlier, Montaigne posed the same question somewhat differently in his magnificent meditation on death and the art of living“To lament that we shall not be alive a hundred years hence, is the same folly as to be sorry we were not alive a hundred years ago.”
Yet mortality continues to petrify us — our own, and perhaps even more so that of our loved ones. And if the adult consciousness is so thoroughly unsettled by the notion of death, despite intellectually recognizing it as a necessary and inevitable part of life, how is the child consciousness to settle into comprehension and comfort?
Now comes a fine addition to the most intelligent and imaginative children’s books about making sense of death — the crowning jewel of them all, even, and not only because it bears what might be the most beautiful children’s book title ever conceived: Cry, Heart, But Never Break (public library) by beloved Danish children’s book author Glenn Ringtved and illustrator Charlotte Pardi, translated into English by Robert Moulthrop.
Although Ringtved is celebrated for his humorous and mischievous stories, this contemplative tale sprang from the depths of his own experience — when his mother was dying and he struggled to explain what was happening to his young children, she offered some words of comfort: “Cry, Heart, but never break.” It was the grandmother’s way of assuring the children that the profound sadness of loss is to be allowed rather than resisted, then folded into the wholeness of life, which continues to unfold. (I’m reminded of Maira Kalman’s unforgettable words: “When Tibor died, the world came to an end. And the world did not come to an end. That is something you learn.”)
cryheartbutneverbreak22
This warmly wistful story begins outside the “small snug house” where four children live with their beloved grandmother. Not wanting to scare the young ones, Death, who has come for the old lady, has left his scythe by the door. Immediately, in this small and enormously thoughtful gesture, we are met with Death’s unexpected tenderness.
Inside, he sits down at the kitchen table, where only the youngest of the kids, little Leah, dares look straight at him.
cryheartbutneverbreak23
What makes the book particularly touching, thanks to Pardi’s immensely expressive illustration, is just how crestfallen — broken, even — Death himself looks the entire time he is executing his mission, choked up with some indiscernible fusion of resignation and recompense.
cryheartbutneverbreak1
In the quiet, the children could hear their grandmother upstairs, breathing with the same raspy breaths as the figure at the table. They knew Death had come for her and that time was short.
cryheartbutneverbreak24
To stall the inevitable, the children devise a plan — believing that Death only works at night, they decide to keep refilling his coffee cup until dawn comes, at which point he would have to leave without their grandmother. Here, too, one is struck by the ordinariness of Death, for what can be more ordinary — and life-loving, even — than to enjoy a cup of coffee at the kitchen table?
cryheartbutneverbreak25
But Death eventually curls his bony hand over the cup to signal that the time has come. Leah reaches her own tiny hand, taking his in hers, and beseeches him not to take their darling grandmother. Why, she insists, does grandma have to die?
cryheartbutneverbreak2
cryheartbutneverbreak26
Some people say Death’s heart is as dead and black as a piece of coal, but that is not true. Beneath his inky cloak, Death’s heart is as red as the most beautiful sunset and beats with a great love of life.
Death is once more overcome with kindness and compassion for the children, so he decides to answer Leah’s question with a story, hoping it would help them understand why dying is natural and necessary.
He tells them of two brothers named Sorrow and Grief, who lived in a somber valley and went about their days “slowly and heavily” because they never looked up, because “they never saw through the shadows on the tops of the hills.”
cryheartbutneverbreak27
cryheartbutneverbreak28
Beyond those shadows, Death tells the kids, lived two sisters, Joy and Delight.
cryheartbutneverbreak4
cryheartbutneverbreak34
They were bright and sunny and their days were full of happiness. The only shadow was their sense that something was missing. They didn’t know what, but they felt they couldn’t fully enjoy their happiness.
As Death is telling the story, little Leah nods her head, for she can tell what is to come — the two boys meet the two girls and they fall in love, two perfectly balanced couples: Sorrow and Joy, Grief and Delight.
cryheartbutneverbreak35
Death tells the kids:
It is the same with life and death… What would life be worth if there were no death? Who would enjoy the sun if it never rained? Who would yearn for the day if there were no night?
cryheartbutneverbreak3
Something difficult and beautiful has sunk in.
When death finally gets up from the table to head upstairs, the youngest boy is moved to stop him — but his older brother puts a rueful hand on his shoulder and gently discourages him.
cryheartbutneverbreak31
Moments later, the children heard the upstairs window open. Then, in a voice somewhere between a cry and a whisper, Death said, “Fly, Soul. Fly, fly away.”
They hurry upstairs, where their grandmother has died — a moment of great sadness, enveloped in warm peacefulness.
cryheartbutneverbreak32
cryheartbutneverbreak5
The curtains were blowing in the gentle morning breeze. Looking at the children, Death said quietly, “Cry, Heart, but never break. Let your tears of grief and sadness help begin new life.”
Then he was gone.
cryheartbutneverbreak33
cryheartbutneverbreak6
Ever after, whenever the children opened a window, they would think of their grandmother. And when the breeze caressed their faces, they could feel her touch.
Cry, Heart, But Never Break comes from the courageous Enchanted Lion, who have brought to life such daring and deeply nuanced picture-books as The Tiger Who Would Be KingLittle Boy BrownThe Lion and the Bird, and Louis I, King of the Sheep.
cryheartbutneverbreak20
Complement this particular masterpiece with Oliver Jeffers’s The Heart and the Bottle, which explores what we stand to lose when we deny difficult emotions like grief, and Michael Rosen’s Sad Book, a beautiful meditation on loss, illustrated by the great Sir Quentin Blake. For a grownup counterpart in the same spirit, see Elizabeth Alexander’s The Light of the World. For an Eastern perspective, see how a Zen master explained death and the life-force to a child.

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

Céline Dion & Andrea Bocelli - The Prayer (Vietsub)

I so miss the live opera, musicals, and orchestra concerts of my younger years.  It was a crucial part of being a student in Philadelphia at that time. We would go to at least one concert or musical a month.  Sadly, coming South afforded no such immersion or opportunities. I have never had an illicit drug in my life ... I believe that a plethora of experiences as this were the most natural highs one could have.

Bocelli is one of my favorite tenors in the world ... this You Tube video is exquisite.  Watching his love and utter passion with music is indeed (for me) mind-altering. His face and micro-expressions is a gift. I cry with joy each time I hear this. This then is passion and joy about being in the moment......

No other words are necessary.... watch closely.

ANDREA BOCELLI (HQ) AVE MARIA (SCHUBERT)

My FAVORITE TENOR!



Tuesday, January 3, 2017

11 TED Talks that show how weird the human mind really is - ScienceAlert

We use our mind every second of every day, but it's safe to say no one understands exactly how it functions. Even psychologists and neuroscientists are often stumped by why we think and behave the way we do.
Some of those researchers have appeared on the TED stage to talk about the questions that keep them up at night. The following 11 talks - on topics like decision-making, happiness, and our concept of time - are some of the most thought-provoking in TED's collection.
Each one will bring you one step closer to understanding who you are, and who you might be.
1. Tali Sharot: Your inherent bias toward optimism is a double-edged sword.
Sharot is a neuroscientist who, along with her colleagues, was able to reduce people's optimism by controlling activity in certain areas of their brains. On the one hand, this could be a positive development. After all, Sharot says in her talk that people underestimate the likelihood of bad things like cancer happening to them, so they're less likely to take precautions like scheduling medical checkups. But on the other hand, Sharot says that optimism enhances our well-being because it acts as a self-fulfilling prophecy. When we believe we're going to land that job or promotion, we're more likely to get it.
So how do you reconcile those two viewpoints? "We would like to protect ourselves from the dangers of optimism, but at the same time remain hopeful," Sharot says. "The key here really is knowledge."
She illustrates this idea with a cartoon of penguins trying to fly off a cliff. The ones that are successful have a back-up plan:
"If you're an optimistic penguin who believes they can fly, but then adjusts a parachute to your back just in case things don't work out exactly as you had planned, you will soar like an eagle, even if you're just a penguin," she concludes.
2. Dan Ariely: You have less control over your own decisions than you think.
Most of us believe we're totally in control of our own decisions. But as Ariely, a behavioural economistexplains in his talk, we're incredibly susceptible to outside influences.One of his most enlightening examples is based on an old Economist advertisement for three subscription levels: $59 for online only, $159 for print only, and $159 for online and print.Ariely figured out that the option to pay $159 for print only exists so that it makes the option to pay $159 for online and print look more enticing than it would if it was just paired with the $59 option. 
Using examples from medicine and online dating, Ariely proves that traditional economics can't fully explain irrational human behaviour - and that's where behavioural economics comes in.
"When it comes to the mental world ... we somehow forget that we are limited," he says. 
"I think that if we understood our cognitive limitations in the same way we understand our physical limitations ... we could design a better world."
3. Sheena Iyengar: The freedom to choose is not always empowering.
Iyengar's talk illuminates how our beliefs about choice are shaped by our cultural backgrounds. For example, Americans tend to believe that if a choice affects them, then they should be the one to make it.Compare that to people from Asian backgrounds, who generally believe that it's best to defer to other people you trust and respect."It is a mistake to assume that everyone thrives under the pressure of choosing alone," she says.Iyengar, a psycho-economist, debunks the idea that the more choices you have, the better decisions you make. In fact, she says, when you give people 10 or more options, they tend to make poorer decisions in areas like healthcare and investing. 
Ultimately, Iyengar says it's about accepting that constraint can in some contexts be more liberating than freedom.
The American narrative promises "freedom, happiness, success. It lays the world at your feet and says, 'you can have anything, everything'", she explains.
Yet upon closer examination, Iyengar says you'll realise that the idea of choice is much more complicated and can be interpreted in many other ways.
4. Daniel Kahneman: Your happiness depends heavily on your memory.
According to Kahneman, a behavioural economist, every individual is divided into an experiencing self and a remembering self. The differences between these two selves are critical to our understanding of human happiness. To illustrate this idea, Kahneman refers to an experiment in which two groups of patients underwent a colonoscopy.The group that experienced the peak of their pain at the end said they suffered more - even when their procedure was shorter. Kahneman says that the second group's experiencing selves suffered less, but their remembering selves suffered more.
The remembering self, Kahneman says, is the one that makes decisions, like which colonoscopy surgeon to choose the next time around.
"We actually don't choose between experiences, we choose between memories of experiences." Even when we contemplate the future, Kahneman says, "we think of our future as anticipated memories."
Bottom line: What makes you happy in the immediate present won't necessarily make you happy when you reflect on your life overall - and it's important to consider that idea the next time you're making a big decision.
5. Dan Gilbert: You have no idea what will make you happy in 10 years.   
CONTINUE READING at:
11 TED Talks that show how weird the human mind really is - ScienceAlert

How to Choose Discipline Methods that Help Your Child Grow - Dr. Tali Shenfield

This is an insightful article about the discipline of our children:



How to Choose Discipline Methods that Help Your Child Grow

Friday, December 23, 2016

7 Disturbing Facts About Trump's Personality - Janet Altom / Alternet

7 Disturbing Facts About Donald Trump's Personality


6
Senator Al Franken, who formerly made his living in comedy, recently made a weirdly unsettling observation about Donald Trump. He never seems to laugh. And it’s true. The New York Times [3] reporter to whom Franken made the comment did some research, observing Trump at events where normal people tend to crack up, like the Al Smith Dinner. Though Trump smiles, he never laughs outright.
“I don't know what it is,” Franken says.
We don’t either, but it’s creepy.
An abundance of pieces have been written about Donald Trump’s malignantly narcissistic personality, his lack of impulse control, his gnat-like attention span on any topic but his own fabulousness, his complete disregard for the truth, and the fact that he's a racist, sexist bully [4] who may also be fairly unintelligent.
All true.
But he also has some weird and disturbing personality tics that are less frequently mentioned, but which nonetheless give us the heebie jeebies.
Here are seven of Donald Trump's worrisome quirks.
1. He has never done drugs.
Trump has never smoked a cigarette or had an alcoholic drink. All respect for those who have had an addiction problem, or decided to abstain after some time as a drinker, or who simply don't like alcohol—but never to have tried a mind-altering substance of any kind is just not normal. It also shows a lack of curiosity and a fear of losing control.
Trump has said the alcoholism and early death of his older brother turned him into a life-long teetotaler, and maybe that is true. He won’t even have a cup of coffee, though. Seriously, who does that? That’s not normal.
He has also said in many interviews that his biggest piece of advice for his kids when they were growing up was not to do drugs. Really, that’s it, dad? That’s all you’ve got?
Of course, Trump has tried to cash in on other people’s drinking habits with Trump vodka, which failed.
2. He’s a germophobe in the extreme.
Trump has called the practice of shaking hands “barbaric." He won’t shake hands with his children’s teachers because teachers are in touch with too many germy kids. Then again, it’s hard to imagine he has attended too many parent-teacher conferences. Teaching children, after all, is germy women’s work.
His germophobia [5] is such that he is unwilling to push ground-floor elevator buttons because they have been touched by too many people (the masses).
Perhaps on the belief that it distances him from germs, he drinks with a straw and eats pizza with a fork, which is fine if you’re from Chicago, but definitely not New York. He even explains his penchant for fast food in terms of what he imagines to be its cleanliness. “I’m a very clean person,” he told Anderson Cooper on the campaign trail. “I like cleanliness, and I think you’re better off going there than maybe someplace that you have no idea where the food’s coming from. It’s a certain standard.”
He has spoken about how he loves to wash his hands, and does it as much as possible. (Here’s a theory: maybe his hands got so tiny from all the washing. He wore them away.)
He has openly boasted about never changing a diaper on any of his five kids, probably as a result of his germophobia, plus sexism and wealth.
Some have speculated that Trump’s germophobia and anti-immigration stances are related, since he sees immigrants as potential carriers of disease. But really, all the unwashed masses are carriers of disease for Trump, so he must stay in his high tower.
3. When he does shake hands, he does it in a very weird way.
Whenever possible, Trump avoids shaking hands. When he absolutely has to shake someone's hand, he has a weird habit of aggressively pulling [6] the person in close to him, so that the person practically has to hug him. When the fellow (it is usually a fellow) offers any resistance, the whole dance can become a fairly awkward arm-wrestling match.
No word on whether Trump pops a Tic-Tac before pulling the person in closer than they would really like to be.
4. He has a 10-year-old’s mentality about bodily functions.
Especially the notion that women have bodily functions. He has made weird comments in interviews about being blissfully unaware of whether his wife Melania has ever used the toilet. And when Hillary Clinton had to use the ladies room (at least, we think that’s where she went) before a debate, he called it “disgusting.” He used the same word about a female lawyer who needed to excuse herself to pump breast milk to feed her infant. That is not what Trump seems to think breasts are for and he finds it repellent.
Ten is the age Melania Trump suggested Trump acts sometimes, and that was part of her explanation to Anderson Cooper about why Trump bragged to Billy Bush that women just let him “grab them by the pussy.” Melania knows what 10-year-olds are like, since her son Barron is also 10.
5. He doesn’t have any pets.
Trump will be the first president in 150 years [7] not to have a pet, if you count James Polk’s horses. It does not even appear that Trump likes animals much, if his family's enthusiasm for trophy hunting is any indication.
He has been publicly criticized [8] by the Humane Society of the United States for having cozy relationships with anti-animal welfare zealots who rake in profits from puppy mills, agribusiness, trophy hunting, factory farming, and horse slaughterhouses.
Being a self-confessed clean-hands freak may be part of the reason Trump dislikes animals, and certainly his run-in [9] with a bald eagle did not help warm him up to animals. Recent science has shown that caring for animals is a big part of what teaches us empathy, since domesticated animals are completely dependent on human beings.
6. He has bizarre ideas [10] about exercise and sleep. 
We already know that Trump does not have much regard for science as he gears up to gut climate change mitigation and voices the view that vaccines might cause autism. But he also does not hold much stock in basic common sense or the recommendation of health professionals.
The fast-food-loving germophobe-in-chief also has some notion that exercise is bad for you. This may be based on his theory that the human body is like a battery, and if you use up the energy it’s all gone, or because he has had friends who have needed knee surgery because of working out. Trump also tends to latch onto one example and overgeneralize: if there is a cold day he thinks climate change is a hoax, and if someone he knows had a cute baby after considering an abortion, it means all women should be punished for having abortions.
Trump also seems to think that needing sleep shows weakness, and claims only to sleep three or four hours a night, which leaves him plenty of time to tweet at people who have affronted him.
“I’m a guy who lies awake and thinks and plots,” he told New York magazine [11] in 1992, somewhat terrifyingly. Among the things he likes to plot, he said, are revenge strategies. Adequate sleep is tied to mental health, and what Trump expressed smacks more than a little of paranoid tendencies, but don’t take it from us. Three professors [12] of psychiatry are also concerned about Trump’s mental fitness to be president.
7. The suit thing.
Trump is never seen in anything but a suit, and since he doesn’t sleep much, he probably doesn’t even don silk pajamas at night, a la Hugh Hefner.
A suit is fitting attire for a businessman, but he reportedly also violently demanded that his college-age son wear a suit to a baseball game by one account. Donald Jr.’s college dorm mate recounted the story [13] on Facebook during the campaign. "Don Jr. opened the door, wearing a Yankee jersey,” Scott Melker, now a Florida Realtor, wrote. “Without saying a word, his father slapped him across the face, knocking him to the floor in front of all of his classmates. He simply said 'put on a suit and meet me outside,' and closed the door."
Don Jr. was a freshman at the time, and yes, they were going to a Yankees game.
None of the Trump sons have been seen in anything but suits ever since, except when big-game hunting in Africa. Ten-year-old Baron is sometimes seen in a polo shirt, though even he is often seen in a suit, which is weird.& Disturbing Facts

Saturday, December 17, 2016

ALERT! New Video: Watch Wisconsin Election Officials Reject Hand Counts After Electronic Scanners Make Big Mistake | Alternet

New Video: Watch Wisconsin Election Officials Reject Hand Counts After Electronic Scanners Make Big Mistake | Alternet

Is spanking discipline or abuse? MOST IMPT: Does it work?

Is spanking discipline or abuse?

It's common, it's cultural, it's legal in all states in the nation. But does spanking work?
I grew up with two kinds of spanking. My mother, a gentle and affectionate Brit raising four small children without much support, rarely spanked. Well, she often smacked our butts, jokingly, affectionately, with a laugh, sometimes followed by a tickle or hug. If that’s spanking, she was doing it wrong. It wasn’t a punishment. It became a joke between us. My father — Irish, angry, probably a survivor of extreme corporal punishment as the eldest of 10 — was the designated disciplinarian. And, if we did something worthy of punishment, he would be called upon to deal it out. Even if not called upon, he often raised a hand.
Since those days, spanking has lost its veneer of normality. Twenty years ago, studies showed that 74 percent of parents used spanking as a disciplinary practice. Research suggests many parents now feel torn about this age-old parenting practice. In a survey of 3,000 parents across the country, only 19 percent of parents believe spanking is part of the standard parenting toolkit, but 53 percent say that threatening a spanking is moderately to extremely important and 1 in 4 parents admit to spanking their children “a fair bit” to “very often.” (The truth of such self-reported numbers may in fact be higher because the behavior ignites such disapproval.) Suffice it to say, spanking is not dead. Parents continue to decide where they stand on the issue more based on their own family history than a single cultural consensus.
When it came to raising my own children, it didn’t take much soul searching. My mother and I are close. I confide in her. My children love her. The opposite is true of my late father. We were never close. I didn’t trust him as a child and refused to leave him alone with my own children. So they weren’t close to him either. At best, my siblings and I survived him. Possibly, according to some compelling research, not even that. “Being hit by parents is a very stressful experience,” explains Murray Straus, Professor of Sociology, founder and Co-Director of the Family Research Laboratory, University of New Hampshire, and the author of numerous defining books and research studies on corporal punishment. “And it is a chronic stress that, for a third of American kids, begins in infancy. The average age of cessation is 12. So it is a chronic stress for 12 years. That affects the brain.”
Knowing firsthand how I feel about the parent who hit me and somewhat familiar with compelling research on the negative outcomes, I fell firmly into the no-spanking camp when it came time to raise my own kids.
But what is spanking? The dictionary definition — to strike especially on the buttocks with the open hand — leaves a lot to be desired. How hard? How many times? Is it a joking swat to the bottom or a euphemism for a belt to bare flesh? Researchers have specified further that spanking is done with intent to discipline and that it does not leave a mark or bruise. But this still leaves a lot of questions unanswered.
Regardless of the exact definition, more than 100 studies agree on this point: Spanking is not only ineffective, it has negative outcomes. “Parents have no way of seeing the damage done,” explains Straus on a recent video. “Because it doesn’t show up for months — or years — later.” The official statement on spanking from the American Academy of Pediatrics puts it like this: “The more children are spanked, the more anger they report as adults, the more likely they are to spank their own children, the more likely they are to approve of hitting a spouse, and the more marital conflict they experience as adults. Spanking has been associated with higher rates of physical aggression, more substance abuse, and increased risk of crime and violence when used with older children and adolescents.”
Deciding not to spank and not doing it, though, are two different things. Even Straus acknowledges that as some point parents face the decision again, less rationally, when negotiating peer disapproval and fury a toddler tantrum. “The advice that professionals give,” says Straus. “Is to avoid spanking if you can. And everyone accepts that. But if you are the parent of a two-year-old, it only takes a day to discover” that this is harder than it seems.
Faced with rambunctious toddlers, I spanked each of my kids. Once.
Like my mother, I did it wrong. My son laughed and tried to spank me back, undermining the entire effort and making me laugh. So I changed tactics. My daughter laughed and repeated what I was telling her not to do so I would spank her again. In both cases, it became a game. It was clear from my small experiment, that in order to use spanking as a deterrent, I would have to hit these babies who trusted me with enough force to hurt them. Why would I do that? So, since I couldn’t bring myself to really spank my children, I explained why their behavior was inappropriate instead. That took more patience but it was effective. Both of my now-teenagers are respectful, helpful proto-adults.
“If there is any age when you should not attack a child,” advises Straus, “it is when they are an infant or toddler because that is when the brain is in its period of most rapid development and most easily set on the wrong track.”
Spanking occurs in most of the historical record. It predates the Bible. But it was not always a way to discipline children. It started out with willing, adult (female) participants — usually as part of pagan fertility rites. (There are a few examples of this throughout history, but during the Lupercalia festival Roman priests spanked willing women to help them overcome infertility.) The Biblical proverb — “he who spares the rod hates his son, but, he who loves him is careful to discipline him” is often cited to defend spanking, but according to experts that may be a misinterpretation. In a time of shepherds who used a rod to steer sheep, it was more likely a metaphor for guiding a child. Even if this phrase was intended literally, another Proverb also prescribes punishing disrespectful children by having birds to peck out and eat their eyes. No one advocates for that.
The word discipline means — at its root — teach. It does not mean to beat or punish. Another phrase often used as an edict to spank kids “spare the rod, spoil the child,” is also attributed to the Bible. But it’s not. It comes from a satirical poem, Hudibras, by Victorian-era novelist and poet Samuel Butler, and the phrase refers to sex, not parenting.
None of this is really relevant, though. Somewhere along the way, in most cultures, and all throughout history, smacking unruly children became a thing humans do. And these proverbs and phrases are among the many ways we have managed to find reasons, euphemisms, rationales, and excuses for the practice, even though decades of science says it’s not only ineffective but has lifelong negative impacts on children. The more violent the culture, the more the children get smacked. (Or perhaps it’s the other way around.)
The recent case of Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson points up another problem with spanking: It’s very hard to determine when it has crossed over to abuse. Peterson whipped his 4-year-old son with a tree branch stripped of leaves — a switch. The beating left welts, broke the skin, and left marks all over a small child who was helpless in an altercation with an adult professional athlete. If Peterson had done that to someone his own size, he would be in prison. But because he did it to his 4-year-old child, he might have been within the law. Peterson called it a whooping much like he received at the hands of his own parents — and deemed it reasonable discipline. (He accepted a plea bargain of a fine of $4,000 and community service, so it will not be decided in court.) He credits his own father’s beatings with his own wild success as an adult. Though there’s no evidence of this, Peterson’s experience does track with studies that show children who are spanked or beaten are more likely to hit other children, their own children, their spouse, and others when they grow up. It’s not surprising: their parents taught them that hitting someone is an effective way to resolve conflict and “teach someone a lesson.”
According to a Google search on Adrian Peterson, whether whipping a small child with a tree branch is abuse remains a matter of debate in our culture. Striking a child, as long as it’s within the context of reasonable discipline, is legal in all states. But spanking — when dealt in anger as it often is — sometimes crosses over into our legal definition of child abuse. So the courts are often left deciding what blows are abusive and which are parenting. That’s one reason that more than 40 countries have outlawed spanking entirely — from Norway and the Congo to Brazil and Israel. If it’s not allowed at all, there is no gray area to dispute.
Just because our parents did it — or their parents did it — is no argument to continue to do it. Our parents and theirs did a lot of things we don’t do anymore —serve laudanum-spiked baby bottles, ride in cars without seat belts, arrange marriages, and drink alcohol during pregnancy — because we learned that they’re bad for us or our children. I’m lucky that I was so bad at spanking. My kids trust me. My father, who rose to the task and behaved like the father his father taught him to be, was an old man before he could admit that he regretted that role and wished for a different kind of relationship with his children. Much too late.

Tuesday, December 6, 2016

"Dear Elf On the Shelf Haters: Get Over It!

HERE'S AN OPEN LETTER TO ELF ON THE SHELF HATERS. YES, PEOPLE TAKE IT TOO FAR, BUT THIS CAN STILL BE A SIMPLE PLEASURE OF THE SEASON, IF YOU DIAL IT BACK.

Dear Elf on the Shelf haters,
I feel you. I really do. The Pinterest perfection spamming every social network with Elf on the Shelf ideas annoys me too. Oh, your Elf took a poop and it looks like a Hershey’s kiss?! How clever. But, if you can ignore those who take it too far for a minute, there is magic in that cheap, creepy elf.
It’s the same thought process we must use with the teen pop stars. When Bieber was big, I actually wrote a defense of his music. “Justin Bieber doesn’t suck!,” I proclaimed. Just because the hardcore, passionate fans are in our face and skew the headlines, is it fair to dismiss the kid’s obvious talent?
“The instant and life-involving obsession pre-teen girls are bound to attach to anything they are interested in becomes an instant lead weight against credibility,” I wrote. “It’s like making a deal with the devil, you can have all the success of your dreams, but first you need to sell your (credible) soul.”
And so it is with the Elf on the Shelf. The rising tide of popularity it has created has brought the inevitable backlash.
I get it. It’s become too much. People are taking it too seriously. The oversharing of your friends has risen to such a cacophonous crescendo that you can no longer thumb scroll through your feed without seeing those creepy vacant eyes staring back at you through the screen, daring to tell Santa that you don’t believe.
Why do we do it? Why do we concoct all these crazy mythologies for our kids? From little green footprints on toilet seats, to hidden chocolate eggs, to swapping out missing teeth, why has parenting risen to David Copperfield levels of illusion-making?
Because we like it when our kids believe. We love nurturing that naive faith in the impossible. We like it when a 5- and 7-year-old will debate over dinner how Santa can get inside houses with no chimneys. We like it when our kids start to question just a little bit and ask for video evidence of the magic that happens in our house. We like it when, after staying up all night editing that magic, they believe once again.
There are those who go a little crazy with Elf on the Shelf and, frankly, they’re ruining it for the rest of us. The over-achievers set the bar high, the kids talk at school, and well .. suddenly my boys want to know why our Elf, George, doesn’t bake cookies and string lights in our house. George just sits there.
Could parents putting the Elf on the Shelf in silly situations be a coping mechanism? A way to help them believe they can still have grown-up fun surrounded by childish magic? Could Elves hitting on Barbie, swinging from tequila bottles, or playing poker with the stuffies be like the inside jokes in Shrek and other Disney Movies? Just a little something to keep parents interested in the silliness of childhood?
Perhaps. And yes, it’s a little much, but just as with Bieber, Miley, and One Direction, we can’t dismiss something because the fans are annoying. It’s okay to appreciate the Elf on the Shelf for our own simple reasons.
“As adults we don’t need to make Christmas magic for kids, we just need to not (mess) it up with our crazy,” Lyz Lens tweeted this week. And it’s true.
I, too, wish those who were so eager to share their cleverness would dial it back a bit. But that’s the world we live in. The Instagramming of meals, the tweeting of random thoughts, the Facebooking of freakish Elf behaviour.
Despite that, I look forward to every morning in December as the boys scurry around the house searching for our elf, George. Sleep stuck in their eyes, blankies dragging at their feet, hair standing on static end, they rush around trying to find this magical piece of plastic and felt. And when his hiding place is uncovered, they cheer “I found George!” and high five each other before running to tell their parents of their successful hunting expedition.
And, for a few seconds, the terrible news of the day fades away, the crankiness at the lack of sleep drains, and I smile too. Magic. Belief. Wonder. The impossible has become possible. And everything in the world is perfect. It doesn’t need to be complicated. Our elf never gets too wild, I don’t post daily pictures of what he does. He just moves around, sits on assorted shelves, and brings us immeasurable joy.
So get over it, Elf on the Shelf haters. This little guy is a wonderful addition to the magic of the season, and he’s not going anywhere.

Sunday, November 6, 2016

A Contemplative Message on the Present Chaos - from the Arcturian Group

This is an excellent offering from the Arcturian Group.  In my humble opinion, it is to be read thoughtfully and absorbed into our essence.

11040930 10153033693621647 5477772963873960274 n
NOVEMBER 6, 2016
Dear ones, in these times of chaos and confusion, many are beginning to experience a sense of hopelessness because they see no peace or signs of Light, only violence and suffering. Let go of any concepts you may still hold regarding how energetic change must appear for you are indeed witnessing the actions of Light as each bit of previously hidden information rises to the surface. The dark underbelly of world beliefs based in a ruthless quest for money and power are being exposed as the Light of an evolving world consciousness shines into the shadowy corners.
Be not discouraged, for the creations of old energy must seen for what they are--concepts, opinions, and false beliefs. It is imperative for those who accept without question everything said by those in positions of authority, to understand that much of what they have heretofore accepted as truth, is not.
Many leaders have tried to fulfill the promises they made to the public but have been thwarted by rich and powerful forces working through fear, threats, and demands in order to achieve some personal agenda. Other so called "leaders" simply consider their position a means to personal power and control. These are the very corners the Light is shining into.
Dear citizens of the USA, meditate for election guidance. Let intuition be your guide as you take time to review every candidate no matter how insignificant is the the post they seek. Do this before going into the voting booth so you are prepared when you get there. Choose the candidate that most closely resonates with truth, honesty and love. Do not look to commercials and hype to give you this information for you will not find it there, it must come from within. Ask your Higher self and Guides to help you with discernment as you review the qualifications of each candidate.
We wish to speak of peace, not third dimensional concepts of peace but the higher sense of Peace, which only manifests from a consciousness of oneness. Many are seeking to achieve peace with self, others, and nations but because they do it within a belief system based in duality and separation, they are only able to bring about a peace that reflects this--a peace capable of manifesting its opposite at any time.
Mankind attempts to wear the medallion of duality with its good side facing out, but at some point the medallion will flip because that is the nature of duality regardless of how much effort is put forth to keep the good side showing.
The energy that formed much of the third dimensional belief system is dissolving, rendering many commonly accepted and long held beliefs, invalid. Society in general is quickly changing as more and more awaken. Old concepts of peace no longer resonate as they once did and are being re-evaluated, especially as many young and very evolved souls come of age. Those who insist upon perpetuating the old and financially lucrative ways of "pretend peace" are beginning to find less and less support.
Many have begun to realize that actions utilizing the lives of others as necessary for peace, have simply been power struggles based in personal quests for more power and possessions--land, people, power, oil, gold, etc. Peace between individuals as well, is often nothing more than an attempt to bend another's will to one's own in the belief that non-resistance from another is peace. True peace cannot be forced whether it be between nations or individuals.
Peace is a natural expression of the realization of Oneness, an attained state of consciousness that knows all living things to be individual but formed in and of the ONE. This does not mean that everyone must think the same way or never have an opinion for there is and always will be individuality.
Each day more people including those in the military, are recognizing the futility of killing, maiming, and violence in the name of peace. A new and higher sense of peace is being born but it is accompanied by birth pangs of rebellion. This is what you are witnessing at this time. As the Light of truth continues to expand within world consciousness, peace without arms and violence must manifest, for only True Peace is the reality.
Every awakened soul contributes world Light through their holding to truth within regardless of what is appearing in the outer scene. The energies of truth must flow, and not be kept just for oneself. Just as fruit must be picked in order for more to come the next year, so must awareness and Light flow outward making room for more to come. The times of permanently retreating to a cave for one's own experiences of Light are finished. The key is; "In the world, but not of it".
There is a popular saying about what would happen if each person of many were to light a small candle--imagine the brilliance. Now imagine each truth that unfolds to you as being that small candle. Violence, war, rebellions, and hatred would soon be depleted of the energy needed to sustain, maintain, and manifest them.
Since true Peace is eternally held in place by Divine Law it will eventually manifest, but can only do this when consensus consciousness provides the substance from which it is formed--energies of unconditional love and Oneness. What you are witnessing in the world are pictures that reflect the energies of a world still living out from duality and separation. Always remember that pictures no matter how disturbing, have no law to sustain or maintain them, and are held in place only by belief and can thus be dissolved in a second of realization.
Know that every terrorist is a Divine being in spite of the fact that he/she may be many lifetimes from knowing that for themselves. Every realization of truth becomes your candle adding Light to world consciousness in spite of events taking place still requiring a degree of control and action.
Today's message is to illuminate the difference between what society has come to accept as peace and methods necessary to attain it, versus True Peace. Predictions that speak of the end of the world are obsolete and no longer relevant because mankind has shifted the energy. Predictions can only access the energy of the moment and have only the power mankind gives them.
You are in charge, dear ones. You hold within yourselves the real Power should you choose to acknowledge who and what you really are. Peace must come into expression not through arms and force, but as an activity of the still small voice within each heart flowing and nourishing a tired and hungry world.
This is the work, and you are ready, dear Lightworkers.
We are the Arcturian Group 11/6/16
1px
 

"there were no words, but images flooded every cell in her being ...4 and a half decades!"

"there were no words, but images flooded every cell in her being ...4 and a half decades!"