“I was exactly who I am by the age of five.” -Simone Beauvoir
My family was exceptionally dysfunctional. My mother was what people who survive narcissistic parents call “a destroyer.” The worst of the worst. And yet during my early years, I remained intact and whole.
How was that possible?
My dad owned a camp in the foothills of the Adirondack Mountains. It gave me a month and a half every year, immersed in Nature. And until I was ten and he lost the land, it was everything to me. Beauty, comfort, hope, wisdom, truth. Reality.
I recall sitting on a bench under one of the large oaks. The breeze swept gently through the leaves, rising and falling like waves. It was warm, the sweet clean air played across my skin with the susurration of the wind, each lifting of the leaves a crescendo carrying me higher into peace until I rested in stillness.
Nothing was lacking. Everything was in harmony, inside and out. I felt an exquisite, bone-deep tenderness for all the life around me, passing through its mortal cycles. It was perfect to be alive, be who I am, be a part of the vastness of Nature.
I must have been about eight.
And yet we have not, as a society, recognized the depth and wholeness of children during these early years. We take no steps to nurture their intrinsic spirituality, their creativity, their innate closeness to the natural. Instead as kids, we get bent out of shape being forced to fit into a system that doesn’t recognize children’s organic capacity to grow and learn, based on the nurturance of their inner life. It’s a tragic misdirection that splits the child apart, leaving the best parts to whither.
Sometimes kids get a toe hold on keeping themselves intact and growing. A passion. A love of an art, a sport, a place of their own inside. And reading books.
Never take books away from children. Never. They are a key to the kingdom of so many things. Humor. Solace. Compassion. Joy. Confirmation of one's experience and values. And of what not to do. They are friends and teachers, who open conversations.
Let’s let children teach us how they need to live and learn by accepting them as they are, and listening to their needs. Listen to your own heart; what, as a child, nurtured your growth? What did you learn that you still value?
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