How to Land Your Kid in Therapy

In her blog entitled “How to Land Your Kid in Therapy” Lori Gottlieb explained why many young adults were not always happy with their childhood experience. Although, many of these young adults seemed to be happy with their parents, yet something was still missing in their lives. One of her patients said, “I love my parents! I had a great childhood! I’ve got a good job! So why do I feel so lost?” According to Gottlieb’s explanation, their parents might have been too familiar with them or they might lack parents’ attunement. Instead, by giving their children freedom to “find themselves” many parents did not prepare them for life’s realities.

There is a common saying in Africa that it takes one person to give birth to a child, but the whole city is responsible for training this child. Parents are responsible for balancing their children’s behavior and providing for them their basic needs. It is not everything a child asks for that should be given to him/her. As adults, parents should know when to set limits for their children. Also to let them know that life does not provide one with everything one wants.

When I was six years old, I left my family to stay with my aunt. I am the third child in my family, and I have some younger ones after me. I was not solely responsible for their wellbeing because I had two elderly siblings taking care of us when my parents were not in. Living with my aunt, I became the first child because her children were younger than me. I learned how to manage a house, especially when my aunt and her husband were not in. I remembered her telling me “If you were not born, would you not come to this world?” That is, must I be taught everything? I learned how to take initiative and to make some decisions when they were not in. This helped me to learn how to take responsibilities for my actions.

I agree with Gottlieb’s assessment that parents are either too attuned to their children or lack attunement. You can always find such children among multitudes of people because they are not secure in themselves. Their parents had contributed so much to these children’s lack of self confidence. Therefore, these children began to look for solutions to their problems as adults, in other words, they landed in a therapist’s office.

Kenyon Commencement Speech

  

In his commencement address entitled “Kenyon Commencement Speech”, David Foster Wallance advised the Kenyon’s graduating class of 2005 to be strong as there were many challenges ahead of them. He said that it is true that they have learned many things during the course of their studies. Implementing these learnings would not be an easy task as they would be dealing with many people and difficult moments. He reminded them that they would not always get their way because they would not be the center of the world as they might think they were. Other people also are important. He emphasized that they need to learn some control over how and what they think about. This would help them in choosing what they pay attention to and to choose how they construct meaning from their life experiences.

School days are like theory periods, when one learns all the techniques and skills required to make things work. When one eventually finishes studying, then it would be time to implement everything one learned and to practice all the skills that they have acquired. This is not as simple as it sounds because one will be dealing with different people with different personalities. It is not possible to control these people like robots because they also have their feelings and the freedom that you have. They also want things to work out for them, just as I do for myself.

Five years ago, when I completed my initial training as a religious, I was sent to a new community to work there as the school Bursar. This was a time to implement all that I had learned. I had figure out in my head how I would cope in this new environment and practice all what I had been taught. It was not as simple as I had thought. I had to learn how to balance my work and my relationships with people I lived and worked with. Adjusting to this new environment and new job was so stressful for me at the beginning. Attending to so many people and their requests, being conscious of making many silly mistakes and doing some extra curriculum activities in the school clouded my mind. Gradually, I began to adjust and I was able to implement the skills I had learned during the course of my studies.

I really agree with Wallace because theory and practices are two difference things. It is enough to learn something in abstract, but to make them real is where the problem lies. I had to make a choice either to be happy or to be miserable because things did not always work out the way I would have wanted them. Life is always presenting us choices. What to choose does not depend solely on us, but everyone around us should be taken into account while deciding on the things to do.   

    

Old Faithful

Risk a wonderful spice of life

In his blog entitled “Old Faithful” David Sedaris described his marital life. Once he was in a relationship with someone, but after six years of courtship, they broke up. After losing his first boyfriend, he became uncertain if he would ever find a suitable partner again. His first relationship had been awkward when he found out that they were not a good match. He wanted somebody that would be faithful and caring. Taking another decision about his life partner was a difficult one for him. He eventually found a suitable match. Somebody Sedaris felt that they did have a lot in common, but he was not sure if their relationship would last. Of course it did last. They were both an old couple at the time he was recounting this story, taking care of each other and sharing in each other’s pain.

There are moments in our lives when we wonder if we would make a reasonable decision, a decision that would last. These are periods when we doubt if we had made the right decision or not. But we could never be sure what the outcome would be until we were able to take the risk and make up our minds to start somewhere. There are many questions that will not be answered in our life time. Such as how long one would live? Who would be one’s best and faithful friend? These could be called mysteries, but there will always be a need for one to take risks.

Before I joined religious life, I had a deep reflection on the life I was entering into. I made my decision despite the fact that I had no idea what life would hold for me. But I felt I had made the right decision and I was at peace. For people around me, it was a crazy decision that I had made. They kept asking me, “Are you going to spend the rest of your life serving others?” They were thinking about what I would have gained in the society and not what I could contribute to the society. For me, life is more than daily routine: live, reproduce and die! I have a passion for contributing positively to life, to help make our world a better place to live. I joined the order of the Sisters of Notre Dame de Namur because they have a similar vision with me. Their passion for education, especially the poor children and women who are the most marginalized in our society, motivated me. These are vowed women who have devoted their lives to prayer and service of others.

Just like Sedaris sharing his joys and pains with Hugh his partner, so also we share joyful and disappointing moments as we live together in a community making known to the people of our time that God is good.