2020: a year of disintegration

dis.in.te.grate
/dis’in(t)ə,grat/

verb
break up into small parts, typically as the result of impact or decay

Anyone else feel the impact and/or decay of the year 2020? Please tell me I’m not alone in feeling like all of my insides and outsides, my mind and my soul have been broken up into small parts as a result of the ginormous collision of all the worlds’ ills within a mere 12 months.

It's been a year. A year that’s inspired pretty snowflake Christmas ornaments laced with the f-bomb. We all know the global events that have inspired these dainty baubles, so no need for me to list them out here, but without exaggeration we can claim to have lived through a year that has quite literally, and I do mean the literal definition of literally, brought every social scourge to the surface. It’s been a year when all the -isms have refused to stay quietly obscured and have demanded we take a position to act or not act while looking them straight in the eye. A year when every U.S. institution has been ripped open to show the skeletons desperate to remain hidden in the closets. Oh, and there’s been this crazy new disease spreading around the world, too.

One would think that life would take pity on us all and eliminate all the typical sufferings of being human, but nope. People are still being diagnosed with cancer. Babies are being miscarried. Psychotic breaks are still happening. Personally, I’ve seen my entire daily life disintegrate over the past 12 months. Pending divorce. Moving my business. Restructuring my business. Appliances and cars dying. Revisiting past traumas. Avoiding writing and podcasting. My entire worldview disintegrated.

It's been a heavy year. It’s been a dark year. It’s been a painfully good year.

In 1964, polish psychologist, Kasimierz Dabrowski, published his theory of positive disintegration. Essentially, he posited that in order for advancement and development and growth to occur, a person first needs to go through a phase of disintegration. Everything that person believes and understands needs to be broken into small parts in order for it to be rebuilt and addended to create a higher sense of the world, of the individual, and of the individual’s place in the world. Before we can grow, we must first fall apart.

This has been a new theory for psychology, not such a new concept for philosophy and religion and nature. The birthing of a butterfly requires the disintegration of the caterpillar. The birthing of a plant requires the disintegration of the seed. Jesus said, “Very truly, I tell you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but if it dies, it bears much fruit (John 12.24). Gautama Buddha said, “Just as a snake sheds its skin, we must shed our past over and over again.”

The first steps of healing a wound, physical or otherwise, is to debride it. To clean out the infected tissues, beliefs, behaviors. This is painful, but without debridement, new and healthy tissue and mindsets cannot grow and therefore wounds cannot heal.

2020 has been painful. All that we have known has been disintegrating before our eyes. And it has been necessary. In the midst of the pain and discomfort, we must remember that we are positively disintegrating. We have to let our former ways fall apart, so in the rubble we can find the pieces we want to hold on to and rebuild something more beautiful, more enlightened, more well.

No one knows when this time will come, but there will be a time when we will stop disintegrating and begin to reintegrate. There will be a time when our collective trauma ceases and we will be left to collectively create new meaning. This is a time of hope. This is a time of required collapse and exciting opportunity.

Yes, 2020 has disintegrated into a shiny f-bomb ornament inspiring monstrosity. Thank f*%# for that.

I am grateful to be rejoining my online friends and colleagues in Hoagies’ Gifted BlogHops. Check out their interpretations of 2020 here.

7 Ways to Support Our Compassionate, Justice-Minded Kiddos

Look at any list of “gifted traits” and you’ll see intense emotions, sensitive, empathetic, strong sense of justice and right and wrong.  So many of our kiddos can see bigger and feel bigger and this leads to them having an acute sense of compassion and understanding of the many injustices of our world.  To help our kids move from empathetic, understanding people, to people who may actually change the world, they need our guidance.  Here are 7 steps that may help.

1.       Help them regulate their emotions.   Being aware of injustice, pain, and suffering triggers a multitude of intense emotions.  Some kids feel intense sadness or fear.  Others feel anger or hopelessness.  It is crucial that we, first and foremost, help our children identify, express, and manage these emotions.  When our bodies and minds are hijacked by emotions, our actions become ineffective.  It does not help homeless animals find care and shelter if we are overwhelmed and crying in the corner.  Angry outbursts do nothing to increase access to potable water around the world.  Of course, your children will feel these emotions.  If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be motivated to help.  But, they need us to teach them the skills to feel their emotions, allow space to get them out, and then productively channel this emotional energy toward solutions.

2.       Transform Guilt to Gratitude.  As children become more acutely aware of their privileges and compare their lives to the lives of less privileged people, the emotion of guilt can often be triggered.  Guilt can be a helpful emotion when it results from specific behaviors an individual has done which have been harmful.  I feel guilty when I yell at my children.  That guilt motivates me to better regulate my own emotions so I yell less often.  However, guilt is misplaced when it results from something in which we’d had no control.  Feeling guilty for missing an important meeting because you were ill is futile.  Feeling guilty that you happened to be born into a stable, middle class family serves no purpose.  Help your children transform any guilt into gratitude.  It is possible to both appreciate your own life’s advantages and understand that others do not have these same advantages.  Not only is it possible, but to be of any real help in correcting our world’s injustices, it is necessary.  Only when we appreciate our privilege can we fully use it to advocate for the underprivileged. 

3.      Listen to Them.  Kids’ voices can easily be dismissed or minimized.  Generally, because they bring up huge, complex issues at the least convenient times.  My mind was not prepared to discuss what it feels like to die with my 3 year old as I was driving through a snowstorm.  Nor was I prepared to discuss the causes of food insecurity while checking out library books.  It is far easier to give a short answer or an “I don’t know” or “You don’t have to worry about that” than it is to actually listen, validate, and engage in deep, critical thinking.  But, our kids need it.  It does little to ease their anxieties or compassion to say, “you’re too young to worry about that” or “that’s for adults to think about, you just be a kid.”  We need to actively listen to their thoughts and concerns.  We need to help them find answers to their questions.  If we quiet their voices by not listening, it won’t actually quiet their concerns.  They’ll only be left to deal with them on their own without adult guidance.  That said, it is also important to teach them the appropriate times and places to have these conversations.  So, as your child brings up homelessness while you’re on the phone, tell them they’ll have to wait, but then come back to the conversation when you’re able.

4.      Provide Reassurance.  Our kids often have amazing imaginations.  Which is great.  Until it isn’t.  Their brains can identify a real need or concern in the world, and then their imaginations can run wild with it.  They can be consumed with imagining what it’d be like to actually be homeless.  They can imagine that the world will end in 5 days due to global warming.  They can vividly picture the spread of a fatal illness and the death and destruction left in its wake.  We need to help our children rein in their imaginations and provide logical reflection to their concerns.

5.      Help them Narrow Their Focus.  A child who notices suffering will notice lots of suffering.  A child who notices injustice will see injustice of all types.  They will be concerned about healthcare and the environment and animals and race relations and housing equality and free trade and child slavery and mental health and, and, and . . .  This becomes overwhelming.  It is not only okay, but necessary, that we all choose a small amount of issues for which we will be strong advocates.  We do not have the energy, stamina, or ability to work to change every wrong that is in the world.  We have to choose our focus and trust that others will focus on the other things.  Of course, we can still take small steps to be responsible, but we must be good stewards of our energy and skills.  I will recycle, but I am not skilled or passionate enough about the environment to take it on as my “issue”.  Instead, I will focus on promoting mental health and relational well-being.  I will invest my energy and time into that and trust that others of you will be focusing on healing our environment.

6.      Help Them Define Action Steps.  Truthfully, we can feel extremely helpless when we face our larger social issues square in the eyes.  Combating childhood cancer can seem impossible.  Encouraging acceptance of neurodiversity seems daunting.  The most solid way to combat feelings of helplessness is to find a way to help.  Help your child identify their larger goal and then smaller steps they can actively do to reach that larger goal.  Think of questions or obstacles they might not have thought of and help them find solutions. 

7.      Believe in Them.  They need you to have confidence in them.  They need you to be their cheerleader.  They need you to reassure them that they are loved and worthwhile whether their solution or project is “successful” or not.  Give them the courage to go out and make a difference.  Our children are the innovators.  They are the idealistic dreamers.  And they can be the world changers.

 Looking for more ways to support your child activist?  Check out the other posts on this topic at this month's Hoagies' Gifted Blog Hop!

Accelerating to What?

As a high school student, I didn’t really understand that my math education was “accelerated.”  I knew that once a week a small group of my friends and I traveled to a nearby university and spent the afternoon with a college mathematics professor.  I knew that we covered 4 years of high school math in 2 years.  And I knew that I enjoyed getting out of a few regular high school classes while I made the weekly math jaunt.

I also knew that I was supposed to be covering much of the material independently during the week between classes.  I knew that it was supposed to be more rigorous and challenging because the pace was accelerated.  I knew that I didn’t crack the textbook on any day other than “math day”.  I knew that I completed my homework on the thirty minute bus trip each week.  I knew how to balance my notebook in just the correct position so my penmanship didn’t reflect the bumps and jostles of the bus.  I knew that I passed the 2 years doing the bare minimum without putting a dent in my 4.0 gpa.

Why do I bring this up?  Certainly not because I’m bragging or feeling better than anyone else.  I bring it up to point out the limitations of acceleration if we are only accelerating gifted students into more of the same type of academics.  The problem with gifted education is not simply the pace.  It is the lack of depth that is missing.  It is teaching to a test when gifted students want (and need) to follow their deep and inquisitive thoughts down rabbit holes to discover new information, new ways of thinking, new connections, new ideas and innovations that couldn’t possibly be on the test because they’re brand spanking new.

I had one little guy, about 8 years old, in my office.  He informed me that school was really stupid.  When I asked him why, he said that today he had to begin working on a writing assignment which involved gluing words in place, but he was only allowed to temporarily place the words correctly because tomorrow’s assignment was to actually glue them.  He said, “Heather, it was the stupidest thing.  I put the words in place in about five minutes, then I had to take it all apart, just so I can redo the work tomorrow.”  But then, as though he could read my thoughts about talking to his teacher to find more challenging assignments, he quickly stated, “But, you CAN’T tell anybody that I got it done so fast.  You CAN’T tell anybody that it’s easy for me, because then I’ll just have to do more!”

More of the same isn’t helpful.  More or faster paced of the same isn’t helpful.  For the most part, our current education system in the US isn’t meeting the needs of our gifted learners.  And giving them more of that is simply not going to be the answer.  Gifted children learn in different ways than the norm.  They need to be challenged and to be allowed to ask questions and to be allowed to dig as deep as their brains can take them. 

That little 8 year old understood very early that he needs to hide his intelligence for fear of being moved into doing more of the same meaningless work.  Is that the message we really want our brightest minds to be sent?  I know that the only thing I truly learned from my accelerated Math class was that I could get away with doing the bare minimum.  And I certainly wasn’t the only person sitting in the back of the bus completing that week’s assignments.  Is that the message we really want our brightest minds to take on?  It doesn’t matter if you’re challenged, just do the minimum and get the grade?

Accelerate or don’t accelerate, for gifted kids in a broken system, the end result will be roughly the same.

This blog is part of Hoagie's October 2016 bloghop.  Check out more great posts about acceleration here.