Stepping out of the box

Here's an excerpt from a mini-article written by a newer unschooling mom. The whole post is available on Sandra's site here.

"For the first time, in what seems like my entire life, I am not terrified...

"My husband and I were talking about being put into the proverbial box (i.e. the 'school' box or the 'good little child' box or even the ‘good parent’ box) and he made an analogy that was quite startling to me. He said, 'It’s as if people start lopping off pieces of the child, in order, to fit them inside that very tiny box.' I had a disturbing image of pieces of myself lying outside my own box. I have been in that box since a very early age and only the label on the outside has changed. I was the Good Girl, the Good Student, and the Good Parent among other things. He asked, 'What if the best parts of us are lying outside that box?'

"I didn't even realize I was confined because I was put in there very early in my life. Even though the lid has been off for quite sometime now, I didn't know to get out. It makes me very sad to think that my fear has pushed me to confine my children the way I’ve been confined. I think of the pain caused by ‘lopping’ off parts of who they are just to fit some kind of ‘ideal’ that [is] not even beneficial to them and I’m so remorseful.

"So as of today, I am stepping out of my box..."

By jbantau