Except me

For the past couple of years on this blog, I've been writing about accepting people as they are. During that same timeframe, I've been doing some work on accepting myself as I am. I have a ways to go there. You see, acceptance applies to everyone but me. I must be perfect.
I have no idea what the hell "perfect" is except that I know when I'm not being that. Which is often.

Recently I've been putting in very long days at work. They start at 6:30 a.m. and, counting commute and the occasional hour of so-called downtime (when my brain remains dominated by work thoughts), they end at about 11 p.m. I'm doing the work of two people, and I'm doing it damned well.

But I'm short on sleep, and I'm tired, and most nights I go to bed feeling like an utter failure because there is always so much that didn't get done that day. The work is never done, and my personal commitments are suffering. I have nothing left for my family except snarky comments about the housework that didn't get done while I was working. The only one who gets any quality time is Rigby, and that's because she attacks me or cuddles with me until I pay attention to her. (That's the solution, Frank and MJ and Chloe and Emma: pounce on my feet or get in my face if you want some time from me.)

I suck, and I refuse to accept that this is Who I Am.

Let's try that again. I don't suck. But I'm ridiculously human. And accepting me for Who I Am is a process rather than a switch I can flip.

That's true with the kids too, of course. They are also human, with foibles and preferences and habits and their own varying capacity for daily accomplishment. Living with them involves some daily adjustment of my expectations and my attitude. But I don't look at, for instance, Chloe's foibles and preferences and habits and accomplishments and think, "She sucks." I don't think, "There she goes again, being imperfect." And I don't qualify "human" with "ridiculously" when I talk about her humanness. Only my humanness is ridiculous in degree.

I'm special that way.

For the last couple months, I've been doing this thing where I take those "special" thoughts in my head and amplify them by saying them out loud. I am trying to hear myself better, trying to hear how hard I am on myself. What's been the most illuminating about this practice is how very distressing my family members find it when they hear me say these things. They find them vicious and frightening and cause for immediate remediation, not of anything I've done or failed to do but of the underlying belief that I'm expressing.

They are horrible beliefs.

What gets really tricky is that accepting myself as I am includes accepting that I have them.

I expect perfection in/of myself. And that's okay.
I am really hard on myself. And that's okay.
I can practice loving-kindness with everyone but me. And that's okay.
I have less time for my personal life when work is busy. And that's okay.

Except none of those is really okay. They are all things I'd like to improve. And that's okay too.

This acceptance business ain't for sissies.

Avoiding zombies

The other night, Frank was watching that new zombie series on AMC, "The Walking Dead." At one point, a ~10yo boy spots his zombified mother outside the house. He bursts into tears, and his father tries to quiet him because, hey, if the zombies hear them, things are going to get ugly. What was interesting was that the scriptwriters chose to have the father respond compassionately. He snuggled his son close, spoke in loving tones, and offered the boy a pillow so he could cry into that.

That is peaceful parenting, folks, and I am so pleased with the writers for showing it that I might even give the series a try, blood and guts and all.

The sad thing is how infrequently one sees that kind of compassion out and about in the world. Instead, it seems like people want their kids to BE zombies, stifling their emotions and walking the earth in a mindless, hungry shuffle. Their kids' emotions (and probably the parent's too) are too much work, too much noise, too much mess. Sure, they might dredge up some compassion when their kids are suffering a huge, gaping wound of a hurt (as this boy was), but the rest of the time they just want their kids to suck it up and move on. They want things to be easy, which means they want their kids to be quiet (without having a fraction the motivation this dad had).

Consider the possibility that, to kids, smaller wounds are just as gaping and scary and overwhelming. Consider that kids with smaller wounds are just as deserving of compassion as that boy with the zombie mom, and that they are just as entitled to some time and space to feel what they're feeling. And consider that asking them to bottle their emotions is just another way to lose them to the zombies.

The joy of being uncomfortable

It is natural to want to avoid discomfort. We shy away (literally or figuratively), change the subject, change the situation, change the channel, change something and make it quick! Most of us have very little experience with simply experiencing discomfort.

And then we become parents, and we discover that, what do you know, parenting is not terribly comfortable. True to form, we get very busy trying to make it comfortable. Change this, change that, change the child, control, control, control, busy, busy, busy.

And maybe it works for a while. Maybe. But what so many people seem never to notice is that any brief victory that we achieve over parental discomfort is fleeting (and probably artificial). By the next day—hell, by the next minute—a new uncomfortable situation has arisen.

When I look back on my control days, I see a long and painful series of attempts to avoid discomfort:

Kid with messy hair = discomfort. Kid with messy hair who resists having her hair brushed and who is going OUT IN PUBLIC = mega discomfort. Battle ensues, "willful" child is subdued and rats are vanquished, discomfort is avoided (unless you count that whole long ordeal with getting the hair brushed) and Mom is victorious. Yay! Cue the triumphant trumpets.

And then that same child wants juice for lunch. Yes, just juice. Battle ensues, etc.

And then that same child wants to stay up past her bedtime. Way past her bedtime. Battle ensues, etc.

It was neverending. And folks, those were the EASY issues. Fast forward a few years, and now my parental discomfort is about late nights out, and driving solo, and sexuality, and alcohol, and Decisions About the Future, and oh my freaking god, MOVING OUT...

What I wouldn't give for some ratty hair to contend with!

But at some point, fortunately well before we got to the teen years, I learned something really, really important to peaceful parenting:

I can survive being uncomfortable.

My discomfort is not something that I have to do anything about. I do not have to react to it. It can just be there, in the background, held at least somewhat separate from my interactions with my kids. (I provided one example of what this looks like here.)

And do you know what? Being uncomfortable is really not that bad. It is not the Big Scary Monster that it seems, that our instincts and habits and culture make it seem. It's just an emotion, and it can be coped with.

What's more, it can be embraced. When I feel parental discomfort, it is a signal that my child is making her own choices just like I want her to do. My child is experiencing freedom and adventure and independence just like I want her to do.

So, I breathe, and I breathe some more. And then I settle into the joy and privilege of observing the life that my child is creating for herself.