I did my overview of Flourish at co-op yesterday. The book was full of great, practical ideas, though it would have benefited from some editing. (The author said he started writing it while on vacation, and I believe it.)
Flourish outlines five areas that go into having a sense of well-being. These are:
Positive emotion -- happiness, pleasure and all that. Culturally this is largely where we are, goal-wise, and it's only a fraction of flourishing. I found it interesting that one of the conundrums that happiness researchers face is that as much as 80% of their results can be attributed to how the respondents are feeling on the day they take the survey. So measuring this is subjective, but still important.
Engagement -- pretty much what Csikszentmihalyi (love that name! no idea how to pronounce it) calls Flow. This is when your greatest strengths are fully 'on'; for a writer it's when the ideas are pouring out and the brain is working hard, for a 6yo boy it might mean being in the midst of a complex Lego project, for a dancer it's when the body is moving smoothly through complex choreography. In the midst of engagement you may not be thinking, "Oh, I'm so happy!" but that's because you're so in the moment that the satisfaction comes in retrospect. I think this is the area which technology depletes us the most, because the web allows us to trail our interests rather than develop our passions.
Relationships -- Even introverts need others. When I was in my 20s I traveled to Europe several times alone. I enjoyed the sights and the independence, but ultimately I stopped going. It wasn't the hardships that made the trips unsatisfying, but that when I saw something glorious or interesting there was no one with whom to share it. I need solitude, but without relationships it is empty. I recently read about a study that showed that too much dependence on virtual relationships creates social deficits because 80% of all human communication is non-verbal. If you're not seeing it, you're not completely getting it.
Meaning -- Having a story or purpose that's bigger than you are.
Achievement -- Getting something done or reaching a goal because you can brings its own satisfaction.
These five areas are nicknamed PERMA.
So here's the thing: ALL of these elements go into having a sense of well-being. Seligman is a psychologist, and he notes that in the early stages of his career he thought that if you were treating someone for depression and got the sadness to go away, you'd have a happy person. What he realized over time is that the absence of sadness and lethargy doesn't create a happy person but an empty person. We have to know how to fill our lives with richness in order to lead rich lives.
Interesting stuff. And it gets even more interesting when you use it as a framework for looking at your life -- and the lives of your children -- to see which areas need shoring up or further development.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Monday, February 13, 2012
A little bit older
I had a birthday today. It was neither a big deal nor a little one; I don't care much that I'm getting older, and I don't particularly want to be younger. It's good to be who you are. In general I think I'm very Julia. That makes me happy.
I was up early, because I had a good dream that appeared to be heading the wrong way (my plane was taking off and I realized I was outside on the wing), so I thought it was better to wake up. I lay in bed thinking about beginning a new year. I know better than to wish I knew what lay ahead. I mean, really. We've all BTDT, and I can tell you that if God ever sat me down and said, "Well, this year, Julia, you're going to deal with ___ and ___ and _____" I'd be screaming, "NO way can I do that! Not a chance!"
Except, of course, I can. And when I'm stuck with it, I do. And in the long run that's better, and I'm a better person because of it. Even if at the time it stinks.
I have two pieces of good news to report:
I was up early, because I had a good dream that appeared to be heading the wrong way (my plane was taking off and I realized I was outside on the wing), so I thought it was better to wake up. I lay in bed thinking about beginning a new year. I know better than to wish I knew what lay ahead. I mean, really. We've all BTDT, and I can tell you that if God ever sat me down and said, "Well, this year, Julia, you're going to deal with ___ and ___ and _____" I'd be screaming, "NO way can I do that! Not a chance!"
Except, of course, I can. And when I'm stuck with it, I do. And in the long run that's better, and I'm a better person because of it. Even if at the time it stinks.
I have two pieces of good news to report:
- At the last possible minute, Dancer was given a scholarship to the high school of her choice in EXACTLY the amount we needed, and
- Big Guy will have insurance again as of March 1. His case worker has filed to get him bumped up to the next level of care, too, which would give him a Medicaid disability waiver and a number of in-home services. That could be good.
My mom sent me a box with the two things I'd asked for: vacuum cleaner bags and a pair of jeans.
And so the day ends with much to be thankful for. I am content, and older, and still staggering along the trail of sanity. Here's hoping the same is true for you.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
Stuff
Little Guy decided he wanted to buy another BeyBlade top today. We had a discussion about the wisdom (or lack thereof) of spending $45 on a toy that will probably be popular for another two months. He conceded that it would be better to go to Target and get a garden-variety BeyBlade. On sale. So we walked Snuggler up to play rehearsal (which runs 2:30-6pm today, and again tomorrow), and kept walking.
It's 1.98 miles from our house to Target, according to Google Maps Distance Calculator. We got there and bought the top, and Little Guy said he wasn't sure his legs were up to walking home. While we were waiting for the bus I opened my wallet and realized that another family member had neglected to replace my transit card yesterday. So we walked back anyway, a bit more slowly than we'd walked before.
A top is small. It has a limited number of parts. We can find a home for it, even in the boys' room. But in general, my tolerance for further acquisitions is limited. After 15 years of living in the same 1200 square feet I am ready to jettison any toy I step on. I fantasize of sending the family away and renting a dumpster. I could discard a bag or three of belongings every day for a month and feel no regret. Given a three-fold increase in income, I would spend it primarily on donations, food and activities: things I don't have to store anywhere except in my belly or brain.
So dare I admit that my bedtime reading at the moment is Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things? (It's a library book; I did not buy it.) If you click on the link and scroll down the Amazon page, there are nine photos that act as a scale for assessing hoarding problems. After I got over the eye-popping disbelief, I found the pictures soothing. Perhaps my life is more under control than I thought.
It's 1.98 miles from our house to Target, according to Google Maps Distance Calculator. We got there and bought the top, and Little Guy said he wasn't sure his legs were up to walking home. While we were waiting for the bus I opened my wallet and realized that another family member had neglected to replace my transit card yesterday. So we walked back anyway, a bit more slowly than we'd walked before.
A top is small. It has a limited number of parts. We can find a home for it, even in the boys' room. But in general, my tolerance for further acquisitions is limited. After 15 years of living in the same 1200 square feet I am ready to jettison any toy I step on. I fantasize of sending the family away and renting a dumpster. I could discard a bag or three of belongings every day for a month and feel no regret. Given a three-fold increase in income, I would spend it primarily on donations, food and activities: things I don't have to store anywhere except in my belly or brain.
So dare I admit that my bedtime reading at the moment is Stuff: Compulsive Hoarding and the Meaning of Things? (It's a library book; I did not buy it.) If you click on the link and scroll down the Amazon page, there are nine photos that act as a scale for assessing hoarding problems. After I got over the eye-popping disbelief, I found the pictures soothing. Perhaps my life is more under control than I thought.
Smart but scattered
Since we're thinking about sending Snuggler to school next year, my to-do list this winter includes getting a good handle on the ADHD. At home we can work around (and with) it, structuring the day in bursts of work that map well to attention span. While that is a functional approach here, it's not going to help Snuggler stay on task for six hours a day in a classroom.
I picked up a book from the library recently called Smart But Scattered. This title is my child in a nutshell. Bright as can be, creative, interesting, insightful... but her mind jumps from idea to idea. I have seen her walk across the room with wooden blocks in her hand, think of something else, drop the blocks and not notice the clatter because her brain is focused elsewhere. It's mindboggling. Forget being able to follow two or three-part commands; we're still in the touch-and-make-eye-contact stage for simple requests.
But on some things Snuggler can focus for long periods of time; she can read four books in a day or spend an hour or more on an art project. Last night she used wooden blocks and little figurines to create LaGuardia High School for the Animals. She can write complex stories and is a natural team player, managing group work with ease. She's a curious mix of attention and inattention, highly inconsistent.
Or maybe not. I opened Smart But Scattered and did the assessment quiz for Snuggler (there are different versions for various age groups), which breaks out executive function issues into sub-groups: response inhibition, working memory, emotional control, sustained attention, and seven other categories. This is fantastic. For it turns out that executive function isn't an all-or-nothing issue. My child has strengths as well as weaknesses. Afterwards I did the same kind of quiz for myself, to see where my strengths match or complement my child's, and where our weaknesses overlap. It's a start.
I was setting up a neurologist appointment recently for Snuggler (we need to explore the possibility of neurofibromatosis), and got to talking with my pediatrician's office person. Her son is Snuggler's age and has ADHD, or what sounded like ADHHHHHHHHHD. We don't have the hyperactivity at our house, just the inattention. Same brain region, different issues.
As this woman and I talked about how to get an IEP and she said, "I don't want him getting a label!" I smiled and said, as gently as possible, "But you just said everyone at school has already given him one: 'the annoying kid'! Better to have a label that gets him the accommodations he needs."
I've written about labels before. Sometimes they help.
I picked up a book from the library recently called Smart But Scattered. This title is my child in a nutshell. Bright as can be, creative, interesting, insightful... but her mind jumps from idea to idea. I have seen her walk across the room with wooden blocks in her hand, think of something else, drop the blocks and not notice the clatter because her brain is focused elsewhere. It's mindboggling. Forget being able to follow two or three-part commands; we're still in the touch-and-make-eye-contact stage for simple requests.
But on some things Snuggler can focus for long periods of time; she can read four books in a day or spend an hour or more on an art project. Last night she used wooden blocks and little figurines to create LaGuardia High School for the Animals. She can write complex stories and is a natural team player, managing group work with ease. She's a curious mix of attention and inattention, highly inconsistent.
Or maybe not. I opened Smart But Scattered and did the assessment quiz for Snuggler (there are different versions for various age groups), which breaks out executive function issues into sub-groups: response inhibition, working memory, emotional control, sustained attention, and seven other categories. This is fantastic. For it turns out that executive function isn't an all-or-nothing issue. My child has strengths as well as weaknesses. Afterwards I did the same kind of quiz for myself, to see where my strengths match or complement my child's, and where our weaknesses overlap. It's a start.
* * * * *
I was setting up a neurologist appointment recently for Snuggler (we need to explore the possibility of neurofibromatosis), and got to talking with my pediatrician's office person. Her son is Snuggler's age and has ADHD, or what sounded like ADHHHHHHHHHD. We don't have the hyperactivity at our house, just the inattention. Same brain region, different issues.
As this woman and I talked about how to get an IEP and she said, "I don't want him getting a label!" I smiled and said, as gently as possible, "But you just said everyone at school has already given him one: 'the annoying kid'! Better to have a label that gets him the accommodations he needs."
I've written about labels before. Sometimes they help.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
Our homeschool co-op
Someone wrote and asked about our weekly homeschool co-op. Here's the skinny:
We have seventeen families, with 45 or so kids in grades 3-8. Every child takes writing and an elective. Over the years the electives have included documentary production, logic, electronic art, hands-on geography (with water tables and scale models), urban planning, stage combat, Shakespeare, and stop-motion animation. This term's options include chess, film analysis, art, and debate. Interesting stuff, classes we'd probably travel to participate in, but are relieved to coordinate in one place at a reasonable price. There is a math team (MOEMS) for 4th and 5th grade girls and a visual math class and a chorus after lunch.
We hire teachers for each class. I particularly value this for writing, because by the time a child reaches age ten I think it's hard for parents to teach writing. That has nothing to do with parental ability, and everything to do with the fact that writing is inherently personal. No matter what the topic and no matter how objective a mom may be, a kid is going to take a mom-critique too personally. It's life.
I like having hired teachers because it allows my kids to work with adults who aren't Mom. They learn with the same group of children from week to week. Invariably there's a kid who is disruptive, one who can't keep up, and another who's way ahead of the crowd. This is good: learning to deal with annoying people is a life skill one can't live without, and learning where you fit on the yardstick of ability is useful, too.
One of the less-spoken-of benefits of co-op, though, is the benefit to the mothers. While the kids are in class we have chatting time and book groups and parenting discussions. Next week, for example, I'm going to present the ideas in Martin Seligman's new book about the research on what one can do to foster a sense of well-being in life. My book group just finished reading Conversations With Great Teachers.
When your child is very young you know you need a support group; when your kids are pre-teens it's far less likely you'll still have one. But whether you homeschool or not, it's important to have friends off of whom to bounce key questions like "How much of this is normal adolescence, and how much of it is that we need to see a psychiatrist tomorrow?" I get that kind of feedback at co-op. It's a good thing.
As for the logistics, you need a core group of 3-5 people to figure out the basic structure, and to do the planning and scheduling. There are other groups for planning speakers for moms, hiring teachers, coordinating payments, setting up a refreshment schedule and so on. Pretty much every mom has some job; it is a co-op, after all!
We have seventeen families, with 45 or so kids in grades 3-8. Every child takes writing and an elective. Over the years the electives have included documentary production, logic, electronic art, hands-on geography (with water tables and scale models), urban planning, stage combat, Shakespeare, and stop-motion animation. This term's options include chess, film analysis, art, and debate. Interesting stuff, classes we'd probably travel to participate in, but are relieved to coordinate in one place at a reasonable price. There is a math team (MOEMS) for 4th and 5th grade girls and a visual math class and a chorus after lunch.
We hire teachers for each class. I particularly value this for writing, because by the time a child reaches age ten I think it's hard for parents to teach writing. That has nothing to do with parental ability, and everything to do with the fact that writing is inherently personal. No matter what the topic and no matter how objective a mom may be, a kid is going to take a mom-critique too personally. It's life.
I like having hired teachers because it allows my kids to work with adults who aren't Mom. They learn with the same group of children from week to week. Invariably there's a kid who is disruptive, one who can't keep up, and another who's way ahead of the crowd. This is good: learning to deal with annoying people is a life skill one can't live without, and learning where you fit on the yardstick of ability is useful, too.
One of the less-spoken-of benefits of co-op, though, is the benefit to the mothers. While the kids are in class we have chatting time and book groups and parenting discussions. Next week, for example, I'm going to present the ideas in Martin Seligman's new book about the research on what one can do to foster a sense of well-being in life. My book group just finished reading Conversations With Great Teachers.
When your child is very young you know you need a support group; when your kids are pre-teens it's far less likely you'll still have one. But whether you homeschool or not, it's important to have friends off of whom to bounce key questions like "How much of this is normal adolescence, and how much of it is that we need to see a psychiatrist tomorrow?" I get that kind of feedback at co-op. It's a good thing.
As for the logistics, you need a core group of 3-5 people to figure out the basic structure, and to do the planning and scheduling. There are other groups for planning speakers for moms, hiring teachers, coordinating payments, setting up a refreshment schedule and so on. Pretty much every mom has some job; it is a co-op, after all!
Saturday, February 4, 2012
Handling disappointment
Snuggler choked on her middle school entrance exam today. The first section was speed multiplication, 50 problems in three minutes. As homeschoolers, we have never done this. Fluency in calculations is necessary for math, but there are calculators for that kind of speed. And besides, computation is a lousy measure of mathematic ability; there are excellent mathematicians who stink at addition and subtraction. Eldest can vouch for that!
At any rate, Snuggler freaked, and after those first three minutes had a hard time gathering her wits. She made some foolish mistakes on the rest of the math section. Then there were three essays, all of which it sounds like she aced. But the school she wants to attend focuses on math, science and engineering. And all her friends thought the math was easy. And she is devastated at the thought that they will get to go to this terrific school, and she will not. So this afternoon she sobbed for a while, then went off to be alone. Then she came back in for a hug, then retreated. Then there were more tears. And so on.
If I didn't have to hold it together to help my child, I think I would cry: I hate to see her hurt so much. I hate to see her writhe this way, to feel so terribly bad. And while I know it's not over 'til it's over (and we've got a long wait, for we won't find out until late May or early June) in a way it's better to assume the worst, and let it be what it is.
I remind myself that my job is not to try to make her feel better right now. My job is to let her feel her feelings, and to empathize with them. My job is to make sure she's handling the disappointment in a healthy way. My job is to love her and guide her through the lousiness so that she knows that disappointment passes, and pain passes, and hurt heals, and most setbacks in life -- even the hard ones -- are situations from which we can recover.
It's a stinky job. But the payoff is this: tonight she came in for another snuggle, and as she started to cry she said, "Oh Mommy! I feel so stupid... even though I know I'm not!"
That sounds pretty darn healthy way to me. And I'm so proud of her for that. Even though she did just come in again, at nearly 10pm, in tears.
Thursday, February 2, 2012
In which I go all theological on you
I'm a big believer in paying attention to the good things in life. Not because I'm a Pollyanna, but because I'm not: there are times when negative emotions will grab your life and run with it, if you let them. The way to stop that is to work at seeing -- and remembering -- the good stuff in each day. After all, it's there. Somewhere.
Most days, taking note of the positives adds enough perspective to tone the negatives down to a manageable level. This is true even when you've got a 15 year old in Major Depression with no health insurance, an unemployed husband, uncertainty over where your kids will go to school, perplexity over how you're going to make ends meet, and the emotional tenor of the family seems to vary between frazzled and freaked out.
But this past week remembering the good things wasn't enough, and I had a handful of rough days. Bleak, dark, heavy days. Days when it seemed like the troubles were endless and insolvable and I was going to crack. One morning I said,"Lord, I feel like I've forgotten how to succeed." I got an answer to that right away. It was, "That's okay. There are other things you can learn now."
Sigh.
This is why faith is good for you. In its own weird way, it helps.
On top of everything else on my plate, on February first I was scheduled for jury duty. I haven't had to go since I sat on a Federal jury for three solid months, back when I was single. But since we won't be homeschooling next year, I didn't feel I could ask for an exemption. So I was planning on serving... up until last Thursday, when I realized that this was a really, really bad time to lose a couple of days. I went online to reschedule, only to discover that I needed to have postponed a week in advance. Missed it by a day.
Andrew told me I could still go in person to postpone, so on Wednesday I dragged myself downtown to the Supreme Court building. I was almost there when I realized a) I was 15 minutes early, and b) a lovely church was nearby. I detoured to the church, which is one about which I have particular memories, and went in for ten minutes. It was so unbelievably quiet that the silence muffled even the cacophony in my head.
I sat in a pew and stared rather blankly at the front of the church, letting nothing fill my mind. It was great. It was like breathing again. After a while my eyes started to focus, and this is what I saw:
I mused for a bit on how, when one looks at a cross, one sees different things at different times. If you are Protestant and look at a crucifix, you are struck by how stark and uncomfortable it is. If you are a Catholic and look at a plain cross, you are struck by its emptiness. And on this morning I was struck by the shadows. For look: the shadows are different than the cross itself.
I looked at the shadows, and realized that though the shadows were created by the crucifix, they were actually a lumpy shape. They were related, but not the same. And I wondered how many times we think we have our eyes fixed fully on Christ and instead are focused on his shadow. We're close, but not as close as we think.
I wondered how many times we try to take up the shadow of our crosses instead of the crosses we're given, and then we wonder why we struggle.
I wondered at how many things there are to wonder about with the cross, while it hangs there: silent, waiting, hoping, blessing.
And then I smiled in the silence, and said a prayer, and went off to wait in line to see the County Clerk to postpone my jury duty. And instead of feeling like I'd crammed something else into my day, I felt as if the world was light again. And there was hope.
But this past week remembering the good things wasn't enough, and I had a handful of rough days. Bleak, dark, heavy days. Days when it seemed like the troubles were endless and insolvable and I was going to crack. One morning I said,"Lord, I feel like I've forgotten how to succeed." I got an answer to that right away. It was, "That's okay. There are other things you can learn now."
Sigh.
This is why faith is good for you. In its own weird way, it helps.
On top of everything else on my plate, on February first I was scheduled for jury duty. I haven't had to go since I sat on a Federal jury for three solid months, back when I was single. But since we won't be homeschooling next year, I didn't feel I could ask for an exemption. So I was planning on serving... up until last Thursday, when I realized that this was a really, really bad time to lose a couple of days. I went online to reschedule, only to discover that I needed to have postponed a week in advance. Missed it by a day.
 |
| The church, not the court |
I mused for a bit on how, when one looks at a cross, one sees different things at different times. If you are Protestant and look at a crucifix, you are struck by how stark and uncomfortable it is. If you are a Catholic and look at a plain cross, you are struck by its emptiness. And on this morning I was struck by the shadows. For look: the shadows are different than the cross itself.
I looked at the shadows, and realized that though the shadows were created by the crucifix, they were actually a lumpy shape. They were related, but not the same. And I wondered how many times we think we have our eyes fixed fully on Christ and instead are focused on his shadow. We're close, but not as close as we think.
I wondered how many times we try to take up the shadow of our crosses instead of the crosses we're given, and then we wonder why we struggle.
I wondered at how many things there are to wonder about with the cross, while it hangs there: silent, waiting, hoping, blessing.
And then I smiled in the silence, and said a prayer, and went off to wait in line to see the County Clerk to postpone my jury duty. And instead of feeling like I'd crammed something else into my day, I felt as if the world was light again. And there was hope.
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