I am delighted to share another beautiful submission to the Monk in the World guest post series from the community. Read on for Laurie vandenHurk’s reflection Mindfulness of everyday life – caring for children.
Quote: Thich Nhat Hanh, “If you touch one thing with deep awareness you touch everything.” (1.)
“Look out,” said the sign, so Jasper stopped to look out at the view. I stopped too. As I waited for Jasper, I felt a call to wake up and look out, to come out of my interior funk/fog and be present, mindful and fully embodied in the moment.
Last summer we had a working holiday, (read holy-days). We took our grandchildren camping and hiking. It was a holy time because hiking in the wilderness grounds and connects me with the vastness, beauty and power of the Ever-Creating Spirit. It was a mindful time because the intensity of child care forced me be to be fully present in the moment. There was no time or energy for anything else.
Our spiritual practices need to fit our lives and work for us. The Holy One is available and accessible to all, and not just to intellectuals, or to those whose time of life or vocation allow for sitting in silence. Healthy spirituality is not about achievement; rather, it is being open to the gifts of life. Hiking with the grandchildren helped me to recognize spiritual practices that open me to gifts of life.
Trappist and Benedictine monks consider their daily work to be part of their spiritual discipline. Hiking, like walking, jogging, dancing, gardening, farming, TaiChi and so on are also embodied spiritual practices. My usual morning spiritual practice is meditation on Scripture which is not at all embodied. On the trail I use all my senses. Sometimes it feels good; sometimes it is uncomfortable, like when my shoes and socks are soaked through with rain. Part of the spiritual practice is to be aware and open to the sensations.
For the space of the hours I spend with children, I recognize that I am totally mindful and engaged. Child-care is an exercise in mindfulness. During our hike-camp I was reminded how much energy it takes for parents to be present and attentive 24/7. It has been many years since we had the full-time care of young children and I found my usual spiritual practices not fitting with the full immersion into childcare. For my peace of mind, I needed some strategies for dealing with conflict and wounded pride.
I re-visited that classic parenting book, “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk.” (2) Their philosophy resonates with me: children are real people with legitimate reasons for their behaviour. Relating to children requires listening, imagination, understanding and empathy. A key take-away for me is “ears can’t hear until emotions are accepted.”
Spiritual practices across traditions give insight on practicing this simple understanding. Non-attachment taught in Buddhism does NOT mean we are not attached and don’t care about our children. Rather it means that our children’s fears, wounds, dreams and victories are not ours. By removing our own emotions from a situation, we are better able to hear our children and accept their emotions. Obvious, but still true, humour helps diffuse a tense situation.
Classic teachings on meditation encourage practitioners to sit in silence. Thomas Keating recommends twenty minutes of silence twice a day. (3.) Even 20 minutes of uninterrupted silence is unrealistic for many parents of young children. Some of us will brush off the value of this practice. Others will feel worse about themselves because they can’t achieve it. There is a middle way which is to recognize and use the silence of moments. Mental health practitioners and others encourage us to notice and pause in the moment between a stimulus and a response.
Between every screaming child and my reaction there is a fraction of a moment. In the same way we tell children to count to ten before lashing out in anger, spiritual wisdom encourages us to live into that moment, that pause. The goal and hope is to remove my wounded pride from my reactions so I can respond to a child’s pain and not the chaos they’ve created in my space.
When I step back, I am able to observe my grandparenting with coolness, outside of the heat of the moment. That is, I can understand their upsets and observe my triggered responses. The authors of “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk,” make it sound so simple. When we look at living mindfully as a spiritual practice of parenting, we recognize that it is not simple and practice doesn’t make perfect. We will make mistakes.
Let us not get so bogged down on a bad moment that we miss the next glowing moment of discovery and joy. Mindfulness as a parent (or grandparent) need not be a separate spiritual exercise but a deep awareness of the miracle of the moment. Mindfulness as a grandparent means for me to pause and “look out,” and celebrate who a child is today, because next week they will already be a different and equally beautiful child.
- https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/140994-if-you-touch-one-thing-with-deep-awareness-you-touch
- Faber, Adele and Mazlish, Elaine. “How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and Listen so Kids Will Talk.” Publisher: Scribner, February 2012. The version I own was published by Avon Books, A division of Hearst Corporation. New York. 1980
- Keating, Thomas. “Contemplative Prayer” 3 CDs produced by Sounds True. Boulder Colorado. 1995.
Laurie vandenHurk writes as a partner, grandparent, and care-giver from her years of experience in facilitating community development, spirituality and bereavement, with people of all ages and widely diverse circumstances, including 10 years in Tanzania. Laurie is a trained Spiritual director of The Haden Institute.
