Month: April 2015

Ever just ache over the problems people have with each other and the effect on kids? Problems happen at home, at school, and they even come to define communities. So many people suffer from violence done around them that it gives me heartache, and I’m guessing you feel it too. It is why some people need soul surgery. It is also why young people need soul protection. I think about the young people watching mom and dad fight, those dealing with bullying at school, and the young ones in cities dealing with all kinds of upheaval, or watching it on television.

These hurts need careful attention, like the attention we get when we go see our medical doctor.  Young people need soul protection because of their social circumstances. As we grow, we learn how to reach out courageously to show love to others, or we learn how to be invulnerable and not love at all. If we learn the power of vulnerability, the risks, and how to protect ourselves, we can experience real love. Unfortunately, a lot of people learn the kind of protection that prevents life-giving loving relationships.

Older people have the responsibility of teaching younger people how to appropriately protect themselves in social situations. Wouldn’t it be nice if all young people experienced the kind of soul protection that enables them to resist shame, to love, and find joy in important relationships?

Matt Lieberman talks about how people develop a sense of self in his book Social. He highlights research about how older people have a “direct appraisal of self” and a “reflected appraisal of self.” Here he basically says that there are different brain functions for how we assess our own sense of self versus how we think others see us. He did some research on this with colleagues and discovered an interesting difference between adults and adolescents.

MRI results showed that adult’s private appraisals of self were a different brain function from how they thought others would see the self. Adolescents, on the other hand, had very different results. When 13 year-olds were asked about their private appraisal of self, the only brain function that showed up on the MRI was the “reflected appraisal” process. This means that young people tend to rely on what others think of them to determine what they think of themselves.

If the common social circumstances for 13 year-olds are healthy and supportive, this research finding is interesting but not alarming. However, when I think about the frenetic pace of typical families, the challenges of navigating life as a single parent, the typical relationships of children in middle school, and stories of violence all around, I am alarmed.

If it is true that young people depend largely on “reflected appraisals” for their sense of self, these young members of society need positive soul protection while they develop a healthy “direct appraisal.” So what do parents do when work schedules limit the quality time they have with their kids? What does a divorced parent do when the other parent is not a healthy influence on the kids? What should teachers do about reports of kids bullying each other at school or on social media? What can we do about young people watching news about violence going on around them?

Here are some suggestions for promoting healthy soul protection for young people in these circumstances.

1. Parents can think about how to build non-negotiable quality time into the schedule with their children. This might mean foregoing a promotion at work or getting top reviews on the job. It means that during the child rearing years, it is wise to find satisfaction in being part of your child’s world, whether they like it or not.
2. Sometimes life circumstances give parents no choice but to deal with family dissolution. In this type of situation, parents usually agree that the best course of action is to put needs of the kids first. Make sure that is built into custody agreements. How that typically works out varies a lot. Having a good peacemaker or mediator is probably wise.
3. Over the years, school administrations have become much more conscientious about conflict among students. They don’t always get the best counsel about what to do with it, however, and students in middle schools are more capable of inflicting social harm today than ever before. Developments in Peer Mediation and Restorative Justice have helped schools a lot.
4. Kids need someone to help them process the news. Families or schools should be aware of the news and talk with kids about the lessons to learn from the problems they see. When grown ups show reasonable perspectives about living peacefully with others, children will begin to see the difference between those who try to do good and those who don’t. They can learn good citizenship.

In any life circumstances, kids who have soul protectors have a much better chance of soul survival than kids who do not.  If you are doing this, thank you. If you are looking for help, here are a few suggestions. Families who are active in a church typically have programs and networks of people that focus on soul protection. Churches often have small group ministries where families can do co-parenting. Youth groups often have adult ministry leaders serving as mentors for kids. Having an active Parent/Teacher Organization at school can provide a lot of resources. School administrators and teachers who care about the hearts and souls of kids can provide quality soul protection. Organizations like Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts provide structured social opportunities for learning healthy social living. Wise adult leadership knows how to do soul protection.

I believe kids need soul protectors and I am a big advocate for soul protection. Our youngest citizens deserve an opportunity to grow up to be strong, positive, loving leaders in our society.

Lots of people hurt. Some hurt is physical and requires surgery. Other hurts, however, are not physical. People hurt because of an angry conversation with a friend. They hurt because they feel ignored, or they’re dealing with the death of a loved one.

Matt Lieberman, in his book Social, gives good evidence to show that physical hurts and social-psychological hurts mean the same thing to our brains.

Being hurt is being hurt. The question is, “how severely are we hurting?”

Trained peacemakers are soul surgeons. My good friend, Kurt Boyland, is a counselor for people with social and psychological pain. He talks about how peacemakers have to do surgery. When people have conflicts that they cannot heal themselves, they need to bring the hurt to a peacemaking counselor or mediator. Sometimes the result is a surgery that heals the hurt and repairs a relationship. Other times, the relationship is discontinued – a social amputation.

Either way, surgery is a big deal.

Medical doctors take great precautions to make good decisions for our physical health. Soul surgery is a big deal too. The hurts that we deal with socially or psychologically are important. When couples break up, sometimes they get really bad advice like “Shake it off. There are more fish in the sea” or “He was a jerk. You don’t need him in your life.” While there may be some truth to the statements, a good soul surgeon does not say these things. A peacemaker wants to help heal a soul that hurts from social pain.

It also does not mean a peacemaker recommends restoring a relationship to a previous status. In fact, after most soul surgeries people relate to each other differently than before. New and better rules for relating and boundaries for social activity are often part of the social rehabilitation.

Here are some pointers for dealing with social pain:

1. Don’t ignore the pain. When you are in conflict, it is appropriate to consider the problem a big deal. Like a physical hurt, ignoring it may have long-term negative consequences. It is the same for social hurts. Don’t buy the idea that people can shake off or just get over any social pain.

2. Get help. Know when a conflict is beyond your ability to provide self-healing. Everyone learns how to do self-care from a young age. However, we don’t often know what to do when we are feeling angry a lot, or sad and lonely for a long time. Learn how. Ask someone who knows. You might need professional care.

3. Be open to soul surgery. Sometimes a conflict requires careful soul surgery. Get help from a well-trained peacemaking counselor or mediator. When surgery is needed, a surgeon does not try to operate on herself. Find someone who has the necessary skills and experience to make the right kind of healing happen for the social hurts.

Everyone experiences social pain at one level or another. Your conflict may be minor or major but be sure what the social hurt is before you decide to ignore it. And when your social pain is connected to someone else, include him or her in the healing process if he or she is willing.

There is a lot of social pain in the world and many people just live without peace. They need the advice of a good peacemaker, or maybe they need soul surgery. Is there a peacemaker in the house?

Lieberman, M. (2013). Social. New York, NY: Crown Publishing.

The surfer looks for the perfect wave. The pitcher longs to pitch the perfect game. Mary Poppins was “practically perfect in every way.”  Perfection is an odd concept to me.  If it exists in life, it must be a standard created by imperfect humans.

I believe I am better off focusing not on achieving perfection, but on being good.

It was my granddad’s favorite admonition for me.  After a visit, he would always say, “Be good.”  I like that.

I want to do the right thing and also succeed in what I am doing.  I don’t need to focus on being better than someone else or to compete with others who are also trying to be good.

In Leonard Cohen’s song “Anthem,” he says “there is a crack in everything.” Now this is a profound statement.  I get concerned about the pressure to wear a mask of perfection suited to whatever I am doing.  It probably has something to do with the fact that I’m not very good at even pretending perfection.

I’m imperfect and that’s just the way it is. So are you.

Cohen’s song goes on to say “that’s how the light gets in.” Wow. To me, this line takes the song from profound to prophetic.  Yes, there is a crack in every aspect of my life.  I am ‘practically imperfect in every way!’ But it is okay because that is how the light gets in.  That is how I learn and improve. It helps me realize my humanity and keeps me humble.

In a world where people realize how ‘practically imperfect’ everyone is, there is more collaboration and compromise, more teaching and learning, more peace and goodwill.

How do you describe pure joy? Does it involve the peaceful easy feeling of an ocean breeze, a cool drink, a good book, and all being well with the world? Well, I have it on the good authority from a middle school boy that pure joy also exists when one takes a punch in the face.

One day a boy in middle school was exiting a bathroom while another boy was entering. The boy entering must have been startled because his reaction was to throw a punch, which happened to land on the face of the boy exiting the bathroom. You can imagine what happened after that, but if you’re like me, you’re probably wrong. The boy exiting the bathroom bolted away from the situation and went straight to a teacher to say that he was involved in an altercation (however, I don’t think the word altercation was used). The teachers quickly collaborated to apprehend the other boy and find out what really happened.

On the way home from school, the boy who took the punch explained to his father what happened. Upon arriving home, the phone was already ringing as a teacher was trying to contact the family. The teacher was hoping, and praying, that the father would be an understanding man because it was obvious that the other boy came from a rough background. What that boy needed, the teacher said, was acceptance and love with encouragement to appreciate living by school rules. It turns out the father was an understanding man, and a man who understood his son.

That evening at bed time, the father went to say good night to his son. On his way, he grabbed his Bible and turned to James 1. When he said good night, he told his son that he was very proud of the way he handled the situation that day. Taking the punch without reciprocating, and exiting the situation rather than fighting, was the best possible response. The father asked his son to read James 1:2-3 which says “²Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, ³because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.” In the silence that followed, the father asked the son, “so, what do you think?” The son said, “James is a weird dude, dad.”

The dad explained to his son that some other boy might have punched back and turned the situation into a bloody brawl. Another boy might have been devastated and never wanted to return to school. Dad explained that the best guy to take a punch in that situation is the one who could do it without being devastated or wanting to retaliate. And maybe the other boy needed to see that example. The act of taking a punch could turn a life around. Dad went on to say that if the experience helped his faith to develop perseverance, that we could consider it ‘pure joy.’

The son said he understood, was at peace about what happened, and that his faith was never stronger.

The father’s perspective? Pure joy.

Basic textbooks in Social Science courses often highlight the concept of stereotyping. And the discussion about the concept will often address the value of stereotyping, the negative aspects, or suggest that stereotyping is just a natural part of human nature—neither good nor bad. Of course these textbooks will also hurry to add that when our stereotypes lead us to be prejudiced or to discriminate it is bad.

So what is stereotyping? I heard it described once as being descriptive of the printing press where images are reproduced so that each copy looks like the original. The idea was borrowed by scholars in the social science disciplines to refer to what humans do in mentally categorizing people. From one perspective, stereotyping is just part of human nature that is neither good nor bad. Women have standard images of men and men have standard images of women. People of one ethnicity standardize people from other ethnicities.

I can see the value of humans having the ability to anticipate what may happen in a social encounter. By categorizing the elements of a social context based on past similar experiences, we are able to avoid potential dangers and pursue potential opportunities. Stereotyping helps us survive.

However, there is a downside to this ability and practice which is very well described in the recent book by Claude Steele called Whistling Vivaldi and Other Clues to How Stereotypes Affect Us. Steele begins his book talking about Brent Staples, a young African American college student, who lived with the stereotype of being a black man in Chicago. Because of the black male stereotype he noticed that white people would often cross the street to avoid being near him. And even worse, as a person who liked to smile and greet people, he found that he would avoid white people so they wouldn’t feel so uncomfortable.

The title for the book came from a story where Staples decided to whistle Beatles tunes or Four Seasons music by Vivaldi when he approached people on Chicago sidewalks. People recognized the music and their fears melted away. Throughout the book, Steele discusses stereotype threat and identity threat. Stereotype threat is rooted in how people think about people groups. For example, Asians are good in math, men are more logical than women, blacks are better in athletics. Because people think these things, there are stereotype threats for non-Asians in math, women studying computer science, and whites trying to be successful in sports. Steele says identity threat occurs when whites fail in sports or blacks do poorly in school. He explains that we are conditioned to live according to the stereotype. So much energy and focus is expended in contradicting the stereotype that people often end up proving the stereotype true.

So how do we minimize or eliminate stereotype threat or identity threat? Steele suggests several things that can help. There were a couple of tools that I thought were particularly helpful in the fight against the threats. First, awareness of the threats can help people in the dominant group create non-threatening contexts for members of minority groups who struggle. Also, Steele found that if members of a threatened group can have a critical mass of others like them, the threat is lessened.

Steele suggests some interesting ideas about how stereotyping negatively affects society. And I don’t want to be someone who gives up because of a stereotype…or even worse, promotes threatening environments where people will struggle because of a stereotype. We can all promote peace and even help solve conflicts by being a voice against these threats. And being a peacemaker is a good thing.

Steele, Claude (2010). Whistling Vivaldi And Other Clues About How Stereotypes Affect Us. W. W. Norton & Company: New York.

 

You hear it all of the time. Whenever a commercial comes on television, someone is telling you that you deserve a break today or that you can have it your way. When I see these commercials I think—yeah, a break would be nice, and having it my way would be a welcome change of pace. But I’m also thinking this person on television doesn’t have a clue about who I am or what I deserve. Not only that, but I’m pretty sure that if I take the break I’d like, it will cost me something.

These messages serve as a reminder for me to be mindful about my entitlements. We all recognize that we have rights and opportunities. It’s human nature. And come to think of it, it is animal nature too. Saying “don’t take the bone away from the dog” is a bit like trying to teach your children to share. Taking turns is not easy. You may see your dog and your child demonstrate an emotional expression of entitlement.

But sharing is a good lesson to learn and can solve a host of potential conflicts before they ever arise. Imagine a world where a divorcing couple engages in a peaceful process of dividing property and determining custody. When the husband recognizes a particular item having great value to his wife, he can speak up about wanting her to have it. When the wife knows her husband really wants to share a holiday with the children, she can give that. Of course, this is a complex process but the honesty of the giving process can be very rewarding in the long term.

When parents die, siblings have to deal with property and wishes of the parents. There can be great joy or great conflict in the process. Imagine the long-term joy that can result from a brother telling his siblings about how daddy used to love to hear the sister play the piano. When there was no will to determine who should have the piano, it was obvious that the sister should take it home and play often for daddy. A potential conflict situation where siblings might argue over who is entitled to keep the piano turned into a time of joy in sharing stories about loving parents.

Entitlements can be very complicated though. Who is entitled to have health care? Who is allowed to sit at the front of a bus? In what part of town can a person live? Privilege and ownership are complicated determinants of entitlement. A social system made of self and others we do not know can easily make us overlook the appropriateness of fair sharing of things or privileges.

A maturing person will think of her or his entitlements with a focus on what is right or fair for everyone, and how to bless others, especially the less fortunate. If you think of it, we think about entitlement because we live in communities where rights and resources are not equal between people. If we could get beyond our desire to protect our entitlements, we would look to the interests of others, build friendships, find joy in giving, earn the respect of others, and even have reason to respect ourselves.

My grandmother was a Chippewa Indian. I loved her for many reasons but one that stands out to me was her storytelling. She always wanted to know the latest about what was happening in my life but she also had many stories to tell. One particularly meaningful story for me is the 7 Grandfather Teachings. Interestingly, in my research about the story, it first appeared as the 7 Sacred Teachings of the White Buffalo Calf Woman. I don’t know how it became The 7 Grandfather Teachings but that’s the way stories go.

Many writings on the story refer to it as the story about how to have a successful life. I see the story as a path for living into a community of peace. Each teaching is associated with an animal that in some way reflects the teaching. The first teaching is humility. Look to the wolf, the story says, as an example of humility. In the presence of others, the wolf bows in deference but not in fear. Humans can begin to have good relationships by engaging the practice of having confidence and power but bowing in deference to others.

The second teaching is honesty. Look to Kitchi-Sabe as an example of honesty. Kitchi-Sabe is known as a four-legged creature that walks with two legs. It sounds like Big Foot but who knows? The story says that he cannot move as fast as the 4-legged animals but he accepts himself for who he is. Honesty is for self first. You cannot be honest for others if you cannot first accept yourself for who you are and let that be enough. It is a lesson for me to recognize what is enough and to know that I am always enough for what is right for me.

The third teaching is respect. The model of respect is the buffalo. The story reminds about the time when buffalo were plentiful in the plains. In times past, the buffalo were hunted respectfully. Virtually all of the body was used for some purpose. There is food, clothing, and tools to have and share from the gift of this life. In respect for others, the buffalo sacrifices his life. Peace depends on our ability to treat others and ourselves with respect. At times this means sacrifice and at other times it means receiving a gift gracefully.

The fourth teaching is courage. Our example of courage is the bear. Just as the bear hibernates in winter, so does her courage remain hidden until it is needed. The bear takes care of her young and we take care of our responsibilities. We face our fears and dangers with courage because that is who we are.

The fifth teaching is wisdom. The example of wisdom for us is the beaver. He works and works using his gifts to serve his purpose. He thrives because he uses the gift of his teeth with commitment and effort for building and providing for others. Without using his gift, his teeth would grow until they become unusable. If this happens, the beaver would not be able to serve his purpose. In wisdom he will not fail to use his gift. We must also use our gifts in serving our purposes or risk losing what is important.

The sixth teaching is truth. The turtle is our example of truth. He slowly moves forward with strength and stability understanding all of the teachings. Truth in life is that by incorporating all of the other teachings, we live out our purpose. Truth is about what the journey looks like. It is not just about reaching a particular destination. The spirit of truth also gives us peace because living in it we care for self and others fairly.

The seventh teaching is love. The eagle is our example of love because she exemplifies all of the teachings. She flies high in the sky to see all truth. She lives in humility, honesty, courage, respect, and wisdom. She cares for her young, teaching them by example to live in peace by these principles.

A final sacred teaching is both a condition and result of all these teachings. It is about living in gratitude. Some days it is harder than others to see what we should be grateful for. Every day, however, we receive gifts from what others have done prior to each moment we experience. By accepting the 7 Grandfather Teachings and living them with gratitude, we live into the community of peace.

My grandmother showed me that these are good teachings, and she also reminded me that we always live out these teachings imperfectly. It is the effort that counts, she said, and to remember that this is a good journey.

See more about these teachings and others at davidbouchard.com