Tough-Luv
Originally uploaded by Anantya. A young person in my life is going through changes, and some tough
times. And it's got me thinking...
I have this very special nephew who i love very much. He's now 14-15 or
so and really "testing" both his freedoms and limits as well as the
patience of those who love him so dearly and serve him daily.
He's at that crazy age where the exploration of his possibilities and
the testing his freedoms (the range elasticity of his relations and
rules) is now his driving fascination. This is that critical period in
a boy's (and girl's) development where the boundaries between healthy
curiosity (necessary experimentation) and dangerous fascination lie in
beguilingly close proximity.
How to support a young person at this stage in making the right choices
when the process of developing discrimination itself is almost always
one of surviving and then learning from mistakes? How to balance the
giving of enough room for a youngster to move, experience and reveal
their unique tendencies (strengths/weaknesses, attractions/aversions,
sensibilities/liabilities, etc.) without failing to, creatively and
clearly, surround their widening sphere of new freedoms with effective
limits?
So yes, as i was saying, I have this very special nephew who, while not
being my kid to actively co-parent, I love so much and want to wholly
positively influence to come through his adolescence empowered, not
burdened by reactivity and patterns of unhealthy rebelliousness (from
having concluded/constructed a personal survival strategy of mistrust
and unhealthy secrecy, self/other-destructivness, addictive and/or
antisocial behavior etc.).
How did we all make peace with the temptations or trappings of "sex,
drugs and rock-n-roll" ourselves. What is your "would've, could've,
should've" personal history about all that. Were you over-disciplined
or under by your parents and schools, culture and laws?
Any/all personal politics and "religious" morality aside, we all know
there are most serious physiological, psychological and emotional
developmental implications of all our kid's most basic choices/actions:
the company they keep and personas they try-on/test therein , the diet
they consume and any inebriates they may experiment with, the
sensitivity/skillfulness of their teachers and learning environment,
the cultural and (in the "west" therefore inherently) commercial
messages they are boraged by and submit to or resist, etc. When and
with whom an adolescent first experiences/explores their sexuality,
their states of mind/consciousness, their sense of
art/performance/creative expression, their spirituality, their polity,
their social/relations constructions, etc. is often a very strong
determiner of subsequent conclusions about reality (...self, other,
life) and therefore also, until later personal reflection (either of
their own free will or forced upon them, usually by some dysfunction,
negative symptom or breakdown) major factors aiming at least the
initial trajectory of their impending adulthood.
As we all know, the new saying is that "it takes a village to raise a
child". But what to do when "the village" is itself so confused and
lacking in concrete and conclusive evidence to justify its rules, a
healthy world that would give its/any demands and limit setting real
foundation and justification? Indulge the rebellious adolescent mind
for a moment and entertain:
Rule Test #1: "Don't have sex until....
-a) ...you are married." (Marriage: an "institution" or
cultural/religious convention so fraught with failure, dysfunction and
violence as to call into question the intentions of its advocates),
or....
-b) ...until you leave this (the family's) house." (which is to
communicate nothing more than the blatant or de-facto communication 'if
you are not going to duplicate/imatate/submit to and confirm MY
conclusions about how to manage/limit/control human sexuality,
pair-bonding, etc. then you will have to go away and/or do that in
secret." or the like).
-c) ...until you are (usually in conjunction with "b" above if not
honoring "a") in a committed relationship." (as if all such
Judeo-Christian based moralizing even showed up in any statistically
rigorous mental/emotional/psychological health research (or even
layman's observations) as proving its a requisite guideline.
Rule Test #2: "No taking of "drugs"...
-a) ...in this house." ( or in other words "i would rather have you go
to potentially dangerous places with potentially dangerous people to
ingest potentially dangerous/unknown substances....etc., than to do any
such thing here"), or...
-b) ....at your age" ( or the risking that the youth will see what may
appear to them as merely another typical and lazy adult
double-standard), or...
-c) ...as we define them". ( the irony is that statistically speaking
both the one speaking and the adolescent listening/weighing his/her
options are currently under the influence of some of the statistically
most deleterious substances so commonly available: refined white
sugars, nicotine, alcohol, caffine and any number of complicated new
and highly experimental popular pharmaceutical psychotropics like
antidepressants, anti-anxiety or anti-ADHD meds. Furthermore, into that
already deeply chemically compromised (and therefore of dubious
integrity) conversation (usually read "shouting match") add the more
deeper "political"/ or human rights irony that if the "drug" in
question happens to be a naturally growing plant of the Cannabis Sativa
family, the guardian presuming to lecture of its evils and prevent its
accessibility themselves now stand against decades or overwhelming
scientific evidence as to its non-toxicity and entire nations of
conservative legislation which are enjoying a humbling list of positive
feedback from its de-criminalization.).
What is a loving parent, guardian, relative, family friend,
teacher.....etc. to do?
Clearly so little is clear. And, therefore, open and deeply caring
sharings, research and mutual self-inspection are required.
The basis for any rules found necessary at this stage of raising the
adolescent must be fully available for mutual inspection as to the
rule's depth of reason as well as intuition, tradition as well as
legality, chemistry as well as cultural, personal as well as collective
moorings. If the young adult is not to be rebellious isn't the adult,
not wanting to merely play petty dictator (with all that is rightfully
insulting to developing intelligence and justifiable insighting of
further rebellion about that), also accountable to be completely
transparent in revealing their drives, reasoning, including even
misgivings and conditions justifying re-consideration?
Its easier to just make rules, or at least at first it may seem.
The lazy close their minds, end the conversation, risk making
uninformed, idealistic, reactive or merely fear-based rules and thereby
guarantee at best only postponement, if that, of these same issues to
the next generation and at worst incite division, suspicion, separation
and the failure of the kind of spirit of mutual respect and honoring of
difference that only rigorous and deeply empathetic intelligent loving
progressive consideration/investigation/conversation can engender.
But are the unconscious friends, or worse yet these preditor-dealers,
any better? Is there any proof that their noxious pandering, and
peer-pressure pushing (if not more innocent grass then more deadly
bath-tub poisons) is not 100x worse than merely over-protective
parenting? How to cultivate and maintain the kind of intimacy and
respect that would have our kids turning to us rather than to strangers
of dubious intent when making such important (and inevitable)
decisions?
When my nephew, in some attempt to bond with me his "cool" uncle,
started to talk about Marijuana I chose to tell him that while i
thought that its use could be of value to some people consumed
infrequently in a manner respectful of its effect and influence, my
sense was that it was not something that people in his age group should
be yet experimenting with. He asked why and a rich and valuable
discussion followed in which i felt i had effectively made a case for
abstinence based on age/maturity. Do i believe that such a conversation
is conclusive or could really form the basis for a decision on his part
not to experiment with, in the case of this discussion, grass? No. If i
were his legal guardian i would be drawing him into a much deeper
consideration, enrolling him into the limit-setting process and set of
conclusions i would work to reach together. And I feel relatively sure
that both his mother and his grandparents, his primary parentors/role
models, will do their best in that direction.
I have this nephew i love and wish i could spare him, as well as all
those around him, the chaos of his developmental years and the
necessary mistakes and wrong turns he will most likely have to take.
His own maturity, merely developing as it now is, will surly itself be
a pivotal factor in how much freedom he deserves to be entrusted with.
Yet another one of youth's frustrating/bewildering Catch-22's.
I have this nephew I love, we all love. May he make it through without
too much trouble, danger or over-stressing those that live for his
health, happiness and success.
