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Publisher notes
I wrote this article over two years ago for a
magazine, yet it was never published. I decided to publish it here
myself. It touches on some basic spiritual principles that I find
very helpful on this journey; unconditional love, surrender and
acceptance. I hope you enjoy it!
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All I Needed to Learn I Learned
from My Children
By Tracy Liebmann
Life it’s about the journey not
the destination, oh what a journey! I feel like I have had a few
different lives already. My childhood which was dysfunctional, my
college years which were wild, my twenties which were both
professional and academic, my thirties wow my thirties…I think I’ll
start there.
We were living in San Francisco when I turned thirty. We really
wanted to start a family and I knew I really wanted to stay at home
with the children. We decided to move back east for cost of living
issues. We moved to coastal South Carolina, got pregnant, and had a
baby. Our wonderful daughter who is now almost 11. The day I gave
birth to her I started to give birth to me. Two years later the next
mile stone on this journey occurred, the birth of our loving son,
now 8 years old. These two miracles have taught me more in 11 years
than…hmmmm let me count…18 years in schools and colleges! I had a
lot to learn about living, I had a lot to learn about parenting and
being in a healthy family. It was challenging because of my “story”
from childhood.
Looking back the first lesson I learned was about unconditional
love, which was not an easy one. It took years to come to the
understanding I have today about unconditional love. Yes, from day
one I loved my baby girl with love in which I thought was
unconditional, yet it had conditions. The conditions I had, that
today I hate to admit were that she sleeps through the night, nap,
eat without trouble, not cry too much and give me 5 minutes to take
a shower. I set myself up for failure. Those things I just listed
are what babies do…incase you didn’t know ;-) Jumping to the present
the things that I do accept unconditionally are things like; not
sleeping, eating less than perfectly, yelling and best of all I
always get a shower and love every quiet moment. Today unconditional
love means acceptance, accepting my children just how they are at
that very minute. How did I learn how to accept and love
unconditionally even during a rage of anger, which happened pretty
frequently during our first few months of unschooling. I found
support from online lists and magazines. I read and learned all I
could, then I tried it, I tried to remember to breath deep, I use
mantras, like “only good can come to me”, I remind myself that it’s
not about me! Oh there is another thing my kids have taught me, it’s
not about me. It’s not about me that they are crying, screaming at
one another, throwing a rock at grandma (yes, it really happened).
They are who they are. This leads me into the next subject my
children have taught me all about…acceptance.
I just described accepting my children for who they are and that’s
were it all started for me. Then I realized if I accept them for who
they are no matter what, then what about me? I had never accepted
myself for who I was until after this journey into unschooling. SO I
started to do just that love myself with out conditions…it is still
a work in progress, but what light it has shown my spirit. OK…so
who’s next, the hubby, oh boy this one is also a work in progress. I
have always had a special place in my heart for children, not true
about adults. I have learned through accepting my kids for who they
are that I must accept everyone…including my loving husband.
Acceptance to me is always about what is not what was or what could
have been.
Surrender is another big lesson my kids taught me. When I came into
this parenting thing I was quit the control freak. Being pregnant,
giving birth, then the preceding days, months, years, taught me I
was not in control. It didn’t matter that I had just given darling
daughter a bath, she was going to poop and puck all over herself, it
didn’t seem to matter what I believed she should eat to grow big and
strong, she knew what her body needed.
When my son was around two, it was obvious he was special. He is an
acutely aware little boy, so that made living in this world a little
more exhausting for him than you or I. I had no control over who he
is, he is amazing and I had nothing to do with it. He has taught me
more about myself and communicating with others.
Unconditional love, surrender and acceptance; those are the
principles I have learned from my children, pretty profound stuff
that I continue to work on everyday. If you would like support on
your journey sign up today for a FREE sample session at
www.transformingfamily.com |
