Day 10: CHILDHOOD, MY STORY Pt. 1 - 'The Big' Memory

THE FOLLOWING SERIES OF BLOGS I AM ABOUT TO SHARE IS IN NO WAY INTENDED TO SPEW REACTIONS OR POINT BLAME TO THE ADULTS I INTERRACTED WITH DURING MY CHILDHOOD BE IT MY CAREGIVERS, TEACHERS OR ANY OTHER ADULT BACK THEN. WHEN I LOOK BACK AT MY CHILDHOOD AND WHAT I WENT THROUGH, IN HONESTY, IT IS SOMETHING THAT I WOULDN’T HAVE WISHED TO GO THROUGH, BUT IN SELF-HONESTY, I AM GREATFUL THAT, I WENT THROUGH SUCH A LIFE AND MADE IT OUT ‘ALIVE’ AND HERE TO SHARE THIS PART OF ME ON HOW I TOOK, STILL TAKING RESAPNSIBILITY FOR MYSELF BY INVESTIGATING EVERYTHING IN ORDER TO SHOW AND PROVE TO MYSELF AND OTHERS THE IMPORTANCE OF WHY SUCH A WAY OF  RELATING TO CHILDREN WAS AND IS NOT WHAT WAS BEST FOR ALL AND THEREFORE SHOULD SIMPLY BE UNNACCEPTABLE WAY OF LIVING/EXISTING/CO-EXISTING AND RELATING TO CHILDREN AND THAT, ALL OF US ON AN INDIVIDUAL AND COLLECTIVE LEVEL ACTUALLY CAN TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR WHO WE ARE, HAVE BECOME AS A RESULT OF OUR UPBRINGING AND FROM HERE RE-CREATE OURSELVES INTO HUMANS OF INTERGRITY THAT VALUE AND UPHOLD LIFE ABOVE ALL ELSE. SO HERE, I WILL TAKE MY CHILDHOOD MEMORIES OF WHAT I FACED DURING THAT TIME AND INVESTIGATE IT, SEE MY RELATIOSHIPS TO IT, APPLY SELF-FORGIVENESSAND RECREATE MYSELF THROUGH COMMITMENT STATEMENTS THAT I SHALL LIVE TO BECOME THE CHANGE I WANT TO SEE.

For a while now, I had been pondering on how exactly I was going to face this point of childhood memory(ies). I have kept on suppressing this point or walked only ‘surface’ dimensions of it, all the while approaching it from a starting point of separation meaning, within my mind, I kept on seeing this memory(ies) as too big for me to handle/face, to challenging or complicated or overwhelming. All these are the 3 excuses I made up in my mind in regards to this memory(ies) because, it is from this memory(ies) that I have come to exist as who I exist within and as today, this memory(ies) has infiltrated almost if not all of what/who I have defined myself as today, it has infiltrated so much into my physical living that, my actions became so automated that I came to accept as a ‘normal’ part of who I am until I began questioning all my experiences as shown by my mind and body and with the help/assistance and support of the desteni tools, I could see clearly that I am actually more than capable to standing as a point of self-responsibility and face these memories and correct myself through my living as the application of myself/movement of myself within my physical reality in order to impart change that will bear only the best outcome. I have come to realize and understand that, real change is not a mental process, it is a physical process within space and time as the constant and continuous process of living a change as self, moment to moment until it is done. So I shall share here how I have walked some process and still walking other processes in regards to my childhood and how it shaped my life today as a human being, but most importantly, AS A PARENT.

WRTTING OUT THE 'BIG/ONE' MEMORY

As far back as I can remember, most of my childhood was filled with a lot of physical, mental/emotional and verbal abuse some more extensive than others. I am sure that, most of us humans, our childhood is marked by one or more forms of abuse from the adults that meant to be our source of care and security. I do not know the stories of everyone else. What I do know is my story and here I am going to share/walk this point/story/ memory(ies) in self-honesty and really take responsibility for what I accepted and allowed myself to become as a result of these memory(ies) and from here, walk the correction in my living, moment to moment until it is done. I am doing this for me because I am and want to live change I want to see, because I also want to ensure that, my children learn from me through me living as an example which is a point of showing that I never had the privilege of receiving as a child.

so here I shall share the extent of this fear in my life. But first, I am going to write about how I came about creating this fear/petrification within myself and why.

Just to stress this point I AM THE ONE RESPONSIBLE FOR MY FEARS BECAUSE THEY EXIST WITHIN ME, AS ME NOW. This is to show that I HOLD NO BLAME, ANGER, REVENGE, REMORSE or any other REACTIONS towards all the adults in my childhood that may have directly or indirectly contributed to my childhood experience(s). I am taking responsibility for my part as should everyone else as what one accept and allow because this is how we create who we are or have come to be. Also PLEASE, do not REACT to what I am sharing because, reactions I have come to realize and understand always veil the point of being responsible for oneself i.e., reactions indicate a point of BLAME and as long as one BLAMES, one will never step beyond the point of blame and see how actually one is the only one responsible for everything about who one exists within and as today and unless one lets go of the point of blame, one can never change for REAL, as one CANNOT SEE change and this is why our world without is a picture perfect representation of THE SUFFERING  that is going on within us, a world we keep escaping through blaming other for what’s going on with us.

So, I had quite a violent childhood, what I mean by this is that, in as far back as I can remember, the adult’s relationship towards me and my brethren (but ill focus on me for now) was that of violence. This may get graphic as I share so please no reactions, no blame, only learning, lol. I faced beatings that once got me hospitalized for many days. Within this memory, most of my days were filled with some kind of abuse, either mental/emotional, verbal or physical abuse and mostly it was all of them in a day.

My parent separated when I was quite young, maybe around 3-4 years old and my mother had to go away in another country to study as she then became the sole provider of our needs. So, she left us with other care givers that were mostly never kind to us. The schools I attended in those early years, physical abuse of all children was like the highest and best form of punishment. Not matter how small or big the ‘mistake’ was, the abuse would at times be just barbaric and this was not only physical abuse through caning, but verbal abuse was rained down on me or the child to emotionally tear the me or another child apart in fear as the I/child was being caned. This was considered normal. But how? Why? Ill open this up as I continue sharing.

The only time I remember sharing and expressing myself fully was only when I was playing with other kids in an environment where there was no adult at ALL! why? Because I created an extreme fear/petrification towards adults. To an adult, I never really met one that was genuine within themselves and even if they were being nice at times, it was always out of self-interest. To the eyes of an adult, I never did anything ‘right’, to them I knew nothing, I was a no body, I was only a trouble maker just like every other child. Everything I did, I was told not to because it was wrong and how I was told not to do it was in some form of abuse, no one ever really went to the extent of really showing me anything. At school, the teachers just taught us the curriculum and if one would be slow in ‘learning’, well, the child would be abused mostly physically. Here are some of the ways physical abuse was conducted:

·         Caning on the palms of the hand with a really strong hard wooden stick.

·         Caning on the back of the fingers with the same stick, here the fingers and palms of the hand would swell really bad and of course be in excruciating pain but it did not matter to the teachers, I/one was still expected to write through all the pain and agony and if not, more caning

·         Caning on calf muscles of the legs at times until they bled, this left marks/scars that took a long time to heal.

·         Caning on the soles of the feet and this would lead to difficulties in walking because of the excruciating pain but either way, I/one couldn’t just lie there, I/one had to walk or else, more caning.

·         Caning on the back and this for me was one of the most painful and most sensitive area of my body to cane as well as caning the back of the fingers and knuckles. (within this point comes a lot of sadness that bring tears to my eyes)

·         Caning the lower back and buttocks too was the most common form of caning.

·         Caning the thighs and this area being so sensitive, most of the time I ended up bleeding which left some scarring or rather marks that did fade slowly over time.

·         Being punched or slapped on the face or anywhere else on the body

·         pushing,

·         pinching and biting as there was one specific adult that would bite me or other children to the point of always leaving torn skin and teeth marks.

·         hitting

·         violent shakes

·         being beaten by a hose pipe

·         being punched

·         and there were times when the adult(s) would get fully possessed by an emotion especially anger and would just randomly kick, slap, cane, hit, pinch, punch, shake, push back and forth or up and down freely or against something and these blows would be directed anywhere on the body! Here, there was no telling when this would end or stop, there was not telling how hard the next blow or punch or whatever would be and where. This to drove me into total petrification, I was so afraid at times that I peed myself. It was equally agonizing to watch this happen to another child, and even worse, was when we as children would be forcefully asked to physically cane each other and within this, use all our force towards the other child or else, the adult would take over and rain their terror on the child that would not forcefully abuse the other through caning.

As I allow this memory to come up within me, with it comes a lot of pain, I cry, I cry so much, there is so much pain and sadness, so much fear and petrification, so much anger within the adults faces and body, I felt disrespected, disregarded, hopelessness, a giving up on MYself, a total surrender to abuse and the fear thereof, I felt like a reject, a nobody, useless, as the verbal abuse ensured of this. I knew of no other life. I always wondered why this was happening, why this was considered ‘normal’. A part of me did not want to be a child any more, I wanted to be seen and referred to as an adult but this was just wish thinking.

I had to stop and take a break from writing because, suddenly, I felt like my mind/head region was going to explode due to so much pressure building up there and then followed by a nasty headache. I was shivering and shaking/trembling, my heart beat was racing, I was sweating at the same time feeling really cold/chills running all over my body, I was a bit dizzy and disoriented, I became agitated and jumpy. This cold chills, shaking and trembling all over my body was because of the immense fear that was contained in this memory, and here is when I realized that, I was actually so afraid of these memories because of this very fear contained in them ie I had fear toward my fear of being abused and thus, why I preferred to suppress and resist this memory plus many points in in my life.

I could see anger within this memory that came up when I asked myself ‘why do these people just never stop abusing me/other children?’ the backchats I could see like to them, I am invisible, a nobody, a nothing, useless, non-existent and that is why I am being abused also contained lots of anger. More anger also came about when this backchat (which I shall explore more in future blogs) ‘to them (the adults) I can never do anything right, everything I do is wrong and therefore, punishable through physical abuse, and I always asked, why won’t anyone show me then what is right?  Soon after, a flood of sadness followed and I felt the urge to not talk to anyone, I just wanted to be left alone and immerse myself in this sadness. For a moment there, I wanted to get lost within this sadness because it felt ‘comforting’ embracing in a way, like I just want to shut down the world around me and just be sad because for a moment there, it seemed like there was nothing to live for and everything felt better within my sadness. Within this sadness, I saw backchats like, this will never stop, everyone is just so mean hence, I don’t want to talk to anyone, I just want to be left alone, I wish someone would defend me/be on my side for once. What I also see within this sadness is the fear that this abuse will never end meaning, I felt really sad that I had to live in so much fear all the time.

Within this memory also exists the point of blame where, I blamed others for abusing me in many ways. At this point in time, I just did not understand why myself and other children would be subjected to such torture and because it happened to me as well as every other child I knew, I presumed it was ‘NORMAL’, that this was the only way children ought to be treated which is a point I shall expand on in future blogs, because it turns out, the ‘abusers’ knew no better either and the copied this behavior from their abusers i.e., this kind of abuse is very common amongst African parents because it has been passed on from generation to generation and it has become a ‘NORMAL’ to abuse children.

Also, the ones that abused me were most of the time very angry people, easily irritated and frustrated by whatever I did. They always yelled and screamed at me to stop doing whatever they perceived was wrong according to them, none of them ever showed me another way, a better way. I was only asked to stop but was never told why I should stop and then offered an alternative on how I can do it better. How it played out was, when I did something that was perceived as wrong, first was the yelling of the words STOP/STOP THAT NONSENSE! Or WHAT ARE YOU DOING/WHAT HAVE YOU DONE followed by some form of verbally abusive words like YOU STURBBON CHILD, YOU NEVER LISTEN TO ME, YOU ARE STUPID, YOU ARE FULL OF SHIT, YOU ARE NOTHING, I WISH YOU WOULD DIE, YOU ASS HOLE, YOU DOG, I WILL BEAT YOU INTIL YOU DIE, YOU COME FROM A COMMUNITY OF THIEVES SO YOU ARE A THIEF TOO, YOU PROSTITUTE JUST LIKE YOUR MOTHER (my mother was not a prostitute as I know her), YOU ARE A DEVIL, YOU ARE A DEMON, YOU ARE SO UGLY, I HATE YOU. These words were spoken with a lot of anger, irritation, frustration, hate, remorse which were geared to instill fear and this is the emotional abuse part after which came the physical abuse the extent to which depended on the extent of the adult’s mental experience, meaning, if they were really angry, the physical abuse would be really bad and mild Anger, they it would settle for pinching or slapping or pushing, shaking or threatening while doing one of these physical actions of 'mild abuse'.

 

Next blog, Day 11. FORGIVENESS. 

 

Day 9: BEDTIME, Stress-express or Decision-Express

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have the backchat ‘’it’s time to sleep now, I will not play this hanky punky games with you’’ to exist within and as me especially in the evenings before the kids go to bed.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to create expectations within my mind on how bed time for my kids should be like i.e., I want to take them to bed, give them a hug and a kiss and they go under the covers and sleep without jumping out or wanting to play or come to my bed etc., what really happens is the opposite of my expectation whereby, one of my kids jumps out of her bed soon after I put her down while I tend to the other one, I put her back to bed and she jumps out again, sometimes, they both want to run around and play with their shadows, other times, one of them simply want to hug me and be in my arms and kiss me and talk.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think that my children like resisting bedtime and from this thought, I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to want to force them to go to bed and sleep not seeing and realizing that, bedtime is a process that follows a series of moment to moment events that lead to bed time and instead of thinking and imposing, I should teach my children to make bedtime a decision by actually walking this process with them in real time, teach them and show them that it is bed time and not make assumptions that they know and therefore expect them to comply because them knowing is again another one of my expectations, I should directing each moment as it unfolds ensuring that, who I am within myself is stable, calm, quiet and really here with myself as well as with them until the moment when they are comfortable in their beds.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see just how my reality with my children cannot and does not fit within my expectation, in fact it’s the exact opposite.

From within this backchat and expectation, I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to react in irritation and anger when the kids did not meet my expectation of making bedtime ‘smooth’.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to have the expectation of my kids going to bed on time without resisting exist within and as me, from within this, I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to expect my children to go to bed when I want them to and expect that they should not resist and when they resist, I react in anger and irritation.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to direct these bed time moments every evening instead of suppressing my reactions towards the bedtime routine.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realize that, my daughters just want to spend a little more intimate time with me in bed before they go to sleep and that, there is nothing good or bad about them wanting to spend some time with me and therefore, my reactions usually lead me to pushing them away by wanting them already in their bed positions and already begin to sleep.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to feel guilt  that I am a bad mother when I push my kids away when they just want to spend some time with me before bed.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to from within anger, raise my voice and yell at my kids so they can stop moving and go to bed on time.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see and realize that, in the evenings when I am tired and my partner is equally tired, I tend to easily react in irritation and anger which I suppress and when I face this same point every evening, I just end up accumulating a lot of emotions towards bedtime from within which I go into and anger outburst.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to use being tired as an excuse to rush within myself and therefore end up wanting to rush everything and everyone to go be quiet by sleeping so I can rest and bring the rush to an end.

I forgive myself that I haven’t accepted and allowed myself to see, realize and understand that, when I rush within myself, I actually end up creating a state of stress within me within my body and from within this state, I tend to rush while doing things within my reality like taking the kids to bed and I know very well that, when I rush, I always tend to miss many physical reality point and thus, I do not consider all points equally, I don’t consider everyone especially my children and what they really need in terms of assistance and support before bed and when I miss all these points, I miss myself and the opportunity to make a decision from the starting point of what’s best for all is also missed and therefore, I just create a series of unpleasant living experiences for myself and my family and this is simply unacceptable from me.

I commit myself to assist and support myself to, when and as I see myself about to react in anger because my kids won’t go to bed as I expect them to, I shall stop and breath and will not allow myself to participate within the anger for I see and realize that, when I am reacting in anger, I go completely blind from what is really happening right in front of me within my physical reality, as well as I go blind on what is really happening within me that lead me to reacting in anger in the first place and take responsibility for it because reactions like anger are always a result of much more happening within my mind that I have not brought my awareness and attention to. herein, i commit myself to investigate within myself by bringing my awareness out of anger , stepping back and investigating what mind processes I have bees accepting and allowing my participation that lead to my reaction and take responsibility for these process, be it thoughts, backchats, expectations, imaginations, etc., apply self-forgiveness and commit myself to stop and change these points within me.

I commit myself to assist and support myself to, when and as I see myself about to create expectations within my mind of having my kids go to bed smoothly without any resistance or without them wanting to jump around and play, I shall stop and breath and will not allow myself to participate within such expectations for I see and realize that, these expectations are not based on physical reality, they are my mental reality and therefore are not real and when I impose/project my mental illusions in the form of expectations onto physical reality, I simply end up creating conflicts within and without that in the end create an a living moment that is not based on what’s best for all, because then, I only see my expectations and move from within the starting point of these expectations and here, I can’t give myself the space to see what’s really real, because, what is really real and needed my directive principle is seeing that my kids were busy moving in all sorts of directions except their beds, they wanted to spend time with me, play with me, hug and kiss me like they sometimes do before bed, and as directive principle, I would have allowed this and if not, I assist and support my children to go to bed without exerting my anger and irritation onto them and forcing them to go to sleep.

I see that, before bed, Crystal loves to hug me, and kiss me, and touch me and above all, simply talk to me while in my arms, she really does enjoy this every single evening and I see that, when I am tired, I tend to want to move fast within myself and hence without inti my without where, I want fast results i.e., putting the kids to bed fast and them sleeping fast so I can sleep as well, but it is obvious that, this fast movement is my mental pace, my physical reality pace with the kids is much slower and requires me to consider my children’s needs as well as my needs and fulfill all the needs the best way possible. I also see that, I always do enjoy spending ‘quiet’ time with my kids before bed and this quiet time goes out the window when my partner and I are tired from a busy day. I also see that, being tired from having had a busy day is absolutely no excuse to not remain calm, stable and quiet within myself while directing my reality.

Therefore, I commit myself to assist and support myself to move even slower in the evenings when I am physically tired, to remain within the quiet and calmness and stability of myself, my breathing, my body and from here, also assist and support my kids to also slow down, calm down before they go to bed.

I commit myself to assist and support myself to embrace the evening moments before bed as they come, to not create any expectations, to simply move moment by moment, one breath at a time, really be with myself and my kids, hug Crystal, embrace her in my arms, share the hugs and kisses and the talks, sooth her with my voice, my words and myself, really be tHERE with her, for her, as her and finally put her to bed, because I see that, each time I do this, she always goes to bed without resisting, bedtime becomes a decision she makes and not an imposition from me and actually this usually doesn’t take too much time as I perceived in my expectation.

I commit myself to assist and support my myself and my partner by coming up with an agreement on how we can assist and support our kids together before bedtime by stopping the excuse of ‘we are both so tired’ from within which we both end up reacting, fact is, despite our tiredness, we must find a way to take responsibility for our children before and during bed time, by really giving them some time and attention that will assist and support them to transition to bed easily.

I commit myself to assist and support myself to when and as I see myself about to rush within myself to fulfill certain tasks like putting the kids to bed so I can rest, I shall stop and breath and will not allow myself to participate within the rush and will investigate the energies that are present within my body from within which I create the rushing state within and without myself, apply self-forgiveness and let go of the energies for I realize that, rushing is a state of mind that I participate within and as especially during the moments when I am tired, I also realize that, when I rush, I only create strain/stress within my body which is already tired and  here, I compromise the opportunity of assisting and supporting my body in equality and oneness to be in a calm, quiet and stable state of being even while I move and fulfill my physical activities, I also realize that, in the moments when I feel physically very tired, to really breath and slow down, to physically move even slower, for I have noticed that, when I move this slow, I actually enter into an alignment with the movement of myself within and as my body and this movement eliminates any extra stress/strain for my body and actually support my body to rest better than when I rush within and without.

I commit myself to assist and support myself to when and as I see myself about to react in guilt after I have done something to my kids that I perceive as wrong, I shall stop and breath and will not allow myself to participate within the guilt for I realize that, when I go into guilt, it is out of self-judgment that I am a bad mother and as long as I judge myself and remain in guilt, I cannot the mind programs that led to the point of self-judgment and guilt and as long as I cannot see these mind constructs, I cannot take full responsibility for them, stop them and change them/change who I am within them and thus, my physical reality will not change either, therefore, I commit myself to assist and support myself to investigate what it is that I am accepting and allowing to define who I am instead of defining who I am in every moment of breath within the principle of equality and oneness as what’s best for all.

I commit myself to teach and show my children slowly but surely that, bedtime is a decision they can learn to make and not something I impose onto them out of my very own reactions.

Day 8: UNPREDICTABILITY - When Anticipation Meets the Physical.

On this day, I went out with the kids to fly a kite. Flying a kite is an activity I did a long time ago and just once. Back then, we made our own Kites. On a windy day, flying a kite can be really enjoyable and I wanted to share kite flying with my kids, only thing was, this day was not that windy as I had anticipated it to be.

I prepared the kids and of we went to the field, it was mildly windy. in my mind, I had created a future projection to the actual moment when I would fly the kite. I imagined how nice it was going to be, all the 3 of us running around and the kite flying high, all of us immersed in laughter as we ran with each other, after each other, after the kite etc. Once we arrived at the field which was large enough for us to fly kites, I quickly did the kite set up and had the kite ready within a short time.

A long time ago, the memory I had of flying a kite was by running really fast and this was have the kite fly high. back then it did. The kite I used was not really the best quality and so, I really do not have a reference point in my mind of what a good quality kite should look like, be like. When I shopped for this particular one we were to use on this particular day, the only aspect I considered was the cost. I went for the cheapest option available. and so I assumed, it would fly equally well.

as soon as I was ready with the kite, I held the string at the handle and began to run really fast, well, contrary to my imagination, the kite just dragged on the ground and managed to barely get off the ground. I kept running thinking it would fly higher, well, it did not. By this time, Crystal had already been really wanting to fly the kite and I did not really allow her because I wanted to fist show her how its done, her begging soon turned into crying and screaming for the kite. So I let her have it and asked her to run as fast as she could to fly the kite.

To my daughter, this was her first time to touch, see, explore a kite. she couldn't wait any longer to delve right into the 'mystery' that is a kite and she did. At first, she ran like I did, but her hand coordination was not really aligned with kite flying, I must say, neither were mine because, we both had no clue on how to best do it except by running fast which did not work. as she dragged the kite along with her as she ran, the string kept on tangling. By the time she came back to me, the string was all over and around her little body, it was more like, a string tangling adventure rather than a kite flying one. I had previously asked if she could give me the kite back so I could show her how its done and she completely refused. When I saw that the kite was  not flying with her at all, I began to feel frustrated and angry. when she refused my help, I was really irritated, frustrated and angry. I was frustrated that, the whole kiting thing was not turning out as I had expected. Soon after, the little one, my youngest, joined us and nothing fascinated her more than the long string on the kite. what I noticed is how she really went for the tangling experience within it where I saw her simply tangling her feet, hands, fingers, body etc. At this moment, I was even more frustrated and irritated because not, I was not kiting anymore but busy detangling string from the kids, from my stance, the whole experience was unpleasant/awful.

It was no where near or close to what my imagination had conjured up in my head. It was the actual opposite. The moments unfolded before me in almost the exact opposite of what I had imagined it would be. The field was mildly windy, the kite was poor quality, running is not really the only way to fly a kite, the kite dint take off/fly, I wanted the string a certain length - the kids wanted to undo the whole string and they did, I wanted to show crystal how its done by first learning quickly how to do it, I did not really learn and crystal did not allow me to show her, she wanted to explore it her own way, without PRESSURE from me to do it the 'right' way, I preferred having the string neat - I had to deal with a tangling and de-tangling mess, I wanted my children to listen to me and stop and follow my lead on kite flying - they wanted to explore this kiting thing their own way, I imagined we would have fun, run around laughing, all of us enjoying the kite and each other - I 'killed' the enjoyment by going into reactions of anger, frustration and irritation all because, the kiting thing dint go as well as I anticipated and the kids dint really make it easier with the string and crying and screaming. so I decided, I had had enough and I packed everything, strapped the kids on the stroller and left the field.

As I walked back home, I could see within myself how I had created the experience of myself within myself where by I ended up destroying all the opportunities I was presented with within kiting to enjoy myself and the children, to learn. here is how: the moment I went into Imagination and from within it projected myself into the future where I saw myself in the field enjoying kiting, this is the very moment where I separated myself from reality as my physical body and everything physical around me. I separated myself into my minds imaginations and became excited of an event that had not even happened, an event that was not real, it was an illusion I created in my mind of what reality would be like, and thus the actual separation of myself from my reality happened here in this very moment. Flying high in the realms of my imagination, completely detaching myself from physical reality, I did not consider the reality of flying a kite for the first time and with 2 babies. I did not equip myself with sufficient information on how to fly a kite through looking it up online and from here, expand my awareness and skills on all the possible considerations and outcomes of flying a kite which I would then apply in real-time in physical reality. Instead of doing all this, I just delved into an imaginary kite flying experience in my mind and went with it and when my imagination encountered physical reality, my oh my, did these 2 worlds collide. The experience of myself changed, I mean, it had to change because, my starting point was from separation all along and so I had to land back into reality but after such a turmoil within myself that included reactions of anger, irritation and frustration was all lead to an unpleasant experience of myself which was not enjoyable at all, my children did not enjoy me like this, nor could they enjoy themselves fully because I was all the time trying to manipulate how they should explore their reality which was from my starting point and they simply did not 'follow' my lead because for sure they must have seen, I was already so very lost, I did not know what I was doing, and above all, I was not HERE with them. That, it was actually I who needed to follow their lead because, they were simply HERE, rolling with the moment which included tangling and detangling themselves within the kite string and they did not react because this was happening, to them it was so fascinating.

I did Self forgiveness and some of the realizations that came through were:

I realized that, when my minds imaginations encountered the unpredictable nature of the physical reality, chaos set in within me because, I did not stand as the stability of myself within my physical body as I separated myself into my mind as imagination and thus I was not really here/equal and one with the physical to direct the unpredictable physical reality moments from within this stability, but I rather reacted to these unpredictable moments and from within these reactions, I further separated myself from what was really physically happening right in front of me, I could not see, my starting point was that of separation, I held on to my imagination, and the more I held on to it, the less and less I could embrace and roll with and enjoy the unpredictability of the physical and learn more about my physical self from it instead of reacting to it. And so here, I greatly diminished myself as the potential I would have become and lived/stood within and as to show my children through example on how to really be HERE as directive principle of ones life within the unpredictable nature of the physical reality so as to always ensure that, the outcome of IT ALL is what's best for all, nothing more, nothing less. This is the principle of equality and oneness as LIFE living HERE, making what's best for all an actual real livable measurable quantifiable reality in the physical/our world.

I realized that, because children are more aligned to/with and as the physical, they don't usually react to the physical, while observing my children in this moment, I could see that, they were not really bothered by whether the kite flew or not, whether they were tangled or not tangled in the kite string, whether it was a string mess or not. To them, dragging the kite on the ground was all there was to it in that moment, tangling and de-tangling themselves in the string was really no big deal to them, that was all there was to it. I did not see them yelling and screaming at each other for not having the kite flying or for being tangled within the kite string. The one that was busy teaching them to react to this given physical reality moment was myself. At this moment, I did not stand equal and one to the physical reality in this moment, equal and one with the entire activity or with them leave alone myself and because I was so separate, all I could teach them was based on separation of right and wrong for example, I stood as the reactions of anger, frustration and irritation towards that given reality and so I was literally teaching them that, when things don't work out in reality, that we should react and not find other ways, other solutions, we should blame the kite or the weather or each other and not take self responsibility and become directive principle of every single unpredictable physical moment and created a solution that when applied will created an outcome of what's best for all, nothing more, nothing less.

I realized that with children, one can not really anticipate or desire a certain outcome wile working with physical reality and children. This is because, children at such an early age are usually always moving, touching, exploring anything and everything physical and as a parent, my role is not to project my perceptions, judgments, anticipations, desires of a particular outcome on to them but rather to simply guide them through it all especially in terms of what can physically dangerous to them. Ironically, at the moment, my children are playing my 'role' where they sort of are the parent and I the child, because, I as the parent have separated myself from physical reality by creating all these perceptions, judgments, beliefs, desires, anticipations of a certain outcome etc. which is not only a form of self limitation but also a manipulative and spiteful way of existing if we look at it really where we project our limited separate reality as for example an imagination or a desire to manipulate reality and everything and everyone in it so as to have an outcome that is only best for me/self, to glorify self, make only self happy at the expense of countless suffering, make self seem more/important/superior/special etc. which is the main reason why our world is so messed up today because we are all separate from physical reality and locked ourselves into the bubble of our minds perceptions, judgments, beliefs, desire, anticipations, fears etc. Having observed my children, they do not live nor express themselves from within the starting point of separation, I as a parent do and this is why I must change my starting point from that of separation to that of equality and oneness so I stand as an example for my children to learn from and keep expressing themselves from within the starting point of equality and oneness as what's best for all, children are indeed Innocent/pure/harmless so to speak, until we as parents/adults corrupt them with our limited perception of reality where we consider nothing or no one except self and sooner or later, children pick up on/learn  this spiteful nasty way of living and treating each other as humans let alone other life forms and above all self.

I realized how in my mind, when I was imagining the experience of kite flying, the anticipation, here within my mind, I felt I was really in control of how everything was going to go and how I was going to eventually experience myself as happy, having fun etc. I imagined how I was going to control the whole moment so that we can all meet my desired anticipated outcome. when my anticipation and imaginations met the physical reality, it stood no chance in terms of control. It was obvious that, in as much as I felt in control in my mind and how I was going to control the Physical, this simply was invalid. everything within this moment became so unpredictable and the outcomes I kept getting were not in alignment with my perceived desire of controlling the whole moment of flying a kite and my experience there of. Here, it was obvious that, one can not control the physical reality in terms of an imaginary process to create a certain outcome like I did. an imaginary process is simply an imaginary process, its not real and therefore, it can not stand within and as the reality that is so physical and furthermore so unpredictable and thus its really meaningless to even try to impose onto the physical my imagination/desire and anticipation of a particular outcome like how I imagined a smooth kite flying adventure without considering the physical reality of both the weather and the children and where we were etc. there was very little wind for starters and i couldn't even see through all my perceptions and judgments

So I made a decision to learn about how to fly a kite, when and where to fly a kite, to look up good quality kites and even how we can create our very own home made kite. I decided to go out again to fly a kite with the kids but this time, want to ensure that, I am not separate from physical reality by anticipating or imagining how it is going to turn out, I am simply going to roll with the moment. I am going to equip myself with knowledge and information on how to fly a kite by looking up on google or YouTube, then ill look for a solution to a better kite. On the actual kite flying time, ill make sure that I let go of any desires to have the kite fly a certain way and I shall also let go of any form of wanting to control my children to fly the kite 'my way or no way'. I shall simply stand with my children equal and one while we all explore kite flying, not expecting certain outcomes or anything in return but simply rolling with the physical reality and what will have to be offered for I realize that, its not really about the unpredictability of the physical reality or of being with my children, but its all about WHO I AM WITHIN IT ALL. Am I equal and one with/as the physical and all there is to it in any particular moment moving and directing myself from within to without so as to take absolute responsibility of anything and everything that steps forth from within the physical and ensure that my decision bears an outcome that is what's best for all in real time or  have I separated myself from physical reality by going into the limited bubbles of my mind where I generate illusions as perceptions, judgments, desires, anticipations, beliefs about physical reality instead of seeing physical reality simply for what it is as IS. Also, when and if I see my children exploring the kite a certain way out of the blue, I shall ensure that, I remain stable within myself and not react to what they are doing but actually join them and we do it together and within the doing, I can decide to show them how to for example remain patient and detangle themselves from the string by showing them through doing or how we can all practically work with the string which is usually very long by either tying it a certain way or cutting it so as to prevent the string from becoming a danger to the children.

In my next blog, I shall share how the practical application went.

Day 7: I AM AN IMMIGRANT, THERE ARE SOLUTIONS TO THE CURRENT IMMIRANTS CRISIS.

Many of us have watched in the news about the outpouring of immigrants into Europe. Many of these immigrants have faced harsh conditions of travel, some of whom have lost their lives as in the case of the thousands upon thousands of immigrants that have died on the ‘waters’ of Italy for example.

Many consequences have been created with such an outpouring of immigrants into Europe. I talked to 2 immigrants now living in Switzerland (one on asylum and the other through marriage to a Swiss woman), one of the 2 came by cargo ship from the coast of Nigeria. He narrated to me how his living conditions had been back home, having 3 kids and no way to make ends meet in regards to having an income, he was forced to save the little that he was making each day over a long period of time (years) because believe it or not, these immigrants don’t get free transportation to Europe. They pay large sums of money amounting to thousand if not ten thousands of Euros. One of these 2 immigrants payed over €10,000 to the point where she had to settle down in Switzerland. Many may wonder why pay so much money and risk one’s life to come to Europe? Well, much of the money these two used was borrowed money with the hope of making a better income in Europe so re-pay back the loan. The other immigrant on Asylum came from a war tone country in Africa, she simply couldn’t survive there with her newborn child and being sick, so she gathered herself and her baby and off to Europe she came. She narrated to me that, she really wanted medical attention otherwise she would have died back in her war tone home either by being killed in the war or dying in sickness and she just couldn’t imagine her child’s life without her!

The 2 cases above depict the main reasons why immigrants leave their countries and come to Europe or other developed countries; to search for a better life in terms of earning a decent income to support their families or to escape war that many at times creates adverse consequences in a country for example, a deterioration in health care, education, poverty, displacement, disease etc. which makes the very survival of anyone threatened. Most of the human beings or life form on earth whether understood or not is currently fighting for survival in a world that has more than enough to support each and every living beings’ survival and thriving. So, where then is the problem? Why are masses ditching their countries for the ‘hope’ of finding a better life in another country?

Myself, I am equally an immigrant who moved to Europe because, I was at a point in my life where my very survival was threatened in terms of not having money. I did not have shelter that I could call home, I lived in my friends parents’ home. I barely had enough money to buy food, I couldn’t afford transport money for public transportation to attend a job interview or looks for a job. Many times, I had to choose either walking to the city to look for a job or attend an interview or buy food. One time, which was really the worst time that drove me to making the decision of migrating to Europe was when, I had just 10 Kenya shilling in my pocket (€0.10) and an orange. So here, I had to really calculate my decision with the food (the 1 orange) as well as the money, the 10 Kenya shilling. The money was only enough for transport during ‘non-rush’ hours and only half way to my destination. So I i knew that, I had to take the non-rush hour half way option and walk the rest of the way. This time I was going to a job interview. Coming back home, it was obvious, I had to walk. The hardest part was the food part because, with just one orange, I knew it was not enough to sustain my energy needs but this was all I had. So I decided to eat the orange as I walked back home because this would give me extra energy to walk the entire way to a ‘home’ that was not even mine.

This was my final Blow! My ‘hit rock bottom’ moments. So I decided to take the opportunity immigrating to Europe which in itself was quite a journey up till the point where I was now legally accepted to live and work here. A story for another day.

Unfortunately, this is not the only way that this immigrant’s crisis has directly affected my life. Last year, I tried to get my mother to come visit me in Switzerland as well as help me out with my newborn baby and spend time with my eldest child, her granddaughter. She is currently living in Oregon USA. They denied her a visa on peculiar grounds. It came as a big shock to her and myself, she was devastated, appealing was just a waste of money because the Swiss immigration did not accept my cousin to visit either. My mother has never physically been my children, her grandchildren. My children know her through skype but that’s just it. This happened because, I understand not, Switzerland has tightened its immigration laws so despite us providing all the evidence that they required from us to have a relative visit me here especially financially, they still said NO.

This immigrant’s problem is not going to go away on its own. Many countries have reacted to this problem in violent aggressive ways especially from the police. Immigrants are perceived as a threat to a countries economy, an economy is valued by its amount of money and we do know that, the more the immigrants, the more moneywill be used to solve the many consequences that come with having a largenumber of immigrants in terms of shelter, clothing, health care, education etc.  Many European countries are complaining that, they do not have sufficient funds to cater for all the immigrants needs. So humanitarians have stepped in to help but it seems like the support is not enough, can never be the end solution as many more immigrants will still risk their lives from all over the affected areas in the globe for a chance of a better survival in Europe or elsewhere.

For the EU countries to really solve this immigrants Crisis, a solutions must be brought to where the problem begins in the first place otherwise, the longer we ignore this, the worse it will become and it will not go away until the solution is brought to the people living in dire poverty where one can barely survive or in the war torn countries.

The equal Life Foundation has proposed a Living income to be guaranteed for every human being so that they can afford to live a dignified life that is free from the fear of survival which is the very fear that is driving immigrants to Europe. I would recommend everyone to investigate this proposal so we can work together in granting everyone an opportunity exist within an environment that supports every need that they require to survive in a dignified way, for is this then not ensuring that, human rights have been upheld in each and every corner or the world?

If I had a basic income guaranteed for me to meet my every need, I am certain that, my move to Europe would not have been in any way influenced my very survival being threatened. Am pretty sure if every persons needs were full taken care of within the provision of a living income for all, no one would wish to migrate from their home countries. so lets give a living income to everyone to support themselves within their home environment and the immigration crisis will end.

 

 

Day 6: STAY AT HOME MOM, SYSTEM WORKING MOM - Part 3

........The last point I would like to share here is in regards to what I recently realized I have been accepting and allowing that has been sending me into reaction mode instead of taking responsibility through changing.......

 

In the recent times, I noticed that, whenever my partner or someone mentioned that I have so much help and I’m doing nothing, I immediately went into the reaction of anger and frustration as an experience of myself within myself. At first, I blamed my partner for not seeing just how much I am responsible for in terms of raising our children. I felt he undermined and belittled my responsibilities as a mother whereby, how he working in the system perceives his responsibilities as of much more value than my responsibilities of raising our children. This honestly pissed me off that he did not recognize nor respect my efforts. To make this worse, because I have someone that helps with cleaning and at times (if needed) with children, this perception of me by others as lazy and having too much help  and too much time to do nothing increased and this only heightened my reactions of anger and frustration towards such people including my partner. They had no clue how little I slept at night only to wake up to a busy day.

I was compared many times to other mothers that have no help and yet, they can do it all alone. I tried doing this by myself, it just did not work for me, us. With little sleep and caring for children plus a big house, this took a toll on me both physically and mentally as well as emotionally. At the end of each day, I was so exhausted to do any more, in as much exhausted as I was, my reality did not allow me to rest. I had had/have an infant that needed/still needs me throughout the night. My babies are not perfect sleepers. My eldest can now sleep throughout the night but my youngest still needs me to wake up several times a night to feed her. I received books, online education on how to make a baby sleep the whole night without interruption, well, my little one digests food fast and within sometime, it’s all out and she needs to feed some more. I mean, in as much as others wanted to support me to support my daughter to sleep throughout the night, my reality was different. I stick to my reality and I support my child(ren) the best way I know how in any given moment. This quickly took a toll on my body and a few times, I had a complete burn out, others, I fainted and even once, I had to go to ER because I suddenly I couldn’t walk and my world seemed to be crashing down around me, I was petrified because I did not understand then that, this was exhaustion and thus went to ER.

But for me, what was the worst was who I was becoming towards my children. Being exhausted all the time, I became quite emotional and had anger outbursts at times. Any little thing agitated me so much, I was too tired to interact with my babies and this ‘crashed my heart’. It became quite a battle to remain stable within myself and direct my reality from within stability. I did not enjoy who I was within and hence without. I knew something had to change. My partner also being extremely busy with his work responsibilities left him little to no time to help me out. He is away almost 16 hours a day, so one can imagine how equally exhausted he gets at the end of each day. Our quality of life in terms of our relationship towards each other and our children was diminishing and so we decided to have long term help especially cleaning so I can focus only on the children. This has been a tremendous step we took towards supporting each other.

So why then am I still reacting to people perceiving me as ‘doing nothing’ even after I see clearly that, I was overriding my physical body to the extent of blacking out because of just how much was doing? Was it because I now have help and I don’t do much house work? Hmmmm…NO.

I realized that, it’s actually been because of my whole entire approach to my responsibilities as a mother. It has been who I have been within it all. Let me share here another example of myself to further elaborate this point. A while back, due to many circumstances, at some point in my life, which was after graduating from Uni, I had decided to be a career woman. I thought to myself, a husband and kids may not be a life for me unless I met a man responsible enough to be a father. This decision came because I had dated men that were quite irresponsible and so I made an assumption that, many if not all men are irresponsible, the father figures in my life were not responsible either. And so I was not willing to settle for such an irresponsible man even and thus the no marriage and not kids for me ‘theory’.

My path of chasing down my career did not prosper as one can imagine living in an environment where there’s thousands upon thousands of university graduates all aiming for a job in a jobs starved country. For over 2 years, my plan was not becoming a reality for me. I became disappointed many times. I was willing to work for any salary as I was as broke as can be! As some would say, I was flat broke. No shelter and no money for food, I walked to go for interviews as I couldn’t afford transportation by bus, I was desperate, I mean who wouldn’t be. By this time, I had met my current partner back then but I was not willing to relocate from my country because I still hoped that, I can make ends meet and embark on my career. Well, I remember there was some pressure from my partner to relocate and it wasn’t until after a few months that I gave in, found ways and means and voila, I relocated, and after a couple of months, got married and a year later, the first child was here. Before the first child, my partner and I had a mutual clear agreement that I will be a stay at home mom.

So the problem begun when I started comparing myself to my University mates. Some had gone further and acquired masters degrees, and a few even up to PhD levels. So within myself, thoughts began creeping in about if I’d made the right choice to be a mother. When I saw just how much further my friends were in their careers, I began to feel sorry for myself, I begun to diminish myself and my responsibilities as a mother. I began to perceive my parenting role as a ‘nothing’, not a job, has no reward in terms of money, career, and recognition. Id backchats like, all I do is sit and play with babies day in day out.

I had regrets on choosing to be a mother. Regret because I felt that, I had to give up so much of myself, in fact all of myself to care for another. I felt like I lost myself completely within this responsibility. I was a completely different person when my first child arrived. My life changed overnight! I felt like, my life, my freedom had been robbed. I literally felt like ‘I’ DIED. It was obvious that my reality, my life had changed completely, but yet, I was not willing to embrace this change, I wanted to push it away, far far away so that I can have ‘me’ back, my freedom back, this just happened in my mind even though my reality screamed otherwise. I imagined what my life would have been like had I succeeded in being a career woman. I kept comparing my life to that of my childless friends fully immersed in their careers or chasing one. I felt that I missed out on that life. I felt I would have become ‘so much more’ having a career as opposed to being a mother and a stay at home mother in this case.

This perception of myself as a mother as less than, inferior to the working woman, mother or not, is what has been stirring up my reactions of anger and frustration whenever my partner mentions the words, ‘you are doing nothing’.  These words resonate within myself as a mirror of how I have actually been perceiving myself within my role as a mother which has been, ‘I am just sitting around with kids doing nothing’ being a mother is nothing because I am not out there working in a system where all value is based on money and not life, thus myself as well as masses out there perceive being a mother as valueless as there is no form of monetary reward, that I am not a strong woman.

Another point I have created and held within my mind that has been influencing the perception of my role as a mother as a nothing role, is that of, associating interactions with people who work in the system, corporate system as more valuable interactions, more valuable relationships that will make me ‘get noticed’ (EGO) in comparison to interacting or associating myself with children or childlike stuff day in day out! So here again, another example of how I have diminished myself and the potential I can embody and live as the absolute point of stability of an example of what it means to raise a human being that will consider and regard all life from within the principle of equality and oneness as what’s best for all, which begins with me stopping being elsewhere and actually starting to embrace the whole responsibility of motherhood.

so, I realized that, to me the most important aspect about being a mother is who I am within myself within it all. who I am within myself while fulfilling my responsibilities of being a mother to my children be it during play time, bed time, book time, outdoors time and any other time/moment I spend with my children. I ask myself, is who I am within myself stable, HERE and ready to embrace the entire moment am with my children or am I existing elsewhere in my mind worrying about career or working in the system to make money, comparing myself with other mothers and end up competing with them on who's job/responsibilities are more valuable than the others or am I being a mother to get recognition and praise from others to boost my ego and much more. I understand that, each mother faces different responsibilities in how they care for their children.

Bottom line is, it shouldn't be about a war between system working moms and stay at home moms, but rather about who we are within ourselves as mothers and how we live and interact with our children. This is so important as this is the very point that will determine the very foundation of a child that will become the future adult as what a child will learn, will mimic/copy from us as mothers/parents/adults and therefore, we should stand and live as the best example of what care, respect and honor of another human being is all about and not make it about judgment, comparison, beliefs, perceptions etc as this only diminishes our ability and potential to live HERE as the best example our children can emulate to also become the best they can become in honoring life as themselves and others. It should be about assisting and supporting eachother to raise our children into adults that regard, honor, respect and care for the  life and all that is here, regardless of whether you work in the system of stay at home with the kids.
 

For the world exists as it does today due to our parents not having known any better and their parents not having known any better and thus from generation to generation, the sins of our fathers is what we teach our children to live by today and this is one of the major reasons why our world isn’t changing, because we as parents have not changed. For how will this world ever change if we as parents do not teach our children changes that we ourselves have and a living by? Changes that have been walked and lived in regards to what’s best for all?

Day 5: STAY AT HOME MOM, SYSTEM WORKING MOM - Part 2

Another example I would like to share here involves myself. I have been a stay at home mom and for much of this time, I know how many times I have been criticized/judged/perceived in relation to my role of a stay at home mom. The first point here I’d like to share out is that of being perceived as lazy and doing nothing because, apparently, caring/looking after a child, children is perceived as ‘no job, doing nothing’. Some people have gone to the extent of telling me, ‘but you are a stay at home mom, what do you do with all your time the whole day?, you should use all that time to enjoy yourself, have some ‘me’ time, like, to pretty yourself up’, or a statement like, ‘why do you need help with household or the kids since you are a stay at home mom, other mothers do everything by themselves’ which is an obvious way of implying that as a stay at home, I do nothing and hence should have so much time to do whatever it is that I want which is quite ironic at times as it has been implied that, I must do everything by myself as a stay at home mom because I have time (but am lazy). This here is a false perception, an interpretation of my reality as a stay at home mom that is not based on the reality of the responsibilities I have every single day of taking care of my children. In any case here, I would say that, this perception is nothing but the opposite of what I face/do every single day, I have no time to focus on other activities that don’t revolve around taking care of my children. I can create time to fulfill a certain task that is NEEDED but other than that, my commitment is towards my children, they come first in every decision I make, iv to make sure that what I say, do, is what’s best for the children and in actuality, this leaves little room for ‘me time’ as others may perceive.

Another thing I’d like to point out here is something that my mother shared with me some time back. She told me, not to be the kind of mother she was towards me/us towards my children. She mentioned that, I have the opportunity of doing better, meaning, being there fully for my children and not only this, but also to educate myself on what it entails to raise a child/children, how who we are shapes the entirety of who/what the child will live/express/become and therefore, as a parent I must change who I am within and without to stand within both word and deed as an example of what’s best for all, and as are children who

copy everything the parent/adult does, they then can copy/emulate a living/an expression of themselves in consideration of what’s best for all. I shall elaborate this point in blogs to come. Surely, the caregivers we were left under had no clue on how to raise children and so, I’d say, they raised us the best way they knew how, a way they also were raised by their parents. This may have been their ‘best’ way of doing it, but what I must elaborate here is that, most of the childhood memories I have are filled with fear/petrification of the adults back then, almost, if not all, I learnt was based on fear. My childhood was quite a tough one, filled with immense physical, mental and emotional abuse. Who I am today was shaped by going through a lot of abuse, I do not blame my caregivers/the adults or my mother as they all did not know any better, this is the only way they knew how to ‘parent’ as what they learnt from their parents, so how I shaped myself has been coming through now that I am a parent. This also I shall share in blogs to come and the process I have walked, still walking to change the patterns that I copied from my caregivers, patterns that should not be copied by my children and the future generations. So here I stand, everyday pushing myself to investigate all patterns that I accepted and allowed to shape who I am today as a parent and change myself by stopping this patterns and re-creating myself as an

expression that my children can emulate within the principle of what's best for all. So as I grew up, I ‘swore’ to myself that, I never want my children to go through what I went through, I remember saying to myself that, if I don’t have the opportunity of being a stay at home mom, then, I will not consider having children. The reason being, under caregivers, there are just mothering instincts that a caregiver cannot express to another person’s child , there are some parts/needs in a child’s life that only a mother can fulfill and in the best way possible, these needs are mainly dependent on the deep physical connection between a mother and a child. An example would be, when either of my children is sick, mothers do know that, night time is usually the time when sickness skyrockets be it fever, coughing etc., this time, I’m usually fully alert on what’s happening to my child at aphysical level. I wake up often to check on them not because I’m forced to, but because I want to and they need this support. To another, this may be a bother or may not be executed in the best way possible as support for the child. This does not make responsibilities towards my children any more or less than those of an system/office working mom.

So here really, I find it absolutely unnecessary to judge a mother or condemn her in how much she participated in her child’s life, rather than judging, condemning, the approach I would use and have used is to try and understand why a mother makes the choices she does in regards to her child(ren) and then from there, assist and support in the ways that I can, this way, as mothers, we would be much more effective in how we fulfill our responsibilities in regards to our children without having to bear the burden of harsh judgments/perceptions from each other which in turn influence the potential of who we can become in terms of parenting. Wouldn’t it be best for us to stop judging, condemning, persecuting, diminishing each other’s responsibilities towards our children and instead focus on understanding each other, the decisions we make and from within the understanding assist and support each other through ideas, suggestions etc. on how we can be better/best mothers to our children? This comparison and competition of stay at home moms and system working moms is completely unnecessary because, the one who comes/should come first in our decisions is what’s best for our children and not whose job is more demanding, more valuable or who does more than the other.

The last point I would like to share here is in regards to what I recently realized I have been accepting and allowing that has been sending me into reaction mode instead of taking responsibility through changing. This in my next blog.

 

Day 6: STAY AT HOME MOM, SYSTEM WORKING MOM - Part 3

 

Day 4: STAY AT HOME MOM, SYSTEM WORKING MOM - Part 1

There have been countless opinions/perceptions in our world in regards to being a stay at home ‘working’ mom or a system working mom. A while back, I encountered posts on social media targeting either group of women or both. The comments themselves were made out of self-defense whereby, either of the woman defends her status of ‘work’ as of more or less value than the others’. This debates went on and on and I could see just how much of an emotional turmoil this point did trigger within the mothers. The system working mom perceives her nature of work/responsibility as very challenging because they must work both in the system during the day and be a mother to the children at home in the evenings and most of these mothers have the common assumption that, a stay at home mom has so much time on her hands to do pretty much what she wants and caring for the kids is not of so much value mainly because there is no reward in the form of an income at the end of the day. Another common perception is that, stay at home moms are lazy because they do not work in the system to become ‘independent’ women because in this equation, the man/husband takes care of all the financial needs of the household and everyone in it. Another perception is that, a stay at home mom is a waste of potential of who/what the woman/mother could have become if only she worked in the system.

Meanwhile, the stay at home mom perceives the system working mom as unfortunate in that, she has to leave her kids under the care and supervision of another person which in itself may be consequential to the child especially if the caregivers are not really as passionate in caring for the child as the own mother can. A stay at home mom at times thinks/perceives that, it is irresponsible of a system working mom to put career and money as first priority and mothering/parenting in the lesser priority category.

So there’s obviously this internal and external fight/conflicts among stay at home moms and system working moms. But does it really have to be a war? Does parenting have to be about competition on whose responsibilities are more valuable or should it be about the support of another being/child in the best way possible? What is being a mother then all about? What circumstances have we accepted and allowed both within and without that have shaped the very perceptions about raising children/being parents/moms/mothers? How can we as mothers stand up and step out of these self-created illusions as the perceptions/opinions/judgments we have created towards ourselves and towards each other as the responsibilities that entail being the best possible example for your child to emulate? How can we assist and support each other through sharing and uplifting each other instead of fighting through comparison and competition?

Let me open up these points further by going through some typical examples of a system working mom and a stay at home mom:

My mother was a system working mom, from what I see now, one of the reasons that she did this was because she had us 4 kids (later 5) and she had to fulfill the responsibilities of being a single parent to us. She had to ensure that, all our basic needs were met and the only way she could do this was by getting much more education and thus land a better job in the system to afford paying for all our needs. Most of the times she was not physically with us as she at some point had to go abroad to study for three years and once she came back, she got a job where we could just see her and spend time with her just one day a week. This was because her job was quite far away in the city and we at this time lived in a small town, so commuting daily to her would have been a big hustle as well as expensive. So clearly here, it was practical that my mother made such choices, it was commonsensical, the system she worked in gave her no other option to ease her separation

from her children until much much later when the government gave her a government house that was much more affordable and so we were able to move to the city. So here, from this memory that I have just shared, it is obvious that, my mother, as a system working mom had to fulfill all the financial obligations that come with having not only just 1 child but 4 (later 5) children. There was no one or nothing else that gave us monetary support at this time. So, her responsibilities of mothering us were done by someone else i.e. my relatives, teachers and maids. It was not an easy upbringing with adults that had no clue on what parenting entails. These were the people that we were supposed to learn from/emulate as children, the people that we learnt from, I learnt from. People that had no education experience or background of what being a mother entails and so there was an exceptional amount of abuse physically/mentally/emotionally. The caregivers always threatened not to tell my mother, or bribed us with candy if we don’t tell of the abuse, and so we never told.

So in this example, it was obvious that my mother needed to work in order that she earns some income/money to fulfill our basic needs. Here her role as a mother was not more or less, just different because in her circumstances, as a single mom, she had to, so if I judge/perceive her as having been uncaring, irresponsible and a bad mother for neglecting/leaving us under the care of others and not physically being there for us/with us, I would be self-dishonest. This are exactly some of the judgments/perceptions that are passed on to system working mothers.

Next blog: Day 5: STAY AT HOME MOM, SYSTEM WORKING MOM - Part 2