From Me to You

I was diagnosed with high-functioning Asperger's at age 9. However I didn't know that at the time - in fact I didnt find out until my late thirties. In many ways this was a blessing - but in others it wasn't as back then instead of my gifts being encouraged and celebrated i was made to feel wrong and less than. I don't talk about it much because it didn't form a significant part of my identity. High-functioning Aspergers - although the term isn't in use anymore - are often highly gifted, hyper-focused people with a mission to get something new out into the world. They are outspoken and direct because they don't have time to pretend, or learn anything other than specifically what they are interested in. I've never liked labels much because I feel that self-acceptance and forward motion often comes from putting lables aside and finding solutions. However, i recently realised that in a world that mostly ignores differences and tries to fix or correct them, labels can help draw attention to differing needs and increase self-worth and self-confidence.

I feel this question points to the central question of what parenting is really all about. Is it about teaching a set of norms and behaviours so the child can "survive and make good money" in the mainstream? There is a huge amount of pressure on parents to go this route. It creates a huge amount of stress and pain for children who are not neurologically cut our for that life. Or is parenting more about feeding curiosity and supporting your child's passions, listening to their struggles and helping them find ways to do what they want to? And trusting that they will find their own way to survive and even thrive if you support who they are rather than forcing them into an external ideal? Could it be that "allowing the child’s soul to reveal itself and flourish" as I would suggest is actually beneficial in terms of their own thriving? From thirty years of working with parents and children what I have found works best is to first and foremost acknolwedge and support the child's unique way of being, and secondly help them build bridges to the mainstream social world as far as they want and need. To me this is the real fine art of parenting highly sensitive and nuerodivergent - or indeed any - children. Holding an unmuddied space for that child to grow into who they are and express themselves in the world is the most noble intent.

Both the school system and the working world contribute to this demand on children to suppress and grow away from what is in their hearts and their souls that they are really enthusiastic about. And to put aside their real passions and motivations in order to make money and do something "productive" or something known as a career or gaining recognition. I have felt this pressure accutely myself despite offering a unique service to children and parents that isn't taught at university and can only be quantified through its results. Encouraging peopel's souls is not yet a university degree - although it could be. However things are changing - businesses are realiseing that utilising their employees talents and strengths actually serves them. And parents are realising that making their children behave and conform doesnt improve happiness or schoolwork. Whilst parental concern for their children's future well-being is totally natural, if we acknowledge that the world is changing fast and current ways of living and working will also evolve, then maybe this opens up more space for parents to trust and support their children's unique attributes, viewpoints and behaviours. In the near future, adaptability, authenticity and creative co-operation and inclusion, will be the new currencies that replace climbing to the top, competition and exclusivity. Passion, soul and innate motivation are what connect us to the centre of life itself - that which supports and moves us, helps us grow and develop. If you think this is an overly spiritual concept - I suggest it isn't. It's both scientific and common sense. All I'm saying is that no-one says to a small apple tree - hey why don't you grow into an oak, or better still we could really do with a thicket of bamboo right here to block out the wind. So why are we as parents, schools and a society suggesting to certain children who are obviously a certain way to distort themsevles into a totally alien form? It doesn't make any common sense when it's obviously not who they came here to be. Why aren't we encouraging children to be more of who they are and really find the thing that makes their hearts sing? Is it maybe because since a lot of adults did not have that opportunity themselves it is extremely painful to allow others to have it?

From my own reflections I suspect it is a combination of the pain and frustration it brings up for parents (especially those who are neurodiverse and only just realising), and also not having recieved that support, not being sure how to go about giving it. Personally, i find the pain of the years of wasted life in insecurity and being lost doubting myself when I was in fact brilliant and innovate all along a huge motivator. I want to shift the paradigm and make sure that younger generations have the supoprt I never had.

I also ponder about why so many pretend to be blind to the health and social implications of doing anything other than supporting people's innate capacities... A person whose passion and life direction is thwarted, first gets sad and angry, then gets physically as well as possibly mentally unwell and may even go on to create social unrest. This is a drain on the social and healthcare systems. These connections are universally recognised across cultures - so why are we still pretending they don't exist in mainstream school and work structures? Why are we so blind to the root cause when it is so apparnet? Instead of asking how can we change these children's behaviours, or increase these adults productivity, we need to be asking how far removed from their own centre and their own joy and passion are they, and how can we support them in getting reconnected with themselves. Because that shift is the root which resolves all the other issues across the board. It is by far the most efficient and effecitve approach. And also the most emotionally intelligent one.

When you figure out how to un-crush children's souls and make sure they know they are valued as they are and that we support them in every way, then not only do they begin to thrive but our whole culture can shift.

I'm allowing myself to have a bit of a rant today because it seems recently that everyone has some degree of ADHD or Autism or this or that and its really annoying me deeply. I have to admit it is ADHD month this October and that is alreay a step forwards... In has to be a good thing that people are acknowledging their own struggles openly. But not if the response is to endorse medication at the expense of making radical changes in our culture, to make it more suitable for the people in it! We don't need to learn to find ways to cope with our surroundings - we need to design lives that help us thrive! I also don't like the term "Neurospicy" which is recently being bandied about because I feel it diminishes the anguish that people go through who are different and not understood. People who want desperately to fit in but don't and can't. And who always feel less than the mainstream and actually are sidelined and excluded. Whilst knowing deep within themselves that they have so much to contribute, but not being able to get anyone to hear them or take them seriously because the social and work culture is only set up for one way of contributing (loud, brash, exagerated, overwhelming, fast and competitive) and everything else is vetoed. But that's just me - I'm fed up. You may love the word neurospicy and if it supports you that's wonderful. I personally don't feel that more diagnoses and more specific labels are the answer.  Labels just allow people to dismiss someone and move on rather than look properly at who is in front of them and find a way to connect. Yet what nuerodivergent, different and simply creative and gifted people need is precisely to be seen, heard and perceived with LESS prejudices and preconceptions, not more. So if you are interested in a reframe which can actually get humanity out of this mess then please carry on reading. My sense is that both the neurotypical and the nuerodivergent people need to extend towards each other so that there is more mutual respect and understanding of the differences between people, their needs and their limits just as a matter of fact, and not because of special labels. Respect and acceptance and uplevelled abilitiy to relate is what needs to become normalised in our culture for us all to thrive together and move forwards. 

ARTICLE: Beyond labels - there is hope and humanity; but we need to relearn to relate.

Introduction

I have been asking myself for a long time, what is the real underlying problem with acknowledging that everyone wants to be themselves, follow their passions and express what is truly in their hearts? Why do people i mentio this too often say I'm a dreamer or an idealist whilst i feel it is the only real possibility for human peace and evolution? To me anyone who denies this is either a psycopath or not fully human! ( a typical asperger's statement).  The conclusion I have come to is that people simply are too afraid to or cannot re-imagine a world where this is actually the case. Their minds boggle and collapse at the changes for school, work, economic and social structures and everything that this would imply. So they defualt to the status quo. It's miserable and desperate, but safe and known.

However it isn't safe anymore. It's changing very fast - nothing will be the same very shortly as any observant person can see - and nothing is certain except change and the need to adapt and innovate. So will clinging on really help at all? Is fear and control the answer?

The problem is the definition of normal

When children don't "do well" at school we never stop and question whether the tasks they are being set are interesting or relevant to them as individuals. We try to find ways to help them to do well. Or better. To catch up or cope. Don't you find this totally absurd? I do. The problem here has nothing to do with them not being able to do the school curriculum tasks - any child can learn all the simple tasks given the right conditions. The problem is that the child as a whole is not being encouraged, seen, accepted and acknowledged. I have worked with hundreds of children ranging from "dumb", "stupid" and "learning challenged" to gifted and extraordinary - and I can say that across the board, as soon as a child feels safe emotionally, fully accepted, secure and allowed to make mistakes, learning and growth happens. The schoolwork is not a problem. Ever. I taught a failing child maths who thought she was stupid - at 11 she didnt know her times tables. She took her GCSE two years early at 14 and got an A. She is one of many many. So this is not a theory - I have been teaching children since I was 14 - those with labels and diagnoses like autistic, ADHD, dense, slow, dyslexic, dyspraxic, Tourett'es, PDA, unfocused and more - and they have all excelled without fail. If a child were really "dyslexic" then they wouldnt be able to learn to read alone in three weeks now, would they? So what is really going on?

Not doing well at school usually indicates a problem in the child's ability to feel good in themselves, to feel safe, included, liked and worthy. So trying to change behaviours or teaching more will not help - we need to help the child look inside themselves and like what they see. It's not hard - in fact it is incredibly simple. Yet this is so often overlooked in both parentig and education in an attempt to help the child fit in and not fall behind. Ironically, to achieve these aims we need a pre-stage where we put them aside in order to lay a foundation first.  

When a child fails at schoolwork, they are usually not understanding what is being asked of them, or they would do it. This may be because they are not interested, because they can't hear what is being said due to the teacher's emotional state, becasue they didn't eat the right breakfast, because they are tired, because the class is too noisy or any other number of factors. Many of these factors are social or emotional, and a lot have worsened since the home-schooling periods during COVID. They may feel so worthless that they can't even be bothered to try. Or too scared of failure and punishment to actually function. Or just feeling they are too behind to ever catch up so why bother. There can be so many different things going on - none of which are actually to do with being able to do the schoolwork. 

Whose responsability is it to fix these issues?

To answer this we have to go back to basics. I started researching parent-child interactions and their effects on child development in my early twenties in Mexico. As a result of what I found I shifted to supporting parents as much as children as the relationships they create have everything to do with a child's ability to thrive and function. I have been working with parents for decades, helping them to give their children a solid foundation in self-assurance, ability to say no, express emotions, defend physical limits and know they are backed by their parents. And still, children spend the majority of their childhood lives actually physically at school away from their parents. So parents count on teachers to do some of this work. Often they don't really know how to instill a basic sense of worth and self-assurance to their children because they didnt have it either.The same goes for emotional regulation. Teachers are not really equipped to do the work, and they are under-resourced. It's very much luck of the draw - whether the child gets a teacher who gets and supoprts them or not. The whole system is not set up to support children's holistic health - and this won't change until we realise the huge amount of human resources we are wasting and losing by forcing square pegs into round holes. And the unecessary serious mental health issues that are generated.

So overall, we have some parents trying to support their children's holistic development and then a school system that tries to get them to conform to some norm that isn't realistic or feasible, because of a lack of resources, or inability to imagine something different. (Or is it just lack of committment to human health and wellbeing and more of a response to producing obedient citizens to feed into the capitalist job system as some argue? I don't want to get political here but it does seem frankly illogical for an intelligent society to still be behaving this way.) Everybody is waiting for somebody else to make the change, change the system, for priorities to shift or something to give. And whilst we wait individuals struggle, children lose their sparkle, their hope and their belief in the beauty of life, and uniquely gifted individuals are medicated and taught to sit still so that they dont disrupt the others. The well-being of a class of torpid children who have realised that if they get by and learn a minimum of stuff that they "have to" they get to play on their electronic devices at home. Of course i am exaggerating - but i am trying to make a point.  This is not education - this is brainwashing. We need to stop disrespecting individuals in the name of limited resources and convenience and start supporting human life in its richness and full expression. It's the only way we can have a thriving whole. Because every person, and in fact every living being that is born is part of this living whole. We are all equally valid, and we have to figure out how to co-exist and support each other in being without making one way the standard for everyone to aspire to. People need to grow towards their own aspirations, not each other's. 

But it doesn't stop there

Until authenticity and respect of self and others become mainstream values and are brought into workplaces, business structures, money matters, policits and every aspect of human life, these obligations and distortions will limit the ability of parents to really support their children to thrive as the individuals they were born as. There are systemic distortions that filter down to the family on every level.

The cost of having employees in a company not speak up with their ideas, not feel valued to contribute with their creative initiatives, to step up, lean in and shine is collosal. Thankfully there are initiatives where NVC for example is being used in industry and government to falicitate conversation, and many places are more progressive. But the norm needs to shift radically.

It isn't about increasing diversity either

The step towards increased neurodivergent, gender, race, age, physical ability inclusion, quotas for black females in top management etc is of course a much needed step in the right direction. But every new label or category that gets created to give some previously ignored sub-division a place and a voice creates more fragmentation. Moreover the label itself gives the vast majority the chance to switch off and stop engaging and relating to what is actually there. Instead they have a concept - like a post-it note eg that person has ADHD so takes ritalin and stuggles with x. It doesn't help you see or listen to that person, feel deeper and respond authentically. If anything it distances you from a real and maybe uncomfortable encounter with something different from yourself - or maybe worse, uncannily similar. And so you remain safe, in your normal conformist box where you fit into life well enough and get by whilst the other remains distant, alone and excluded. Or lumped with similar rejects who are given value in label, but not in reality.

Is this what we really want as individuals and a society - to fit in, get by, make it through?

There is more

I personally cannot accept this and will not. It isn't my truth. How do I know that? I have known since I was very little that what was going on around me socially was often not coherent. Because it made my blood boil. My stomach shrinks in and twists up when people are inauthentic. By that I mean their words do not match up with their emotions. And when I don't feel a sense of love coming from them towards me. When they are not kind to animals I know they are sick and need help. I could never stand it when a teacher singled out a vulnerable child and wielded power over them for a sense of self-satisfaction or to discharge their own frustration. And this happens so much! These people need support and empathy, and the chance to grow.

And what makes me happy, joyful, inspired, energised and often near genius level in what I contribute and the way I interact comes from a different paradigm, a different mode of functioning.

When I am lablelled i feel judged and boxed in. When someone looks at me with acceptance, curiosity and open-ness i feel loved, encouraged and invited to share my creativity and insights. I literaaly unfurl my leaves and lean towards the light. Kindness and acceptance  is the paradigm from which i have always related to people, the one that removes boundaries and allows connection and empathy. And it isn't hard - any child can do it. And they do. And when we mirror it back to them their brains develop - again this is scientifically researched and proven. It's just that many adults need to consciously relearn what they were taught at school and become their heart-centred selves again. We need a revolution in actually relating, brought about by being present and feeling.

Holding clear space creates connection. 

I have been practising this since I was a child - with my parents, with animals and with other children at school. It enabled me to see very early on why other children weren't understanding the teacher and to explain things to them in the way they needed. It also helped me to learn things I didnt understand my self from books and from observing reality. I call it clear-seeing or seeing reality directly. When you look in this unfiltered emotion-free way from your hear it creates connection and acceptance.  It also creates trust even in children and animals. Because it's not possible to fake it. When you speak from that place people hear something that touches them and makes sense on a deeply intuitive level, even though they can't always reason why. You may be getting that feeling as you read this. Even though it is very long and detailed (that's how highly sensitive people write). 

Clear-seeing and holding clear space is the foundation of the embodiment practice which I teach parents, and which I use to work with children to help their brains connect in new ways so that their own sense of their unique self strengthens and develops. It sounds complex but its really just active acceptance. Another way of saying the same thing is looking without judgement. Or getting your own emotional baggage out of the way. It something that CAN be learnt and practised and is available to anyone. All of these are just detailed ways of saying being fully present.

It is also the basic place to which our whole humanity needs to reorient from the bottom up and top down and all directions sideways and diagonal. The heart and alignment with the whole - the whole of nature, the whole of creation and the life that animates us. Some call this God or spirit - but again the label often just gets in the way of the experience. It runs through, animates and connects all of us.

Conclusion

There is no real conclusion here - only an impulse and a direction. The impulse of stepping out of the fear, control and security-based paradigm and trusting that the authentic deepest passions, impulses and leanings of each individual do hold the real answers for all of us when they are encouraged and combined.

If any of this touches you and you want to know more, please email me and book a free call. If you have children who have big emotions or you are concerned about their school or social progress I would love to interview you online for a new programme I am creating. Let's do this together, one family at a time.

COOL RESOURCE

It's well worn but made of gold - if you haven't read Eckart Tolle's The Power of Now - and you struggle to know how to respond to your child when things get difficult and overwhelming - please have another read. Even reading half a page before bed or at lunchtime can bring you into a more present state that can only benefit you and your whole family. 

UPCOMING EVENTS

My next online event will be on Sunday 1st December. If you have any burning issues about your children's big emotions and how to best support them that you want answered then come along and bring a friend for free. Please email me for details and to book a spot- places are limited.

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