For Mature Adults Only

A bite of my mother-daughter book:

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Somehow, what gets stuck in human beings and keeps us from flourishing are the “bad” moments, the uncomfortable moments, the moments of conflict. These moments can keep us from being fully expressed in the future, because they were so uncomfortable when they happened in the first place. Like when I knocked a cartoon figure from my teacher’s desk in fifth grade—it went clattering to the floor and its little protest sign broke off…all because I was making a grand gesture with my arms. Do you think this made me want to be expressive?

What if it’s not an accident? What if you’re in a great mood so you randomly get up and sing a love song to your whole class, who respond by staring back, in stunned embarrassment that you were willing to be seen--do you think you’ll ever do it again? No, of course not. Wait--would you? Why or why not? How much does or should our past experience dictate our now? We learn from our mistakes, but how do we even know what’s a mistake and what’s just something that the world isn’t ready for yet?

And what if someone else sang to their class and it was taped, and put on YouTube, and had a million hits? All of a sudden it’s cool, to get up and serenade the class. And it would be cool to know this kid, who is now a YouTube sensation--but who is taking the risk to BE this kid? To be fully expressive? Didn’t that end before kindergarten? Maybe it didn't end, but it likely became more of a risk.

As we age, we are taught to pull our expression further and further inward (unless we’re a rock star) until we become mature adults. That’s what “Mature Adults” means, right? It means boring people who are in judgement of us; mature adults are the gatekeepers of the expression of pleasure and joy and anger and intensity. Mature adults define our borders and boundaries and “contain” us. And that’s what our society used to need, because of limiting belief systems that told us that if grownups didn’t contain their kids, they’d grow up to be criminals, outlaws. But slowly the world is coming to realize that the personal power and expression of individuals is not inherently dangerous, if we are connected to the highest part of ourselves.

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