It’s the morning after Yom Kippur, the most solemn day of the year on the Jewish calendar, and I am at my computer at 5:17 AM. It’s the 3rd night in a row waking up super early for no reason at all. I am frustrated at the lack of sleep, but I am told, it comes with getting older. Turns out, my body is not waiting for my 40th birthday in a few months to show me who’s boss.
In any case, I had alot of down time on Yom Kippur this year, which means I had alot of time for reading. (I can’t believe I just typed out that sentence. Just a few years ago, in the throes of parenting young children, I never would have believed it to be true.) I started – and finished – Daring Greatly by Brené Brown.
I was a little skeptical at first. People love Brené Brown. But with a title like Daring Greatly, it seemed a little overachieving to me. (Maybe that’s because I have a little overachiever myself in me.)
Her book focuses on expressing vulnerability as the key to true courage. The title comes from Teddy Roosevelt’s famous “man in the arena” speech, which I’ve heard quoted before:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
The book as a whole was a surprisingly enlightening and enjoyable read, but the section that really resonated for me was how it affects the way we parent.
I have always known that I should call out my child’s behavior, rather than the whole child herself, but the way Brown puts it explains why in a crystal clear way. “If a child tells a lie, she can change that behavior. If she is a liar – where’s the potential for change in that?” I know this intellectually to be true, but the simplicity and trueness of the statement took me by surprise.
Her discussion centers around the feelings of shame that we invoke in our children. As parents, many of us see shame as a tool to motivate children into choosing correctly. My whole life, I’ve been taught that shame is a powerful motivator, but it hit home for me yesterday when, as I was reading the Yom Kippur liturgy, I found myself scanning the words of one of the sins in the Viduy prayer “lacking the Jewish attribute of shame.” Are we supposed to really feel shame when we sin?
When I read that, I realized that the real word, according to Brown, should be guilt. Guilt motivates us to change because what we did doesn’t align with the values we hold true for ourselves. Shame tells us that we, ourselves, are bad. See the difference?
Brown explains why shame is so damaging. “Shame is so painful for children because it is inextricably linked to the fear of being unlovable,” she writes. “Feeling unlovable is a threat to survival. It’s trauma.”
Brown writes that more important than making our child feel that they have done wrong is modeling for them the behavior we want to cultivate. Owning up to our mistakes, but loving ourself in the process. Not openly calling ourselves an “idiot” when we lock the keys in the car. She relates a story in which she helped her daughter navigate an unpleasant situation in elementary school where she felt left out by empathizing with her, and just a short time later, her daughter recognized the same feelings in her mother when she felt left out of a conference flyer noting many speakers at a conference by name, but not her. It’s those parenting moments that make for the most powerful. When we own up to our own feelings and recognize that our job as parents is simply to be there, and be honest, for our children.
As neuroscientist Dan Siegel and parenting expert Tina Payne Bryson, note in their book The Power of Showing Up, this doesn’t take alot of time, energy, or money. “Predictable care that supports a healthy and empowering relationship embodies what we call the “Four S’s”—helping kids feel (1) safe—they feel protected and sheltered from harm; (2) seen—they know you care about them and pay attention to them; (3) soothed—they know you’ll be there for them when they’re hurting; and (4) secure—based on the other S’s, they trust you to predictably help them feel “at home” in the world, then learn to help themselves feel safe, seen, and soothed.” That is the key to preparing them for adulthood in a meaningful way.
Brown relates a message told by her pastor in a sermon he gave on sacrifice, how the original Latin of the word points to the word meaning to “make sacred.” It got me thinking, the Hebrew word for sacrifice is Korban, the root word meaning “to draw near.” Sacrificing what we think we need to get done and spending time just listening to our kids – that draws us nearer to each other. That bring us closer.
We don’t need to preach to them about what they are doing wrong. We simply need to show up. To show them that are loved, that their home is a buoy in a storm, a safe place where they can regroup before going out into the world.
That is one lesson this overachieving mama needed to hear.