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#3853 -
The Nonduality Highlights - http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NDhighlights
The following was
published in the Halifax Shambhala Banner Newsletter,
April 2010:
http://www.halifax.shambhala.org/banner_10/banner_april2010.pdf
On applying
mindfulness practices to the care and maintenance of
toddlers
by Dustin
LindenSmith
I’ve been a
full-time, stay-at-home dad since 2004; first with our
daughter who’s seven, and now with our two sons, 2 and 3
years
old. With both of our boys now firmly in the terrible twos, I’ve
found myself questioning if I’m destined to keep any shred
of my
sanity by the time they reach school age.
Many toddlers
require nearly constant supervision. They’re quick
to shun their basement playroom full of safe toys, games,
puzzles
and train sets, choosing instead to empty the kitchen
cupboards
and drawers of the most breakable and delicate contents; to
relieve the filing cabinet of its most important papers; or
to
raid their sister’s doll house and toy chest of her
most prized
treasures.
Child-proof drawer and
cabinet locks no longer pose a challenge.
Even our upper cupboards are accessible now they’ve
discovered
how to use the lower drawers as stairs to reach counter
height.
Cooking raises distinct challenges; I’m constantly on the
watch
to avoid potential cuts or burns arising from their sudden,
unexpected appearance at the cutting board or stovetop. As
beautiful and inquisitive as they can often be, they’re
also
indefatigable and incorrigible; nearly all of our verbal
instructions to them are ignored as a matter of course. My
wife
and I refer to them not infrequently as our pair of
Tasmanian
Devils.
It is exactly these
qualities which remind me that rearing
children can be a most fruitful spiritual practice. I
realize
that the greatest frustrations in my day-to-day life arise
from
my children not acting according to my expectations. Even when
my
expectations are reasonable -- say, not climbing directly
onto
our gas-fired stovetop to investigate the contents of a
boiling
pot -- these boys still manage to dash them just by acting
upon
their utterly normal, curious impulses. When they erupt in
a
screaming tantrum because I’ve yanked them away from the
computer
keyboard which they’ve just decorated with a permanent
marker, I
have come to understand that their angry outbursts are a
natural
response to what they perceive as an unwanted and abrupt
halt
called to their ordinary investigations of the world around
them.
In their minds, I am the one with a problem -- not them.
Meditation and
mindfulness practices help us to train our minds to
accept our lives just as they are in this moment; even the
stuff
that apparently drives us crazy. The wisdom of extremely
young
children is that they always live inherently in the present
moment, never concerning themselves with what happened an
hour
ago or what might happen an hour from now. Whenever I
successfully align my own expectations with that kind of
time
frame, I find myself instantly living more harmoniously with
my
sons.
I turn my attention
regularly to my breath and on bringing my
awareness back into the moment. I can imagine what it must
feel
like to be them: to be surrounded by giants who have
complete
control over their every move; to be forcibly removed from
the
only activities and places they haven’t yet fully explored;
and
to have little or no language skills with which to express
their
true desires at any given moment. When these glimpses of
realization occur, the compassion I feel for them stops me in
my
tracks. It makes me squat down to their level to find out
what
they really want at that moment. It makes me realize that I
can
hold off on washing these dishes for a few minutes to play
a
short game with them. It reminds me that I can even let them
help
me measure out the ingredients for that night’s meal,
accepting
that I’ll need to do more clean-up than usual after the
fact.
In short, I need to
suspend my own expectations for the way I
think things should be, replacing them with acceptance for
the
way things are. It’s a profound spiritual teaching, and I
didn’t
even need to go on retreat to learn it. I just happened to
pick
it up in my own kitchen from my very own toddler gurus.
Dustin
LindenSmith is originally a jazz tenor saxophonist by
trade, but he also worked as a market research consultant
and an
IT project manager throughout his 20s and early 30s. Born
in
He has been a student of yoga and Eastern meditation for 15
years.
Dustin partnered
with Jerry Katz to bring nonduality to "the
people" prior to the advent of Nonduality Salon
and the Nonduality
Highlights.