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Rewiring Our “Mother Boards”
By Jacqueline King-Presant
One of the greatest gifts that children give us
involves their ability to push all of our buttons. (Some gift, huh?)
Really though, if we give up resistance to that (this is where “trust”
and “acceptance” come in), we see they are truly helping us to see what
about our brain’s “subconscious programming” needs to change in order to
be the people we need to be for ourselves, for them, and for our life’s
work – whatever that may be. This involves changing our “internal
programming” as well as our thoughts, and since these topics are so
integrally connected, I have included both in this article.
Internal Programming
We all have what is referred to as “internal
programming,” the subconscious programming of our minds. Our minds are
like computers. There is the hard drive part of our brains, which keeps
everything within our body and minds running smoothly and in a
particular way, and then there is the software that has been downloaded
on top of it. This has become a part of who we perceive ourselves to be,
and is always running in the background, in our subconscious minds,
affecting everything about how we live our lives via our thoughts.
Much of our subconscious programming was
“downloaded” when we were children. We are biologically designed so that
what we experience as children becomes deeply ingrained in us. Our
programming also is set through what we have experienced throughout our
adult lives (but less so), and through the intentionally (direct) and
unintentionally (indirect) depositing of beliefs and attitudes into our
mental spaces by sources such as the people we meet and the media. Also,
and powerfully so, the programming which runs our lives was set through
conclusions we have made about ourselves and the world due to how we
were treated. (Nancy Levin often explains this on her Hay House Radio
show and in her books.)
For example, if you were shamed often enough or
even in one powerful way as a child, you may have concluded that you
were a bad person, unworthy of love. There are many ways this particular
conclusion could have affected you, but one way is it may have caused
you to choose partners or friends later in life who did not treat you
well, because they fit the part of "primary relationship" in the story
of your life in your mind. We all have been constructing these stories
that both explain and direct us and our lives since our first
experiences. This conclusion could also have affected your career by
either making you think you were not worthy of a leadership role or high
salary, or on the flip side caused you to overcompensate in search of
the validation you did not receive when you were young.
I'm sure this subconscious programming came in very
handy to help us elicit all of the behaviors necessary for survival back
in our nomadic days, since it allowed us to live without each person
having to consciously discover for themselves which berries were edible
or not, how to find a suitable place to rest for the night, and how to
choose an acceptable mate. Our brains probably just weren't developed
enough to think for ourselves too much beyond that. We just saw what
others did from the time we were very young, and then we did the same
thing. If someone did have a brainwave, then voila – evolution occurred
through that person. But, it was a much slower process than it is today
with our capabilities for more advanced thought processes.
So, programming is how important information and
values have been passed down through the ages to help us to constantly
increase our knowledge base and enhance our lives by building upon it
without each generation having to spend time and energy learning and
relearning the basics of life. Up until now, this is what has allowed us
to evolve, but paradoxically as life so often is, this is exactly what
we must now call into question in order to take humanity and our lives
to the next level. This applies (most importantly in my opinion) to our
roles as support systems for our children.
I have heard people say that they fear they are
becoming just like their parents. When we become parents, our
programming is apt to try to get us to do just that. For certain things,
this is good and, for other things, it creates fear and anxiety. If we
turn this fear into an attitude of conscious love for our children and
act on a desire to do better for them, it could be a healthy thing. One
such mode of programming that most of us have involves praise. As
children, we were praised when we did something that adults liked and
wanted to reinforce.
With the release and popularization of books such
as How to Speak so Talk so Kids Will Listen & Listen so Kids Will Talk
by Adele Faber and Elaine Mazlish, many parents and educators know that
it's not great to say, “good girl” or “good boy,” so they instead will
say, “I like how you____” or “Great job ___!” However, they are still
praising the child when they have done something they perceive as good
or acceptable because they were programmed to do so. They are training
the child to seek out outward approval for every action instead of
cultivating a sense of behaving according to what they feel is right.
This also applies to their creative endeavors. We praise and comment on
their creations thinking we are motivating them; however we are leaving
children to mistrust their own judgements of their work as well as
dampening their own powers of self-motivation. Our own experiences and
the society in which we live give us the message that this is the right
thing to do. Whether or not it is the right thing is a whole other
topic. But the fact is we do it, and the positive emotional response
from our children when we do gives our brains a rush of serotonin, the
“feel good” chemical, which reinforces the behavior.
Our Programming and Our Thoughts
The thoughts that trigger emotions, reactions,
words, and behaviors are simply products of our internal programming.
Many of us have learned to identify with these thoughts and believe that
they are us. However, as Eckart Tolle explains, we are the “I” which
exists underneath our thoughts and emotions. Basically, we are not our
thoughts; we are the consciousness experiencing them and, if we can
connect with that consciousness even for a moment, we can truly feel and
connect with who we are at the deepest level. Cultivating a meditation
practice is wonderful for connecting to our true selves.
We hear a lot today about “detoxing.” What we must
do now for our own well-being, for the well-being of our children and
the world that they will inherit, is detox ourselves from limiting
thoughts and beliefs through choosing better programming. Just like when
programming a computer, this takes work at first, but then it just runs
in the background, allowing us to live out our new way of being. This is
what a large part of my work with parents and children is all about:
helping them to realize where some faulty programming is running, and
taking conscious steps to rewire their thoughts, words, and actions. It
takes time and effort! But it is worth it when we feel how connected to
our kids we can be and when see them thriving in the full, joyful, and
free expressions of who they are. It, of course, has the same effect on
us as well!
Where to Start
There are many ways in which we may need to rewire
our brains, but our emotions and our children's states of being are good
clues to where we can start. We need to separate ourselves from our
reactions to our children’s words and behavior and take a moment to
analyze our thoughts, as Naomi Aldort suggests in her book Raising Our
Children, Raising Ourselves. We need to ask ourselves if the reaction we
are having is truly about the child, or if it is about us. We need to
ask ourselves if we are putting up resistance to allowing our love and
intuition flow through by having a knee jerk reaction. Anxiety isn't
just annoying; it is a great clue that we need to make changes.
A classic example would be if you find your child
happily drawing on the wall, one of the rites of passage of the
toddler/preschool years. Your initial reaction might be to yell or
loudly say something like, “What a mess! Why would you do this? This is
bad; we never draw on the wall!” as you rip the crayon out of his hand
and send him off stunned or crying, unsure of who feels worse – you or
him. However, if you cultivate a practice of catching yourself,
assessing the situation, and calmly asking what your child is doing as
soon as you notice yourself having an emotional reaction, you might find
that in his child-world he is decorating the walls and making a nice
picture for daddy when he comes home from work. “See mommy, there’s our
house, there’s you, there’s me, and there’s daddy! Won’t he love it?”
You could then assess how you want to address the situation, knowing
that your child had good and sweet intentions. You could now say
something like, “Oh you wanted to make a nice picture for daddy! Let’s
show him when he gets home.” You can then honestly state your preference
for a clean wall and that other people hold the same preference. “You
seem really proud of your work and we will leave it up for a while. If
we are both ready one day, we can have fun repainting the wall. In the
future, though, mommy would like it if you can draw on paper instead
since she likes her walls to be plain. Other people do too. Besides, if
you draw on paper, we can hang it up wherever you want!” This way, your
child’s self-esteem has remained intact, your connection with him has
not been damaged but strengthened, and he has learned what you and
others prefer regarding clean walls.
He wouldn’t have truly been able to hear you the
first, more emotional way anyway. When children sense anger, they shut
down as a defense mechanism, and lose respect and confidence in our
emotional capabilities. He still might not have done it again, but it
would have been because of a conditioned fear response. However, the
damage to his self-concept and trust in you would have been long lasting
with negative consequences down the road if trust was not restored. This
is not something any of us wants to do to our kids. We all know
intuitively as parents that a strong bond with them should always be
held in primary importance as it will be a source of comfort and
protection them in the difficult adolescent years, even if some outside
sources try to get us to convince us to put other things first on our
list of priorities.
So the next time you find yourself in a state of
anxiety about your child’s behavior, I suggest taking a step back before
you act and exploring the thoughts going on in your head so that you can
make a conscious choice. Some areas you might want to explore are:
1. Rules, routines, and restrictions
2. The mode and attitude surrounding your child's
education
3. Praise, rewards, and consequences
4. How we deal with our children’s emotional
expressions
Jacqueline King-Presant, M.Ed. is a child development specialist and consultant.
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