Those same rules still exist at the zen center but I now find comfort, familiarity, security, community, sweetness, home in them. So I tried to figure out what is it about the rules now that makes them feel like that. I know the rules haven’t changed, my attitude toward them has. So then I tried to understand what is it about a container that can make you feel held rather than confined. What is the difference between the slats of a white picket fence and the bars of a jail?
I thought about it a while, even wrote a poem about it, and I think I have an idea about what I can do to make rules and procedures feel like an embrace or a play yard instead of a choke hold or prison. I think that if the rules are there to provide you with a safe place, if they're meant to give you feedback or guidance or advice when you're starting to travel somewhere unsafe, then they feel good, they feel like they know you and are trying to help you. But if the rules start to infringe upon you, if they start to squash something out of you or enclose you, suffocate you, then you run from them. You try to break free of them, go to a place where you know you can be yourself. So my rules need to be that- to provide a safe container for the kids in which they can be themselves. I want the rules to come from a place of warmth, of caring, and that allow the kids to be themselves while coexisting with their classmates.
And I need to think about that when I make these rules and share with the kids why we have them, that I've actually thought long and hard about them, that I designed them with them in mind, they aren't just random or controlling. But really, I really do have to look at my rules and rethink any of them that are arbitrary or that don't have a reason behind them or that restrict the kids. So that’s what I’m hoping to do in the next couple of weeks as I prepare for the school year to start: genuinely investigate my rules, why I have them, what purpose they serve, and tweak or remove any that are designed to control the kids rather than support them. Wish me luck!
This is wonderful Shannon, thanks for sharing! I am interested in how your rules have been going this year.
ReplyDeleteA question: so what (and WHO) defines somewhere "unsafe"? I am in a place where I feel wary of being told what is "unsafe", because I want to grow and I want the world and others around me and our traditions to grow. I also think that part of youth is to challenge old rules and, like you say, "try to break free of them, go to a place where you can know you can be yourself". But where is that place? I think it is ultimately right here inside us all along. AND I think there are things we can do to be proactive about creating living/working/social situations which make all this a little easier, like it says in the 5th Mindfulness training about mindful consumption. Check this out if you've never read it; it is my favorite version of the Five Mindfulness Trainings:
Nourishment and Healing
Aware of the suffering caused by unmindful consumption, I am committed to cultivating good health, both physical and mental, for myself, my family, and my society by practicing mindful eating, drinking, and consuming. I will practice looking deeply into how I consume the Four Kinds of Nutriments, namely edible foods, sense impressions, volition, and consciousness. I am determined not to gamble, or to use alcohol, drugs, or any other products which contain toxins, such as certain websites, electronic games, TV programs, films, magazines, books, and conversations. I will practice coming back to the present moment to be in touch with the refreshing, healing and nourishing elements in me and around me, not letting regrets and sorrow drag me back into the past nor letting anxieties, fear, or craving pull me out of the present moment. I am determined not to try to cover up loneliness, anxiety, or other suffering by losing myself in consumption. I will contemplate interbeing and consume in a way that preserves peace, joy, and well-being in my body and consciousness, and in the collective body and consciousness of my family, my society and the Earth.