Childish Behavior

Oh there are so many wonderful things about preschool. It's been so much fun for me to be so involved. We put Ty in a Co-op school and it's been perfect. I feel like a part of the family. I know what's going on, I know every kid, I know every parent, I have a great relationship with his teacher. I feel like I'm as much a part of the class as he is. It's a wonderful, friendly, loving community of people all helping each other in a team effort. The perfect school for our Ty guy.

But what I love most is the behavior of preschoolers. One of the most important things I want my kids to be is kind and loving to everyone. More than getting good grades, or being popular, or super smart, or being first at anything I want them to be kind to everyone. And sometimes that will take courage. I want them to love people for who they are, not what they have or what grades they get, or what stuff they have. I want them to walk into the home of a friend and not even notice it. I want them to not even notice the size, the cleanliness, the furniture, the stuff. I want them to notice the people and what's in their heart. I want them to not notice clothes and cars and fancy shoes. I want them to see a human being who is important and good no matter what they look like or what they have or where the live. Material things mean NOTHING. What's inside a person means EVERYTHING.

Ok that's all great and good but how do you teach that? So far I haven't had to. You see in preschool they don't care about what you look like, or how you dress, or what size or shape you are. They could care less about the size of your house or the size of your stuff or how much of it you have. They just want to play.

In Ty's class there is a little boy, who since he was 18 months has LOVED girl stuff. He loves pink, he loves princesses, he loves anything beautiful. With a passion. He wants to wear girl clothes and he wants girl toys and that's just how he came into this world. Can you imagine being his parents? Knowing that inside this little boy is a love for all things pink and beautiful, and knowing the letting him BE is going to not go over so well in the real world. What do you do? Do you let him be HIM and teach him to be so confident that when the ridicule comes it doesn't hurt so much, or do you squash it out of him in order to protect him from the mean spirit that will often be thrown in his direction? What as a parent do you do?

But in preschool, it's totally ok. No one even cares that he has a pink skirt on over his levi's and boots. Or that for show and tell he brought a beautiful tiara he made himself, or that when they play dress up he's the only boy wearing high heals and butterfly wings. Who cares? In fact, they not only not care, they don't even notice! That's it! That's what I want my kids to be like! They already are! They don't even look and say, oh that's different, but totally fine, they don't even notice or care! They just want to play with people because they are nice and fun.That's how it is in Ty's class and how it is with Ty so far.

Yesterday as I was there watching Ty and his good friend battle it out for good and evil, the boy in high heels and butterfly wings joined right in, and no one skipped a beat. They just kept on with their battle. In a year or two those wings aren't going to fly so great in that same situation.

My Ty LOVES pink and has now for several years. I know that one day someone is going to make him feel embarrassed and shameful for it and they are going to kill the pink in him. He is going to choose a more boyish color and make himself learn to like it because it's more acceptable. For now he loves pink all he wants and no one cares, and if someone does care, he doesn't care that they care. In fact in preschool, there are only four boys in the class and since two of them love pink so much, the other boys have jumped on board and more often than not, choose pink over every other color. I love it!!!! What a fun thing to watch happen, instead of ridicule and poking fun, the others just jumped on board with the attitude of yeah, pink is a really great color, we'll take pink also! Awesome!

When Ty first started playing violin a young boy said to him "My dad said you are going to get made fun of for playing the violin". I watched Ty to see how he'd react to this, while holding my own tongue as hard as I could. He had a look of question on his face and said, why would anyone make fun of that? And then went on about his play like no one had ever bothered him. And when he does have someone say pink is a girl color, he just replies back, no it's not. It's for boys too.

So how do I keep that in him? How do I not lose that? How do I keep him so confident in what he likes that he is not hurt by other people telling him it's not cool? Is it even possible? Somehow we all seem to grow out of that. Someone makes fun, we feel ashamed, we conform to what we think will be cool, or we give up something we love. We start to judge others, harshly. We notice the size of their house, the size of their car, the size of their body and we compete. Why does that happen and how? I think Heavenly Father sent us here the way we are supposed to be, just loving and letting people be how they want to be. And knowing that everyone is different and puts their priorities in different orders. Look at nature? Why would God be so boring as to create us all the same? He loves diversity, it's in the world around us. I believe he celebrates the uniqueness in each of us and how we choose to live our lives! And then somehow we get ruined. We start hating and judging, and being mean to each other. Why? How? No wonder we are told to be like children. They are so perfect.

Somewhere along the line we get selfish. And that's when it gets ugly. We think only of ourselves and then we must be better, not better than yourself, but better than everyone else, then that makes us feel better about yourself? It's all strange, but happens to us all. We become so deficient in understanding our worth that we must constantly feed and feed and feed our ego's by judging incessantly and competing relentlessly. It never satisfies. Ever. So we keep feeding our ego even more. It's a craving that will never go away with that kind of food. When we feed our ego with outside sources, we have to keep it up or else we don't know who we are.

When we are happy with who we are, and spiritually mature, we don't need any outside sources to tell us we are ok. We stop competing, we stop comparing, we stop judging, we have no need. We are told to look to the Savior as the bread of life. That's the stuff we should be feeding our ego's. When that is in order we love and only love and we don't notice all the external stuff, we just notice hearts and people. We don't care about anything else.

I love the quote, and I don't know who it's by, but it says "When you judge or criticize someone it doesn't define them, it defines you."

My prayer is to be like a child myself. I'm getting better, but still have a long ways to go. My prayer is to help my children maintain this as much as possible and instill this in them while they are young. My prayer is that we can all be like preschoolers. To be more like little children. Then we will be satisfied. We will love ourselves and quit looking to others to fill what we lack. Then when we are full of love, that's all we have to give away. No hate, no judgement, no competition, just love. Preschool rocks.

“Except ye be converted, and become as little children, ye shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.

“Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3–4).