We don’t need to go to an ashram to become enlightened. Experience resonates throughout the brain and body like solar winds shimmer in the northern sky. Watching and feeling Carly Elizabeth unfold each day is like that; brilliant, exponential, utterly appropriate, perfectly age and stage appropriate, never the same, not even for a second. What a miracle. You and I are that too if we are sensitive enough and quiet enough to notice. Carly is a good teacher whenn it comes to sensitive, quiet attention. As good as it gets.

Carly’s attention deepens, distills and expands. She doesn’t miss a thing, not a sound or speck on the floor, the tone of my voice, tension in my body or the ever-changing emotional expressions we share. The play look has taken root. In a glance the chase is on, laughing and rolling together on the floor. The absorbent mind is what Maria Montessori called it, absorbent because it is not preoccupied. Her attention is like the wind touching, experiencing, indeed absorbing, creating new patterns of relationship with every leaf on every tree. The greatest challenge we face is steady attunement with this unfolding miracle. We are mentors and completely responsible, moment by moment, 24/7. That’s intense and it is a blast.

Between Crawling & Walking

Calry Elizabeth is like a little CSI tank or bulldozer chugging across the floor, reaching, investigating, touching and tasting everything on the path, relentlessly. She makes my usual twelve to fourteen hour day look like a nap. The mama nurturing, papa playing dynamic now begins to shows its teeth. Not being ‘in arms’ means great new vistas to explore with related dangers. Mama hovers and protects while papa temps and encourages, a beautiful Yin/Yang set of complimenting balances, not always but in general this is the case.

There are so few who have the depth, experience, point of view and intellectual rigor as Noam Chomsky.

In the final analysis the overarching theme of Joseph Chilton Pearce’s life work is the anti-intelligence, anti-development force that ‘culture’ exerts on nature’s billion year agenda for human growth and our transcendent development. Transcend means ‘overcoming limitation and constraint.’ Joe argues, and has for 50 years, that the greatest force to overcome is the ultra-conservative, fundamentalist nature of ‘obey or pay’ culture.

I began the self-discovery journey called ‘being a father’ about forty years ago with Eric, added my post graduate training thirty years ago with John-Michael and nine months ago I was born again under the firm mentorship of Carly Elizabeth. The general view is that parenting is a one way street. Parents demonstrate how everything is and should be by introducing various forms of rewards, threats and punishments to insure lasting conformity. And yes, of course, it is important to help Carly discover that climbing up the stairs implies the risk of falling down. On the other hand, what is it that I am discovering, learning and developing while assisting Carly Elizabeth with her discoveries? Unconditional love? Patience? Quiet listening? Being firmly grounded in my body? Sensitive attention? Nonverbal communication? Appreciating that the resonate meaning, the nature and quality of my state of being, is shared and creates the context for the dance this moment and the next? There is an implied sacred responsibility to model with that state the highest expressions of kindness, compassion, care and play. Wow! I thought parenting was all about kids.

The power of Touch the Future’s Academy is its ability to create relationship. A dramatic illustration of this synergy is in the relationships between four interviews:

(New) Joseph Chilton Pearce on The Death of Religion and Rebirth of Spirit

(New) Darcia Narvaez, PhD on Neurobiology in the Development of Human Morality

(Now indexed w/tanscripts) James W. Prescott, PhD on Sensory Deprivation and Brain Development and

(Now indexed w/transcripts) Jean Liedloff of the Continuum Concept on her experiences with stone age tribes in the Amazon.

This constellation began with our discussion with Darcia Narvaez exploring her and neuro-scientist Allan Schore’s new book on the relationship of neuro science and morality, something James W. Prescott has been describing for years. What is morality? Our capacity to be kind to others. Indeed, this capacity is innate; however, like all capacities it must be developed and this cycles back to nurturing or its absence in early childhood with what we call nurturing directly impacting how the brain forms structurally and functionally.

A friend said she would like to share my ideas regarding children and family. This is really quite challenging. On the one hand the issues are so personal and so diverse. On the other hand, there are a few simple things that will guide anyone in the best possible way through the entire adventure.

1. Celebrate parenting as developmental stage of expansion and growth for YOU

You will be challenged to discover new things about yourself in the same way your child is discovering who and what they are. Embrace this precious opportunity. Appreciate the value of being open and vulnerable. If you think you have all the answers, that the child should be this or that, at this age or that stage, you are not learning. You are repeating, not discovering, not expanding. Rediscover wonder and curiosity that not knowing everything invites. Greet each day with what some call ‘beginner’s mind.’

2. Focus on your behavior instead of the child’s

Appreciate that your ‘behavior’ is the knife that sculpts your child’s destiny. For example, how you treat the people you care for, how gentle or rough you are packing or unpacking groceries, how sensitive and aware you are preparing meals, the tone of your voice, the quality of affection or violence in the way you touch anything, the weight of your heart - light or heavy, full of song and laughter or conflict and frustration, day in and day out, moment by moment. Treat you child as an honored guest, leading with sensitive care and respect, much more important than the Pope or President.

Carly Elizabeth is eight months young and doing exactly what she is destined to do, learning explosively every moment. This month has been one breakthrough after another. Tossing one hip over the other. Rolling onto her tummy. That was big. Then, pushing with her arms backwards to sit upright. From there it was getting her knees under, butt up. Finally she pushed one arm out and then the opposite knee, and she was off. ‘Huston, we are in orbit.’ Life changing.

There is no attention deficit here. Carly is moving, touching, reaching every second. Ops! Watch the plant, the kitty, no, the banana. That was only two weeks ago. What was so difficult and frustrating is now routine. Carly practices her moves like Ben Hogan hit golf balls or Michael Jordan shot hoops, just to see what they could do. Self-imposed conflict and resistance seems curiously absent. There she goes again. Today she is exploring ‘up,’ reaching up, standing up, even climbing up. Just a moment ago she pulled herself up on the leg of a white wooden stool, stood there, waited for our attention and giggled. I know this is no big deal but somehow it all seems miraculous. How many billion years? From bacteria to one of those transparent jellyfish like creatures in the primal oceans, to plants, reptiles, furry mammals, on and on to you and me and now Carly Elizabeth. And all of this without texting or Instagram, without words, verbal concepts, comparisons, judgments, grades, shame and trophies. A miracle indeed!

The Challenge and Responsibility We Call Parenting

The miracle we are is a constantly changing interplay, a constellation or radiant galaxy of trillions of independent but interdependent cells relating, communicating and cooperating. No thing is ever the same, not for a blink. As we now know there is no such ‘thing,’ as an atom, only movement. We are that, only movement.

We honor that impermanence, that we are a river moving or we misconceive. We create an abstract, somehow fixed notion that we are static, a me, mostly as a defensive strategy to avoid anticipated and self-projected fear.