If you’ve ever felt a gaze of disapproval for how you’re living your life or raising your kids, chances are, the gaze is coming from one of the foot soldiers of the Supposed-To-Be Army.
It’s easy to find these foot soldiers marching on the front lines wherever you happen to be—the grocery store, school corridors, fb threads, etc.
They’re armed with shame and good intentions.
And if you listen hard, you will probably even hear their echos on the front lines of your own mind.
But what I’m here to tell you, is that there’s no need to defend yourself for how you’re raising your kids and living your life.
Bc these foot soldiers are not trying to upset you. They’re only protecting what they’ve been indoctrinated to protect: the way things have been, aka, the way things are supposed-to-be.
It’s all the stuff they’ve complied with that gives them a feeling of safety and belonging. It’s predictable. Contained. T’s crossed. I’s dotted. And it works for them. And that’s fine for them.
But the truth is, that for many of us, the way things *have* been are not the ways that work for us.
We’ve tried.
Some of us have tried at the expense of our mental and physical health and our kids’ mental and physical health.
But at some point, it occurred to us that maybe we weren’t meant to uphold the way things have always been.
Maybe we’re meant to try something new—to honor our own real experience and the real experiences of our kids and create a life based on that. Which is a very brave thing to do.
So many of us are at the drawing board—we’re creating new ways of relating to each other and new ways of relating to ourselves and new ways of contributing to the world.
We’re healing the trauma we’ve endured from being forced and coerced into the ways things were supposed-to-be and giving ourselves and our kids a chance to thrive based on what’s meaningful to us, based on our own particular values, intelligence, sensibilities, interests and talents.
Things change. Contexts evolve.
Sometimes people just aren’t supposed to do what other people insist they’re supposed to do.
Sometimes people actually have better ideas, ideas that maybe even some of these foot soldiers would benefit from.
But either way, if you do cross paths with one of these foot soldiers of the Supposed-To-Be Army, and you feel that gaze, instead of defending yourself, or worse, looking at yourself or your kid through that gaze, look back at who’s doing the gazing.
See if who they are, is, or is not, your role model. See if their life, the way they handle themselves, what they stand for, is something you’d like to emulate or something you’d like your child to emulate?
Then, look at your kid in front of you, just as they are, and as they’re becoming. And be proud that you’re strong enough to create a new paradigm. Not based on the way things are supposed-to-be, but based on working with the way things actually are. And grow from there.
-JLK
