(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
Welcome back to the Simplicity Diaries with me, Kim John Payne. Oh, I'm so glad you could carve out another few minutes to be with us in these mercifully brief little podcasts. This week we're going to be talking about children and mortality, and a child becoming more and more aware of life and death.
But before we come to that, I wanted to let you know that over at the Simple Steps site, there's this beautiful Simple Steps site that we have called Simple Family Living, and the Simple Steps is podcasts that are embedded each week within the Simple Family Living site. You can try it out for free, no cost, and so in the next three episodes over at Simple Family Living, I speak with a wonderful author, Keira Willey from an author who's written many books, actually works for the same editor as me at Random House, and her new book, The Joyful Child, it's just a gorgeous book full of really sort of simple, I would say like playful practices to help family navigate transitions. Stress is a big theme, reducing stress, and a lot of it, when I read that book, a lot of it makes life simpler and it's more doable.
That was what struck me. It doesn't add to your to-do list like so many parenting books do. This actually strips it away.
So I'll be speaking with Keira in an interview in two parts over at Simple Family Living, and then after that, the third episode will be this question of how to navigate through this maze of over-protecting children, and also I want to add to that hyper-providing, you know, when we provide too much, and so that'll be the third episode this month over at Simple Family Living. Remember there's one episode a month at this site, Simplicity Diaries, and three over at Simple Family Living. All right, so on with the show.
This theme of children's mortality, gosh it can be a hard one. It really can. As children wake up more consciously to this world, and they separate out from the world of a young child when they're a part of the all.
There's very little separation between, you know, me and the world, if I'm just two or three years old. I am the world, the world is me, I'm a part of it all in a normal, you know, typical child. But that begins to change, and it changes not all at once.
It comes in little steps, and you can tell it's changing. You can tell that consciousness is shifting, and a child's moving more into the big child world when they talk about death. Because now they know there's life, so obviously there's death.
And even their games can be like that. I remember once our older daughter was dragging our younger daughter over the polished wooden floor, and the younger daughter had her arms crossed in front of her, and had sort of a neutral look on her face, and she was being dragged over to a great big pile of clothing and cushions and all sorts of stuff in the corner. And what they were doing is that our older daughter was dragging the little one over because she was dead, and she was composting her so that she could then come back as her favorite flowers.
All right, now it's kind of cute, kind of sweet, and it was, right? But I was thinking, oh, the older daughter is waking up a little bit more. And sure enough, it wasn't long after that when questions about mortality arose. For some of us, we've heard these things our children can say, and they really seem shocking.
Like, I wish I was dead, or I wish I was never born. Comments like that just shock us to the core. It's like, oh my goodness.
You know, on so many different levels, no one wants to hear a child say that. A parent wants to hear a child say that. But the reality in most situations is that it's a call for connection.
I want to connect with you. I realize I'm separating out from the world now. I'm just not this little infant, a toddler, a little one anymore.
And the I wish I was dead, those kind of comments, I wish I'd never been born, of course, of course, three of course, three of course, you have to take it seriously, right? If a child says, I wish I was dead, I mean, you got to pause and think, okay, do I need to see the doctor, our family doctor here? Do I need some professional help? You know, it goes without question. And another thought I want to add to that, to put alongside that, and not to negate it, but to put alongside it, is that when a child says something like that, it's often a call for connection. It's often a, I am feeling separate to the world.
And I'm feeling disconnected. And death is the ultimate, you know, disconnection for when in a child's world, in many children's world, unless they're composted, come back as a flower. But it's this, it's this disconnection.
And they're what they're the, what we need to do in that moment is hear it, as well as a concern, but also alongside that, a call for connection, it might be that we have a little bit of a story, or sweetheart, it's very hard, that's a very hard thought. Let's go and see what see if we can find something in the garden to do, because I do know that or do you think we need to have a little story now? What about just a cozy hug? Come, come, come. That kind of connection is, it could be, could be exactly what a child is looking for.
Again, it's also signaling to you that a child is awakening, they're into a new developmental stage. And it could be good to pause there and think, you know, what stage are they up to? Do they need to have a little bit more of a voice? For example, if a nine year old says that, and I cannot tell you how many nine year olds, eight, nine, 10 year olds I've heard say, I wish I was dead, I wish I'd never been born, it'd be better if I was dead. Because it's what I call an age of mortality consciousness, when it reaches a real peak.
Carl Jung called it the age of orphan fantasy. And I've heard kids sitting around at recess, you know, like it's snack before recess. And they're talking about, yeah, yeah, I wonder if I'm adopted too, you know, and there's this whole question of, of biography and life's path.
And who am I? And was I, am I really my parents and child and big questions come up, they don't only come up at nine, they there's another little sort of moment that happens between three and four. And another little moment that comes up, it's almost like the aura of the nine year old phase around sort of six and a half, seven. These are ages, it doesn't mean that these these comments only get made, and these feelings only come up at those ages.
But you hear them a little bit more, at least I have. Now, is it is it manipulation? When a child says this, these very strong statements? Is it manipulating you? And it could you could see it as that because it shocks us and we react. And but what's happened is that now a child's got our attention.
So, so rather than invite more and more comments like that, I think it's, it's, it's good to consider coming alongside a child and just sitting with them quietly, maybe getting your sewing out, maybe inviting them over to the counter and tell them a little I remember when story about when they were a baby or when you were a little girl or boy or just little connecting actions or connecting stories. But that is every time a like that has been made in our own family, or in my time as a school counselor, when I was working with kids, they'd be sent to me by the teacher who said, I just said something really bad. And can I? And, of course, I'm checking to see if that is really, you know, a self harm, ideation, checking that out really quickly and thoroughly.
But so many times, it's a call for connection. I've heard kids say this when they've fallen out with friends, and they have no friends. And when you sit with them for a little while and do some things together, or play a little board game together, I had a whole selection of board games in my room as a school counselor.
They just say, I don't have any friends. Totally sucks. I just, and out comes what's really going on.
But they're there, but it's for them, it's total. And they're coming into the world in a new way. And, and that's when we can have that big, like become a big heart with ears, and just listen to their stories.
And just maybe keep poking at the at the Legos or magnet tiles or the game or go for a walk. But very often, that is what a child is looking for. I want to emphasize for the third time, we do have to take these things seriously, of course.
But this is also another way of looking at this. Okay, I sure hope that was helpful. Don't forget Kira's interviews over at Simple Family Living.
There's a link right here. You can go to Simplicity Parenting and see a link to Simple Family Living. Gosh, it's a wonderful, wonderful supportive site with workshops and and, and simple little quick little quizzes and longer supportive workshops, all sorts of stuff over there over at that site.
And I hope this as always was helpful. Bye.
(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)
