I've just completed the Introduction and Chapter 1 of The Gift of Failure by Jessica Lahey and my first impressions of what is to come are favorable. First and foremost, the author is not a lecturing, "How-could-you?" voice of condemnation. To the contrary, she employs a reassuring, "I'm-with-you" voice as she offers her own parenting approach up for us to understand the journey to raising self-sufficient children.
Ms. Lahey does a particularly masterful job of outlining the history of parenting in America from colonization through the present day in a manageable and entertaining 14 page first chapter. As a father of three, four and under (and a daughter who is 4 going on 16...), I was particularly drawn to her John Locke quotations. Here is one of those gems:
"Locke advises, 'crying is very often a striving for mastery and an open declaration of their insolence or obstinacy: when they have not the power to obtain their desire, they will by their clamor and sobbing maintain their title and right to it' (emphasis Locke's, and I can almost hear the derision dripping from those horrid, emotional words)."
Lahey goes on to outline the progression from parenting as a matter of survival to the helicopter/interventionist approach of today: "Today, parenting is less oxytocin-soaked rosy glow, more adrenaline-fueled oncoming headlight glare."
I recommend it heartily and if the above quotation offers anything, it should be an indication of the sensibility and humor with which Ms. Lahey approaches her subject matter.
Please enjoy!
No comments:
Post a Comment