Dieing to know the answer to the question, "Who Am I?"
This is a Call to Action.
I just read in the news a story about an officer who rushed to call at 3am Easter morning... found his 20-year-old son, stabbed to death. http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/03/29/nj.officer.ap/index.html
The article said his son had success in track and football while in highschool, but had dropped out and "drifted."
It's not every day that an officer finds his son dead.
But kids are dying every day.
Being killed by others, taking their own lives, taking the lives of other kids.
It doesn't even seem to be a tragedy anymore. It seems common place.
It is old news.
That is the real tragedy.
It is almost as if we have come to accept that human beings are by nature irresponsible, self-destructive, sinners and criminals.
Animals or lower. Animals don't wage war, commit murder or suicide, etc.
Well, if our pet animals had a problem, what would be the solution?
1) Punishment. Punish the bad behavior (and threaten punishment, e.g., hold up a whip).
2) Reward. Reward the good behavior (and promise reward, e.g., dangle the doggie treat).
3) Drugs. Put in the right chemical to eliminate the bad behavior.
The lines of thought most often taken in our society include,
1) he should have stayed in school and out of trouble
2) his parents are to blame for not keeping him in school or raising him well
3) the school system is to blame
4) we need more laws, more controls
5) bring more religion into the school system
6) reduce violence on TV, movies, music, etc.
7) some kids are too hyperactive, treat them for ADD
8) some kids are too depressed, give them anti-depressants
So we add more punishment, more rewards and we put our kids on Ridilin and Prozac.
Some people take sides and strongly preach corporal punishment over the drugs.
http://www.christianpatriot.com/12_08_2003.htm
Others preach on behalf of these "miracle drugs."
The effect is the same.
OUR CHILDREN ARE GROWING UP WITHOUT STRONG INNER GUIDANCE BY CONSCIENCE, WITHOUT A DEEP INNER SENSE OF HONOR, WITHOUT TRUST IN THEIR OWN MINDS, WITHOUT PERSONAL VISION.
They are guided by fears, desires and drugs.
They have no real answer to the question, "Who am I?"
They search aimlessly for meaning and purpose.
Should we force them to coform them or dope them so they follow queitly with a smile? Should we beat them or threaten with guilt and punishment so that their actions look responsible?
Such people would make for a nice docile society willing to follow any leader's vision.
Our children are our future!
They are not animals. And no amount of beating, bribing or doping will create the visionary leaders that our future depends upon.
And lets be clear. We NEED visionaries. As we head into a future of more and more change, uncertainty and chaos, WE ALL MUST BECOME VISIONARIES. Visionaries for our own lives, visionaries for our families, visionaries for our communities.
(If you subscribe to my list you know about the powerful Vision Force 101 program, a great step for all who would be visionaries:
http://www.visionforce.com/academy.shtml )
Mostly our "solutions" for making our children more responsible are the cause of the irresponsibility in the first place.
The Catholic Church of the Dark Ages succeded in getting people to obey. It even kept most people from thinking for themselves. Such crimes were punished with death via the Inquisitions and Crusades. The human spirit was all but mass murdered. And gone from the Earth was rationality, science, individual thought, joy, longevity, happiness.
The human spirit and the human mind demand freedom. Intellectual freedom, psychological freedom, political freedom, economic freedom. The Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment brought more of such freedoms and we enjoy them today.
There are many who think that those freedoms are now the cause of our problems, because human beings are fundamentally irrational, self-destructive animals... undeserving of and unfit for freedom.
I would suggest the problem lies NOT in our levels of freedoms... there ought to be much more freedom on all levels. The problem lies in the ways we've been conditioned to guide ourselves and each other. It is time we revisit our methods of parenting, schooling, governing, etc., with an eye to raising our children as visionaries, not blindly obedient followers.
You can't force children to be inner guided by their own sense of honor and their own vision. You can't drug a child into becoming a Gandhi or a Martin Luther King, Jr.
In the name of your future, your children's future, your grandchildren's future, I beseach you...
Join the next class of visionaries TODAY in the Vision Force program:
http://www.visionforce.com/academy.shtml
Don't delay.
I just read in the news a story about an officer who rushed to call at 3am Easter morning... found his 20-year-old son, stabbed to death. http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/03/29/nj.officer.ap/index.html
The article said his son had success in track and football while in highschool, but had dropped out and "drifted."
It's not every day that an officer finds his son dead.
But kids are dying every day.
Being killed by others, taking their own lives, taking the lives of other kids.
It doesn't even seem to be a tragedy anymore. It seems common place.
It is old news.
That is the real tragedy.
It is almost as if we have come to accept that human beings are by nature irresponsible, self-destructive, sinners and criminals.
Animals or lower. Animals don't wage war, commit murder or suicide, etc.
Well, if our pet animals had a problem, what would be the solution?
1) Punishment. Punish the bad behavior (and threaten punishment, e.g., hold up a whip).
2) Reward. Reward the good behavior (and promise reward, e.g., dangle the doggie treat).
3) Drugs. Put in the right chemical to eliminate the bad behavior.
The lines of thought most often taken in our society include,
1) he should have stayed in school and out of trouble
2) his parents are to blame for not keeping him in school or raising him well
3) the school system is to blame
4) we need more laws, more controls
5) bring more religion into the school system
6) reduce violence on TV, movies, music, etc.
7) some kids are too hyperactive, treat them for ADD
8) some kids are too depressed, give them anti-depressants
So we add more punishment, more rewards and we put our kids on Ridilin and Prozac.
Some people take sides and strongly preach corporal punishment over the drugs.
http://www.christianpatriot.com/12_08_2003.htm
Others preach on behalf of these "miracle drugs."
The effect is the same.
OUR CHILDREN ARE GROWING UP WITHOUT STRONG INNER GUIDANCE BY CONSCIENCE, WITHOUT A DEEP INNER SENSE OF HONOR, WITHOUT TRUST IN THEIR OWN MINDS, WITHOUT PERSONAL VISION.
They are guided by fears, desires and drugs.
They have no real answer to the question, "Who am I?"
They search aimlessly for meaning and purpose.
Should we force them to coform them or dope them so they follow queitly with a smile? Should we beat them or threaten with guilt and punishment so that their actions look responsible?
Such people would make for a nice docile society willing to follow any leader's vision.
Our children are our future!
They are not animals. And no amount of beating, bribing or doping will create the visionary leaders that our future depends upon.
And lets be clear. We NEED visionaries. As we head into a future of more and more change, uncertainty and chaos, WE ALL MUST BECOME VISIONARIES. Visionaries for our own lives, visionaries for our families, visionaries for our communities.
(If you subscribe to my list you know about the powerful Vision Force 101 program, a great step for all who would be visionaries:
http://www.visionforce.com/academy.shtml )
Mostly our "solutions" for making our children more responsible are the cause of the irresponsibility in the first place.
The Catholic Church of the Dark Ages succeded in getting people to obey. It even kept most people from thinking for themselves. Such crimes were punished with death via the Inquisitions and Crusades. The human spirit was all but mass murdered. And gone from the Earth was rationality, science, individual thought, joy, longevity, happiness.
The human spirit and the human mind demand freedom. Intellectual freedom, psychological freedom, political freedom, economic freedom. The Renaissance and the Age of Enlightenment brought more of such freedoms and we enjoy them today.
There are many who think that those freedoms are now the cause of our problems, because human beings are fundamentally irrational, self-destructive animals... undeserving of and unfit for freedom.
I would suggest the problem lies NOT in our levels of freedoms... there ought to be much more freedom on all levels. The problem lies in the ways we've been conditioned to guide ourselves and each other. It is time we revisit our methods of parenting, schooling, governing, etc., with an eye to raising our children as visionaries, not blindly obedient followers.
You can't force children to be inner guided by their own sense of honor and their own vision. You can't drug a child into becoming a Gandhi or a Martin Luther King, Jr.
In the name of your future, your children's future, your grandchildren's future, I beseach you...
Join the next class of visionaries TODAY in the Vision Force program:
http://www.visionforce.com/academy.shtml
Don't delay.
posted by Michael Skye at 11:37 AM
2 Comments:
Dear Michael,
OK, now you have really touched my heart. I agree with you that our children need vision; they also need people who believe in them and encourage them.
Both of my boys are visionaries. Brandon is 13 and Joshua is 9. Brandon is legally blind with corrective vision at 20/400 in each eye. He has Leber's Congenital Amaurosis and has been this way since birth. He reads braille and uses a cane for mobility. Brandon never lets anything get him down. He pursues his ambitions with determination until he succeeds. He has raised market lambs and won grand champion over all at the fair. He ran cross country for his school and moved from last place to 3rd over all. He played guard during basketball. He is now doing track and field. He is an entrepreneur and uses his money wisely. He has taken control of his own learning and sees to it that he has straight A's in school. I am so proud of him.
I am proud of my youngest, too. He is a cook, baker, and enjoys sewing. He is an avid reader and reads books written at the 6th grade level in the 3rd grade. He is also a math whiz doing 4th-5th grade math in 3rd grade. When he wants to earn money he whips up cinnamon rolls and cookies and sells them to the neighbors. He also raises chickens and sells the eggs. I am very proud of both of my visionary boys. They are incredible.
When I see other children who do not have the parental support, understanding, and freedom to develop their individuality it makes me sad.
I am a teacher and work with the blind and visually impaired. I am also a consultant to homeschool families. My youngest is homeschooled now and my oldest was homeschooled through 6th grade.
I am with you on this blog of yours, Michael, and if you ever wanted someone to work together with you in giving workshops for children and parents, I would be willing to team up with you on this.
Sonja Biggs
teachersonja@charter.net
Michael:
I couldn't agree with you more! Many of our children are left to face life on their own, as parents are having to each work jobs to make ends meet. This leaves the children at home alone and not enough parental visitation for our children to know how much we care for them, until it is too late, sometimes.
I don't feel that parents look to the fact that they are at fault as such, but use their work environment as an excuse to not move on into better visionary positions. This develops into the inner conflicts that everyone goes through and don't know how to deal with.
Yes, Children need to be taught the ways of the visionary, and it is the parent's responsibility to teach or find someone who can teach them how to be visionaries. Parents should also learn those ways too, so they are a better guide for their children too.
As a graduate of the Vision Force 101 workshop, I have had my eyes opened wide on how to be a visionary. The seven week course is well worth the time and effort to go through, and I do recommend it for anyone wishing to find a new and better way to live.
Blazzzzzzze
David Imlay
rebelrider52@netscape.com
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