This is the weekly-ish newsletter version of Sara by the Season, where I explore a little bit of everything that’s on my mind as I try to lean into nature’s wisdom and rhythms. You can listen to me read you the newsletter by hitting play above - or you can click the little link above and to the right to play in your favorite podcast player. If you know someone who would like this sort of thing, share it!
I was listening to Dr. Anne Lembke on The Huberman Lab podcast a few weeks ago, and she said something that keeps ringing around in my head. I can’t find the exact quote now, but she was talking about impulsivity control and said that she could imagine that at some point, evolutionarily, a lack of impulse control could be helpful for people. If you’re being chased by a tiger, you don’t want to overthink it; you just want to run. However, in our modern culture, a lack of impulse control is a detriment to success at work and life (or say they tell us).
For whatever reason, this made me think of our son. From the time Jasper was little, he has had a defiant streak. Even as a five-year-old, he could argue his way out of situations. We have grown to coining it “being Jaspered” at our house when he debates with you and makes such good points that you realize you’ve lost the argument. When he was younger, it was completely maddening as a parent because he never just listened to a simple request; his first instinct was to argue with you. Grant and I had thousands of conversations about our frustration with this phenomenon, but we also tried to repeatedly remind ourselves that what was frustrating as a parent of a five-year-old, we would be thrilled about as a parent of a sixteen-year-old because Jasper wouldn’t be doing anything “because all his friends were doing it.” His stubborn, lawyerly streak would probably make him a more secure and self-aware adult because he doesn’t do things unless he has thought them through and seen the benefits for himself.
Dr. Lembke’s thoughts on impulsivity and this parenting conversation Grant and I have had so many times reminded me of this week’s discussion on Pantsuit Politics of kids in sports and the various ways that reflects on our values as a society. In their discussion, Sarah and Beth talked about how our public schooling system rewards competence - but how, as Beth said, “the line between competence and compliance is razor thin.” They went on to discuss how they both excelled at competence (and compliance) until they reached their 30s, when they began to unpack some of the repercussions of all of that good girl-ness. This is my story too, as well as so many of my friends that are around the same age, as well as women I observe and admire in the world.
So between these different situations, I began to wonder what other things we’re collectively teaching our children (whether that is individual parents, religion, or culture) that they will have to end up undoing or unlearning in order to become whole, integrated, healed people at some point. It also makes me wonder at the depths of my own unlearning that I have yet to do.
What are things that we reward in children and young adults that wind up creating new and different problems as they grow? What types of people do our communities that we belong to put on a pedestal that breed behaviors or characteristics that we generally don’t value - or at least say that we don’t value - in adults? What are the behaviors we critique that end up creating anxiety, neuroses, and addictions later in life?
I’m not asking these questions to heap any more pressure or blame on parents or teachers or any of the rest of us that influence children and young adults in any capacity - we’ve got plenty of that already. I’m asking these questions because they are important and necessary - and because they point to system-wide problems more than individual ones, although, of course, it’s the individuals that suffer.
Some further examples that I’ve come up with now that I’ve been paying attention and asking myself some of those questions above:
Our culture glorifies work and a very narrow definition of success, which is leaving so many of us sick, depressed, or worse.
I was a sensitive child. Instead of having the freedom to express that sensitivity out in the world, I felt like I had to squash it down or swallow it, which has led to me being an adult who spends a lot of time and money on reconnecting with my feelings.
Because of our fetishization of a certain kind of focus and achievement (likely coupled with the addictive nature or smart phones or the failings of our education system), 30-35 percent of our students are on amphetamines of some sort, which seems…bad and like it will have many long-term consequences.
The professionalization of sports and hobbies is burning out our kids - and us adults too. What happened to just doing something because it’s fun? Our kids don’t know how to do it because we adults don’t either.
Grant and I say that, mostly, we want to raise our children to be kind, empathetic humans who speak up for marginalized people and places and are gentle toward themselves. Jasper is on a travel soccer and basketball team, so he spends a ton of time each week with teams and coaches that largely consume themselves with competing, winning, and becoming better athletes. Those two sentences don’t seem to be in alignment with each other. We’re sitting with this seeming contradiction every week these days.
Seeking to maximize everything we do in terms of achievement and productivity is how we judge machines - not how we should judge human beings. Our collective spiritual wisdom teaches that our lives are meant to be lived and enjoyed, not hacked.
For years, we went to a church that put certain kinds of people on an actual pedestal, and it allowed certain kinds of people to lead. We left more than six years ago, but both of our children still talk about the lessons they learned from that time - most of which are not aligned with our family’s values. It is a frequent reminder for me to be careful about the types of communities we invest our time and energy into.
It seems to me that the entire thesis of the excellent (and infuriating) Jesus and John Wayne is about the disastrous consequences of evangelicals glorifying only certain types of masculinity - and how we’re all living with the repercussions.
As usual, I don’t have any answers to these questions - let alone good ones. But naming the problem(s) is a good first step. Having these conversations in our homes and communities is a good first step. Not blaming ourselves, but getting curious about spaces and places where we’re just going along with the current instead of asking what we (and our people) really want is a good first step.
Rants and raves
👍 The autumn equinox and the cooler fall temps this week that make it feel like fall has officially arrived.
👍 I found this album this week and can’t stop listening to it. The lyrics are poetry.
👍 Speaking of poetry, this arrived this week, and I love it so much. It’s like a permission slip and guidebook to paying closer attention.
👎 We’re out of Afghanistan, but our proposed defense budget keeps going up from an already astronomically bloated number. I can’t even.
👎 The Biden administration’s handling of the Haitian refugees at the border. I have zero clue what the appropriate responses are (because you know it’s not just one or two things, but at least twenty), but what they’re doing isn’t it.
Stuff worth sharing this week
Obviously, if you’re wanting to have these conversations, check out this Pantsuit Politics episode + this Atlantic article and this killer piece from Anne Helen Peterson that spurred the conversation.
Our kids’ school doesn’t provide school lunch, and I would LOVE to have that fifteen-ish minutes of angst back into my morning by having them eat at school. But if your kids’ school does provide lunch, I think this piece is required reading (also thank you, Michele Obama).
This will be maddening reading, but I think it’s important nonetheless (or here is one of the reporters of the story with a Twitter thread summary). Here’s another journalist’s succinct summary of the reporting for Twitter: “Giant accounting firms send their officials into the government, where they water down tax rules in ways that help their firms' clients. Then they return to those firms, which double their pay.”
I’m so excited for this book.
Seasonal view of the week
A downpour ruined my planned equinox wander, but I was able to at least start my mandala before getting soaked.
(If you want my little worksheet of autumn equinox ritual ideas that I created for the workshops that I led this week, forward this email to a friend and copy me and I’ll send you both a copy!)
Cheers to getting curious in the week ahead,
Sara
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