Seedlings

This is No Place for My Son -- The Story of Mother Meng

 

“The formative period for building character for eternity is in the nursery.  The mother is queen of that realm and sways a scepter more potent than that of kings or priests”—Author Unknown

A Chinese mother watched her son play.  The three year old had observed the burial rituals taking place in the graveyard next to his home.  The boy happily spent hours building miniature tombs and grave mounds.  She whispered to herself, “This is no place to raise my son.”  So the widow and her young son moved.

Their new home was next to the village marketplace.   The young boy watched the merchants and vendors in action along the boisterous marketplace.  Soon he was hawking imaginary wares and haggling with imaginary customers using the same words he had heard in the marketplace. Again the widow muttered, “This is no place for my son.”

This time they moved next to a school house.  Here the Chinese classics were studied.  Now the lad was imitating the scholars and students he saw studying the words of Confucius and other Chinese sages.  His mother smiled and thought, “This is indeed the right place for my son to grow into manhood.”

This mother has been revered in China for more than 24 centuries.  She is known as Mother Meng and her son was Mengzi.  In the West we known him as Mencius.  The choices Mother Meng made to find the right place to raise Mencius would be felt for centuries.  For Mencius became one of the greatest Chinese sages.  He spent great energy influencing the kings and rulers of his day, but even more time and thought defining for all the qualities of the human heart and a life well lived.

There are many choices parents face in the nurture of their children and the activities of their adolescents.  These choices, when purposefully made with the child’s best interest paramount in our minds, may have profound long-term impact on the child. 

I started Kindergarten in a public school just a few minutes from my home.  Three weeks after school began my mother announced I would be going to a different school, one that was a 15 minute drive from our home.  My parents were sure the new school was the “right place” for me.  It was a small, semi-private K-12 school and I would graduate 12 years later with almost 40 students who had started in elementary school with me.  I don't know that there was anything that wrong with the first school.  I just know my mother wanted me to have the best educational experience possible.  And, she and my father were willing to pay the tuition and sacrifice their time to drive me to the new school so I could have the best teachers.  They knew, like Mother Meng, that the right learning environment could have a profound influence on their child.

Some of the parental choices which have the greatest impact are simple lessons in quiet moments.  Let me close by sharing another story from the boyhood of Mencius.  Mother Meng worked hard to support herself and her son with weaving.  One day Mencius cut out of school and came home early.  As he passed his mother weaving at a loom, Mother Meng asked,  “How are you doing at school?” Mencius replied “just so-so.”  She quickly seized a knife and cut across the threads of the loom, leaving the unfinished tapestry frayed and useless.  Shocked that his mother had just destroyed something so vital to their well-being, Mencius blurted, “What have you done?” Quietly she replied, “Neglecting your study is like my cutting the threads on the loom.  We are poor.  You need a good education to establish yourself.  If you stop your study halfway, you’ll accomplish nothing.  When you grow up, you’ll either be somebody’s servant or become a robber.  What difference is there between half-a-weaving and a boy half-educated?” 

Mother Meng’s lesson was both felt and learned. Mencius applied himself diligently thereafter.  He became a revered Confucian scholar.  By the 12^th century his book Mencius had become a classic in Chinese literature, second only to Confucius’ Analects. A mother’s work is never done and she may never know how far her example and lessons will extend.

 

“I will fight for my children on any level so they can reach their potential as human beings”—Princess Diana

 

The Joy and Travails of Finding Your First Job

 

"Work spares us from three evils: boredom, vice and need”—Voltaire

What was the first job for which you received a pay stub?   I remember the exhilaration I felt when I looked at the dollar and cents I had earned and the adrenalin of anticipation of how I might spend, what seemed to me, an incredibly large sum.  What was the amount?  If I remember correctly I was working for $1.25 an hour so the wages for two weeks would have been about $100.

But that excitement pales in comparison to the pride I felt when my supervisor told my father what a hard worker and quick learner I was.

I don’t remember much about how I got that first job other than that my father scouted it out and took me to introduce me to my prospective employer.  In hindsight it seems like it was a foregone conclusion I would be hired.

Unfortunately, it is getting more and more difficult for teenagers to find employment.  The last two summers the number of employed teenagers were near record lows.  And, despite a slightly improving economic outlook, this summer doesn’t look much better.  Teenagers are still facing a tough time finding work—nationally 24% of the 16 to 19 year olds looking for work are jobless. 

Knowing how valuable that work experience can be for teenagers, let me offer a few suggestions on the ways in which you can help your child get a job:

• Start early. The best time to be looking for summer jobs is during the winter or early spring.

• Help your teenager put together a resume.  We didn’t need resumes when I applied for my first job.  I recall filling out an application but I wouldn’t learn what a resume was for another six or seven years.  Working with your child to create their resume is a wonderful opportunity to affirm their accomplishments and to help them begin to appreciate what employers are interested in.

• Review what to expect in a job interview.  In fact, you might want to consider role-playing with your teenager what a “real” job interview might feel like.  If your child has classmates who are also in the job market see if your child would be willing to be interviewed by the classmate’s parent.  And, of course, you could extend reciprocity.

• Did you ever suffer rejection when you were applying for jobs as a teenager or young adult?   It can be crushing to teenagers particularly if they have been very successful in school and extracurricular activities.  They make take it as a general statement about their worth or inappropriately extrapolate what the rejection means about their future.  Or, they may disparage the prospective employer, describing them as stupid or worse.  You can exercise your empathy muscles, share rejection experiences from your repertoire or that of others your teenager admires, and help your child understand that being turned down for jobs happens to everyone and that other prospective employers won’t know that he/she has been rejected. 

What tips might you offer to the prospective employee or the parent of that teenager?

“Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment.  Full effort is full victory—Gandhi

 

The Path to Achievement: Lessons from the Life of James A. Michener

“Achievement without knowledge and hard work seems to me impossible” - James A. Michener 

James A. Michener is perhaps the second or third most popular author ever in the genre of historical fiction.  He was known for sweeping sagas, covering the lives of many generations, and set in diverse geographic locales.  Among the more than 40 best-selling books he authored are Centennial and Tales of the South Pacific (which would inspire the Broadway musical South Pacific). 

Michener recognized the value of work and education.  His prolific writing allowed him to acquire substantial wealth.  During his lifetime he gave approximately $8 million dollars to establish an art museum in the small town he had grown up in.  At his death, he left his entire estate (reported to be $10 million dollars) to his alma mater, Swarthmore University.

Perhaps the most profound piece Michener would ever write, in terms of life wisdom, was entitled “The Path to Achievement” and appeared in a condensed version in the January, 1977 edition of the Reader’s Digest.  I would like to share some excerpts from the experiential reflections James Michener shared about how he acquired the powerful work ethic and thirst for education which led to his ultimate success as an author.

Michener was adopted into a large family.  His widowed mother did “sweatshop sewing of the cruelest kind, yet saved enough to send six children through high school and two through college.”  At the age of 11, James worked six days a week during every summer and delivered newspapers seven days a week during the winter months, rising at four every morning.  At age 14 he was apprenticed to a plumber and worked ten hours a day during the summer months and four in the winter.  Reflecting back on the rough circumstances he grew up under, he noted: “Instead of turning me against work, this ingrained in me the attitude that sensible people work hard to attain sensible goals.”

James Michener then described what he considered the pivotal experience in developing an authentic work ethic.  His family fell temporarily apart and he was placed in the local poorhouse.  Here he bunked with a group of “memorable old men” on the top floor of the poorhouse dormitory.  As he listened to these derelicts describe the specific disasters which had overtaken them, Michener concluded most of them had failed because of their inability to work intelligently.  This experience generated a “positive reverence for work” and helped him see that work was the “principal means whereby people achieve what they want and avoid what they do not want.”

In 1977 Michener had detected a trend in which “many of our best young people are questioning the assumptions of the Puritan work ethic.”  He respected “the young person who has the courage to keep casting about until he or she finds work that is meaningful.  But in looking, one should also be learning.  The only way to attain the goals of which the youth speak is to acquire the necessary training.”

Michener’s story probably triggers lots of memories of what chores, tasks and jobs we tackled in our youth and what lessons we gained from these experiences.  Today’s economy and labor laws may make it more challenging to “give” our children job experience at an early age. 

What types of opportunities are you creating for your children to help them discover “The Path to Achievement”? 

Let us realize that the privilege to work is a gift, the power to work a blessing, and the love of work is success.” - David O. McKay

MORE LESSONS FROM THE LIFE OF RAY CHARLES

“My mom would say ‘You might not be able to do things like a person who can see.  But there are always two ways to do everything.  You just have to find the other way.” - Ray Charles

 

“He left not only the phenomenal music he sang and recorded, he left the indelible impression on people that it's all right to be yourself" - Johnny Mathis, who recorded a duet of Somewhere Over the Rainbow with Ray Charles just a little over three months’ prior to the Genius’ death

 

Ray Charles’ life was not only a testament to the unique ability each person possesses to overcome adversity and weakness but in finding the way to become the person you were meant to be. 

 

He felt it was important to share his financial success to improve the lives of others.  In 1986, Ray Charles created a private foundation dedicated to providing support in the area of hearing disorders and the empowerment of young people through education.  The vision of The Ray Charles Foundation is to instill in the youth of America that “there is no challenge too great one cannot overcome.”

 

Just a few years before his death Ray Charles gave Wilberforce University, our nation’s oldest African-American college in Ohio, $2,000,000 to fund music scholarships because “"It was what I had to do, and the reason I had to do it is too many people have been good to me."  In 2001 he donated another $1,000,000 to Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia.

 

He then gave $3,000,000 to Albany State University.  A few years after his death his personal representative threatened to sue the college to get that money back.  

 

Mr. Charles’s children strongly opposed that move and sent a letter to the attorney for the estate stating: “Ray Charles would be outraged by your threats to rescind the gifts he made...to Albany State U.”

 

Shortly after his death tabloids reported Ray Charles died broke and was a negligent father.  This publicity so angered his children that they shared with the public a very private story about what their father had done for each of them.

 

A few days before Christmas 2002, Ray Charles called a meeting of his 12 children at a hotel in Los Angeles. Few of his children knew each other as they had 10 different mothers.  Ten of the children, ranging in age from 16 to 50 – came to this luncheon to listen as their father told them he was mortally ill and outlined what they could expect from his fortune.  What we know about this family meeting comes largely from Ray’s second oldest son, the Rev. Robert Charles, who recalled:

 

"He called and we had a sit-down lunch...We took a lot of pictures. And we had a really good time getting to know each other. There were 10 of us there because two couldn't make it. My dad talked about how they always wait until a person passes. He said, 'Why do that? I'll give it to you now so you can build on that now.' It wasn't publicized because he was a very private man."

 

At that time, Ray Charles presented each child with a check for $1 million and explained that most of his financial assets would be left at his death to his charitable foundation.  When he passed away it is believed Ray Charles’ holdings were worth between $25,000,000 and $50,000,000.

 

Another son, Ray Jr., responded to the rumors that his father had died penniless with these words:  "How can you be broke when you give us $1 million and pay the taxes on it? What does that tell you? My father was second to none. He died not owing anyone anything. Everything he had belonged to him. He has 12 kids and he recognized them. He gave them $1 million in the prime or peak of their lives."

 

It really doesn’t matter how large Ray Charles’ estate was or how much he left his children.  The key to his personal and family legacy is found in the strength he exhibited in overcoming weakness and adversity and in the desire he had to give something to his children before he died that they could build on.

 

How will you tell your children about what your testamentary intentions are?  In what ways will your personal and family legacy empower your children to build upon what you have given them—both monetarily and through that family wealth that isn’t taxed, your wisdom and experiential reflections?

 

"Heaven wanted some music, and God sent for Ray Charles," - The Reverend Jesse Jackson speaking at Ray Charles’ funeral

 

"Through his darkness, he enlightened and brightened our lives." - Cecily Tyson, who along with Clint Eastwood, was present with Ray Charles at his last public appearance in April, 2004

Climbing Higher on the Ladder of Listening

The greatest gift we can offer each other is the framework in which to think for ourselves—Nancy Kline, author of Time to Think and most recently More Time to Think

 

In the prior Seedlings’s blog we talked about the first rungs on the Ladder of Listening: hearing and listening for content or substance.

 

Further up the ladder of listening we reach the rung of Empathic Listening.  If you ever attend a marriage enrichment retreat you will no doubt spend considerable time honing your skills as an empathic listener.  This is listening where we reflect, in a positive and affirming way, what we believe we have heard. 

 

The pure intent behind Empathic Listening is to insure we have not just heard but have listened to the person who is communicating with us.  We strip out our natural defensive reflexes.  We lay aside judgment.  We control our fear of silence.  We suppress any impulse to interrupt or to finish a sentence for our friend or family member.  We find the inner strength to concentrate, in a spirit of love and compassion, on the words, the tone, and other subtle indicators of emotion such as facial expressions and body language.

 

My friend and mentor, Courtney Pullen, has taught me there is yet another rung on the Ladder of Listening he calls “Essential Intent.”  He notes that beneath and inside our communication there is something essential; often at the core there is a purpose of concern that isn’t spoken and therefore is not being heard or listened to.  When individuals perceive we are aware of and sensitive to their purposes and concerns, they communicate and collaborate.

 

Nancy Kline in her books and teaching suggests that there are 10 key elements necessary to create a   thinking environment.  A dialogue can be turned into a thinking partnership when the listener applies the skills Nancy teaches us are essential for empowering the best thinking in the person we are listening to.

 

Is there a gene for becoming an empathic listener or certain natural tendencies that make it easier for some to get to the rung of “Essential Intent” or to create a Thinking Environment for their listening partner?  Regardless of your answer, I am convinced we all have innate abilities to become the type of listener which empowers other to share their deepest feelings and to do their most powerful thinking.  Thanks to people like Courtney Pullen and Nancy Kline, we have both models and written wisdom to help us begin our climb up the ladder of listening.

 

How can we get to the rung of “Essential Intent?”  What are the practices parents and grandparents can initiate which will allow their loved ones to do their best thinking and communicating?

 

Listen to me…as you would if I were talking to myself.  I am admitting you to my inmost thoughts and am having it out with myself—Seneca the Younger

The Ladder of Listening

Johnny Carson: Is it true that you find money every day?

George Burns: Yes

Johnny Carson: How is it that you find money every day?

George Burns: I look for it.

 

The conversation between the legendary host, Carson, and the almost centenarian, George Burns, helps us understand a universal law: we always get what we are looking for.  I have wondered, however, if our success in finding what we are looking for is correlated with both the depth and clarity of our purpose and to the energy we devote to that purpose.

 

I think we can use The Law of Listening to illustrate this point.  
 

Everyone understands there is a difference between hearing and listening.  I hear very well.  In fact, I believe I have developed a unique ability to simultaneously hear Sports Center and my wife.  The problem with my duplex hearing is that it never allows me to get beyond the first rung on the ladder of listening.  It doesn’t serve me well and it infuriates my wife, who wants to be listened to and not merely heard.

  

As we climb up the ladder of listening we may reach the rung of content.  Now I’ve not only heard but I’ve begun to process the content and may be able to respond with a relevant comment.  If my wife says, “Sweetheart, the trash can under the sink is overflowing,” I have not just heard those nine words but I’ve processed the content and realize that my wife is really asking me to take the trash out.

 

What have you learned about the Law of Listening?  Will you resolve to learn more and to put what you have learned into more frequent usuage?

What Does Money (Wealth) Mean to You?

"Money may be the husk of many things but not the kernel.  It brings you food, but not appetite; medicine, but not health; acquaintance, but not friends; servants, but not loyalty; days of joy, but not peace or happiness."  ~Henrik Ibsen

Someone has said: “The real measure of your wealth is how much you’d be worth if you lost all your money.”

At a critical point in the Civil War Abraham Lincoln was distressed to learn that some of his most trusted officers had been leaking key secrets to the Confederates.   The Secretary of War was pressing President Lincoln for a decision on what to do with the traitors.  Lincoln replied by telling the story of a farmer who loved a large shade tree which stood as a sentinel near his home:

It was a majestic looking tree, and apparently perfect in every way—tall and straight.  One morning the farmer saw a squirrel run up the tree into a hole.  The farmer proceeded to examine the stately tree and was surprised to find the tree hollow from top to bottom. Only a rim of sound wood remained, barely sufficient to support its weight.

What was he going to do? If he cut it down, it could do great damage with its great length and spreading branches. If he let it remain, his family was in constant danger. In a storm it might fall, or the wind might blow it down, and his house and children could be crushed by it.

As the farmer turned away he said sadly, ‘I wish I had never seen that squirrel.’”

Since I heard this story I have thought how the stately but hollow tree is a metaphor for the dangers which occur when family wealth is transferred without meaning.  Meaning is what prevents a family’s financial wealth from becoming a hollowed out façade that threatens the well-being of rising generations.

The farmer expressed remorse over the squirrel calling to his attention the flaw in the stately tree.  I wonder, however, if the farmer shouldn’t have felt gratitude for the role of the squirrel in alerting him to the danger which he and his family were ignoring.

Is there a squirrel in your life who has helped you understand the importance of creating meaning for your life and around financial resources?  What are you doing to make sure that this meaning doesn’t get disconnected from your family’s wealth?

"Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realize we cannot eat money."  —Cree Indian Proverb

The Overweight Ballerina

One who gains strength by overcoming obstacles possesses the only strength which can overcome adversity.”—Albert Schweitzer

A mother was concerned about her obese 8 year old daughter.  A helpful friend suggested that exercise, and particularly ballet classes, would be a great solution for the young girl’s weight problem.  Ballet would help burn off excess body fat and would also give the little girl confidence and grace.

So our young ballerina began her classes.  After the first class the parents were gathered and informed of the importance of the recital which would be held at the end of the 12 week class. Orders were taken for the beautiful pink tutus which each little ballerina would wear.

A few weeks later the tutu arrived.  The 8 year old broke into tears when she looked at herself in the mirror.  She needed to shed many pounds before she could gracefully slip into the pink tutu. 

On her way from each class she begged her mother not to force her to go to the recital saying, “everyone is going to be laughing at me. I’m so fat.”

“Nonsense,” replied the mother, “you’re not fat and besides you are going to perform so well.” 

In reality the mother tried to see if she could get the tutu altered but that was impossible.  She could purchase a teenage size but her daughter would be even more noticeable because it wouldn’t exactly match the style of the little girls’ tutus.  Instead, the mother and the ballet teacher agreed the 8 year old would be put at the back of the stage and would never appear by herself during the recital.

The night of the recital arrived.  Despite the mother’s best intentions it ended up being a nightmare.  Early in the first group number the overly plump 8 year old lost her balance and fell.  Her classmates burst into laughter staring at the 8 year old whose tutu had embarrassingly split at the point of greatest pressure.  The audience began to roar as well. 

What had the daughter learned from this experience?  Unfortunately, she had learned she couldn’t trust her mother.  Her mother had lied to her and her worse fears had become reality.

What can we learn from this story about the importance of parents accepting their children as they are and assisting their child in the development of realistic goals and expectations?  What could this mother have done to help her daughter develop a resilient mindset if the mother and child could re-live this experience?

“If parents do not match their expectations with acceptance and appreciation of the unique qualities of their children…the stage is set for family stress, friction and the disintegration, rather than the building, of a resilient mindset.”—Brooks and Goldstein, Raising Resilient Children

The Cocoon and the Butterfly Metaphor

"Just as our physical muscles are developed by lifting heavy weights and doing resistance training, so, too, our intelligence, personality, and character are developed by engaging with the world—especially dealing with problems, difficulties and challenges."  —Mac Anderson and BJ Gallagher

A father and a young boy were walking through the woods in late spring.  The boy sighted a butterfly struggling to break out of its cocoon.  The boy pleaded with the father to free the beautiful butterfly from the prison of a cocoon.

The father pulled out his pocketknife and carefully slit the cocoon.  The butterfly immediately fell to the grass, where it lay helplessly trying to flap its wings but unable to fly.

What the father and son had failed to understand was the fact that the struggle inside the cocoon was absolutely necessary for the butterfly’s survival.  The exertion to free itself from the cocoon was pushing fluids out of the butterfly and at the same time strengthening its wings.  Both were necessary if the butterfly was to successfully fly away.

The minute the father acted to “save” the butterfly from struggle he had doomed the beautiful insect.  Only through its struggle could the butterfly develop the resilience to fly through life.

And so it is with children and grandchildren.

Have you been guilty of freeing your loved ones too early from their struggles? 

How important is it that our children experience adversity?

"The things which hurt, instruct"  —Benjamin Franklin

The Red Corvette Story

Putting significant wealth into the hands of a young person who hasn’t been adequately coached or trained reminds me of the metaphor of the Red Corvette:


Can you imagine any parent who on his/her son’s or daughter’s sixteenth birthday would announce: 

“Happy Birthday sweetheart!!!  There is a brand new, bright red Corvette in the driveway.  I want you to have as much fun and excitement in life as you can.  I don’t have time to get you over to Driver’s Ed nor to get the car insured.  Here are the keys.  Invite your friends to go with you for the ride of their lives.  Take that red Corvette out on the freeway and see how fast you can get that ‘Vette up to.”

In a sense putting together a training and educational program for next generation family members is all about making sure that before the keys of trusteeship and control get handed over to the beneficiaries they have been prepared for that responsibility and opportunity. 

What form will that training and educational program take?  Will it be purely a text book curriculum where the beneficiary reads books, white papers, etc. and then engages in a dialogue with the trainer?  Could it also include the simulator version where the next generation family member has the opportunity for experiential learning with examples that pose potential “real-life” challenges they might face someday in the future?  Will it also involve an apprenticeship as a “shadow trustee” or “co-trustee?”

What would you recommend to your client or what are you as a parent inclined to include in your customized training and educational program for next generation family members?