Explore unschooling with Pam Laricchia, Anna Brown, and Erika Ellis. Helping parents figure out how to apply bigger picture unschooling ideas in their everyday lives.
We’re back with another On the Journey episode! Pam, Anna, and Erika had a powerful conversation with Living Joyfully Network member and unschooling dad Sam.
Sam shared deeply about his journey with his daughter through autistic burnout. We talked about Sam’s experiences in both PDA and unschooling parent communities, the depth of the inner work that this journey involves, and some of the major paradigm shifts that Sam has made along the way.
It was a really meaningful conversation and we hope it resonates with you!
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, everyone. I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully and today I’m joined by my co-hosts Erika Ellis and Pam Laricchia, as well as our special guest today, Sam. Hello to you all.
I really appreciate Sam joining us today. He’s a member of the Living Joyfully Network and it’s been really nice getting to know his story and watch how things have unfolded. He brings that thoughtful, intentional energy that I love about the Network. That energy helps fuel my own personal growth and create a beautiful, supportive environment where we can dig deeper and question the prevailing narratives.
So, Sam, to get us started, can you tell us a little bit about you and your family and what everybody’s interested in right now?
SAM: Sure, yeah. Well, I live in Minneapolis with my wife Kate and my daughter. I recently retired from work early. I did the early retirement thing. I had been working part time for the year previous to that.
And so, I guess I can start a little bit with what my daughter’s into. I mentioned to her that this was going to be one of the questions and she said interior design and interior decorating and games. And then I would add a few things to that, too. Right now, she’s super into making slime, large amounts of slime in many different permutations.
There’s lots of experimentation happening with different ingredients and add-ins and colors and that kind of thing. So, that’s kind of fun and messy. She has a wide doll collection and she’s been really into making her own rooms. She calls them mini rooms and they’re essentially like dollhouse rooms, like a kitchen or a bedroom.
She makes one room at a time and adds them on to each other and buys these little, tiny little Mini Brand versions of real life products that she stocks in the doll refrigerator really intricately. And I guess that ties into her interior design interest, as well.
She’s super creative. She really likes to do drawing. She makes videos and she actually, I’m kind of amazed at some of the videos that she makes because she’s, I don’t even think I said she’s nine. And so she uses her iPad to make videos and she has her own YouTube channel.
She has two YouTube channels, which are not updated too frequently. It’s something she’ll get really into and then completely abandon and then six months later be really into it again. And so, that’s fun. And then she likes building forts. She likes playing with our dog Lucy, and various other things. And she watches videos. She loves YouTube and learning. She’s really into watching videos about Minecraft and Toca Boca World, which is the other game that she’s really into at the moment.
She watches videos about all kinds of things like science and history. It’s interesting. She’ll frequently tell me very random facts that she’s learned by watching videos and I, being skeptical, when I look at the videos she’s watching then I’ll Google it and be like is that really true? And it’s interesting because it almost always is accurate and so that’s been an interesting learning for me because I’m the kind of somebody who’s avoided YouTube and never wanted to have anything to do with it for many years. And now I watch quite a bit of it just to keep up with what she’s doing. So that’s kind of fun.
And my wife Kate, she works in public policy. She’s an environmental climate scientist, and she works on making and contributing to the creation of policy to help us in the state of Minnesota adapt to climate change. And she is super engaged and super smart. And she also likes to compete in triathlons a couple of times a year.
She and I are very different in the sense that she needs to have some kind of external motivator to do things and so she really thrives on deadlines and procrastination and that sort of thing and I’m completely the opposite of that. And then we just hang out a lot. We do a lot of hanging out at home, reading, and that kind of thing.
And then, for me, I always have a hard time talking about myself, but I read a lot. I’m currently really interested in reading 19th century British novels, and I’m not sure why, I’ve just been really obsessed with it over the past year or so. So, I’m always reading a couple of books. I’ve really been into reading poetry from different periods, and I’ve been writing for most of my life. My first career was as a professional writer, which kind of drained the fun of writing out of me for a good long time. But I’ve been writing, some creative writing and some poetry which I haven’t done in a very, very long time so that’s been really fun.
And then, my daughter and I, we just hang out pretty much every day. And we just kind of roll with it and see what happens. We don’t really have a lot of plans. We never really know what’s going to happen. But that’s how we approach it, one day at a time.
PAM: I think that’s so fun. I loved the little YouTube story that was tied in there as well. I love the interest piece for you wanting to see what she’s enjoying about this because it’s a way to connect with her, no matter the interest.
And I loved that you could share the various things that she’s watching rather than saying, she loves YouTube and cutting it off there. It makes such a difference like you were saying, even just in that little synopsis, the variety of things that she’s engaging with, right?
SAM: Yeah, well that was a big change for me because at the beginning of our unschooling journey when we started allowing unlimited screen time, which was a huge, huge hurdle for us to get over, for me to get over. I was definitely in the mindset of, oh my god, she’s just watching YouTube all day and not caring what it was. It was just YouTube bad, whatever, internet stuff. And now, she doesn’t like me to watch with her but she’s happy to have me, like not review but just kind of check out what she has watched and then we talk about some of the videos and I tell her what I liked and she tells me what she was into and we talk about which things were silly or which things were interesting.
So, that has been a huge growth for me to just spend more time to really understand what these things are that she’s interested in, in a level of detail that I can actually see it and get it and relate to it in some way, rather than dismissing it, which is what I would have done previously.
ERIKA: I loved all of your shares about all of your interests. I always think when people share about family member interests, it’s like, that’s only three people in the whole world and you’re already covering so many different areas and there are so many ways and things are kind of interacting and you’re learning from each other and you’re all so different. And I just love that and I loved the slime phase. We had that big time with my youngest too and it’s pretty messy, but it’s a lot of fun.
ANNA: I know the slime thing was actually after our time. Did you have slime, Pam? We didn’t have slime. It wasn’t a thing. I have friends from the Network that have younger kids that I get to visit and it’s a whole thing, right? It’s just unbelievably amazing and messy, but it’s incredible.
I love that. And just that again, the diversity of interest with the three of you is just, wow, this is how rich life is when we’re just exploring these things that are interesting to us.
PAM: I love that. And so, Sam, you kind of alluded to this, so I’d like to dive in a bit more, but I would love to hear a bit more about how you actually discovered unschooling and what your family’s transition to unschooling looked like.
SAM: This will be good to talk about because this was definitely a big journey for us and not something we ever would have imagined, conceived of, anticipated in any way. And so I guess we were just, I mean, for me, I hadn’t really put that much thought into it. Maybe this sounds terrible, but I didn’t really think that much about what it would be like to be a parent. And I had no plans, I had no ideas of how it should be, or the right way to do it or anything like that.
I just kind of, I don’t want to speak for Kate, but I just made assumptions that like, okay, you have a kid, kid goes to daycare, until they’re old enough to go to kindergarten, and then they go to kindergarten. And so, we were following that path. And I think we’re lucky that we found out about this daycare pretty close to our house that was, I think, a generally positive thing for our daughter at the time.
It’s a Montessori daycare. And it ended up having just some really wonderful teachers, but also some really wonderful friends, and several of whom live just within a couple blocks of us, and have become, in her short life, lifelong friends of our daughters. So, her closest friends in the neighborhood she’s been with since they were three months old, which thinking back on it, I’m like, oh my god, I can’t believe we dropped her off when she was three months old, and just went to the office.
But you know, at the time, Kate and I were both in very busy parts of our careers. And I was very, very career focused. And, generally, our daughter did great with other kids, did great in daycare. And then there were a few times like towards the end when she was around five, and we were getting close to the kindergarten transition, she started having days where she just really didn’t want to go. And she would be literally kicking and screaming. I would literally carry her kicking and screaming, which is something that looking back on and I’m kind of mortified that I did. But my mindset at the time was, this is not optional. I’ve got to go to work. And you’ve got to go to school, this is the deal. Welcome to the world. And I really felt like I was leaving her in a safe place.
And then we live about two blocks from a public school, and we are here in Minneapolis, and we really wanted to send her to that school, and we just kind of made that choice. We didn’t talk to her about it. We didn’t tour schools. And then it turned out most of the neighborhood kids including all her friends were going to the school that’s just a mile down the road but it’s in the suburban district.
So, when she was at this school in kindergarten she didn’t know anybody there. And socio-economically and demographically the school that she went to for kindergarten is very different from her. And it was pretty rough. She encountered a lot of bullying. She encountered a lot of what was probably traumatic talk about what they call live shooter drills, and the discussion around that was extremely explicit and extremely scary.
And so it was overall not a positive experience for her and within the first month, she was refusing to go and really upset about it. And we realized pretty quickly, though we did this whole, “No, you’ve got to go, there’s not a choice.” We did that for a little while and then finally she was literally just begging us to send her to the other school.
And so we said okay, we’ll do that. It still didn’t occur to us that not going to school was an option. That was definitely not on the radar, but we were able to transfer her to the other school. They put her in the class with her friends, and she had this great group of friends. It seemed like everything was fine. It seemed like it was a total 180. We really didn’t have any more school refusal. The rest of the kindergarten year seemed good.
And then we went through first grade and that seemed good. Summers were challenging because there’s this whole world of summer camps that’s super competitive and you have to sign your kid up for camps in January for the summer and my work schedule was so intense, and I was traveling a lot for work.
So, Kate was alone with our daughter for a lot of the time. And so we signed her up for every week that we could. In retrospect, that was pretty intense. So, at the end of first grade. And while we went through first grade there were various signs, but nothing that was really telling us definitively that this is not working for her. And she really had a wonderful teacher in first grade, who really got her. And what we realized is that the teacher was really providing our daughter with a lot of accommodations, without her or us having to ask for them, and sort of would bend the rules of the school, just to make her more comfortable.
And so that was super helpful and, and I think also pretty unusual. But after first grade ended that summer. We signed her up for a camp, a couple camps, and something happened in the course of that, where she really didn’t have a break at all between school and the camps, and she hit a wall, and we just started to see a dramatic, dramatic change in her.
That was really frightening, because it was so intense. And so, at first it was not wanting to leave the house, I’m not going to go to camp, that sort of thing. Which was okay, by that point we were already into the pandemic so my travel had stopped and that was actually a big relief. I was still working a lot but I was at home, so it wasn’t like the end of the world if we couldn’t drop her off somewhere.
But we started seeing a lot of physical aggression, and just anger and rage really. And it was something that was just very scary and challenging. And then that summer between first and second grade, she stopped wanting to get out of bed, and would not get out of bed the entire day. Wouldn’t comb her hair, bathe, brush teeth, none of those things were happening. It really felt like we’re in a crisis. And so, we sought medical help.
But she wouldn’t go, she would not go to see a doctor. So we did virtual sessions with psychiatrists and that was extremely unhelpful. We were really approaching it through this medical model of, this is a crisis, our daughter is having some kind of like so far unexplained psychiatric episode.
And like the psychiatrist basically said, you should commit her to some kind of inpatient thing. Everything about that just felt wrong to me.
That was the point at which it was like, okay, we’re not going to talk to the psychiatrist anymore. This whole time I’d been Googling kind of ferociously trying to figure out what’s happening here. What I came across was all this content about PDA. It felt like, wow, this really sounded like it was describing what we were experiencing. So, I signed up for a class for parents who have PDA kids. And that was an interesting experience.
On the one hand, it was like this huge relief because the class was from a parent who had gone through this experience and had taken a very scientific approach to trying to understand what was happening and how to readjust their lives to deal with this. In that class, which I generally had very mixed feelings about, but that’s the class where I heard the term unschooling for the first time. So to get to the question, I guess, that was definitely a phrase that I had never heard.
In this class, there were 400 parents in this virtual class. I was just astonished at how many parents there were. And we would have these calls and the stories that people shared were all very similar, definitely very relatable.
The thing I noticed is that everybody similar to us was approaching it as a crisis, like as a problem that has to be solved. One of the big lessons from the class was this is not something you can change. This is something you have to adapt to.
So that definitely got me thinking and it was a real shift of mindset for me. It’s like, okay, this is it, life is not going to be the way we thought it was. And we have to make changes. And it was the facilitator of that class who first mentioned the term unschooling. There was lots of talk about homeschooling because so many of the kids whose parents were in this program were refusing or unable to go to school. In the school world, they label it school refusal.
And I think the way I would talk about it now is just, unable to go to school really. So, then I started Googling unschooling and wondering, what the heck is this? Because I was not interested in being a teacher. I actually tried being a teacher in an early career. I had several, false starts, I guess I would say. And one of them was in education and I kind of left that thinking, okay, that is not something I can do. I am never going to do that again.
My conception of homeschooling, and I think Anna, you were just talking about this in one of the recent discussions was like, homeschooling means you’re sitting at the kitchen table with workbooks and curriculum and you’re going through the whole thing. And I was like, I don’t want to do that. And I’m 99% sure that my daughter is not interested in that. And so that’s where the unschooling thing came in, I’d like to learn more about this.
And so through Googling, I found this podcast (Exploring Unschooling) and it was a totally life-changing experience. I think just listening to the podcast, because I think the thing that really struck me is that I was immersed in this PDA community, which was very much using the medical model for looking at things and the deficit lens of looking at things. And then in the podcast, you all were taking this totally different lens.
You’re not doing this because it’s a last resort and you have no other choice. It’s this intentional way of approaching life differently. And then just kind of turning all these things that I never questioned, like school is required and just asking, well, why? Let’s actually think about that. Is that actually true? What’s the goal of education and what are other ways of achieving that goal? And so just listening to stories of parents who were making this choice was really a really transformational experience.
And then I went back into this class that I was taking, this class spanned a period of three months. And so in those three months was a huge learning for me, I would go back into these calls with these other parents and their voices are all just filled with panic and fear. And I was just like, I’m not feeling that anymore.
When I went into it, I was all panic and fear. That was the deal. And then after listening, and I probably listened to like 150 episodes of the podcast, I’m just walking around the house, the headphones all day, just episode after episode, after episode, everything I’m doing, I’m listening to it. I was just like, I’m not afraid of this anymore.
Then I joined the Network, really not knowing what to expect, but one thing that really struck me when I joined the Network is nobody in the network was using any of the same language that I had learned in my PDA curriculum that I had found. But a lot of people were describing similar things that sounded like similar experiences.
And I was just like, wow, this is like a parallel universe over here where we’re dealing with the same human things, but this group of people is taking a completely different mindset and a completely different approach to it. It’s not a crisis. It’s not a problem.
We’re just rolling with the phases of life and making adjustments that we have to make.
I got really excited about unschooling and I was like, this is great. And then I wanted to be talking about it all the time, but I quickly found that people who are not unschooling are not interested in hearing about unschooling.
That is a lesson I learned very quickly. So, it’s not something that we talked about at the park or at the neighborhood gatherings very much. So, that’s kind of the long winded story of how we arrived at this point.
ERIKA: That gives me goosebumps.
PAM: I know. I do appreciate you sharing the details of it because I mean, it is a very familiar journey for me. I remember the years, the two years where we had a great teacher. I was in the same place, working with my kids. I had no clue that this was a choice. This was something we had to figure out and having those teachers who were not as rigid and who saw my child and celebrated them and thought it was really cool and just accommodated. It was only night and day when then the next year you’ve got another teacher who was very, very fixated.
But yeah, I super appreciate that whole journey and the comparison, the language and the approach, right. With these kids, I don’t even like saying these kids, but with these kinds of situations, this way of moving through the world. We don’t see the deficit side because I hadn’t thought of it that way, but it is completely a choice. It’s like we’re introduced to it maybe because something has gone sideways. Because we grew up with the narrative of, this is the way we do things. We have kids, they go to daycare, they go to school, et cetera. And then something knocks us to ask that first question.
But yeah, once you open that up and then you recognize all the different questions that you can ask and that shift to just being in the world with the people who are part of our families and, and it’s hard to explain fully respecting them and just living together and coming and going and, and understanding each other, and shifting to that perspective versus, oh my gosh, here’s all the accommodations I need to make to try to fix it. And then eventually, hopefully, they’ll work enough that we can go back to the life that we had.
It’s still holding that because it’s revisiting the questions, revisiting the assumptions that we have been basing our life on that this is the good stuff to do. And what are all the things, even the super hard things, that we have to do to get ourselves back to that.
ANNA: I think one of the things I really appreciate was you sharing the whole journey, because I think it will actually resonate with a lot of people. Just hearing how many people were in that PDA group is kind of amazing to me. But one of the things I love, when you first came to the Network and other people that have had a similar journey, because like you said, you’ll hear similar stories to yours very often in the Network, but it’s that first moment of relief, because I think so often you’re really focused on all the things that are happening that feel terrible.
This is so serious, this is so terrible, but then really opening up to really seeing the gifts in your child. I mean, oh my gosh, from the beginning, your daughter just delighted me, she just had so many interesting things about her and the way she moved through the world. And I think when we can bring that perspective and I think parents are craving that, right? It’s why those teachers that were so kind felt so great because they saw the thing that you see in your child.
And I think that is something that I love about the Network where we just celebrate all these amazing kids for the things that they bring to the table because it’s amazing. We don’t need to make everybody look the same and do the same thing. So, I loved that piece and just that little spark that happens when it’s like, yeah, she is amazing. And I love that we can be in a place where we can all see that.
ERIKA: Yeah. When you’re too in the tunnel vision of a certain paradigm, the school paradigm where it has to look like this, and it’s not looking like this, and this is an emergency, it can be really hard to even imagine anything outside of that.
But right, I feel like I remember when you first came to the Network, just the idea of what if there’s nothing wrong, actually, and we just are who we are and that’s okay. I think that feels so good, especially when we’re hearing all these messages about something being wrong.
And then, for me, with my neurodivergent kids, I just have found being in the Network so validating and reinforcing and positive for me, because I just keep seeing all these similar experiences, they get it, they’ve been there with these same things. And everyone is just really appreciating the uniqueness of each of each child. And that just feels so much better.
And I mean, we could try to fix things for our whole lives and just be in constant conflict, and nothing would necessarily even get better or change. And so, I think it’s just so much nicer to be in a nice relationship, in a positive relationship with their kids. And I know you’ve talked about a lot of shifts already.
But the question I wanted to ask is, what has been like the biggest mindset shift for you in this journey so far?
SAM: I think it’s got to be around the school. There are so many things around this. And I was thinking about this on the most basic level, just the idea that school was optional, or that there were different ways to approach it was a big learning.
I think one thing that I left out of the story is that as we were approaching second grade, our daughter was enrolled. And as we were getting closer and closer, I just couldn’t picture how this was going to happen.
I think at the end of the summer, on the day after Labor Day, which is when school starts, it was like, I don’t think things are going to be magically different. And we can’t just pick up and go back to where we were. But our daughter was, I think she also had the message already ingrained that school was not optional. And so she did rally.
We went and got her haircut, and we got clothes. And she went that first day. First, we went to the open house. And that went okay, and we met her new teacher. And then she went to the first day. And everyone in the school said that they were amazing.
And that second day, she woke up, and she said, “I am not going back to that school.” And it was firm, this is the deal. And so then I went through a lot between that early September, and probably mid October, which is right around the time, this would have been 2024, which was right on the time that I joined the network.
I was calling our daughter in sick every day. And keeping in touch with the school, having weekly calls with the school, trying to explain to them what’s going on. And then I switched her from the school district that we had enrolled her in, and had a virtual only. It is a really innovative virtual-only option that they developed during COVID, and then really invested a lot in. And it seemed really cool, actually. So we switched her to that program. And that did not help at all.
She was not going to get on those classes. And she was not going to log in. But I had calls with the teacher every week. And the teacher told me, “I went through the same thing where my daughter refused to go to school. I am totally with you. I totally get it. I totally get where you are.” And I mean, these people at the school could not have been more supportive. But then as soon as we hit the 30 day mark, they were like, well, it’s been 30 days.
And now we got to call the county, we got to get the county in there. Suddenly, it was like, okay, we’ve been accommodating, but time’s up, it’s been 30 days, and it can’t go on for this long.
At that point, we had had our daughter assessed for neuropsychological evaluation and had all of these assessments done and found a really knowledgeable doctor who specialized in autism in girls.
And I felt more confident that what our daughter really needed was rest, and was in a state of burnout that she was not going to recover from quickly. And the psychologist said you should think about it as a year, at least, that she’s going to be in this reduced-capacity state. But it wasn’t until the school said, we got to call the county, that I was like, okay, we’ve got to make a decision.
And at that moment, the decision is we are not going to try to work through this medical deficit lens to try and get our daughter back on track to return to the environment which put her into this state. And so, I think it really took that for me to have that internal shift or transformational kind of moment of, we have to make a different decision.
And so, from that point, instead of being like, okay, this unschooling thing sounds great and we’re gonna do this until we no longer have to, I think that’s where my mindset had been, and then I moved into more of what I would call acceptance of no, no, no, we’re going to really choose this path. And it wasn’t until that point that I really started to embrace unschooling and get excited about it and actually think about it as a deliberate choice.
And I think the other shift that I think is important was more about me and my worries and my career, because I have always had this sense of financial insecurity and just kind of fear around that. When I was insisting that she go to school, forcing her to go to school, it’s true that I had to go to work and it’s true that my work was very busy and that I had to travel a lot for work, but I didn’t have to work that job. And that was really the way I had approached work.
I worked really hard. Work was a top priority in my life before meeting Kate and thinking about having kids and all that. And I was achieving a lot of recognition and success at work and there was no part of me, any new opportunity that I was given at work I said yes to any new challenge I was given.
I said yes to anything. If I was given negative feedback at work, I was going to overcome that and do whatever I had to do. And I just was in this mode of thriving on the validation systems of the corporate world and just moving up that ladder.
And I had ended up in a leadership position and there was really no part of me that was like, this is optional or I don’t have to. It was like, no, I have to do this. And so, I think that when I started to go through the shift about school, it really made me think about, why am I spending so much time at work? When I was working from home, I had like 12-14 meetings back-to-back on Zoom every day. And I was anxious and frustrated all the time and I was super stressed out and it’s like, no matter how hard you work, there’s always more work. It’s just never finished.
And so, I started to think that I don’t have to have this career path. It just doesn’t have to be this way. And so, then I started making decisions at work to pull back from work and first I changed into a lower stress job. I stepped down from the leadership role and I took a different kind of role and then I reduced my hours and then eventually it was like, I’m just going to stop working. And there’s definitely a privilege involved with that and there was also, it really was in in the case of our family, I think it was a huge mindset mindset shift for me about how important work really is and how important money is and what you need to do versus what you want to do and all these different things. So that was like a pretty huge thing.
And I think that’s the other piece. I often think this related to unschooling now, is that I feel like and I really like that the name of the network is Living Joyfully, because I feel like the term unschooling just doesn’t quite do it, because school is just one part of it or how we approach learning. It’s just one part of it. But really it’s been a total change of how I approach life on a daily basis, right? In big ways and in small ways and so that’s really just a huge transformation that this journey has involved for me.
PAM: I love it and yes, the name of the Network was very intentional because absolutely unschooling was my window to this world. It was that the school was the first question when I eventually discovered that it wasn’t the law that there were other options than just dropping your kids off at school or else you go to jail. And it is just so brilliant how you asked that question. You start diving into that and how it opens up It’s like oh, well if I can question school, maybe I can question work.
As I am questioning school I am starting to have different perspectives and thoughts about relationships and the value of relationships and the value of my child, a different way of seeing my child as a human being versus somebody I need to train and who needs to learn that you go to school and then that becomes work.
I remember there was a season where I noticed when I was writing blog posts many years ago that every blog post I wrote that started about unschooling, obviously, by the end of a thousand words, fifteen hundred words was and that’s life because really the perspective can be applied across every aspect of life.
It’s not just school, yes or no, when you want to dive deeper. When you discover it’s not so much that I need to fix all these things so that the kid can enjoy school so that I can enjoy work. Thinking there’s something wrong with me if I’m not making these conventional systems work for me versus questioning the systems in the first place And just I love the journey of how you tweaked it, right? It’s like oh, I’m gonna change my job to release some of the stress.
Now I’m gonna lower my hours. That was the same approach with school, right? Those 30 days you’re just calling in sick because it’s keeping your doors open, keeping the possibilities open until there was a moment where that door is closing and now we really want to make an actual choice. Are we going to force through this or are we going to decide to step out of that system?
ANNA: I think, for me, I mentioned at the top, questioning the prevailing narratives and I think that’s the big piece for me. We have a lot of narratives, school is a have to and school is hard, you just have to do hard things and work is hard and you have to do hard things and we need to be productive and all of these kinds of beliefs that end up not necessarily serving us individually or as a family but end up serving the system that we’re in. That is one of my favorite parts of this, really just questioning all of it and you may still choose to work in some way or to go to school in some way but boy does it feel different as a choice and an intentional path than it does as a have to and the drudgery.
That is why it’s called Living Joyfully, why we so intentionally chose that and why Pam really really resonated for me. It’s questioning, why do we have to have these hard things? Why does life have to be hard? Why does work have to be hard? Why does school have to be hard? Maybe it doesn’t.
And so once we can start asking that question and really examine the answers, I think everything changes so dramatically.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that your answer to the question is basically everything. I just completely changed into a new person. I totally remember that part of my journey as well. When it’s just this ripple effect of one little thing that doesn’t have to be like that and then it just all kind of ripples out from there and I just love it.
PAM: One thing I just wanted to say, I think at first like when I remember way back when we started, when I first heard the term unschooling and you hear of people describing living joyfully, making choices from that perspective rather than, life is hard. We have to do these hard things. At first, I remember thinking- well, if I step back and start choosing not to do hard things, won’t my life or my kids be so boring because we won’t be doing all those things. But like Anna said, you’ve discovered and shared Sam, it’s that shift to the motivation behind the choices.
The fact that they are now choices, we see our kids choosing to do hard things all the time. Challenging things that get them right up at the edge. Tipping over into frustration, but the fact that they’re choosing them intentionally makes all the difference in the world.
That was just something out there because at first you can think oh well then we’re going to be doing nothing but that’s one of the feedback we get to our questions. We used to get so often well, they’re never gonna do anything if you don’t make it do these hard things, right? They do all kinds of things!
ANNA: We’re about to wrap up, but I feel like because you’ve shared this journey I just want to and hopefully this isn’t too much of a surprise. I know you’re about a year and a half into your unschooling journey, maybe just give a brief glimpse into, things really do feel better, right? Your daughter really feels better, you see her kind of coming back into the person you felt like before and even more so I just maybe that would help give the arc for people that are feeling like it’s hard and it’s scary right now.
SAM: Yes, and I thank you for that opportunity because if I think back to where we were. If I think back to a year and a half ago, I was scared. I guess on the one hand I would hear stories of parents who’ve been through something similar and were in a different, better place now was helpful, but on the other hand the voice in my head was like, but that’s not going to be your situation. This is the rest of your life.
And it was slow and I think you, Anna, said something really helpful to me at one point. We were probably six months in and I was saying something and I can’t remember what we were talking about but it was in one of our weekly calls. I was commenting on being in burnout and what it was going to be like after and you said, Sam, I think you have some thinking to do about what it means to be done with burnout or what is life going to be like after burnout? What does that even mean?
That was super helpful and I’ve thought about that a lot because going into burnout felt very sudden. It just felt like one day we woke up and we were in a different universe. That’s how it felt. But when I think back, there were lots of signs. And if I go back and read, I’m a journaler, and if I go back and read my journal entries from three years ago, the signs are there in my journal or even from longer ago than that.
So, it really wasn’t sudden and the sort of transition out and now our daughter does talk about how she was in burnout and she talks about that sometimes. She talks about it as in the past tense and sometimes. She’s still a little bit in there, but she knows she’s in a better place. It really is just very incremental one day at a time, but things have changed dramatically. And we’re just in it as a family.
I think we’re just in a way, way, way better place and it doesn’t look anything like it looked before. I think it’s better than it was before but I could never have imagined or thought that this is what we would want. But now I just think things are great. I just feel more confident that we can deal with whatever challenges come up as they come up and we just have a new approach and a new lens for life.
ANNA: I think one of the cool things about her and some of the other kids that we’ve seen transition in that way is just how they teach us how to regulate. I want to do this thing and then I want some time off and wait, I don’t want to do this thing. I’ve loved watching her journey of really understanding herself because I think she was pushing herself beyond her limits, sometimes with a little help from you all.
But sometimes I think she was just reading the signs and saying okay, I need to do this. But now with this freedom you see her just being so intentional and expending a lot of energy on some things and then saying hey, I need to dial it back. I just feel like that’s great for all of us to learn and remember and normalize that that’s actually how humans like to move through the world.
That fast, linear pace is really hard for most humans and our nervous system. So, I love what these kids have to teach us as well. I appreciate you just sharing a little bit more of that arc.
Thank you so so much for being here. It’s been really interesting and powerful and I hope everyone enjoyed the conversation and maybe had their own kind of aha moment or just resonated with the feelings that we’ve been talking about. If you enjoy these kinds of conversations and want to come hang out with us. We’d love to have you join us on the Living Joyfully Network. We invite you to check it out and see if it fits with our free month trial and you’ll find the link in the show notes. And also at livingjoyfully.ca. The link will be on the home page.
Thank you so much for being here and for everyone for joining us.
PAM: Thanks so much, Sam. ERIKA: Thanks, Sam.
SAM: Thank you.
EU410: On the Journey with Ari Lambie
Jun 04, 2026
We’re back with another On the Journey episode! We had a fascinating conversation with Living Joyfully Network member Ari Lambie. Ari is a mom of three young children and she spoke with us about her journey. We talked about the philosophy of learning, the fallibilism of humans, creativity, children’s social development as well as their capability, and a lot more.
It was a really rich conversation and we hope you find it helpful!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you.Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello everyone, I’m Anna Brown with Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-host Erika Ellis and Pam Larcchia, as well as our special guest today, Ari Lambie. Hello to you all.
Before we get started, I just want to mention the Living Joyfully Network. It’s a lovely place where you can find support at any stage of your journey, and I feel so lucky to get to hang out with so many amazing people from all over the world. If you’d like to join us, we’ll put the link in show notes, and you can also go to our website livingjoyfully.ca, and there’s a link right on the home page.
I am so excited that Ari is here with us today. She is one of those amazing members of the Network I was just mentioning, and it’s been so fun getting to know her and her family. She loves to dive into all the nuances, and that is my favorite, so I’m very excited.
Ari, just to get us started, can you tell us a little bit about you and your family and what everyone’s interested in right now?
ARI: Sure. Well, thanks so much for having me. I’m really grateful to be here. I am Ari, and I’m part of a family of five. We live in Portland, Oregon. My husband, Joaquin, is a critical care doctor, so he spends a lot of time taking care of people and solving challenging problems, but he’s also really fun. He brings a lot of light energy to the house. He likes to cook, which I love. I mean, I don’t love cooking, so I love that he cooks.
He also likes to garden and play sports and come up with challenging ideas and concepts that are away from the norm, which is our favorite thing to talk about. We’ve been together for 20 years, and we just love talking about the ideas he comes up with, which makes me think hard and come back with either a new way of thinking or challenging him with a new idea. So, that’s what we spend a lot of time doing when we have time to ourselves.
My nine-year-old daughter likes to come in on those conversations sometimes. She really likes figuring out the world, talking about it. She likes to read. One of her interests is unusual animals, particularly marine animals. She’s taught me a ton about all these animals I’ve never heard of. She also likes to bake and do some crafty things. She likes to watch Minecraft videos and hang with friends. She spends a lot of time with her friends.
My seven-year-old is just this fantastic person of expression. She loves to draw. She loves to listen to music. She’s teaching herself how to play some music. She loves stories and is really good at telling stories. And she expresses herself with her body, too. She’s really athletic, and she gives the biggest, best hugs that you’ll ever feel.
My five-year-old, she’s really into pretend play. We play a lot of games together. She loves to be a pet in a pet store, and I come and have to buy her because she’s the most special pet in the store. Or we’ll play that we’re both shape-shifting dragons, and we have to defend against the other dragons. So that’s kind of her jam. She also likes to cook, and she’s really into numbers right now. She’s always figuring out how they go together, how they count up. So that’s been fun to play with her, too.
We all like to move. We’re all pretty physical. One of our favorite games is tag. When we go to the park, we will almost inevitably end up playing some form of freeze tag. We’ve invented lots of different games of freeze tag.
Me, I like to move outdoors. Hiking is probably one of my favorite hobbies right now. I also like to journal, and craft, and do art here and there. I spend most of my time hanging out with my kids and figuring out life. I’m loving it. It’s so nice.
PAM: It’s so great to hear about everybody. I feel like we say this every time, but it’s just so fun to hear the different kinds of expressions of each person, yet as you’re listening, you can see how they weave together. Like you were even saying, oh she likes to join in cooking. This one likes to join in on conversations. There’s so many pieces.
What I always love is just how it’s a beautiful expression of the idea of a family of individuals. How we can all be living together and being ourselves. Like you said, you’re very busy with parenting and figuring all those pieces out, and also you have the things that you enjoy doing, and that you notice you enjoy doing, and bringing those where they weave in to all the different pieces. So, I just, I love unschooling families.
ERIKA: I love that too, and yeah, it’s just making me think about, people are different, and how when we have these different individuals in our families, how we learn from each other, and I think initially when I went into parenting, I was thinking they’ll be a lot like me, and they’ll just learn from me kind of thing. I didn’t realize quite how much interconnected learning there would be, just because we’re all so different. I didn’t realize how different they could be, and I think, each child you add is just a whole new layer of learning for everyone in the family.
So, I love that for sure.
PAM: I think for me, that’s been one of the big shifts, was recognizing the individuals, right? As a family, we’re going to do this, and as a family, we’re going to do that, and then recognizing that legitimately doesn’t work for some of us, and that was kind of an eye-opening moment.
Okay, so the next question. We are very interested to hear a bit more about how you discovered unschooling, and what ideas and people have influenced you so far along the way, because, you know, the journey keeps going, doesn’t it?
ARI: Yeah, I don’t think it’ll ever end. So, my interest in unschooling started about four years ago, when I read a book by a physicist named David Deutsch. He talked about a lot of physics concepts that are beyond me, but he also talks about this philosophy or understanding of knowledge, and how knowledge grows, and it really shook up my understanding, but made it clearer to me what I believed, it made it make more sense.
And he draws a lot on a 20th century philosopher, Karl Popper, who coined the term, the bucket mind theory, I guess it is. So, thinking about the mind as a bucket, where you pour knowledge in, which is wrong, but it’s how a lot of us think about how knowledge is passed from one person to another.
It’s just this receiving process, where someone tells you information, and you receive it, but Deutsch and Popper challenge this and say, learning is actually a creative process. And it happens when we have a conflict in our mind, two things that are incompatible, as simple as a desire. I want this, and I don’t have it yet, or I want to understand this, and I don’t yet, and then what we do in our mind is we come up with ideas that can reconcile the conflict, or solve the conflict, and we use our knowledge to criticize all the ideas we come up with.
A lot of this is subconscious, but we’re criticizing our ideas, and picking the one that is the best explanation, and then we try it out, and then we see how the world responds, and we learn more information. This idea just made so much sense to me. They apply it to a larger scale, how humans as a species gain knowledge, and how science advances, but it also applies to the individual, so that really got me thinking.
I realized that school is so much based on the bucket theory of pouring knowledge in, and it doesn’t really allow for as much of this creative trying, or see your ideas are as valid as anybody’s, let’s hear more about them, so that was a big knock against school for me.
Deutsch also talks about the fallibilism of humans, that we’re just, most of our ideas are wrong. We don’t know anything for sure, and school sends the message, at least I got the message in school, that we’re telling you information, this is how it is, and it’s not going to change, we’re the authority here. I think that’s a real disservice, because the truth is that knowledge is always changing, the truth is, these are our best explanations right now, but in the future, we’ll probably prove most of this wrong. And so I think it’s dangerous to tell kids, this is how it is, don’t think that it could be different
So, you combine these ideas of creativity, that learning is about creativity, and that our ideas are always coming up with better explanations, replacing things, and it shows the big problem with ever forcing a person to think a certain way, or to do a certain thing, because even when you think you’re telling somebody to do something because it’s in their best interest, you’re probably wrong. We just don’t know enough about the world, or about that particular person, and then you’re also taking away their ability to come up with their own ideas, and test them out. That’s how they’re going to learn about their interfacing with the world, and how they want to be, and the best understanding that they can come to. You stunt human progress, because you’re limiting ideas, new ideas for us to test out.
Those were all big epiphanies for me, this new way of thinking, and I was like okay, so we should avoid forcing people as much as possible. It changed my view on society really. But I still wasn’t sure that it could apply to children. I had a five-year-old, a three-year-old, and a baby at the time, and I was telling them what to do a lot, and so I was like how do you apply this to, does this even apply to children.
So, I did some research, and I was like yes, people are doing this. Kids are full humans, they can be seen as creative knowledge growers as much as anybody, in fact they’re more creative, because they haven’t learned to criticize as much. I found John Holt, I found Peter Gray, I found you all, I found the term unschooling, and I was like wow, this is possible.
So, I talked with the family, presented it to my oldest, who was in kindergarten at the time, and our life was not as interesting as it was before they started preschool and kindergarten, I was not feeling, I don’t know, not as full myself, schlepping them places, and just dealing with the, let’s get to places on time energy. My oldest was starting to get a little bored with her experience in kindergarten, and she was all for staying home and continuing to play, so that’s when we started.
ANNA: All right, see, this is exciting though, because I think it’s so interesting, that idea that he was talking about, and that you were looking into that, how it really does systematically shut down that creative mind, that critical thinking mind. What a disservice, it really is. That’s why it’s so hard for me when, and I know it feels to people like such a radical concept, but I just think, oh my gosh, how does it not make sense, you can see it happening, and I think it’s just so fascinating. I love that this idea was related to adults. And still I think for many people it’s that resistance, but can it be for kids? I see that with so many interesting people that are putting interesting ideas out in the world, and so often are not applying to children, and I just think, whoa, you’re really missing the boat, one, because kids have so much to teach us, and they bring such creativity to things, but I just think, wow, you are missing that the ideas definitely apply to kids. That was very interesting, thank you.
PAM: The part that really bubbled up for me, that connected, because I feel like that’s something that I learned so strongly at school, that still gets in my way, so yeah, maybe it might be partly personality-based, but the idea of having the right answer first before acting. That is something I learned watching my kids, but still, it’s so ingrained.
I have to literally remember, and which is why I talk pretty often, and I don’t know if we’ve shared it yet, the Baby Steps episode from the Living Joyfully Podcast, but Baby Steps have become a mantra for me to remind myself to think, just as you were describing, what’s my best interpretation or thought or idea about this thing that I am feeling a push with? And go try it, and see what I learned, because I’ll learn more by trying it, more that I can take back, rather than just intellectually trying to solve it completely to the end, before I ever actually take it out in the world and see what it looks like.
So, I’ve spent all that time trying to figure it out, versus experimenting. I think maybe it looks like this, boom, go try it, learn some more, come back and, ooh, I’m going to tweak it a little bit more from what I learned, how things unfolded in that moment, and I’m going to take that idea out into the world and test it, that just makes so much sense.
It is how I saw, even though my kids were in school for a handful of years before they came home, but yeah, that period was just, like, releasing the crud, right. The crud that they had been absorbing, so their own kind of de-schooling, but mistakes still were not yet this huge, horrible thing to them. They didn’t even see them as mistakes, they just said, oh, that didn’t work as I expected, let me bring that information, tweak it, and try it a little bit differently next time, or two minutes from now when I want to keep pushing down this path. For me to recognize that mistakes aren’t literally bad, they’re just more learning, they’re just more context to the situation that I’m pulling in,
And that, to me, that’s where the creativity lies, because the more little bits of information I have, or if we think about learning as a web, the more little connections I’ve got, the more creative I can be, because I have more pieces to play with, to bring together.
It reminds me, you were talking about the discussions you and your husband love to have about very interesting things, it’s like, oh, let’s pull it apart this way, what if we look at it this way, what if we go way over here, and what would that look like, let’s go try it, or even if it’s a mind experiment. It’s just so fun and creative, and that’s what learning is, versus the, oh my gosh, here’s the bucket, take the fire hose, all the stuff you’re supposed to memorize and implement, because it’s the right way. Anyway, yes, so fun.
ERIKA: I feel like I’m going to be thinking about some of these for a while, it’s very interesting, and kind of a unique path to get to unschooling. I don’t know if I’ve heard this exact story before, which is really fun.
It was making me think, that idea of, you’re probably wrong, it could be a really good one to kind of play around with, because that’s so not what we learned growing up. It was, there’s one answer, that’s what the fact is. Then I was thinking back, and I remember in school, learning in science or something, we would learn something that people used to believe, like spontaneous generation, or something, where now we think how could they have been so clueless? I remember having the thought at that time, so what about now, don’t you think people in the future are going to be like, how could they have been so clueless back then?
So, I had that thought, but then you don’t really have a chance to play around with that. Everything is taught as facts now, and I just remember being, like, how will we know which ones of these are completely wrong, that we’re learning right now?
And so it is really interesting, and I think maybe approaching my kids with the idea that I’m probably wrong about what I think I know about whatever it is, I think that could be helpful. It might also make it more challenging to know what to say sometimes. I think I grew up in that environment of, you listen to the person, and they know what’s true, and that’s it. It feels super expansive to kind of shift that.
ARI: Yeah, I love all that. I think the way we try to come at our kids is not with that authority of, we know what’s best, but we have some ideas. We have stories that we’ve experienced, and we try to look at our kids. Are they interested in hearing from us about this topic?
And when you were talking, Pam, I was thinking about how the internal versus external processor, how maybe you go try things out, and that’s how you test ideas and criticize them and come up with better ones. A lot of people like to process them against the knowledge they have in their head or maybe go read about stuff. I love how you all talk about these different kinds of processing.
Some people want to talk to other people. The problem with the mindset that we learn in school is that talking to another person means asking an authority for the answer when it could mean let’s bounce some ideas around, like, what do you think of my ideas? Tell me your ideas. Let’s come up with what’s the best one to try, you know?
PAM: Yeah, or cheating, right? Then don’t talk to them about it. It does very much say you have to learn it all, and you have to regurgitate it this way. Just imagine external processors. You can’t talk to the teacher. You can’t talk to the other students in the classroom, and do you have a lot of time for processing outside of the school hours?
That was something that surprised me when my kids first came home, because we went from very scheduled and busy and stuff, right, and I thought, oh, well, we’re not going to school anymore. We have all this time to do other things, but then to realize that, they’re like, no, thank you. No, thank you. They spend so much more time just processing and engaging in what they were interested in, much more than I was kind of expecting. I thought, oh, I’m going to have to keep them busy, and that too is personality-based.
Some people like to, but that’s the difference. Even when we went to, say, the Science Center, seeing the difference between how they moved through exhibits and just the whole environment versus how the school kids in the exhibit right beside us were moving through it. They had no control, no agency over that pace, and they didn’t even get to choose what they were trying to process because they had the little worksheet that said, at this exhibit, when you do X, what happens. There was no time then to be creative with what is actually catching your attention. What would you like to focus on versus, what somebody else, authority, is telling you.
These are the important bits that you need to be picking out of that, right?
ANNA: Right, which I think makes you question things too, if you’re picking up different things than what the authority is picking up. I think a piece of my journey that’s related to this is, just kind of toying with the whole subjective reality piece, which I think was really the foundation for my understanding of how different people are. I do a lot of internal thinking about all the things, and that was really it for me.
Oh, things that feel like a fact, we are experiencing differently. So there was this nuance to the fact. The fact is that it’s 40 degrees outside. I’m cold, someone else is hot.
Okay, so we have a fact, but we have how we’re interacting with that fact. A dramatic example of one nation’s terrorist is another nation’s hero. There’s a fact of what happened, but the interpretation of the fact is so subjective, and so it was just this idea of, wow, we are experiencing the very same things very differently because we’re all so different. That just really changed so many things about the way I related to my kids, related to the people in my life.
Then we’ve just built on that as we’ve talked about relationships, but I think it’s all related. And I think school really stifles that understanding because it’s trying to put everything in a very neat box. And again, I think it can make kids kind of doubt themselves too, because they’re seeing different things that are just as important, but that aren’t being highlighted on the worksheet.
ERIKA: I think the younger kids, especially, like, when you’re describing being able to talk things through and that everyone’s ideas have value. I feel like it gets more like that when you get into college and beyond where people actually want to talk and professors want to hash things out. I mean, not everyone, but some.
But younger kids, you’re not ready for it. You know, you need me to dump all this information into your bucket because you don’t know anything yet. And so I think that’s so interesting that if we question that, kids have so many ideas and are so open to that.
ARI: Simply the idea that they might know what they want. They’re having this subjective experience and they have unique wants. But no, we want to take them to this class and this activity and they shouldn’t be watching this TV. There’s just this idea that we know better what they want.
PAM: Right. We don’t trust. Like you said, we just can’t know. We can’t. And I think that’s why when we talk so often about this de-schooling phase of the journey, how so much of it we recognize quickly enough is our work to do.
Because we are questioning some of these more basic ideas and then playing with them and seeing how they unfold. Here’s the school’s conventional ideas and here’s, for lack of a better phrase, unschooling’s unconventional ideas. And it’s not about just taking those on wholesale as your new set of rules to follow, et cetera. Because then you don’t get that richness. You don’t get that understanding. You’re not playing around with them to see how they make sense for you. But to take this, like you were saying, that makes sense to me. Does this apply to children?
And then looking to your children and playing around with some of those ideas and then seeing how they actually unfold is how you learn how capable kids really are and how they can have an idea of subjectively what they want this experience to be. Notice that it’s different from the experience we were kind of hoping they were going to have.
But letting it play out and seeing, oh, look how super valuable that was for them, for who they are as that unique human being versus, yeah, sure, I could have said, oh, no, but do it this way, but do it this way. And they would have taken that in, but they would have taken it as my interpretation. And then, yes, you get into all the, oh, does that mean I’m wrong? Does that mean I can’t think through this properly?
I should be thinking about it and seeing and being interested in what they think, et cetera. So there’s all that piece that comes along when they didn’t get to play around with the one thing that they were super interested in about it all.
ERIKA: The next question we had is how you have shared on the network about how trust has been harder to find related to your children’s social development more than physical or intellectual development. I was hoping you could share a little bit about that journey and what has helped you in that area.
ARI: Yeah, it’s been really interesting to watch in myself how I have no qualms about the kids climbing up structures and maybe taking a tumble, playing sports and making mistakes. I see that as part of their physical development. And with intellectual, academic stuff, it was pretty easy for me to make the paradigm shift of if they follow their interests and their problem solving, they’re going to be able to lead their way here.
But when it came to social stuff, the moment my kid said something mean on the playground and I’m worried what the other kid is going to think, I immediately tense up and rush to intervene. Even if my kids like making a suggestion for a game to a stranger on the playground, I feel myself, oh no, what if, I don’t know if she asked it in the right way. What if the other kid says no and I’m so untrusting of their social exploration, it’s been really interesting. And so with all of your help, I’ve been exploring why that is and where I can go with it.
I think that the social stuff has always been really hard for me, or the hardest part for me. And so, in a way, I wish I had more help with it. And so I want to help my kids. And this is how I know how to help is to jump in and tell them what to do. I also think that in our society, and I’ve noticed it, in particular in the homeschool spheres, there’s this real desire for everyone to play nice. I think even families keep their kids out of school to avoid bullying and terrible behavior, which is legitimate.
But then it makes these expectations in the play spaces of, we don’t accept certain behaviors. And so we have less tolerance of their developmental journey in this social stuff. They’re supposed to know how to act now, which I think is really interesting.
And so I feel that social pressure. And then the third piece, I think, is that I feel like my impact on the world, my desire to bring certain energy, certain positivity to the world is intertwined with how my kids act, how my kids are in the world. And so if they do something socially that I don’t like, if they do something that might hurt someone, or behave in a way that is not how I would carry myself, then I think that’s a problem, because I am too connected.
So there are those three pieces that I’ve tried to work through. I think the first one, as far as me wanting to intervene, because social stuff is hard for me, I’ve unpacked as like, would little Ari have wanted more instructions, more judgment, telling me how to act? Or would I have wanted curiosity and more questions like, what’s going on for you? Compassion, trying to understand what’s going on. And an acknowledgement that we don’t know the right way, there’s no right way to act, right?
Language like, this is not okay, or we don’t do that. That doesn’t fit in my sphere anymore. It’s more about, what was this experience? And do you want to process it with me?
That’s the energy I would like to bring to my kids. It’s still a struggle. I get triggered all the time. But I try to think back on what would have helped me and looking into my kids eyes, what is going to be helpful for them now? Is it judgment? Is it instruction? Or is it this openness and acknowledgement that you’re on a journey and you don’t have to get it right now.
First of all, there is no right, but also, it’s just a long learning process. And then with the social expectations, I’ve tried to surround myself with people who are interested in trusting their kids more. And I found some beautiful people. And that’s been helpful.
I acknowledge that we don’t want our kids to be hurt. So we still want to talk to our kids about and inform them if somebody else is being impacted by their behavior. I try to just have a lot of conversations without judgment around that. And I think helping our kids through difficult social situations by being okay. Helping our kids know that hurt is going to happen and that I’m here for you and what do we want to do about it? Instead of mom should have prevented that.
I think there’s just so much more nuance to their social development than kids should have these instructions of how to treat other people. Because social interactions are really complicated. And then, my biggest aha, I think, has been untangling my impact from my kids’ impact.
I think there’s a story that I have. And I think a lot of people believe that our kids are part of our way of making the world a better place. We’re raising our kids to be good people so that the world can be a better place. And the moment, this statement came into my head that my children are not my agents to make the world a better place. It’s like, whoa, that’s me. That’s about my actions. And they are full people. And I am here to support them in becoming who they are. That has been a really helpful aha moment for me.
ANNA: Yeah, that one’s huge. And I think that is interesting, because I think we do often put things on children that are really ours to carry. It is okay for me to say I want to be this change agent myself, but this idea that our kids can do that is super interesting.
But something when you were talking earlier to just the idea of, we tend to focus so intently on behaviors that we really do miss those nuances of needs that are happening underneath of that. And so when we’re solely focused on, even just the labeling of bullying behavior, it’s like, oh, there’s so much underneath of that. Now, granted, in a school environment, they don’t have the tools or the time or the people that can work with that. So, I totally get wanting to get kids out of an environment like that that doesn’t feel safe.
But when we have engaged parents with kids, we’re able to dig under that to see, oh, is this actually not a good environment? Have we not eaten? Is there something else going on? We can look at all these pieces. And when we’re having that kind of conversation with our kids, they’re actually learning about their own triggers, like, okay, I don’t do well in large crowds, or I need to eat before we do something, or I can only last two hours.
That’s so much more productive for everyone, for the family and the group as a whole. But for the individual to have the space to learn about themselves in that way, when they’re young, is so valuable. I also feel for you because I’ve been there feeling that like, oh, that’s not what I would say. That’s not how I would have handled that. And I love just being able to help myself, find that compassion for the person and really see them and have really seen so many people just kind of melt under that and just feel really held. And have a real learning opportunity of what was happening for them in that moment. There were just so many interesting things about that.
PAM: So many. I mean, it really is the piece, maybe I’m reiterating again, but that piece of how much they’re learning about themselves, having the space to process that, spaces in that doesn’t mean literally leaving them alone, because that’s what we feel we’re supposed to do or anything. We have the conversations and they’re like, I don’t want you to come jumping in if you see, I want to try this, this and this.
But you’ve made that plan beforehand. This is an experiment that you’re running. This is how you’re trying and how you’re going to learn more about all the pieces. Because like you were saying, there’s just so much context to every moment. Maybe one park day, everything goes fine, there are no big blow ups or anything. And, the next one, there’s clashes.
And to be able to chat more about the context of those moments. And if you don’t have as much of a chatter, we’re still observing. I think that was one of the things too, so often was seeing that, like you talked about finding a group of engaged parents, Ari.
And I think that makes a huge difference because so often it was the parents all off in one area and then the kids just off on their own. And I was often one of the only parents who would hang out with the kids. They’re fun.
But because we saw what was going on, we could have meaningful conversations after about it. When they did this, how are you feeling? Or we have enough information and context to have meaningful conversations to process through which they can learn.
I was really hungry or I was frustrated because like three interactions ago, something happened that I was stewing about that came with me. So my cup was almost full. And this one little thing which I could have moved through 90 percent of the time just kind of filled me up and I exploded because of that.
Those are all such valuable pieces to learn about ourselves. And for them to learn about us, like moving forward that they can bring that you can then prep for it. Like you were saying, eating before you go, noticing the time and maybe even having like a code word for when it’s time.
There were times when I’m like, we’ll totally just blame this all on me or whatever. Like I’ll come up and say, oh, we have to go, we have to go. And we’ll have prearranged it before that, that they’re going to want to go at this point.
Or if we see something happen, but then I am able to just pull them out of it. We are just learning so much every time we just try something out and see it takes us right back to where you started. I try something out and see how it unfolds and what do we learn from it?
And yes, it applies here too. But yeah, socially, that can be a hard place to take these ideas or a more challenging place to take these ideas. Because there are so many social roles. And like you said, you kind of have to find the people who are also willing to engage with social situations in the same kind of way.
ERIKA: It is so interesting. I think it’s just an area that triggers us, because of our own experiences and how you’re describing that social life was hard for you. Then that’s so triggering. I have the same experience with my kids. I don’t want them to lose their friends. I want them to be accepted and I want them to not be rejected.
And there are these very kind of almost scary feelings that can come up for me. It feels very urgent that this go well. And I just hope that they say the right thing. It’s a panicky feeling that can come up for me. But just like everything else, there’s no one right way, which you mentioned, which I think is so huge. That doesn’t even seem possibly true at the beginning.
But then it’s like, well, of course, there’s not one right way to behave socially. And that it requires learning like anything else in life. And so just being open to it, they’re going to try things and see how it turns out. And that’s just how humans learn. And that’s okay. That’s safe. It’s been really interesting to sit with the reality of that.
My oldest does a lot of processing of social things with me. That has been very enjoyable to have things occur and him to notice things he didn’t the first time, after our discussion. So he’ll be like, so and so is really making me mad right now, he’s furious. And I’m like, oh, my gosh, what’s going on? But then he’ll bring things up. I think he probably didn’t sleep well, you know, just the context pieces or we don’t know. Maybe I could provide information. His mom’s been out of town all week or just different things.
There are things that go on with people, maybe it’s hormones. And so we’ve talked about hormones and maybe it’s all these different things. And so just kind of giving everyone more space, I guess, to make mistakes socially and that to be like, and we’re still okay. And we can make repairs.
It’s such a different feeling and story than I had when I was growing up. I feel like the validation I got from my mom was kind of like, that’s a mean person. It wasn’t about, I wonder what’s going on with them. It was more, no one should talk to you like that. They must be a mean person kind of feeling. Maybe she didn’t use those words, but that was what I internalized about it.
So, yeah, I totally appreciate that this area is so hard sometimes. I really enjoy hearing you process about it and just opening up to, there’s no one right way, even here.
ANNA: Yeah. Something you said too, that I think a lot of us deal with is we take our childhood experiences and I mean, of course, because they’re a part of us, right? And so they become these triggers in these situations with our kids. But I think it’s so important to remember how different the environment is for our kids. You are there to have those conversations and those nuanced pieces. And it is so different.
And almost the stakes, while they still feel high, I know what you’re saying, Erika, they are lower. In the sense of my experience of school was just me having to go to this place and figure it all out on my own. I had a close relationship with my mom, but she didn’t know anything about school or the politics of school or what was happening at school. And so I didn’t even bring that to her.
I think it’s so different when we’re with our kids more in this weaving in and out of our lives day to day, where they just have that space to talk about their feelings and what’s happening with it. And even if they’re not kids that share every little bit, there’s just some different nuances there related to how we support our kids. So it’s always important for me to remember, that was my experience. And it was so hard because I didn’t have the support.
But I guess that’s what I liked about what you said, too, Ari, asking what would I have wanted? Would I really have wanted somebody to jump in and tell me what to do? Or would I have wanted this nonjudgmental space with somebody to help me figure it out for myself? I thought that was really interesting.
ARI: I think it’s one of the most rewarding parts of parenting in this way that our kids come to us to process. Like you were describing, Erika, when they just see a moment and they know that it’s always an opportunity to process with mom or anybody here. It’s just a beautifully different environment.
PAM: It just reminds me of, I always remember the drive home from Girl Guides meetings. That was always a big processing time. But what stood out for me often was just like you were saying, Erika. It’s like, oh, so-and-so seemed like really out of sorts today or whatever, whatever. And she would be explaining to me, yeah, because X, because Y. Where I feel this defensive mama bear come up. But I got to the space where I could just recognize that in me. Doesn’t make it wrong either, right? Nothing, it’s not wrong, wrong. It’s just recognizing that experience.
And then when I just put a little sentence out there, I get the whole context and the understanding. And I was like, oh, yeah. That’s the human being I want to be.
ANNA: Whoa, right? It’s not getting defensive. Being able to see other people’s experience.
And also, just be able to make that repair if it’s needed. Or be open to repair if something’s happened to us. I think it’s a big difference. And it’s a learning process, right?
It’s not perfect for any of us at any age. And so this expectation that kids are going to be perfect doesn’t make sense, but it’s creating that environment where that’s possible. And I feel like even, Ari, some of the stuff you’ve talked about on the network, you’ve seen changes in them as they’ve had this freedom. Especially your oldest to really be understood in some of the ways that she was approaching situations. So I think that was really cool.
ARI: Absolutely.
ANNA: Well, thank you so much. This was a lot of fun and I just really, really enjoyed it. And we hope everybody enjoyed our conversation, maybe had a little aha moment or picked up on some ideas to consider for your own personal journey.
And of course, if you enjoy these conversations and want to come hang out with us, we’d love to have you join us at the Living Joyfully Network. It is really such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things that we encounter in life, our own and our kids and all the things. So we invite you to check it out and see if it fits with our free month offer.
And you’ll find the link in the show notes or you can go to livingjoyfully.ca and the link is on the homepage. But thank you so much again for joining us. It was just really great to hang out with you all.
ARI: Thank you for having me.
PAM: Thank you, Ari.
ERIKA: Thank you so much, Ari.
EU409: Foundations: Baby Steps
May 21, 2026
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Baby Steps.
So often, when we’re faced with a challenge or making a choice, we don’t need to have the full picture or the final answer in order to move forward. By taking a baby step in the direction that makes sense to us or to our loved ones, we can learn more about the situation and see how it feels. One baby step can lead naturally to the next. As we keep communicating and checking in, we can find a path forward that works for everyone.
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
Does it feel like many of the day to day choices you’re making are urgent? Are they really? If you haven’t listened to episode 8 yet about Anna’s mantra, “there’s plenty of time,” I highly recommend it.
Thinking back, can you remember a time when you felt pressured (often by ourselves!) to make a decision quickly yet the better choice wasn’t immediately clear? Can you think of a series of baby steps that might have helped? Feel free to get creative!
Is there a choice or a goal you’re considering right now that feels big? You don’t need to know exactly how you’d get there, but can you see a baby step in that direction? Can you do that and see what happens?
Are you more of a leap-first person or a firm-footing person? What about your partner? Your children? How can understanding that help you communicate with them about future decisions?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are happy you’re here exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
If you’re new to the podcast, we encourage you to go back and listen to the earlier episodes. We started with some foundational relationship ideas in these first dozen episodes and have really enjoyed how they are building on one another. And if you’ve already been enjoying the podcast, please share it with the people in your life that you think would benefit from contemplating these ideas. It’s super easy to share. Just send them to pod.link/livingjoyfully. From there, they can pick their favorite podcast player and it will take them right to the show in that app. Thanks so much for helping us spread the word.
And so, this week, we are going to talk about the idea of baby steps. When we’re trying to make a choice, so often, we don’t need to make the big, ultimate decision right now. This builds on the idea that there’s plenty of time, which we talked about a few weeks ago. These are the threads that are moving through them all.
So, maybe we’re not yet sure whether we want to pursue the end goal that we’re considering. When we find ourselves here, what’s often missing is more information or experience. So, taking the next baby step in that direction can give us more information to help us make that bigger picture decision. Sometimes we need to take quite a few baby steps before we get a keen sense of what we ultimately want to do.
Or, maybe our partner or child wants to do something that stretches our comfort zone. Chances are, we don’t need to make a yes/no choice immediately. Staying open and curious, which we talked about last week, can help us take the next baby step in that direction and just learn more about what it entails and how it feels. It can also give us a better understanding of why they’re wanting to go in that direction and some experience that can help us better explain our perspective. We’re learning more about them and we’re learning more about ourselves.
That deeper level of self-awareness and having a better grasp of the language around their goal, now we can have more meaningful and connected conversations with them. There’s just so much we can learn when we try just that next baby step, isn’t there?
ANNA: Oh my gosh, yes. And it really is the natural extension of last week’s discussion on being open and curious. When our partner or child brings us something they want to do, sometimes if we don’t see the whole path clearly, we’ll just shut it down. At the first thought of resistance, we’re just like, “No, that doesn’t sound doable.” But if instead we can ask some questions and start walking in that direction, we learn so much more about each other and also about the task at hand. What does it really mean? What is it really going to entail?
We don’t have to commit to that end goal, like you’re saying, right away. Taking that first step helps us learn more and keeps us connected.
PAM: Yeah. Yeah. So, I have a story to share about taking baby steps and stretching my comfort zone, that, looking back, I do remember fondly.
It’s an example of how we don’t need to make all or nothing decisions immediately, and how choosing the next baby step does not mean that you’ve committed to a big yes right now.
So, this happened years ago now, in the aftermath of a big January snowstorm. My daughter was maybe 13 or 14 and we had tickets to see a concert in the city about an hour away. So, that morning, the snow was falling heavily and I was sure they’d cancel the show. People were being told to stay home if possible. I was looking forward to settling in and hanging out around the fire in our wood stove.
My daughter had been looking forward to the show and was understandably disappointed. I told her that I was pretty sure they’d reschedule the show. So, she wouldn’t miss it. It would just be postponed. She kept checking the website. And by early afternoon, they announced that the show was going to go on.
Obviously, she wanted to go and I wanted to stay home. I imagined all the hurdles in our way. And it seemed like way too much work, yet I could see her immense disappointment and I chose to shift to being open and curious about the possibility.
And though I couldn’t yet muster a, “Yes, let’s go!” I did manage to take a baby step to meet her with a maybe. Though the snow had now stopped falling, I explained the obstacles I saw and that I was willing to try the next baby step and see how it looked. If it looked okay, we’d try the next baby step and the next, and she agreed.
So, step one was, clean off the car and shovel enough of the driveway to get out by our planned departure time. And we did it, even after the snow plow went by and created another curb of snow at the end of the driveway that we had to dig through again.
So, step two, is our local rural road plowed and safely drivable? Once we could peek out and see the road, that was a yes, too. Step three was pack the car with extra hats and mitts and snacks in case we get stuck along the way. Done.
By the time we pulled out of the driveway, it felt like we were on quite the adventure. I was rather surprised we’d actually made it this far, but there was no point that said, “Stop,” so we kept going. Step four, as we slowly drove into the city, I reminded her that if the road or the traffic got bad, we would turn back. Even in her excitement, she was fine with that. It turned out that though the roads were snow-covered, they had been plowed, so it wasn’t deep, and traffic was very light. Slowly but surely, we made our way into the city.
Step five, we pulled into the venue parking lot. We were both so surprised to find ourselves there. It was almost surreal. I can still remember the feeling. So white and quiet outside. And inside, the concert turned out to be a very intimate show. The band thanked those who showed up and really connected with the audience as they played. It ended up being a pretty magical night.
I remember that day vividly because it was a great reminder that, when I’m feeling overwhelmed, when I’m feeling like I need to make a big yes/no choice, taking baby steps and looking around after each one to see what’s up and see how I’m feeling can be a really helpful way for me to move through it.
I could acknowledge both my discomfort and her enthusiasm, holding both of them gently in my hands. And baby step by baby step, explore whether we could find a path forward that worked for both of us.
And that said, sometimes we don’t have the capacity for that, and that’s okay. Sometimes we start out and come to an impasse. That’s okay, too. But sometimes we find a path of baby steps that works out. And over the years, that happened way more often than I expected. That inspired me each time just to give it a shot.
ANNA: Just to give it a shot! Oh my gosh. I love that story. And I think what I want to highlight is that by being open to those next steps and communicating along the way, you stayed on the same side.
You were a team. You were solving it together. You were traveling those next steps together. And you could have shut it down with a no saying, it’s just too snowy, which really wouldn’t have been that unreasonable of a reaction. But most likely, it would’ve led to some kind of rupture, even beyond the disappointment. Maybe even a slammed door or just some kind of upset. But instead, you dug into your concerns. You were honest about them, talked about them, and slowly started to address them together, knowing that at any time you could change your mind.
And what she saw was that you were trying, and again, that you were working together. And that is just such a different energy than making top-down decisions. Because had it not worked out, she would’ve seen the path of why it didn’t work out. The road’s impassable. We can’t get the driveway dug out. The car’s not starting. Whatever the real thing would’ve been, as opposed to you inside by the fire making that choice for her.
I think we can do this with our partners, too. They’ll have an idea and instead of examining where our reactions are coming from, we just react and we shut it down and it’s really disconnecting. And interestingly, we can do this whether the idea has anything to do with us or not. It’s really easy to fall into that trap of pointing out all the problems. Instead, we can listen, ask questions, celebrate the excitement that the person has for the idea. That’s what keeps us connected and helps us find the next steps that make sense.
So, it’s back to being open and curious. I want to cultivate that mindset when someone comes to me with an idea, because from that place, we can figure out any resistance and start to address it with those next baby steps. And the key with this process is to remain connected and curious. I can be honest about what’s coming up for me without judging or shutting down what’s happening for them and where they want to go.
I think part of it is releasing any sense of urgency, which we talk about a lot. I know sometimes I can feel pressured when somebody comes to me with a request, but what I’ve learned is that, if I answer from that place, I most likely will say no or something that disconnects us. It’s okay to ask for some time to think and gather your thoughts and consider things. And that’s back to, are you an internal or external processor? Taking time to think about what’s causing the resistance helps you to be able to communicate that with your partner and child.
And honestly, the first step is often just listening, like really listening. What’s behind the request? What are they excited about? How do they see it playing out? Then perhaps the next step is really still information gathering. There’s a lot you can do that’s pretty low stakes, but it shows that you’re open to understanding and trying to find a path forward, and it just makes all the difference in a relationship.
PAM: Yes, as an internal processor, I have said to my kids over the years and they learned to work with, “If you need an answer right now, it’s gonna be a no. But if you give me a few minutes to just take it in and figure out how it feels and what it looks like,” I just need to process it and it’s not something I can do aloud. As an internal processor, I just need to do it in my head. And do the different paths. Okay, so this is the change, this is what that change looks like over the rest of the day or week, depending on what it is. And then I’m like, “Oh yeah, that’s all good.” And then I go back and say, yes, or I actually discover what the hiccup is, and then I can go and say, “Oh, but look, that impacts this for me. How can we address that?”
But if I need to answer right away, I would say no. And most people are not like, “I’ll take the no right away, please.” So, seeing through their eyes is just so very helpful, because that’s what each baby step can help us with. So, even if I don’t get to a place where I share their level of excitement about the thing, I can definitely often get to a place where I can appreciate their excitement. And want it for them. That makes all the difference in the world for me.
ANNA: So much. And I think just what you were just talking about it, it’s important to acknowledge that there are differences that we can learn about in each other. And we talked a bit about that in episode three, but I think this is another potential difference that can trip up relationships.
So, you’re going to have the people who like to leap first, ask questions later, and then you’re going to have people who really need to feel out every step, to confirm that there’s some firm footing here before I go any further. And understanding where you lie on that continuum will help you communicate with your partner.
So, if you’re a leap-first person and you’re partnered with a firm-footing-only person, you can take that into consideration, just like your kids were able to do, and see that their questions are not about discounting your idea at all but that they’re trying to make the idea work for them.
So remember, often our work is to not take things personally, but to see that our partner’s actions or behaviors are trying to meet a need. And so, then we’re learning about one another and we’re learning about how to approach these conversations. So, even when you have two different styles, you can find ways to come together honoring each other. That starts with setting any defensiveness aside and trusting that the two of you will keep working to find a path forward that feels good.
You may find some unique combinations of leaping and planning or leaning on each other’s strengths to get the best outcome, because so often in these situations, it’s really a bit of both, right? Leaps of faith and some pre-planning that get us there. And sometimes there’s certain situations that are better served by one or the other, but knowing each of your strengths puts you in the best position to get where you want to go together and helping one another. Knowing that there are options and keeping the lines of communication open helps us remain connected even if we’re navigating difficult decisions or stretching our comfort zones.
PAM: Yes. Our differing personalities are such a great thing to consider when we’re talking about goals, paths, and what that next step might be. It makes all the difference. And as you were sharing there, what comes to mind for me is just the experience. Each time we move through it, we’re building trust with the other person. Trust that I will consider the kind of person you are. What feels good to you? What doesn’t feel good to you? I’m not gonna try and railroad my answer. But I’m not going to just accept your answer either and be martyrly about it, because that’s going to lead to burnout. That’s going to lead to overwhelm, all sorts of places. And sometimes that happens, but then there’s work to move through that and to get back to connection from there.
So, the more I can bring myself and be open and curious about other people, each time that happens, we build a little bit more trust that this process is working for us, no matter what path we ended up on. That, to me, was always one of the most fun things. Yes, there was a hard piece about the uncertainty, like going into the conversation, not knowing where we’d go, but oh my gosh, the places that we ended up so often were way more interesting and fun than the original path that I thought of.
ANNA: That’s so true, but that’s because we were open and created this environment where they could feel open to ask and respect and understand, and all of those pieces that weave together to create these strong, connected relationships that we’re talking about every week.
PAM: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So, here are some questions you might want to ponder as you explore how taking baby steps can make choices and decisions easier. It’s a skill that you can definitely get better at through experience.
So, number one, does it feel like many of the day to day choices you’re making are urgent? Are they really? If you haven’t listened to episode eight yet about Anna’s mantra, There’s Plenty of Time, I highly recommend you start there.
Question two, thinking back, can you remember a time when you felt pressured (and that can be pressure we’re putting on ourselves) to make a decision quickly, yet the better choice wasn’t immediately clear? Can you think of a series of baby steps that might have helped you along the way? And feel free to get creative. It can feel like, oh, that’s just more work. But, oh my gosh, the journey is the experience.
ANNA: Exactly. And the creativity is all a part of it and what makes it a little bit lighter, not so much weight, as we can be creative together.
PAM: Yeah. All right. Question three. Is there a choice or a goal you’re considering right now that feels big to you? You don’t need to know exactly how you would get there, but can you see a baby step in that direction? Can you do that and just see what happens?
And lastly, are you more of a leap-first person or a firm-footing person? What about your partner, your children? How can understanding that help you communicate with them about future decisions?
All right. Thank you so, so much for listening and we will see you next time. Bye! Have a great day!
EU408: A Field Guide: Challenging Our Beliefs About Learning
May 07, 2026
We’re back with the second episode in our new series on the podcast, in which we’re working our way through Pam’s book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Today, we’re beginning our exploration of the deschooling phase of the journey with stage six: Challenging Our Beliefs About Learning. Deschooling has several aspects, and this is one of the big ones. We may carry many beliefs about the way that school is connected to learning and the way we expect children to learn.
In order to challenge those beliefs, we dug into five truths about learning: teaching is not a prerequisite for learning, curriculum is unnecessary for learning, children are always learning, learning is fun, and learning is not hard. Once we start to question our existing beliefs, many of these new truths come to the surface. And they really build on each other until we’re living in a whole new paradigm!
We loved diving into learning and we hope you find this episode helpful!
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone, I am Pam Larrichia from Living Joyfully and today I’m joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis.
ANNA AND ERIKA: Hello!
PAM: So we are back with another episode in our Field Guide series. We’re working our way through my book, The Unschooling Journey, A Field Guide, which is framed around the hero’s journey and it’s a weaving together of myths, contemporary stories, and just tales from my own journey.
In our first episode, if you haven’t listened to that yet, you can go back, we dove into the first phase of the unschooling journey, which was Choosing Unschooling, in which we answered the call to unschooling. We found our guides, which in a fun twist are so often our children. We navigated past various threshold guardians as we crossed the threshold from the ordinary world into the world of unschooling and moved through our time in the belly of the whale where we came to embrace the curiosity of a beginner’s mind.
Now we are firmly in the deschooling phase of our journey, which encompasses seven stages and really does represent the bulk of our transformational work. Joseph Campbell calls this next stage the Road of Trials, which through the lens of unschooling, I have broken into two stages because I experienced them as quite distinct from each other. The first focuses on challenging our existing beliefs about learning and then the second one on those related to parenting.
In this episode, we’re going to talk about five truths about learning. And if you’re new to unschooling and this is your first time exploring these truths, you’re likely to be dancing with these ideas more intellectually to just understand what they mean and some of their further reaching implications because it’s just mind-blowing enough to hear these the first time and go what, that doesn’t match with what I’ve known so far. Anyway, if you’ve been unschooling for a while and feel like you already intellectually embraced these ideas, now’s the time to peel back some more layers to build more connections and context around them.
You’ll be strengthening your web of understanding with your own experiences, because you’ve been doing this for a while, so building your wisdom. And you are moving towards really believing and feeling these truths in your own bones, owning them for yourself.
All right, after all that preamble, the first truth we are going to explore is that teaching is not a prerequisite for learning. And right off, oh my gosh, there are just so many aspects to this one truth, isn’t there?
ANNA: It’s true. And I think it’s so interesting, because all of us can think of so many things we’ve learned without being specifically taught in that one way. And, oh my goodness, just look at babies learning to walk and talk without expert classroom instruction. And yet somehow schools have really sold us on this concept that to learn you need to be instructed by someone.
And not only that, but learning happens while sitting at a desk. And let’s throw in some power dynamic, loss of autonomy, a little peer pressure for good measure. But even without all of that soup, the idea that we need another person to teach us in a very specific way is just so limiting.
But what’s funny, personally, is that I didn’t want to homeschool in the beginning. I was very resistant because I didn’t want to be a teacher. So that statement right there shows you how deep I was in the idea that learning was about a teacher giving information to a student.
I think it was just so baked into my experience and what I’d been told for my whole life. And so even when in my own life, there were all these examples of me learning things all the time as an adult on my own in different ways. But somehow those didn’t count now. It was just so interesting to unpack that for myself.
And watching my kids was really what changed that, with a little point in the direction of observing from John Holt. I could see that I couldn’t even stop them from learning. They were just these little sponges, so interested in taking in everything, turning it around, trying to make sense of it, building context, building their own unique web of learning that we talk about so often. And then I started to kind of deconstruct the whole process.
So, even with the most amazing, well-meaning teachers, and there are so many of those beautiful people out there, if a student wasn’t interested, it wasn’t going to work. And I also read a lot about brains at that time and how we don’t learn well under stress. And that’s when I started to think, is school ever a helpful environment for learning? Does it ever make sense? And I’m just not sure that it does. And I think learning can happen there, but it’s kind of despite the terrible environment, not because of it, not as if it’s an optimal environment.
And like you said, it’s so individual. How does each person take in information? I prefer reading. I’m not auditory at all. David’s much more hands-on and experimental. So, long lectures just wouldn’t hold his attention. He needs to be moving at all times.
There are definitely times I turn to people who know more than me about a particular subject. I love that. It’s fun to see how they approach it, how they move through the challenges. But in the end, their approach may or may not work for me, but I can learn more about them, the subject, and ultimately myself as I’m able to move in and out of that type of learning environment.
I think the big thing here is just as we start to question and observe, ourselves, kids, our partners, see all the different ways that learning is happening every day around us. And it really just opens up such a new world.
ERIKA: I love that. This idea is so huge. Once I started thinking about it, it’s like, oh my gosh. And it was one of my biggest paradigm shifts at the beginning of my own unschooling journey was realizing this truth. And I had a lot of fun digging into the word “teaching,” which started to not even make any sense to me anymore.
Once I thought about it, it’s like somebody can say, “Well, I taught these kids how to do whatever.” And it’s like, but did you? You could say that you told them about it, but you really can’t say what happened inside of their brains. And so, I really liked questioning the word “teaching” overall and trying to move to the idea of just learning.
Learning does not require teaching. Learning happens inside of the learner. And having someone teach you could be a way of learning something, but those two are not necessarily connected. And just because a teacher says that they taught people does not mean that they learned it. I know that’s true from my own experience in school and my experience as a classroom teacher in high school. I’ve taught more than high school. I taught music classes and some little kid classes as well.
Everyone is so unique, every individual is so unique. And what I’ve seen is that process of teaching, the way that I would teach makes sense to my brain. It’s such a challenge to try to, what they would call in school, differentiate your instruction in order to meet everyone’s brains. But then the thing that’s missing from that is the interest.
And so, the way people actually learn is by being open to learning and about being ready to learn. And so the format is less important. And the teacher is just a possibility. It’s not the only thing. And it’s not the thing that makes learning happen.
I really think that having that experience as a teacher probably helped me get there a little bit faster on this part, because I’ve seen it. And so, I know that the classroom experience can be really frustrating for teachers and students. But I think you’re right, it’s not an optimal environment for learning in any way. Because we’re trying to get every single different person onto the same page in the same method. Trying to learn the same thing. And that just doesn’t really make sense if we think about how different everyone is. So yeah, I love this one.
PAM: Yeah, I mean, for me, too, Erika, this was one of my big first shift. Because as you were saying, Anna, I didn’t want to be a teacher. When the kids came home, it was, oh, so I’m supposed to teach them now. But to recognize that teaching didn’t mean learning was happening at all. Why don’t I use the lens of learning for a while? Because anytime I use the word teaching in a sentence, I could actually rephrase it to look at learning instead. And looking at it through that lens was just so helpful for me on my journey. And it’s something to dance with, which we talked about.
We’ve talked about the pendulum swing. We may think, oh, well, if teaching doesn’t make them learn, I guess I won’t teach. And then if we’ve started thinking of everything we share as teaching, I shouldn’t tell them things, right? So, you just let them figure it all out themselves.
And then you recognize, oh, no, I can be part of this picture, as you were talking about, and I like dipping in and out when somebody else has more knowledge that you’re interested in getting. And Erika, you pointed out how important the interest part is. Because that is when it all bubbles up, right?
When somebody is interested, maybe they’re asking questions, maybe they’re trying to do something. And we’re like, hey, I know a little something about this. This is how it works for me, do you want me to show you how it works for me? Keeping in mind that learning looks very different for each person.
But we can still share the stuff that we know, that we think, all those pieces. So, the dance of the relationship of learning, for me, it’s really, really fun. And I don’t need to frame that as teaching. It’s just our relationship and how we all enjoy learning new things that we’re interested in at the moment.
And so, Erika, something you said there at the end leads very much to the next truth that we wanted to talk about, about how people learn better when they’re interested and how teachers have this thing that they are supposed to be teaching. But so, anyway, second truth, curriculum is unnecessary for learning.
That is something that many of us grew up with. It was a foundational truth that we didn’t even visit. School curriculum is all about just creating and delivering this linear system all around teaching delivery. It’s about divvying up all the bits that they want to teach over the next however many years equally, so that, this is what we do in grade one math, grade two math, grade three, blah, blah.
And while most teachers understand that the most effective learning happens when the topic is relevant to the learner’s life, at least even better if they’re actually interested in it, that’s just not possible within this system, right? And most of the time, curricula is out of step with the learner.
So, we flipped the perspective between teaching and learning. Let’s consider learning without following a curriculum. What would that look like? And what would that look like through the lens of a particular child? And when you think about it, that unique set of knowledge and skills that will be valuable to that child will be different, definitely, maybe a little bit, maybe wildly, from a school’s generalized curriculum, right?
I think it’s so interesting to contemplate what our child chooses to learn just by following their curiosity and their interests as actually creating a beautifully individualized quote “curriculum” that really just fits them like a glove, because it meets them where they are in each moment.
ERIKA: I like how that turns it on its head. We could still use the word curriculum, if we want to. It’s just completely different than it was in the school context. And I really think that this truth was hard to see when I was in the middle of it, because they’re saying that school is about learning, but school is more like a game where you have a goal to get good grades.
And so, when you’re in that system, it doesn’t really matter what’s on the curriculum. That’s just the process of this particular game that we’re trying to play. So, it didn’t matter if something that I would want to learn was missing from that curriculum, because the point was to get good grades on this curriculum, so who cares? But in the real world, there’s just so much outside of school learning.
If you think about almost anyone’s work in the real world, there are just so many aspects to it that are specific to that field that would never have been covered in school. I learned that curriculum was really chosen because it’s easy to test, or it’s easy to assign grades to these particular areas. Math could be so interesting. But school math has to be easy to grade. And the testing is really easy, based on the things that they’ve chosen for the curriculum. And so, once I realized that, it’s just so much less important than it feels when you’re inside that system.
What people are supposed to learn in school, are not actually the most important bits of knowledge for living life. It’s much more random than that. And so, that’s why so many people get out of school and they’re like, why didn’t they teach us about these important things? Taxes, or how to buy a house, or fix my air conditioning system, or whatever, like things that would actually be useful, or even being in relationship, communication tools. Those would be useful things for life.
What I’ve seen since then, in our unschooling lives, is that kids following their interests really does include everything that they’ll need to know for the life that they want to lead, which makes perfect sense. If they’re living the life they want to lead, they’re going to be learning the things that make sense for that.
And so, any additional learning that looks more like school subjects could come up naturally, or maybe they’re just curious. What if they’re like, I’m curious about what school math is like. And so, it could be a side project if it’s interesting to them. But another great benefit of learning without a curriculum is like you were talking about the pacing and the order in which they learn is so individual and unique.
So maybe they would be considered very far ahead in one area or behind in another area, according to school, but in the real world, that there’s no ahead and behind, there’s not a fixed order to things in the same way. And so it’s like what you were saying, developing their unique web of learning based on what makes sense to them and developing their own interests and skills as they grow with their unique brains, which is just going to look so different for different people.
ANNA: Yeah. Oh my gosh. I love that piece of really deconstructing the whole of it. What is the goal? And what tools do they have?
Because they’re saying, we’re going to take the things out of math that are the easiest to measure. We’re not looking at what are the most important things of math to learn about, because they may not be easy to measure. And as soon as you start to unpack and deconstruct that a little bit, it’s like, wait a minute, why are we all in service of this system? What is that serving?
I think a big sticking point for me with school learning has always been that linear aspect of it. It’s interesting, because it stuck out to me at first when I was pregnant and going through natural childbirth classes, we talked a lot about how labor isn’t linear. Doctors and hospitals would have you believe that you’re dilating at this set rate per hour. And if you don’t, they want to intervene. Well it’s one centimeter per hour we need to be doing.
But that’s not how the body works. You know, it’s fits and starts, rests and surges. And so quickly, I could see how that made sense with learning, too. We aren’t going to learn one number a day. And then the next day, we’re going to learn one number. And let’s learn one color. No, no more colors today. Just this one color. And I saw my kids get interested in colors when they were so young, and wanting to know the color of everything, running around the house. What’s this? What’s that? Showing me all the pieces. That’s how they get excited about things and want to make sense in their brain.
I saw them dive so deeply as they were exploring any topic, because you could see them building this context, building their web, placing the new information into their existing web. It is anything but linear, and any interruptions or redirections just messed with their flow.
And that really reminded me of another thing I remember from my own time at school, was being in class in the middle of a large geometry proof, and the bell would ring, and on to a completely unrelated subject. Now we’re going to talk about history. And only to have to get back into that mindset for the proof later that night to do my homework, because it didn’t get finished during the class. And I hated it. I loved proofs so much, but I wanted to do them from start to finish without interruptions, because there’s so many pieces to it. But the constant interruption just killed my natural love of learning and love of math.
And I just started playing the game, like you’re talking about, Erika. I just started playing the game. Okay, this is what they’re wanting me to do, is just check these boxes. So, give them what they want for the test, and then promptly forget it, because it doesn’t mean anything. And what I learned was not the material that was being presented, but how to survive and master that system. And so, I just think that’s happening every day in schools all around us, and nobody’s talking about that piece.
And I will say that I definitely looked at all the different curricula when my girls were young. I was like, oh, there’s all these cool nature-based ones, because that’s what I love. But like we’ve talked about with any kind of classes before, I’d look at these things, and I’d feel like, oh my gosh, they’re so dumbed down, because even those more alternative curricula, we’re trying to make it linear. We’re going to learn about this bug today. Doesn’t matter if you’re seeing other bugs outside. We’re just going to do this one.
And after observing my kids learning when they were so young, I knew context was everything. And to divorce a subject from the context of it just made it so abstract. It lost the meaning and just became about memorization.
Okay, we’ll memorize what these bugs are. We won’t look at where they are, where we’re finding them. And it almost felt like it was tying their hand behind their back, because the world is so rich with things to learn, to see in context, to explore. And I came to believe that really no curricula could improve upon engaged parents exploring, supporting kids as their interests popped up in their kind of natural environment.
And I say that to say, it’s not just schools that can do this. We can do this in homeschooling as well, if we’re trying to follow this linear model and not really watching how humans learn and understanding the specific brains of the people in our family.
PAM: Yeah, that’s that whole curriculum piece, right? And another aspect that came up for me recently, in this area, someone commented on one of my Substack posts where I was talking about learning, and I’ll link to it in the show notes. But it was really interesting. They were very favorable. But the one thing they were concerned about was learning gaps. Gaps in their knowledge.
And it’s just so bright now, having thought through all this. But look at all the assumptions that are just built into that learning, the idea of a learning gap, or summer learning loss, all those ideas. Because, number one, you basically got a curriculum against which you are comparing what somebody should know at some age for you to determine that’s a gap or you didn’t learn that when you were supposed to. So you’ve tied in curriculum there.
And no matter how much people talk about lifelong learning, if you’ve still got a curriculum that something should be known by some particular age, lifelong learning doesn’t fit. It doesn’t matter when somebody learns something. When you have bring that lifelong learning lens to it, it’s like, when is it important? When are they interested in it? When will they actually use it? That’s a great time to learn it.
It’s not like you need to learn in the past, in case someday you need it in the future, which is a lot of what curriculum is based around. So, I just found that to be super interesting, that there are just so many pieces wrapped up that just assume curriculum is the way people learn. And that just shows up and says, but I’m worried about learning gaps, which you can totally understand, but my goodness.
ERIKA: I totally understand it. But it’s so interesting, because if you think about something, like if you were to point out to that adult about their learning gaps, something that they don’t know about, it’s like, oh, but that isn’t important. So, the school curriculum devalues everything outside of it. And so, learning gaps can only happen with school learning. You wouldn’t say, I have a learning gap about auto mechanics or something. I’m not expected to know that. And so, I think that’s super interesting and really something for us to turn around in our minds so that we value all of the different things that people might want to learn about and not just this one set.
ANNA: Right, because I guarantee any of those kids that we’re talking about having a learning gap, they know things off the charts that other people, adults included, don’t know, because they followed a passion or interest. We see that all the time. And like you said, you wouldn’t say I have a learning gap because I don’t know about chainsaws like my husband does, but that serves him. And so, yeah, I think that’s one of those thoughts like my thought about how I don’t want to be a teacher. It’s that it’s so baked in. It’s so baked in that we don’t even see it.
PAM:
Yeah, yeah. And that’s what I was excited to point out. It’s not that when that thing was being taught that we were just sitting in a corner, not doing anything, we were just learning so many other things. And I think this conversation also comes up some with some unschooling families when their kids decide to try school or they want to go check it out. And then all of a sudden, they’re measuring their knowledge versus the knowledge they think the child should have in whatever grade, etc. And, oh, we need to catch up.
But instead of the phrasing “catch up” and “behind,” bring the lens of they’ve been learning all sorts of other things. Yeah, maybe not what matches specifically that curriculum, but they’ve been learning all sorts of other things. And they don’t lose those if they decide to go check out school. That is there, as you were talking about before, Anna, how rich life is, the context, all the things we know that are related to who we are as a human being and the things that we’re interested in.
And if school becomes something we’re interested in, it’s like, oh, I’m not behind, but I’m bringing my full self. And then I can learn those other things, rather than getting all stressed, like, oh, my gosh, did we fail because they don’t know?
ANNA: Okay, one quick thing before we move on, because I think it’s where we have that hierarchy, where we’re thinking school is somehow this important monolith, whatever we want to call it. And really, that’s why this deconstruction process is so important to understand school for what it is. It serves a particular purpose, and it is what it is.
But if you were to take your child and put them into an auto mechanic shop, you wouldn’t expect them to know all the things in the auto mechanic shop. You would know they need to figure those things out and learn them. And someone might tell them about stuff, and they might read a book, and they might try different things.
But why can’t we have that same environment with school to go, okay, yeah, they haven’t learned about how they annotate things and do this particular thing a certain way, so then they’ll learn about it, versus there’s something inherently wrong that they don’t know about it. Because it’s its own system, no different than any of these other systems. It’s not better or worse, but that takes the deconstruction to understand what’s behind it and how we got here.
PAM: Oh, that’s beautiful, beautiful. Okay, yes, we should move on. The third truth is that children are always learning, because I mean, they really, really are. Humans are, right? But when you look at kids, you can see it in action, whether or not you can name it, whether or not they can name it, they are learning.
Even when they’re cocooning, even when they’re watching a favorite show on repeat, they are having an experience. And the idea that children are always learning implies that learning doesn’t just happen at school, it doesn’t just happen with the teacher.
So, let me go back another layer, and that nudges us to consider the idea that all learning is valuable, just like we were saying, like auto mechanics to somebody who needs that information and skill is just about as valuable to stuff that would appear in a regular school curriculum.
Learning about themselves, learning about being in relationships with others, as you were talking about earlier, Erika, learning what they like and what they don’t like, what they’re curious about, what seems uninteresting, and how that changes over time. That is just all such valuable learning. Facts and skills are just other bits that are on that buffet table of learning, which each person can individually select at any particular time, what they’re interested in. And without the curriculum, and with this always learning lens, that brings us right back to that rich context that you were talking about, Anna, because if we’re following a curriculum, we’re really just picking out those bits.
But when we’re like, I’m interested in this thing, all the things that are connected or that we notice come with that, when we’re not just focused on the quote “important little bits.”
ANNA: And I think we’re at such an interesting time in human history, too, where we have access to everything, to people, to resources, to information that is very unique to our time, if we look back over the long scale. But no matter what, it’s really almost impossible to stop a human from learning. Even if you had no internet, you’re still going to be learning what’s important to you, what’s right in front of you. Every minute, we are taking in information, learning about ourselves, those around us, the environment.
Learning is so much broader than the idea of subjects at school. And as I said earlier, divorcing concepts from context is really counter to actually learning about the concepts. And I feel that way about math, English, history, music, all of it. It’s that interconnectedness. It’s that understanding why we need it, why it’s important, how it serves us in the life that we want to live. That’s what gives it meaning and helps it stick.
I loved watching my oldest as a toddler when she was putting things into context. The lion we saw in a book, then she saw it on a show, then she saw it at the zoo. And you could just see her building this web of understanding about it. And it’s so amazing to watch.
I think that’s the special thing about kids is that they have so much context to build. So it’s happening very quickly. I think we’re all doing it as adults too, but we’ve been working on that web a little bit longer. So, I think it’s so much easier to see in that young child.
And I think just that important piece of not ranking learning. Learning numbers is no more valuable than learning to draw or learning that you don’t like bright lights or learning how to be in relationship. It all has value.
And I guess if there would be a ranking, it would be more about what helps you the most in your unique life. That’s really what we’ve been talking about. What helps you explore your interests, achieve your goals, be the person that you want to be. That’s a very different metric than what school values. And I think it’s why people get disenfranchised because they think I’m supposed to be learning this. They’re telling me this is important, but it’s not helping me towards my goal of being an artist or a musician or even a mathematician because it’s very different than what they’re doing in school. And so, I think that’s where people get where it feels bad and they start to think “I can’t learn” and all of those pieces. Okay, I’m going to stop.
ERIKA: I remember getting those questions about, why do we need to learn this school? And I think most of the time I was pretty honest about, it’s on the curriculum and it’s going to be on a test. And so, that’s why we’re learning it. It’s interesting to some people and not to everyone.
And I really think, people intuitively know that children are learning, especially when they’re babies and toddlers, like, as you were describing, you can just see it happening. But then we might forget if we think that learning happens in school. And so, we might forget that they were capable of that and they are still capable of that. And we all are.
So if we think big kid learning needs to look like school, adult learning has to look like college courses, then you may not notice what’s actually happening and that learning is happening all the time.
But as we were talking about earlier, what they learn might be outside of that limited range of what is like observable learning in school. And what’s really interesting for me to think back on is what I learned in school was also mostly outside of the range of what was tested. The memories I have of school and what I learned there were about people, how to be safe, like what the signs are of dysregulation, is what I would call it now.
But that kind of hypervigilance, watching how people are behaving, how the teachers are behaving, how we’re being treated, and all of that kind of stuff. That is much more my memory of school than any particular little curriculum item that I would have learned and then forgotten.
And so, how kids learn outside of school might not look anything like how it was taught in school, or how you remember learning it and everyone’s brains are different.
I definitely have seen unschooling parents say they’re just not learning anything or things like that. And it’s just like, maybe let’s look at it differently, because that’s not possible. And so, the way that a unique child puts together their own web of learning, I love that image for it too. It makes so much sense that each person’s construction of their web is unique to them.
And I’ve heard my kids come back about things and be like, oh, that’s what that meant when I saw that on that show one time. They will literally make connections, and I can see it happen, but it may not look anything like something that I would have thought they were supposed to have learned.
But it’s just natural human learning. And there are so many internal things that people are learning. I think even in my experience in school, or other kids’ experience in school, there are so many internal things they’re learning about themselves, they’re learning about relationships and human nature, it might look like they’re learning nothing. But I trust that they’re getting what they need out of those moments and putting together their own web.
PAM: Right? That is so often conventionally devalued, because in school, that’s not measured. You want to measure just on those little bits that you know now. And then when we move on, the next time you kind of circle back, it’s just not valued. When you learn something and connect it, like you were saying earlier, Anna, it can’t really be measured. So, we can’t give it a grade. So, we just don’t consider it at all. It’s not part of school, which is how we come to see learning.
Oh, my gosh! And I think that richness is just what is so missed, that context, that building that web of deeper understanding, that’s just so valuable. Okay, I’ll be quick.
The fourth truth to explore. I love this one, too. And that is that learning is fun. Ooh, yes. Let’s try that one on for a bit. I think an interesting aspect of this idea. It’s something that you will, when you start learning about unschooling, you will come across it pretty quickly. The idea that our focus isn’t on learning a particular skill. We talk about following their interests and their passions instead of following a curriculum.
So, from there, they pick up the skills that we’ve talked about that are helpful along the way, but they do it on their own timetable versus the curriculum’s timetable. I like to use reading as a classic example, because that’s something that people are concerned that their kids learn quickly. And that’s totally understandable, because at school, learning to read is definitely a goal. One that they hold out as key for a child to be able to learn. And again, that makes sense, because at school, not being able to read can definitely interfere with learning, because so much of the communication at school is written. It’s a characteristic of that system. Here’s your worksheets, write this test. It’s all about words and reading.
But when the goal is pursuing their interests and passions, they have the time and space to find all sorts of ways to engage with the thing that they’re interested in. And we are there to read things for them whenever they like, if that’s how they want to bring in some information.
And they also have the time and space to explore just that complex puzzle of reading in their own way, and at their own pace when their unique brain is ready for it. So not reading is in no way a handicap to learning when we’re unschooling. Another layer around the idea that learning is fun.
It reminds us that people learn in different ways, as we’ve been talking about this whole time. Real learning is just so much more interactive and fluid than a classroom can accommodate. You really just have this one teaching style learning with reading, writing, communication, that’s really what you’ve got for learning there.
Okay, then there’s yet another layer, because we like peeling back layers, and seeing how when kids are following their curiosity and pursuing their interests and goals, so often this learning happens almost incidentally, like they’re just having fun. They’re just like doing the thing they wanted to do. And it doesn’t even need to be labeled as learning.
Once we get to that layer, at first we want to see, we want to expand our understanding of what learning is by basically labeling everything they do as learning. And then it’s like, when everything is a thing, then we don’t even need to label it. But because when they’re just engaging and doing the thing, it just now makes sense to them, and they remember it, like we were talking about earlier, because they chose to engage with it, it means something to them, and they’re going to be using it because it’s something they’re interested in.
So even if something gets challenging or frustrating for a little while, so often they choose to keep going, because it’s helping them accomplish something that they want to do. And again, they learn along the way, they learn how to deal with frustration, feelings, learn how to move through those, maybe learn how to take a break. They learn how to choose, is this worth continuing pushing through or do I want to give it a break now? Do I never want to see it again? And then they learn six months later, it’s not quite as hard as it was when they first burst out with it. But yeah, learning can be so much fun.
ERIKA: Yes! And I feel like when they do hard things because it’s important to them instead of because someone’s telling them to, all of those things, it’s so curious to think about. And I really think the fact that in our schools, at least in my country right now, they’ve pushed the curriculum lower and lower into the younger ages, because it’s like, oh, well, if we want them to be at this level at this age, then they should be preparing for that earlier.
And so, I mean, it’s gotten to the point where there is three-year-old curriculum that’s preparing them for four-year-old. All of this exists now. And so, this is not developmentally aligned. It doesn’t actually make any sense. And it backfires, because then kids think that they are stupid, or they think, I’m not good at this, or whatever internal messages they develop. But it’s really because we’re putting things on them in schools that their brains are not ready for, literally not ready for it.
And so, there are kids who can thrive in that environment. But it’s pretty unusual. And so, following what’s most interesting to them, it’s like a little secret. I feel like it’s just the best way for them to learn everything.
And I love that you pulled reading out, because it’s a tool. Reading is not an end result. And in school, it feels like reading is this end result. And we get so focused on it. Can they read? Can they read? It’s like, okay, but reading is a tool that humans use. Writing and reading are to help us share information with each other.
This is a way that we can learn about things or research things or whatever. And so, reading is part of life, because it’s helpful to us. It’s not important as a skill on its own. Treating it like that, like a tool that is helpful, makes so much more sense.
What I saw with my kids is they were curious about reading. They wanted to be able to do it because it would help them. It helps them in their games. It helps them communicate with others and all of this. And so, it really was a journey that they owned for themselves and it didn’t feel like me pushing them to learn it younger than they were ready to learn it. It felt like their curiosity was the driving force and then they picked it up as they needed in a way that made sense for their own brains.
And so, I think kids just naturally learn about what’s fun and interesting to them. And when they’re young, it looks like playing and when they’re older, maybe it still looks like playing, or maybe it starts to look like something different and unique to them. It could be projects or processing ideas with us or interacting with friends. Maybe they want to sign up for a certain class. Maybe they love collecting certain things or whatever it is. It’s so unique to each individual person. I think the idea that learning isn’t fun that school gives us is so terrible and damaging to people.
ANNA: Oh, it really is. Oh, and I love that you mentioned that reading is a tool, a tool among many other tools to learn and take in information. And I just love this whole idea that learning is fun.
And I think it’s because I love learning all the things, that it is fun! And I love your point, Pam, about how unschooling, the learning almost appears incidental, but it’s so purposeful in the way that it’s helping the learner move towards something that’s important to them, whether that’s a goal, an understanding, whatever it might be.
And I think because it can appear incidental, we brush it aside or think it’s not as important, or that it’s not this drudgery. And with any passion, the learning isn’t linear or confined to a subject. With a passion for Minecraft, you’re learning about building, geometry, animals, strategy, gems, tools, so many things. A passion for horses, the same. It incorporates all the school subjects, but then so much more, the connection, the nuances, all the pieces.
And so, observation is really our friend here. Watch and walk alongside your kids and be amazed, because I was constantly amazed. And I think, Erika, you touched on this, unfortunately, one of the side effects of a poor school experience is a belief that learning has to be hard and it has to be drudgery to mean anything. But that’s not true. Learning is magic. It’s amazing.
And again, there’s a deep internal drive that we have as humans to learn and understand the things around us. And as you both mentioned, it may not look like learning if we’re so narrowly defining learning, if we’re holding onto this school book drudgery as our definition of learning. But if you broaden your definition, you will see it’s rich and rewarding and absolutely equipping them to live a life that’s meaningful to them.
PAM: Yeah. And you started talking about it and that’s the next truth that we’re going to explore, because they’re very related. So, that’s that learning is not hard. Through the lens of unschooling, that’s our next truth, that learning is not hard.
And I found it distinct, because I could think learning is fun and hard. Like I want to enjoy learning, but it’s something hard that I do. So, I think that that’s why for me, I separated these out as well. And when you think about showing up at school, and this ties into what you were saying earlier, Erika, about the curriculum getting pushed down and down earlier and earlier, when kids are presented with this stuff, it really is so easy just to pick up the message that learning is hard.
Because there are so many reasons in the classroom following this curriculum that it is hard for them. It’s totally true. Trying to learn something that you’re not interested in can definitely be hard. Trying to learn something that your brain is not ready to process and connect and bring together can definitely be hard. If it’s just something that’s not part of their day-to-day lives, so maybe they’re not super interested in it, but also they won’t be using it because it’s not something they need to do, then that is hard to learn because it often just doesn’t make sense.
It’s just this little floating point, which earlier you mentioned, Anna, that’s when we end up stopping trying to understand what we would call learning and just memorize that factoid, because it has no context in our lives or in our interests. So, I just have to memorize this thing to perform on the test and to play that game.
So, for lots of brains, learning in school and following curriculum is hard. And then just put yourself in there. If you’re trying to be interested in the thing, questions are so discouraged. And not because the teacher’s just like, I don’t want to, but they don’t have time. If it’s not on the curriculum, we don’t have time to spend 20 minutes discussing it, because it won’t be on the test. How many people ended up asking that question eventually? It’s like, is this going to be on the test? And if not, you could just forget about it. It’s like, okay, I don’t even have to try memorizing or understanding it, because it’s not going to be on the test.
When you imagine kids in school, their days really are just filled with that push and pull of what is it that I need to know? How do I memorize it? And in all that, because of all the testing and the grading, we become so afraid of being wrong and we can’t ask questions. So, we stop being curious about stuff. We have to answer questions on the test in exactly the same way that we were told. So, we don’t even try to think of other ways that might connect for us better or understand better. We have to say it the way it’s supposed to be said. So, our creativity fades. I just feel it’s become so ingrained in that school experience that we now think that is the human experience that learning is hard. Full stop. That’s just it. Learning for anybody is hard.
But what so many unschooling parents have seen over these decades, as we’ve talked to more and more unschooling parents, what we’ve seen with our children is it’s the environment that makes a fundamental difference in how learning feels. When you’re doing the things that are interesting to you or that you want to learn, you’re following your curiosity, you’re following your needs, your own goals, oh my gosh, learning can be fun.
And the incidental piece is like, it’s not hard because I’m meeting it where I am. And I’m meeting it right at the place where I can learn. If I do jump too far ahead, it’s like, this makes no sense. I’m going to find information or a person or whatever that’s going to meet me where I am. So, now I can just soak it up like that sponge. We can learn like little kids do no matter our age. When you think of challenging or frustrating moments in it, it doesn’t feel like the learning piece is hard. It’s just like, ooh, I’m trying to figure out this piece and I want to play around with it. I want to figure it out. It’s much less about defining all learning as hard, because this particular piece is challenging or frustrating for me in this moment. It’s just so interesting.
ANNA: It’s true. And so this is going to sound a little bit cynical, but I think it’s really one of the ways that the powers that be keep us in line. Learning’s hard. You can’t do it on your own. You need these experts in this building or you’re not going to be successful. You’re not going to get a job. You won’t amount to anything.
Because as soon as you realize learning isn’t hard when it’s in service of an interest and that you don’t need that expert and that building, the whole system starts to crumble. But truly what you said is so important to tease apart. Memorizing facts devoid of context is hard, especially for some brains. For other brains, memorization comes really easily and I think those people do well in school. And so, like most things, there is a grain of truth to the idea that learning is hard. It can be, but it doesn’t have to be.
And for me, I think watching the babies and toddlers learning so much in such a short amount of time just really blew the lid off the idea that we can’t learn without proper instruction. But even then, they pick out specific things. Well, then reading’s going to be hard or math is going to be hard.
But again, it’s made harder by that environment and by that environment not taking into account different brains and different timelines. And if something does seem hard, is it still hard if we let go of the agenda around it, the timeline around it, the context? Is it a context issue that’s making it feel hard? Can we examine something that we’re saying feels hard and just understand it a little bit more?
A few months ago, a Network member talked about how people will say learning gets harder as you get older. It’s another truism, learning gets harder as you get older. When really, it’s that being in that school environment gets harder because as adults, we have much more context for living alongside learning. So, the artificial environment and arbitrary hoops make much less sense and are much less tolerable than when we were kids and didn’t know there was a choice.
And I think that there are actually some kids that intuitively know there’s a different way and they end up not doing well in school, because they just keep bucking, like, I’m going find my way out of this tiny little narrow place that you’re putting me in, because I know there’s another world out there. And for a lot of us, we don’t really discover that until we’re adults and realize we just performed for that system for many, many years. And now there’s this whole other world out here.
ERIKA: My kids didn’t go to school and I didn’t question it when I was in school. And so, this was a lot of new information for me and super interesting. But what I observed with my kids was that they just resist anything that doesn’t interest them, period.
And that’s not every personality. My husband, Josh, and I are really curious and interested in almost anything, where my kids are more interested in very specific things. And so, I can be like, isn’t this cool? And they’re just like, no, like, why would I care about that? So, it’s so unique.
And then imagine in school where they’re not even saying, isn’t this cool? Most of the time, they’re just saying, you have to learn this. It’s important to learn it. Of course, it’s going to be hard. It’s going to be hard to learn something if your brain either isn’t ready for or if it holds no interest at all. It just is so logical now for me to think about that.
But when I was in it, I didn’t know what was the problem with these other kids, that they weren’t actively participating or they weren’t trying hard or to do better. So looking back on it, I’m like, okay, that doesn’t make any sense though. The reason why I’m doing well in this system is because I’m good at memorizing or because I’m able to put my internal feelings and thoughts to the side in service of, this is what they said to do. I want to get this good score, whatever.
And so, looking back when I was first coming to unschooling, I felt a little bit jealous of the people who had realized about school when they were actually in school and were a little bit more rebellious, because I just totally got sucked into the game. I didn’t even see it. I did start to see it when I was a teacher in school.
But the more I think about this story that most people tell about learning being hard and learning being no fun, the more upset I get about this. Because it really doesn’t have to be that way. And I think it affects people for the rest of their lives, either thinking that they can’t learn or that they hate certain topics. And I think this is also the core of the “adults versus kids” conflicts that people have in their lives.
Because if the adults are saying, this is the most important thing, and the kids are saying, this is hard and I hate it, that clash is so terrible. And so, I think some kids can push themselves through it, but I don’t think that it’s natural and it doesn’t really make any sense because, like you were saying about the memorization aspect of it, the things that I remember from school are few and far between.
It’s not like that memorization type of learning to put it down on a test. It’s not learning that lasts or that makes any sense as something we take with us through our lives as important information. And so, yeah, this one upsets me.
PAM: I know, it’s so true. That is what is so fascinating about this stage of the journey, I think. Okay, so it’s been a long time. I do want to thank everyone for joining us. And we do really hope that you enjoy diving into this stage of the de-schooling phase as we challenge some of our conventional beliefs about learning.
I really think, as you were saying, it fundamentally sets us up so negatively, those conventional beliefs of how you have to be taught by a teacher, you have to follow a curriculum, learning is hard, learning is not fun, all of those pieces, we bring all that weight with us into adulthood. And we carry the message that we can’t learn. But then all the fun stuff that we’re doing and the deep dives into our own passions and interests, we don’t call them learning because they weren’t on a school curriculum, right?
ANNA: We devalue it.
PAM: We still carry the message, I can’t learn. Oh sure, I love this and I could do this for hours, but that doesn’t count, right? I mean, it’s just so deep, the messages that we carry.
We do invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network to continue these kinds of conversations. It is a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents, absolutely. And a nonjudgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional unschooling ideas and just explore what they might look like in the day-to-day of your unique and wonderful family of individuals.
No matter where you are on the journey, just learning about it, been doing it for years, there are always layers to peel back around as things come up at different ages and stages. And we are very excited to welcome you. To learn more, just follow the link in the show notes or go to livingjoyfully.ca and just choose Network in the menu. And thank you so much, Anna and Erika!
We wish everyone a lovely, lovely day.
ERIKA: Bye!
ANNA: Bye, take care.
EU407: On the Journey with Lucia Silva
Apr 23, 2026
We’re back with another On the Journey episode! We had a rich conversation with Living Joyfully Network member Lucia Silva. Lucia was previously on the podcast in episode 251, Unschooling as a Lifestyle. She is an unschooling mom of two and she came back to share some updates about her unschooling journey.
We talked about trusting our children’s learning journeys, Lucia’s inner growth and mindset shifts, as well as her experience in the Living Joyfully Network and how the community has supported her over the years.
It was a really beautiful discussion and we hope you find it helpful!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone. I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia, as well as our guest today, Lucia Silva. Hello to you all!
PAM, ANNA, AND LUCIA: Hello!
ERIKA: Before we begin our conversation with Lucia, I wanted to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, which has really been life changing for me in so many ways. On the Network, we have such great discussions about so many topics. Our community has such a wide variety of experiences, and everyone’s really interested in learning and growing and being intentional with their families. It’s really unlike any other online community I’ve found.
Being part of the Network offers powerful support, especially during those moments when fears pop up or if you’re new to unschooling and just need a place where people understand what you’re going through. If you’d like to learn more about the Network and check it out for yourself, you can visit livingjoyfully.ca and click on Network at the top of the page. And we’ll also leave a link for that in the show notes. We would love to meet you.
So I’m very excited that we get to talk to Lucia today. I met Lucia on the Living Joyfully Network and have just loved getting to know her over the years. And she was also on the podcast back in episode 251 and shared her journey to unschooling in that episode.
I encourage everyone to check that out as well. And we’re excited to dive in for an update five and a half years later, which is wild. So Lucia, we would love to hear what everyone is interested in right now.
LUCIA: Five and a half years later sounds like, in the scope of kid time, it’s so long. It’s so long. And then thinking, how long have you been unschooling? Five and a half years still seems really new.
So, it’s interesting to think about those elastic times. And it was fun to see how some things are just so similar. I’m sure you guys see that with your kids. But, wow, I can connect where they’re into the exact same thing.
So there’s four of us. It’s me and my husband, Micah, and my two kids. They’re older now. To respect their privacy, I’m not going to be using their names. And I’ll just refer to them with neutral pronouns. They said I could talk about them in general.
My oldest child is still really into ballet. And that’s their primary passion. And that has remained strong, grown, changed a little bit. It’s not what they want to do professionally, but it is just a primary part of their lives. They’re also still really into reading and drawing and making.
They have a great friend group. And they do lots of fun stuff. I just dropped them off at the botanical gardens to hang out with friends this morning. And let’s see, there was one other thing I wanted to mention. I lost my train of thought.
My younger child, back when I originally did the podcast, they were really into building and constructing items out of stuff. And I had not really forgotten, even though we still have a lot of that preserved in the garage. But they’re really into building tabletop games, mostly card games. They’re constantly inventing new games.
We’ve brought a lot of them to the table, done a lot of design. We’ve taken them to little fairs and sold lots of them. And we have game tournaments.
They’re kind of based around the Wings of Fire lore, because that’s what their friends were into when they started it. It’s turned into this thing where they have this whole group of friends that are waiting for the next booster pack to come out. But it’s kind of amazing to see connections, from that fascination with construction, like moving pieces, how they fit together.
And now it’s, Mom, I have a new game. And it’s this whole fully formed game mechanics and point values. Now it’s branching out to some things that aren’t just trading card games. They’re thinking about what would be a good family game? But mostly card games. So they’re really into that. They’ve gotten really into fencing and chess, which I think are both similar sort of mental games.
And they love talking with Micah about probability problems and stuff like that. They’re also really into philosophy and philosophical debate, or debating anything. So that’s that.
And I think when we last spoke, Micah, my husband, was a professor at UGA, and he’s now moved into tech. And along that whole journey, so much of what we’ve gone through in our unschooling journey, I’m putting that in air quotes, because it just sort of becomes your entire sort of life philosophy, unschooling. But that has really been so meaningful for him on his journey of just learning the way his mind works, what his interests are, stuff like that. So he’s still in the research, data field, has gotten really into improv and musical improv with a little group here, and plays music all the time.
And I am, I think, still doing a lot of the same things. I like to sew, and I’m reading, and I love following little rabbit trails and researching anything and dabbling about here and there.
ANNA: So fun. All the things, but how they all weave together, right? You can just picture the household and the weaving together of all the things.
ERIKA: I love connecting it back to the old conversation and seeing how that tracks, because we always talk about that, looking back and seeing how those threads connect together. And it just also makes me think, oh my gosh, kids are all so different, the things that they love and are interested in. You can’t predict it. And it’s just so interesting.
PAM: Yeah, I loved hearing the piece of looking back and now seeing how that is weaving into the things they’re interested in right now, because they can seem very different. Yet, when you look back, you can see the thread that underlies the various things together over time. And that is so interesting, just as a piece of knowledge, just a little bit more understanding about who they are, right? I think that is super cool. Did you want to say something?
LUCIA: Oh, just as you were saying that I realized that along the way, I feel like that’s given me, it’s a really important reflection to have when they get interested in something that maybe I’m unsure about, like video games, for example, and thinking, what is happening with all this time? And it’s so easy to see what’s underneath for them. How does this work? How do the team dynamics work? How do I analyze these moves? It doesn’t mean that if you’re not doing that, it’s not important, but there’s always something going on underneath an interest unless they’re not being attended to, right? But if it’s intentional, just like we’re intentional.
And seeing that there is that through line and that intention under it. Oh, and then sorry, one other thing about my oldest kiddo, who’s really into working with kids these days. They’re interning at a Waldorf school and they’ve been babysitting a lot too, which is a job, and they assist in the little kids’ classes at our co-op. There’s something underneath it that’s more like a passion rather than just like, oh, I go babysitting. Looking at the intention they bring to that and how respectful they are of the children, their privacy, what they’re going through and what reverence they have for that job.
I mean, there’s all kinds of ways to have a job, but also to look at that as we are spending a lot of time doing that because I’m seeing that it is something that is really important to them to do rather than, oh, they’re working or they’re working without getting paid.
PAM: All the different stories we can tell ourselves, right? But when we take that moment to actually dive a little bit deeper, so often we can see those threads. We can see the intentionality rather than the surface story that just, oh, I’m taking them to their job. They’re doing this thing. I don’t quite know why they’re not getting paid. Whatever lenses that kind of automatically bubble up, if we take a minute to just dig a little bit deeper and see what else comes up alongside it, it is really exciting.
And it helps, as I think back, just helps with the mechanics too. Like I don’t mind driving them to X, Y, Z because I know the impact and what they’re getting out of it. I’m not just a chauffeur or something like that.
If I take that as the superficial story of what’s happening, but no, I’m fundamentally supporting their pursuit of something that they are intentionally interested in. Who knows where it will go? We’ve talked a lot about how you really can’t predict it because we can guess but it’s really only looking back where we can see those threads and the connections and go, oh my gosh, I am so glad that I supported and helped with that along the way.
ANNA: I just want to say I feel like this is a core piece of unschooling for me, this valuing the experience and the exploration and facilitating that. But it’s hard because it doesn’t necessarily have a product at the end, or it doesn’t necessarily even have a photo op or whatever the thing might be that grounds it in our culture. But gosh, it’s such a big part of it.
And when you can take this time to look back, you do see those threads and you do see that growth. And again, it may be that they end up doing something with children, but maybe they’re just building a wealth of information and connection and relationship pieces that’ll be used in some other way. So yeah, just love that.
ERIKA: It’s trusting, trusting that they know, right? They know the thing that’s interesting now, and that’s going to lead to something. And I feel like it can be hard because we are always seeing through our own lenses. That’s the part that can be challenging about that for me. I think, but it doesn’t make sense. Or why would you want to spend your time doing that?
Or little judgmental feelings can come up just based on what it would be for me, like that interest doesn’t make sense to me. I think if we can drop that part, drop the judgment and just trust that they know themselves and this is going to lead to whatever it needs to lead to for them. I really love them.
LUCIA: And it is so hard for people, they really want to attach it to something. Are they going to be a professional dancer? Are they going to go into child development? I’m like, I don’t know.
Are you going to become a historian because you learned about the battle of the bulge. I get it. I think they want to know that everything’s okay. I understand it, but it’s important, or it’s been important for me to make my little energetic bubble and go like, yeah, is that cool?
No, they don’t want to be a professional dancer because of XYZ or whatever. Then their face falls, oh, but they dance for 12 hours a week. Yes, that’s pretty awesome. That’s still great. It’s very, it’s just interesting when you get so steeped in this, to have to pull yourself out and see through those eyes, right? Remembering, that’s where they are. And I get it. And I’m going to figure out how to talk to you about this in a way that doesn’t make you so worried.
PAM: Yes, I would want them to not be worried. Although I have no control over that. I got those questions so many times, especially as your kids get older, right?
People start, well, then what are they going to be? Et cetera. And I got to a point where I just loved answering those with, “I don’t know, maybe.” They look at you like, don’t you know your child?
LUCIA: Don’t you care? Well, especially as they get older, right? When they’re seven, that’s fine for everybody. When they’re 15 going on 16 and everybody’s talking about college and what are you going to do?
And they look at you like, do you not care? Are you going to abandon them? And they’re starting to feel that, not pressure to do, but pressure to answer. Luckily we don’t get that from our family.
So, I’d like to care a little bit less, but we’ll encounter adults who are like, what are you going to major in? Oh, are you going to this? Are you going to that? What do I say? It’s like, well, here are the options. We can prepare a little, you can just be out there with it.
ERIKA: It depends on how humorous you want to be. You have lots of options.
PAM: Oh my goodness. So I wanted to pull back something that you mentioned a little bit earlier and we’ll tie it in with the first interview we did. Episode 251. I do recommend everyone go back there and check out because you talked a lot about your journey to unschooling there. The theme and the title of the episode was unschooling as a lifestyle.
And like you said earlier, it just becomes the way you live. So I was curious as you look back, how has your journey evolved so far? Because we know it will continue. And what things have helped you along the way?
LUCIA: Well, I did read the transcript of that episode again. I had a vague idea. And it was so interesting to me to see both how I was at the beginning and how I was already like two feet in, here’s what we’re doing.
And a lot of the sort of philosophy for lack of a better word, or like the ideas now are just, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. And I know then that my yes was a different kind of yes. It just had a different feel and I was really eager and trying hard. And now a lot of those things just feel like, Oh wow. I can’t believe I was worried about that. That was my primary focus. I totally remember feeling that way. And I was thinking of Pam’s unschooling journey. Also, that was the first book that I read. That’s what it’s called, right? The Unschooling Journey.
PAM: Yes.
LUCIA: And thinking about the Network as this constant companion and knowing that the unschooling journey is based around this idea of the hero’s journey as the journey into and through unschooling. And I’m thinking about how many times we do that journey in this spiral, right? This big sort of macro journey of we won’t do that and we won’t do this and let go of that.
And we’re okay with this and then you go the next layer in and in and in, and now we’re sort of on this really micro journey where sort of everything spins around more quickly. I enter an unfamiliar situation or way of thinking, or how do I feel about this that my kid wants to do?
How do I feel about this and do a little whole circle of a journey with that. And I realized that for me, and I think for a lot of us who are part of the Network, that it’s a mix of a companion, a champion, an oracle, like all of the things that those mystical mythical heroes come upon that reveal some little truth, here’s a little encouragement, here’s your magic potion to keep you going.
But, for me, symbolically, there is no way, I guess I won’t say there’s no way I could have done it without the Network. But I know that my life is just totally different because of it. I know that every relationship I have is totally different because of it. I know that our family is totally different because of it.
And it’s funny, because I never get to talk about the Network. I think all the people outside my life know that I’m part of this unschooling network. They know it’s this online thing, and I have to go to a Zoom all the time. People will ask, why do you have all these Zoom meetings? Do you have a job? I’m like, no, no, I have, it’s a very important meeting I have to go to.
Because there are all these layers to it. When we started, I approached it the same way I approached listening to the podcast as like, I was in mentorship mode. And I still am in a different way. I remember, every week, as soon as the talk came out, I would listen to it. And then Micah and I would sit together on the couch at night, and I’d either play certain parts, we’d listen to the whole thing. We were steeping in this lecture series, and then we’d talk about it.
And I’d make notes and have these things I wanted to keep top of mind that week. And I could feel that transformation of ideas come loose in me and be like, okay, these are ideas I want to steep in. But then, I think I was maybe a little hesitant sometimes to post in the network, but I realized so quickly how much I learned from reading other people sharing it, everybody commenting and realizing this is unlike any other place that I’ve been.
And in the same way that unschooling is unlike any other place that I’ve been. If you think of this as the ultimate community for that based on intentionality, and not based on this set of rules and ideals. Which is so funny that a lot of the homeschooling and unschooling communities online turn into exactly that. Because I think people look for advice. And there’s always one person who wants to be the expert.
And that person ends up being the quote, unquote, expert and having the rules and you’re either in or you’re outside of that. And what I love seeing, even now, when somebody new comes into the Network, I learned so much from reading their new posts and the new things they’re wondering about. And I learned so much from people who are dealing with things that could seem totally irrelevant to me and my family. You learn so quickly how to read into the core of that relevance, how to offer support from your own experience to receive support from that shared experience.
And the ability to share those things and be in a space that is really without judgment, which is so weird. Especially when you’re dealing with something that feels like a high principle, or just high intentionality. Most of those spaces, and I’ve been in a lot that have to do with unschooling, but also that have to do with health or lots of other things, and it can feel like there’s this sort of untouchable expert at the center, or this untouchable idea, and we’re all sort of at the feet of that.
And feeling like we have this communal place, or real community, but also there’s this strong architecture that makes it so that anybody who walks into that space knows, gets the vibe. You can read the room really quickly, what’s going to be allowed here and not allowed here. There’s just not any bad behavior. So it feels really safe in those ways. But now it just lives in my head, all three of your voices live in my head, other people’s voices live in my head, phrases that people have said that I’ve written on a Post-it and stuck on my wall.
So that sometimes throughout my day, like, I’ll be like, oh, okay, I’m feeling uncertain about this. I got to post in the Network. But I can write the whole post and all the answers before I even do it. I realized that’s why I’m maybe posting less, and I think I should just do this anyway, because it was so helpful for me then.
And I love knowing that there are people in there who have been in there since I was there, whose kids are much older, and who aren’t visibly active so much. But just the other day, I posted something that was kind of a tender post. And immediately someone who had been in the group since I joined, who I wasn’t even sure was part of the group anymore, because I didn’t see them, but I thought about them as we’ve had some dialogue, and they just messaged me the loveliest message. Just knowing that there are people for whom this is so important. And just looking at the calls, I get so emotional sometimes when someone is sharing something. And everybody’s giving space, holding space, giving feedback, whatever it is.
And I see these 16 tiles of faces. And I think these are parents all around the world, who are dedicating their Saturday morning or afternoon or whatever it is, to talking about their families and their self development as caring people who are stewards of other people in the world. And that just blows me away. I think that in and of itself is so powerful.
ANNA: I feel like you captured it in a way that I don’t know that I could, because I think it’s really hard to explain to people. Because we do have those calls every week, we’ve been having them since we started in 2020. And I think of all of those weeks that we’ve had calls.
And that’s the piece too, that this web of people all over the world, bringing such intention and there isn’t one path. And you know that we don’t ever talk about there’s one right way or one way to be. But gosh, have I learned so much from just seeing other people navigating all the different pieces in their life.
And again, it may be a relationship issue, and maybe I’m not having that problem in my relationship, but just steeping in that intentionality and growth mindset is so powerful for me individually, and then just the collective of it is incredible. But yeah, I just am so grateful for you being there. And you really have seen it from the beginning and how it’s grown and what it looks like.
I just really appreciated that and got very emotional, because it is, it’s so powerful.
LUCIA: Yeah, and the growth mindset part of it. I think maybe you get lucky to meet a few people along the way in your real life who are invested in that. And I feel so lucky to have that in my partner, Micah, that’s where we are too, that is so important and central. And some people do have that with friends, but to be in a community of people where that’s their focus. And I think it’s maybe the kind of community that some other people may find in a totally different way in, like a church or something.
I always wanted that type of community without any of the one right way, or the dogma piece. Even with the most wonderful ones, there’s a book we’re going to go back to, or there’s a principle we’re going to go back to. Well, our principles are there’s no one right way. Everybody’s different. These expansive ideas.
Some people are nervous to come on the calls. At first, I know that I was, sometimes I’m even nervous now. But it’s hard to describe what it feels like once you’re there. It doesn’t feel like how I imagined, how can you create a warm, kind of magical community online on Zoom? I don’t know how it happened. But I think it’s just exactly that. You guys are the stewards of people coming together in this container with this intentionality, and everybody sort of rises to that occasion. And to do that kind of work in my life constantly is absolutely transformational. It’s changed every relationship I have. Really.
ERIKA: It speeds up the process for me. I feel like being around people who are constantly kind of reminding me of things that I need to work through or things I want to process. It helps me grow faster. I don’t know if that’s the right word. But that’s what it feels like. I don’t know if I would have gotten to these places. You know?
PAM: That’s the word that keeps coming up for me. This whole conversation is intentional, right? It’s like with that intentionality, and just showing up with that openness and curiosity. Okay, we’re going to go open and curious. Showing up with that piece, instead of the dogma, the direction, the measuring against, am I doing it right? Those are the pieces that we work hard to dispel, really, right? Which on one hand feels really good, there’s no rules to follow.
And then on the other hand, it’s like, oh, what do I replace that with? What do I do if I don’t have a rule to orient myself towards? But that’s where the openness, the curiosity, and the intentionality come in. It’s the intentionality piece, like you mentioned, Erika, that helps with the moving forward versus feeling stuck.
And I understand your hesitation about using the word fast to describe it, but maybe faster. It’s the reminder to visit those things. And also the compassion when we don’t have the capacity in the moment, and the space, as you mentioned, just the space, right? Just the open space that’s there for whatever is going on.
But I think that brings me back to the book, The Unschooling Journey, because number one, I love that you talked about the commonality of the different roles and people, mentors, and monsters. We talked about that a little while ago in the network, things that seem like maybe they’re getting in your way, but really, maybe they’re bringing messages. And that side is super interesting.
And to see when we’re spiraling or using that journey, how we can go more quickly, because we have more experience, and we have more language to help ourselves walk through those pieces, to remember, oh, yeah, this is my intention. This is why I want to do this. And oh, yeah, this is new.
Why is this bubbling up now? We’re always talking about that. It’s not that we don’t have challenges in life, we can just notice them a little bit more quickly, and move through them a little bit more quickly, because we gained these tools on what to do, instead of following the one path, right?
ANNA: That’s what I was going to say. We talk about that a lot. It’s not like this makes it the panacea, that nothing ever happens. It’s not all rainbow and sunshines. But wow, do I catch myself faster. I reorient faster. I get back to connection faster. I just slow things down to be able to be present with whatever’s happening faster than if I didn’t have that. So I think that’s the piece, because it keeps happening, keeps happening, all these decades later.
And there’s such a gift to it. And like you’re saying, I think it is faster, but there’s no end point. And I also appreciated you saying, Lucia, that it’s not always comfortable for people. I think some people come to an environment like the Network, and it isn’t comfortable because the one answer idea feels easier. Like, if you just give me the one answer, I’ll do it. That’s how we were trained in school. Tell me what I’m supposed to do, and I’ll do it. I’ll exceed the expectation. This is a little scarier in some ways, I think.
But if you can just get past that fear piece of it, and kind of steep in that container of acceptance and curiosity, it’s so empowering. It just opens up so many possibilities. And I think it really speaks to people when they can get past that piece of, but wait, I don’t want to do it wrong.
PAM: I was just going to say, that reminds me of, Pam, don’t lose it. When you mentioned it, Lucia, too, like when questions or challenges and things come up that don’t directly relate to things that are going on in our life, but it is still so useful to think through because it’s the foundational processes, right? It’s the tools that we’re using.
How do we apply the tools in this situation and in that situation? And that is just so much more deeply useful because then that’s understanding the tools and how you apply it in different places. It just gives us so much more experience on the breadth of how I might take this tool and apply it to all sorts of different things. I think of when we first come to unschooling and you encounter a challenge and you go and you ask, and you get an answer and you’re like, oh great, that worked great.
And then another challenge comes up a few months later. It’s like, oh my gosh, I don’t know what to do. I need to go ask and you ask and you get it, et cetera. If you’re not taking that intentional step to foundationally understand what’s the connection between why these different answers are working for me. I just find for me, I always need to go back and ask somebody because I haven’t learned the foundational stuff, gone underneath all that, where I can now think through something and help myself through it, et cetera. I don’t know if that makes sense.
ANNA: Okay, wait, just really quickly. I think this is making me, sorry, this is making me think about why it makes it faster is because, and maybe it’s personality driven too, but I’m experiencing to some extent all of the issues. We have a member that’s gone through like house flooding and having to move and all the things she’s navigating. Oh my gosh, I’m thinking of your thing with the fire extinguisher, Lucia.
I haven’t gone through those things physically and yet I was able to sit with it, hold the container, process it myself, think about what that would mean. So I think that’s what makes it faster because we only have so many experiences in our life but I don’t need all of those personally to learn more. There’s something interesting about that.
ERIKA: Yeah, I learned a lot about fire extinguishers from you, Lucia. I also, I wanted to pull back that other bit that I love that you said about intentional communities are often rule-based. I think that’s so interesting to think about.
Maybe other people that we meet that are very focused on growth and intention, they are trying to do things the right way though. And so our intention is totally different because it’s an intention about figuring out how people are different and being open and curious, An intention to be curious about things, which just, it feels very different.
LUCIA: Yeah, I mean, I wish it existed. I wish there was a beautiful room I could go to and be next to people and eat cookies and coffee afterwards. It’s like totally that part of it, but I realized it would be great if the world would be different.
You reminded me when you were talking about going through all of these things, even if they’re not your experience. I realized that a lot of what I used to do and still kind of do it out of habit, a fear-based habit, when I would hear about someone had this emergency and they were misdiagnosed and it turned out I would catalog, okay, if they have a rash on their palms, they check for Kawasaki disease. I was cataloging these, okay, if my kid’s not talking by this age, I have to demand whatever it was, some fear-based, okay, I’m going to arm myself with this practical knowledge that will fend off any bad eventuality.
And as we were talking, I realized that’s what we get, this real sort of other meta prevention, which is like we’re not going to prevent anything bad or practical happening, but what we have, we’re going to go through the same thing with it. If I’m feeling really strong about that, my priority is connection with the people involved, choosing out of love, being open and curious, all of the things that foundationally can feel like safety when so many things feel scary. Whether it’s that your kid’s playing video games or that they have an illness or that there’s a challenge. That there’s a different kind of safety, whereas I have always ascribed safety to rules and following best practices and figuring out the best way. So, this is something I’m still working on, but I like the concept.
ANNA: Me too. I do think, because I think our brain can be, you and I are very similar in that, and well, all four of us really, knowing the four of us as I do. I think we all want to, we have that brain that’s cataloging and thinking all the things. But for me, that deep breath into, there’s plenty of time, staying in this moment, being open and curious really is the thing that provides me the most peace and safety, because I think it was so stressful for me when I thought I was preparing for every eventuality, especially in my first pregnancy, and then everything went to hell in a hand basket. It’s like, but wait, I did everything the “right way”, and that got me stuck, right?
But I don’t get stuck there anymore, because I know things are going to happen, but what I know is that I can be present, I can have these connections, I can have these relationships, and that we’re going to figure it out. That feels more like real safety to me than what I was kind of chasing when I was younger with trying to do everything perfectly.
PAM: I love that.
ANNA: Okay, so I want to go to our next question, because I think it’s interesting. Something you’ve talked about on the network and reflected upon on calls is just observations about your kids and their relationship to themselves, and how you’ve seen them evolve as they’ve grown in this environment that you’ve created. How they move through the world, and so are there any little bits that you feel comfortable sharing just about your experience of that.
LUCIA: Yeah, I mean, it has been so interesting. This is an area where I can so directly see. Where I’m just practically learning from them, just by observing how someone else can be in the world, and being someone who is shaped totally differently by an experience of looking outside and adhering to outside standards to determine how I feel, when I need rest, what kind of food I’m eating. To see the opposite of that, of people who have such a strong basis in that type of self-knowledge, intuition, self-reflection, and all bolstered by, I don’t want to say extreme, but just actual autonomy of being.
And I don’t want to say I’ve given them autonomy, they’re not being prevented from being autonomous beings who have agency over so many areas of their lives, as much as possible. I believe that’s part of how they’ve developed this. Just watching how to do it. There’s no question, if they need to rest, they’re going to rest at this time, and if they they’re going to eat this kind of food, they’re going to eat this kind of food, and just this really strong conviction of anybody who gets in the way of that.
And they’re not rude people, but it’s about people who press back on that, are you really going to eat that? You’ve been in bed all day, etc. They have no tolerance for that type of external judgment, and they have sensitive humor about it. They function pretty well in the world, but things that I’m so uncomfortable with, I feel like this is the big personal project of my life to try and unravel the ideas of, have I done enough work to deserve rest? What should a person of my age, what am I capable of doing in a day?
Really having lost total touch with what I actually need to be resourced, and then living with people who are in total touch with what they need. And so, kind of going back to this idea of what are they going to do with their lives or major in, and also what we’ve been talking about as our process is in being open and curious, and all of these principles. That’s what they’re majoring in, right? You can do anything if you’re open and curious, you have a relationship with yourself that is grounded in trust or intuition. People see this, they will say, they’re so amazing, they’re such a pleasure to talk to, they just know who they are, but where are they going to go to college?
You just answered your own question, so it’s fine. But really, it’s just a total flip side of priorities of what starts to happen being steeped in something like this is where those priorities come up and change.
My oldest child was diagnosed with severe scoliosis a few years ago. A total S curve, and they deemed it surgical immediately. They would need surgery, and just in that room, they were just, I think they were 13 at the time, anyway, and just asked the surgeon questions, like, oh, what would happen if we wait? Do we need to do this now? The doctors started with when is your ballet break? When are we going to schedule the surgery? And then answered well, you should probably do this before you’re 22 or 23. They were like, okay, so let’s wait. What are the other options?
I’m using a little more confrontational tone than they did. But they said those things on their own. And then in the car later was said, they put their hands on my back without even asking. And I had to step back from not taking that as like, Oh, I really messed up. That’s my job. But I come from an era where doctors did all kinds of things without asking.
A lot of things, especially for a child, but that they would expect having very little experience with that for a doctor to say, Hey, can I touch your back? They’ve received no education about that. That’s just what they mean, well, they have by living in a world of the person who’s respected, autonomous.
So, that’s how they walked through that whole journey and ended up doing really intense physical therapy and loved their physical therapist. And it turned into this whole fascination with the body and how the body works and alignment and, learning that they were hyper mobile and reading books about this. And so they have a whole fascination with physical therapy and physiology now.
But ended up being deemed by that same doctor a year later, that their curve was corrected by like 14 degrees. And the doctor said, I would not recommend surgery anymore. They have no pain, a total success story for them. But again, there were all kinds of practical and sort of more emotional parts of how that is supported, right?
One is being willing to go out on a limb and run a ledge and be the outsider who’s not going to do the surgery, being willing to do that, right? You have to, again, step outside of this sort of echo chamber, everybody’s going, this is what you do, this is what you do, it’s going to be your fault if you don’t do this.
And just taking in all of the information, looking at the person in front of you asking all of the questions, getting all the information and going, Yes, let’s try this. And then being 100% willing to drive them to physical therapy four times a week, for a year, and them being willing to do it. And I’m having the time to do that in the middle of the day. And so many times I was more in it, in a practical sense. I think during that year, we didn’t have time for a lot of other things.
And they were getting older, we were doing just little, and that faltering that you have along the way. Is it enough? And Micah was like, look how much they’ve learned about themselves, their body, their relationship with their body, their relationship with all kinds of things this year, I realized, yes, wow. And seeing now a couple years later, what a big role that had in their life.
For some people, that story is different and also meaningful for them. They have a surgery, they have this long recovery, they have limited mobility, there’s an identity in that. And for my kiddo, they got this experience that fit their personality, which was to be in their body, get really in tune with, I mean, as a dancer, that’s how they relate to themselves. So it just expanded this vision for them of what is happening for them in their body, in their role, what it means, and the kind of relationship they can have with their body.
I think that really started to solidify for them, a core piece of the way they walk through the world, which I think could feel like an insignificant little side trail for some people. That was the year I had scoliosis and got the surgery or whatever, which is, again, the right path for some. It is not the right path for every 13 year old to do physical therapy every day on their own and in an office for two hours. But that’s what they wanted to do.
And there was a lot of support and scaffolding needed. And then a lot of trust to know when they got to a place where they didn’t need to do as much, and I was still in the like, well, have you done this today? Have you done that?
And they were like, no, I can feel it. I can feel my alignment, I can feel I’m doing okay. And I realized that they had integrated this into their whole, that’s the way they are, is that they’re constantly sort of being in that spiraling place of alignment in their body.
And I got to see it on an x-ray, which we don’t get to see when we’re talking about emotional things, right? There was this kind of parallel for me to get that level of trust with things that are not as evident or not physical around ways they’re thinking about things they want to explore, and to trust that all of that is just as valid, if not more than filling out the transcript, we would have filled out for a ninth grade year. Which is also challenging to come up against.
ANNA: It’s so interesting to think about that journey and how when we look at the threads, that piece of who they are with dance, that was there before. And so I think that’s the piece you trusted for them to be in dance six days a week for years, because it was that important to them. And now you see that they’re taking that experience into all these other pieces and all these other realms. And then their ability to be able to say, to know that I can ask my questions, I deserve for somebody to talk to me and answer my questions.
That’s just really powerful at 13 years old, and I know they’re both like that in different realms. That they have that experience. And I think that is one of the big things that we touch on. That’s a big difference that I see is, I feel like we were talking about it in the network not too long ago of just this kind of adults as authority or the enemy that we kind of structure it that way in our culture. And I think it’s so different when we can have that collaborative relationship between adults and children.
I think everybody’s better off. I feel like that surgeon learned a lot through that experience. And they still may value surgery, because that’s what they do. And they love it. But they learned something. I think having that collaboration just helps everybody involved, no matter what path is chosen.
PAM: I just wanted to bring it back, Lucia, I loved your point about how you could see the results on the x-ray. But it’s just beautiful to recognize that you had that moment, and you could see the intentionality that they were bringing to this whole process, and the choices that they were making, and how that was fitting with who they are as a person through their other choices and activities. But to understand, like you said, for other journeys, and emotional ones, just the different kinds of choices that a person, child or adult, makes in their life, that they are perfectly capable of bringing that same level of intentionality to it.
So that even if we don’t quite understand why they’re making those choices, we’re going to trust it the same as the one that we could more visually comprehend because of its particular circumstances. But to recognize that they are just so friggin capable of that, of being in the world and of choosing how intentional or how deep they want to go with a particular interest, or choice or, I’ve had enough of that. I don’t want to go any deeper, I don’t want to push any harder. I want to quit. That whole piece that is still with intention, that is a choice that they are making.
That is totally there, like you were saying, that authenticity, whatever word one wants to use. I just think that was such a great point. And to recognize the intentionality that they so often bring to things that we can’t see, often we can’t see the impact, again, looking back is easier as well. But yeah, I love that piece.
ERIKA: It’s such a beautiful example of that. And I feel like our kids who have grown up with this kind of autonomy and being more in touch with who they are as a different person than we are, I feel like that helps me remember, there’s not one right way. That’s literally what your child told the doctor’s, there’s not one right way, just telling the surgeon, there are going to be other ways to do this, and we’ll figure it out.
And I think it’s such a great reminder when my kids do that, because I think I was so schooled. So, you just get to a point where it feels like, oh, when this happens, you do this. And if this and this, this is the right way to do that. And that’s the right way to do this.
There’s just a lot of peeling back all those layers of expectations, or just feeling like, what are people gonna think? All of these different judgmental parts that we have. I remembered recently, I asked my youngest, are you interested in traveling?
Because in the past, that’s been something that we’ve talked about a lot and really enjoyed as a family. And it seemed like they really liked it too. And the answer was, not right now. And I was like, that is such a great answer that I would not have been able to give at that age. Because it just kind of leaves space to change. I’m not gonna say I’m not a traveler. But right now, I know I’m not in the season where I would enjoy that. And, I’m just like, wow, it just feels like such a more mature response. Your child at the surgeon is a much more mature response than I would have been able to have at that time. I would have been taken over by the authority feeling. So anyway, I think the kids are amazing.
ANNA: Yes. Two other things that came to mind about this whole piece, I’m going to try not to lose them. So one is, this is back to the x-ray and being able to see it, but not always being able to see it, whatever the journey for them is. And I think it’s just important to say out loud that we may never see it, we may never see the actual x-ray, right?
Sometimes we can look back and we can see the threads. And we can see how that really led into this developmental piece. But sometimes we’ll never see it because we’re different human beings, we’re never going to be inside of them. And I think that can, again, feel scary, or it can feel kind of exciting, to know there is this person on their own journey, and I trust their journey. But that can be tricky. So that stuck out for me.
And then the other piece you said about how people recognize, oh, they’re so self aware and easy to talk to. And then where are they going to school? Or what is their next step? It just reminded me, so you know, I work with a lot of adults and couples and I just wish people could understand that piece that you’re talking about. That’s the reason why they’re coming to seek help in their 40s and 50s. And 30s is because they don’t have it.
It’s not because they didn’t go to school, or they didn’t have the career, they did all those things that they were supposed to do. But they can’t figure out, who’s who am I? What is my voice? What matters to me?
And so for me, these kids that we see, because I mean, we’ve been at this for almost 30 years now, Pam, these kids that we see growing up in this lifestyle and moving on, that is the piece that they have, even through the bumps, and even through the maybe not figuring it out, or tough times, because it’s hard to become an adult and figure out all the things. It’s not that it’s without bumps.
But they do have that core sense of who they are, they do have this sense of, yeah, I can ask people for things, I deserve to have that collaboration. It is just such a different feel. Go ahead, Pam.
PAM: Yeah, so what bubble, they know who they are. And tying back to what Erika said, they know they can change. Yes, that they aren’t static. I know who I am. And this is static. And now everything that happens around me, I must measure against that vision of myself, and respond that way. No, that they have a sense of who they are, and a sense of how they can change, that that change isn’t bad, or wrong, or that who I was two years ago is now wrong, because I see things differently.
LUCIA: Without that, I feel like I was so oriented, like Erika, I was very well schooled in how I was being observed, how I was being interpreted, how I was being identified, and then identified with those identifications. I’m this, I’m that. And so really feeling this pressure to be that and always falling short of that.
And then seeing kids who just have no relationship to that. It’s like it doesn’t exist. It’s so weird. And I can feel it. I felt it. It’s so easy to see with the ballet piece, because you’re going to talk about something where you’re just looking at a mirror all day, right? How do you escape that? And it’s not that they’re not aware of the toxicity around ballet and dance. And that’s why they don’t want to do it professionally.
But they are an unbelievably gifted dancer, their musicality and technique, combined with the amount of hard work that they want to put into it is astounding. It’s hard to not go, but you could be that, everybody thinks you’re that. If it were me, that’s all I ever wanted was to actually be that good, right? And to realize, oh, wow, that’s what they don’t have, which is why they love it.
Why half the days they wake up and they’re like, I love my life. Instead of just what I remember is just the pain of being inadequate. And everybody’s going to experience that no matter what kind of life you grow up in.
But that’s not inadequacy is not the central driving force to overcome. It’s amazing to watch. It’s amazing to be around people who are not oriented to an external reflection of who they are, I guess. That’s what I would like to speed up for myself.
ERIKA: Well, this has been so much fun. And thank you so much, Lucia, for joining us. We hope everyone enjoyed the conversation and maybe had an aha moment or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey.
And if you enjoy conversations like these, I really do think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the different things we encounter in our unschooling lives. So we invite you to check it out and see if it fits with our free month offer. You can find the link in the show notes or you could just go to livingjoyfully.ca and the link is right on the homepage. So thanks for joining us and we’ll see you next time!
EU406: Foundations: Open and Curious
Apr 09, 2026
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Open and Curious.
Open and curious is a helpful mindset shift for navigating relationships and challenges. In this week’s episode, we dive into Pam’s mantra and some of the many ways that it has proven to be so valuable in our lives. Being open and curious takes us back to beginner’s mind and allows us to see possibilities and question limiting beliefs that no longer serve us.
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
How does it feel to think about being open and curious about the people in your life? What do you discover through that lens?
Try being open and curious while navigating a conflict this week, rather than jumping right to the solution you have in mind. What felt different?
Think about something in your life that you’re feeling stuck around. What bubbles up when you approach it with openness and curiosity? What other possibilities exist?
Next time you’re judging something your partner or child is choosing to do as “bad,” play with the question “Who would I be without this perspective? What would I do instead? How would that feel?”
TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. Thanks so much for joining us as we explore relationships, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
If you’re new to the podcast, we encourage you to go back and listen to the earlier episodes. We started with some foundational relationship ideas and have really enjoyed how they’ve been building upon one another. And if you’ve already been enjoying the podcast, we’d love it if you could leave a rating and a review. That definitely helps new people find us.
In today’s episode, we’re gonna talk about being open and curious. This is something you will hear us say a lot. I first heard about it from Pam and I find myself saying it daily at this point. When you think about the opposite, it’s being closed and disinterested, so it’s pretty easy to see why we both love it.
I don’t want to move through the world feeling closed and disinterested, and it definitely doesn’t help us solve problems or to connect with the people around us.
Being open and curious serves us in our relationships on a lot of different levels. When we’re open and curious about our partner, we want to understand them, what’s important to them, why they see things the way they do. We want to set aside any judgment and really lean into connecting with the person in front of us.
When I find myself not understanding something they did or said, I can remind myself to be open and curious about it, to not jump to conclusions, to not write a story, like we were talking about last week.
That gives us the best chance to avoid a misunderstanding. And part of being curious is asking questions and listening.
PAM: Yeah. I love this so much. I have found open and curious to be such a helpful lens to bring to my relationships. For me, it’s a quick way to get to beginner’s mind, which is a place where I don’t feel like I have to know the answers, and I’m just curious to learn more. I often feel a sense of wonder and a childlike energy when I can get there. And it’s not childish. Childlike. There’s a big distinction.
So, when I’m open and curious, I’m attentive and I’m interested in hearing new ideas and new perspectives. I want to learn how the other person is seeing things. I want to learn what they’re interested in and why it lights them up. And, of course, that doesn’t mean forgetting about who I am.
To me, beginner’s mind is about understanding that the world is richer than just my story. My story, the one I tell about myself, is definitely a vibrant thread, but it also weaves alongside the stories of the other important people in my life. And it reminds me that their story is theirs to tell and I want to listen. I want to know them, not my version of them.
And to take that metaphor just one step deeper, being open and curious reminds me to explore the tapestry of my life, which includes the people I love and care about, not just the thread of my story, thinking it’s the one right way to move through the world. It’s a tapestry of unique people and stories that weave together to create the bigger picture of my life, which leads us nicely into the next aspect that we wanted to talk about, doesn’t it?
ANNA: It does. Because being open and curious also really serves us when there’s a conflict. So often, when we find ourselves in a conflict, we have in our mind the right answer, how this needs to resolve for me to be satisfied. And unfortunately, It just rarely works out the way we plan.
If we come into the conflict pushing our agenda as the only way, we put the other person on the defensive and we end up spending a lot of time defending ideas back and forth, really rarely hearing the other person’s perspective at all. And if we come into the disagreement with this open, curious mindset that we’re talking about, we aren’t abandoning our ideas, like you said, we’re just remaining open to hearing the other person’s perspective.
That energy is felt by the other person, and then they are so much more likely to join us on the journey to understand and figure out options. We’re going to be committed to finding something that works. We’re going to get there faster by remaining open and not tunneling in on our one perspective or idea or what the fix should be.
PAM: I know, for me, when I first heard the advice years ago to listen to my partner, it made so much sense. So, when we were navigating a conflict, I listened. But eventually I realized I was still holding tightly to my right answer, and my listening was mostly focused on picking up the pieces that aligned with my solution, right? Everything else just kind of flew by. I truly wasn’t hearing their perspective. I wasn’t hearing their story. I was only taking in what I thought I could use to support my agenda or my solution, that tunnel vision that you mentioned.
And unsurprisingly, we often ended up at an impasse that way. Each person trying their best to defend and convince the other that their interpretation of the situation and their proposed solution is a right one. Our conversations were energetically draining and steeped in a power dynamic that definitely strained our relationship.
So, once I came to recognize what was happening, I chose to instead try to bring an open and curious mindset with me into our conversations. How are they seeing the situation? What parts of it feel important to them? What parts feel especially challenging to them? Does that make sense alongside what I know about them as a person, all the things we talked about way back in episode three that make them the unique person they are, their personality, their strengths, their weaknesses, sensitivities, all those pieces?
And in these more open conversations, with defensiveness down and curiosity up, there was space for me to share my thoughts and perspectives, not with the energy that this was the solution, but as more information to consider. And without that grasping and no longer feeling like the only choices we have are their initial solution or mine, we could often find a third or a fourth or a fifth path forward right through the situation that took each of our perspectives and needs into consideration.
So, it turns out that open and curious mindset not only gave me the space to learn more about what was going on, it also gave me more space to get creative in finding a solution that worked for everyone involved.
The process is like a muscle that gets stronger with practice. With each experience, where shifting to being open and curious helped us creatively navigate a challenge or a conflict, it became a bit easier to shift the next time, and then the next. Over time, I found myself shifting more quickly from defending myself to trusting that we could find a way through together. Being open and curious just helps me in so many ways, in so many situations with so many people.
ANNA: Oh my gosh, yes. I see it in so many different ways and I feel like it’s one of those tools we can cultivate that gives us something to do instead of taking things personally when we’re in a conflict. And that is so key when we want to navigate those conflicts with more ease and connection.
And this idea is also really important if we find ourselves stuck or with some limiting beliefs. Often this involves outside voices or some cultural constructs that maybe aren’t serving us. And if we bring that open and curious mindset to it, we can start asking questions. Where are these ideas coming from? Are they serving me? Who would I be without them? What other options can I find?
But we can only get there if we open up our minds beyond the parameters that are being applied to us by forces that don’t know who we are or what’s important to us. This allows us to start questioning these societal constructs. So, if I’m in a job that I don’t love, why am I still here? What’s stopping me from leaving? What would life look like if I made a different choice? How would that feel?
And also things we view as “have tos”. We talked about this a few episodes ago as well. We can start to question those have tos. And being open and curious allows that exploration to move us away from things that aren’t serving us, the things we’ve just accepted even if we don’t like the way they feel. “Relationships should be this,” you know, “School looks like this,” “Being successful looks like that.”
All these ideas are worth questioning, especially if we’re wanting to live our best life, a life where we can truly thrive.
PAM: Yeah. When we realize that we can question everything, that we can be open and curious about all the possibilities, I swear it just feels like the whole world opens up. I feel so much lighter. And it’s fun that you mentioned that. One of my favorite thought experiments is to play with the opposite perspective to see how it feels, particularly when I’m feeling stuck or frustrated.
So, say the story I’m telling myself is, I hate that my kid wants to play video games all the time. In my head, it’s fascinating to explore the question, “Well, what if I was a person that loved that my child is excited to play video games all the time?” So, being open and curious means letting the likely immediate reaction of listing all the reasons I think that’s a silly perspective just float on pass, because that’s definitely not being open and curious, and then just noticing what comes up next. How would I feel in those circumstances when I saw my child happily playing?
Well, I think I’d be happy too, because I like this. I’d probably have a big smile on my face.
And then I was like, okay, so then what would I do? If this was something I loved and I was excited about, I’d probably join them, sitting with them, and watching them play. I’d listen attentively to what they shared. And they’d probably be really happy that I’m showing an interest in something that they really enjoy. I’d cheer with them when they beat the boss or finished the level or solved a vexing puzzle, and we’d celebrate together.
So, I have that vision in my head, and then maybe it would occur to me to ask myself, so what’s wrong with that? It sounds like I’d be seeing their game playing through their eyes, which definitely helps me better understand who they are. And it sounds like a very connecting thing to do, which is something that I want to do. So, when I play with that thought experiment, so often I discover that things aren’t as bad as I imagined them to be on the other side. And I can ask myself, why was I holding on so tightly to my fear and judgment of the thing?
It’s just a great tool for me when I’m feeling stuck around what often turns out to be a conventional message that I’ve absorbed, that once I take some time to play with it and dig a bit deeper into it, I discover it really doesn’t make so much sense to me in my life in this moment.
ANNA: Exactly. And I think it’s so interesting that we can find ourselves defending and enforcing ideas because we think we’re supposed to, yet, when we choose to examine them, we find they don’t serve us or our relationships at all. And that open and curious mindset allows us to tune into ourselves and evaluate ideas related to who we are and how we want to move through the world.
Another time I use this idea a lot is when something bad happens, especially something that I might initially label as bad. Instead I can say, hmm, I wonder what’s going to happen here. I wonder what’s coming next. I don’t have to have all the answers. I don’t know all the things.
So, being curious allows me to look for new directions around things that might first be considered roadblocks. I don’t want to be shut down by what happens to me and around me. And the fastest way for me to avoid a spiral is to start asking questions and look at the issue with a wider lens, not jump into the judgment about it.
PAM: Yeah, that makes such a big difference. When you can just know that there are other possibilities. We talked about that tunnel vision, and we can especially feel that when something is going wrong or bad around us and we can get really fixated and pulled into that. But when we can take a step back to start asking questions around it and just looking a little bit bigger picture, that really keeps the possibilities bubbling.
ANNA: Right, and I think it’s related to the things we’ve talked about with time. There’s plenty of time. Because that’s the other thing. You feel the expansiveness of that open curious mindset. So, when something happens, instead of locking in and the judgment, you can feel that expansiveness of, hey, I can take a few minutes to kind of look at this from the wider perspective. So, I like those inner things that we can find energy shifts, because that’s what can help us move through any of these challenges, bumps, conflicts, whatever, with a little bit more ease.
PAM: Exactly. The energy is the whole thing, because the energy is, is ours, but it’s also the energy that we’re bringing to our interactions with everybody around us. It’s so helpful.
ANNA: So, here are some questions you might want to ponder as you explore the idea of being open and curious this week. How does it feel to think about being open and curious about the people in your life? What do you discover through that lens?
Number two, try being open and curious while navigating a conflict this week, rather than jumping right to the solution you have in mind, and then look at what felt different. How did that change how that conflict played out?
Think about something in your life that you’re feeling stuck around. What bubbles up when you approach it with openness and curiosity? What other possibilities exist that maybe you didn’t see at first?
And next time you’re judging something your partner or child is choosing to do as bad, play with that question. Who would I be without this perspective? What would I do instead? How would that feel?
So, hopefully you’ll take some time to think about those questions and about what an open and curious mindset could bring to your life. And we really appreciate you listening and being here with us today, and we will see you next time.
PAM: Yes! Bye.
EU405: A Field Guide: Choosing Unschooling
Mar 26, 2026
Welcome to a new series on the podcast that we’re calling A Field Guide, in which we’re working our way through Pam’s book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
We’re using the chapters of the book as monthly themes in the Living Joyfully Network, which is bringing everything top of mind for us, and got us excited to share our thoughts here on the podcast as well.
The book, framed around the hero’s journey, is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from Pam’s unschooling journey. The monomyth of the hero describes an individual who somehow stumbles upon clues to a truth that lies outside of conventional belief, and begins a quest—physical, spiritual, or both—to understand and eventually embody that truth as their new way of life.
Sound familiar? Unschooling unquestionably lies beyond today’s conventional wisdom around learning, parenting, and childhood. And through our journey to understand unschooling, we will learn and grow and change as we come to embrace this new lifestyle. It’s an inner, or spiritual, journey and, by the end, we will see our ordinary world in a new and extraordinary way. And while no two journeys are the same, there are similar stages and characters that you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey. This is where a field guide shines.
In this first episode, we’re talking about the initial phase of the journey: Choosing Unschooling. We talk about the initial call to unschooling, which looks different for different families. We also explore what it looked like to find our guides along this path, describe the threshold guardians we may meet as we cross the threshold into the world of unschooling, and share what it was like to find ourselves in the metaphorical “belly of the whale.”
It was a fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone, I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and I am joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both. And today we are starting a new series on the podcast called A Field Guide.
So that means we will have these episodes being released alongside our ongoing foundation series and our journey conversations with other unschooling parents and any other ideas that bubble up for us along the way. We definitely like to go with the flow that way. For this series we’re going to be working our way through my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
We’re also working through it in the network, our online community, which is bringing everything top-of-mind for us and got us excited to share our thoughts here on the podcast as well. So the book, it’s framed around the hero’s journey. It’s a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my unschooling journey.
The monomyth of the hero describes an individual who somehow stumbles upon clues to a truth that lies outside of conventional belief and begins a quest, physical, spiritual, or both, to understand and eventually embody that truth as their new way of life. So, I think that probably sounds familiar to most of our listeners. Unschooling unquestionably lies beyond today’s conventional wisdom around learning and parenting and childhood.
And through our journey to understand unschooling, we will learn and grow and change as we come to embrace this new lifestyle. It’s an inner or spiritual journey and by the end we will see our ordinary world in a new and extraordinary way. My body is full of goosebumps right now.
Anyway, as I explain in the book, we’re calling this series a field guide. That’s in the title because while no two journeys are the same, there are similar stages and characters that you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey. In this episode, we’re talking about the initial phase of the journey, which I call choosing unschooling, and the first stage is the call to unschooling.
So our journey begins in the ordinary world. I think most of us grew up absorbing the conventional messages around learning that kids have to go to school because that’s where the trained teachers are and to learn something they need to be taught. The call to unschooling is the moment when we catch a glimpse of this new and mysterious world, that world of unschooling, and all of a sudden our ordinary world looks a little bit different, maybe a little less tolerable.
And what I find interesting is that it doesn’t mean that we’ve never heard of it before. You may have heard the term unschooling or homeschooling in passing, but this time for some reason something has caught our attention and we are curious to learn more. That’s the call, the individual call to unschooling.
ANNA: I love the reminder that each journey is so unique and really each calling to unschooling is so unique. I think sometimes it can be this really organic thing that just kind of unfolds and other times a crisis point brings us to a place of looking around and seeing that message that, like you said, maybe had passed by our view before but we thought it didn’t apply, and now it does.
I think for us our call came very early on when we realized school would not work for our oldest. She was a deep diver from the start and we could just see that she really wouldn’t be served by kind of going backwards into this slower linear progression that someone else defined as learning.
We had never planned to homeschool. I was aware of it. It was big in our area, but it just wasn’t our plan. And as I started my own deep dive, I found all these different methods. I can’t even remember all of them. There were so many books that I read at the time and there were bits of each of them that I thought were interesting, right? But they didn’t really seem to line up with the child I had in front of me.
And then I read John Holt’s book, Learning All the Time, and it was this full-body yes. Not only did it validate what I was seeing in our daughter, but it felt deeply true to me on another level related to David and me and how we learned all the time and how we like to engage with learning in the world and how unique that was, even between the three of us, that ultimately became the four of us.
Our priority was this child who had been through so much, medically, already in her very, very short life because this was probably around three. So, stepping out of the well-worn path really wasn’t an issue for us. Our focus was just on her, on her survival, her thriving, and ultimately it helped us to create an environment where all four of us could thrive, which was, just it was really beautiful.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love thinking back to that beginning when I first heard the word, first heard of the idea. And it’s been fun to hear people on the network also share how they got that first call. I just remember, when Oliver was a toddler and a young kid, when he would see other kids playing, he would avoid them. He wanted to be off to the side looking, to have some distance for safety.
And then, if all the kids are going to do this one thing, or everyone’s doing this, he would go the other way. I was just like, okay, that’s going to be really challenging in school where the whole thing is to get everyone excited to be doing the same thing. If everybody was doing the same thing, he didn’t want to be there.
That has kind of changed over the years. But that was my first little peek into thinking that I don’t know that this is really going to work. And I had this vision of people judging him as not doing the right thing, when to me, he was amazing and perfect and doing everything he needed to do.
And so that was where it began for me. I really was just looking around, in a way that I hadn’t before, for alternatives. And I remember learning about different kinds of homeschooling. We didn’t know quite as much about neurodivergence at that point either. But I understood that I can’t make him do any particular thing, it just wouldn’t work. And so, I was trying to support his interests.
And then when I heard about the idea of unschooling, it was like, oh, okay, people are doing something that’s completely different than anything that I had experienced as a kid. But also that just made so much logical sense to me. And I thought, this kind of life is something that could really work for him.
And then when Maya joined the family, we were already kind of thinking that this was the way we were going to move ahead. And so, it’s interesting to see a lot of us get to some of the same thoughts, but from different angles. I really like that part.
PAM: Yeah, for me thinking back to when my kids were young, I did not even know homeschooling was a thing, that it was legal. So, I was deep in trying to help my eldest work with school. I was actually doing a lot of research around neurodivergent and stuff. And there was not as much as there is today. But that’s where I was exploring and trying to work with the schools to try and create an environment that worked for him. And I was doing a lot of work with teachers and with principals, trying to figure out things that would work for him. We tried another school, etc.
It was finally through that research into neurodivergence, where I found somebody’s article who mentioned homeschooling as an option. I was like, what the heck, and I think it was an American article. And oh my gosh, that quick search to see if that was legal in Canada, is that a thing. And I was doing that research and prep for a meeting with a principal at the private school we had transferred to. And I went and talked to the principal. And she’s like, Oh, yes, we will look at what you brought. And she was amenable. And she’s like, well, we’ll look for ways to work with him. Well, she said, ways to look for his gifts. So I was like, Oh, thank goodness.
And I went home and I thought, well, jeepers, he’s been there for months. If you haven’t yet seen him shine, because that’s what I was looking for, because, for me, seeing how he was at home and how he learned and just how he had so much fun during his days. And then the sharp contrast to who he had to become to marginally get through a school day.
We’re just so different. That’s why I was always trying to help the school because I didn’t know there was another option. So as soon as I learned about it, there was maybe two months between that discovery, and me going up to each of the kids individually and just saying, “Hey, I just learned that you don’t actually have to go to school.” Because I had said that. You have to go to school. Let’s try and figure out how we can make this work? It was my approach for a few years. And then they all said, absolutely. I’d rather stay home.
But yes, that call, I’m still thankful to the principal, just for pointing that out to me that, okay, yes, you’re wanting to work with me, but that what you’re telling me is already telling me that this environment, while better than the public school was not as good as we had at home. Because that’s where I could see those gifts and that shining every single day.
ANNA: You didn’t have to search for the gifts, right? They’re just there and apparent when he’s in an environment where he can thrive.
PAM: Just so bright and amazing and wonderful. And it was like, Oh, we could just do this. That’s cool.
Okay, so then the next stage I called finding our guides, because you’ve chosen to accept the call. Also, I will point out that it is perfectly valid to reject the call. There’s oftentimes when like you were saying, maybe you’ve come across it and thought, that won’t work for us. But this is the point where you’ve chosen it.
So you’ve chosen to accept the call and embark on your unschooling adventure. And at this point, your thoughts naturally turn to the road ahead. You’re fueled with anticipation, you’re more than ready to take your first steps. Sometimes, however, the questions and the fears swirling through our minds threatened to overwhelm us. This is something so different. How will I stay on the right path? Will there be clear signposts to guide me? What if I need help? What can I do?
As with many tales that I’m sure we have all heard, read, been through, watched, etc. When we begin our journey in earnest, a guide appears. You know, when you’re ready, the guide appears, the teacher appears, that is such a common thing. Anyway, so mythologically speaking, guides do tend to be elderly, experienced, think Dumbledore, think Obi Wan Kenobi.
But in a fun unschooling twist, as I looked back, I really discovered that the most important guides for me on my journey were my children. And I think that is such a fun twist. Dumbledore and Obi Wan and those elderly masters and guides have gone through a huge life process to boil down to the essence. Whereas children, they haven’t been inculcated with all the conventional messages like to fit in, etc. And when given the space and the freedom to follow just their human instincts, their curiosity, their joy, their fun, oh my gosh, they just do it. And for me to look at them helped me see what’s possible, right?
What kind of a life we could have and how interesting that is. I just found them to be the most useful guides for me in my journey. Whenever I was getting stuck in my head, it was Oh, go back and hang out with your kids, Pam, go do that for a while. And then things would become so much clearer.
ANNA: As I mentioned earlier, our focus was our daughter, and her survival. How do we create an environment that works for her and then add in her sister after she got here. They were so clearly the guides from the start. And I think it’s like you said, because this process, it’s a lot of unlearning for us as adults. It’s a lot of excavating and peeling off all these ideas that were handed to us.
And I mean, I feel the weight of it, even now just thinking about it. And what I saw with them was a lightness, an excitement about the world, this ability to just explore and take it all in. I think everybody’s seen it in a toddler but it’s there in the five and the seven, the 10 and even the 15 year olds. There is this excitement about the world that I think it’s kind of tamped down, as we try to fit into the path and take that linear path. They really were the guide, because they were the only ones around that really had that organic piece of just following their heart, just being excited about something and going with it and not putting filters over it, which I saw a lot of adults doing, myself included.
I was lucky to meet mentors and fellow travelers along the way that absolutely enriched my journey. I think they helped me understand myself more, maybe put some things into context. Each journey is so unique, but it was helpful to see, to have those fellow travelers. But really, it was the kids that were the real guides, because they just knew what they needed.
And we could see them thriving. And we could see that the environment worked. It was interesting because it not only worked in great times, when we were having fun but it really worked in the hard times too, because that connection, that focus on relationships, that was a big part of our family. It really helped equip us with what we needed to get through those hurdles that life would throw at us. And so it was just really interesting, like you said, it really turned it on its head to think about like, oh, we don’t need the expert.
The clear message for myself was, I don’t know better for someone else, ever. Not my kids, not the neighbor, not my spouse. As soon as I could get there, then I could be more open to really hearing what they know about themselves, what they know about how they want to move through the world. I love turning it on its head and seeing just how much they can teach us.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that. I think that was why I was drawn to Pam’s work at the beginning of my unschooling journey, just because there was so much of that, redirecting my attention back to my children, because that’s what’s happening. The reality of our situation is what they’re interested in and what works for them.
But it was such a huge paradigm shift. I do remember at the beginning, just doing so much reading and maybe it was almost like a search for some guidance, at that time to just be like, this is so different than anything that I have thought about before so different from my experience as a child. And so I had not done much questioning of anything.
I mean, maybe in the back of my mind, but I hadn’t actively been like, what’s bad about school? What’s wrong with this situation? And school was challenging in ways for me too. And so it was just a lot of learning and a lot of just questioning all the things I thought I knew, all the things that I had been told, and just getting a new understanding for myself. And I think I needed to do that. And really read from the experience or listen to the experience of people who had already been questioning this, because it helped me kind of leap forward along in my own thinking.
And then once I did start that process of questioning things, it was very fast. It just made so much sense to me. And it was so fun. My mind was just like, this is so great, things that didn’t quite make sense to me as I was growing up, it was like, oh, yeah, because that didn’t work at all. It was really validating for myself to realize that the environment is so challenging and does not work for most brains.
And so I think, finding people who had already thought a lot about it, and we’re writing about it was really helpful. I’m thinking about John Holt. And I read John Taylor Gatto’s very angry books about education. They were really helpful just to be like, wait a second. It got me pretty fired up. But then moving forward, definitely Pam’s reminders to just look back at your kids, that was the most valuable guide along the way, as we continued our journey.
PAM: Yeah, I feel that, because they’re both sides to it, right? I found wonderful communities of experienced unschoolers, because I needed that so much. I hadn’t even heard of homeschooling, that was how my world opened to the possibilities.
I soaked it in like a sponge, just to see what other people were doing, what their experiences were, how they were approaching things, how they were thinking of things. That was all brilliant, that helped expand my context, expand the possibilities for what I could bring. And then, you were saying, when challenges come, having to go back to my kids or when my mind started spinning and wondering and questioning, and I wasn’t getting anywhere. My kids were my guides, because I could go back to them.
And that’s what was happening in our lives. You’ll hear that through the podcast for years, people are different, who are my kids, my kids aren’t their kids. But go back, if you’re newer, I hope you can go back to the unschooling rules series and the unschooling stumbling block series that we have on the podcast.
Because that can happen nowadays. When you’re first learning about things, when you’re looking to people who have experience, you’re kind of looking for the rules, well, then how should I do this? It’s something completely. How should I do it?
But if you don’t bring that back into your lives, into your kids, into you as a person, those are bound to rub. Somebody’s generic rules about how we do this thing are going to rub because they’re not your people. They’re not your family.
So, when things come up, and we’re looking for guidance, looking to our children, through the lens of the possibilities and things that we are bringing to mind, and we’re thinking about what might work for us, engaging with our kids and seeing it in action. That’s where you really feel the truth of it. So, as guides, when you’re in a tough spot, they’re such a lovely place to go.
Okay, so the next stage of this choosing unschooling phase of our journey, we are now crossing the threshold into the world of unschooling. In many myths, the hero encounters one or more threshold guardians as they cross into the mysterious new world of their story. These guardians are often gatekeepers like Cerebus, the three headed dog of Greek mythology who stands guard at the entrance to the underworld.
So for me, these guardians were things like, family and friends who were pointedly questioning our choice to not send our kids to school. Kind of testing my resolve to leave the ordinary world. And we were speaking of unschooling communities and finding experienced unschoolers. But there are some, at least, at first that seemed rather dogmatic about what unschooling “done right” looks like.
So it felt to me like they were kind of testing my quote worthiness to enter this new world of unschooling. What if that doesn’t seem like something I would ever do? Does that mean I can’t enter this world?
And then there was also navigating the more official guardians, like getting permission to homeschool from our local Board of Education and finding out what those regulations and things were and how to meet those. It was also helpful to find local communities and see how they were doing that as well. So learning those pieces. These can feel like things that are kind of rubbing, they’re getting in the way of us moving into this new world of unschooling.
But moving through them is kind of all part of the process. Learning about those pieces, learning why, why do I still want to do this, even though family and friends, with all the love in the world, are not wanting us to go outside of the ordinary world that they know, and they don’t understand that. So it’s scary for them.
And recognizing the part of the role that I’m playing and giving them that authority to be telling me that. How I’m taking it in versus how they’re sharing the message. Anyway, so yes, the guardians can be very different for different people, depending on where you are. But those were three that I definitely encountered on my journey.
ANNA: Yeah, I think most people probably encounter those. Maybe one is going to weigh heavier than the other. But I think the imagery is really helpful here, because it does provide that bit of separation, it puts us in that analyzing part of our brain where it’s not so emotional. It’s like, oh, look at these guardians. They are giving me some information.
And I think it can help us see that well meaning friends and family members are really just giving us information about who they are, and what’s important to them. And people can be very attached to their paths. And they feel best when they keep everybody on their path, because that’s their validation, right?
Well, if we’re all here on this path, then it must be the right path. People are still in that paradigm. And so I think it just helps us to recognize that it’s not about us, and that we can stay focused on what’s working with our family, just like we were talking about a minute ago, look back at your kids, what do you actually need? And then that big piece of that is trusting that it’s okay if it looks different, that they don’t need to be on our path, we don’t need to be on their path. We don’t have to convince anybody, it’s okay for it to look different for everyone, we’re all learning different things throughout that journey.
For number two, you know, I’m not a big fan of any kind of dogmatic ideas, whether it’s around diet or education or anything else, because we’re so unique, and each journey is so unique. There is not one right way. Okay, maybe I am dogmatic about that, people probably get irritated with me about that! I think the idea that there’s a right way really can feel comforting, I do totally get that, that it feels comforting, but to me it’s just so short-sighted, and the rigidity of it really restricts our growth. That’s what I saw in myself, because I’ve had my dogmatic days, especially when I was younger, and what I saw was that I just shut out so much when I was so focused on there being this one right way to do something. I feel like a whole world opened up when I realized, oh there are lots of different ways to do things. We’re each going to choose what works for us, and then change and pivot and do it again and twirl it around.
It was just so expansive for me, and I loved that expansive feeling, versus feeling like I needed to put myself on rails, to do either unschooling right or something else right. I just really loved that, and so just understanding there isn’t the perfect path, that it’s all growth, it’s all learning, it’s all context, it’s all building our web.
And then just quickly about the laws, I just want to encourage people to really understand the specific laws in their area, so for us it’s States, there’s provinces, you know, all kinds of different ways that it’s handled in different countries, but know exactly what’s there, and I mean read the statutes, because many times these kind of governing bodies will ask for way more than is actually legally required. When you can truly understand the statutes of your area and be able to speak about them, it will help you feel grounded and empowered because you know what we’re dealing with.
I lived in a state where they required annual testing. But when you dig into it, you don’t have to send the test to anyone, you have to keep it on file for X amount of time. There were all these nuances of the specific laws that I was like, oh, okay, we can make this work. It doesn’t have to be timed, you don’t have to do a specific level, and so there were all these different little nuances. And so I loved what you said Pam too about local groups. It does really help, I think, even if a local group may not fit you in all ways, to just check in with them, because they’re navigating those same laws and can help calm you and help you understand what’s really required. They will share some ways to make that work for your family and your specific kids and their brain.
So, just spend a little bit of time with that, because I think it can feel a little shaky if you don’t know that and you don’t know if you’re on solid legal ground. And so just me taking that time helped me feel really confident in any environment that what we were doing was legal and in compliance.
ERIKA: One thing I like about this guardian section is how the different areas kind of require a slightly different approach, but they’re all manageable. Once you wrap your head around what’s going on here. So, for the official stuff, shout out to Nance from Florida unschoolers, she is serving this role for Florida unschoolers, just reminding us of what is required. And it’s not a lot. She runs this big umbrella school that just makes it really easy for families to avoid having to do extra documentation that’s just not required by law.
There are people in every state who have figured things out and are working to look at what’s legally required and making sure that we can do it as easily as we can. And then for those family and friends, I think it’s so unique. I love hearing other people’s stories about this, because there are some difficult families out there with a lot of expectations of their kids and grandkids and people who have been in education their whole lives, and they think they know everything about it. And I think that adds such a layer of difficulty to this.
When you’re facing a guardian that is that intense, and that feels so confident that their information is the right information, it’s tough. Fortunately, for our family, we didn’t really have to deal with much of that at all. And I think just personality wise, I come in with a lot of confidence about what I’m doing.
And so I haven’t really had as many people questioning. But when I hear about people who have those really close family relationships, where it is very intense, and people are thinking this doesn’t feel safe. And I do love going back to just remembering, that’s based on their experience in their life.
And what they’re telling us about our life is really just telling us about themselves. Where they’re feeling judged, or where they’re feeling, well, if what you’re saying is true, it kind of makes everything I believe fall apart. That’s a very scary feeling.
And so people will really hold on tight to these beliefs that they have, like you were saying, Pam, at the beginning, well, you have to go to school. And if that’s not true, then I don’t know, that starts to feel a little scary for some people. How could that not be true? I had to go to school.
This is the belief that everything we do is based around it. It just helps me have a little bit more compassion for them, because it’s too scary for them to be able to go there. But we are each on our own journey. And so that’s okay. It’s okay if it’s different.
And I did come across those dogmatic unschoolers as well at the beginning of my journey. And that’s just another thing that I think it helped me learn, it helped me kind of clarify, what are the things that feel true to me right now? What are the things that I see working for my family right now? There were ideas that I thought, you know, we would never get to that place of like, what they were calling radical unschooling back then.
That sounds like too much. But then over time, the learning and things just naturally evolve where it starts to make more sense than it does at the beginning. But I do think it can be a little scary for unschoolers at the beginning of the journey.
If they see people who are doing things that are just wildly outside of their comfort zone. But I think that’s why I really like the vibe that we have on the network, because it doesn’t feel like that to me. It feels like everybody’s sharing experiences, but there’s no judgment about where you are along the path. I just feel like that kind of support where you can see people doing things differently. But it doesn’t feel like a threat. And I really appreciate that type of environment.
ANNA: Something you said, I just want to jump on real quick and that was that confidence piece, because I really do think that coming into those family environments with just a confidence, just a calm confidence, not an aggressive, I have to convince you confidence, but just a calm confidence makes such a difference.
And I think one of the things that’s really helpful with that is to be a part of community, whether it’s a small group of friends or joining something like the network, where when you have the doubts or the questions, which are going to come up for all of us, you take it there to a group of people that are going to hold it lightly. They are going to let you examine it without the judgment without the fix being, well, put them back in school or put them in their own bed or whatever the thing is. And so, because I think, especially those of us that have good relationships with our family, we came to them with things, we asked them for things, but this may feel outside of their comfort zone.
So just keep that more about connecting with the grandparents or connecting with the aunts and cousins and asking your questions in a place that really knows more about what you’re trying to do. Because it’s not about that there’s an answer or a path, but I just found it so helpful to hear from people that at least had the same priorities that I did, that we’re prioritizing the relationships and we’re prioritizing this path. It feels really different.
And I think that helped me have confidence in those other areas because I didn’t need to be asking them questions about it.
PAM: And you know what, I mean, this is exactly why I was originally inspired to write this book in the first place, as in a field guide, as in our journeys don’t look the same, but chances are there are going to be some challenges when people start to know that we’re not sending our kids to school anymore, right? Some challenges when we start looking for more information. Just understanding that shift that what they’re sharing is, even though the way it’s shared often feels like a judgment of us, actually, it really is all about them and where they are in their journey. And understanding that piece can completely help us shift how we engage with them.
Like you said, we have more compassion for them because we understand, we see through their eyes why they’re thinking this. We don’t feel as much the need to defend because it’s okay, they’re really stuck. I can’t change them. My goal is not to try to change them. If they’re curious, this is a seed that’s planted and they can come and ask questions. So now I don’t get defensive and keep trying to share and convince and tell them I’m right.
It’s like, this is working for our family right now and we’ll see how it goes. We’ll see where it goes. And pass the bean dip.
I don’t need to engage in this conversation because this is about their need. And we know they’re struggling with all sorts of questions. So give them time to process and to choose which questions they want to actually dig into. That was something that really helped me to eventually just not get engaged deeply. It doesn’t mean ignoring them. It means having other conversation starters in my back pocket.
What’s your favorite movie that you saw recently? What are you doing for fun? That was one that I used to love all the time. There are so many other possibilities. But just having a guide to the journey that can let us know these things are popping up. Help us recognize because so often we’re just so busy and stuck in our days. We really don’t have the opportunity to think bigger picture.
Anyway, okay. So our last stage of this choosing unschooling phase of the journey. We have stepped across the threshold. Hi guardians. I embrace you and now I’m moving past you. We are now going to be embracing beginner’s mind. And I will say I love how Joseph Campbell in The Hero’s Journey describes this stage. He writes it as the hero instead of conquering or conciliating the power of the threshold is swallowed into the unknown and would appear to have died.
So, when I first read this book, Hero with a Thousand Faces, when I got really curious about how the unschooling journey fit in, this was years after, right? But oh my gosh, this hit so hard. Being swallowed is a popular image in stories that symbolize a transition, right?
It describes the hero’s figurative death in the ordinary world and their rebirth in the new one. It’s about shedding our preconceptions and assumptions that made sense to us in the ordinary world and embracing beginner’s mind to learn about the new one. This stage is also often described as the belly of the whale, right?
In storytelling terms. And I just found that such an apt metaphor. And the whale comes in all shapes and sizes too, depending on the journey. When I was looking back, I just found it fascinating how well it described what happened for us, which is a long season of cocooning. For us, the whale was definitely our home. I found we spent a lot of time at home as we transitioned away from our ordinary world.
Home felt like a sanctuary for all of us. And it was free from judging eyes for me. And it was a place where the kids could dive into their play with abandon.
But after I read that, I thought from the outside looking in, I definitely can imagine that it kind of looked like we had died, right? But we were very happily cocooning. So for me, approaching these days with a beginner’s mindset helped me release many of the assumptions about children, about learning, about parenting, that I was carrying with me as truth.
This was just the conventional wisdom of what this looked like. But I can now see what they actually look like in our actual lives. And it got me constantly wondering, what if that’s not true? Beginner’s mindset was just a lens or a metaphor for me that really helped me feel more comfortable, just questioning all those pieces. What if that’s not true? I could just play with it, right? It’s not like I had to shift quickly from one strong belief to another strong belief. It was like, ooh, what if that’s not true? And it was just like a mind-blowing season for me.
ANNA: I love that. I think it is this really important process to create that kind of sacred space, especially when you’re leaving something that’s so institutionalized and mainstream to really allow space for everyone to settle in and begin that journey of self-discovery, self-awareness, outside of those institutional models.
Our call came pretty early. So, in terms of how it looked inside and probably to the outside, it was very similar. We just kind of kept doing what we were doing. But I think for me, what struck me as you were talking is that beginner’s mind piece.
I saw that with myself. I may have done my own little withdrawing a little bit, which ended up being a lot of reading, a lot of finding people because of that exact thing that you mentioned. Everything was on the table. I’ve always been a questioner of things, but it’s really discouraged. Which is so ridiculous. It’s critical thinking people, we should not be discouraging it, but it was. And so suddenly I was like, wait a minute. Nobody’s telling me I can’t do it, like they were when I was in school. Nobody’s telling me that I can’t look at all these pieces.
And so I do feel like there was a time where I really just cleared the slate and saidy let’s just start putting everything on the table. Do we really believe this? Do we really need this? Does this really serve me? And honestly, I will say, Pam, we say this a lot, but I kind of feel like I do this every decade or two. I’m doing it again now, in my mid fifties. Are these the things I want? Do I need to do this? Do I need to have these same rules? And so I don’t know. I think that’s a really cool vision to create a little insular space to get all the outside noise quieted down, to see where you are, to see where you want to grow. And we come out of it, right? We come out of those spaces.
PAM: I just want to pop in for one second, because you said like we cycle through this journey over and over. And I will put in the show notes, my image for the journey. And it is a circle because it is not linear: I was in the ordinary world, now I’m totally adjusted to unschooling and that’s the end of that journey. No, this kind of journey, this spiritual journey of self-awareness, et cetera, definitely is a circular thing that recurs. Anyway, thank you.
ERIKA: I love that. And I think it helps us to realize that that’s true, because I think maybe sometimes it’ll feel like a failure if we feel like we’re back at that questioning place again, about anything really. It can be frustrating when it’s like, didn’t I figure this out? Haven’t I already decided who I am? And then now things change. But yeah, I think it’s cool that it is a circle. And we go through many phases in our lives.
And I also love the reminder about beginner’s mindset, because I think that helps everything. It helps for all parts of our lives. But especially for this, and that being in the belly of the whale. I don’t know if from looking outside in, if anybody would have described it that way. I think for me, that feeling was more internal, because so much of my life was about academic achievement, doing really well at the things people wanted me to do.
And so it was really big, it was like a death of who I used to be, realizing a lot of these things. And I would get little reminders of that when I would be around people from older times in my life, who have this view of me that now doesn’t feel like me. And so, yeah, it’s deep, it’s a deep change that feels, it feels big like that.
And then as a side note, every time I read the belly of the whale, it makes me think of in Roblox, those obbies when you end up going in some big mouth. For some reason, I always think of those classic obbies, you always end up for some reason going into some big character’s mouth. So I don’t know, I thought maybe some other parents might have had that similar experience at some point. And I just always get that visual.
PAM: Yes, I think it’s very fun. There are different visuals too. There’s the train. So often, there’s a train journey, think Hunger Games, think Harry Potter off to Hogwarts. There’s always just some sort of metaphor, leaving one life behind and going to a new one, etc. So I find it very interesting.
Thank you very much to everyone listening for joining us. Thank you very much to Anna and Erica. It was an amazing conversation. And we hope you enjoyed our dive into this first phase of the unschooling journey, choosing unschooling.
And we also invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully network to continue the conversation. It really is like we were talking about earlier, about communities that expand the context that introduce questions I never thought of in that way. When we were talking about all the questions that we can put on the tables, maybe some we haven’t even thought that we could revisit yet, and have a place where we can do that without feeling judged.
Anyway, it is a warm and welcoming online community of like hearted parents, a non judgmental space where you can steep in these kinds of unconventional unschooling ideas. And just explore as we were talking about earlier, turning back to our guides what that might look like day to day in your uniquely wonderful family.
And we are very excited to welcome you. To learn more and join us just follow the link in the show notes or go to living joyfully.ca. And you’ll see network right there up in the top menu. We wish everyone a lovely day. Thank you so much.
EU404: Foundations: Stories
Mar 12, 2026
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Stories.
Humans are storytellers. We choose the stories we tell about our lives. In every situation, we can come up with a number of ways to tell the story of it, and they’re all a version of the truth. But we get to choose which version resonates the most with us, which one feels better to us, and then that informs our actions moving forward. Getting curious about the stories we tell can be an amazing form of self-care!
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
What stories are you holding on to about yourself, your partner, and your family?
Where are the stories coming from? From your parents during your childhood? The outside voices of society? Somewhere else?
Do you see the story in your self-talk? How else might you tell that story?
How does it feel to realize that you get to craft your own stories?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are very happy you’re here exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
And in today’s episode, we are going to talk about stories, both the stories we tell ourselves and the stories we assign to other people, meaning what we think they’re thinking. And yes, it can get very messy.
Now, this episode is a bit longer than usual, but we think it’s worth it. Stories are intricately woven into our relationships with the people that we love, and that’s because humans are storytelling animals. It’s how we make sense of our world. In the book The Storytelling Animal, How Stories Make Us Human by Jonathan Gottschall, he wrote, “Story is for a human as water is for a fish – all encompassing and not quite palpable.” I love that so much, because story truly is everywhere. And the language we choose makes a profound difference, because the stories we tell ourselves become our self-talk. That is why we want to be intentional about the language that we’re using.
And what’s really fascinating is that for pretty much any situation, we can come up with a number of ways to tell the story of it and they can all make sense and all could truthfully tell the story of that situation. And the thing to realize is, we get to choose which one resonates most and feels better to us, which then informs our actions moving forward, which calls back to our conversation in episode seven about how every moment is a choice. Stories and choice are woven together so well, aren’t they?
ANNA: Oh my gosh. So much. For me, truly understanding the role of story has been so pivotal. That awareness allowed me to step back and observe, so, where’s this story coming from? Does it feel real to me and who I am in this moment? Is it serving me? And if I’ve held onto it for a long time, why? Why have I held onto that story? And who would I be without it? That’s one I love to think about. Who would I be? What would it feel like?
Because there’s an energetic feeling to that. What do I feel without this story that I’m telling about myself or these people in my life? And those questions really can only come about once you take off the veil and realize that everything is a story. Then I get to dive in and have these questions. And through the questioning, I can hone in on what is really working for me.
And then I can start to change my story to be more reflective of me as the person I am now, the person I want to be moving forward. And I could see the role of story more clearly and use it as a tool instead of being held hostage by it, which is kind of how it felt before.
And for me, like you said, language is such a big piece of that. I try to be so intentional about my language that I use, whether I’m defining some kind of big event or a very simple task in front of me, because in that language is choice. I’m developing the story that informs my day and tells others who I am. And so, that piece is so critical to me, just seeing it for what it is. And then, how do I want to create my narrative? What language do I want to use to describe it? I like thinking about it.
PAM: Yeah. And once you see the scope of it, it’s incredible, because it’s not only the stories that we’re telling ourselves, but it’s understanding that the stories we’re telling others about ourselves and about our lives is the picture that they’re going to draw from. That’s where they’re going to meet us.
So, first, let’s look at our self-talk, at our inner voice. Sometimes we don’t think we have control over our self-talk. It just appears in our head, the words over and over and over when we’re spiraling over something, right? But we truly can change that over time as we make intentional changes to the language that we use and the stories we tell ourselves.
It is worth taking the time to listen to our self-talk a bit more objectively, to just ask ourselves, is this a helpful story for me?
ANNA: Right, because we have the self-talk, and we don’t think we can change it. I think that’s something I believed when I was younger. It’s hard to change or we’re given this story that it’s hard, but I think we may assign it more importance than perhaps serves us. So, I love the idea of really diving into that, because self-talk is just an aspect of our story. It’s no different. It’s no more powerful. And it’s not this boogeyman that it’s kind of made out to be.
And sometimes our self-talk is the stories that have been handed to us, perhaps by our parents or past relationships. And what’s so important there is to realize that the stories they told, even if the story is about us, is their story. It’s not ours and we don’t have to take it in and own it. It’s about them, where they were at the time, the stories that perhaps they were handed.
And so, that’s the thing, right? We can just keep continuing to hand down these same stories or we can take control of our own narrative. We can look at who we really are and what’s actually in front of us, and then write a story that lifts us up, because that helps us be the person that we want to be and it will inform our next steps in a given situation. And I think that’s what’s so important about it. That’s how insidious stories are. When we carry these stories from someone else, they change our energy and then they inform our next steps, and it keeps us on this same narrow path.
But at any moment, we can take back the reins. We can examine the stories that we’re clinging to and we can make choices because yes, Pam, it’s always about choices with me. We’re going to keep bringing that up.
PAM: Yes. Definitely. I love the point about realizing that the stories other people are telling about us, especially the stories we grew up with, are just somebody else’s perspective. It’s their story. So, maybe we’ve absorbed the story that we’re too sensitive, or we’re scared to try new things, or we’re very shy. That isn’t our story. It’s their story about us. And we get to choose our own story.
Speaking of, it’s also helpful to realize that goes both ways. So, for example, take a moment to consider the stories we’re telling our partner about our day. Maybe we’re more likely to take it as an opportunity to vent. “I am so tired,” or, “So many things went wrong today.” Is that what I want to convey? What will their view of my day look like from my story? Maybe that I’m so tired because I was busy having fun playing with the kids, or deep in the flow of working on a favorite project or knocking a bunch of those tasks off my to-do list.
Maybe more things unusual went wrong today precisely because I was working a to-do list that was filled with those iffy jobs, and I got them done in the end. But how will they see my day through my venting words? Probably not as the ultimately satisfying day that I saw. So, understanding that the stories I tell, big and small, live on in the world reminds me to be more intentional. Now that doesn’t mean not venting, but maybe prefacing it with a quick qualifier. Like, “My day was great. I just want to vent about a couple of things.”
It means considering who I’m speaking with and choosing my language to better convey the meaning of my story. Is what I’m saying true? Is it how I want to be seen by others? What do I need or want from the conversation? Because stories are the lifeblood of communication.
ANNA: Yes. And I think it’s interesting, too, thinking about that. What do I want to get from this story? Because if we do come at our partner with all the things that have happened in the day and then they come back trying to solve things and really we’re like, “Wait a minute, it’s just a story we’re telling about how we had these tough things,” you know? So, keep all that in mind. It’s the lifeblood of communication. I don’t think that’s an overstatement. I think that’s really so true.
And so, keeping in mind that others will see our story through their lens, what they know, and that’s okay. Understanding that helps us put their comments or reactions into perspective as well. Back to everyone is different. We see and experience the world differently.
PAM: Yes. And that is absolutely a wonderful thing. We have control over our stories and what pieces we choose to share and how we choose to share. Understanding that other people come to conversations with their lens, too, so, not expecting them to fully understand what it looks like through our eyes and not even expecting them to even be curious to understand. We can’t control where they are on their journey.
Now, I also want to talk about the stories that we assign to other people, because so often we tend to assume the worst story. For myself and many others that I’ve spoken with, when we’re feeling disconnected from someone or they react negatively to something we’ve said or done, the story we immediately tell ourselves is that we did something wrong, but often that really isn’t true.
It’s so helpful to remember that, when we’re thinking about what someone else is thinking, that is a story that we’re making up. No matter how well we know them, we still don’t know for sure. So don’t assume that the first story that we jump to is the same story that they see.
ANNA: Yes. So often, we find ourselves putting words into people’s heads, and we will actually play out the scenarios till the end without the other person involved at all. “They’re upset with me. I did something wrong. They don’t like what I’m doing,” whatever the words were saying. Even, “They’re trying to hurt me. Their actions are intentional towards me.” So often, we get that very wrong. We really don’t know what’s happening in another person’s head.
I have a friend that will honestly just create entire movies and the challenge with that is, it doesn’t leave room for anything else. Once you’ve created a story for someone, you start acting from that place with that energy. So, if you’ve ever had one of those dreams where it’s so real, your partner has done something terrible and really upset you, and you wake up and you’re still super mad and they’re going like, “What is happening? I just woke up. I don’t know what you’re talking about!”
But it’s the same when we create a story. We can buy into that energy and bring that energy to the person and they have no idea where it’s coming from. But instead, if we can first assume positive intent, second, we can ask questions and leave space and remain open, then the person’s free to share what they’re actually feeling. And so often, it does not come close to the stories that we’re making up.
So, I have a friend and a while back, she shared a story and she didn’t share it as a story. She shared it as a fact. She said that her husband didn’t find her attractive. And she said, “He actively avoids even touching me when we walk each other past each other in the hall.” And I was like, “Oh, wow. Have you talked to him about that?” And she was like, “Well, no.” And then when she did, she found the complete opposite was true. He was trying to be respectful of her space. So, he felt by moving aside in the hall, he was showing respect for her space and honoring her.
And so, then they had this conversation around what would feel good to each other and how they want to move forward. And it’s very different now. But she had been telling that story for years and he had no idea. That’s just how insidious these stories are. And I think it’s just really worth examining the stories that we put on others, even when we feel it’s justified, even if we think we know them so well, even if we’ve held onto these stories for years. Conversations are so important. Being open and curious. Leave space for people to tell us who they are. Pre-writing a detailed story does not.
You can feel that closed energy when you come in with this pre-populated story and it’s so disconnecting. Even some light inquiry can shed light on what’s really going on and give space for each person to share their perspective. And then we can understand where the communication broke down in the first place and why maybe we’re seeing it differently, but that won’t happen if we stay in our head creating stories. That will only happen with that choice of connection and that choice to have some conversations.
PAM: Yeah, sometimes I can get stuck in a really negative story about someone else, and I just don’t feel confident enough to ask about it yet or bring it up. But when that happens, I found it helpful to just remind myself that it’s a story and then start to play with that. How else might this story go? What about this? Does that fit? Maybe this? So, once I think of a few other things, even if they seem outlandish to me right now, I realize that there isn’t just one possible story. It wasn’t just the one thing that I was clinging to and being upset about. That lightens things up for me.
And usually, when I’m feeling lighter, now I can get curious. Which one is it? I want to know now. And then usually I can get to the space, the energy, where it doesn’t feel so heavy and I can actually bring up the conversation with them. I can actually go, “Hey, what about this? What did that feel like to you?”
On the flip side, moving through that process over and over helped me realize that I really don’t know what’s going on in another person’s life that has led them to make whatever choice it is that they made. That’s their story, their truth. That’s been a very helpful discovery on my journey around stories, just that realization that these are stories. My story, their story, it’s their truth in the moment. And that is just enough. I can be curious then. It reminds me that there are multiple ways that things can go.
ANNA: Right. And there are just always more layers, I think, to peel back on our stories, which kind of leads nicely to this last bit we wanted to talk about. We get to choose the stories we tell. And we touched on this back a bit back in the choices episode, but I want to bring it up again. We choose the stories we tell about the big things like our childhood and the little things like the grocery store. And in every situation, there are things that are easier and harder, that work or don’t work. But we can choose to focus on those aspects that make sense and feel better to us.
For any situation, we can come up with a number of ways to tell the story of it, and they all make sense in the context of the activity, the situation, the people involved, and they can all truthfully tell the story. But now, we get to choose which one resonates the most with us, which one feels better to us, which then informs our actions moving forward. That’s the power of story.
PAM: Right. Especially in more challenging situations, it’s so valuable to take a moment to not just jump in with the first story that comes to mind, which is usually fear-based. And it’s usually the worst one, the worst interpretation of things. And if we just stick with that one, we can get tunnel vision and start spiraling downward in our fears. We can get really stuck there if we only see this one worst interpretation of the situation in front.
So, instead, take that moment to come up with a few more stories that align with the situation. If we don’t take the time to consider other stories, we’re not really making a meaningful choice moving forward, are we? You can’t choose between one thing. And choosing more positive stories, ones that feel better to us, isn’t about avoiding the truth, because the different stories all incorporate the facts. But for me, choosing the more positive story is really a form of self-care.
Instead of telling myself over and over the versions that make me feel bad, that weigh me down, that pull me into that tunnel vision, I can tell myself the versions of the story that both make sense and feel better. Because from there, I’m in a more open and curious and receptive mindset, a place where I can now see more opportunities. I can be more creative in choosing my next step and my next moment is truly better. And I find myself then starting to spiral upwards, moving through it, rather than spiraling down and crashing and just feeling crushed.
ANNA: And getting stuck! So, my oldest daughter and I talked about this so many times over the years, because she is a master storyteller. And, I mean, it’s a gift. It is a gift that she has and it is amazing. But sometimes, it gets the better of her, because sometimes she can spin this really intricate story about someone else or about a situation, and it ends up making her feel terrible. But in the end, it’s just a story. We’re making it up in our heads.
And I think once I realized that, I decided, if I’m going to make up a story, I’m going to make up a story that feels good, one that helps me feel connected, that helps me move forward as the person I want to be, which is exactly what you’re talking about.
So, I want to examine if my story spirals me into a place of being stuck, or if my story is lifting me. I may not understand all the pieces, but I can feel okay about the situation if I look at it this way, and that helps me move forward as the person I want to be. And like we’ve talked about before, there are situations sometimes where I can get some clarifying information so that I can get a more accurate picture, because maybe there’s someone else involved and I can stop putting words in their mouth and actually figure it out.
But other times, like you said, it really isn’t even possible. When it’s not possible, I just always want to choose the story that feels better, because it’s just as likely to be true as the one that doesn’t. And so, I’m just wasting the time in this moment feeling bad about something when I really don’t even know the full story. And so, that’s why I love that you tied it into self-care, because that’s exactly what it is. It really is just this intentional choice to look at what’s in front of me and find a story that feels good.
And again, it’s not about pushing the other things aside. It’s not about pretending that things didn’t happen or changing the story. It’s just intentionally using language that makes me feel good about what’s happening around me. So, for me, if it’s a particularly challenging or difficult situation, it’s not about pretending that the difficult situation didn’t happen, but I look for, how have I moved through it? Look at the amazing support I’ve received from the people around me. Look at how loved I am because they’ve helped me through this situation. Look at what I’ve learned about myself from it.
Whatever the situation, I can always find a way to frame it to use what can be a challenging situation to make myself feel better and to move forward from there. And so, that’s also an empowerment piece, knowing that I can turn these situations that can completely derail me into situations that just boost me forward and allow me to be around the people that I love and to connect with the people that lift me up.
PAM: Yes. And another layer that I think would be helpful for people to peel back, and I am still peeling this layer back, but, why is our tendency to take on that weight? Why does it feel like the more positive spin or the silver lining is it cheat? It really is not. And we can do that work to peel back those layers and to realize that these are all stories, they are all versions of the truth. They could absolutely all be true.
ANNA: And I think this part is related to the stories handed to us by society. Things like, life is suffering. Only hard work pays off. Relationships are hard. And so, when you find this cheat, you’re like, “Wait a minute. Maybe it doesn’t have to be this hard. Maybe I can be enjoying it,” but then you might try to stop yourself. Like, “What? But we’ve been told that forever!”
But no, set that aside, because we don’t have to make situations more difficult. There’s going to be plenty of things in life to work through, but when you can find joy, when you can switch that focus, see the light, find the gifts in the situation, life is just so much more enjoyable. But we do have to shed some of those stories from society, some of those stories from even other people in our lives, in order to create what feels good for us.
PAM: Yeah, I love that. I mean, “Life is hard.” Don’t we hear that all the time? But then, if we tell a different story, the reaction can often be like, “Well, you’re a Pollyanna. You’re not seeing the truth.” Another story. Right? It is just so useful to work through all of that.
Now, you and I have both heard, “You guys are always so positive,” and people think it’s weird at first, which is okay, because it’s part of the process of peeling back those layers and understanding that our stories are ours to tell and there’s more than one way to tell the story. We don’t always have to take the negative, life-is-hard bent on it.
ANNA: Right. And the reason I’m telling the story is for me. It’s not to put on a show or make anything look different for somebody else from the outside. It’s because it helps me be the person I want to be.
It helps me in my relationships. I remember one time somebody said to me, “I get it now. I get that you’re not just a Pollyanna about life. It’s that it helps you have these relationships. It helps you move through these situations.” And I’m like, “Yes, that’s absolutely it.” I’m not thinking about anybody else’s reaction to me choosing joy or finding light in a moment, because that’s my internal work.
Now, I’m understanding that it can come across that way as people are listening to it, but I’m like, “Oh, no, no, no. This is just a tool.” It’s a tool that helps me connect with people. It helps me move through my days in a way that feels better to me. And it’s just a choice. And I think if somebody wants to play around with it, they can see how it feels for them, too.
PAM: Exactly. Exactly. And I find it helps me be more creative. It helps me come up with more possibilities. And that’s the thing. You can try it out for a while and you see how it goes. And I do suspect you’ll start to see things that wouldn’t have happened in the other mindset.
ANNA: Yeah, it’s really true. And I do think it’s so interesting and we definitely get feedback about that.
I mean, I definitely get that. “You’re always looking on the bright side!” And I’m like, I feel all the things, but it’s just, again, those stories we create, it impacts how we move forward. It impacts how we see all the things around us.
So, let’s talk about some questions you might want to ponder for this week as you explore the idea of stories. First, what story are you holding onto about yourself, your partner, and your family? And that’s a lot. So, that one may take a few minutes, because we have stories that have been handed us from childhood and on. So, there’s a lot of stories there.
Where are the stories coming from, from your parents during childhood, from outside voices of society, somewhere else? Identifying where, I think, is so key to realizing and taking your power back there, to realize, I don’t need to own their story. That story’s not about me at all.
And so, do you see the story in your self-talk and how else might you tell that story? Self-talk again, it’s kind of this bugaboo that we’re unsure about. How do we change it? But I think the first step, don’t you think, is just identifying it, just recognizing it as a story.
PAM: Yes. Recognizing it as a story and, like in the previous question, where did that story come from? Is it really my story or is it something that I’ve absorbed over the years? It’s someone else’s view that I’ve adopted because they can really feel like that’s our story, That’s our self-talk, because we should be more productive, we should be efficient. “I should be able to do this quickly,” or, “I shouldn’t be so sensitive.” There are just so many stories that we’ve absorbed over time that are really somebody else’s view. And to check in and start asking ourselves and see, well, does that make sense to me? Do I feel sensitive all the time? What’s wrong with being sensitive? There are just so many questions and layers do with that.
ANNA: And you know I love, who would I be without that story? So, feel that. Who would I be without telling that story about I’m so sensitive or I can’t get anything done whatever the thing is that people have handed to us. So, yeah, so interesting.
And finally, how does it feel to realize that you get to craft your own story? And so, I think it, I think that may take a minute, because it’s just realizing, Okay, do I get to write it? Because I think, again, some people think it’s a cheat. But it’s like, no, you really do. You really get to pick the things that you like and craft that as your own personal story, even when there’s tragedy, even when there are bad things that have happened. There are things to look at that we can just say, yeah, but this is who I want to be and this is how I went through those tough times, and this is what was surrounding me during that. And so, that we can hold onto that part of the story as well.
PAM: Yeah, and I think that’s one of the big things that I want to share with people is that these are true moments. This isn’t stuff that we’re making up. We’re not saying, ignore all this hard stuff that’s going on around you.
It’s, as you said, a tool that can be helpful in moving through those seasons, moving through those emergency moments, all those pieces. For me, it is so incredibly helpful for me to move out of that fight or flight tunnel, which can be super helpful in the moment. But we get stuck there so easily. This is a tool that really helps me move through that. I just find it’s become such a useful tool, because I know I’m more creative on the other side. I move through things with more grace and just more compassion and kindness for other people that are involved when I can help myself with this tool move beyond that tunnel vision and the that whole fight flight emergency response when things go wrong. That’s helped me.
ANNA: It will be fun to see what people bring up about stories. So, thank you so much for listening and we hope to see you next time. So, take care. Bye-bye.
PAM: Bye, everyone.
The Unschooling Summit, 2026
Mar 02, 2026
We are so excited to be participating in The Unschooling Summit again this year!
We participated last year and it was such a wonderful event that we want to make sure people know it’s happening again this year.
To that end, we asked Summit hosts Esther Jones and Melissa Crockett-Joyoue if they’d be up to join us to talk about it!
The Details
Join other parents from around the world for three days of inspiration and community at The Unschooling Summit. This free virtual event will feature 90+ unschooling experts and advocates.
You’ll have access to interviews with some of the top experts and advocates in the field of unschooling and self-directed learning
You can take part in live roundtables with seasoned unschooling parents discussing some of the most important topics that come up for unschooling families (teens, neurodivergent children, self-care, community etc)
You can attend live, interactive workshops
You can connect with other parents in community networking sessions
You can join a closed Facebook group and connect with other parents from around the world who are exploring a different path with their children
Whether you’re curious about how unschooling could work for your family, looking for support on your journey or keen to delve into how unschooling can be a tool for social change and personal growth, there will be plenty there for you!
The Unschooling Summit takes place online from March 20th-22nd, 2026.
Note that that’s an affiliate link and you help support Living Joyfully when you use it. Thank you!
EU403: On the Journey with Erin Rosemond
Feb 26, 2026
To finish off our month-long celebration of 10 years of Exploring Unschooling, we’re sharing another On the Journey episode! We had a rich conversation with Living Joyfully Network member and long-time unschooling mom Erin Rosemond. Erin is a mom of four grown children living in Canada. She writes about home education on her blog Ever Learning, co-hosts The Virtual Kitchen Table podcast, and offers mentorship and facilitation for families and individuals.
We talked about developing self-awareness on the unschooling journey and how it leads to a beautiful place of authenticity. Erin shared about how her ability to advocate for her children strengthened over the years. We also dove into the path from attachment parenting to unschooling and how focusing on the relationships we have with our children has been the thread that connects it all.
It was a really lovely discussion and we hope you find it helpful!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone, I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and I’m joined by my co-host Anna Brown and Erika Ellis, as well as our guest today, Erin Rosemond.
So this month, we have been reflecting back on 10 years of the podcast, exploring what we’ve learned, what’s changed, and what still matters. And we are thrilled to have Erin join us to continue the conversation.
We’re going to dive into these three questions with her and I am very excited to hear her thoughts. And if you don’t yet know Erin, she is a long time unschooling parent known online as EverLearning. She co-hosts the podcast, Virtual Kitchen Table, where they share experiences and ideas about family life and unschooling.
And she’s been a long time member of the Living Joyfully Network, which we so, so appreciate. If you would like to hear more about her unschooling journey, I spoke with her back in episode 285 of this podcast, and she shared some wonderful insights. So I do encourage you to go back and listen to that episode.
But to get us started today, Erin, we’re just going to dive right in. What’s one of the most impactful things you’ve learned on your unschooling journey?
ERIN: So, I looked at this question, and it’s such a challenging question, but in a good way. Because there are so many impactful parts, it’s crazy how impactful it is. And I feel like when you talk to other people who are following this path and doing things this way, that’s one of the things that they say is that they couldn’t possibly have imagined how much impact it would have in so many different areas. So yeah, so I was like, oh, where to begin?
I had a few different words come to mind. The first word that came to mind was authenticity. And maybe I’ll end up touching on that. And then it got me thinking about the idea of emotional maturity. And that kind of wove me around to where I think I’ve landed at the moment, which is just – self-awareness. And so if I’m understanding the question properly, because I guess I’m thinking about certainly the impact on me, but I also think that’s very impactful on our children, and just generally the people in our lives.
And I think that probably isn’t something that I had thought about at the beginning. I think most people probably don’t. Even before school age, coming from more of an attachment parenting, conscious parenting paradigm, that was just about my baby, right?
That was about what felt best. You’re operating with what seems to be the kindest, most practical way to parent, and you’re not really thinking a lot about self-awareness. But of course, that’s developing along the way. We do all that early reading, and then it just, I know different people come to this path from different directions, but I think I pipelined in through attachment parenting more than anything.
So really, it was just gradual. Continuing to read, continuing to talk to people, hear other people’s experiences, trial and error for myself. And then it gets to a point where you realize, if you’re going to parent in this really respectful way, it’s actually quite hard. It feels like it shouldn’t be hard, but it really kind of rubs up against a lot of what we’ve been taught, what we’ve learned, sometimes what society values and promotes.
I just think you end up doing so much self-reflection, because you bump up against these things, and you think, okay, well, what would the conventional response be. It might be taking a privilege away, or it might be controlling this or controlling that. And it’s really hard to be in a respectful relationship with somebody when you’re controlling them. And it’s kind of arbitrary.
I mean, of course, as parents, we sometimes have to safeguard things. I’m not suggesting otherwise. But I think it’s that word arbitrary, where we’re just deciding that there’s a different standard because they’re children. And so I think that the amount of self-awareness that we have to develop is actually mind blowing.
Because it’s not just about how they learn or our interactions, there’s a ripple effect. They bring in friends, or kids are adults now. So they bring in partners or spouses, and you just have this circle of people that if you want to remain in good relationship with your kids, which I do, you need to think about how do I want to respond in this moment? And what do I want this memory to be like for them, you know?
I feel like I have so much more I can say about this, but maybe I’ll just leave it there for a minute. Yeah, it’s just that ability now, I think, to stop and pause before responding, and just imagine all the different ways there are to do something and to think about something. And if I’m having a certain feeling about that, what’s that about? Just getting curious about that. Yeah, like I said, I’ve got a lot, but I’ll stop for now.
PAM: Yeah. Okay, I’ll pick up first. Oh, my goodness. I love that that is what you picked. And like you said, there are just so many aspects. One, that bubbled up, is the hard work piece.
We’ve talked before on the podcast and network. Do I put in the effort, the work, the engagement beforehand, having the self-awareness to figure something out, right? Or do I choose that it’s going to happen after, if things break down? When we want to put the relationship first, and then we need to repair, because we didn’t put in a lot of the time upfront to look at everybody’s perspective. How do I feel in this moment? What does that mean about me?
That’s the whole self-awareness piece. And then being open to other people’s self-awareness, and not even defining it, other people’s choices, other people’s agency, how other people are seeing this moment, right? So we’ve talked about that piece.
So, that’s part of the question. But I love even more depth, that’s a choice. And often, we forget about considering, because maybe the relationship breakdown happens a day or two later, right? The next time we try to engage more deeply, and they brush us off, because they’re still upset about what we did two days ago. And that’s when you realize, so it’s hard, it can be hard to connect those two pieces.
But even regardless of that, where you got to the authenticity, where you started, showing up in the moment as the person you want to be, as Anna talks about quite a bit, it’s self-awareness. It’s just interwoven with that so intricately, because how can we know who we want to be when we show up in the moment, unless we understand ourselves.
I feel like I learned that from watching my kids when they came home, because they could show up more authentically, because they hadn’t absorbed quite as many of the conventional messages yet. Those messages that say, when this happens, you do this. And when in this situation, you do this. And when somebody else does this to you, you do this, you know, we have absorbed so many of those cultural messages in how we’re supposed to respond.
And we’re often with great intentions raised by parents who are telling us, in this situation, you do this, or I want you to do this, remember that. It’s something new for us, I think. And that’s why I find what you’re saying about this self-awareness piece being such a huge and impactful part of the journey and realizing it’s understanding ourselves.
And then I think through understanding ourselves, we recognize how different we are, how different other people are, and then realizing, oh, geez, everybody has got a unique perspective. And then like you said, then you have more and more people joining the family community. And then it’s just more and more perspectives.
But that we, at least for me so far, find I get to enjoy the moments more when I’ve done that work or understand people, because I can be more present in them versus part of my mind thinking, but in this situation, we should each be doing XYZ. And I’m trying to prod people, even gently, to do the right thing, etc. So I loved your answer.
ERIN: Well, and something, Pam, just when you were bringing the word authenticity back into it, I think too, there are always things that I’m realizing that I’m working on, always. And right now, it’s with the self-awareness, I feel like in an intentional way, my reaction time is very slow at this point. I take my time. I sit with things, whether it’s decisions or things are happening. And so, yeah, my reactions are now very slow, they’re careful.
And so, I think for me, the figuring out right now, then is also that authenticity piece. So how do I show up as myself, and also give my kids and anybody else in my life, that space of non-judgment. So I’m not sure if that’s making sense, but it’s just a little bit of a piece that I’m sitting with right now. I think I’ve gotten pretty, I wouldn’t say I’m comfortable with it, but I’m committed to it.
Pretty comfortable being committed to leaving a lot of space, having that slow reaction time, leaving lots of room for the different things that my family members do, right? But the piece I’m still sitting with is how authentic am I being here? Or I’m still trying to figure out, where is the space for me?
And nobody is stopping me from being in there, but I’m still just figuring that out, right? Nobody’s pushing me back, it’s just me figuring it out for me.
ERIKA: I think that makes a lot of sense, and it’s so interesting. It’s bringing up a lot of different thoughts for me, but really, everyone who’s on this type of journey, it makes sense that eventually we get to a place like what you’re describing, where it’s like, who am I really? How does that fit in, because our intention from the beginning and how a lot of us came to the journey was we wanted to give our children the space to be themselves.
And I think in many cases, that means we are taking a step back from asserting ourselves, in order to give them the space to really be true to themselves. And then it’s that pendulum swing that we talk about. But I’m still here, and what is the life that I want to lead look like in connection? And with all these new people coming into your life as well, it just gets more and more complicated.
But I just love that deep work. And I think it’s kind of unavoidable. Because we’re not okay with just pushing through our agenda. And I don’t care if you’re upset, that has never felt okay to me as a parent. And so I’m going to have to confront whatever the things are that come up for me, in order to be the parent and the person that I want to be in that relationship. And so learning about myself just has to happen along that journey. And I think it is so impactful.
ANNA: I think what stood out for me, there were a couple things, but that piece of, it is unavoidable. I think if you’re really showing up with the intention to recognize how we’re showing up in those moments. And I think that’s so interesting, because that piece of thinking it’s hard. What I found was that the interactions with the kids weren’t hard, because they’re so authentic. It was that piece that when it’s bumping up, wait, wait, why is it bumping up? What’s happening? That means slowing myself down, then figuring out what is coming up in me.
And that was hard, because I had to look at where did that come from? Why is it impacting me in this moment? Why am I wanting to control or change this?
Because I think in some ways, maybe it is an easier path. I don’t know, kind of like you said, Pam, the back end’s hard, but it can feel easier to just push whatever the agenda is. But the big difference is exactly what you’re talking about, the self awareness, because you can’t really do that.
If you’re self aware, you can’t really push your agenda onto somebody else. If you’re thinking, wait a minute, what’s happening here? I think that is a deep, rich part of the journey, and it’s amazing and ongoing.
ERIN: Wait, this is not something that you learn one time, and then you’re done? And just if I could say one more thing on this question, just the amount that I’ve learned about myself from noticing or listening to my kids’ reactions to me or the way that they come with the question, is huge. And just to give an example, I think I might have shared it in the Network, actually, a few years ago, but it was just around Christmas presents.
And one of my guys came to me with what felt like a very rehearsed sort of speech when you’re trying to launch a marketing thing forward. But anyway, he had this rehearsed set of reasons for his request. He knew he was getting a camera, he was starting to do some wildlife photography. And he had this really well rehearsed set of reasons that it would be great for him to have that camera before Christmas and open it before Christmas.
And he was really pleasant about it. But it was almost like, let me get this all out. I’m just going to explain to you where I’m coming from here. And I sat with it later. And I was like, wow, he put a lot of effort into something that was just about a Christmas present. Because it didn’t really matter that much to me.
But then when I peel back a little bit, because I said, that’s fine. But then I did kind of reflect about how I was feeling about it. And I thought, no, you know what, I think I have been more tradition-oriented around Christmas morning. And I think a lot of that too, was an aspect of his particular personality that maybe we had a bit of a rub where when he was a kid who wanted to know, what’s happening for my birthday? two months ahead. And so, there was always a bit of a need to slow down, you need to learn self control, like this kind of stuff, right. And so it just, yeah, it kind of made me peel back a little bit and think about, what are the signs that he’s seen of that through the years?
Or what are the things I’ve said or done? And it’s just a small, benign example. But I’ve had those things happen with probably more important things too, where I just go, okay, the fact that they’re asking it this way. Or the fact that this already went through my husband, who didn’t know about it. And something’s already been installed. That gives me a clue.
We can kind of use these things to kind of get a clue about how we come across to other people. That reflection helps us learn so much about ourselves, like right to that self awareness. Our kids are lovely mirrors that way. I mean, it may not be fun in the moment or whatever.
But it really is so valuable and interesting, to just take a moment to look at what might that say about me and how I’m being in the world around them, etc. And it’s because it’s often something that I had never even thought of as a thing. It’s just a habit or just just a way.
But to be able to reflect and find those pieces and go, oh, that’s interesting. And just be more self aware, learn more about it. It doesn’t mean changing or anything. But more self awareness that we can bring to a moment. So very cool.
ERIKA: I love that story, they shine these little spotlights on our different things. We don’t even realize they are even a belief or whatever. And I love that. So my question to you, Erin, is what has changed over the course of your journey?
ERIN: Again, another big, big question. So I mean, obviously, lots of things have changed. I guess I’ll go back to myself again, because I think this is really the theme, right?
So much of it is about how we interact in these relationships. I think, well, probably one really obvious, well, it might not be obvious to somebody newer, but I think for lots of people, you quickly realize that your reasons, your ideas about learning and like, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. And so I think what’s changed is that I think about things in a much broader way than just, learning to read or learning to I don’t know, what are all the things people worry about standing in line? All the things people get concerned about.
And so it just becomes so much broader than that. But then I think, to kind of bring it back to this theme of self awareness, I think what’s really changed is my willingness to put my kids first. I don’t know, there’s something about advocacy, I think that’s coming up. I think I struggled for a long time to put my kids first in the face of, let’s say they were part of a club or lessons or something like that. And it’s not that I didn’t put them first, but I’ve become much, it’s become much easier for me. So I’m just thinking about everything from things that didn’t make sense in college residence to lessons my kids have done where something just kind of hits or rubs the wrong way.
And I think where I used to probably indirectly try to steer them toward it not being so big of a conflict, I’m much more comfortable now, just going and talking to somebody, or helping them. I mean, they’re older now. So I’m not doing as much of that, but just even helping them with the language to go talk to somebody. I remember when I joined the network, maybe when I took the course, the Childhood Redefined, my kids were already getting older. My oldest guy was probably 20 at that time.
But I think what I was noticing in myself is that there was this, we talked a lot about quitting and letting kids change their mind and do new things. And I didn’t have a problem with that in the way that a lot of people do. I saw the value in them trying different things. That wasn’t the issue for me. The issue was around not hurting the coaches feelings, or not causing conflict with another family that we were friends with, because they didn’t want to be doing the activity with them.
For some people, that would be very simple. But for for me, it’s taken me a lot of work to do that kind of thing. So I think for me, it’s just how much more quickly I can be in my kid’s corner, in a really more concrete way than I used to be able to.
I think I’ll just say one more thing about that, too. I think, as my kids got older, I realized that a lot of the people, if you think about naysayers, for example, with homeschooling and unschooling, those people don’t always stay in your life. Your neighbors move. We’ve had relatives actually pass away, a lot of the people that you’re hearing all these messages from, whether it’s quitting, or making sure to stick with a musical instrument, or all these different things. At the end of the day, it’s my child that I need to continue that relationship with.
ANNA: I love that piece. And I feel like what’s interesting about that is, I feel like our kids really lead the way, because all of us here have come through school, and often, more school and more school. And I think we’re culturally conditioned to think about those things, and to worry about those things, make sure we’re fitting in and make sure things are fine.
And I feel like my kids would have these really authentic reactions, recognizing that this environment doesn’t feel good, or I don’t like the way this is happening. And I remember reflecting when they were younger, that I had those thoughts as a kid, but I didn’t ever say them. Or there was nobody listening to me.
And so it was interesting to just really see that. And of course, like you’re saying, that’s the relationship that’s so important to me. But I remember having to consciously have that thought of – this is the person I care about.
I mean, now, 20 years later, I can’t even remember who those instructors are, or whatever but they’re not in my life. But my children are still in my life. But I remember having to consciously have that thought to reorient myself, because that cultural conditioning was so strong.
I just really identify with that one as well.
ERIKA: Yeah, the expectations, the external feeling of being judged or feeling that I wouldn’t have been allowed to just leave this activity. And so I don’t have any experience with how to have that more difficult conversation. How do you bring up things that are a little bit surprising to people in the mainstream, but I think when you have kids who are so used to being true to themselves, and listening to what works for them, there’s not really another option, we just are going to have to grow into being confident enough to do that.
And I feel like I’m still definitely in the middle of that journey. Because my kids haven’t really wanted to do that many activities and are kind of branching out more and more as they become teenagers. And so I’m being put into those positions now of, okay, this conversation feels hard to me.
But it is possible to have respectful interactions with the people at these lessons or whatever the things are, and still say, and we’re not going to continue. And that’s okay, we can make that choice.
PAM: Yeah, I found looking to my kids to be so useful. Because at first, I didn’t even realize how much work I did to fit in growing up.
It was just a given. This is school, this is your like, extracurricular activity, this is how we behave and what we do at these things. And I just wanted to do it right, right?
So, it wasn’t until my kids would be like, oh no, I want to quit. And same with you, Erin, it was pretty easy to quit the thing. But I was holding back, because at first, I could feel myself wanting to explain the broader picture and why.
One of my childhood memories is trying to do that with my brother. I guess I was babysitting, and my parents had gone out and they said, he can go out and play once he’s finished cleaning his room. But he didn’t want to clean his room. And I’m sitting there in his room on his bed, like, just do it, it’ll take five minutes.
But oh my gosh, now I look back and go, wow. Wow, what a different mindset, that I could not just stand up to that or push back at that age, because like Anna said, whether it was I wasn’t comfortable, or not being heard or listened to. I would just be told I was wrong, or the right way to do it, etc. So, for me, that was one of the big changes that was like the water I was swimming in that I didn’t even realize was water, you know what I mean? It was just part of my ethos.
I remember it was quitting swimming when the kids first came home, it’s like, Oh, okay, we’ll go and blah, blah, blah. And after two lessons, they’re like, No, thank you. But I had all this justification going on in my head at first. Oh, but they’ve got lots of people to manage. That’s why you need to do it this way, you know.
But because I had started looking to my kids, and really, well, of course, this isn’t a good fit for them. Of course, I am now seeing them all day and how they move through the world. And recognizing that fit, or lack thereof, was now just so much more obvious.
But it’s been layer upon layer upon layer, from the quitting right through all these more intricate pieces that are part of our days, and still learning. Well, I think it’s part of where maybe that word authenticity comes back into it just, it does feel so relieving. So if there’s so much relief, and it does feel so much more authentic to just, just do what the kids are actually feeling rather than try to either control them or over explain to whoever else is involved in the situation.
And I do think they have more practice with that. It’s always fascinating to me how I’ve thought about this before how our intention goes so far, because they often are able to do things that we are still struggle with. They often don’t have hang ups that we still have. But somehow, just our intention and then being in a different environment really makes quite a significant difference.
ANNA: It really does. Just being able to ask for what they need. I think that does come from the environments we created where we’re listening to everybody and where we’re trying to figure out the solutions that work. They go in, I don’t know, and some people, I think, feel like it’s naivete when they go into the world. But what I’ve seen is that they change things, right?
They have different conversations that we weren’t able to have, they change the environments that they go into. It’s empowering. And it’s really interesting.
I love that. So my question, which I think is also very big, is what still matters? What things have been kind of a through line for you, or things that you really feel like, yeah, that’s still important. That still matters to me.
ERIN: This one was actually the one that came to mind the easiest. And I think the through line is that relationship. Because that was from the first days of having a baby, that was what just stood out to me was just having this relationship and this connection. And I think understanding pretty early on, and I didn’t understand it until I had a baby, but realizing within the first couple of weeks that there was going to be a certain amount of that I would have to do differently than I had understood in order to have a relationship with this baby that I wanted to have.
I was telling somebody a story the other day that very, very shortly before I had my first baby, I had been working with young kids. So, I’d often be in their homes, maybe three and four year olds. And quite a few of those families were large families, and they often had a baby or a toddler. And I would be in these houses. And over and over again, I’m seeing that the baby is sleeping in the parents room, or there’s a crib or there’s a cradle in the room. And I remember saying to a friend of mine, I don’t know what’s going on with these families. They all have these babies in their rooms.
And I just thought it was like the strangest thing. And then I had a baby. I understand this now.
And so it feels like maybe sleeping doesn’t have that much to do with this. But I think it’s where I started is just listening to that need, wanting, realizing that if I wanted to have that relationship, I needed to have that closeness, right. And so I think that of course, that follows through childhood.
And then I think, again, there’s been a lot of learning for me. These last few years of what that can look like, past 18, or past 20, or whatever. That when I say I want to have a relationship, I don’t mean that I want to be in more of a relationship than they want to be. It’s not about pushing myself into it, or not being able to let go or whatever.
But whatever that looks like with each of them, I want that to be respectful. And so I think that really has been the through line for me, even in those areas that I find more difficult, which would be conflict, or people pleasing, or I’m not exactly sure what the word is, but that’s definitely been trickier for me. But that’s the piece that helps me override it.
Even just the decision not to put them in school, it would have been so much easier for me, I would have had so many fewer people to argue, not argue with, but defend myself from if I had just put them in school. I could say that about any of that stuff, right, about attachment parenting, it’s not just the school piece. It is really that overriding, just determination to be in a respectful relationship that lets me jump over that last hump of hopefully doing what’s going to be in service to that relationship rather than please somebody else or not look weird, or any of those things. Because I’m past that. So I can rest in the weirdness now.
PAM: I will say I love just that focus on the relationship. And I remember one of the shifts for me, an aha moment that took a weight off. Because certainly my kids were in school for a while before I discovered homeschooling and unschooling. And I thought this is what we have to do. And it was so empowering when they came home.
But okay, they’re not going to school, how do I replace that? What am I doing instead? Right? So, the shift to recognizing childhood does not just equal school, in whatever form, whether it’s homeschooling, or school school, to recognize that our relationships are lifelong. And that childhood is just a part of it. A lovely, lovely part of it. But our relationships last forever. And school is just kind of this blip, right, that may or may not be part of our lives. And the weight when I could just focus on the relationship, and that this is just a continuous thing.
For those of us with kids as adults, there wasn’t a day where things shifted. Right? There wasn’t everybody waiting for this moment when we listened to some of our podcast episodes about the independence agenda and turning 18. Our relationships continued.
And like you’ve been saying this whole time, Erin, the self awareness, we continue to grow, we continue to change and develop and learn more about each other. And then when you’re mixing people in, that’s the relationship through line. It always has our focus. It’s not like I figured out relationships, and now I just do it. It’s forever learning, right?
ERIKA: I love, I mean, obviously, we talk a lot about that focus on relationships and how that’s a through line. And I think it’s interesting to think about how that really does lead to all the other aha moments that we have. If I am trying to be in a good relationship with my child, I’m going to listen to them. If I’m listening to them, I’m going to learn about the things that are important to them.
And then I’m not going to brush those off, I’m going to take it seriously and get involved in it with them. And so everything builds from there, as long as we keep coming back to how’s our relationship feeling? What is the thing that’s going to strengthen that relationship? And that leads us to people are different, it leads us to what is this bringing up for me? Why are my triggers different from their triggers? And all the learning comes from that. And for me, it was the same where it was like having the baby and being like, oh, you know, and just all the aha moments, all those like, this baby is not like me, I thought they would be like me, and they’re not. It’s just such an amazing journey. From that point.
ANNA: My path began with attachment parenting, too. And then we had this added layer of medical crisis at the beginning. The piece of that that I’m grateful for was it really honed us in on all that matters is this baby and this relationship. And all of that other stuff is just noise.
So, it did make it feel so much easier to make the decisions and to put school into perspective, to put these other things into perspective. Because that was the priority. It is hard to explain until you see it. I was around a lot of kids before having kids and did a lot of work with kids. But it is different. And the things you were talking about too, Erika, you really get a sense of, this is my child. And they’re very different. It’s not just these other kids that are different. Everyone is so unique, and all of these different brains.
That, to me, was part of the fun of it. That discovery and understanding, but that through line of the relationship has served me so much as well, because it’s just that North Star. It’s remembering to ask, how is what I’m doing going to impact the relationship? I think about that a lot. And it really helps me in making decisions along the way.
ERIN: Just something else that just came to mind for me about relationships, is the distinction between relationship and connection. Because I think I read a lot or hear a lot of people talking about connection, connecting with your kids. And I definitely think it’s important to connect with our kids. But I think the relationship is different, because it’s overarching. It takes time to build a relationship with somebody. It takes situations and it takes experiences together.
And I think within that broader relationship, there are periods of time where we are more or less connected with a child, maybe a particular child or children. And I think sometimes that’s just a developmental stage, too. Something that they’re going through, or maybe, maybe it’s us, right? Maybe it’s something or our schedules just aren’t aligning in the same way.
So, I can look back through the years and see, almost eras of time that I was particularly connected with one or another. Maybe I had a really common interest. So we were doing a lot of this together. And I was maybe, not intentionally disconnected, but just the way things were going a little bit less connected with somebody else.
Or maybe through some of those like adolescent or teen years. I think the idea of kids needing to individuate to a degree, they need to figure out who they are, and who their identity is. So I do think sometimes in unschooling conversations, we can get a little bit overloaded with this, keeping connected, keeping connected. And sometimes kids, they float around, and maybe we do, too.
And so that’s been kind of fun to see that the relationship is still there. And I go through periods of time where I feel like there’s a real commonality or connection with a kid or two, and then maybe not so much, but it just comes around, I think, when you have that foundation.
ANNA: I liked how you said that. It reminds me when you spoke a little bit earlier about us with adult children, how it looks different, right? It’s not like we’re forcing this relationship on them but it’s there. And there are times where they’re off doing their thing. And we aren’t as connected with the day to day or the little nuances or intricacies. And then there’s times where it’s coming back. But I think, because we’ve had this through line of the relationship, there’s a foundation there that’s just very much built on trust that we can come back and that it isn’t a problem to come back and we can circle back and we can change those pieces.
So, I really love that, because that just really resonated with my experience, too, that the connecting moments are a part of it, but the relationship is much broader.
ERIN:. I think there are periods of time where we have as our kids get older, but maybe even when they’re younger, where the relationship is more about sharing what we’re each doing in separate places. And then there are periods of time where we might really be into a common activity or a common zone with somebody.
And those feel different to me, right? One feels like coming together and each person is sharing how this is going for me. And this is what I’ve been up to, versus, other times, we’re in a real common context with somebody.
PAM: I want to comment just because it’s bringing up so many metaphors, because we’re reflecting back, right? And ideas that have really resonated with me over the years, like one that I feel like ties in there, Erin, is thinking of ourselves as a family of individuals.
That phrase really resonated with me and reminded me that we have seasons. I loved your word, eras. Eras, seasons, where maybe they’re super busy with this thing and so using connection itself as just one measure can get you off course, because it’s like, oh, we’re not literally spending X amount of time each week doing something together. And how you define it, depends on how you define connection.
And I love Anna, that you brought up trust instead, but relationship via another metaphor that really worked for me, works for me with relationship is thinking of it as a dance, the dance of a relationship, because I feel like sometimes someone’s leading, sometimes the other one is, sometimes you’re really connected, and you’re just moving together, because you’re doing things together, other times you are apart. And none of them are wrong.
If somebody’s asking for more, and, and more could be, it could be more time, it could be more, shared activities, or it could be, especially with kids, it could be more money for an activity that they’re super into right now, that handing over some money, so they can do the thing can be a super connecting activity.
But again, it depends on how you define connection, right? So I do love just focusing, that it can help to focus more on the relationship and looking at it through that lens, rather than trying to track the time, or using that to define your connection with them, that especially over the years, seasons, eras, all those bits.
All right, our last question, Erin, and just to say, you have been part of the Living Joyfully Network for years, actually, from the beginning, and we absolutely love having you there, and I do think like, Anna, myself, you, we all have adult children now, and I do think some people wonder why we continue to stay connected with unschooling and parenting communities, even though our kids are now all adults, and we’re not technically homeschooling, unschooling, etc. So I was just curious to hear your thoughts about that, what is it that draws you to continue talking about this stuff?
ERIN: Okay, I think it’s probably a couple of different things, and first is a lot of the things we’ve talked about. I find listening to other people’s experiences and thinking about different scenarios continues to help me self-reflect. I’ll hear an experience or a story, and I’ll think, oh, what would that have brought up if that had been my child, or it’s not even just children, if that had been my spouse, how would I feel about that?
I just think that there is incredible power in people working together. I think what it helps me get really clear about,there’s not like a set of rules, there’s not like a formula that we’re all trying to reach. It’s just putting it out there, getting perspectives. Sometimes people will circle back to something months later, so there’s just something that really makes sense for life, and I think that many people find this when they get to the point that their children are technically not school-age anymore.
We continue being in relationships, we continue learning, even that learning angle, continuing to be curious about things, and to continue going after things, and doing things that we enjoy. It just feels very inspiring to me, and so I think continuing to learn is a big part of it.
And then I also think that you develop relationships with people, and you want to see how people are doing, and how a particular child is doing. There was just a member that posted about a hockey piece, and I’m like, oh, I remember when he was just starting to get into that, and there’s just something really fun about that, to be able to see where people are going, and what their kids are up to.
The other piece for me that I think was originally, when I started writing my blog, for example, which was before the network opened, I just really see the value in home education. Not even, it doesn’t even necessarily have to be unschooling, but just in home education, and creating more opportunities, and more awareness, and just more conversation about it. So, the more people that I experience, and get to know, the more I see how I think it could be different. And I think to circle back to the self-awareness piece, I think this offers our children an opportunity to be quite self-aware.
How different could the world be, if people were, it’s almost like living with more of an abundance mindset, rather than a scarcity mindset. And that’s a little bit unusual, I think. I just see a lot of stuff, people grappling for stuff all the time. And I wonder, how does this happen?
And so, not that I think homeschooling is going to change the world, but, maybe a little bit. I feel like there could be some pieces there that, so I think I just, anything that I can do to be part of the conversation, or listen to other people, or share anything with other people, or just support things in ways that make sense, I just, I don’t know, it just feels like a good thing to be part of.
PAM: I agree very much. For me, it’s the inspiration piece. It’s the reminder to self-reflect, that’s important. And, for us, Anna and I talk a lot about relationships. And that just feels so powerful. And we were talking earlier about how these relationships are lifelong, right?
You’re talking about how homeschooling can change the world. I feel like relationships with children, authentic, actually respectful with agency, all those aspects of it, just make a world of difference in our relationship, in their lives, in our lives. And just having conversations with people about that, and the light bulb moments, yes, for them. But also, every time I try to share a story, or try to explain a thought, or an idea, I learn it a little bit deeper, right? There’s another layer of that infinite onion that maybe comes off. And again, more self-awareness.
Like we were saying, we’re growing and changing all the time. I find it so valuable to keep thinking about these ideas, and participating, and chatting with people who are curious about them. And with people who have been doing it for such a long time, and finding where we have common experiences, and finding those pieces that are unique to me. Back to the self-awareness piece, right? It’s fascinating and fun.
ERIKA: I feel like maybe going through school, we get a message of you’re just with this age group, and then that’s over, and then there’s this adult life. So, I think over this journey, we come to realize, we’re all just on this same journey, it’s all the same, it’s all life. And so there is no sense that I get in the network that someone with younger kids is the beginner, and the people with older kids are the experts. Because it just doesn’t work like that. The areas where I’m growing, I’m able to get feedback, inspiration, and information from other people.
And then things that I have already moved through, I’m able to share those experiences with other people. When we focus on relationships, and when we realize that life is just all learning all the way, we don’t stop learning. It just doesn’t make sense to leave, because it still is giving so much, wherever we are along our journey, or wherever we are with our kids, there’s just still so much to learn and to think about. I had another thought, but it is gone.
ANNA: If it comes back, then bring it up. But I’ll say, I feel like you hit on the two big ones for me too, Erin. That lifelong learning piece. I still learn so much every day from the network. Again, watching somebody move through a situation and wondering how that would land for me.
It’s feeling myself get activated when I read something and then go, okay, where’s that coming from, bringing some self awareness in there. I like those opportunities. I think being around a community of people who are intentional about and like to talk about the nuances is just so fun for me.
And I think for me, the other piece is kind of an advocacy piece. For me, it’s like you were saying, Pam, it’s about relationships. But I really have strong feelings about just how amazing kids are. And I love celebrating the hockey game and seeing them grow up because I get so invested in all the kids on the network.
But it’s also just knowing, it can be so much easier if we’re just communicating. We have new people that come in that have come from hard situations of burnout and other things. And then watching them just open to life feeling so beautiful, almost like, how can it be this great?! Yes, it can be that great. So there’s that kind of advocacy piece there of just wanting people to have that amazing feeling for this special time.
Because like you said earlier, Pam, I mean, childhood really is just a blip on the whole thing. And it does go so quickly. So, those are kind of the big pieces for me, but always, always learning for sure.
ERIN: Yeah, I feel like I need a little bit of a caveat just around the idea of homeschooling changing the world, because I know that not all homeschooling has been great for some people, and sometimes school does work really well. And it is a choice that people want to make. But I think just like you’re saying there, Anna, it’s just so exciting to be able to be part of seeing kids be who they are able to learn in the way that’s best for them and explore the different interests that they have. And yeah, so it’s whatever form that takes for people, but just having that kind of broadness and that choice.
ANNA: I agree! So many people still don’t know what’s an option, though. So I think it is an important piece, putting it out there. Just saying it can be possible. We like to talk about options and all that’s there. And I’m amazed that there really still are people that don’t have any understanding of home education and certainly not unschooling.
And so, yeah, I think that’s super valid. It’s not about that there’s one path, but gosh, here it is. And take a look, because even just understanding it allows you to bring a different energy, even if you stay in school, just understanding that there are options, understanding that there’s not the one right path just brings a different energy to all of those exchanges.
So yeah, I really do agree with that.
ERIKA: I remembered my last bit. I feel like life outside, if you look at the world as a whole, there’s a lot of stress. And I feel like I can get really overwhelmed with bad things or, it feels like there’s so much bad. And so to me, being connected to people in the network reminds me of these good things. It brings me back and grounds me back into what’s really important, like giving these kids space to be themselves.
It’s having these relationships and connections. And I think having it be global also, just gives me this kind of peaceful feeling. There are ripples coming out from all of these families and all of these intentional people, really putting in this work and trying to make the world a better place. And I know, for me personally, in my local community, I have seen my own ripples change things for people. And then I see it in all the other network members. That’s just a really cool thing about being in connection with people like that.
PAM: Yeah, I think it is. It is so fun and enlightening and inspiring. And I mean, can go on for another 20 minutes. But that piece that I find so interesting, because I think often, homeschooling is really a great place to meet people. Because kids going to school can be where the first big problems start to show up, right? If the classroom at school just doesn’t mesh with your child, it’s not a good fit for them.
And that’s a big time when we can start questioning things and trying to figure this out and trying to fit in all those pieces that come up and that can be kind of our first exposure to other paths. That is what happened for me and that is how I finally, eventually, discovered that homeschooling was a thing and that it was legal in Canada. And that was the start of my journey. And then, as we’ve been talking about this whole episode, learning and discovering the value of relationships, we see the journey happening with people in the network all the time.
But when you are cultivating those stronger relationships and really respecting your child’s agency, and their choices and understanding them and their perspective, and I think then you can loop back there, definitely we have members who have a child or two that choose to go to school for a while or for a longer period of time. Because, as we were talking about earlier, school just becomes part of the landscape. That is a possible choice for someone.
It doesn’t affect our relationships, right? We can support them in that choice and in that exploration if they want to do that.Homeschooling is a beautiful door. I feel to bring people in, a reason to notice that something is up. And maybe I want to explore some different possibilities other than this one path that I know. Right?
And it’s just so fascinating for me to see over and over again, people coming and learning that bigger picture, that focus on relationships, really embracing, working together and living together as this family of individuals that we are. And then all these other choices come home and they don’t feel so confronting or judgmental or any of those pieces. It’s like, oh, yeah, okay, we can see how that fits in and that fits in. And it’s just so very beautiful.
All right, well, thank you so much, Erin, for joining us and sharing your reflections. I know it has been a deep, big month as we look back on all this, so we super appreciate you tackling these big questions with us.
ERIN: I just need to say thank you for inviting me. It was really nice. It was an honor to chat with you all again. So thank you.
PAM: Oh, it was so fun. So fun. Thank you.
And we want to say thank you to everybody listening, whether you’re listening in your podcast feed or watching on YouTube. We appreciate you joining us too. And we also invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network.
We offer a free month trial so you can just check it out and see if it’s a good fit for you. It is a great place to take the concepts that we talked about today and in the other 400-odd episodes and to dive deeper, exploring. To me, this is the difference.
With the podcast and these conversations, they really help more with my intellectual understanding. But I remember I was deep into forums and email lists at the time when I first discovered this. But it’s so helpful to have conversations to better figure out what it looks like day-to-day in your unique family. And to just see how many different unique families all over the world are making it work for themselves. There’s no one right way. There’s no one way that it’s supposed to look.
So those are the kind of conversations we love having. To learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes or go to our website livingjoyfully.ca and you’ll see Network up in the top menu. Wishing everyone a lovely day.
Thanks again, Erin.
EU402: 10 Years: What Still Matters (Part 3)
Feb 19, 2026
The Exploring Unschooling Podcast has now been around for over 10 years and 400 episodes! This month, we’re celebrating these huge milestones by looking back and reflecting on three big questions.
In Part 3 of our celebration, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the question of what still matters over the course of the past 10 years. We talked about focusing on relationships, how there is no one path and no one right way, and how children are whole and capable people right now, not just adults in training.
We thank you so much for being a part of our Exploring Unschooling community and hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello everyone, I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully and I’m joined today by my co-host Erika Ellis and Pam Laricchia. Hello!
I have really been enjoying this series reflecting back on 10 years of the podcast. So much has changed and yet the growth and learning continues. The podcast has been important to so many people and it’s always fun to hear how it’s touched them and many times changed the trajectory of their family. Similarly, the podcast has brought many amazing people to join us at the Living Joyfully Network.
It’s such a great place to take the concepts covered in the podcast and dive deeper, to be a part of the conversation. We love that. All three of us are active participants and we’re responding to questions, hosting calls, sharing our journey, learning and growing alongside all of the amazing families there and we would absolutely love for you to join us.
You can find out more information in the show notes or visit livingjoyfully.ca to learn more about joining. And we also have a free trial month, so you can check it out that way as well.
This week, the question that we’re going to be reflecting on is what still matters? And so Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would. When thinking about what still matters, I felt like we have to start with relationships. It’s something that I’ve heard you both say from the very beginning. Focus on our relationships with our children because when we start there, everything else falls into place.
If we make independence our focus or academic skills our focus, we lose sight of the unique child in front of us and our relationships can be harmed. When I first came to unschooling, I was pretty preoccupied with the idea of passing skills along to my kids. It just seemed like that would be my most important role, especially since we weren’t putting them into school.
Like how will they get by as functioning adults without these skills? And so I had this desire to make sure they weren’t “falling behind” or that they would be keeping up with the kids who had gone to school. I think it’s a common fear when we’re choosing an alternative path.
But through time and observation, I really have come to believe that we can’t force people to learn anything. And I could see that putting that agenda onto my kids and pushing them to pay attention to this certain thing or pushing them to independently do something that they’re not ready to do. It just caused them to push back against me and that affected our relationship.
And so the work that I do now as a parent has so much more to do with our relationship than anything else, which I think would have surprised younger me. That cultural idea that we have to mold our children into who they should be. But it’s just not about that at all for me anymore.
It’s more about the things we talk about here, like building trust with them by being trustworthy, leaving space for them to learn in their own way, being accountable and making repairs with them if we have any kind of a rift and really being curious about who they are in the moment as unique individuals. And learning facts and skills can come when it’s time. I’ve seen that happen over and over.
I may worry, if someone’s not reading yet or they’re not interested in learning how to tell time. That was a real one for me. Or to tie their shoes. But our children will come across all the things that are the most important to learn because they’re actually important in their lives. And every brain is different. Every person has their own path and those skills come.
Sometimes it even feels kind of magical, but it doesn’t happen by force, at least not with my kids. Learning happens when the context is right and their desire is there. And so by focusing instead on our relationships, we create a space for them to process with us when things come up. We let them know that we’re there for them no matter what. There’s not this expectation that their lives look a certain way. We support them as who they are in each moment.
And I see that focus on that relationship pay off when my teens now come to me to process their fears or their goals or their relationship struggles or anything else. They know that I don’t have this image in mind of them that they’re not living up to. They know that we are all just humans learning, growing on our own paths, but we’re in relationship together.
And I think that the skills they learn doing that are actually so much more valuable than the academic skills. Those relationship skills and the communication skills will serve them for the rest of their lives. So I try to think to myself, as I remember Anna saying so many times, is what I’m about to do going to help my relationship with my child or harm it?
And making the relationship-strengthening choices over and over pays off. It’s like a good north star for me to aim towards. And of course, not perfectly, since that’s not possible, as I’ve talked about before.
PAM: Oh, I love that so much! And you know what, I love how over these three episodes as we’ve been reflecting back through various questions, how much relationships bubble up as part of the things that we’ve learned. Things that have shifted for us and that’s what really still matters. Because that fundamentally, like you said Erika, the learning happens.
The skills and the facts happen. An early realization for me was, well, if they don’t come across it in their life to want to learn it then it wouldn’t have been helpful to have tried to force them to learn it because they wouldn’t have come across a need to know it anyway. So, it was like that little gameplay shift for me. It is okay.
And then number two, just looking back on my own journey, what do I remember of what I learned and aced on the test. And now it’s only when I need it, I will learn that little piece. I’ll brush up again, learning it in the moment. It’s fundamentally stronger as in it makes more of a connection because that’s where I’m learning what I need. That web of learning that you mentioned in an earlier episode, Erika.
That is how the relationship just became fundamental, because that was so much more supportive of our lives and that interdependence of living together. And if I focus there, everything else kind of like takes care of itself. And in that way, people make choices and we help them. And when I focus on the relationship, it puts my energy in the places that matter the most long-term, even now with all my kids as adults.
ANNA: Yeah. I think what I love about this choice that you made, Erika, about what still matters is the relationship because, I don’t know how to say it because that’s what actually matters years later. Not just when we have kids at home, but when our kids are adults and what kind of relationships we want then.
We have a lot in our culture happening now about people going no contact and not being in touch with their families. And as someone who works with families and adults and their parents, it’s like, oh, that doesn’t happen there, when they are all adults. That doesn’t happen in isolation, over one or two events. That happens over years of not being heard or listened to. And I know these parents, because I’m working with them too. These adult parents that are now in their sixties to eighties, they were doing what they thought was best. They were trying to make sure their kids would be independent adults. They were trying to help them. But it caused harm.
They didn’t have these nuanced discussions that we’re able to have in a community of people who are picking apart these ideas. And I think, oh, that’s such a big difference in this lifestyle. Pam and I both have adult children, Erika’s kids are teenagers, but ours are well into their adulthood and we still enjoy each other. We still want to hang out and we still get the calls and we still do the processing and we are still a part of each other’s lives in different ways.
It looks different for all the different kids that we have because they all have different personalities, but it’s there, that foundation, that attending to the relationship for all those years. We’re still doing it, and it still has so much meaning in our lives.
There’s just something about that. That’s really poetic and beautiful when you think about this life and these choices.
PAM: Yes, I love that. And I think it leads nicely into what I wanted to talk about here. And that’s the paradigm shifting idea that children are whole and capable people right now, not like adults in training.
Then this was one of my earliest paradigm shifts on the journey. And I do think it still matters, so, so much.
And this idea brings together so many pieces that we’ve been talking about this month. When people first hear this, I feel like they often discount it, right? No, children aren’t whole, children aren’t capable.
I can just hear and some people have said, there’s just so much about life that kids don’t know. Or they can’t feed and clothe themselves. They couldn’t live on their own, that whole independence agenda. So, that’s the picture, right?
They need to train to be an adult, right? I can’t help but think about how that whole agenda just comes in there. And we seem to constantly be looking at children, I think, and just comparing them to adults. Seeing all those missing bits, that must mean they aren’t whole, that must mean they aren’t capable. But this was a piece that really locked into place for me. They are not adults, right?
They are whole and capable of being the two-year-old that they are, the eight-year-old, the 15-year-old. And in my experience, our worlds absolutely are forever changed when we can take off those adult tinted glasses and join them as who they are in this moment, right? So when we can do that, we start to see these whole children as our guides.
We start to see them making choices that make so much sense when we look at that through their eyes. They always made sense, but now with our clearer vision, we’re seeing it. It’s like, oh, I never understood why they did that. I thought I had to fix that. I kept trying to tell them to do it this other way. But when we can take off that lens and just start looking at them, we see those choices.
We see glimpses of how capable they are of understanding themselves, of saying no for reasons that make sense to them. And even seeing us and sensing our energy, I think that’s something that is kind of a surprise for us as we start noticing how much our kids can be impacted by our energy. And they can sense that and incorporate that.
They are capable of seeing, understanding, and incorporating that. And spoiler alert, in my experience, we soon find that we don’t even need that age distinction. I think that can be part of the journey, helping to see, oh yeah, they’re two-years-old.
But then it’s not like what can your two-year-old do? Or what should your two-year-old be able to do? What should your eight-year-old know? You realize that, oh yeah, that again has really no value. It’s really, who is this person? What do they want to be doing? What are their interests? That becomes the lens. It just really helps us recognize that they are whole and capable human beings right now, full stop, at any and every age.
And then, you always want to remember that doesn’t mean that they’re always happy and easygoing. It means that they’re living a rich and meaningful human life. There are always ups and downs and frustrations and hard things.
And so often people, well, if they get to choose what they do, they’ll never choose to do hard things. How will they learn? All those pieces that you start to recognize when you’re watching your own kids that, oh, that’s not true.
We really will choose to do the things we want to do, even if they’re challenging, even if they’re frustrating. And I think this also is when we really start to fundamentally understand in our bones that people are different, as we’ve talked about in the last episode. Because that’s the next lens, I think, that we can remove after our adult-tinted ones come off.
The one that has us viewing their choices and behavior through the lens of what we would do in similar circumstances. Okay, so yes, we keep going and going because it’s all connected. It’s all woven together. But I think you can see why I think this idea about children and being in relationship with them still really matters all these years.
ANNA: Yes, I thought they were very nicely connected. Very nicely connected and definitely still matters. And I love that age piece that you pulled out, how that falls away, because it’s kind of ridiculous.
And yet you could do it in the same way with “adults”, well, you’re 30, so you should do this. You’re 45, you should know how to do this. But it’s like, who’s that person? And so I love when we can just let all of those external pieces fade away and just look at the person in front of us. What excites them? What lights them up? What do they want to do? What do they find hard? What do they want help with? What do they need?
I think when you, like you’re saying, take off those glasses, because I don’t know that we see them in all of their beauty and complexity when we have on those lenses that are trying to put them in a box.
It’s like okay, have they done this? Have they checked this? Are they doing this? Are they going to do that? Are they going to know how to do this? Again, all those things are designed to separate us. But gosh, when you just, my vision is just like being on the floor to just be with those kids and just watch the way their brains work. And I get so lit up on the network when people are talking about their kids. Anyone on the network will know, I get so excited about all the kids.
And I just love them all so much because we have this wide range of just amazing kids that say the most incredible things. And that’s because somebody’s listening, right? It’s like these parents are listening and then bringing it to us with these incredible ideas and stories that they share.
And Erika has teens right now who are just deep and feeling things and thinking about hard ideas and all of these pieces. And it’s like, gosh, we can miss that. If we just have that adult lens on and we’re trying to put them into boxes.
And so, absolutely one of the gifts of this life is really that understanding that they are just full, capable human beings in front of us from the start. I love that, Pam.
ERIKA: Oh, I love it so much. It was making me think of a couple of things.
One was my experience being a child. I do have memories of being a young child and my mind was rich and deep and I had all sorts of understandings about the world and about how people should treat each other. And I had my convictions and it was not like me at five was a blank slate ready to just learn from the adults around me. I knew a lot even then and, and I just can picture what my mind has felt like every step of the way and every step of the way it’s me. It was me then and it’s me now.
And so I don’t think there’s any sort of magic in becoming an adult. I think that if we can realize that our children are whole from the very beginning and that they know who they are from the very beginning, it’s just, it’s so much richer. And then I also think that if we’re viewing everything in that adult lens of when you’re allowed to do things or when you will be able to do things or when you mature enough. Or telling them these things you’re thinking about now are just nonsense and not important. It leads to this cultural feeling for the kids of, I just can’t wait to be an adult so that I could finally do what I want to do.
I remember that feeling in school of like, we’re just waiting. School was just waiting to be done and to finally get to live our lives and finally be an adult who gets to make choices.
And so I just love that we can question that with our families and just be like, you know what, you’re a human right now, you are a person. And our culture is set up to not allow them access to every single thing at that age. But having a parent who takes them seriously and listens to their thoughts and ideas just from the beginning, I think it just creates such a different experience for them growing up.
ANNA: Right. I mean, there’s so much that we can facilitate. I do think and will stand by that I think that kids are the most marginalized group in the world. They’re the largest group that is marginalized in that way.
And I think it’s so powerful to know they do have this inside of them and they do know and with agency can make these amazing decisions. And so because of the way our culture is set up, that does put us in that role of facilitating to help them do that.
I love how you shared with me before, Erika, these insights you’ve had from being very young. I don’t have a ton of memories from childhood. And so I’m fascinated by them when we’ve talked about them, because you had such a clear vision of how you were feeling and thinking. And I’m like, yes, intuitively, I know this and could see it in my own kids, but it was really cool to talk to you about those pieces.
I do have one memory from middle school. I remember things were really hard and it was just, middle school was very tough. And I remember just thinking, I’m going to become an adult and I’m going to spend the rest of my life advocating for children. I remember that thought so, so clearly.
And honestly, it has driven me ever since. And that is why I’m still doing the work that I’m doing because children have so much to say and they’re just amazing. And anyway, so yeah, I just, I love that.
But so, I’m going to go on to mine and what I’m going to talk about is something that I think can both be exciting and it can also infuriate people. And, and we’ve touched on it a little bit over the month, but it’s that there’s no one right way. There’s no perfect path.
There’s no one size fits all. And I think when people are first looking at unschooling, they do want the playbook, right? They wonder, what should I do? How do I do this right? And I’m going to be the best unschooler. That’s what I want to do.
And it makes sense. These were the type of questions school encouraged us to focus on. There was an answer, the answer, and we needed to get the answer. And often even show that our work to get the answer was the same, which is insane to me. They do not understand people are different. That’s how we succeed in that environment though.
So, at first it can feel a little scary to hear that there isn’t an answer and that there isn’t one path, but the flip side of that is it can be so liberating and sometimes slowly, sometimes quickly it clicks and it just all makes sense.
Last week when we talked about ‘people are different’, that’s really the root of why there isn’t one path. We’re all so different, how we learn, how we want to engage in the world, what we prioritize, what lights us up.
It’s all so unique to who we are and it adds this amazing color to our personal journey. But within that, it can be really beautiful to share the journey with people who are intentional about their relationships, who value connection above product, who are curious and know deep down there are these other paths that we can take. That feels really energizing to me.
And as Pam mentioned at the beginning of the month, we do not come here as experts with the answer. We don’t believe there is an answer. We are fellow explorers who enjoy teasing out the nuances and asking the tough questions of ourselves, of others, of the world. Growing beyond old patterns and expectations.
And I think those are just a few of the things waiting for people when they step off that treadmill of the one right way that our culture can present and they start to dig a little bit deeper. I feel like that’s one cool side effect of choosing this path. We’ve talked about it before as the window. People may come to it as an alternative to school because maybe school isn’t working for their child in this moment.
But this whole world of questioning and exploration has opened up all the things we thought of as a given or a ‘have to’ come into question. And the thing is, we may choose to hold on to some of them and we may let others go, but the difference is coming from a place of choice. Everything is a choice.
And what’s interesting is that was one of the first essays that I wrote. Gosh, it’s probably been 20 years ago, but it was called, “Everything is a Choice” and it can also ruffle some feathers. But I find it to be the most empowering understanding because we always have a choice. There isn’t one way to do anything. And we can choose how we move through these different situations, whether it’s just the energy we bring to it or the actual choices that we’re making.
And so I’m feeling like I could go off on a tangent here about so many like black and white ideas that don’t serve us. So, I’m going to stop. But the idea that there isn’t one right way is really the cornerstone of the work that the three of us do together and the environment that we’ve cultivated on the network. So, I feel like this is one that still matters and will always matter.
PAM: Yeah, so much like there is not one right way. And it is so hard for people wrap their head around it. And it does it weave into ‘people are different’ so closely. I like to add on the end, there’s a right way for you.
ANNA: Yes, there’s a right way for me, in this moment.
PAM: That’s exactly where I was going, right now. Because that can change over time, too. It’s all about me. Right? And how am I in this moment? What am I wanting to put on my plate? What choices do I want to make? And in this context of everybody around me, of my own capacity, mood, how tired am I?
All the things will go into the choice that I make. And yeah, I remember early conversations about that. What do you mean everything is a choice? Like, I don’t have a choice about this and this and that. It’s just fascinating to think about and absolutely that completely still matters.
It’s just such a huge paradigm shift and bringing it into your days. No matter the age of anyone involved, it just brings the choice back to ourselves.
ERIKA: Yeah. Beautiful. I do think it is so personality driven, too. I think some people have a much easier time with this concept than others. And I feel like when I notice myself thinking, well, that’s not right. It’s just fun then now to be like, what do I mean by that?
What do I think is right? And so, yeah, it’s one of those exploding my brain kind of realizations that’s happened along the unschooling journey. But I feel like if we follow the whole thread of a choice and then the result and all of that, we may have a belief culturally that if we did choose correctly, then we are guaranteed a certain result.
And so realizing through observation that is not in any way true, it then releases some of the pressure around all of those earlier choices. Just because I did what society said was correct on steps ABC doesn’t mean I’m going to get to that end result of D that that they’re promising. And I think, after I was in school, I also spent a brief time teaching in school.
And I think when I was teaching high school was one of the times when I realized this promise that they’ve made to these children is not a real thing. I think it’s really doing a disservice to young people to say, if you do this, this, this, I mean, it’s the longest list of expectations. If you do all of this, then you will be successful.
And that’s just not how life works. And so let’s just take the pressure off of those choices and realize that there isn’t a way to guarantee any kind of result. And why not try to aim for a result that fits us better, rather than just trying to be on this kind of straight and narrow path that they say will get us to our destination.
And so if we observe the world and all the people in it, we can see there are so many different ways to live a good life. And there’s so many different paths that can get you to where you’re going. And so, it’s all about ‘people are different’.
It’s all about there’s no one right way. I love thinking about these things.
PAM: And bringing the mistakes that we’ve been talking about this month, your path can change your destination. That’s the other super cool thing. I’ve taken like three more steps, my own personal ABC, and now E is looking a little off. I don’t want to go in that direction. I want E minus or something, right? And that’s totally okay, that I’m learning a little bit more each time.
And just moving through life that way, rather than on a set path. And then, even people who have taken the path and ended up where society said, Oh, you’ve made it. And then they’re like, is this even where I want to be? You know what I mean?
There’s just so much to consider and it really is that one right path really just isn’t a useful measure or direction to take, because it really just doesn’t align with who we are even if we take it and it works perfectly, it may not feel good.
ANNA: I really love that piece you said that it’s a disservice. Really it is a disservice to all of these amazing capable children that are trying to then grow and figure out what they want to do with their lives because there isn’t one path.
There’s this other thought that I had about that. I think we’ve all been there. I was not a teacher, but I’ve been around the kids a lot in my life, and at some point we’ve all heard or thought, why do I have to learn this? What is the purpose of this? They’re asking those questions and are systematically shut down. And those are fair questions.
Why do I need to be doing this? What is the purpose? I remember asking those questions because that’s just how my brain works. And would just be told, but you’re going to get this thing. If you keep doing this thing that makes no sense to you now, then you’re going to get this other thing. And that’s not how it happened.
And even David did all the things on paper, it looked a lot like that, he did this, did the thing, got the degree, got the job in the degree, did all of it. It served a purpose. And then he realized, this is not where I want to be.
I just wish we could have more conversations with kids, unschooled or not unschooled, just so they could just hear more about the millions of different ways there are to be in the world and to be a quote, success, to live a life that feels rich and enjoyable and sustainable. I think those are the conversations that we’re missing in our culture because we’re so attached to that one right path.
I think that’s why letting go of this one right path piece is so huge. And you just see people really lighting up because they realized that pursuit of the one right path didn’t serve them either.
ERIKA: Yeah. And maybe talking to successful adults about what are the things that make you happy and see if it’s the job or if it’s something totally different, which I would imagine it probably is.
PAM: And that reminds me, the one right path, I think, became real challenging. It was a recent month in the network. And we’ve been talking about putting everything on the table, right?
It can feel so scary up front, to offer even the possibility that there are other paths, right, that there are other possibilities, that there are other choices. Scary to even open up the conversation to creative ways one might make things work. It can feel so challenging. I was just struck by what you said, Anna, about opening up this conversation, whether or not kids are in school, right, to actually take the time to talk about the possibilities, to talk about how people are feeling about what choices or what’s even just going on in their life right now.
And it goes back to the kids are capable. Kids are capable of so much. You don’t just have to tell them to just follow this path. Kids are capable of understanding, and often expressing what’s not working for them about the thing.
And just opening up those conversations, even in the networks I’m listening to. I actually opened up a conversation and was uncomfortable about it. Because I really wanted it to work out this way. But then I learned so much.
And we made it so much better for them as well. Just opening up the conversation can feel hard, because you feel like you might be opening yourself up to having to defend but no, really, your mind is being opened.
So often, there are so many possibilities that are workable, but we don’t see when we’re just looking at that one path, right?
ANNA: Right! Okay, one last thing. And then I know we’re going over, but it’s just what you just said really sparked something. I think it is scary for people to put everything on the table. Because what if we tell kids, there’s all these options, and they don’t make “the” choice. But some of them will still make that choice, but they will do it out of a choice. They’ll be like, this is what I want to do.
And they will be successful on that path in whatever that looks like for them, because they want to be here. But then the kids that want to choose differently are going to find their unique path that fills them. And for me, I’ve always said this, our world is so much better served by people choosing the path that they want and living in alignment in that way.
Because then we get the rich skills and all of the different brains coming at it in a way that just is so much richer than forcing people. So that if you don’t fit on that path, but yet there you are, you feel bad about yourself, right? You’re questioning, why am I not okay? Why is this not working? This is the path. Why does it feel so bad? This is what I’m supposed to be doing.
Instead, that person may be an artist that’s supposed to be over here changing the world in this other way. And we lose that, we lose those colors, we lose that richness. So, now I’m excited about how I can make sure we’re all having this conversation?
PAM: Yes, I think it’s so, so important. Me too. Me too.
ANNA: I just want to thank you both so much. I feel like these reflections and just sharing these last few episodes, thinking about these last 10 years, and all of our journeys has just been so rich, and has felt important to me. So I hope that other people enjoyed it as well.
And to everyone who’s listening or watching, I just really appreciate you joining us for these conversations. We really have such a good time. And we do invite you to join us at the Living Joyfully Network.
As we mentioned in the last episodes, we have a free trial month, so you can check it out. I think that you’ll see that these are the conversations that we enjoy. It’s okay to be a lurker to just kind of check it out.
We have a lot of resources you can dig into if you have questions about this lifestyle and the different pieces about it and what it can look like in your family. And we also love the conversation. It’s just a really fun place.
I do hope you’ll check it out. And you can learn more about that by clicking on the link in the show notes or going to our website livingjoyfully.ca and click on Network in the menu. Thank you both so much and just wishing everyone a beautiful day.
Bye.
Bye.
EU401: 10 Years: What’s Changed (Part 2)
Feb 12, 2026
The Exploring Unschooling Podcast has now been around for over 10 years and 400 episodes! This month, we’re celebrating these huge milestones by looking back and reflecting on three big questions.
In Part 2 of our celebration, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the question of what’s changed in the past 10 years. We talked about how unschooling is more like a branch of the tree rather than the roots, how the realization of the many, many ways that people are different has influenced our work, and how unschooling is really our journey and our work to do as parents.
We thank you so much for being a part of our Exploring Unschooling community and hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone, I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully and I’m joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello to you both!
So, today we’re continuing our series of episodes reflecting on the 10-year anniversary of the Exploring Unschooling podcast.
I know the podcast has been so influential to so many people, as it has been for me on my unschooling journey. And recently what has really deepened my understanding and learning and enriched my life in countless ways is the Living Joyfully Network. Our community of parents on Mighty Networks is a wonderful place to explore all of the questions and aha moments that come up on this journey.
I love our live conversations and our monthly topics to consider and I’ve made so many amazing friends. Every day I feel both inspired and calmed by the network. The topics we dive into inspire me to look closer and grow as a person. When everyone shares their unique experiences, I just feel grounded in knowing that we’re doing this together.
It really is an amazing space and we’d love for you to join us. You can find the link in the show notes or visit livingjoyfully.ca to learn more about joining and our new free trial month offer. So in this episode we’re going to be reflecting on the question, what has changed?
And as Pam said last time, 10 years is a good chunk of time and we’ve all definitely grown and changed during that time so I’m excited for this discussion. Would you like to get us started, Pam?
PAM: Absolutely, absolutely. When I started this podcast 10 years ago, my work was pretty much focused on unschooling, around exploring the choice to go to school or not go to school. Back when I realized that was even a choice and quickly found unschooling, it felt like a fundamental or a foundational choice in our life. I mean culturally school was and mostly still is so integrally woven into childhood that it seems that school is the most important aspect of childhood.
Everything else is extracurricular activities, right? It’s right there in the language. So what’s changed for me over the last decade is that I now see unschooling as a branch of the tree of childhood and not the roots.
For me, what lives in the roots and truly redefines childhood is cultivating connected and supportive relationships with our kids and giving them agency over their lives. Not as in leaving them to their own devices or insisting that they make all their decisions but living consensually as a family as you talked about in the last episode, Anna. How they feel and what they think matters.
We all have value regardless of age, right? And they may or may not want school to be part of their lives. It’s just a question. It’s not the fundamental question of childhood or it doesn’t have to be. And that answer may well change over time. School is a choice alongside the many other choices in their lives.
So that said, unschooling can be a great window into this way of being in relationship with our kids. And I think because it’s often the first place that real conflict can arise, like when a kid and the school classroom environment just don’t mix well. And that was definitely my path but it’s certainly not the only path to discovering the far-reaching and lifelong impact of just cultivating those connected relationships with our kids, right? There’s where the rich soil is.
ANNA: I know. It’s so interesting because you know I love a tree analogy. But it’s funny because in the early days, for me, I actually saw consensual living as the umbrella and unschooling was one choice under that umbrella. That’s the piece that you’re getting at.
It’s like unschooling is one choice when we’re living consensually. We have children making autonomous decisions and having agency about how they want to spend their time, how they want to engage in the world, how we want to do that together as a family. And so I really love that distinction and I do think it evolved really for all of us. I think especially for you, Pam, because you came from school to unschooling. It’s a little bit different for Erika and I. We have always unschooled with our kids. So I think that’s why maybe for me, I had that different view of it earlier on.
But I think it’s critical because, you’re right, I think it’s that first touch point that people come to, this flashpoint with school. It can be so intense and you kind of feel like you’re losing your child or their light is dimming and it feels scary. And so unschooling can be this beautiful door to walk through to realize that there are different ways. But yeah, I think once you’re there and realize, oh, it’s actually about the connection, it’s actually about the relationship we have.
And then together, we can make the choices that best serve us, whatever that looks like. And, and of course, I love unschooling, we all do here. But but yeah, I really love putting it in that place. It’s the relationships that are so important.
ERIKA: It reminds me of my perfection piece from the last one, because I remember when I first found unschooling, it’s like, well, if you are putting your kids in school, then you’re not unschooling. It was all connected. It’s like you have to make that decision in order to be doing it right, because I was looking for how to do it right.
And so it really has been a journey, a mindset journey to get to the place of realizing it’s not about school. It’s not about any one particular choice that may or may not look mainstream. It’s about what the child wants. What is the relationship with the child feeling like? And so I think unschooling kind of answers one problem, which is, the child is hating school. And so unschooling is a way to respect their autonomy in that way. And then a whole bunch of other possibilities open up.
But we’ve seen so many amazing families with these amazing connected relationships deciding to go to school. And that doesn’t change that core value and that root of what is amazing about their families, which is listening to each other, making sure that we’re not pushing past someone else’s consent. It’s very eye-opening to get to that place where it really is not about school. It’s not about that decision. It’s about something deeper than that.
PAM: Something deeper, so much more. And yes, we have episodes on the podcast where I talked to parents whose kids have gone to school and so much doesn’t need to change. You don’t all of a sudden have to become a different kind of parent or have a different kind of relationship, just because school happens to be in the picture.
But yes, it definitely takes that mindset shift, right? To recognize, it’s not like one life I’m unschooling or I’m not unschooling. It’s when you get to the roots of the relationship and start looking at your days and your lives from there. It’s just a fundamentally different way. And unschooling is one of the choices.
I think when you take that journey to recognize the importance and value of the relationships, the school choice is just a choice. Whether or not school happens to be part of your lives for a season or for however long it works, the fundamental difference is that it’s still a choice.
ANNA: That’s what I was gonna say. It’s choice and agency, right? That’s the fundamental difference.
And that’s why it feels different. That’s why the families on the network that have kids that have gone back to school, it feels so different because it’s choice and agency that’s driving it versus have to and cultural expectation. And so it’s just really interesting to tease apart how different the same thing can feel when you’re coming at it from that deeply rooted place that you’re talking about.
I love that. Okay. So for me, one of the big, big ones that has changed, I would say kind of refined and we’ve honed in on it, is this idea that people are different and how that permeates everything.
In the early days, we talked a lot about celebrating the uniqueness of our children. We talked about coming up with solutions that worked for everyone, taking the time to listen, to understand all these different perspectives. So the groundwork was there for that understanding.
But something really clicked when we started talking specifically about how people are different because we are so different. We process information so differently. We prioritize things differently. We see and experience the world differently. There are so many ways that we are different. It is endless.
And it’s funny because Nora in the network just was sharing on one of our weekly calls, another one that popped up for her, another people are different thing. And she was talking about what motivates us to complete a task because she was noticing that she and her husband really take these very opposite approaches. He likes to make the task easy. She likes to make the task interesting. And so they’re coming at this in a very, very different way. And it’s just another way that they’re different.
One is not better than the other. One is not right or wrong. And when we start with that fundamental understanding that our brains are unique and we all have our own way of moving through the world, we can let go of the defensiveness. We don’t have to defend our way of being. We don’t have to convince someone else to see it our way or that our way is right. We can get curious.
And we talk about that so much. We can start enjoying the process of understanding ourselves and others without getting stuck on there being a right way or a better way, which we’ve also touched on this month. And I’m not going to tangent off into all the differences because they’re just literally too many. But it definitely comes up in the podcast. We’ve talked about it there. We talk about it a lot on the network.
But what I’m getting at today is really this more general open curiosity about exploring the ways that we’re different and ultimately celebrating them and getting excited about these different ways, not taking them personally, not being defensive, just getting excited and thinking how cool it is. Because when we feel that defensiveness slip away, it really leaves space for this deeper, more meaningful connection and a deeper understanding, again, of both ourselves and those around us.
I think it’s been so interesting because just understanding that people are different has helped me learn more about myself. Because there’s something that allows me to realize, that’s actually really important to me. That’s the way my brain works. That’s the way I need something to be presented or the way I need to move through something.
I felt before it was more external, I’m just trying to push my way through or this is how it has to be done. I don’t know how to explain it, but the nuance of that really has helped me understand myself more, understand my relationships more, the people in my life more. This is a piece I’m going to be exploring and talking about the rest of my life because it’s just so fundamental.
ERIKA: It’s such a huge paradigm shift. It has helped me so, so, so much. It’s almost hard to talk about the depth of what this is doing in my mind to be able to think this way. What I can remember is that before these big mindset shifts, it was more like, I want to find out the right way to do this thing or the right way to be like this. If something’s hard for me, that’s something that I should work on. If something’s hard for someone else, that’s the area they need to improve or that kind of thing.
Rather than just saying, this thing is hard for me, that other thing is hard for you. Working to our strengths and realizing our differences. I love the part about how it makes communicating about ourselves with other people easier.
It just has none of that fighting energy, none of this kind of argument energy of like, you’re doing it wrong, I’m doing it right, or I feel like I need to just keep apologizing for myself because I just can’t get my stuff together. I can’t handle this for whatever reason. And so just realizing all of these different layers at which we are just so different from each other and accepting it has been a complete game changer in all of my relationships.
I can start to notice why that thing has always bothered me about how that person does it. It’s just because that doesn’t make sense to my mind. So I feel like anytime we come upon something that someone else is doing and we say to ourselves, it just doesn’t make sense. Why are they doing that? It doesn’t make any sense. Then that’s our clue of like, we’ve hit upon people are different again, because it makes sense to them. And yeah, it’s just so deep and rich and one of my favorite topics.
PAM: Yeah, yeah, me too. And it’s another beautiful example of how unschooling is a window because, like you were talking about Anna, at first, we have always used that language when it comes to our kids, because that’s kind of where I first discovered how different people could be. And that it felt wrong to correct them because it was working for them.
They just they did it their way. And it was working out fine. And I was like, oh, it was part of my whole journey around mistakes are bad, right? They did it this way. And that was different than the way I would have ever thought to do it. And look, it still worked. So, that was the fundamental first observation. I think that that set me down this path.
There are just so many layers, because then it was like, oh, there’s a reason they did it that way. You see that consistency over time. I realized they just think about this differently than I do. That’s interesting. And I could see how my kids were different.
And then you start questioning that age component, right? I can see how I like to do things in particular ways, and then it just starts layer by layer. You find all the different ways, discover more ways that people are different, you discover that it’s not just kids who are different, they’re people. They are whole people. I do even remember when that phrase first popped up. But it just encapsulated everything so beautifully.
And, and it sounds so simple on the surface, people are different. We say that to anybody and people think, of course, but it’s just so fundamentally different and deeper. And once you start using that lens, when I see somebody doing something, and think, I would never do it that way. Go to how people are different, rather than they’re doing it wrong, I should tell them how to do it properly, or more effectively, or more efficiently, or whatever lens we used before. We have improved with the way we choose to do it, to instead use that people are different lens. Oh, and yes, what great framing for conversations, right? Because it’s not judging the way that they’re doing it.
Once they can get on that same page, when we’re coming at this with language that isn’t fighting them, isn’t trying to fix them. Conversations about it are just so much more interesting, because then we’re actually learning about ourselves and learning about other people. And then we can bring that consideration with us forward, right? It’s so cool.
ERIKA: And yeah, it’s making me remember that there’s so much coming at us in any given moment, so much sensory information, right? And everyone’s brain is picking the part that we’re paying attention to. And so you can’t even say, we were all there, how did they not have the same experience as I did? It’s because they didn’t. They literally didn’t see or hear or feel it the same. It could be a completely different experience from one person to another. So it makes sense why we’re all so different.
So anyway, the one I came up with for this question, thinking about what has changed about my understanding over the years, is when I was first learning about unschooling, I was so focused on what it meant for the kids. What they were doing, or weren’t doing. What I was doing for them? What I was choosing not to do for them? So basically, how to approach my days with them. And with all that focus just going towards them. And over time, that has changed with the realization, and I’m sure it came from the podcast too, that the unschooling journey is my journey to take.
Unschooling is really about me letting go of old messages and patterns, digging into the layers to figure out why I react like this. Or healing a lot of old wounds that can get triggered by parenting. And so, it’s really a journey of growth for myself, that then benefits my relationships with my children. And since I’m willing to look at myself and learn and grow, they gradually have a parent who is more aware, more resourced, and better equipped to support them.
And it’s this beautiful upward spiral. And it’s not to say that it’s easy, or that the upward spiral is just going up and up all the time. But I think it’s actually a bit harder because I need to focus on myself and my baggage and all of that in order to move forward.
In fact, I know we mention all the time that one of the red flags that we’re stressed or maybe have too much on our plates is when we start focusing outside of ourselves and trying to control other people, control our children. It’s so much easier to say, you’re doing this wrong, I need you to get better, than it is to look inside of ourselves. And I think a lot of mainstream parenting is really focused in that way on controlling the kids and looking for the problems that the kids have, rather than exploring why we’re so activated by certain things that the kids are doing and making changes in ourselves.
But I think changing that kind of generational trauma and that generational story, the old patterns, that really has to start with me. And while the kids are focusing on the things they’re interested in and growing and gaining skills, I can focus on becoming more and more true to myself, and just de-schooling all of those internalized beliefs that I took on as I was growing up. And my kids are really great guides in this kind of work, because they’re just naturally so much more in tune with who they are.
They have not internalized nearly as many limiting beliefs as I have. And so looking at them inspires me to continue, because I think this is big, challenging work to do, but it’s so valuable. And sometimes I can’t even believe how much I’ve changed and grown through my unschooling journey.
And I’m really proud of all the work that I’ve put into it. And I’m happy that I can live more truthfully now with my family. I really think it’s changed our relationships.
PAM: I love the idea of more truthfully. I love that phrase, because that is what it feels like. And I too had that realization. At the beginning of the journey because, my kids left school. So it was like, what are we going to do instead of school?
And it was all very outwardly focused at first. But then as I discovered unschooling, and those kinds of questions started bubbling up, then the shift, then that is something if you listen to the podcast archive, you will hear people echo. Especially when I do like 10 questions episodes, where we really dive deeper into people’s journeys. It’s like, it really was all about me, it really is all so much my work to do alongside supporting them.
But if I don’t do this work, I am putting so much on top of our relationship, and our days that is just doing pretty much nothing but getting in the way. It was just a huge thing.
And, you know, as you said, Erika, it can be such a great clue when we notice we’re starting to look outside. I’m feeling overwhelmed, I just need to control other things, just to settle things down. But that is such a great clue to examine, why am I feeling so overwhelmed? Why am I feeling beyond capacity? That is just a useful clue. And not judging right, wrong, good, bad.
Now, if you listen to this podcast for a little while, you know it’s not about that. But these are all great clues that help us ask better questions that just help us learn more and live more truthfully. Like that’s why that phrase struck me. So, that was really cool.
ANNA: Yeah, I love that, too. And this was definitely a part of my journey. Because we come from this culture that’s so externally focused, do it this way, do the right path, do the thing, you know, all of these pieces. And so, really learning it’s all about me is huge. I don’t know if it’s in the Summit, or one of my early talks but it’s literally called “It’s all about me.” Because that was this big revelation, they’re fine. They know how to do these things. They know how to learn and grow and make mistakes and be in the world. It’s me that has all these things to unlearn and unpack to get to that place of alignment of truth of who I am and who I want to be.
And that was just amazing to me. It’s terrifying. And it’s empowering, right? It’s kind of terrifying, wait a minute, now I need to look at all these pieces. But that I can change, right? I think when we’re so externally focused it’s harder. I can’t change David, I can’t change my girls. They are their own people. And so when we get that, it’s easier. I love that red flag piece too. When I’m out there trying to micromanage everybody around me, it really means probably something’s not feeling good for me, something’s happening for me. And so, again, it can be scary to look at that and do that work. But it is also the thing I can control, which is me, how I move through the world. And so then that kind felt exciting.
So yeah, this was another huge one for me that just really keeps coming back around. Oh yeah, it’s me again. It’s not them. It’s me.
ERIKA: I mean, it makes it easier, right? In a way. We have control over that part.
ANNA: Yeah.
ERIKA: If it’s soothing to think, maybe nothing’s wrong with those kids. Maybe they’re just living their lives. So, thanks so much to both of you for sharing your reflections.
This was really fun. And to everyone listening in their podcast feed or watching on YouTube, we appreciate you joining us. In our next episode, we will be diving into the question of what still matters to us.
And so we also invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. We’re offering a free month trial so you can come and see what it’s for yourself. And if you enjoy the kinds of conversations we have on the podcast, there’s a good chance that the network might be a great fit for you as well. I hope to see you there. To learn more and join us, follow the link in the show notes or go to our website, which is livingjoyfully.ca and click on Network in the menu. Wishing everyone a wonderful day.
EU400: 10 Years: What We’ve Learned (Part 1)
Feb 05, 2026
The Exploring Unschooling Podcast began at the beginning of 2016 when Pam released episode EU001: What is Unschooling?
10 Years! And 400 Episodes! To celebrate these huge milestones, we are looking back and reflecting this month.
In Part 1 of our celebration, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the question of what we’ve learned on our unschooling journeys in the past 10 years. It was a very fun question to explore and we really enjoyed digging into all of our answers.
We talked about how living consensually is really about where we choose to direct our energy, how there’s no such thing as a perfect unschooler (or a perfect parent!), and how independence is not a good measure of unschooling or parenting success. These were all huge paradigm shifts for us over time that have proven to be so valuable.
We thank you so much for being a part of our Exploring Unschooling community and hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and I am joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis.
Hello and welcome, everyone, to episode 400 of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. This year also marks 10 years since I started the podcast. The first episode went out January 10th, 2016 and it all just feels a little surreal yet meaningful for me. And not so much in that celebratory, look how long we’ve been doing this, yay! That is very cool. But in the more reflective sense that 10 years really is a good chunk of time, right? Enough time for thoughts and ideas to grow and change, to strengthen and wither.
And so, in the last month or so, I’ve become quite curious about exploring this more deeply. When I eventually shared my thoughts about it with Anna and Erika, hello internal processor, they were so very supportive and happy to dive into this reflection alongside me, for which I am forever grateful. You guys are amazing teammates, thank you so very much.
And I just wanted to share, Anna first appeared on the podcast in episode 4, the very first roundtable episode that we had, and Erika began listening in the early days, first appearing on the podcast in 2019 to talk about unschooling book clubs. And then in October 2022, they both officially became podcast co-hosts.
So, coming back to now, rather than doing a retrospective or greatest hits episode, as I was trying to think what to do for 400, we decided to use this anniversary, 10 years and 400 episodes, as a chance to pause and just ask ourselves a few simple, but at least what feel to me, meaningful questions.
What have we learned over the past decade?
What has changed?
And what still matters?
So, over the next three episodes, the three of us are going to explore those questions together. Now if you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that we don’t share our thoughts as experts with answers, but just as thoughtful and curious people who’ve lived this lifestyle with our families for many, many years and have participated in conversations in this sphere for a long time.
The podcast continues because we enjoy sharing our experiences, the ideas that resonate with us, and the patterns that we’ve noticed. And if you’re new here, welcome! We now have a rich archive of 400 episodes for you to explore.
The content is timeless and evergreen with a wide variety of formats from interviews with unschooling parents, to Q&A’s answering listener questions, to me sharing my published articles and conference talks that I’ve written, to ongoing series exploring things like unschooling stumbling blocks and the so-called “unschooling rules” that can trip people up as they embark on this amazing journey.
So, in this first 10-year anniversary episode we are starting our reflection with the question, what have we learned? Would you like to get us started Anna?
ANNA: I would! But oh my gosh, I’m glad we’re going to be talking and reflecting for the whole month, because it’s really hard to pick one or two things that I’ve learned, because I have learned so much about myself, about relationships, about the world. I think learning is one of the things that actually draws me to this way of life, because I feel like we’re always learning and I love that.
But what I’m going to talk about today is how living consensually in this lifestyle is really about where we choose to put our energy. The reality of it is, relationships and parenting involves work. It doesn’t have to be hard work, but recognizing that it can take energy to live with other people, to share your life with them, helps me think about how I want to spend my energy.
And as Mary Oliver asks us in The Summer Day, “Tell me what it is you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”
So, for me as I reflect back, I never wanted to be a teacher and really it’s why homeschooling was not even on my radar. I’m too interested in learning for myself to try to impart age-appropriate information to someone else. But when our oldest made it clear that school was not going to be a good fit, I had to rethink some of these ideas.
Luckily, early on, I read John Holt and learned about unschooling and it was such a cool fit, because I love facilitating and supporting people that I love exploring the world and seeing what interests them. And I think a cool part of unschooling is that parents are also pursuing their interests and exploring. It’s about creating this environment where everyone is learning and growing and exploring together and that was exciting. That was a place I wanted to spend my energy.
Another aspect was how I want to be in relationship. Consent and not using coercion as a means to control behavior, well really not even trying to control behavior at all, was important to me. Recognizing that any behavior is just a communication of a need and it’s the needs we want to address. So, with that understanding, it changes the way we relate to each other. In healthy adult relationships we don’t coerce and punish or reward our way to the outcome we want, so why treat children differently? Why not start out with collaboration and connection? Children are incredible problem solvers and quite good at communicating their needs. I think we all know that. Why not learn those skills of navigating conflict and supporting each other from the beginning?
Recently there was a thread on the network where someone was grappling with some fears and they were wanting to reach for some control, and in part of my response I reflected, who do I want to be? How do I want to spend my time? And knowing that being an enforcer to unhappy people is not it. And I think that speaks to this energy lens I’m talking about.
Would I rather spend my energy working towards solving problems big and small than to deal with the fallout of people that don’t feel heard, don’t feel understood, feel like they’re being forced or coerced along someone else’s path? That’s an easy choice for me. Even if the culture is saying it’s for their own good, it’s that energy. What do I want to sit in? What do I want my days to look like? It just isn’t how I want to spend my time or my energy. It isn’t the person that I want to be in the world.
I want to focus on connection, understanding, problem-solving, and finding ways to live together joyfully. So, now you can see why Pam and I were drawn together some 20 plus years ago, because that living joyfully lens is a guiding light for me. I feel like it is this beautiful lens to look through to see these different aspects of our life and relationship and how that all weaves together.
I plan to continue spending my one wild precious life learning, growing, loving with abandon, prioritizing connections, and supporting others on their own unique journey. And so, yeah that’s my reflection for this one.
ERIKA: I love that so much. And actually, until you came up with this idea, I hadn’t really thought of how consent is about where we put our energy, living consensually. It’s just an interesting angle to think about living consensually. And it reminds me of something that I’ve thought about in the past. Sometimes it feels easier to reach for control, but then the way it actually turns out is like it’s not easier. It’s just being fast on the front side of what’s happening and then having to spend all this time with people who are upset.
And so, that is definitely something that I’ve learned through the podcast and through all of our discussions that we can choose that energy that we want to have and we can choose how we’re going to spend our time. And is it going to be that clamping down and trying to make everyone follow these steps? Or is it going to be this more connected, being true to ourselves, and allowing other people to be true to themselves as well, which really is what living consensually means to me?
PAM: Yeah, I love that energy focus and it was a huge a-ha moment for me back then and just so valuable for me moving forward, life-changing in the way that I looked at it. Because sometimes, the control, like you said Erika, makes it go faster up front for the most part, right. So often, we don’t really count the blowback later. We don’t relate it because sometimes it doesn’t even happen in the moment. It’s just a relationship thing that gets harder and harder and harder moving forward so at first we don’t even consider it as part of it. We just say well it’s just so much work to talk to everybody, to see what they need and see what we can figure out. That’s a lot of work because we’re only looking at the upfront piece of it and not really recognizing that back in blowback. But then you but once you start to recognize that and then you start to see oh like that’s why the relationships feel hard. That’s why our relationships feels hard.
It helps us realize that so much of it is our choices in the first place that have set this up. It’s not that our kids are grumpy, or our kids don’t listen, all those stories that more conventionally we hear in those parenting circles but we feel like it’s so out of our control. It’s our kids, they’re the ones that are grumpy, they are the problem. How do I fix my kid when in actuality, when you’re looking at that bigger picture and recognizing I have to use my energy somewhere or the relationships are completely disconnected and then parenting is just like a horrible hard thing that you have to do. You have to get through, it’s way too much of our life to do that for me.
I mean people approach it differently, but for me, what we’ve been learning and for us that’s been my experience as well that it just set a tone and an atmosphere and just felt so much better for me to put that energy there because that was connecting. We learned more about each other, and we actually enjoyed whatever choice that we made more because we didn’t have a person or two that we pulled along because they have to come and they just sit and sulk in the corner. We could enjoy so much more of our days. It didn’t feel like as much of a struggle even though it took more energy or effort up front but when I realized that I was learning things, I could enjoy that piece more and I certainly enjoy that piece more than trying to console somebody who’s really upset after we get back and break down.
ERIKA: It just sounds exhausting. Okay, I want to move on to what I’ve learned. I’m so excited about this anniversary. I think 400 episodes is a really big deal and 10 years of this podcast existing as this bolster and a resource and a comfort for so many thousands of families. It’s just really inspiring to think about and gives me goosebumps. I’m just so grateful for all that I’ve learned on this journey and really I have the podcast to thank for many of those aha moments I’ve had along the way.
When I was thinking about my own answer to what we’ve learned, what bubbled up for me was that there’s no such thing as a perfect unschooler. I can just think back to myself as a young mom or even just a young adult before I had children and I don’t think I could have wrapped my head around the idea that I can’t be perfect. What does that even mean? I think my many, many years in school gave me a pretty good idea that there are right answers and wrong answers. There are the correct paths that are worthy and good and then a lot of other paths that are disappointing and sad.
I just thought it was possible to do all the things correctly and then I could be perfect and I would be safe and so I internalized those ideas into parenting. I just was trying so hard to figure out how I could do it perfectly, how can I get an A-plus in parenting, how can I get an A-plus in unschooling. It’s so stressful thinking about that idea now, but it makes sense that that was my lens, at first. It wasn’t really even at a conscious level. I was just like a fish who doesn’t know what water is. I was just like part of this competitive culture that encouraged me to not make mistakes, to be the best but I think there is a part of me that’s really rebellious as well and so there was this part that knew that this pursuit of perfection isn’t the real story of life as a human.
Then my kids, they’re different from me. They aren’t people pleasers and they’re so clear about what works for them and I love them so much. I just can’t see them as wrong. How are they wrong? They’re awesome. So, in order to reconcile the truth of that I had to let go of the idea of the perfect parent/perfect child, the idea that mistakes should be avoided or that there’s any kind of a right answer to life. I know that in hard moments I sometimes still wish for that simplicity of getting the good grade, knowing what the right answer is but real life just doesn’t work like that.
It’s really too bad that I had so much training in that system that’s actually not that helpful when I got out into the real world and if I’m honest that external and internal pressure to be perfect or to be the best doesn’t really serve me at all. It adds so much unneeded stress. It’s safe to be different. It’s safe to make choices that don’t play out the way that we thought they would. There are just so many paths to take through life and there’s not a perfect approach.
What an amazing journey that realization has been for me. It’s not easy to release all of that baggage and all those messages of the years of conditioning but every time I can remind myself that the idea of perfection is just an illusion, our lives are made up of choices and our choices then ripple out from there, things just feel more expansive more relaxed and the possibilities open up.
I just thought maybe to get your minds buzzing with all the possibilities, I’ll throw out a few areas to consider. There’s not a perfect bedtime or a wake time. There’s no perfect diet or body. There’s no perfect age to learn any particular thing. No perfect way to be a friend or to contribute to your family or to communicate. There’s no perfect way to dress or to express your emotions or to move your body. Allowing ourselves to be unique and imperfect is so freeing and once I got there, then I could leave space for my kids and myself to just be who we are right now. This has been one of the biggest mental shifts for me in my lifetime so far I would say and it’s really thanks to conversations like these that I’ve really been able to process it.
PAM: I love that we’re all hitting on the ones that were big for us because yes this was another big one, just the idea of perfect. I’ve got to do it right. We have that whole “unschooling rules” series on the podcast because of the idea of, ‘just give me the rules of unschooling so I can be a good unschooler’ exists. That’s a fun series because that is really what it’s rooted in. Because at first, of course, I want to be really good at this. I want to be really good as a parent, and if you choose unschooling, I want to be a really good homeschooler, unschooler, whatever, whatever it is.
We are just so used to having that tick box. Then give me my list and I will do it and to reconcile that with the everydayness of life and for me it was so important, I would not have been able to wrap my head around it before I had kids. I wouldn’t have really had a reason to because conventional life and work because often work is the same but seeing my kids when they were younger and the choices they made, it was so different.
A big one for me was them not getting worked up or upset about mistakes. They were just like, ‘oh, that didn’t work the way I thought’ and then they would just try something else. Whereas, I’d be like, ‘oh my gosh I hope nobody saw that. I’m going to go over here and pretend I didn’t know it happened.’ Those pieces that I learned growing up just because being judged and graded was hard. That’s why I was always so driven to do the right thing, to find out what the right answer was and to do the right thing.
So yes, pulling back these layers around this was paradigm shifting for me. Mistakes don’t have to be a bad thing. I do learn a lot. Maybe I was missing some information. Maybe I just need more practice with that skill. I’m learning so much each time and I actually learn more when I can get messier. Often I would just keep trying to input, input, input until I find the right perfect answer before I actually ever take any action. I think it’s so interesting.
ANNA: I think we all have very different personalities and so there’s different aspects of this but I really agree with what you said Pam. If we didn’t have kids I don’t know that I would have gotten this in the same way because for me it was a system to crack. I knew how to perform in school to get what I needed to get. The A’s, the thing, the whatever. And like you said, it transferred to jobs and different things but I really do feel like it was so blown open by having kids.
They just had this natural piece about them of just, we make mistakes. They figure things out. They’re learning. When they’re learning how to walk and talk and do from the very beginning, it’s this really natural human process of learning. There was just something about the way my brain works and being fascinated by it which I think we all have in common. We like to tease out these nuances. It’s like, oh there’s a different way, this isn’t it. That’s a system. Humans actually are okay to learn and be messy and figure out these things and so I love that piece.
Then I love what you said Erika, at the end, when you were giving us the list of the different things because what that really brought out for me was that reminder that unschooling or coming to this way of life is this little door we walk through and then there’s this huge world on the other side. There are all the different things that it applies to. So, those mistakes and not being perfect and being messy, it just applies to everything and then suddenly it is this gigantic paradigm shift of everything that I thought was one way has lots of options and is so different than that and so yeah I just loved all of those pieces so much.
PAM: Okay, ready for this one? One of the most life-changing things I think that I have learned over the past ten years is that my child’s independence isn’t a meaningful measure of either my child as a person or me as a parent. And to take that a step further I’ve come to think that not only is it not a meaningful measure, holding it as a goal on our parenting journey can be actively harmful.
I have been thinking about this a while before mentioning it to you guys. I was thinking more the other day, I was curious and I cracked open my first book “Free to Learn: five ideas for a joyful unschooling life”, which I published back in 2012. I skimmed the table of contents and sure enough in the last chapter, idea five, living together, which is kind of this whole consensual piece we were talking about, but the title of the last section jumped out at me. “Moving on out”, so I quickly flipped to that page and there it was in black and white what I had written about preparing my kids for eventually moving out on their own as an important goal I see for myself as a parent. But the goal is not that my children move out as soon as possible, it is to have supported and helped them gain the knowledge and skills that will help make the transition to living on their own as trouble-free as possible.
How many of us started our parenting journey having absorbed that implicit goal of raising independent adults with the ultimate achievement of that goal being our children moving out. I mean, I certainly did so we began unschooling in 2002 and it’s interesting to see that 10 years into my unschooling journey when I wrote that book my perspective had shifted away from looking at that goal through the lens of the conventional agenda of moving out at 18. Like once you’re an adult, you move out and I shifted towards supporting them on their own timetable. So, I didn’t have that timetable anymore but still the assumption of quote unquote “moving out” was still implicit in my words.
So, in the last 10 years I learned one that moving out is not synonymous with independence and two that using the goal of fostering my child’s independence as context for my everyday parenting choices was actually getting in the way of not only my relationships with them but also in them developing their own self-awareness and hearing their own inner voice, understanding themselves better.
So, basically the choices I was making with an eye on that idea of fostering their independence we’re missing so much of the relevant context about them as a person and what was happening in the moment because I was kind of fixated on that future independence. I came to realize that what meant more to me was the idea of interdependence, of our lives weaving together and supporting each other as needed, no matter our ages or where any one of us happens to call home at the moment.
That paradigm shift had and of course continues to have a profound impact on my relationships with my kids and you can see this revelation unfold for me over the last 10 years of the podcast from episode 96 when Anna first introduced me to that phrase ‘independence agenda’ to episode 365 where the three of us just discussed it directly in more depth. To me it was just such a valuable shift that I learned that continues to have such an impact and that I just feel more and more deeply every year. I’ve had conversations with my kids about what does it prove when you move out? How does that prove that you’re independent? Versus the interdependence of living together that has just brought us so much more joy but also so much more knowing of each other, knowing of ourselves. Instead of all that external framework of trying to prove yourself, knowing yourself it’s just so much more meaningful I think moving forward. So, that was a big one for me.
ANNA: It’s such a big one and you know I do get excited because I just wanted to name it and we have named it over the years, this independence agenda because it is so strong in our culture. It starts with babies being moved to their own room. So, it is so interesting to just bring awareness to it so that you can watch for it because again when I think about who I want to be in the world and what’s important to me, it is that interdependence that you’re talking about. It’s that connection, that’s what makes being a human rich to me. Learning about myself, learning about others. So, this artificial agenda that’s handed to us. And it’s so culturally specific. There are many cultures where that isn’t the goal at all and so that’s always interesting too think of this as a have to, we have to make them independent, we have to be moving towards this and yet other cultures don’t even consider that.
I think it’s really interesting. And when we talk about how different we all are, which we’ll be talking about over the month too, it’s recognizing that when our kids are making that choice from inside of them, listening to that inner voice that it’s so different because they may very well have a drive to go off and explore the world or do different things and they may come back and they may not. They may be able to live their whole complete life altogether because again it doesn’t have to look one way. I think that’s the beauty of this life is just like getting rid of what isn’t serving me. No, what do we want to do, as the people here involved in this home and I don’t know that just opens up a lot of possibilities that I think are really beautiful. I do think this was a really big one so yeah I really appreciate you sharing that.
ERIKA: I love that part about how you can see it unfold over the course of the podcast. I just think that’s so fun and amazing that you have records of yourself saying, “This is what I believe now,” and then how that has changed over the years.
But I think, again, it’s like that fish in the water thing where you didn’t even know it was an assumption that you were carrying. It’s just a fact of our culture that you don’t even realize that there are other possibilities. And so, I feel like when that happens, when it’s something that’s so part of us that we don’t even realize we have that thought. We really only confront it either with help from someone who has realized it or when we bump up against problems in our own family. Like, they’re not moving out. Something’s wrong. And then it’s like, oh wait. Is something wrong? And then we can go through that process of questioning, is this really something that is mandatory?
And I thought of that cultural piece, too, because, right, it really is also so specific to what culture you’re in, what messages you’ve learned through your whole life. And I think once we’ve become adults in this culture, we’ve been exposed to that message so many times it just feels like, well this is literally what everyone does. But if we start thinking about it, it’s not what everyone does. Everyone has their own context.
And kind of like my perfection one, too, there’s not a perfect time to move out. There’s not a perfect age to feel like you’re a grown-up. It’s just these weird cultural things that, once you start seeing it, once you start questioning it, it just all kind of falls apart. And it’s like, okay, really anything is possible. We can just look at, who is this person? What do they want? What is their context? What feels like the next step to them?
And then it really to me is like, when you talk about the web of learning, you don’t want to be throwing them to the other side of their web of learning when they haven’t gotten there themselves. And so, developing independence in various areas of their life, it’s going to look so different for every person. And I just love that I’m not even to that age yet. And I already have been thinking about this. I just feel really grateful for that.
PAM: I love the piece of not throwing them across the web of learning, their understanding of the world. And watching them unfold on their own path and on their own timetable is just so beautiful. Because when you take that moment, it really is them and all about them.
And as they’re figuring things out, that’s beautiful. And I think we’ll probably be talking about this a lot more, but I loved Anna, you mentioned, and this is such a great example, that unschooling is a window to like the world, like to all these pieces.
When you start, because now you’re actually living together, right? You’re actually in relationship, rather than more often moving just from thing to thing to thing, right? So all these questions start to bubble up. Once you look at a little bit bigger picture than just all the things start to come into focus. It was such a great point, Erika, that it wasn’t even something that we had consciously made a choice about, or that we even knew was an assumption that we were carrying.
It was just like this fundamental fact of life, it felt like. But you’re right too, about it being cultural. For my husband, who’s Italian, that wasn’t a big thing. Moving out at any particular age wasn’t a thing at all.
So, all those little pieces, we start building our own web, our own wisdom and context around an idea. It’s just so beautiful.
Anyway, thank you both so much. Thank you for sharing your reflections about what you’ve learned on this amazing journey, and we will be talking about lots more as the rest of the month unfolds. And thank you to everyone listening, whether you’re listening in your podcast feed or watching on YouTube, we appreciate you joining us. So in our next episode, we’ll be diving into the question of what has changed for us.
And we invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. As we mentioned in the last episode, we are now offering a free month trial, so you can come check it out and just see if it’s a good fit for you. And if you enjoy our podcast conversations, that’s probably a good sign that it just might be.
So to learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes or go to our website, livingjoyfully.ca. And we wish everyone a lovely day. Thanks so much to you both. Bye.
EU399: On the Journey with Jenna-Gaye Hollis
Jan 29, 2026
We’re back with another On the Journey episode! We had a wonderful conversation with Living Joyfully Network member Jenna-Gaye Hollis. Jenna is a mom of four living in Australia. Her sons are 17, 16, 14, and 9, and she shared some of her unschooling journey with us.
Before having children, Jenna was a teacher. Her first son, Jye, pretty much fit the mold of what she was expecting parenting to be like, but it was Jenna’s second son, Haize, who really brought unschooling to the family. When school just wasn’t working out for him, Jenna discovered unschooling and it really spoke to her heart. So much fun and learning have blossomed from that point!
We talked about navigating big transitions as a family, leaning on the support of other unschooling parents in the Living Joyfully Network, especially when fears bubble up, and some of the a-ha moments that Jenna has had along her journey so far. It was a really beautiful discussion and we hope you find it helpful!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello everyone, I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully and I’m joined today by my co-hosts Erika Ellis and Pam Laricchia, as well as our special guest today, Jenna Hollis. Hello to you all. And before we dive in, I want to mention that the Living Joyfully Network is celebrating six years in February.
It has been and continues to be the most amazing space with intentional families from all over the world sharing their journeys. And recently we’ve been hearing some from new members that they were kind of sitting on the fence and not sure about joining, but now they’re loving it and they wish they had joined sooner. So to help people hop off that fence, we are now offering a free trial month.
That way you can see for yourself what a warm inviting space it is, filled with resources and connections. You can learn more about that opportunity in the show notes, or you can also go to livingjoyfully.ca and the link will be on the homepage.
I am very excited about Jenna joining us today. She has been a longtime member on the Living Joyfully Network, and it has been such a treat sharing in her journey and getting to know her family. Her generous spirit, deep reflections, and ability to articulate her personal journey has sparked so many aha moments for all of us. And I think it’s going to be really fun to share her beauty and insights with our podcast audience. So welcome, Jenna.
And to get us started, I was wondering if you could just tell us a little bit about you and your family, what everybody’s into right now. And we’d love to just hear a bit about your story of coming to Unschooling.
JENNA: Yeah, no problem. First of all, I’m excited to be here. This has been such a big resource in my life. And I just don’t think I would be where I am today without it. It’s just that real life line that keeps me true to this journey, that has not been easy by any means. But what makes it easier is it’s our journey.
And anyway, I’ll jump into talking about my family. I’m married to Leon. He’s my childhood sweetheart, I’ve been with Leon since I was 15. And yeah, we’ve really grown together. You think you get married and you’ve got it all worked out. And it’s like, no, this journey is always under construction. That is for sure.
So, we’ve got four boys. We’ve got Jye, who will be 18 in April. Haize, who is 16. Blair, 14. And our youngest, Leeton, who will be 10 in a couple of weeks. And that makes up our beautiful, loud, dynamic family. And we are all very different. You kind of think you’ve got it worked out before you even have kids, or I know I definitely did.
I was a teacher before I became a parent. So I had this idea that I just knew exactly what I was walking into. And then we have one child and Jye was that child that kind of fit that idea of what it meant to raise children.
And I’ll talk a little bit about Jye. He, at the moment, he’s right into his football, like absolutely loves his footy. He’s actually living down in Sydney, predominantly with my husband, because we made a big move three and a half hours from where we raised our family over the past sort of 15 years.
And so, he’s down in Sydney, and he’s really getting right into his football. He had an amazing year last year, found an awesome team that was really aligned, the same attitude, they just wanted to just get better and better. And so that’s where a lot of his focus is going this year.
And he’s also doing his electrical trade. He decided to follow in his dad’s footsteps and give that a real go. And he’s really loving that.
And so he’ll be actually going into his third year of his apprenticeship halfway through this year, which is just like, what, how did that happen? How did we get here? But he’s there, he’s really stepping into his own, and living down in Sydney away from us. It wasn’t an easy decision. But it’s been the best decision, because he’s just he has his mates down here, he’s got a girlfriend down here. And he just loves being down here. And at the same time, when he comes up and stays with us, he really enjoys that time too. He gets right into his fishing. So that’s another one of his interests.
And then moving on to Haize, who is our 16-year-old, and he’s the one who actually brought us to the unschooling pathway. When I had Haize, he was a child that shook up all of my ideas of what it meant to raise children. You know, because he’s just his own, his own little spirit, who literally cannot live outside of what is right for him.
I feel like Jye is very peripherally aware, very much aware of what pleases other people. And he doesn’t sacrifice himself for that. But he very much is in tune with, okay, how is this person wanting me to do X, what ticks off other people’s boxes, whilst also staying true to himself. And then Haize came along, and he’s just this, he’s just so in tune with who he is and what he wants, you know, the decisions he wants to make at any given moment.
And so we did start in the school system. The school system fit Jye really well. He’s a real people person, loves being around lots of different people, and just fit that system quite well.
But then as Haize was getting older, I was like, I don’t know about how this is going to work. He just runs his own show. Anyway, we gave it a real good go.
And it wasn’t until we got to year two, and he had such an amazing teacher. He had some great friends. But he just wasn’t happy. You could just see that light dimming in him. And I just knew that I had to look for an alternative option. And so we went down the route of a Steiner school as well.
And that was okay to begin with. But then I discovered unschooling, and it just spoke so deeply to my own heart that I just could not, not follow it. And that’s where I really came to understand Haize as a person who like, when something speaks so deeply to you, you can’t not do it.
It’s a bit like once you know something, you can’t unknow it. And it’s like, once you start to tap into making decisions from that place, living in alignment with who you are, you can’t not do it. Anyway, he was the one that brought us here.
As a kid, he was always outside, always playing with bugs, always catching spiders, you know, and he still loves all those things. He loved fishing. But as he’s gotten older, he’s gone through this real cocooning phase. And he’s gotten right into his gaming. And I’ve been sitting back and really watching and aiming to understand that as opposed to judging it, accepting that this was a big part of his life. And it was a really challenging thing for me to do. You know, he’s this kid that was so outdoorsy and so into everything. And then all of a sudden, it changes. And I think we get so many messages about gaming that that doesn’t help.
But once I stripped all of that away, and took the time to actually understand what it was that he was drawn to, it makes total sense. He is that immersive learner, he learns through his whole body, doing whatever it is. And so I was watching him play all these different games, and then seeing how that marries up with the things that he does out in the real world as well.
So, it’s just another way of exploring those interests. Like he loves target shooting, and he loves roleplay. I watch how all of my kids interact with each other. And they just love roleplaying and getting really into the story. My kids have never been the sit there and read a book kind of kid, as much as the teacher in me would have loved that.
They just were not those kinds of kids. But then when you watch your kids in a natural environment, you really come to understand who they are. And you see the threads throughout their whole life.
So that’s Haize, he’s definitely the one that brought us here. And I’m so grateful that he did that and that I was able to undo a lot of my already predetermined thinking. All of which has led me to this place where I have learned a lot about myself.
And so I’ll move on to Blair. Blair is my 14-year-old. And I am so in awe of the changes that this child has made. He too went to school to begin with, and he was a kid, well even as a baby, he was that real kind of anxious kid who was always watching where I was. He never left my side. You know, I’m going to the shopping centre and always lose things. Turn around. And then I’ve got Blair, who’s always by my side, always clinging to me, just didn’t have that confidence about him. And then he went to school as well, because that’s what we were doing back at that time. And I think he spent every day of kindergarten clinging to the fence, crying. When I think about it, that’s probably the biggest regret that I have is that I persevered through that for the whole year of kindergarten.
But now looking at him, giving him that environment where he was just free to be himself. He was able to really develop that ground of confidence. Like, you watch him in conversations with people, and he just has this, this confidence in who he is.
There’s none of this, you know, self promoting, like, it’s really hard to describe, but when you watch your kid’s journey, and you see how much they just grow into who they are, it’s really cool to just go, far out, I don’t need to do anything other than provide that environment that really allows them to grow into more of who they are.
So Blair has gotten back into his basketball. He’s always been my more gaming kid. He’s always been right into his technology, which, in the beginning, I couldn’t really understand, because Leon and I are not tech people whatsoever. But Blair would always have an iPad in his hand, was always into gaming more than anyone else. But as he has grown older, that’s become less and less in his life, and he’s more into his acting, loves to do stage performances, which is something Haize loves to do as well.
We’ve joined this stage production company up where we live now, and the boys have really gravitated towards that. It’s just a really nurturing environment that has allowed them to just step into that confidence. It was probably shaken a little bit with the move, like it was such a big move, which I’ll talk about a little bit later on.
But finding that nurturing environment that allows them to just, again, be who they already are is just so, so pivotal. Both boys this weekend are actually doing some paintball training. They both really enjoy their paintball training sessions and games and things. And Blair’s actually interested in going back to school this year, so that’s something that we’re in the process of exploring as well. And yeah, I’m excited to see how that journey unfolds for him, however long that goes for.
And then that brings us to Leeton, my youngest, who I would say has been the luckiest to get sort of the more evolved parent in myself, that’s for sure. You really see that in the conversations that you have with Leeton. He’s just, oh, you cannot not see your own BS behavior, that’s for sure. He really reflects back at you, like he questions you.
He’s like, okay, but mum, you said this, why are you doing this? And it’s just really cool to see this child who is so young, but just has all of these critical thinking that apparently, kids don’t supposedly develop until whatever age it is that the experts decide. And so what I’ve seen with him, because we’ve been on this pathway for pretty much most of his life, is that he’s an active thinker in his own life.
He’s had the opportunities to have a say as opposed to being spoken to. He too is very much interested in going back to school this year and has just started to take an interest in reading, which has been a really interesting journey for me to be on with Leeton, letting go of that whole idea of kids need to learn this skill at the age that most kids in school are expected to learn it. And just allowing him the space to come to it in his own time has been really cool to watch.
He gets excited about picking up a book now to further develop that skill. And I’m like, how many kids actually even get that opportunity to have that excitement for these things? So that’s something that he’s definitely into at the moment.
He’s also loving his basketball. I find that he tends to sort of pick up the things that his older brothers are interested in, which is really cool, right? Because then it brings a shared interest where they’re spending this quality time together over those shared interests. He’s also loved gaming.
That’s becoming a little bit less and less. You can sort of see Leeton going through this stage at the moment where he’s trying to work out where he wants to go next. He’s getting a little bit bored with the gaming aspect of things.
But he absolutely loves it when the boys step into this role playing and they get their Nerf guns and just muck around. And it’s so cool to see that a 16 and a 14 year old are still doing that sort of role play. I have seen kids let go of that because it’s just, I just feel like we make them grow up way too quick. And so it’s just really cool to see them in that, in that natural environment and just being free to be who they already are.
And then that brings me to myself and Leon, because we also have interests. I think sometimes we forget, hang on a minute, adults also have interests and it’s been really cool. We bought a 50 acre property up on the mid north coast and my husband has always spoken about farm life and has always spoken about how he’s wanted a farm.
Not quite 12 months ago, we ended up purchasing a 50-acre farm, which actually came on the back end of my 14 year old Blair’s interests. He wanted to get into acting. And so that took us further up to the coast and we’d have to stay overnight when they needed to be in this particular location for consecutive days.
And so we’d go stay at a farm-stay and then we ended up finding this area that we really loved. It’s interesting to see how each of our interests are then coming to blend together to become the life that we’re living now. And so going back to my husband, that’s something that’s been a huge interest of his. Seeing him up on his new playground, it’s just, I don’t know, you can tell when someone becomes just light again. And that’s what it’s like when Leon is on the farm and is problem solving, like, where is the water naturally running? How are we going to organize the paddocks? Because we’re going to get cattle and, so it’s really cool to kind of go, yeah, we are all human beings. We all have interests. We’re not just here to work, to generate an income for our family that then dictates our whole life.
Well, that’s what it was for Leon, for sure. It just became all consuming that we kind of forget that we’re more than just that. And so we’ve started to make these decisions that are changing the priorities and that’s what’s led to the big move. I’ll speak more about that a little bit later.
And then finally myself, obviously an interest is definitely unschooling. When I came across the unschooling podcast, I couldn’t wait until the next episode came out. And I was constantly checking when the next episode was going to come in and now I’m part of the Network and have been for a few years. So it’s a matter of just waiting for the next week. And I wonder what the next weekly focus call is going to be. And I just love it. It really keeps me constantly evolving and moving through those things that could potentially hold me back.
So, that’s definitely an interest of mine. I also have an interest in interior decorating. We’ve renovated our house down here in Sydney that we’ve got on the market to sell. I loved that process.
We’re going to be doing some Airbnb stays. So I get to zhuzh up the different places that we’ve bought. And I just love that whole thing of working out which pieces will work really well in this room and what kind of feeling it’s going to give to the people who stay here.
So, that’s definitely an interest of mine. And also starting to tap into the potential of writing my own book, which I feel like it has been percolating over the last sort of 10 years and just capturing all of those beautiful golden nuggets, a lot of it comes from being part of the network. But I’m going to stop talking because there’s a lot of people to cover.
PAM: I do just love that. I loved your point about how things weave together and it’s not something you can predict and it’s not something you can set up. But when you’re open and you’re supporting each person as the individual they are and just helping them explore, it is so fascinating just to see where things weave together.
Because it is surprising, I guess maybe just surprising to me, but so many things that feel independent are quite rooted in just being human. And so often there are overlaps that you see and it really just helps bring me back to the like, we’re all humans moving through this world. So yes, that’s the nice thing about that question and about the details because that’s where we have space to see the bigger picture than just, I support this kid and I support that kid, but we’re a family.
That comes together when we support the individuals as well. You are individuals in this family. And when we all do the things that we love, and we’re doing them side by side and connected with one another, they just come together in such fascinating ways.
JENNA: Absolutely. And as someone who is has lived that world of, feeling like I needed to be the one that transformed these children into these upstanding citizens, so to speak, to moving to this place of actually taking a step back, and understanding who they are, and finding those elements, if you will, that allows them to just be more of who they are. What a way easier pathway to parent from. Oh my goodness, when I think about all the things that I used to try to control, no wonder I was so exhausted all the time.
It’s such a load that we carry as, as mums and as dads, and just feeling like we are responsible for how these people turn out. And it’s just realizing that all they need is just a little bit of love and support. And they find their own way.
And I could not plan this out if I tried. And in fact, the more of a plan that I have for other people, the more I come to the same point where I realize that, oh, that wasn’t for me to plan for. Because that’s not my life. Plan for your own life for sure. But hold those plans really loosely.
Because these other people are people and they’ve got different ideas on how they move through the world, and what the next step is that they want to take in their life. And by holding that really loosely, you become a lot more flexible and more open to taking in information that you otherwise wouldn’t know.
ERIKA: I just loved that. And it was so fun to hear, Jenna, because I feel like I didn’t know that part of your story about your move to unschooling. So that was fun to hear. And I especially loved accepting each person as their unique individual person, and how much easier it makes parenting when we’re not trying to fit them into these particular boxes.
I loved all of that. Your family has made some big transitions in the past couple of years, which you’ve been alluding to. And so my question is, how has this way of life impacted your choices, and helped you navigate all the ups and downs of those transitions?
JENNA: Yeah, well, like I said, at the beginning of the call, I definitely don’t think we would be where we are today if I hadn’t been on this pathway, that’s for sure. It’s not even hard saying it’s a pathway because it’s not a predetermined pathway.
I feel like a lot of the time we’re seeing all these pathways, this is the pathway to get you here. And really, it’s just this unfolding of your own pathway. And so what being immersed in this kind of way of living has done for me is really opened up my thinking. Where you start to see all of the possibilities, where I would have otherwise seen that there was either this way, or there’s that way.
But there’s so much in between. If we just step outside of the ‘have tos’, I think that’s a big part of transforming, forming those ‘have tos’ into really discovering what the ‘want tos’ are. And I think we also have these ideas. I know you spoke about this in the last podcast, these paradigms, the spectrum of things, of right and wrong and realizing there’s so much in the middle.
And that’s where the juice is. I think sometimes we think that, okay, well, how do we get all of our ‘want tos’ met? Well, if you’re going to get your ‘want to’, then I’m not going to get my ‘want to’. And it’s like, no, it’s realizing that when you come together, and you also open up the conversations for your kids to be part of that, whether it’s them actually talking, or whether it’s them showing you through their actions, what’s important to them. By really taking in all of those pieces, we get to this place where you end up really allowing everyone to live according to their ‘want tos’. So, that was a big thing, shifting from the ‘have tos’ to the ‘want tos’.
Also, with that came the flexible thinking, you know, actually being able to, have a plan, like we had a plan of selling a house, and all moving together up the coast where we bought our three bedroom unit, that was kind of our transitional move. We knew that there needed to be a transitional move that would allow us to start to recreate this new way of living, but also get to know where we wanted to buy that bigger parcel of land where we were going to create our own little farm from. And so, yeah, the plan was that we would sell our home, but our home didn’t sell.
And we’d already bought our unit, and interest rates started to climb. And so we got to this point where we were like, we need to do something, we cannot sustain this. And so this is where we turned to, and it just came to me one weekend, I was like, what if we rent out our house, with the option of the people renting to buy, that was like, okay, this might work, because I don’t know what it’s like over in the US, but in Australia, the market, the housing market, really became very unstable.
And so this is where we moved to this whole idea of, okay, well, let’s rent out our house, we’ll make the move up to the unit. And we’ll just see how that goes. And so without going into too much detail, when I’m talking about flexible thinking, it’s about knowing where you’re heading.
But taking just that small step, and then being able to take in the new information that comes from that small step, to then take the next small step. And that might mean that what you thought was going to unfold may change. And so by having that flexible thinking, you’re able to move with the tides, whether that might be someone’s needs changing as well in the family, because, they might. Just just be open to all of the info, the new information that comes in with taking a new step.
Because if we would have waited for all of our ducks to be all in a line before we took action, we would never take action. It’s just about taking those small steps now, based on what you feel is the right move and then being open to the next lot of information coming in to decide the next step and the next step. So, definitely the flexible thinking has come from being on this unschooling pathway and all of the learning that I have gained from being open in my thinking to adjust those beliefs and those associated behaviors that are driven by those beliefs that may have served me in the past but were not serving me in the here and now. And so being able to look at those and work out, okay, does that stand true with where I am now?
Being able to change that thinking that then creates a whole new bunch of behaviors. So that’s definitely something that this pathway or this way of living has helped. And also being able to even hear your own heart, just hear what your own heart is telling you.
I feel like the life that I used to live was so busy, just busy doing, busy being busy, just constantly doing, doing, doing, doing, doing that you don’t take the time to stop and actually think, is this the kind of life that I want to be living? I remember with the kids being at school, I felt like I was marching soldiers off every day and was like ch-ch-ch-ch-ch. Like, oh my goodness, is this really what I signed up for?
Is this really how I want to be a mum? Where I am controlling these other human beings down this particular pathway that I personally see time and time again?
I look at a lot of adults who are just living life because they have to, not because they’ve had the time to really work out if this is what they want. And on top of that, then having the courage to follow through. Because it’s one thing to know what you want, but having the courage to actually step into, to step outside of the familiar zone and do something different, it takes a lot of courage and it takes a lot of support that you may not necessarily have already in the environment that you’re in.
Our loved ones and our friends, we all mean well, but if we don’t have the skills of even pure listening, a lot of the time you’ll go to a loved one with a problem that you’re having, and then there’s this whole idea that you’re going to them because you want them to solve your problem. And unless you take the time to really reflect on, well, when you’re sharing something with someone, what do you want in that space? And all you’re wanting is to be heard so that you can find your own solutions.
But a lot of the time, a lot of us haven’t had that model to us first and foremost, or haven’t developed the skills to just be able to sit there and listen and ask the right questions for people to get to their own answers. So I hope that answers the question.
ANNA: Yeah, I think it’s really cool because people can think, oh, unschooling or whatever, it’s very focused on kids and education. But I think that what you said really spoke to how it opens up this whole new world of, hey, how do we feel? What serves us?
Let’s look at this, let’s pivot, let’s figure these different things out. And I think that’s something that’s hard to explain to people until you’re in it, that it just opens up everything. So yeah, I really loved that.
JENNA: Yeah, absolutely. And I feel like in today’s world, particularly, I know in my world, they talk about kids of today finding it so hard because of social media. And I’m like, yeah, it’s so challenging for adults, too. Because we have all of this information telling us that this is the right way, that’s the right way.
And so we’re constantly bombarded with information. But the only information that really matters is the information that sits within you, no one has lived your experience. And so it’s so important to be able to get back to that space where you’re taking what you’re hearing with a grain of salt, but coming back to what feels true to you and what you’re seeing in your own family, as opposed to taking the information that we’re presented with. Whether it be about gaming, right.
And then we start to fit our situation to that information. And then all of a sudden, we’re coming in and we’re switching the game off and telling our kids to get outside or whatever it is. So, it’s being able to take that information with a grain of salt, but really coming back to the information that matters most. And that’s the information that sits within inside of us. And yeah, and then having the courage to act on that information. It’s not easy by any means, but it’s definitely worth the journey.
PAM: Yeah, I feel that you had mentioned earlier too, that listening piece. When we’re moving through things, because you were talking about big transitions, and to be able to listen to others is quite a skill because so often, especially during big times like that, we kind of know the general direction that we want to go, so to be able to give that space for listening, I think is just so valuable because we learn so much.
And then we’re able to, like you said, take that next little baby step. Even if we don’t know exactly how we’re going to get to that destination that we have in mind, that direction we want to go, taking that little baby step is just so much more helpful, just because like we’ve listened, we’ve understood what other people’s perspectives are. And then coming together to just choose that next little baby step so that we can learn more. We learn more each time. So I think that’s super interesting.
You have just been so gracious in sharing your perspective on these things. And I love when you come with aha moments so often in the network as you move through this. But now you were talking about big transitions, and how you like to move through those. I’m curious if you would talk a bit more about how you process through times when older fears bubble up.
You kind of alluded to what I expected to be as a parent, etc. But so often as we come up, we think things are going well, and then something changes, or we notice that, or we hear a voice of what society’s telling us. I find for myself, anyway, that those can spark older fears that I’ve been carrying.
And I didn’t know about it until we’re facing this, this moment. I hadn’t really thought about that before. And then there’s all this stuff bubbling up. So, it’s another whole process to move through that. I was wondering if you would share a little bit of your process.
JENNA: Yeah, absolutely. Well, when I think about the Network, this is where it becomes so invaluable. We all have a nervous system. It’s designed to keep us safe. So, for you to create something different, it requires you to step outside of that, we call it the comfort zone, which I don’t think is a very good term for it, because it’s not comfortable. It’s not comfortable, but it’s familiar, right?
And so the moment you try to step outside of that, you get these alarm bells. And as you’re going on the journey, and you’re putting those alarm bells at bay, because you’re starting to take those small steps, and you start to realize that you didn’t die from taking that one small step, your nervous system starts to relax into it. But then you might be having a conversation with a friend who is talking about how they do things, or this expert over here is saying, children need to have x amount of time outside or whatever it is.
And then all of a sudden, that comes in. And then you’re questioning your decisions, your old fears start to bubble. And so by being part of the Network, I’m able to bring those fears.
And we were able to really go deep into them, and start to see it from different perspectives, because it’s realizing that’s all transformation is, it’s being able to shift the perspective that’s creating the fear to seeing it from a different perspective, where you get those aha moments. And then before you know it, you’re still coming up against those messages, but you’re so grounded in your own decisions. Because you see the other perspective, you see that there’s nothing to be afraid of here.
There’s nothing, that it’s all part of the journey. And I actually see it now as an invitation, whenever those things pop up, it’s an invitation just to look at things a little bit more deeply. And so when I get those feelings, which naturally, I’ve had lots of them, continuously stepping out of my familiar zone, and doing things, I guess, a little against the grain from the world that I’ve been brought up in.
And so being able to bring those fears to the Network, and sometimes I’ll find if I’m in the thick of it, I don’t necessarily want to be out, I don’t want to talk about it. But just being able to listen to other people’s shares, it brings on that feeling like, me too, like, I’m not alone in this. Oh, yes.
And then you beautiful ladies with all of your wisdom, and how you do it is just so nurturing, you’re always validating whatever it is that we’re bringing. And then you’re offering your own experiences or experiences that you’ve had with other people who you’ve worked with, to help us get to this place where all of a sudden you sink back into your own reasons for doing things. So, you might have been swept away with someone else’s agenda or whatever the message is. But then you’re brought back into your own reasons for making the choices that you are.
And it just brings you a sense of calm. So, whenever I have a fear coming up, and strangely enough, I’ll have those sorts of things pop up. If I’m going to catch up with people from even my family, I sometimes worry that I’m being judged. And so my brain gets into, okay, well, if someone asked me why Leeton isn’t reading yet, what am I going to say? And so I get myself worked up because I’m thinking I’m getting judged because I have done this horrible thing, where I haven’t forced my child to learn something at a time when someone else wants him to learn it. And so like, how am I going to hold that conversation without trembling.
So I get myself so worked up. It’s funny how our thoughts can kind of spiral. And so what I would typically do before I’m going to a big event, or where I feel like my confidence is shaking a little, I’ll just listen to a podcast, or I’ll jump on and listen to one of the weekly focus calls from the network. And all of a sudden, I just found my grounding again.
And so what that does when I’m interacting with other people, I don’t even get those conversations coming up. Because really, the people that are in our life that may be living differently, they’ve only got concerns, because they’re looking to us. And if we’re not looking like we’re sure of what we’re doing, naturally, they want to help.
And so their form of help is pulling you back to the familiar zone, like come back over to this side, where we all live, and we all grind, and we all live our life by a bunch of have tos, as opposed to want tos. When I’m grounded, I find that then those conversations don’t come out, I’m not questioning myself. So, in answering your question, Pam, when those fears bubble up, it’s just having that space to be able to come and explore those in a really non-judgmental space.
But also to have them validated, which is a skill that I’m still working on. I’m still not that fantastic at it. It’s not that I’m not fantastic at it, it’s something that I’ve really had to work at. And I just think that when people validate you and just appreciate your experience of things, instead of coming in and sharing their experience, and feeling like they have to try and solve your problem, the weight gets lifted off your shoulders and you can find your grounding again. You can become centered, where you’re hearing what next step is right for you.
So yeah, that’s definitely how I deal with those times. I mean, it’d be nice to think that they don’t pop up, but they pop up, but that’s where the juice is, that’s where all the learning is. When things become shaky, and you start to become aware of those things that are ready for you to transform and to liberate you to the next level of being able to move forward in your life.
ERIKA: I love that last bit, because that was just what I was thinking. It still happens to everyone too. Fears coming up again is such a part of life. And so, I love how you described the feeling of just being validated, grounding back into yourself. It just makes such a huge difference.
It makes such a huge difference, even just to hear your fears out loud in front of someone else. There’s something about that processing and putting it into words. Because sometimes it feels so big inside of our brains as we’re ruminating and going over and over these fears. But as soon as we start to try to express them out loud, I think that’s step one of the process of releasing them. And yeah, I love how the Network is that for me, as well, like grounding back into myself.
PAM: I have to point out about validation, because it is a skill. And it is always work. But for me, it eventually gets to a point where, if that’s how somebody’s feeling and seeing a situation, that’s reality. That’s the way it is. So, it’s not like you’re validating something that’s made up or something that’s wild. This other person, this wonderful person in front of you, is feeling that and is seeing things that way.
So, to be able to meet someone there, I feel like on both sides, it’s just so helpful as a person doing the validating. It’s so helpful to me because that’s the learning. That’s where I’m expanding. It’s like, oh, wow, I couldn’t have even imagined seeing that moment or seeing this thing in this way. That is so interesting to me. Thank you so much for sharing.
And not to get off on a tangent, but one of the challenging things I think for people is thinking that, if I validate that, especially if they’re having a hard time, it’s like I’m saying that that is also how I’m seeing it. There’s such a difference.
And I think it doesn’t feel as validating if you’re meeting them exactly where they are, like, oh yeah, I see that too. That’s exactly how I see it. Because so often, it’s their unique experience, which is a culmination of who they are in this moment and the context of things going on for them and whatever situation you’re discussing. They’re a unique human being, so they’re going to see it in their unique way. So, to be able to meet them there is just super helpful, but helpful on both ends, I think.
JENNA: Absolutely. And what I found has helped me, because somewhere along the lines, I decided it was my responsibility for everything and everyone.
Somewhere I decided that I’m responsible for how other people process the world and I need to do something about it. And so what I found with validation, it helped me to detach myself from whatever was going on. So detaching from my husband having a response to something, the more I’m able to validate his experience, the less I felt like I was taking it on.
Because it’s just acknowledging that his experience is his experience. It has actually got nothing to do with me. Like, no offense, Jen, this ain’t to do with you.
Just focus on what’s happening here. And this is something that I get tripped on. I mean, I got tripped up on it last night, even.
And it’s just like, ah, validation, that’s right. And if you just use it, then everyone softens in the situation where then we feel open to be able to go deeper into whatever the issue is and find those magical solutions that allows us all to move forward. So yeah, validation is definitely key.
ANNA: I mean, you know I love validation. So huge. And I think what you both are really touching on is validation isn’t making it about us, right? It’s not getting defensive or making it about our experience. It really is just hearing, reflecting, giving space to that person to be really heard around what’s happening for them. I loved that piece.
Well, we are just so happy to have you here and just really appreciate you sharing these little bits of your journey. Thank you so, so much. And I hope everybody enjoyed the conversation and maybe had their own little a-ha moment or something that’s like, “wait a minute,” for their own journey, because they’re all so, so unique.
And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I really do think you’d love the Living Joyfully Network, because this is the kind of stuff we talk about and dig into all the time. It’s such an amazing group of people. So we invite you to check it out and see if it fits with our free month offer that I mentioned earlier. And you can find the link in the show notes or go to livingjoyfully.ca. and the link is on the homepage.
Thank you for listening. And thank all of you for being here. It was really, really a fun time, so thank you so much.
JENNA: Thank you for having me.
PAM: Thank you so much, Jenna. See you soon!
ERIKA: Thank you, Jenna!
ANNA: Bye!
JENNA: Yes. Bye!
EU398: Foundations: Polarizing Paradigms
Jan 15, 2026
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Polarizing Paradigms.
While it’s common to see things through the lens of right and wrong or good and bad and to look for someone or something to blame, these polarizing paradigms are damaging to relationships. Real relationships and real life are more nuanced. They exist in the gray area.
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
How does it feel when someone puts their ideas of right or wrong on you?
Do you notice an area where polarizing paradigms are impacting an important relationship? How would it feel to let it go and lean in to understand?
How do you feel when someone blames you for something and you don’t see it the same way?
Have you seen judgment impact a relationship with someone you love?
How would it feel to let go of black and white thinking and dig into the gray with the people in your life?
TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. Thanks for tuning in to explore relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
So, in today’s episode, we’re going to talk about moving beyond polarizing paradigms. Right/wrong, good/bad, blame/fault. These are all paradigms and it’s pretty interesting when you start exploring if they are serving us or hindering us in our relationships with others.
So, I love teasing apart the ideas of right and wrong, because on the surface, it seems like a simple and very useful concept. And I think it can be when it’s applied to our own personal journey. What feels right to me? What doesn’t feel right? How do I want to act in the world? Who is the person I want to be in the world?
It’s when we start to try to impose our ideas of right or wrong or act as if there’s one definition, one definitive definition, that it really just stops learning. Standing staunchly in what could feel like a very justifiable position stops learning. Instead, we can ask, why does someone have a certain belief or act in a certain way? Why do some people agree with it and others don’t? How can we move beyond that thought to start looking at the people involved?
And even more importantly, looking at the needs behind the behavior. What’s driving the behavior? What’s driving the action? And as we lean into that, we learn more about the person and perhaps gain new insights into the whole situation, insights we wouldn’t have seen had we stayed stuck in our position of there’s one right way.
And so, when we just look at behavior and judge it as right and wrong, we’re losing this chance to connect with the person in front of us, be that person, our child, a friend, our partner. We’re losing our chance to understand their motivation and the need behind it. And it’s in that place of refraining from judgment that we can choose connection and understanding. If the behavior is impacting us, I guarantee you the fastest way to stop it while still remaining connected is to address that underlying need. Because once the need is addressed, the offending behavior no longer serves a purpose and it just falls away.
PAM: Yes. Judging another person’s behavior is so often disconnecting, and that’s precisely because it’s a surface level perspective. Digging in to find the underlying need they are trying to address with that behavior hits so many more connecting notes between us.
We learn more about them. They feel more seen and heard. The challenging behavior fades. And there’s much less need for any relationship repair at the end of it all.
And another situation where the idea of right and wrong can cause upset in relationships is in how someone else chooses to do something. So, beyond behavior, is there really a right way to pack the dishwasher?
ANNA: Maybe!
PAM: Or to fold clothes or to play with a toy? Surely there are ways that are right for us. We absolutely have our preferences, but we can take that too far when we expect others to do things the same way that we do. It’s like when we expand “right for us” to mean “right period.”
Of course, sometimes those other ways just kind of grate on us, like utensils the wrong way up in the dishwasher. I have found it helpful in those moments to remind myself that the way they are doing it probably feels just as right to them as my way feels to me. That is always such a good reminder. I still use it all the time, just as a way to process.
And I also sometimes ask myself, well, if I believe that my way really is the best way, am I willing then to be the one who does the task? Or might I instead choose to be just grateful that someone else has done it? Either of those choices is more connecting in a relationship than trying to control another person’s actions. The relationship is my lens. It’s my priority. I’m also going to bring those considerations into my self-talk, into what I’m thinking about the situation or the rub that’s happening.
ANNA: And then it boils down to choices, too. Am I going to choose this dishwasher being loaded this way versus this relationship? Am I going to put that above? And so, I think it’s just really interesting to play with those ideas and really walk yourself through it, versus when we get stuck in that, “No, this is the way,” we have this shrapnel that has injured lots of people around us from that.
But it’s kind of the same, too, with the ideas of good and bad. So, again, that boils down to a judgment, often a snap judgment, of how something or someone fits into our ideas of how things should be. But we’re talking about humans here. As we’ve discussed before, humans are complex. They are different. And they absolutely resist fitting neatly into boxes.
So, if we go back to behavior and we label it as good or bad, we again lose sight of the need that they’re trying to meet. And we do it a lot with children. “You’re a good boy if you’re doing this thing I want you to do, and a bad boy if not.” So, you’re a good boy if you’re sitting still and being quiet and a bad boy if you’re fidgeting and making noise. But what if your whole body is telling you to move? What if you’ve been sitting for hours and you just can’t do it anymore?
If instead we look at the need, we don’t have to judge the person. We can help them figure out how to meet the need or to see if the environment is not the best place for them right now. And what that does is develop a person who doesn’t see themselves as good or bad based on outside opinions, but a person who can listen to their body, state their needs, and find solutions that work in the environments that they’re in.
PAM: Yeah. And for me, this, this whole area, it was a realization that people really are different, as we talked about in episode three, and I love that it keeps coming up in most episodes. That realization helped me ease up on judging other people through my personal lens of good and bad. I could see the choices that felt good to me didn’t necessarily feel good to others. And if I wanted to understand their perspective, I needed to learn more about what was going on.
And when I have relationships as my priority, I really do want to understand them better. These are my loved ones. These are the people I choose to have in my life. I really do want to understand them better. And I want to help them process through whatever is feeling off for them, finding solutions that feel good to them.
Again, in the context of those deeper connected relationships, the framework of good and bad is surface level and limiting. The real world is so much richer and messier all at the same time.
ANNA: So, much richer, so much messier. And like you said, that’s where the learning is, though. Sticking to cut-and-dry, one-right-way answers just shuts down learning and connection.
Another thing we do is we tend to judge situations as good or bad. And so, I’m just going to pop in a quick paraphrase of the Taoist farmer story who says that maybe might be a more useful idea? And so, to paraphrase, the farmer’s son lets out their one horse. The village says, “What bad luck!” “Maybe,” says the farmer. The horse returns with the herd of other horses. “What good luck!” they say. “Maybe,” says the farmer. The son breaks his leg working with one of the new horses. “What bad luck,” they say again. “Maybe,” says the farmer. The army comes to the neighborhood to conscript the young men. His son isn’t taken because of the broken leg.
So, life is filled with events. If we spend our time judging each one as it comes along, we take ourselves out of the moment. We don’t know how things will unfold, so let’s just face what’s in front of us without judgment. That keeps fear out of the equation. It keeps us squarely in the moment, and that is the only thing that we have control over anyway.
PAM: I love that point. When we’re judging all the things that are happening around us, that thinking takes us into our heads and it takes us out of the moment. And the other piece is, we lose our sense of flow, not literally flow moment to moment per se. But as the story tells us, flow over time. Things in the world are connected. That is another thing that culturally, we stumble around. We’re very much, “Here’s the thing in front of me today, going to do it efficiently, productively, it’s done, good, bad, however,” and then just move on to the next thing.
But there is a thread that connects so many moments over time and it’s so interesting just to keep that lens. It helps us realize we don’t need to judge all the things, because maybe it might be helpful along the way.
ANNA: And for me, that thread is really a trust in the unfolding, that I may not see it all now, but there’s a thread and it’s unfolding and I don’t want to be judging each thing as good or bad, because I feel like it derails. And I just want to trust in that unfolding.
I think it’s important to realize that when we’re judging other people or their actions, we’re missing this opportunity for deeper understanding. And what usually ends up being a pretty thinly-veiled ploy for control, often, when we’re judging. I think it’s important to look at that for a minute, because when we’re judging someone’s action, what is our goal? What do we want to happen? Do we think it will help our relationship? Do we think it’ll change what they’re doing? Maybe. But how will that feel?
And so, then to flip it around, how does it feel when someone’s judging us? Does it make us feel closer to that person? Does it make us want to change our behavior? Most likely, it makes us want to pull away or double down, even if it might not serve us. Judgment really has no place in our relationships. In its place, though, we can use inquiry. We can have this genuine openness and desire to understand, because like you said, these are our most important relationships. I want to understand them. I want to know what makes them tick. I want them to feel good about how we’re moving forward.
That keeps us connected as we learn more about each other. And it also allows a place where our concerns or ideas can be met with curiosity and not defensiveness on both sides, because that’s the environment that we’re cultivating.
PAM: Yes. Because judgment really is all about us, right?
ANNA: Oh yeah.
PAM: It is about how we’re seeing, what we want to happen. But a connected and loving relationship is about both people. I also love and often use the thought experiment of flipping things around to see how I would feel if I was on the receiving end of things, because it doesn’t feel good to be judged. And I notice that my defensiveness rises, leaving me with little space to consider changing things up and learning something new. “No, I’m going to defend this. I’m going to hold on maybe even longer than I would normally if I wasn’t feeling judged.”
I am much more apt to be open and curious when someone approaches me with information without that side dish of judgment. As you mentioned, that just feels so much less controlling. It feels like we’re on the same team. We’re going to try and figure this out. You just brought me some new information. And you gave me this space to like hear it, bring it in, and see if it makes sense to me. It’s not controlling anymore.
ANNA: Right. Exactly. Now you’re open, you’re curious, you’re learning, you’re both learning, and how different is that? You can learn from each other. I think when we’re feeling judged, it really puts up a wall to what they’re saying. What they’re saying might be helpful, but not when it’s delivered with that side dish of judgment. We’re not even going to hear it.
And so, again, these are our most important people. We want to stay connected. So, yeah, just so important to keep in mind.
Okay. So, the blame/fault matrix is another paradigm that is so common in our culture. It’s really easy and at times comforting to lay that blame on someone else. If you didn’t do this, think like that, act like this, X wouldn’t have happened. The problem is, when we focus on blame, we never look at our role and we never dig deeper into the whole situation. We’re never getting to that underlying need on either of our parts.
And blaming is just a surefire way to create a rupture in a relationship. No one wants the finger pointed at them. It makes us feel that this love that we have is conditional. If you don’t way behave the way I think is good or right, I’m going to blame you for things that have happened. I’m going to withdraw my love potentially. And again, it’s just that judgment and blame. It just creates craters in relationships. I believe ruptures can be healed and that a repair is super important, but we don’t need to just keep creating them. Let’s just try not to keep creating them!
PAM: Absolutely. That is an important part of a relationship, the repair, because things aren’t always going to go smoothly, but we don’t need to keep setting ourselves up for these challenges. It’s just so fascinating to think about how urgently people look around to find someone to blame when something goes awry.
We all want to. “It’s not my fault. It’s not my fault. No, no, no.” And how often once we find someone to blame, that’s the end of it. We want to move on. It’s not really surprising then when it keeps happening over and over, because we’re not really learning anything that we can bring forward with us for the next time.
Instead, when we approach the situation with the energy that we’re all on the same team, we can empathize with our partner or our child or friend about the upset. Because chances are, they aren’t particularly happy about it either. We can listen to them, support them as they process things, and brainstorm with them about different things they might try next time. So, just think about how you’d like others to help and support you when something you do goes sideways. And just try that. How would it feel for me if someone did this? Well, let me try doing that for someone else when things go sideways with something they’ve done or said.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. We all just want to be held in those times when things go sideways. We just want to be understood at least, or have somebody not pointing the finger at us, because we know what we’ve done half the time. You know what I mean? We don’t need that outside judgment. We really just need somebody that’s like, “Hey, where do you want to go from here? What can we do next? How can we fix this? What can we do?”
And so, it’s just such a different energy to bring and I think especially because we’re talking about our most important relationships, it’s just worth that work to find that kindness and compassion. So, yeah, so important.
So, for me, all the things that we’ve talked about today and lots more out there, fall into the idea of black and white thinking and life and for sure relationships are lived in the gray and I really feel like so much suffering and so many relationship issues boil down to this black and white, right and wrong thinking. There’s not one right way to do or be. There just isn’t.
We make the choices we make in each moment based upon all kinds of factors, including very changeable things like how much sleep have I had, or food. Understanding the context of the moments, the needs of the individuals involved, and cultivating that open and curious mindset allows us to learn and to grow. We can develop deeper relationships, because they’re based on the understanding that we’re doing the best we can in each moment, and that our behaviors are trying to meet a need.
So, when judgment is set aside, we can look at all the factors that make up the context and keep connection at the forefront. We can talk about our needs and the impact something is having on us with an eye to understanding one another and to work together to find solutions that feel good to us both. So, I decided to look up antonyms of “polarizing” when we were naming this episode and their unification, connection, and attachment. And I thought, oh yeah, that really sums it up, why I choose to let go of paradigms that don’t serve me in my relationships, why I choose to remain open and curious. Because being connected in meaningful ways to the important people in my life is my highest priority.
PAM: Yes. I think when we see polarizing ideas, things that divide people into two opposing groups, like right and wrong or good and bad, that is a great clue to dig deeper. Things are rarely that simple, especially when it comes to relationships with the people we love. As you said, Anna, life is lived between those two poles, in the gray. And while sometimes that can definitely feel more nebulous, it is also, as we’ve mentioned, so much richer and it’s more connected with the real human beings that we’re choosing to be in relationship with. Celebrate the gray.
ANNA: Absolutely. Okay, so let’s talk about a few questions for pondering this week.
So, how does it feel when someone puts their ideas of right or wrong on you? I think it’s just always good to flip this around. So, just how does it feel? Because we’ve all had it happen. So, how does that feel?
Do you notice an area where polarizing paradigms are impacting an important relationship? How would it feel to let it go and lean in to understand? And I think there’s lots of times now where we have these polarizing beliefs that happen. What would it feel like to let go of the rightness of your position and just lean in to try to understand where that person’s coming from?
PAM: I want to bring back, how you mentioned open and curious, and I love how that helps us here. Letting go of feeling right isn’t about replacing it with, “I’m wrong.”
ANNA: Right. Or changing your mind at all.
PAM: Exactly. It’s more expansive. It’s bigger. It’s about being open and curious to see how else other people are seeing things or feeling about things.
ANNA: We just learn more. Again, it may not change our opinion, but maybe it gives us more information about the situation. Or maybe it’s the “through their eyes” that we’ve talked about, too. We see why they got there, because their life is different than ours. Their experiences are different.
So, letting go of that strong-held “right” just opens up. Again, it doesn’t mean it’s going to change your opinion necessarily, but I think it will give you a lot more information about the people around you. So, number three. How do you feel when someone blames you for something and you don’t see it the same way. So, that can just give you some good clues about how blaming at any time never feels good, no matter what. If the person thinks that they’re very right, that blaming just doesn’t feel good.
And number four, have you seen judgment impact a relationship with someone you love? And so, I think that’s really good to dig in. And I would say if you have children, really look at that, too, because I think we do tend to lean into judging children about how they’re spending their time or what they’re doing and how that is impacting the relationship. But you’ll also see it with your partners and friends and extended family. So, where’s judgment coming into play? See where it’s coming at you, see where you’re putting it out there, and think about what it would feel like if you could let that go.
PAM: I think that will be a huge one, too. Because even if we’re not sharing our judgements. Maybe we take that first step, okay. I didn’t say it. At that point, we could start to notice that we may still have an energy about it. We may still be bringing that piece. And most people can sense that, children can sense that.
ANNA: For sure.
PAM: People can sense when we are bringing a judging energy. And our questions, they feel less open and curious and more pointed when we’re asking questions.
ANNA: Right. And we’re less willing to even talk about it. I think we’re less willing to even share our perspectives with people when we feel that judgment coming at us. So, think about that in reverse with people. Why are they telling me this? Because, well, if they’re sensing judgment, that may be stopping that conversation right there.
PAM: Because you don’t want to be giving them evidence is what it feels like.
ANNA: Exactly. Right. Because you know they’re sitting there waiting for like, what can I judge you about the situation? So, yeah, that’s not the energy we want with these people that we love. That’s not at all. And it’s absolutely something we can change, even if it’s something we’ve done historically, we can absolutely change it.
And part of it would be this. So, number five, how would it feel to let go of black and white thinking and really dig into the gray with the people in your life, to trust that they’re doing things for reasons that make sense to them and learning more about them, letting go of these really strong polarizing paradigms?
So, I think it will be interesting to steep in that for a little bit and see where it’s impacting your relationships and how that could possibly be different.
PAM: I think that can be just such a fundamental mindset shift and it’s internal. It’s something that we can completely just play with ourselves for the first while.
ANNA: We don’t have to make any declarations. We could just play around with it. How does it feel and, “Okay, yeah. I do like the way it feels to just be more open and to not be judging everyone around me.” And I remember someone in my life before telling me that she found her judgements of everyone else was because she was so harshly judging herself. And so, once she could get to that place of not harshly judging herself, she had no need or desire to judge the people around her. And so, that’s another piece to kind of turn around and look at as well.
So, we hope that everyone is enjoying their holiday season and hopefully some of the ideas we’ve been discussing will even make those big family gatherings a bit more enjoyable. Thank you so much for listening, and we will be back in two weeks. Take care. Bye!
PAM: Bye!
EU397: Celebrating Interests
Jan 01, 2026
On this episode of Exploring Unschooling, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about the immense value of celebrating interests. As humans, what we are interested in really makes us who we are as individuals. When we celebrate and show interest in the things that our children and partners love, our relationships deepen. Our loved ones feel seen and understood when we take the time to learn more about their interests and share in their joys. We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
Spinning a Web episode 323 – Pam’s talk about how learning can look in unschooling
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone, I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and today I’m joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both!
So, in this episode, we are going to be talking about the value of intentionally celebrating our child’s interests, because there can definitely be more to that than meets the eye. But before we dive in, I would like to take a moment to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network.
There is just so much value in walking alongside others on our journey, particularly on more unconventional journeys like unschooling, because we don’t see a lot of it happening in our everyday life. Because while everyone’s journey is unique, many of us face similar obstacles and challenges and that is where the power of community shines in feeling seen and heard. In the network you will learn from the experiences of other parents who are on similar journeys.
You can draw inspiration from their a-ha moments. You can gain insight from the unique and creative ways that they navigate both their own and their family’s needs every day. It’s just so fun. I know my kids are all adults. I still love going in there and seeing what people are doing because it’s the energy, it’s the creativity, it just opens things up for me every time I visit. So, to learn more and join us just follow the link in the show notes. We look forward to welcoming you. And Anna, would you like to get us started on celebrating interests?
ANNA: I would, thank you so much. I love thinking about the ways to celebrate the people in our lives, especially our children. I have a favorite quote from our friend Anne Ohman. Years ago, we made it into a bumper sticker. And so, I’m going to read that to you.
“Today I will connect with my children, bring joy into their lives, nurture and encourage what they love to do, and celebrate them for being exactly who they are.”
And celebrating our kids and what they’re interested in is such a great place to start because we really can feel misunderstood and even judged if someone makes light of or disregards something that we love and we can feel so seen and supported when they show interest in it and in us.
Because a big part of who we are is made up of the things that we love and the things that we do. When someone criticizes something we love, it feels like they’re criticizing us. The thought process is kind of, I love this thing, they’re saying I shouldn’t or I shouldn’t be doing it, is there something wrong with me? And it starts to sow that seed of doubt and it disconnects us from our inner voice.
When the people in our lives celebrate our interests, it makes a difference in cultivating our inner voice and learning to trust ourselves. It’s also just a great way to learn about our kids or our partners. As we lean into learning more about their interests, we see what draws them into it. So instead of thinking well they just love video games, what kind of games? What is it about the games? Is it the art, the music, the story, the action, the excitement of it? Learning the lingo and what’s going on helps us celebrate and have that deeper conversation with them. And really that goes for all kinds of interests.
I have this young friend who’s into hobby horses. So yes, this is an actual thing. There is a World Hobby Horsing Championship. It’s in Europe. The hobby horses are these elaborate handmade, that in itself is art, beautiful kind of horse heads on a stick. The events involve people riding these hobby horses over jumps and obstacles. It gets so athletic. It’s like, who knew this? I did not.
But I love learning about it and seeing the joy that it brings to her and really this whole community of people across the world that are into this thing that I didn’t even know existed. It’s fun, right? The art of it’s beautiful. The athleticism is beautiful. The joy from the kids is beautiful.
But sometimes if someone has an interest that maybe is a little bit harder for me to understand, I look at them. Because they’re important to me, right? This is a person that I care about. And so I get excited about their excitement. I can join that fun energy of someone doing something that they love. That excitement is contagious if we just open ourselves to it, even just a tiny bit.
Because I truly want people in my life to feel loved and celebrated. And it’s such an easy gift to give. And I have just found it deepens those connections in such a beautiful, beautiful way.
ERIKA: Oh, I love that so much. I feel like people’s interests are so important. It’s so core to who they are as people. And so, if we can see that and say, I see what you love and I appreciate that you love it. It feels so good. It feels like being seen. It feels like being understood. And I love that part that you talked about with the lingo.
Because that has been so huge for my relationships with my kids to be able to speak the same language that they speak about the things that they love. So, it’s things like learning about the characters, learning about the stories, being interested when they’re sharing about the things that they love so much. And I see that when I am able to remember the little details about the things that they’ve told me in the past, how much that helps them feel connected to me and like I’m with them, that I support them. And so, I just really do put a huge value in learning about their interests and celebrating their interests.
And I remember, I think it was a recent network call that we had where one parent shared that they had played Minecraft along with their kids, which was kind of challenging because it’s hard to dive into Minecraft as a new Minecraft player. And especially if your kids are quite advanced and you’re just kind of trying to figure it out.
A lot of these interests might not make a lot of sense to our brains. Maybe they’re things that I would never choose to spend time on if it were up to me. But what it showed was that taking that little bit of time to be like, okay, I’m in here, show me what to do.
You know, really giving it a try was just such a connecting moment for them. And so I just love that. Even if it feels a little bit out of our comfort zones, even if we don’t quite understand it, I think there’s just so much value in making that time to try to learn that little bit more and show interest.
PAM: Yeah. And I think for me, when I think back to when the kids first came home from school, I had that mindset of not so much judging the interests, but varying the value that I placed on them, right? Video games were at the lower end of something that yeah, you like that thing. That’s great. You enjoy it. But, I couldn’t lean into celebrating it as much as something that looked more, whatever, you know, I can’t even come up with a word for now, like it was more culturally valued.
So because, we’ve talked about before, the values and the things that were the way we are placing things in our life, in our context, are those from outer voices or from inner voices? So that was a really helpful step, just taking the time to recognize where I might be judging things. And when I first came home, I was still looking through the lens of subjects, like is Minecraft math?
Then I can tick off the math box when they’re playing Minecraft or, you know, that kind of stuff. So it was really beautiful to be encouraged, not only to celebrate their interests, but as you were saying, not judging them at all, like this is something interesting to you. Therefore it’s interesting, just full stop there.
I don’t need to justify it before I can celebrate it. I can just go right to celebrating it, right? And absolutely you just learned so much about who they are as a person, what they’re loving, what they’re loving about it.
Because in so many things, there are different aspects of it. And maybe one side’s challenging, maybe one side’s not so fun, but the stuff that they are getting out of it makes it worth coming back to it again and again. So it’s just so interesting and so fun after a few months, a few years to look back and see how their interests have kind of morphed and changed.
And you can start to see the thread that kind of goes foundationally. Oh, there’s also that aspect that shows up in this interest that just may seem totally random looking back if we’re just looking at what the literal interest is. But when we have those conversations, we learn that language, we know the bits and pieces that are exciting them.
We can really see what is foundationally them, because we can see that bit attracting them to all sorts of different interests.
ANNA: Yes, it’s so fun. And I think that’s a really good point. Because if we’re just looking at the interest kind of at surface value, we are missing that it’s building blocks to other things, right?
And so, again, it may be that the art or the music that’s attracting them to this particular video game, and maybe that morphs into actually doing some physical art or some digital art or into making music or to understanding different things about it. But we can really stuff that down if we’re judging it, if it’s coming with this judgmental lens, because the judgment’s so surface level, right? It’s really up here.
It’s not getting excited and understanding what’s lighting them up about it. We really only see those things in looking back a very long time, really. So there’s a trust piece, which I get can be hard because, well, it’s a trust piece.
But I just think about how many adults I work with, adults I know in my family, I’m thinking of my brother and in more extended family that really had these strong, passionate interests that didn’t fit the mold of what people thought they should do. And so they pivoted from that and did the more conventional thing that they were supposed to do. And it’s decades later, where they’re thinking, I hate this.
Why am I doing this? Why do I have this job? And it seems dramatic that it’s coming from this, but it is, had someone seen them and seen how art was such an important part of their life, and had really gotten excited and maybe brought more of that in, what a different path that would have looked like.
So I do feel like if we can shut off that part of our brain that’s judging or thinking, how does it look to the outside and just get curious. I mean, here we go again. I feel like we always talk about the same thing, but just create space, just get curious.
I think you’ll see all these interests, how they weave together and how it’s all a part of growth. And my friend Pat always says, you can take any interest and really see the whole world from it. I think you even have an article, don’t you, Pam?
Everything can come from one thing. And that really opens us up, I think, as parents to recognize it. So we’ll link that too in the show notes, because I think it’s a really valuable paradigm shift. It can be this really specific interest of hobby horsing that leads to, geography and horses and sewing and this and that and art and all the things from this one, what would seem a very niche interest.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that. Once you have that belief of, okay, we can learn anything through any interest that they have, then it makes it so that everything’s valid. And I’m not going to be afraid to support any interest.
And so I’m just imagining how cool would it be if all parents could just be encouraging their kids in the thing that right now the kid is the most interested in? How powerful that could be? Because there’s a reason why that particular interest is speaking to them so strongly right now.
There’s a reason why they keep bringing it up and keep wanting to do it. It’s doing something for them. It’s working with their brains and their personalities.
And it’s kind of reminding me of when we talk about being true to ourselves. And so if you get that chance to really listen to what you are interested in as a person, individual, unique person with your personality, you learn so much more about yourself. And then everything that happens from that point is more aligned with who you are.
And so if we give our children that chance, they can really dive deep into this thing that they love the most. Okay, now they’re meeting other people who are interested in the thing they love the most. They’re making connections that work better for them.
They’re able to learn better because when you’re learning something you love. Learning happens more easily and naturally than if we’re trying to pull ourselves away to something that people think we should be doing. And so I think if we can really just sink into all interests lead down a path that can be valuable for that individual person, then we can stop judging our kids and just lean into supporting them to go down that path.
PAM: Yeah, I love that so much. It’s beautiful. And I think that’s the next step that I want to make sure to repeat, that you both talked about it.
But just to be really intentional that celebrating interest isn’t just about going okay, I’m so glad. It can be so much more. It can be in the conversations, or if they’re not much of a chatter. It’s in just observing when they’re watching that favorite show doing that favorite activity, which parts of it, light them up more like when you really see them light up what’s going on in that moment? They’re still communicating to you, even if they can’t sit down and nail off for you that this is my favorite part. Maybe you have those conversations, but it’s okay if you don’t.
But finding those pieces that light them up and then getting creative, where might that also exist in other places? Maybe it’s really close. Maybe it’s something that might be quite different from that, but might give that same sense of that same energy, or that same piece.
And it can just be so fascinating if we share that without expectation or judgment, to see if that connects, do they even want to try it? How does that unfold? If they don’t like it, yes, or no, or maybe, we’re learning every moment, right?
And they are learning too, because they’re like, Oh, do I? No, I don’t want to do that. They took a moment to consider that.
So helping them explore their interest in interesting ways can be so helpful. That is the learning that is so fun to just see in action. Because yes, even when they’re super frustrated, they will come back to it if it’s meaningful, right?
If it’s something that’s really speaking to them. And just to see them putting those pieces together and they’re exploring the window. Yes, passions are a window to the world, and that is how they’re putting together their web of learning, the context around this thing that is really interesting to them, right? So like, if it’s a particular game, you can get more of exactly the same kind of game, but you can also get a game that also has this aspect of it and try that out.
And being there with them and just like, It’s so fun!
ANNA: It’s just so much fun. It is and I love that piece of, are there ways we can find that bring this interest in? I mean, from little things like finding a plushie of a game that maybe is not easy to find and we have to figure out how to ship from Japan, a plushie from a game that they love. Or, oh, it’s this aspect that they really enjoy, the video game symphony stuff, that was really fun, because it’s something that they enjoyed, this music piece, and it was music they knew and that they had enjoyed. So, those are things that they may not know exist in those moments.
And again, having no attachment to it, but just saying, “Hey, I saw this, and it kind of reminded me of this thing you love.” And they may say yes or no, we don’t have to have attachment to that. But it’s fun to just think of, how can we boost somebody up along their journey? How can we add things to it that make it fun?
And something you said, Erika, that I wanted to pull out to is, that piece of when we’re doing something that we’re really interested in, that’s really important to us, we will actually push harder to learn something that’s maybe trickier, or that we’re struggling with a little bit more, but it’ll have a very different flavor than if somebody is forcing us to do something that isn’t clicking with us, right? Because then it just feels arbitrary. “Why am I having to do this? It makes no sense.”
But if it’s like, Oh, I really want to understand how to put these pieces together to make this thing that’s so important to me that I want to take to this comic con or this place or this thing, so different.
And so I think watch for that, because sometimes we’ll hear feedback from parents, but they get so frustrated. And I’m like, right, they’re working through those pieces. How cool is it for them to figure out how to handle the frustration of that and practice that and try to move through it and see all those opportunities. We always want the kids to stick with things, but we don’t want them to stick with it if it’s something we’re not judging as okay to stick with. And so, letting go of all that and just celebrating and looking at your child or partner, anybody in front of you.
Everybody really feels great when they’re seen and heard around these things that they love. So yeah, I hope people can feel the energy of it because I think it just really, it’s fun.
ERIKA: It’s so fun. And okay, so this part is less fun, but it came to mind, which is let’s not take over their interests. Because that can happen, especially if we get very excited about celebrating their interests. We may think we know the part that they like the best, and we get really excited to push them down that path, because it’s so great and fun.
But then maybe that’s not what they actually want to do. Or maybe we’re pushing them faster than they would have gone on their own. And so, I think there’s nuance to this, supporting their interests. And I have definitely swung too far to that side sometimes with my excitement. And so like, it’s all about being attuned to what they’re showing us. And so, I want to meet their energy. I don’t want to drive them forward with what I think about their interests.
And then I was also thinking about, you know, just financially supporting their interests. Sometimes that could come up as a bit of a rub, if it’s something that we’re not seeing as valuable. And so, again, I think it would just be about realizing there’s value in this for them, and making the decision to support an interest, even if it doesn’t quite make sense to us, can really pay off in the long run. And so, seeing it more as like investing in them and their own development along their path, rather than, oh, I’m just, you know, such a fan of whatever horror video games and so I really want to buy all of them, which I don’t really want to. But separating my own taste and my own opinions about things from the things that they’re really loving.
PAM: Yeah, that is a big part of it. And I find that when we are diving into that, that’s such an important piece to separate out, our feelings from it, and not jumping ahead, so when we’re really excited about it, and we jump in and energetically take over, because we’re excited. Not only are we happy that they’re interested in something, we literally share this interest, and this was our path, and we want to help them go through that. But that’s what I love about the metaphor of the web of learning. We’re trying to get them to jump. We’re trying to put our web on top of their web, or life, a better word.
And so, on their journey, that might be four or five points out, where for us, that maybe was just one or two, or in our excitement, maybe three, because we just want them to know where we’re going. “Isn’t that awesome?” And yeah, that we can often stifle the interest, because we’re not letting them make their connections the way it makes the most sense to them.
So, we can be stepping on their learning. And maybe that can be a lens at first that helps most to bring your energy to it, because in celebrating their interest, you’re celebrating their learning. And so, then, yes, on the opposite side, knowing that we can also stop their learning, when we start putting it through a filter of what we kind of agree with, don’t agree with, or like, oh, this is gonna cost a little bit, or will take up more time, which I don’t feel comfortable with.
And then I’ll just rationalize it or justify it rather than leaning in getting open and curious, bringing my context piece, maybe I don’t have a lot of time right now, or money, or whatever it is. But instead of putting the kibosh on it, or saying not right now, we can lean in, because maybe even just talking about it, and celebrating the idea of it can help keep the energy moving forward on it and they’ll also be picking up the context of everything. It’s a window to the world, just navigating through something that we want to do. We learn so much doing that as well, don’t we?
ANNA: Yeah, oh my goodness. But yeah, making it about us, that’s a really important one, because I get excited. But it doesn’t need to be about me. If I want to pursue it, I can do that separately. It really is, like you said, kind of matching their energy, really letting them take the lead. Because like you said, Pam, they’re putting pieces together in a way that makes sense for their brain, not necessarily a way that makes sense for my brain.
And so, I can be excited about watching that process. That’s how I could tone that down a little bit. It’s like, oh, I’m curious to see where they’ll go with this, or what that will be. And that would allow me to have my excitement, but not start lawnmowing their way through so that they’re like, wait a minute, what’s happening here?
And oh gosh, there was one other thought that you were saying. So, this is a little bit on the darker side too, but watching for maybe we’re not criticizing an interest, but are we celebrating in line with what we want them to do, right? And so, just watching for that. I think that is important because, oh, this interest, this we could get behind because everybody’s going to love the pictures from this or the idea of what this is. This is conventional or accepted.
Watching for, are we really celebrating all those moments? Are we looking to them and what is actually bubbling up for them and being excited, whether it looks like a photo op or not? And I think that can just be an important thing to kind of check in ourselves because it’s nice when they have a hobby that then the grandparents will like. And I want to make sure they’re feeling seen about all the pieces that are interesting them.
PAM: Well, thank you so much to everyone for joining us. We hope you enjoyed our conversation about celebrating interests. And maybe you have some ideas, a little spark of getting a little curious about what your kids are into and just the fun of just creatively trying to come up with what else might be interesting for them.
And we also hope you consider joining us in the Living Joyfully Network to dive into these kinds of ideas and conversations with other kind and thoughtful unschooling parents. It will add a depth and richness to your journey that I really do feel you’ll deeply appreciate. And we are excited to welcome you to learn more and join us. Just follow the link in the show notes. We also invite you to check out our Substack When School Isn’t Working. It’s also a great resource to share with friends who are feeling stuck and might just be open to considering these ideas. We wish everyone a lovely day. Thanks so much, you guys!
EU085 Flashback: Deschooling with Lucy AitkenRead
Dec 18, 2025
In this episode, we’re sharing a conversation that Pam had with Lucy AitkenRead in 2017. At the time, Lucy unschools her two children and blogs at Lulastic and the Hippyshake. Pam and Lucy talked about her family’s move to unschooling, the hardest parts of her journey, the most surprising bits, as well her husband’s journey to unschooling.
We hope you enjoy the conversation!
QUESTIONS FOR LUCY
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling?
What has your family’s move to unschooling looked like?
Can you share a bit about your husband’s journey? Was unschooling new to him? If so, how did you help him learn more about it?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
You recently started a group and website called Parent Allies. I’d love to know the inspiration behind it and a bit about your plans!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hi everyone, I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca, and today I’m here with Lucy AitkenRead. Hi Lucy!
LUCY: Hi Pam! How you going?
PAM: I’m going very well. Just to let everyone know, Lucy is an unschooling mom of two kids, and I have been following her adventures online for quite a while now, including her family’s experiences living in a yurt in New Zealand, and now their travels back to the UK. So, I’m really looking forward to diving into her unschooling and deschooling experiences at this point on her journey.
To get us started Lucy, can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
LUCY: Yes, of course. So, I’m Lucy and I’m married to Tim. And he is a Kiwi, but we spent most of our early marriage in London, where I’m from. And that’s where we had both of our daughters: Ramona who is now six, and Juno who is four. We lived really happily, living quite a normal life I suppose, in London, until a couple years ago when we decided to sort of up sticks and move to a forest in New Zealand, where we now live in a yurt.
PAM: That is so awesome Lucy. And I’m sure you’re going to share some amusing stories from that time as we go through this.
Can share with us how you actually discovered unschooling? How’d you come across it?
LUCY: Well yeah, it’s quite interesting for me, because I guess, deep in my heart, I’m a bit of a socialist, and I always really held onto the idea of school as being a really important common good, and that my children would definitely go to school. We would support that school. Because education is something that every child deserves, and people who are able to input into their local schools, it’s a really great thing that we should support. Basically, I had a really strong belief around that.
And then I had my children, and my first child Ramona really took me on a huge learning curve, I guess. She’s a child who is just incredibly spirited, and I believe that her spirited nature caused me to ask a lot of questions about how I wanted to raise my children.
When our second child Juno was born, we sold everything in our London home and we sold our London home, and we packed our bags into a VW camper van and we went traveling around Europe. And someone had given me John Holt’s How Children Learn, you know, which is always a slippery slope when you pick up a John Holt book, I think.
So, I was kind of reading this probably a little skeptically, but also knowing that I was already raising Ramona in quite a radically different way to how I thought I would. I guess my mind was already beginning to open about some of these ideas about raising children respectfully, for sure.
But then we went to a forest kindergarten in the Black Forest, in Germany, as part of our big trip around Europe, which we were doing. We’d set aside six months to do that. And then we got to this forest kindergarten, and I was reading How Children Learn, and I think it just was like a potent combination for my mind.
I was reading John Holt, and seeing all of these children around me, basically just unschooling in the great outdoors. There are teachers there, and they’re well trained teachers, but they see themselves much more as facilitators for a child’s own learning. And yeah, it was just so incredible to see it in real life in action, exactly what John Holt is talking about. I guess that was the moment when I knew that we would be unschoolers, and that all these ideas I held about school weren’t actually necessarily going to be the reality for my family.
And so, then we ended up back in New Zealand with our kids, and even though Ramona was only three at that stage, and Juno was a tiny baby, we rocked up in New Zealand and immediately attended an unschooling camp. And there were 150 people there, and we just kind of arrived and we felt like we’d found our people. This is a community that we wanted to stay within and raise our children within. So, I guess that’s the story.
PAM: How did you hear about the camp? Was it just random?
LUCY: I googled it, yeah. I actually googled “unschooling NZ,” and instead of any websites coming up or any groups or resources, there was just an event detailing where to turn up and how much to pay. And we were like, “Okay, let’s do it.” Google had spoken. (laughter)
PAM: And that is such a nice introduction—actually in person. I know when I first came across unschooling, it was all online. There wasn’t like local gatherings that I knew of. All those connections came so fast and made so much sense, at the point that I was there. But definitely seeing it in action would be a nice introduction, right?
LUCY: Yeah, it was really, really cool. And there were definitely a few moments where we were like, “Oh! That’s interesting!” It wasn’t at all like, “Oh we do everything exactly this way.” It wasn’t at all like that.
But it was the community that really inspired us, I guess. We really just felt at home within the way that adults were interacting with the children, because that was something we really felt certain about at that stage. We really knew that we wanted to be parents that interacted with our children in a really respectful kind of democratic way, I suppose. And that is what we saw there.
And that was probably the magic for us, that made us go, “Ah! Yeah, this is something we’re going to really dive into.” And now we actually go to between four and five unschooling camps a year. They’re a really important part of our family’s unschooling framework, I guess. And all of that. Just a whole massive group of people just being in their element for a few days and every season. We make it happen come hell or high water.
PAM: That’s awesome. And you mentioned there too that already before you even came across John Holt etc., that your parenting was less mainstream, right? So, you were kind of already primed for that. You noticed the difference in the relationships even just at camp, even if some of the details still weren’t … ready for you.
Because it really is a journey, isn’t it? I remember at first I would read about unschooling and I’d think, “Well, you know, it’s super cool. So much of it makes sense. You know, this little bit … I don’t think we’ll do that. I don’t think we’ll be doing that.” But as the months went by and I learned more and more and I understood why they were doing that, it really was a journey. Because it’s like, “Oh, of course I’m going to do that!” Right? (laughs)
LUCY: Yeah, that’s exactly right. And I see it a lot. Like with my writing, I’ll be writing about some sort of specific and then people will really kind of grab hold of that specific and be like, “I can’t see how that can possibly work, da da da da da.” And it’s like, well I guess it really does only work when you look at the whole picture. It’s sort of like people really want the detail, but, I mean, the devil is in it. The devil in the detail.
It’s not really so much about the very specific practical details as much as the big picture of the life you’re trying to lead, which is one where you’re not making decisions based on fear, but you’re making decisions based on connection. And having that overall philosophy is what makes then the details make sense.
PAM: So true.
LUCY: I don’t know if I made sense. (laughs)
PAM: It did! Absolutely. Because, if you look for the details too quickly, I think there’s a tendency to kind of interpret them like the rules of unschooling, right?
LUCY: Yeah.
PAM: “Tell me exactly what you do each day and I will do that.” But it might not work in your family. Because it’s all about how the individuals relate to each other, and how the individuals like to pursue their interests and everything. So, what my day looks like isn’t going to look like anyone else’s, right?
LUCY: Yeah, that’s exactly right.
So, let’s talk a little more about your family’s move to unschooling. You went to the camp, and it made sense, it connected, you guys loved that. Did your days just kind of keep on going, or how did that work?
LUCY: Yeah, yes, basically nothing changed, I guess. We just kept on just living our life. And that’s the thing that, you know, because we’ve never been to school, we just keep living our life, and nothing has really changed much at all. So, the life that we were living with our children age one and three is now pretty similar to age six and four, really.
I guess they’re way more vocal in what they want to do. But we still just go about living our lives, all of us ticking away, following our little hopes and dreams each day. Yeah, there’s not been any momentous shift I don’t think, since that camp. It’s just been living each day as it comes to us.
PAM: So you just kind of kept on keeping on. That’s awesome.
LUCY: Kept on keeping on. Yeah.
PAM: Yeah. Have your kids mentioned school at all?
LUCY: Ramona does sort of every now and then mention school. And it’s nearly always when there’s been a bit of time in our life where we’ve been quite farm-bound, for whatever reason. She’s an incredibly social kid, and I think sometimes when we drive past a playground she’ll see the hundreds of kids kind of just running around there, and she’ll think, “Oh, I’d do really well in that situation.”
So, we tend to work really hard at getting her enough of that social interaction. And when that’s going really well, she doesn’t mention school, or she knows that she’s getting all her social needs met. And every now and then when she does pop out with this sort of question about school, I can almost always look around us and see that we maybe dropped going to something, or we’ve been a little bit caught up with all our farm chores and haven’t quite managed to meet up with as many people as we usually do, or that sort of thing.
And one of her best friends started going to school for a couple of weeks, and she was quite intrigued by school at that point, which was really interesting for us. It was somebody that we live on the farm with, and they’re an unschooling family, but their boy wanted to give it a go. And so, they did, and that was really interesting, because I guess we had to ask ourselves the question, would Ramona go to school if she wanted it?
And we sort of did a bit of soul searching about that, around that time. And then he decided it wasn’t actually all that. You know, he liked having a lunch box and he liked having play dates after school, and his mum realized that both of those things could be done outside of a school context. And he didn’t like being told what to do, when, and where. And he really quickly just went back to being at home on the farm. And then that moment just kind of disappeared. But it still was an interesting one, to figure out whether, in your unschooling family, you would be willing to support a child going to school.
PAM: Yeah, when it first gets mentioned, it can knock you off a bit, just because you feel like, “Well, what am I not doing? What’s wrong? Am I failing? Am I not doing it right?” So, it takes that soul searching—that work to get past that reaction—and realize, this isn’t personal.
But, like you said, it’s a great clue to start looking around, you know, and you see that that question—it might be just the solution that they see to a need that’s missing. Right? Like you said. Maybe it’s a need for some more social interaction, and they’re not going to come to you: “Mom, I need more social interaction.” But she may see in her mind that playground full of kids at school and think, “School is a good solution.” And then come at it that way.
So, I think the first thing is to look around, like you do, and see if there’s any clues to what need they’re trying to fill with that. Because then from there, you can say, “Well maybe the need is, literally, to check out school.” Maybe. But it might not be. There might be a million other ways to meet whatever it is that they want. It’s a hard time, but it’s so interesting, and when you can get past that initial fear, it’s a big release to do that soul-searching, figure that out, because you’re in a stronger place, aren’t you?
LUCY: Yeah, definitely. And I think it might—who is it—it might be Peter Gray. Let me have a little bit of a think about that. But someone speaks about this idea that if a child really wants to go to school and they don’t get to go to school, they might forever feel like school was a club that they weren’t allowed in. And that is probably something to worry about more than your child actually going to school and you being merely kind of phlegmatic about it.
I kind of came to two conclusions, I suppose, with this whole soul-searching period. And that was: I really felt like six is too young to make a decision to put yourself into a situation that so drastically impacts your family’s circumstances, and your own well-being. And I do think that school really does impact a child’s well-being. And I guess I decided that I wanted to try and protect Ramona from that, for as long as I could, until she made it really clear that it is school that she’s after. I would try to meet her needs as much as I could, and then, if it still is school, I would support her to do that, but I would do it in a way that supported her as a person, without making all of the school’s toxicness something that impacts her. So, I’d be very nonchalant, shall we say, about testing and exams and homework. You know, all of that stuff I’d just hold really lightly, but support her in going to school, if it really was the need that she had to do that.
PAM: Yeah, and I think that’s such an important point, because you’re so right about the atmosphere, the environment, and the effect that it can have on a child. And to realize that it can be such a different experience for a child if we choose not to bring all that home, right? If we don’t buy into, “I need to be on top of them at home to study,” and to use the grades as a judgement of them, and everything. Rather than, just, it’s a place they go for a few hours, and did they have fun? And supporting them if they’re like, “Mom, I have a test this week. I’d like to study. Can you help me study?” or something. Of course, you’re going to help them—
LUCY: Totally.
PAM: Yeah! Because I can see, if we’re still feeling resentful about their choice—like it was a choice against us—how we could so easily, “Well, you chose school, you have to finish your homework.” You know, to make it as bad as it can be, in hopes that they’ll leave. But that’s just going to hurt!
LUCY: Yeah, and I guess that’s why I really like to take the school out of unschooling, you know. And I suppose it’s why I talk more about this other concept, which we might address later on—because for me, it’s not about education or even learning actually, but it’s more about the relationship that you have with your child. So, if there’s any one thing that you’re totally hung up on, it’s a good sign that it’s moved away from being about the important partnership you have with your child and it’s become an unhealthy fixation or something, do you know what I mean?
PAM: Yeah, yeah. We talk on our Q&A episodes so much about whenever there’s an issue, go back to the relationship. Does this feel connecting, or disconnecting? And choose the actions that feel connecting. Because no matter the environment, you’re right, it really does all boil down to relationships. And you know what, during my deschooling—though that keeps going—but that realization.
Because, at first, my kids left school, and it’s like, “Okay, so I’m replacing the learning that they’re not getting at school.” But, the realization after a few months that it’s not really about the learning. Because the learning’s going to naturally happen if I keep the relationships strong and connected; everything’s going to flow from there. So, I love that point.
I was wondering if you might share a little bit about your husband’s journey. Was unschooling a new kind of idea for him, and how did you guys work together along the way?
LUCY: Okay so, unsurprisingly my husband is a teacher by trade, and I say unsurprisingly because I know a huge number of teachers in the unschooling world.
PAM: So many. (laughs)
LUCY: Yeah, it’s like as if their experience in the classroom, you know, actually is the thing that opens their eyes and says there has to be a better way to treat our children and for our children to learn in a really joyful way.
So, Tim is a teacher by trade, and he did that for quite a few years, but these days he focuses more on a bit of youth work. Which, for him, is what it was all about. It was being able to help young people find their way in the world by having really healthy connections and relationships with them.
So, yeah, teacher by trade, and he really gets the learning stuff, for sure. Like we check in, not formally, but just by nature of the whole thing, once or twice a month about little interesting learning points that have happened with Ramona and Juno. And I guess that his teacher training makes him do that perhaps more than me. So, he’ll point out something that Ramona’s done, which is such a classic learning point, but that she’s come to it completely by herself using an everyday situation. Yeah, so he’s completely on board with the learning side of it, and I guess both of us are still on this learning journey about living democratically and consensually with our children.
We’re both trying really hard to read as much as we can and talk together as much as we can. And I guess the challenge is constantly how in a family of four you can all feel as though your needs can be met, and that it can be win-win for everyone.
PAM: Yeah, I think the parenting side of the journey, that we’re always learning because they’re always getting older.
LUCY: Yeah, yeah, that’s exactly right.
PAM: There’s always something new.
LUCY: Yeah, I do like to think though that every bit of learning you’ve done paves the way for the next bit of learning. And, right now, with the kind of really incredibly amazing and opinionated and determined six-year-old, I’m thinking about how much this is paving the way for those incredibly opinionated and determined teenage years. (laughs)
We’re going to be just like so radically on board with everything they want to do by the time they’re teenagers, because we’ll have developed this sort of trust and acceptance. So, I’m quite excited about the future really, or maybe that’s just incredibly hopeful.
PAM: Well, I’ll just share my experience a little bit. The groundwork that you’re laying now and those first couple of years of really doing all this work to figure out the ways we all communicate our needs—it’s even about figuring out our needs, because we’re not used to that. Even as adults, to be able to just reasonably say, “I’m tired.” Or, to really bring ourselves to the moment without being manipulative about it.
LUCY: Yeah.
PAM: Yeah, to just bring all our stuff lightly, like you were talking about before, and finding ways to work through them and find those kind of win-win-win opportunities for us to move forward.
And I must say, by the time my kids got to their early teens and through their teen years, it was never argumentative. It was never issues that way at all. Mostly it was me stretching my comfort zones. (laughs)
Because they knew themselves so well, and the trust that we had together. Like, I knew they weren’t making choices or wanting to do things that they didn’t think they were capable of doing. There’s the way to put it. They were choosing things for reasons of their own, that made sense, and that they felt ready to do. So, when I was ready to stretch my comfort zones and help them accomplish those things, we were never at odds. It was all finding ways for myself to support them in ways that I was also comfortable enough with.
When my daughter was 13 and wanted to go into clubs for shows, for me to be comfortable I just said, “Sure, I’ll go with you.” You know? So, we did that. But yeah, it never felt like butting heads, let’s put it that way. So, I think you’re right. That was a long way to say you’re right, you’re building an amazing foundation. (laughs)
LUCY: (laughs) No, I always absolutely love hearing from people who have older children and who have been through those teenage years, because we talk about those teenage years as if it’s some kind of impending horror show I suppose.
And, I mean, I suppose mine was a little bit of a horror show for my parents, but I had an incredibly different upbringing. But I really believe it doesn’t have to be that way. I really believe that this partnership that we’re developing with our kids now is something that lasts your whole life long, and one of the things as well I think that unschooling has done for me—it’s made me trust everyone a lot more.
My children have asked that of me, but it’s something that I can extend now to everyone. I’ve become much, much, much less controlling about all these different situations. Like I can remember in the early years of our marriage, I would be texting everyone trying to get them in the right place at the right time, and kind of guessing what people’s needs were, and trying to kind of preempt how we could get them met. And I would just never do that now. I just sort of sit back and see how I could support someone to get their needs met, or, perhaps I can’t, and just need to trust that they’re making good decisions for themselves. And that’s something that you know extends from my children to my in-laws to my neighbor. It kind of is a really cool stance for all relationships, I think.
PAM: I just love that Lucy. And what’s really funny is I’m writing a book about the unschooling journey, and this is what I’ve been writing about this week!
LUCY: Oh, cool.
PAM: Yeah, that point where you realize it’s about being human, and it applies to everyone. And you lose that need to try and control other people “for their own good because you know the best way things will work out so smoothly.”
Because, after you do it a few times, isn’t it just amazing all the places that the ways things end up working out, like even better than we could have imagined at first, right? And tried to control it to A, but B was so much more awesome!
LUCY: I know! Like seriously, I talk about this a huge amount. Like the ridiculousness of taking a step back and just being like, “Look, I’m not going to get involved in this, I’m just going to see what happens.” And then the thing that happens is so much more better than anything you could have planned for. Yeah, it’s actually, it feels serendipitous. But maybe it’s because it’s the way the world is meant to work. You’re not meant to be hung up on everybody else’s choices. (laughter)
It sounds so obvious when we’re talking about it, but it’s really not obvious. And I think I had quite a few anguished years because I felt that I had an important role to play in lots of other people’s lives.
PAM: Oh no, I totally can remember just the uptightness back then, of trying to make sure everything worked out. That there needed to be Plan XYZ, and we need to follow it, and if we didn’t I was getting myself so frustrated and worked up. But anyway, anyway. (laughs) I guess we don’t need to talk about that forever. But it’s such a huge part …
LUCY: We probably can.
PAM: Yeah, exactly. I mean we could share a million stories I’m sure. But …
I was wondering what you have found to be the most challenging or the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
LUCY: (pauses)
PAM: Or was that it? (laughs)
LUCY: Oh, well, that’s been like a definite shift.
The hardest challenge? Probably it’s not the hardest thing but the challenging thing has been: I guess unschooling has taken me on a journey to sort of ask questions about all sorts of different things and to really try and dismantle institutionalized thinking. And it’s a journey that I’m really appreciative of, but it’s been a journey that has definitely shaken the ground beneath my feet a little bit.
I was raised in a church, and I was raised in the Salvation Army, which is a really beautiful social justice loving movement of people, but it’s also quite regimented, or ordered, at least. And it’s been interesting for me to sort of look at institutions that I’ve been raised in, that have always provided a sort of structure to my life, and just try and hold on to the really good and beautiful parts of those things while really asking questions about the healthiness of other parts of it. And I guess what it comes down to is this sort of imperialist history of the human race, which is quite a big deal. Maybe we shouldn’t really go there. (laughter)
But when you look historically, the last hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years, we’ve been living in an incredibly controlled hierarchical society, that is really, really unhealthy. And I guess that was an unexpected challenge for me, was to become a bit of an anarchist. I mean, not quite an anarchist, but to just want to dismantle some of those structures in society that I don’t think are very healthy. And move away from those that have had a really important role in my life. So yeah, that’s probably been the biggest challenge, I think.
PAM: I think that’s a great one, because when we start, we don’t realize how far reaching it’s going to be, do we?
LUCY: No.
PAM: No, it’s amazing once you start realizing that choice is important. Not only for learning, but then for living. And when you start to see, you start to knock up against all these places where, like you said, the systems where we don’t have choice. And you start questioning every single one, don’t you, by the end of it?
LUCY: Yeah and I think I just say to myself, “Lucy, you don’t have to throw the baby out with the bath water.” (laughs)
PAM: Yup.
LUCY: So, you know, with the church, I guess where I’m at now is holding on to really healthy spirituality, which is really beautiful and really important, I think, whatever your spirituality is, for your well-being. And community and all that sort of thing. So, holding on to that. And then kind of letting the rest of it blow away. So yes, I say that a lot. “Don’t throw away the baby out with the bath water, Luce.”
PAM: That is such a great point, that was something that helped me. Because feeling uncomfortable with something didn’t automatically mean to reject it. Which I think lines up with your “Don’t throw the baby out with the bath water” phrasing. And to be able to hold my discomfort alongside my positive feelings about choice and whatever, so that I could dig deeper.
Like, when you can hold them both together, that’s when you can start to tease out the pieces that are helpful, like you were saying, alongside the pieces that aren’t working for me anymore. Because automatic resistance or knee-jerk “noes” aren’t much more useful than blindly following things either, right? Because you don’t understand yourself better through that process. We talk about that with our kids, right? Try not to automatically say no. Maybe you can say yes, but also, “Say yes more with your kids,” doesn’t mean always say yes. Because there’s no thought or consideration in that either, right?
LUCY: Yeah, but we so want black and white answers, don’t we?
PAM: I know, we do!
LUCY: (laughs)
PAM: Those rules are so easy, right? (laughs)
LUCY: Yeah, we just want it there in black and white. We just want to be able to go, like, “This is how it goes, this is the rule, this is what I need to do in this situation.” Yeah, but it’s just not really how we are, and it’s not really how the world should be. We need to kind of learn to operate in those gray areas, and to be flexible and fluid and resilient, and not need that sort of sturdy ground under our feet, but to feel really comfortable just floating in the chaotic unknown gray substance. (laughs)
PAM: Yeah, and like you said before, going back to the relationship, right? When you don’t know—yes, no, I have no rule to follow. Okay, let’s look and see foundationally how that is going to impact that relationship. Because, when it comes down to it, school years, childhood, those are just a flash of a lifetime right? And these are relationships that we’re going to have for our whole lifetime. They will always be our child. We’ll always be their parents, no matter the age, right? So that relationship is a lifetime thing. So, it’s so useful to keep that as your guide.
LUCY: Yeah.
So, I am curious—what has surprised you most about your journey so far?
LUCY: Okay. The most surprising thing has probably been how unsurprising it has been, in the sense that it’s just been a life lived, I guess. And I think like maybe a few years ago when we were at the start of this unschooling journey, I think I imagined that with a six-year-old and four-year-old we would be rammed with projects and activities and it would be like a non-stop kind of educational life that we were all living together. And actually, I think that’s been the surprise, that it’s not. It’s just—we just wake up, and we do our thing.
And we have really fun days. We have those epic days of non-stop projects and making and learning, but we also have a huge number of just little bits and bobs in the day, da da da. And I think that’s the thing that is surprising for others when they sort of see our lives in action. (laughs)
We just have a really slow, really simple life that we’re just trying to live with as much time and space and patience and freedom every day. And I just think that the key to that is to not really be doing loads and loads and loads and loads of stuff. So that’s probably been the most surprising thing about it, is how unsurprising it’s been.
PAM: I love the way you describe that, because that was a huge revelation for me too. The concept of time. Time and space. When I write about unschooling, I use that phrase so bloody often. (laughs) Time and space. Because we are so used to go, go, go, go. I had no clue how much actual time and space we need; that we would take if given the opportunity.
LUCY: Yeah.
PAM: Right? To process, that down time, which we used to think of as “lazy,” or not doing anything productive, et cetera. How valuable and important that time is. I had no clue. (laughs)
LUCY: Yeah, and, you know, it might feel like it takes an hour for everybody to put their shoes on, so you can go out to the woods—I’m speaking from experience from this morning.
And that hour is really important because if you feel like you’ve got an hour for everybody to find their shoes and put them on, you’ve got space then for the trauma that happens when you can’t find socks with the right seams in the right place. You’ve got time to validate that person’s feelings and hug them until they’re ready to move on from that moment. You don’t have to snap at people to get them to hurry up, and you don’t have to forget things because you’ve all rushed out the door too quickly. You can definitely have all the snacks you need, you can definitely have the right socks with the right seams, and you can definitely all have the space you need to be patient with each other.
And increasingly I see—perhaps it’s in contrast because we’re here in England at the moment, and I’m quite busy with lots of different work things, and we’ve got hundreds of people it feels like to catch up with while we’re here, like friends and family. And so, at the moment, we are kind of a little bit like go, go, go, and it’s in such stark contrast to our life in the yurt, which is just basically no, no, no. (laughs)
Just like slow, slow, slow I should say, actually. It’s just really, really slow. And here I find myself having a quickening of the breath and a kind of, “(gasp) We don’t have time for me to validate all of these emotions!” And I realized how much of my parenting comes down to basically not really doing very much, but just being really present with your children and having the time to let them feel everything they need to feel, and connect with them in all those down times.
PAM: Yeah, that patience to be with them, right? Like you were saying, validate. Because that patience keeps your connection with them, and they see, through your patience, that you see them.
LUCY: Yeah.
PAM: Right? Because if we’re trying to rush them through things, they really don’t feel seen. Like I’m just putting myself in those spots. When I feel rushed through things, you have to kind of close off part of yourself, don’t you? Because you don’t have the time to feel whatever it is that’s coming up. Yeah, that’s brilliant.
You recently started a group and a website called Parent Allies, and I have joined. I am really looking forward to that. And I would love to know the inspiration behind it, and a bit about your plans for it?
LUCY: Cool. So yeah, ParentAllies.org is the website, but there’s also a Facebook page and a Facebook group. And the group is probably the bit that I’m most excited about, because there’s a real community rising up around this idea. And the idea is taken from social justice movements, where in every rights movement so far there’s been a group of people who are in the sort of dominant group but have chosen to stand next to the marginalized group and advocate for them and support them and be people who will just show solidarity and do whatever they can to allow this group to have their rights met.
You’ve seen it in the Civil Rights movement, and in all sorts of movements over history. I’ve come to believe that children are one of the last marginalized groups in society; groups where it’s really socially accepted to basically marginalize them. You have conversations on Facebook where people are just like, “Yeah I don’t like kids.” And they’re almost proud or cool to sort of say it. And I really believe that there’s quite a systemic marginalization of children too, just in things like not having steps in public toilets so they can reach the taps or reach the toilet without having to climb over this grim thing. So those are a couple of little examples.
And the idea is that parents are invited to be allies to their children, to advocate for their needs and to show solidarity with them, and see their role as one where they’re partnering with their child to make sure their rights are fully honored and upheld.
On the website we are putting out lots of resources for people who are in different situations to share how they are allies to their children. And this is where it’s really exciting for me, because it’s moving right out of the education sphere. And I guess the root of the concept of parent allies, for me, came because I’ve been writing about unschooling for five years or so, and every time I write about unschooling in terms of respecting children, I have a lot of teachers and mums and dads of children who are at school say, “Well, how can I do this at home?” or “I feel like I do this, but my children do go to school.”
And so, by talking about parents as allies, we’re moving out of learning. We’re moving into the whole of life, whether you’re at school or not at school. Whoever you are in the world, you can be an ally to your child. So, the website is meant to be a resource for people who are choosing to be that.
And the Facebook group is a really, really supportive group where people can come in and they can ask for advice. You have to ask for advice—we don’t just give it willy-nilly, because I guess I’ve identified that that is a bit of a problem in our world. We’re so quick to give advice, rather than simply hearing someone’s story, or hearing someone’s problem.
So, there’s a tag where you can just say #solidarityplease, and that’s where you can come and you can talk about something that’s been bothering you or something you’re finding really hard, without getting any advice. You just get people saying, “Love to you” or “You’re doing really well” or, just showing solidarity. And then you can also ask for advice. And you can also get a high-five. You can go into the group and you can be like, “High five! I did really well with my kid today because this has been a bit of a struggle and I realized that in my role as an ally I need to help her and get this need met.” And then, you know, they’ll give details, and then everybody will say, “High five! High five!” (laughs)
And it’s sort of like, I guess it meets needs. It meets those needs of the parents to be heard, and in a way that is also respectful to their children. And it is a way to receive advice if you’re struggling with how to be an ally.
I think so often we have—I don’t really know what it is—maybe it’s a thing to do with human nature, but so often parents will think that they’ve got a problem that can only be solved with a punitive or disrespectful measure. They think, “Oh my kid doesn’t like brushing their teeth,” for example, “So the only thing I can do is hold them down and clean their teeth.” They sort of put up their own barriers and they say, “There’s no other answer. I’m mostly a respectful parent but, in this situation, I have to coerce my child.”
And the idea of the group is that we kind of crowd-source solutions. So very often people go in there and they’re like, “My child doesn’t want to clean their teeth.” And then we can say, “Oh I’ve been there and this worked for me, and this worked for me.” Because something I’ve found with parenting and problems is that answers one, two, and three don’t work, but four and five and six and seven and eight and nine might work. And I really think that in our role as an ally to our child, we can find the patience to look for four, five, six, seven, eight, and nine. Because it’s so important to us to remain connected and remain in partnership, and to respect their rights, that we’re willing to dig deep for those creative solutions. (sigh) That’s a little bit.
PAM: Yeah, that’s beautiful. And I love the idea of expanding it to all parents, and even the “come get a high-five” deal. Because it’s still an unconventional way to parent, right? If they tried to share that with like a more conventional friend or whatever, they would get the side-eye, like “What the heck did you—just tell them to brush their darn teeth!” (laughs)
LUCY: Yeah, “My child’s got a really creative urge to paint on the walls, so today I dedicated a whole part of the wall so my child could literally just paint the wall. Can I get a high-five?” You can imagine having that conversation with a conventional parent, and them just being like, “You let your child paint on the wall?!?” Whereas in the group, everybody is like, “Rock on! You’re amazing that you could come up with a solution for that urge!”
PAM: Yeah, that works for everyone. Because, as we were talking before, when we were talking about school, there are ways. If that’s a necessary part of your life, there are ways to still respect and nurture and care for your relationship with your child. Just because school is part of the picture doesn’t mean all your relationship has to be about control.
LUCY: Exactly. And I used to find myself writing to unschoolers, and unschoolers at heart, and what I mean by that is people who loved all of this rights, respecting, freedom-loving stuff, but did, for whatever reason, have to send their children to school. and I guess that is really why I tried really hard to come up with a term to describe all of the people that are wanting to live this way with their children, whether their kids are at school or not.
Because certainly we need parents and teachers within the education system—which I believe is incredibly coercive and oppressive—we need people in there standing up for children and saying, “You know what, it is a child’s right to go to the toilet when they need to go to the toilet.” You know, we need allies within the education system.
My kids are having fun, by the way. (laughs) I’m sure you can probably hear them, and it sounds horrible and terrifying, but they’re all gleeful sounds. (laughs)
PAM: (laughs) No, that’s lovely. Oh, and, I was going to mention, Emma and I, we do a book chat every couple of months, and we’re reading the Childism book.
LUCY: Oh, cool.
PAM: I forget her name—I’ll put it in the show notes [Elisabeth Young-Bruehl]. And I’ll have links to your Facebook group and your website, and all that stuff as well. I think that’s awesome. People are going to have a lot of fun checking that out.
LUCY: Oh, cool.
PAM: And I want to thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today. It was a lot of fun to finally get to chat with you Lucy.
LUCY: Yeah, totally. I feel kind of like, you know, we’re basically friends now, rather than people who know a little bit about each other from the internet. (laughs)
PAM: Yeah, exactly! Yeah, I was very much looking forward to chatting with you.
LUCY: Yeah, it’s been really lovely to be on here. Thank you so much for having me.
PAM: Yay! And before we go, where is the best place for people to connect with you online?
LUCY: I would probably say YouTube. People find me really personable on YouTube for some reason. It’s kind of a new channel, and I’ve been writing for seven years but only doing YouTube for a couple of years. But I think people find videos really helpful in a way that perhaps writing isn’t so. So, I’m on YouTube with my channel Lulastic and the Hippyshake. And I update that really regularly, like every single week, whereas other parts of the internet I’m slightly more like I pop in and pop out.
PAM: Awesome. I will definitely have the link to your channel there as well.
LUCY: Cool.
PAM: Thank you very much and have a great day. Have fun with the kids!
EU396: Foundations: There’s Plenty of Time
Dec 04, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, There’s Plenty of Time.
It’s amazing how so many things that come up in our days can feel like emergencies, like they need to be solved as soon as possible. Taking a moment to consider whether the situation at hand is a true emergency can help us release so much of the time pressure that we’re feeling. Reminding ourselves that we have plenty of time gives us more space to explore the root of the issue. And with that space, we can imagine the possibilities with a curious, creative mindset.
We hope you enjoy today’s episode and that it helps you in your relationships and on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
When you imagine the idea that there’s plenty of time in the context of a disagreement with a friend, partner, or child, how does it feel? Expansive? Overwhelming? Just plain wrong? Why?
Do you recall a time when an issue bubbled up again and again because you didn’t take the time up front to more fully understand it?
Where in your life do you feel time pressure? What if you could release that? How would that feel?
Can you think of a time when feeling time pressure interfered with coming up with a creative solution to a challenge?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are thrilled you’re here and interested in exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
And in today’s episode, we are going to talk about the idea that there is plenty of time. Now, it has been such a helpful tool for me over the years when navigating challenges with the people I love, and I believe I first heard about it from you, Anna!
It’s amazing how so many things that come up in our days can feel like emergencies, like they need to be solved as soon as possible. I think taking a moment to consider whether the situation at hand is a true emergency can help us release so much of the time pressure that we’re feeling. Reminding ourselves that we have plenty of time gives us more space to explore the root of the issue, rather than throwing Band-aid after Band-aid at it just to quickly solve it. “I gotta get this, I gotta move through it.” It’s so fascinating just to consider having plenty of time.
ANNA: Yes. Oh my goodness. So, it has been one of my main mantras for a very long time. Our society likes to operate with this extreme sense of urgency about everything and I get caught up in that really easily. I feel like time pressure is just a huge trigger for me that kind of sets me on this path of not thinking and just being really stressed out.
And the thing is, I like to get things done. I like to check boxes. I like moving on to the next thing, and that can have its place. I can be super productive. But what I found was that carrying that sense of urgency around all the time did not help with my relationships at all. It takes time to navigate things in a relationship, and if you stop and take a breath, you can ask, is this really urgent? Is it an emergency? Does this need to be solved right this second? And often, you’ll find the answer is, no. It does not need to be solved right this second. I can calm down.
PAM: Right? And I find that even when we recognize that it’s not an emergency, I feel that time pressure can trigger our need to perform, if that makes sense. As I was thinking, it’s like, okay, yes, this is not emergency, but then boom, I still want to perform well. I want to solve it quickly and efficiently. I want to get an “A” in problem-solving, to be productive, because those are strong cultural messages we hear so often. But are they actually helpful goals in and of themselves, particularly when other people are involved?
Another question that I found very useful to ask myself is, are we looking for future approval or validation about how we handle the situation? That’s that performance piece, maybe from a person that we anticipate telling about the situation in the future. Are we looking at that more than we’re looking with care and compassion to the other person in front of us who’s involved?
And yes, being someone who jumped straight to problem solving for many years and still works on it, another consequence I found was that solving a problem quickly was often shorthand for implementing my solution, which relationship-wise, often meant pushing through the other person’s consent. And maybe not even obviously pushing through it, but more so by not even slowing down to ask them for their thoughts and ideas. Instead, just presenting my solution with an energy of, “Of course this makes sense and you’ll agree. Let’s do it.”
But I came to see that that approach definitely took a toll on my relationships, on my connections with the people in my life. Their trust in me dwindled because they felt less seen and heard by me over time, because I wasn’t asking them what they thought. I wasn’t asking them for their ideas. I was just saying, “Oh yeah, look, this happened. We can do this instead. Let’s go.” Just pulling them along with my energy.
ANNA: Exactly. And as you’ll hear us say so many times, everyone wants to feel seen and heard. So, anything that’s short circuiting that is going to be an issue. And that’s the thing. When we are holding speed and efficiency and production ahead of people and connection, it’s going to take a toll. Period. And again, I like to be efficient and get things done. So, this isn’t about just stopping all the things, but for me, it’s about being aware of the energy I’m bringing into a situation.
And if another person is involved, am I taking the time to really hear them and understand them, especially if we’re talking about our most important relationships? It’s key to avoiding conflicts and misunderstandings to give ourselves time to really hear one another. And I’m one who likes to fix and solve and to be fair, I have some very good ideas, Pam.
PAM: You do. You do.
ANNA: But no one wants to be dragged along, even for my really good idea. And so, remembering what we’ve talked about in the past on the podcast, how different everyone is. We see and process the world differently. So, my really good idea might be a really good idea for me and not for the person I’m in relationship with. But if I push through their consent with this intense sense of urgency, it ends up just leaving us feeling so disconnected.
PAM: Yes. And when I’m feeling time pressure, particularly self-imposed time pressure, I’ve found that I am much more apt to take that conventional straight-line path from A to B to solve the problem, because it feels like a race against the clock to me. But when I can realize that that’s happening and remind myself that there’s plenty of time, I feel more expansive and free to be curious. I feel I have the space to more creatively navigate a challenge, because you know what? And that’s fine, too. If it was just me, I could take my straight-line, A to B and do it and move on, but as I chat with the other person or the people that are involved, I can give them that space and just slowly map out what’s going on. There are signposts of everyone’s needs.
Maybe there’s lines of trees representing the constraints that we’re discovering. Maybe environmental constraints, maybe time constraints, maybe capacity constraints. Maybe there’s hills for aspects that feel a little bit harder. And flower gardens or some beautiful art in spots that we’d like to pass by if it works. And from there, once we kind of start to fill in that map, we can more fruitfully begin exploring paths through the space of the challenge that hit most of the need sign posts, navigate around many of the hills, and maybe even take some time to stop and soak in the view of a sunflower field in bloom.
I know, maybe that sounds a bit sappy. But in my experience, our lives are so much richer when we give ourselves the time and space to be open and curious about the situation, to chat and ponder a bit more to get creative.
ANNA: Yes. I love that image. Honestly, I can feel my body slowing down just thinking about it. And so, I think finding what helps you stay present in the moment and slow yourself down. Even to notice the sense of urgency and slow it down. So, what kind of imagery, what kind of breathing, what kind of things in the moment help bring you down? And again, that mantra of, “There’s plenty of time,” this vision of a map of all the possibilities we have, like whatever that is.
And I think another aspect of peeling back the layers related to this is to look at where is the sense of urgency coming from? What is its purpose? Who is it serving? And asking those questions really helped me kind of deconstruct this a little bit, because the truth of it is, when we’re rushing from task to task, there’s very little time to question anything.
And I think sometimes we think that sense of urgency is coming from within us, but I don’t think it is. I think we’ve been trained to rush, to value efficiency and productivity above all else. And I think humans naturally want to connect, and the two just don’t really work well together.
So, the question for me becomes, do I want to sacrifice or harm my relationships so that I can be a better producer for society? And I would argue that people in strong connected relationships actually bring more to the world and end up producing the most amazing things. And so, how this looks in practice for me is, when I find myself feeling frustrated or trying to rush someone along to my chosen outcomes, I just stop and I take that breath and I say, “There’s plenty of time.” And I feel it. The energy instantly changes.
And if I’m still struggling, I will ask myself, “Where is the sense of urgency coming from? Is it even real? And is it helping? Because even if we feel there is some real time constraint, there is some real thing that’s driving it, is it helping me make the choices in the moment? Is it helping the two of us get through this situation? Because if it’s not, we still need to set it aside, even if it’s a real thing, because we’re not getting anywhere.
And, as I mentioned, so often this applies to our relationships with both kids and adults. Rushing a child out the door frustrated or pushing a partner to get something done on a timeline without regard to their experience of it, it just doesn’t feel good to anyone. So, reminding myself there’s plenty of time just grounds me back in that moment.
Because the truth of it is, if we’re five minutes late, if we miss the thing altogether, if the project doesn’t get done, the world does not end. Most likely, a year later, it’ll be hard to even remember what the issues were. But if we continually push past the people in our life, if we push them along this arbitrary timeline, it will absolutely impact the relationship, and that’s something I want to avoid.
Again, back to priorities from episode one, I want to keep my relationships as the priority. And if what’s being handed to me by society is in conflict with that, then I want to question it and ultimately set it aside.
PAM: Yes, exactly. With relationships as my priority, I want to use that lens as I navigate my days. And it’s fascinating to discover how often cultivating connected relationships is at odds with the societal messages that we hear or even just infer from how people are moving through and navigating their days all around us.
ANNA: So true!
PAM: The immense value given to having power and influence over others, the call to create strong boundaries to protect ourselves from others, the importance of being productive members of society at the expense of others, it is just so interesting to think about how relationships, while talked about so often as being an important part of our lives, in reality, are often expected to take a backseat.
So, with that, here are some questions you might want to ponder as you explore the idea that there’s plenty of time.
Our first one is, when you imagine the idea that there’s plenty of time in the context of a disagreement with a friend, partner, or child, how does it feel? Just bring that idea, that lens of plenty of time in. Does it feel expansive? Does it feel overwhelming? Does it feel just plain wrong? “No, I don’t have time.” “Why?” is a great question to ask yourself at that point. What is it that’s making me feel like I don’t have time in this situation?
The next question is, do you recall a time when an issue bubbled up again and again because you didn’t take the time up front to more fully understand it? I find things can bubble up and we can solve them. We can put that Band-aid on them. But if we don’t take the time to get to the root of things and really find out what the underlying need is, or play around with the process through which we move through things that come up regularly in our lives, we can just see it happening again and again.
ANNA: I think that one can help people that have the efficiency piece, because really it is more efficient to take the time and deal with it and to actually figure out how we want to move through it, versus the plugging the holes or the Band-aids that we end up having to revisit and revisit and revisit the same challenges.
PAM: Exactly. Exactly. It is so interesting to think about that, that we think we’re being efficient, we think we’re being productive, but so often, maybe it bubbles up over and over, but maybe it has relationship implications that I have to spend time with later. So, you can start to discover that it’s really a choice of, where do I want to put my energy in the process? In the space up front or into the, going through it again and again.
Okay. Okay. Question three. Where in your life do you feel time pressure? What if you could release that, how would that feel? I think that could be a big one, too. And if you release that, how would that feel? And where is it coming from? Is it something that I am putting on myself? Because so often, it’s something that we’re doing.
ANNA: So often, it’s something we’re putting on ourselves that again, we kind of think is coming from somewhere else, maybe our job, or maybe school, or maybe something else.
But really when we look at it, it’s our interpretation of that that’s putting this super intense sense of urgency and time pressure on it.
PAM: Yes, yes. And sometimes we’re just feeling that we have to bring somebody else’s framework or approach and be the voice of them, whether that be society or a boss or a teacher, and that I have to be them now, because they’re not here to say it, but is that how I really feel?
All good stuff. Okay. Our last question. Can you think of a time when feeling time pressure interfered with coming up with a creative solution to a challenge? And this is one I just would love people to think about, because what I discovered over time is that even when it is just me, it can be so useful to take the space not to just go with A to B, the first thing that comes to mind.
I have found there are so often more creative ways that that feel even better, that may be even more fun. There are so many possibilities. So, when I just let myself play with these things, take that time pressure off myself of something that I need to do, like the bathroom thing. It’s like, just do the damn bathrooms and get it done. I can tell myself that story, but it’s so much easier or so much more fun when I can just give myself some space to play with it.
ANNA: Yeah. And I think the time allows us to bring in the context that we talk about so much, because if we’re just going point A to point B, we’re really missing a lot of context around us. And then that can inform us, because again, maybe it helps us make a decision that saves us some work down the road or that keeps a relationship intact that we might be running over. And so, taking that time for ourselves to take in that context, to me, just makes it easier, more fun, and a lot of times, even more efficient.
PAM: Exactly. Exactly. Okay. Thanks so much for listening, everyone, and we will see you next time. Bye!
EU395: Navigating All the Needs
Nov 20, 2025
In this episode of Exploring Unschooling, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about navigating all the needs in our unschooling families. Navigating all the needs can be one of the biggest puzzles of parenthood. In many cases, we’re going from only being responsible for ourselves, to then being in partnership with someone else, to then adding children one by one. And as the children are growing, they each have their own ideas and their own personalities and their own needs. And so, the number of needs that exist in our family at any given time is just increasing as we have more children.
In our conversation, we talk about some common challenges that come up, how to approach problem solving with curiosity, and ways to have conversations with our family that move us from trying to control and direct to collaboration.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello! I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully and I’m joined by my co-hosts Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis.
PAM AND ERIKA: Hello! Hi!
ANNA: Happy to have you both here. Before we get started, I wanted to encourage you to check out our Substack, When School Isn’t Working, at whenschoolisntworking.substack.com.
It’s a great resource to share with friends who are feeling stuck and when you’re hearing those stories about kids being upset or crying or things not working and people just feeling at their wit’s end. It’s just a good place for that and we would love to have you join us there.
Today on the podcast, we’re talking about navigating all the needs. This is a big topic and I’m excited to have the chance to dig into it today. Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would! I love this topic, too, and it’s been a monthly theme on the Living Joyfully Network which was really fun. So basically, I see navigating all the needs as one of the biggest puzzles of parenthood. In many cases, we’re going from only being responsible for ourselves, to then being in partnership with someone else, to then adding children one by one. And as the children are growing, they each have their own ideas and their own personalities and their own needs. And so, the number of needs that exist in our family at any given time is just increasing as we have more children.
I only have two children, but it can still present so many interesting challenges, because as we’re always saying, people are different, and that includes our kids who we may have even assumed would be like us, but then they turn out to have quite different needs than we do. So I wanted to give a couple of common examples of just where the idea of navigating all the needs might come up and then I’m excited to see what nuances we dive into in our conversation.
One that seems to come up a lot is when some of us may like to go out of the house to do activities and others don’t as much or as often and so what can we do then?
And another is with sleep. People have different needs for how long they sleep, what time they sleep, the conditions for sleep, and this can be a real puzzle in families.
And finally another example that comes to mind was during that time of early childhood when we have babies and toddlers and how to fit in the care needs of the adults when the children just have so many seemingly constant care needs. Just the basics like eating, showering, rest, and movement. Sometimes it can just feel overwhelming to try to figure out these kind of challenging moments.
And what I like about the kind of deep processing and thinking that we do here on the podcast and in the Network and really just on my unschooling journey overall is that kind of processing invites me to slow down, get curious, and really assume that there are ways to figure it all out. Everything can’t always happen at the same time, but there will be solutions that we can find that will address all the needs the best that we can.
And so, I think coming in with that kind of mindset really helps when it starts to feel like there’s just too many competing needs. So, those are my initial thoughts.
PAM: Good ones. I love your examples. Those are pretty common ones that we hear about and see in the Network all the time.
And, for me, and when I’m thinking back to the transition to unschooling, the idea of meeting all the needs, at first it could just feel overwhelming. It’s like, how on earth? Someone needs to kind of judge which needs we’re going to meet and which ones we can’t meet and here’s the most effective slash efficient way to meet those needs.
And we really feel like we’re doing our best for the people that we love. And it can feel very disappointing, disconcerting when people don’t appreciate all the work we did to think all that through and figure this out. That was a lot of work right there. That’s really when my mantra for myself of being open and curious came in. And it was encouraging to hear from other unschoolers who were further on the journey than I. It is possible it can be done. And so, I’ll try it and see. It was making that shift to being open and curious.
Open to it doesn’t mean me not thinking it through at all. I can have ideas that consider everyone who’s involved and also the bigger picture context that I see that others might not see, etc. But as we were talking about in the last episode people can’t read our minds. If I just show up with a plan that’s the most effective and efficient, then how are you going to get buy in? When people don’t know what’s going on. And when the kids are younger, then maybe that’s your partner. Anybody else who’s involved.
The communication holds the clues, even if they’re not verbal from our kids. The resistance, the crying, all those pieces are communication to tell us when something that we’re trying to do is or isn’t working and helping. So being open and curious was so helpful just to be open to seeing and hearing other people’s perspectives and what their needs are.
And sometimes it’s helping them sort out what the actual need is. “I want to do this.” Why? What’s going to be really fun about that? And we can join them in that excitement rather than trying to shut things down right away. If we want to navigate all the needs we need to be open to hearing about them and to actually find or try to find the root of it.
Because maybe I want to go here, I want to go to the park. And if you can get more into the details of it, then it can be a lot easier to find that common ground where we can meet that need.
Like you were saying, Erika, maybe it’s not right now, maybe it’s okay if we do it in the evening when someone else is home to stay with someone who doesn’t want to go. Just being so curious about, what does that really mean to you? What would feel good about doing that thing? So that we can meet that need.
Getting to the need rather than the action that someone’s proposing that would meet the need. There’s a distinction, a level, a depth to it. So once we can start getting to the needs themselves and then get curious. Oh, what if we did this? What if we did that? And just being totally open to the yes, no, maybe, like what if we did that? That was one of the things I managed to keep going forward with because, oh my gosh, kids really are capable.
They really are capable of understanding that piece, what they would love the most about this. And being able to share that kind of information and to be able to hear from us even if it is disappointing. We can’t make that work right now. We don’t have the car or whatever, whatever. We’ll need to save up a bit of money. Whatever the thing is but it can really be a conversation. And that’s why we love using the word navigate. Right? Because it’s not, let’s figure out the answer.
It’s not the answer. You may eventually come to a path and you’ll take the next step on the path and it might tweak what you know along the way before you ever get to the end of whatever the moment is. But yeah, for me, it was so much about the shift to being open and curious with our kids and having those conversations.
ANNA: Okay, so many things have bubbled up. I think a big piece was what you said, Erika, was the slowing it down. Because I can be about efficiency. But efficiency is usually me jumping to an outcome. So, that was another big piece, bringing open and curious. Letting go of whatever outcome.
Because you know my brain when I hear a problem. So somebody’s telling me they want to do this, they want to do that. I am trying to solve the puzzle because I like to do that. But I’m often locking in on a particular solution and it’s not flexible at that point. And so that was a big piece of me just letting go. I don’t know how this is going to play out. We have a lot of competing needs but I’m going to slow down. We’re going to dig in a little bit like you were saying Pam. Get to what’s underneath of it.
Okay what’s at the playground? Oh you’re actually just wanting to fly this kite or do this particular thing. We can do that right out here in the street in front of us or in the backyard. Okay, you’re not wanting to go because you want to still play your game on your device. Okay, we can bring that with us or we can set up something.
Once we have those conversations, things open up. Two other things that bubbled up, one was creativity. I think when we slow down and have that open and curious mindset, that’s where the creativity comes in and kids are so creative. Because I would sometimes get stuck on maybe what seems fair or something that would be in my mind about it and their solutions I’m thinking hmm, does that really work? But they were both happy with it. So it was okay. Why am I inserting anything into this?
But when we’re all creatively listening to what the roadblocks are for each person, we get a chance for everybody to be creative. Yeah, I’m okay to wait till tomorrow. Can we then add this thing to it if we do it tomorrow? Yes, we can do that and then this time we can get this. So, that creative problem solving, collaborative energy I really loved.
And I think another big big piece was the mindset shift to trust. For me, I had to have this deep abiding trust that we could solve it, that we could figure out a way that we could all feel comfortable. And again, it might take a little bit of time. It might not be right in that moment, but that trust is so important.
What I found in our family was me having that trust suddenly fostered that trust in everybody. Even when we bumped up against something that felt like there’s no solution, if I was feeling a little low and wondering if we were going to get there, they would say, we’re going to figure it out! And so I loved that it was just the energy of we’ll just keep at it. We’ll figure it out. We may have to step away for a minute and come back depending on what it is but there is room to trust that we can find solutions that feel good to everyone.
And so, that’s the problem-solving piece of when you have those competing needs but I think you touched on too, Erika, that just sometimes it’s young kids and how do we take care of ourselves and all of those pieces and that’s a little bit different but I think the slowing it down, creative energy, trusting that there’s plenty of time and that we can find it, calms me enough to then see the moments where I can take care of myself or the moments where we can create a little bit more space around something. Anytime I’m getting worked up and tight or too far ahead of myself it actually just compounds whatever is happening in the moment that’s feeling stressful.
ERIKA: Yeah, if we get too caught up in seeing the finish line, we can picture how it would work, we have the vision of that. And if we get stuck there, then we can’t see all the other possibilities that really could get us to the same place. With the little kids situation, I think a lot of parents really try to just do it all themselves and not ask for help, because that’s the vision. And they should be able to do it. And so, just little things like, there are lots of ways that we can solve this problem. There are ways that we haven’t thought of yet.
Getting creative, getting unconventional, what works for someone maybe it doesn’t even work so well for someone else. What we see working for someone else may not be the solution for our family. It just depends on the different individuals in our family.
And I think when we really value every family member’s contributions to these conversations, it’s just so amazing. It’s such a great experience for kids. It’s a great experience for parents to be able to all be working together as a team. It’s something that we might not have experienced ourselves as kids and so I think that’s why it has a learning curve and takes some time to understand, how do we even do this? I’m so used to the parents just saying what’s going to happen and then that’s what happens and that’s the answer. But we all know that sort of parenting has some downsides to it.
If we’re trying to do something different, getting everyone involved in the conversation, making sure that everyone knows, I hear your needs, too, and those are also important. It’s as important to me as getting my needs met and we can figure out a way that all of these things can happen. That’s a really valuable problem-solving skill and important conversational skills to have that they can take with them in their adult lives.
PAM: Yes. Two things that bubbled up for me. One both of you were speaking about is I remember when the kids were younger and I was trying to navigate my own needs in this very hands-on care season. What I found was when I was trying to make those plans for the shower or whatever, I would try to plan it. It would be like, okay at 3:00 they have their nap and I’m gonna take my shower. But then they don’t fall asleep at 3:00 and my shower plans are shot for another day. That shift from trying to plan ahead and making life fit those plans versus, I’m just gonna pay attention to when I can have ten minutes to jump in the shower.
It may not look like we’re expecting. Maybe somebody drops in and they can hold the baby for ten minutes while I go jump in the shower. I don’t have to entertain them. They would love to have some quiet time with the baby. Then it’s the creativity you were talking about. These are the things that I would like to do and I’m going to watch out for moments, so adding those into the flow weaving them into what’s actually happening, versus trying to create what happens to match some future plan I have in my head. So, that was the first thing that bubbled up.
The other piece is something I bring up when these conversations come up, when we’re chatting with our kids. It doesn’t have to be everybody involved talking together to come up with the plan. Maybe it’s me going and talking with one child and trying to speak with them about what their needs are and why this doesn’t feel good because having an audience maybe just doesn’t feel good to them or getting comments from others trying to work it out. Giving people the space to think about their needs to talk about their needs to feel validated to be validated about their needs and then with a deeper understanding that you can go talk to the next child and bring up why that doesn’t feel good because of this or that. “Maybe we could try this.”
There’s a depth of understanding as they’re learning a little bit about each other as well through me alongside trying to figure it out. So there were times when I was doing that circle for a while until we figured out, oh yeah that’ll work, that’ll work, that’ll work. Okay off we go! So, that was one piece.
And then the other piece was for ones who aren’t as much into the conversation, they’re still communicating even as young kids. “I don’t want to talk about it,” that’s still communication, right? That’s letting you know something, maybe just getting some sort of short word, maybe a shrug, maybe a nah and just circling back. And also knowing okay that is not the child in this season that I go and give long five-minute paragraphs explaining all the context and everything that’s going on. Maybe it’s like three seconds. Does thinking about doing this sound good and we’re done. I get feedback and then I can go off and think if it did or did not sound good. It’s just understanding the people who we are talking with and engaging with and communicating with that it might not always be all about the words.
ANNA: That’s so important. Not everybody is that deep conversationalist who is able to even articulate their needs, but I love what you did with that separate space because I think that helps them have the space to think about it. Because especially if they’re siblings, I don’t want to do that while they’re trying to think about what their need is. It’s hard, but giving them that quiet space where they can say, okay, this part I don’t mind, this part I do. I love that piece.
And then there was something that you said, Erika, that I wanted to highlight again. I think you stated it is like sometimes looking for the unconventional solution and what that brought to mind for me was sometimes in these situations we’re taking that outside lens of how other people see this or how are other people doing it and I think that can really derail us.
Even if we take it within an unschooling environment and take something like sleep. Some families have this around-the-clock thing going and it’s working very well because it’s working for their child and that makes sense and that could be a solution.
Or maybe in your particular family you are thinking, that wouldn’t work because of your partner’s schedule or because of this thing or because of my own whatever. You don’t have to do it that way. I think what I wanted to pull out from when you said that was just really circle the wagons and look at the people that are involved in your family, because whatever solution you come up with that you all feel good about, it doesn’t matter what it looks like to the outside world. It really doesn’t. No one cares. They don’t. They’re wrapped up in their own thing so just really finding the creative solutions that feel good to you.
You might get a side eye from an in-law or something else if you decide to do around-the-clock or something different, but if you know it’s working for you and your kids, that’s all that matters. So, sometimes watch that outside noise, because I think that’s one thing that gets in the way of us finding the creative solutions.
ERIKA: Yeah I had made a little note that says “make sure you’re not just responding to what they will think about our solutions.”
I know we talk about this a lot, but it’s not like you find the one answer and then that’s going to work forever either. As needs come up, as we see what’s rubbing, as problems come up, conflicts, whatever it feels like in your family, then we do it again. So we get practice figuring it out. I’ll catch my husband saying something like, “But you like doing the XYZ.” It’s frustrating when they change their minds about how things used to work and now they want something different. But I think that happens to all of us. We all are growing and changing and so what works to meet our needs during one season, it’s not gonna work for another season.
That was another thing I wanted to bring up, seasons. Just to keep grounding back into even when this feels like too many needs at once eventually it’s going to change.
ANNA: Yeah yeah and just really quickly, I think what you just said could actually be helpful for the outside voices too. To just say, “for now”. This is what’s working for us for now so maybe that calms them if they’re thinking wow that’s looking really unconventional or strange but instead, it’s like oh they found something that’s feeling good for now. Sorry, go ahead!
PAM: That’s fine, that’s great and because what I was taking away from that, I love the seasons thought and I think it can help in both ways. When things are going well, it’s not getting attached, like your husband saying, “But this is the way it’s been.” “You like this thing,” or, “You don’t like this thing.” And not taking it in as a failure if we’ve solved this. This is the way that works for us now and if something breaks in that like stops working, starts rubbing, if we take that on us as a failure, then our energy can feel judgmental to the person who has changed. “Why did you change? Why don’t you like this anymore?” I like all those pieces.
So, thinking of it as seasons can help with that and then also when things aren’t going well. When you’re in a season when things are rubbing, when you’re still trying to figure out how this might work where everyone’s needs are getting met. Whether it’s trying to figure out sleeping arrangements or whatever, whatever, it can feel like you’ll be stuck there forever and like you’ll never find a solution, etc.
So, again reminding ourselves that this is a season and like you were saying earlier, I know we’ll figure this out at some point. Not putting agendas and timetables and targets on it can just be so helpful to keep that open and curious energy as you’re navigating.
ANNA: Well, thank you everyone for joining us. I hope you enjoyed this conversation. I know we’re not solving how to navigate all the needs but hopefully some ideas about slowing down, being creative can help. Because for me, that shift of energy can make such a big difference. I appreciate all the things that came up during this call and hopefully it will spark some ideas for meeting the needs of your families.
We would love, love, love for you to join us at the Living Joyfully Network. It is such a beautiful supportive community and we love diving into these topics. It feels great to move through some of these situations with other people because we’re all so different.
We’re coming from different countries, different phases of life, different ages of children but the ideas and that intention is there and it really makes such a difference for the conversations. I find them just so rich and really, really enjoy it.
If you would like to learn more and join us you can follow the link in the show notes. Thanks for listening and joining us today.
EU394: Weaving Together Neurodivergence and Unschooling with Melissa Crockett-Joyoue
Nov 06, 2025
In this episode, we were so grateful to be joined by Melissa Crockett-Joyoue of the Unschooling Summit and Weave ND. Melissa shared her dramatic journey to unschooling, her experience as a neurodivergent parent of neurodivergent kids, and how amazing unschooling has been for all of them. We also talked about increasing our capacity through intentional self care practices and being an entrepreneur while unschooling.
It was a very rich conversation that we hope you enjoy!
QUESTIONS FOR MELISSA
Can you tell us a little bit about you and your family and what everyone’s interested in right now? And then we would also love to hear a bit about your story of coming to unschooling. Before the call, you mentioned how valuable unschooling as a lifestyle can be for ND kids. How have you seen that in action?
I know you talk about the importance of building capacity for ourselves. Can you share some of your ideas around that?
You’ve mentioned your online community, Weave, and there’s The Unschooling Summit event you co-host with Esther Jones. We’d love to hear more about those and a bit of your experience weaving unschooling together with being an entrepreneur.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone, I am Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia, as well as our special guest today, Melissa Crockett-Joyoue. Hello to you all.
MELISSA: Kia ora.
ERIKA: But before we begin our conversation with Melissa, I wanted to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, which has really been life changing for me in so many ways. On the Network, we have amazing discussions about so many topics since our community has such a wide variety of experiences. Everyone in the Network is really learning and growing and being intentional with their families.
It’s unlike any other online community I’ve found. Being part of the Network offers powerful support, especially during moments when questions and fears come up, or if you’re new to unschooling and just need a place where people understand the journey. If you’d like to learn more about the Living Joyfully Network and check it out for yourself, you can click the link in the show notes. We would love to meet you there.
We are so excited to have Melissa joining us today on the podcast. She is the co-founder of the Unschooling Summit, and the founder of WeaveND, an online membership community supporting neurodivergent unschooling families with a focus on building capacity and connection for the parents. She lives in New Zealand and is mama to two unschooling kids. I met Melissa recently when I participated in her Sunday Session with Esther Jones, which is part of the Unschooling Summit. I’m excited to learn more about her in our conversation today.
And so to get us started, Melissa, can you tell us a little bit about you and your family and what everyone’s interested in right now? And we’d also love to hear a bit about your story of coming to unschooling.
MELISSA: Okay. Well, I’ll check back in an hour with you. So, kia ora koutou. So I’m Melissa and you know that we’ve done that part. I live in Aotearoa, New Zealand. I live in a small coastal rural fishing village, which is approximately an hour north of Auckland. I grew up in the very far north.
I’m part M?ori on my mother’s side, and a big mix on my dad’s side, and grew up really intensely connected to that part of me growing up in a small, predominantly M?ori area in the far north. And my wife and I, she is from St Lucia in the Caribbean. And we have two children.
So we have T?mana, who is 10. And we have Hinem?rie and she is seven and a half. Hinem?rie did three part days at preschool with me in attendance and was a big fat no. And that was her journey in mainstream schooling. And T?mana did a year at our really lovely little country school with a role of 60 kids max. It was probably about 55 when he was there, a school that I had been on the board of governance of for three years before I even got pregnant, because we moved to a small town and I wanted to make connections and help out. And I thought, I’m going to make the school really awesome so when my kids get there it will be great. That didn’t turn out quite how I anticipated.
So, that’s where we live. And we live on a big, big property that my parents own. So it’s native forest. They live there as well in a different dwelling within shouting distance. And my uncle lives there as well. And my brother and his wife and two kids live just a five minute drive away.
So, it’s a beautiful intergenerational kind of living with all the ups and downs of that when you are striking out on a different path. My parents are supportive, really supportive of the unschooling stuff, more challenged by understanding the neurodivergent stuff, because they’re neurodivergent too, they don’t know it yet. They’re working it out. So, we have a different parenting style that they are trying to be supportive of. And we’re all kind of learning how that works.
Our journey to unschooling was a mixture of, longer than I wish it had been in hindsight now, and kind of quite quick to jump straight into unschooling in other ways. So as I said, I was quite invested in the whole local school and so on. I was also doing fundraisers for them. I was working on M?ori strategy with them and so on.
So, when T?mana was smaller, he had really intense food allergies. And so we didn’t do a lot of socializing with him. We lived quite an unschooling kind of lifestyle anyway. He didn’t go to any kind of childcare. He was only ever looked after by my mum occasionally.
It was a very kind of attachment-style parenting. And I ran a M?ori language play group with my sister-in-law. And so he socialized there. But apart from that, play dates were really hard because of his food allergies. And he liked other kids, but there was always something. He really liked adults. For his fourth birthday party, his list was all grown-ups and elderly people he wanted to come to his party. And so it was always a little bit challenging. And he really liked babies. Those were his key interest areas with other kids.
We put him into preschool when he was three and he wouldn’t go inside. And we just thought, oh he’s just such an outdoor boy and he just wanted to move rocks and climb trees and ride bikes. But every time he went inside, he’d get really upset, particularly if it was raining.
Now I’m looking back and seeing all these flags for sensory overload and stuff that we just didn’t know or understand at the time. And we thought that it was his food allergies making him really cautious around other kids. So, he did a little bit of preschool, like two mornings a week. But I had a new baby and I might get him there at 10 and he might have to finish at 12. So he did about two hours twice a week max.
When my daughter was eight months old, I actually had three SCAD heart attacks, Spontaneous Coronary Artery Dissections, which were near fatal and pretty extreme. And I spent five weeks in hospital. And it is a key part of our story because it was very traumatic for the children.
So T?mana was there for two of the times, including one which was cardiac arrest. And it meant that he had really severe separation anxiety. And the nature of him anyway, he was very, very attached. But this was really intense. And so I spent five weeks in hospital and had to have open heart surgery. And he kept going to preschool during that time. But it was really difficult for him.
So, it was probably a year later that it was time for him to start school in New Zealand, we start at five. And pretty much everyone just goes at five. You legally don’t have to be there until you’re six. But I knew that he was going to need a long transition into school. I felt that. And the preschool and school were right next door. So, we had this plan in progress. And then COVID happened.
So we locked down at home. And that suited him really well. And also, after I recovered in that period of time, my wife got really sick, but that came after. So, we put him into school. And it went abysmally, basically, from the get go. And after a few months, he started halfway through the year. He started in June. And so the other kids had kind of settled in at the beginning of the year. He only had 10 kids in his class, but it was just too much. And I’m trying to think how I can make this shorter.
So basically, school was really difficult. He, from the very first day, it was screaming violent meltdowns from him. And I couldn’t lift him because of my chest surgery and stuff. And so my mum helped literally drag him into school. And we pushed him in the door. And the teacher closed the door on him. And it was horrific. And I was really fully in PTSD still at that point. So I was having panic attacks and stuff. And so it was, it was intense. It was really hard.
And then they did the classic thing of, you know, 10 minutes later, sending a photo of him playing and being like, he’s fine. But this didn’t stop. And pretty much every day was traumatic for all of us.
And we had meetings with the school and they said that it was because of me. And so we had his grandparents drop him off at school, occasionally my wife if she wasn’t working and so on. And it just didn’t get better. And he would be up trees and my dad, who is a bit rough around the edges. “I’m gonna have to get the chainsaw and cut the tree down.” And it was just really dramatic every morning.
And he went through a small phase of kind of being okay to go. And they were bribing him with Lego he could do in class and stuff. But it just wasn’t supportive of his neurodivergence.
They didn’t understand that. They just blamed it all on his trauma around my heart stuff. And yeah, it just continued to go on.
And everyone was telling us he’ll get used to it. Kids are like this, it’ll be fine. He’s just traumatized, you know, like it’s just that.
And yeah, the plans that they put in place were basically me not being involved. And you know, don’t make it nice for him to be at home, encourage him to be at school, all of those kinds of things. This is with a five-year-old who’s really traumatized.
One of the final days they were restraining him on the ground while I drove off with him, you know, yelling for me. Sorry, I didn’t think I’d get this upset again. I’ve talked about this. It’s all your empathetic faces.
And we had anxiety bands for him that were giving him bilateral stimulation, all this kind of thing. And nothing was helping.
And at that point as well with his learning, I could see some disparities. And I ended up finding out about giftedness and I had him assessed and it turned out he was a highly gifted visual-spatial learner. So then I kind of went down the path of, okay, things will be better if we get them on board with his visual-spatial giftedness.
And we talked about it with him because he knew he was different from the other kids. And so we went in with all these ideas and this 26-page report and the school just wasn’t able to support him in that. And they gave him a teacher’s aid, but it just wasn’t working.
He kept running away from school grounds out onto the main road and stuff. And it was just difficult. And I really wanted to homeschool him. And I knew homeschooling was going to be our future at that point. I’d always kind of seen it because of his food allergies, placements didn’t work out. Then I was like, yeah, I could be a homeschooling mom, but I did really like that local school.
I knew homeschooling was in our picture, but my wife and I thought that I was just having to deal with the trauma that I’d been through. And I was having panic attacks and so on. And we just thought that I didn’t have the mental capacity to homeschool him at that point.
I didn’t know about unschooling. I mean, I’d heard about it. And I thought that was like those really happy, slack parents. I followed one woman on a blog, and she lived in a house bus and the kids were constantly being picked up for not being looked after properly and stuff.
And I was like, yeah, no, that’s wow. And I have nothing against house buses, I think that’s a cool lifestyle. But a particular blog I was reading maybe wasn’t very representative.
So, I thought we were going to have to homeschool him, but I thought that I was going to need to get a whole lot better first. And it just got to the point where he had like four vomiting migraines in two weeks. I thought maybe he had some kind of brain problem going, like some kind of illness or something, some terrible thing.
And it was just stress. And it turned out that he was being really bullied at school. And he was telling us, but we didn’t believe that it was as bad as what he was saying and so on.
And it just came to a crunch when we had a second big COVID lockdown for about, well, it was big for us, it was about four months of complete lockdown. And he absolutely blossomed at home. He completely thrived. He was learning. He was much more interested in learning. He was so much less anxious. And we sat down and had a conversation. At that point, the new protocols had come in that we would have to drop him at the school gate and leave.
Parents just had to drop and go, you weren’t allowed into the school at all. And we just said, that’s not okay. It’s my mental health or his, we decided. And we were like, I can be more robust. I can sacrifice mine for his, we just couldn’t do that to him any longer. And that’s when we decided to homeschool. And I’d been trying to convince my wife for probably six months that we needed to do this.
And we finally had this conversation. I remember I got up off the couch and I walked over to the kitchen bench and I started doing dishes. And then I just had this complete wash over of me, like, how the hell am I going to homeschool him?
Like, oh, I don’t have the capacity and how am I going to teach him maths? You know, and all of those things that just washed over me, just like this whole whoosh. And I went and spoke to her, sent a message to a friend who is an unschooler, who’s a psychologist who lectures at a university. And she unschools her two similarly neurodivergent, at the time we thought, similarly gifted kids. They’re gifted as well. And she said to me, yeah, read this Carol Black essay and you need to unschool.
And so that was it. And I just autistically deep dived into that. And that was it. We were unschoolers from pretty much that day. We didn’t start homeschooling. We just went straight into unschooling.
Wow. Okay. I told you, see me in an hour. Yeah, so it’s a big, big story. But that’s how we got to unschooling.
ANNA: It’s amazing. I think so many parents can identify, just all those feelings and trying to make it work and trying to do what everybody’s saying you need to do. And oh my gosh, it’s just so intense. And then with your health pieces too. So yeah, just feeling all the feels of that experience for sure.
PAM: I was just going to say, so many feels. And I resonated with a few spots that were very similar. Like trying to work with the school, going in with the reports and trying to create this environment in which they’ll thrive and it just not being something that they’re able to do within the constraints that they are living with.
But that moment, I was actually writing about that recently. The moment when you realize all of a sudden, that there really are other options than this, this one thing. You were working so hard with the school and trying to make it at that welcoming and wonderful place. And then the bright side of a lockdown, I guess. But I think it’s kind of the baby steps too.
And I think for me, it was really helpful when we decided to ask the kids if they wanted to stay home, that it wasn’t like, okay, this is our decision that we’re doing forever. We’re going to try it out and see because when you give it that opportunity, oh my gosh. Like your description of how he was shining when he had the opportunity to just be at home and do those things. That is amazing. And that was your insight and moment to be like, okay, I need to make this work somehow.
So it was just fascinating. Thank you for sharing. It’s okay that it was long!
ERIKA: It’s just such a beautiful story. And you can really feel all of the, there’s so many elements to it. And I think for everyone who goes on this journey, there are so many contributing factors. So you’re feeling all the context of what’s going on for you, and then for your partner as well. And then for your child, everyone, all these different people with different needs. And then those relentless outside messages saying, it’s you. Don’t get involved in this, that’s such a pressure on parents.
MELISSA: Yeah, I hear that so much as well, in my community. People that are considering it and they’re like, but everyone says that if I remove my child from the system, where’s all the support going to be? They need an SLT, they need an OT, they need a behavioral person. And it’s like, actually, once you remove them from this environment, so many of those needs drop away.
PAM: Actually that is a wonderful lead into our next question. You mentioned this before the call, but your whole description just brings it to life, how valuable unschooling as a lifestyle can be for neurodivergent kids. So, I was hoping you would dive into that a little bit more.
MELISSA: Okay. Be careful with a little bit more. This is my soapbox.
ANNA: We’re here for it.
MELISSA: Yeah, I’m just so passionate about parents of neurodivergent kids understanding that unschooling is not just a valid, legitimate option, but it may very well be like a life-changing one for their family and for the trajectory of their children’s lives. Because I think that what they are able to gain at home, in a supportive environment, assuming that you can provide them with a supportive environment, is, I can’t put into words, and this is rare for me, how much that can turn around can be. I think about the potential life story of our kids, because my son was at school for one year and there were lockdowns during that time, and there were school holidays, and all of these things, vacations, whatever you guys call it, and he left there, telling us that he was stupid, and that he was worthless.
And he’d got all these messages from there. He hadn’t been told that by anyone, he had internalized all of that stuff. And he had really deeply internalized it. And it’s just because it wasn’t the right environment for him. Even though he had this paperwork telling him he was a gifted learner, he has an extremely asynchronous, really spiky profile.
So, he’s 97th percentile for some things, or 98th, and then 4th percentile for something else. And so all that was amplified at school was those 20 percentiles and the 4 percentiles, and none of the 97th or 98th genius were the things that were focused on. And all we do is celebrate the stuff that they’re good at. Our life’s work is to help them to learn how to regulate and to celebrate all the good things that they bring. And autistic people, which now he’s diagnosed, I’m diagnosed, and our daughter is yet to be diagnosed, have like a really increased risk of very, very poor mental health and a really high suicide rate and so on.
And for me, that is my bottom line is that I want my kids to be mentally well. And if they don’t have mental wellness, to have supports for that, and to be able to learn how to regulate themselves and keep themselves safe. And that is the most essential thing, I think.
And with neurodivergent kids who are in school, even the ones that are doing okay, there’s so much around just the sensory overload and the amount of capacity that they are using in a day just to get to the baseline that other kids start the day at, or spend the day at. The amount of executive function that they, you know, it was said we have no executive function, but actually, we’ve just used it all up, because our brain needs to utilize it just to do all the things that come naturally to other people. So, it’s not that we don’t have any, it’s just that we use it really, really quickly.
And when a person’s central nervous system is in fight or flight all the time, it’s hard for them to thrive in any way, let alone do the bare basics of learning. I think that at school, just simply the sensory overload, even for being in a room of 10 kids. Now I’m not going to put my kid in a room of 10 kids without knowing what we’re going to need to do in advance. We’re going to accommodate in this way. And afterwards, we’re going to have a buffer of one to two days, depending on whether he knew the kids or not, and whether it was extra loud or what they were doing.
I can calculate all of this into my dysregulation maths and be like, okay, this is what we need to place around this so that the rest of our week goes bearably. There’s no control over any of that in school, and just the amount of overstimulation and sensory overload, now that I know that I’m autistic, and I can look at how as an adult I function in certain ways, I can unpick and unpack all of that and just be like, wow, all of these aspects are so, so challenging for our kids. And then they’re there trying to learn? It just seems completely unrealistic, you know. They can’t learn when they’re in complete fight or flight.
I actually had an example with T?mana. They have parent-child interviews, I assume they do that all around the world where you go and you talk about the kids’ learning goals and what they’re doing well at and what they need to work on and so on. And we had one of those when T?mana, it wasn’t long before we finished, and we went in and you’re sitting on the little five-year-old tables with the little seats, and we’re all sitting around with our adult knees up. And there’s the teacher and my wife and I and T?mana, and T?mana was doing well.
But he’s ADHD as well as autistic. And so he was on his knees on the chair, on his elbows, and then his feet, doing all the things that a five-and-a-half-year-old does when they’re sitting in a boring meeting. And I was trying to focus and I was probably trying to people please and over-stressed about trying to convince her that yes, we’re supportive of that, but what about all these other things we want you to be doing? I was trying and feeling like such a pain in the butt parent because I was constantly riding them. And I was starting to get a bit stressed because he just wouldn’t sit still.
And I said, you know, T?mana, we’re just, you know, a few more minutes and then we’ll be ready to go. Like, just try and put your butt on the chair kind of thing. And the teacher looked at him and she said, oh, she said, we never have this. He never does this at school. And my wife and I just looked at each other in disbelief. And we’re like, really? And she’s like, no, no. I mean, you know, sometimes they lie on the floor because they’re allowed to do work lying down and stuff. But he doesn’t do this.
And we left that meeting and for all of the things that got said and discussed and stuff, the thing that my wife and I were just absolutely flabbergasted by was he doesn’t do that at school. Like, I don’t think that kid’s ever sat on a chair unless it’s like an ice cream or something in front of him. He didn’t eat ice cream for sensory issues until he was like six anyway. But, you know, unless it was something that he was hyper focused on.
And we just went, how can he have any creative flow if he is controlling his body so tightly in order to do what he thinks he needs to be doing? How can he excel? And we went, how can he do the bare minimum when you’re putting that much bodily muscle, let alone thought, et cetera, into controlling your whole self? We were just like, there’s just no way.
And that really stuck with me. So, I think that neurodivergent kids who are at home can have environments where they can learn. And that’s probably the key thing. You know, they can regulate. They can learn. They can socialize in ways that suit them. And they can just, they can just blossom because it can be so individualized. Yeah.
ANNA: It’s so interesting. That chair piece really sticks with me, too, because look at how hard he was trying to fit into that environment. And they’re saying he’s not doing this. He’s not doing that. All they’re seeing are the deficits and trying to fix these deficits, but missing the fact that, my gosh, he’s trying with everything that he has, you know, to fit into this environment he’s been put in. And I think all that’s missed. I think that is very, very powerful. =
MELISSA: And there was another day as well where he was more unmasked, shall we say, where we’d had to go to the city for a medical appointment for me, like a checkup, and the teachers didn’t know. And they rang us, the principal rang us and said that he had a substitute teacher, so that was yet another change in his routine. And he was on the table doing a strip show and had got down to his underwear.
And the principal was like, they were used to him running away, but she’s like, I’ve never seen him like this. And we were like, he’s probably quite dysregulated because, well, we didn’t even use the word dysregulated, but we said he’s probably really worried or anxious because we’re doing this. But yeah, these are the things that he was trying to keep down, and that day he couldn’t.
ERIKA: Yeah. My family is neurodivergent as well. And when I think back on just how overstimulating the school environment was for me as a child. The memories that I have of being a young child in school are all the people. I remember what they were all doing, and I was worried because if you do too much, you get in trouble.
There’s so much coming at you being in this room full of children all doing different things. And so to expect someone who’s paying attention to it at all to be able to then somehow tune in to what they’re supposed to be listening to and supposed to be doing. And then if you don’t do that, then you’re getting in trouble. It’s such an intense environment.
And I don’t think that a lot of adults recognize that or remember how it was. But when my son was very young, I was trying to picture him in that type of environment and how aware he was of what all the children were doing. And I was like, it’s just going to be too much for him.
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah. I remember when T?mana was at preschool and then one day he was inside and he was building with blocks. And his teacher said to me, oh, we were having a conversation, like an adult conversation, nothing bad, but they were talking about different countries they’d visited or something.
And they were sitting adjacent to him. But it was a day where there were other multiple children moving and talking and playing and stuff. And she said he was just sitting there doing his blocks and maybe with another kid as well. His cousin was there or something. And then he just started feeding into our conversation. And he’d fully been following it and he knew a whole lot of facts about one of the countries or something.
And she was just like, oh, kids aren’t normally that tuned into an adult conversation. We couldn’t talk about and we can’t talk about anything in our house. And we couldn’t from the time he was a baby, because he would come in and he just knew. He just was super hyper vigilant and aware and all of those things.
The other thing I think that makes it really hard for lots of our neurodivergent kids is T?mana does his learning by asking a lot of questions and info dumping. Those are his communication styles. And there’s no capacity for a teacher to deal with that.
I said to him the other day, he was asking about being at school and whether he might try to go back at some point. And I was like, yeah, one thing I noticed though about you, T?mana, is you like to ask a lot of questions. Do you know that when you’re in school, if there’s like maybe 15, 20, 25 kids in a class, what happens if every kid wants to ask one question at the start of a session? And he’s like, well, that wouldn’t work. And I was like, so how many questions do you reckon you’d get to ask a day? And he’s like, oh, never mind. Our kids learn in different ways and it just doesn’t work at school.
PAM: I do remember a very similar story. I was told by the teacher or the principal. Anyway, I guess my eldest was in class and the principal had come by to look in and could see that he was fiddling with stuff in his desk and playing, et cetera, et cetera.
So the principal called him out and started quizzing him and how he was supposed to be paying attention. And he answered every question about what the teacher was talking about. And yeah, it was probably the principal who told me this story because I talked to the principal a lot.
And he was just flabbergasted that he could know and understand what was going on all around him, even though he looked like he was doing something completely different. So yeah, the environment is just not a place where they can shine. And the other piece that bubbled up while you were talking, Melissa, is so often I think we can worry or wonder, could we even bring our child home to homeschool, unschool, et cetera? The child that we see in that environment and the challenges they’re having, oh, if they come home, I’m just going to have to deal with all those challenges. But no, it is such a different environment.
MELISSA: Yeah, I see that again and again.
PAM: Yeah, completely different child, right?
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I mean, we still get meltdowns and we still get dysregulation and stuff. But I think the thing as well that we’ve been talking about in the group a lot lately is there’s this spaciousness. There’s this time. And I did a member feature with one of our people yesterday, and she’s only been unschooling since the Unschooling Summit. So she did that and then she started unschooling.
And she was just talking about how, in her family in particular, so her kids are six and two, and just how long everything’s taking to come to reading or come to dressing themselves or what the different things are. And I said, I think that is the thing with our neurodivergent kids is that everything does can take longer.
I spend a lot of time in my family with my wife saying, it’s okay, it’s just not yet. We can have that experience with our kids later. It’s not the time yet that it would actually be beneficial for them or that they would enjoy it or that it would go the way you think it might or you wish it would.
And we do need to face that with some of our neurodivergent kids that, for some of them, they are disabled in some ways and that things are going to take longer for them to get to certain ways of doing things or being able to regulate themselves or helping you within that space and that time. And we can just kind of lean into the season being longer and that they may not sleep any better than they did when they were babies until they’re 10 and that we have this kind of spaciousness that we can give them time.
We talked the other day, I think maybe it was with one of the Sunday Sessions, I’m not sure, or a Zoom I did recently. We talked about surrender and that surrendering is just such an important part of being a parent and particularly with some of this process. Yeah, that all of those kinds of aspects are really important because things might take longer and we don’t need to rush things.
And I think it was something that I think it was a quote I wrote down from you, Pam, once you guys were doing a talk and you were saying that unschooling learning is internalized and not memorized or something along those lines. And it’s like, yeah, we don’t want our kids to learn stuff by rote because they have to, whether it’s about the need to wash themselves or mathematics or whatever it is. We need them to come to that slowly in this expanding and contraction of their capacity and of their growth and a thing so that it’s really rooted in all aspects of themselves and their learning about themselves and so on. And we have the time for that. It can be hard as parents.
ANNA: We also have neurodiversity here as well. And I think what time allowed what was to see the gifts. I think when you’re in that tightened timeline thinking we have to hit this milestone, we have to do this thing. There’s just only the deficit focus. That’s why it happens that way at school.
But I think unschooling really gives us that chance to see all the gifts. And so those timelines really have no value or meaning, because it’s just we get there when we get there. But oh, my gosh, there’s so much beauty along the way that it doesn’t feel like we’re missing anything. So I really love that.
I’m going to change gears just a tiny bit for this next question, kind of bringing it back to us as parents. I recently had a little aha moment myself about capacity and understanding if I’m operating within my capacity, I’m able to hold things more lightly, and I’m able to be present and not have not take things so personally, not kind of crash and burn when things go awry.
And I mean, it seems really obvious when I say it out loud. But there was just an aha moment for me, because I think I do push beyond my capacity a lot. And I’m like, oh, okay, I need to be aware of this because it’s impacting the way I’m showing up and the way that I want to show up.
And so I know that you talk a lot about the importance of building capacity for ourselves. And so, I would just love to hear more about your experience with that, ideas you have around that, and just what your journey has been around that piece.
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah.
I mean, I think especially for me, because it came into it in quite a deficit place, I didn’t have a lot of personal capacity. And now I know that as well as being a kind of PTSD, I was probably in autistic burnout from, I mean, my goodness, just being in a heart ward five weeks is kind of rather stimulating, because people are dying around you and you’re having CPR and stuff. So, I came into this whole season, pretty depleted.
And I really needed to be the one that was building my own capacity. And also, once we were about three or four months in, and things were starting to go quite fine and quite lovely. And we’d kind of done nothing schooling wise.
And then we started to try and do some arts and crafts with our daughter. And so that our son was starting to sniff around that and we were starting to just kind of gently ease into doing things and doing a few more trips out and so on as his capacity grew. And then my wife had a massive medical situation as well, and had to have massive surgery and nearly died as well.
So massive PTSD for the kids, bringing all that up again, and for me, and it was really rough. And so, capacity in our family has been super, super limited. And my wife now lives with an ongoing medical condition. I have to have a lot of capacity. And now I’m also running a business. And so, I’m trying to unschool and I do most of the outings for our family and try to run Weave and the Summit as well.
So, there’s a lot to be said for the pressures that are around you and kind of rising to the occasion, but that can only go on for so long. And so for me, what I did was I tried lots of different modalities to support myself and things like EMDR. And I think that dealing with your past trauma and your past history and so on is a really important thing to do. So I did a whole lot of work for me on this more recent trauma with EMDR and EFT tapping and different things to help my nervous system. And we see a chiropractor and so on. And all of those things are to support our central nervous system. But then I started doing breath work.
And for me, as an autistic ADHD person, meditation was very difficult for me to grasp. But breath work, which really, and it’s not like the Wim Hof style, it’s a polyvagal central nervous system relaxing breath work and it really is just breathing and you might hold like a yoga pose of some kind. But yeah, that has been very, very supportive for me in terms of my capacity. And so, I do lots of online programs where I’m doing breath work with other mostly mums. And that I’ve found has been extremely helpful for my capacity.
And then when I started doing Weave, which is the community that I have, I noticed that so many of us were coming in crisis and that we were discovering that we had neurodivergent kids. Most of us didn’t know that we had neurodivergent kids until they burnt out in school. So the kids were in school refusal. They were coming home because there was no other option. And we were then realizing that we needed to unschool, not just homeschool. And unschooling, you guys all know this, but I think it’s a lot harder than homeschooling. There’s no curriculum.
You can’t just lock them in a curriculum and be like, do that, tick the boxes, red pen out. I don’t know if people use red pens, but you know. And that’s your schoolwork done for the day.
Unschooling is very, very intensive on parents because we actually all really want it to work. And we have all of this weight on ourselves to begin with, especially of like, we are holding this and we are taking this new path and it is on us. And lots of the people that I know don’t have fully supportive, committed partners to the process.
It’s like, okay, if that’s what you want to do, you’re responsible for the reading and the carrying out and the kind of reporting back to me if it’s working or soothing the other partner’s fears.
And you’re going to be holding a whole lot. Often the families that I work with, just like us, are arriving into unschooling in a state of crisis. We’re not starting out in a nice, we’ve made a philosophical decision to unschool and we’ve known that since our children were small and we kind of ease our way into it. We just drop in, trial by fire. It’s all happening at once. And you’ve also got kids that are burnt out and in school refusal and you are at the scraping the barrel levels of your own capacity.
And you’ve got a kid at home who is there 24 hours a day. Lots of our kids don’t sleep. We really, really need to build our capacity. It’s just essential. And also a lot of us are starting to realize in the process of having our kids diagnosed that we are neurodivergent too. And I think if we don’t build our capacity as neurodivergent parents of neurodivergent kids, if that’s your picture, then it’s going to be very difficult. It’s going to be very, very difficult to survive, let alone thrive, you know?
And so I think that we need to get to a point where we can survive and then we need to be working towards thriving. And what I’ve done is I’ve tried out lots of different modalities because everything’s going to be different for what works for different people and what works for different seasons.
And I think for those of us that are unschooling, you have to have things that you can do in these little pockets of time that you have. And you need to find ways to kind of fill your bucket or your whatever you want to call it, your basket, in these tiny moments. And so for me, it’s things like purposely going and finding glimmers and noticing the moment that I take a sip of hot tea because it might be the only one that’s hot. We kind of talk about having a hot cup of tea is like, ahh! but the reality is maybe only you get the first few sips. Make sure you enjoy them, notice it, feel into that. Bank all of these small moments, so that when you do need to dig deep, because there will be multiple times probably through every day where you need to be holding something external from yourself, that you have some capacity.
So, we use havening. I have a havening practitioner that comes into Weave and we do this, we do, that sounds really silly, we do this. Havening is like a whole movement that’s kind of continuing on from EFT, and it’s very good at bringing the nervous system back into alignment. And as an autistic ADHD person, havening practices are very accessible.
Finding a moment to breathe is often very, very inaccessible. So I find that things for me that are very physical, like feeling my toes as opposed to trying to do something like a 10 minute meditation. If my son is trying to get on the roof and I’m the person responsible for him not getting on the roof during a meltdown, I can do some havening or feel my toes. And I don’t have the time for anything else.
So I think that really focusing on spending some time every day, doing one minute of havening to get that muscle memory in your body so that when you need it, you can grab it. And I find that the more that I put in these small practices, these small accessible practices, the more that I am able to have the capacity to feel like there is a well of all that I’m connected to and the earth and all, everything that I’m trying to hold, because otherwise I’m constantly in my head or beyond it. And I don’t feel in my body a lot. So I have to be very determined that I need to have these practices in my life because it’s very easy to let them go.
And ADHD, I love something and then I forget about it. I need to kind of keep coming back to things.
ERIKA: That’s very relatable. I love the idea of practicing them over and over so that they almost come as second nature when you’re in the more difficult moments.
Yeah. I really love that.
MELISSA: It’s like anchoring.
ERIKA: And I was just thinking in some moments when we’re at low capacity, I’ve noticed a pattern of like, we tend to want to add even more things or notice even more things that are missing.
And so, for me, that’s one of the things I noticed. When I’m having a hard time things in my mind get worse and more intense rather than me trying to drop things. And so, I think that the physical practices would help a lot with just kind of coming back to center, but then also just remembering to let things go that I don’t need to deal with in this moment. Because there’s always plenty to deal with in that present moment.
MELISSA: Yeah. And I think for me and for lots of people, the overwhelm cripples you. And this is a small thing I can do to start to move.
PAM: That was one of the big things that bubbled up for me too, how valuable it can be to make it almost second nature by practicing, giving ourselves a space in those less overwhelming moments so that we have it in our back pocket. Because it’s so easy to freeze and just forget all the tools that we have when we are in a challenging moment, so keeping them top of mind rather than saying, oh things are going well, I don’t need these tools right now. Then we don’t have access to them when we need them.
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah, we do havening once a month and during that time of practice it’s, oh I come out of there feeling like light as a feather. But what I was finding was that when I was feeling my dysregulation rising in a moment with my child when I needed to stay calm because their dysregulation was rising or going off, I wouldn’t remember to do it. And so yeah, so we did a thing in the group where we did one minute of havening every morning for 14 days and we all knew we could access one minute and now it’s second nature. So yeah, anchoring in and finding things that are accessible that actually work for us and for other people it might be like a different move or it might be tapping or something, but yeah, finding some, just some little thing that works for you. And for some people it is breathing and things, but for me it’s not always the easiest thing. It feels very forced to control my breath.
ERIKA: Right, yeah, I love that people are different so you have to find what works for you. So I just wanted to see if you wanted to share anything additional. Your group sounds amazing, Weave ND, and just your experience of creating that group and weaving unschooling together with running your businesses.
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah. Weave came about, when we were in that very stuck season when my wife Doria was very unwell as well and we were unschooling and I jumped into a really fantastic online community for unschoolers and we had these Zooms and they were fantastic, but what I was finding was that it made me feel a little more isolated some of them, because if we were talking about socializing of our kids or events or things, the advice that everyone else was sharing on the experiences was so different from ours because my son was not able to engage in those things. And so I ended up asking if I could run a Zoom for neurodivergent parents just to connect and talk within this other group.
And we had wonderful conversations and we started doing that monthly and for about two hours we’d have these meandering conversations that people could come in and get warmed up and then spill and not record it and so on. And then that group decided that they weren’t going to run as a community anymore and went off and did different things. And so I decided and they encouraged me to take it into Facebook and so I did that and then I ran that for two years from the time that I was doing it within the group to deciding that I needed to have employment and my wife couldn’t work.
And so the group, I was saying I was either going to have to close it down or start charging and so we moved into a paid membership community. And yeah, it’s fantastic and it’s a way that I can be at home with my kids and I run it mostly from home. I’m in a hired motel today for the internet.
I use the local motel to have fast speed internet because I’ve ended up doing things like the unschooling summit and I needed to be able to interview people and stuff that the internet wasn’t going to lag and the children weren’t going to come in with chickens and interrupt if I was interviewing some famous person like Pam Laricchia or whoever it was.
But yeah, it’s been an amazing journey and with that journey I worked out that instead of just coming together and talking about our woes, which was a lot of what we were doing but that was becoming quite heavy, was that the key thing that I needed to focus on was this capacity building, because it was the piece that we were all really struggling with and I think also the kind of compassion part. A lot of us are not very good at being compassionate to ourselves in a very difficult circumstance that we’re living in at points of our journey. It can be really difficult and very isolated and so finding ways for us to like connect and be compassionate and then kind of build this capacity was so important.
And so, part of that was that I spoke to Esther Jones about coming in and doing a mindfulness session for us and that just blossomed into a really amazing relationship which has been really cool and we decided to start working together more last September and then one of us just in one of the first emails we had backwards and forwards because she’d been in my community and been doing like you know mindfulness and so on but one of us said and I can’t remember which one of us it was, was like maybe we should do a summit. That would be cool.
And so I was really passionate about more people hearing about unschooling with the neurodivergent flavor and she’s of course, an amazing unschooling person, figure and so we thought we might do like a one or two day summit and maybe invite sort of five or six speakers, weren’t sure, eight maybe and maybe a thousand people might come if we were lucky and we kind of both went nuts, hard out.
She’s in the UK, I’m in New Zealand so one of us would be waking up full of enthusiasm and vim and vigor and the other person would be suggestible and tired and would agree to anything and so it just was this magic equation of alchemy of,I’ve had this idea overnight and I think we should this and the other one would be like okay look if you’re going to take care of that part it sounds fine with me go for it, invite them or do this or whatever.
So I think it honestly was the fact that one of us would be fresh fueled up and one of us would be working on fumes and so we just kind of kept going but yeah it ended up amazing and it was such a joy for us to work together and to create the Summit. So that’s been pretty special and it has had a really strong neurodivergent flavor. It’s been really supportive for our ND families because so many of them are unschooling but yeah really, really broad, interesting thing to work on. So, that’s been pretty special.
ANNA: And so it will be happening again in the coming year? What are the plans?
MELISSA: Yeah, we’re working on it now so we’re doing early morning or late night Zooms again. It’ll be happening in the last weeks of March. I can’t think of a date right now so yeah of next year, same thing three days all for free online and lots of amazing speakers. I’m sure you guys will get invited to be on panels and speak and so on so yeah we’ve got some different ideas this year, ways of doing things.
So, yeah, we’re really keen to have like the diversity of unschoolers reflected which was one of our key things last year and I really loved that people were brave enough to say yes to these two people that well they certainly didn’t know me, they do now but yeah, it’s been pretty amazing and really lovely for my community as well because I’ve had some wonderful people come in and speak within the community now that I know more people and I don’t need to be so shy to ask people to come in and talk and so on.
PAM: I really enjoy participating in it as well but also your piece of finding stuff that you can do for the most part within your home life. You can do it from home mostly, you can like and the people like in your community, they understand obviously the circumstances of your family life as well, so you can have chickens come in and kids.
MELISSA: Yeah, exactly and like yeah, I think that is something I did want to talk about, it’s encouraging people to be entrepreneurial. I think unschoolers often are very entrepreneurial, it’s a very common kind of thing and partly it’s probably out of desperation because we need to make money and get creative about how we’re going to do it. But there is that real spark of not needing to live by the rules and not needing to do things the same way and not wanting to work for a boss and so on. And I do most of my stuff from the kitchen bench or a chair in my bedroom and the kids come in and out and I do have a caravan in the garden but it’s not any less kid infested.
So, I come here to do the recordings because of the internet quality but you can do these things from the kitchen bench with your kid across from you and needing to get up and make snacks and it all just happens and when you find the thing that you’re passionate about, just like our kids, you can just focus on that and they can see.
My son is so invested, drives him nuts, he doesn’t want me on the laptop and he gets very dysregulated part of the time as well but he’s so proud. And anywhere we go out, he’s like, oh yeah, my mama has an online business and she does this summit and she does that and so he tells everyone, oh we’re unschoolers and my mum is an advocate.
And our kids seeing us do something and seeing us mess it up or fail or have a bad day or send the wrong email or whatever. It’s all such vital learning and that was something I think I got from your podcast as well, Pam, I binged yours, and Esther’s, Stark Raving Dad, I was in that really stuck season where my wife was very unwell and my child was in crisis and was having constant meltdowns and stuff because of like the PTSD and we were getting the autism diagnosis and stuff, I just went, I need to work on me. I need to feel like I’m not stuck so I’m just going to educate myself in every way, shape and form about unschooling and then about neurodivergence and the crossover.
And hearing all of your different interviews with different people and all of the different ways that unschooling has gone but part of it for me because I’ve been an entrepreneur in the past was you talking about, you know, you get to actually indulge in your interests as an unschooler because you kind of have to because you need to model that for your kids and you need to not go crazy and I heard stories over and over of people saying, I just do my thing and my kids are around. And that was really motivational for me. It was like, yeah, I could just do my thing and the kids could be around.
It’s hard, and I’m often working till 11 or later at night. With the Summit, we’re up till 1 many, many times and you just fit it in around and you’re really tired and you have bloodshot eyes and you have bags under your eyes but it is possible. I hear other people say, oh no, you need to dedicate at least one day out a week where you go and you do this and whatever and it’s like sometimes it’s just not the reality and if you’re going to wait for that, you’ll never start these things. You’ve just got to dive in, just like we tell our kids, I suppose, if we sit around waiting until everything’s perfect, we’re never gonna get anywhere.
ANNA: That conventional wisdom, right? If you’re going to do a business, you do x, y, z, do the checkbox, but really there are so many ways. And if we can make it fit for our life, that keeps our enthusiasm going, that makes it work for our families and we’re much more likely to then be successful at it. So, yeah, I think that’s always a great reminder.
MELISSA: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, it’s definitely a juggling act and I have to be careful not to burn out because of my autistic hyperfocus but, I love that.
PAM: Yeah.I think that piece that you mentioned is just beautiful. Because then you’re thinking about being an entrepreneur and you go and you start looking and you want to learn and it is so much about, do x, y, z, and make sure you tell everybody that when your door is closed, you don’t interrupt me. All these “tips” for working from home, etc.
But what we learn through unschooling, is that we can question conventions, right? So, we can do things differently and not just for the sake of it, but because it works better. It actually works better for us. It keeps our relationships. It keeps our connections.
Yes, we’re up and down and doing this thing and that thing. And maybe it feels like juggling a few things. But you know what? Even the challenge of juggling a few things, in my experience, for my brain, just works better than trying to spend all my energy to get those two hours alone to focus. Even now, when my kids are adults, it’s just how my brain works. And valuing that over trying to make myself conform.
And then your children seeing you do it, even my adult children seeing me play around and doing this thing and trying this thing, etc. It’s just our lives all weaving together, which just feels so much better than trying to put boundaries and separations between it all.
MELISSA: And my kid’s really invested. He comes in and he checks my phone, because when payments come through, it’s updated to my bank on my app. And so he’s like, monitoring there. And he’s like, now I’ve heard this thing on a podcast, where there’s this thing that you can get, this piece of tech. He comes in and he tries to advise and he’s really invested.
And I love that. He’s thinking about it. He’s won a Lego competition recently, because Lego is his special interest. And he’s phenomenal at it. And it was with a real estate agent. So, now he’s engaged his own real estate agent. And so, he keeps telling people, do you know many 10-year-olds with a real estate agent? He hasn’t earned a dime yet, but he’s like, when I make my millions on these particular business plans, because he’s going to be an entrepreneur, then he’s going to have her looking for a piece of land in advance. And it’s just, I don’t know, I love that he has really big dreams. And because he can see me starting something from scratch and growing a thing, he’s learning all of that stuff. And he’s really invested.
And my daughter as well, but she’s more independent whereas he’s more up in my business. She’s out in the garden and doing her own thing. Yeah.
ERIKA: So I just love all the space. Everyone can be doing the things that work so well for them. And we’re all figuring it out. I feel like that’s something so valuable about the unschooling journey is just like, we are all getting to figure out what works well for us and getting to follow our interests. And it’s just a lot of fun.
So, this has been so much fun, Melissa, thank you so much for joining us. We hope that you all enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an aha moment or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network.
It’s an amazing group of people having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. And you can also check out our new substack at whenschoolisn’tworking.substack.com. And the Network is at at the top of the page at livingjoyfully.ca. So thank you so much for listening. And we will see you next time.
PAM: Thanks so much, Melissa! We’ll have all your links there in the show notes as well. Bye!
EU393: Foundations: Every Moment is a Choice
Oct 23, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Every Moment is a Choice.
It’s common in our culture to look at our lives in terms of “have-tos,” but staying in that space takes away our agency and our joy. By getting curious about our have-tos, we can figure out what is really important to us and play with ways to make the things we do more enjoyable. And in difficult moments, when it really feels like terrible things are happening to us, we still have the choice of how to respond, what story we tell about our situation, and what energy we bring to it. Realizing how much choice we have can be so empowering!
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
Do you find yourself saying “I have to” a lot? Can you find any patterns around when you see it happening more frequently?
How does it feel to think about having choices in each moment?
What helps you find your center when moving through a challenge?
What choices do you see around the stories you are currently telling about your life?
TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hi, and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast! We’re happy you’re here and interested in exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
In today’s episode, we’re going to talk about choice. I love talking about and grounding ourselves in choice, because life is filled with choices from the mundane to the epic. And for the most part, it’s an invisible process. We’re making decisions on the fly throughout the day. Other decisions are made with a lot of deliberation and forethought and take a lot of time, but the ability to choose is something that empowers us. The knowledge that, no matter what, we have a choice.
PAM: Right, and that is so surprisingly easy to forget in the moment. I can find myself moving through parts of my day almost by rote, and sometimes that means I’m in the flow of things, feeling good and accomplishing things I want and choose to do. And other times things start to rub.
When I start hearing myself say, “Oh, I have to do this,” that feeling that I don’t have a choice is a good clue that I’m probably feeling a bit overstretched or under-resourced, and it’s a great clue to step back, take a breath, and just take a moment to look around a bit.
It’s so easy to fall into the “I have to” trap, because it is used so much in our culture. The phrase “I have to,” or, “You have to,” has become so commonplace that we’ve mostly stopped questioning it altogether. It just seeps into our everyday language. We say we have to go to the store, we have to brush our teeth, we have to go to bed, and so many more things. And soon, we start to believe that we have to do all the things, that we don’t have a choice, that we are, in fact, prisoners to a long list of have to’s.
And not only that, when we come to feel that we don’t have choices and buy into this whole “have to” ethos, it’s usually not long before we start to feel pulled to impose them on others. “This has to be done and you have to help,” which then can lead to judging others around the things we think they have to do. Like, “Why aren’t they doing this thing I don’t want to do, but have to do?” It is so disempowering and disconnecting.
So, taking a moment to look at a situation, any situation, even small everyday ones, and noticing that choices actually exist helps us let go of that overwhelming feeling of being trapped in our days. It reminds us that we have agency. We can use phrases like, “I have to,” or, “You have to,” as red flags, signs that it’s a good time to step back and see where we’re feeling pinched, where we’re feeling controlled, because definitely those things can sneak up on us bit by bit.
And then, we can dig deeper to identify our underlying needs, find the choices in the soil of the have to’s and shift things up to meet our needs in ways that don’t include controlling others or even using control tactics on ourselves. Realizing that I always have choices has been such a freeing and empowering mindset shift for me. It’s just been amazing.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. For me, too. It’s been such a critical part. The shift from feeling like life is happening to me, to understanding my agency and navigating this thing called life. It’s funny, I have a good friend whose husband does not buy into this idea at all. So, he believes, “There aren’t always choices, Anna,” but I find it so interesting.
And one of the examples he used was, “Well, we have to do the animal chores in the morning.” So, they have a small farm, donkeys, goats, chickens. And here’s the thing. They don’t have to do that. They could choose to re-home the animals. They could skip the morning chores or do them later. I know the lap of luxury these animals live in and they would be just fine. They could also hire someone to do the chores for them.
There’s always a choice and with each choice, we hone in on our priorities. They don’t want to re-home the animals. They love them. They love bringing the special treats in the morning and moving the donkeys to the track to watch them play and run. They don’t have to do those things. They want to. And maybe they decide it’s not worth the money to pay someone else, or in that choice, they realize that they actually enjoy it and might miss it and don’t want someone else doing it for them.
And so, then it’s like, okay, so if we’re feeling pinched about time, in that exploration, they might find they’d rather free up time in another way, adjusting something they don’t enjoy as much. What a different feeling than to feel we’re held hostage by an obligation. And maybe it’s just semantics and energy, but I really think it’s worth examining our language about any of these have to’s and deciding if that language is serving us.
Is it helping us find joy? Is it helping us enjoy the things around us? Could examining it as a choice help us understand what we actually want to do and how we want to spend our time and resources?
PAM: Yes. I think what can happen over time is that we make a choice and then it’s new and exciting.
We relish it. It’s fun. And then, over time, we shortcut our language down to, “I have to.”
For me, it feels like as the activity becomes more commonplace in my days, “Every morning I’ve got to go take care of the animals,” my internal language becomes more efficient. “I have to take out the animals, I have to take the dogs out,” all the all the things. “I have to go grocery shopping, I have to clean the bathrooms.”
And I think the word obligation is a great way to describe that feeling and the growing weight of it. And I think we can naturally start to resist that obligation and maybe even start to resent it. So, if our internal “have to” language doesn’t catch our attention, eventually that growing weight of obligation or resentment definitely might. So, time to dig in and see what’s in there. What’s the rub?
And what’s so interesting is so often digging in helped me remember my why. So, you had that wonderful example about the animals. I’m going to take a quick moment to look at cleaning bathrooms, because it is a very basic example. But to give you an idea of ways to dig into those festering feelings.
So, I can remind myself that I enjoy the feeling of walking into a clean bathroom. If I realize that’s even feeling a bit stale for me, I can start there. So, maybe I choose to spruce up the bathroom a bit, bringing in a plant or two, or some art for the walls. Maybe I print out an inspirational quote or two that makes me smile, or a couple of pictures that make me laugh and I tape them to the mirror. How can I more enjoy walking into this mostly utilitarian room?
I find that is such a fun way to look at things. It’s like, cleaning the bathroom, what do you mean decorating it or whatever? But that is a wonderful aspect to look at, too.
I can also contemplate the cleaning schedule that I’m holding myself to. There are no bathroom police that are going to come and arrest me if I don’t stick to it. So, what if I change that up, extending the period between deep cleans? How does that feel? I can try it out and see. That’s something you can always play with and is likely to change over time, depending as the number of people rise and fall.
So, just because we’ve done it weekly for years doesn’t mean it has to be weekly forever more. That frequency may well change over the seasons of our lives.
And we can look at the how. How can I make it easier for me to slip into cleaning? Can I keep the cleaning supplies in the bathroom ready to grab quickly? That may mean having more supplies up front, but they each last longer, because they’re only being used in one bathroom. So, it works itself out. Can I make the process itself more enjoyable? I often put on my headphones and listen to podcasts or sometimes upbeat music to help my body get moving. Or we could also choose to pay for cleaning service if that’s an option. There are just so many possibilities.
So, after taking some time to dig in and discover what’s really rubbing for me, so often, I still do the thing. I clean the bathrooms. But my internal language is much different now, because I remembered how much choice and agency I have. It may not be the most fun I’ll have all day, but I remember why I want to do it and I’ve made the process more pleasurable, particularly the bits of the process that were rubbing me the wrong way. My internal language is lighter. Maybe even, “I want to clean the bathrooms today,” rather than that obligatory weight of, “I have to.”
It’s so fascinating to see that we can find choice even in the most mundane bits and pieces of life.
ANNA: And just how different it feels when we do. I mean, those choices all along the way. And I think the money piece that I talked about is a really interesting way to check in. So, do I want to pay somebody to do this? Does it have that value or is it not that big of a deal? Is my time more valuable there?
It’s playing with it, asking questions that we talk so much about. It just opens up instead of getting stuck in the weight of the have to’s. So, yeah, I love that, because again, I just really think it helps us hone in on our priorities and get back to that why, like you said, and then we know, okay, I got these animals for a reason and I like having a clean bathroom and that’s why I’m doing it for me. Whatever those things are, getting back to that why.
PAM: Yeah. And I love that priority piece. That was episode number one, because that is so foundational, playing around with our priorities and the time that we’ve got, the things that we want to do. We can always bring it back there to realize that we have choices with all the things that we think are on our plate.
ANNA: Yes. And it just really changes things. But I do want to talk about times when it feels like there really is no choice, that life has happened to us. There’s a tragedy, a death, a loss of something that’s out of our control, because that’s going to happen to all of us. It’s certainly happened to me and realizing I still had the choice of how I react made all the difference in moving through those difficult events. No, I couldn’t change the fact that the job was lost or the injury happened, but I could decide how I was going to let that impact my mood, how I was feeling, and how I wanted to move through the world.
So, for me, that helped me to put things into perspective and to feel again, that life wasn’t just happening to me. I’ve had some pretty difficult things happen to me over the years. We all have, but the times I’m able to ground back into who I want to be, how I want to learn from what’s happening around me, and how I want to find joy, even in the darkest moments, those were the times that I moved through the events with the most ease. It’s not easy necessarily, but with more ease than when I was fighting and bucking against the reality of what was happening.
And, for me, gratitude was a big part of that. Finding those little spots of gratitude is a choice, and I found that I could find them even in the darkest of days. And with that choice, that first move towards looking for the tiny points of light, the shifts would start and new ways forward would present themselves.
PAM: Yes, definitely. Things happen in our lives that are out of our control. Times where we find ourselves just reacting to things. It can feel like our life has come to a standstill with this big thing. And for a time, that can definitely be helpful, because it needs immediate attention, right? Yet moving through these challenging events often takes time and staying stuck in that emergency mode can have its consequences.
So, for me, once the initial shock and overwhelm began to ease a bit, I found it helpful to gently remind myself to come back to the present whenever I noticed myself getting stuck in my head with my swirling thoughts. Because in the present, I slowly began to notice those bits and pieces of life that are happening around me. Those spots of gratitude, as you mentioned, Anna, even small ones, like how the light comes through the window, a moment of connection with my child that makes me smile. Continuing to bring myself to the present, soon I was open enough to start to see more possibilities, new ways forward that I couldn’t see when I was like stuck in tunnel vision. I began to see choices.
ANNA: Yes. And that’s what it’s all about, finding our way to just seeing the choice in the moments. And so, this leads to another area where our choices influence our perspective. And it’s an area where we often give away our powers. And it’s, we tell our own stories. We’re the creators, we’re the writers, we’re the orators of these stories of our lives.
And digging into stories is so important to us that we’re going to do an entire episode on it in a couple weeks, but I think it’s worth talking about it right now in this context of choice and seeing how it’s playing out in our days, because our stories have a way of defining us for ourselves and for others. For ourselves, they become this sort of self-talk. If that talk is negative and full of worry and distress, then we can become that. If that talk is positive and full of joy and gratitude, then we become that. We start to embody it.
For others, it colors the way they see us. They trust that our story is our truth. And if that truth is steeped in frustration and anger, then we can attract the frustrated and angry, because it’s that whole misery loved company thing. And if that truth is infused with joy and gratitude, we tend to attract the people that are looking for joy and gratitude. And I’ve found that, for me, where I put my energy is the areas that I’m growing. And so, I just want to be really aware of that. And so, again, it just boils down to this choice. How do we want to spend our energy and what do we want to attract with it?
PAM: Yeah. The stories we tell ourselves and those around us have such a big impact on us. So, I am really looking forward to diving into that idea more deeply in a couple of weeks. But it is also a great lens to consider when we’re thinking about choice, because if the story we’re telling ourselves and the people around us is that we don’t have a choice, that we have to do X, Y, Z, that’s most likely going to be the one we all run with. So often, we treat our stories as facts. “This is the situation. Now where do we go from here?” And that’s where people join us.
So, if our story is grounded in frustration and full of have to’s, that’s where they join us, often sharing their frustrations and just generally tossing around in the muck with us. Back to that misery loves company. But if our story is steeped in choice and possibilities, that’s where they’ll jump in with us. Oh, that is a big change. Best of luck with that. Have you considered this? They’re just generally more supportive and helpful. And both stories can absolutely be true to the facts. But we get to choose which one we tell ourselves and others, which one feels better to us in the moment. And that is not a trick question. Sometimes what feels better is to vent, right?
But it is absolutely helpful to remember that it’s a choice and we don’t need to stick to that version of our story forever.
ANNA: Oh my gosh, yes. We can change a story when it stops serving us. That’s another big revelation. Like, “Oh, this story I’ve been hanging onto, I can change it up.” So, lots to consider there.
So, we’re going to leave you with a few questions to ponder.
First, do you find yourself saying, “I have to,” a lot? Really listen, because actually we don’t even always notice it.
PAM: That’s so true.
ANNA: Tune in. Can you find any patterns around when you see it happening more frequently? And kind of like you talked about, Pam, it tends to be those under-resourced moments, where we kind of start clicking off the have to’s and the giant list and all the things.
How does it feel to think about having choices in each moment?
PAM: So, I think that’ll be a big one. You don’t even have to like move forward with it, but just take a moment to think, “Oh, what if I had a choice?” If you can’t see a choice yet. But it could even just be how does it feel to think about, “Oh, what if there were choices?” And that I think can be the first little baby step.
ANNA: I’m so curious how my friend’s husband’s going to think about some of this stuff, because he listens to the podcast. And so, what does it feel like to just think, but what if you did have a choice? What if you let go of that story that you don’t?
So, another thing is, what helps you find your center when you’re moving through a challenge? I think that can just be really helpful, because we’re going to keep getting challenge. So, helping people understand what helps us move through that, what helps it feel a bit more with ease, what helps us find that gratitude, whatever it is that feels good.
And lastly, what choices do you see around the stories you are currently telling about your life? Yeah, that’s going to be good. Because we’re always telling stories. If you’re sitting there listening, going, “I don’t know if I have stories,” no, you do. You have stories. And let’s look at them like, because these can be things we are carrying with us for a long time. And again, check back in a couple weeks when we really dig into stories as well.
So, just thinking about this idea of choice, I think is just interesting. Play with it. How does it feel? What feels better? How does it work? So, yeah, I think it’s going to be fun.
PAM: Yes, I think so, too. And that stories one, too. As you said, if you don’t think you’re telling stories, I think just take a pull back and instead of choices around the stories you’re telling yourself, think about, what stories am I telling myself? Just start to look through the lens of story and see how that feels. See what you see. I think it’ll be so interesting to dive into.
ANNA: Thank you so much for listening, and we will see you next time. Bye-bye.
PAM: Bye.
EU392: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: Strong Beliefs
Oct 09, 2025
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and this time, we’re talking about unschooling with strong beliefs.
Sometimes our strong beliefs can be a stumbling block along our journey when we put the belief ahead of our relationships. When those moments come up in our families, it can help to remember that our own strong beliefs work for us, for now, but that people are different. And leaving space for people to choose what works for them can strengthen our connection and build trust. Whether the strong belief is about food, spending time in nature, early bedtimes, a particular type of social interaction, or anything else, taking time to peel back the layers and examine how these beliefs affect our relationships can be so enlightening!
We really enjoyed diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello to you both.
So, today we’re going to be talking about another unschooling stumbling block, which is when parents have strong beliefs. It’s a topic that comes up a lot and I’m really excited for this conversation.
But before we begin, I wanted to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, which has been really life changing for me in so many ways. On the Network, we have amazing discussions about so many topics, since our community has such a wide variety of experiences. Everyone there is really learning and growing and being intentional with their families. It’s really unlike any other online community that I’ve found.
The Living Joyfully Network offers such powerful support, especially during those moments when questions and fears come up or if you’re new to unschooling and just need a place where people understand what you’re going through. If you’d like to learn more about the Network and check it out for yourself, you can visit livingjoyfullyshop.ca and click on the Network tab. We’ll also leave a link in the show notes and we would love to meet you there!
So, Pam, would you like to get us started about unschooling with strong beliefs?
PAM: Strong beliefs, yes. I would very much like to do that, because exploring the idea of strong beliefs has definitely inspired an important paradigm shift for me on this journey. Because, of course we can hold beliefs so strongly that it feels like a truth for us, but the big shift for me around this was recognizing that it was my truth and that didn’t mean that it was a universal truth. Because, as we may have mentioned, people are different! My kids, my partner, my friends, they aren’t me.
And yes, a strong belief I hold is something that is working well for me, right, that helps me care for myself, helps me be the person that I want to be but that strength of that belief comes from so much experience. I’ve probably tried on numerous different perspectives along the way that didn’t quite click or that maybe sent me in a direction that I eventually found I didn’t like. So, trying to wholesale drop my strong belief and all the experience that comes with it onto someone else’s lap just isn’t going to land with that depth of understanding.
And as I was thinking about it, to me, it’s really like that web of learning that I talk about. So many bits of life are connected in interesting ways and that’s what’s bringing the richness of understanding, not that one point of information or a belief that is disconnected from a person’s experience.
So, I remember thinking back when I was first playing with this paradigm shift, I just kind of stopped jumping in to share my strong belief in the moment. And it felt a bit like I was betraying myself by not sharing my hard earned knowledge with the people that I loved, earnestly trying to convince them of its validity and that it’s the one right way in the circumstances, like it makes sense.
But when I managed to put the “it makes sense to me, let’s see how things unfold here,” oh my gosh, they unfolded in such interesting ways, in ways that I could see and I look back on that moment more closely aligned with the person that they were at that time, and in ways that they learned something that stayed with them. It was a meaningful experience for them instead of me popping in with what the cumulative belief of all my meaningful experiences along the way.
So, it doesn’t mean that I’m tossing my belief, because I know it works well for me. And nor does it mean never sharing what works for me. Those are like the opposite ends of that spectrum, and at first I needed to not share so I could see well, what would happen? Would the world end? Would they choose like something that I wouldn’t choose and it was a big catastrophe? Those pieces did not happen.
So, for me, it came to me just being more careful to share my stronger beliefs without the energy of an expectation that others take it on as their truth. I want to be in that space or that mindset first before I share, where I can see it has more information that I’m sharing with them. They learn a little bit about me, because this is something that is meaningful to me and makes sense for me and so they see how I kind of see the world, how I navigate things, and they’re welcome to try it out and see if it fits for them, see if they might want to tweak it without any fear of feeling judged by me if it didn’t work for them, at least for now. It’s not that this is your one opportunity to decide or not to adopt this belief wholesale. There are going to be so many experiences now and into the future.
There are experiences now where I get to revisit my strong beliefs and see if they are still working for me and see if they’re still making sense. So each moment is just like another point in that web of learning, another piece of experience that we can bring with us and it just makes the next time something similar comes up a richer moment because we have more experience and more thoughts and stuff to draw from as we come up with the plan for this time.
ANNA: Yeah, I think the thing that stood out for me that you were just talking about is how unique our journey is to the strong belief and how it is so involved. We really don’t just kind of pop with a strong belief out of nowhere. It comes from this experience. It comes from going down a road that was maybe the opposite and realizing that doesn’t feel good. We’re taking in information. So, again, so personality-dependent. Have I done a lot of research about this? And I feel really strongly and I’ve done all these pieces. But that’s what holds it up is all of that experience that I’m bringing to that moment. So, like you said, we just really can’t hand it over to someone and think that it’s going to have the same meaning to them.
And I think the challenge becomes, too, if we’re coming at people with the strong belief and not really giving them a chance to even have a chance to figure out if it works for them and try it on. We’re coming with this judgment piece. That was the other thing you said that I thought was important. I think it can lead people to believe we’re judging them if they don’t hold the same strong belief, whether that’s our children or partner or friends. And so, that’s not where we foster understanding. That’s not where we foster connection.
Because I do have strong beliefs, 100%. I have strong beliefs. But like you said, it’s from my learning what I know about me. And I can get excited about sharing those beliefs. But just like you, I had to go through a process of like slowing some of that down, making sure there was room for conversation, understanding what’s happening with the people around me so that we could have a more rich conversation and it didn’t feel like that judgment piece was coming in.
ERIKA: I mean, it is such an interesting and rich topic. And that’s why I think it comes up a lot. Because what it can feel like is, when we’re the one with the strong belief, it can feel like, “But this is a fact. And my child is going against this fact of life that I know in my heart is so true and right and good.”
And so, that’s where you get those relationship rubs. But if we come in really believing there is only this one right way, then we can put a lot of judgment on the other person, not give them room to come up with their own answers to things. And we forget about that whole history that we have of, how did we even get to have this belief? And I know we’ve seen lots of examples, just around of people who have had a strong belief that they grew up with and then change it in adulthood. Strong beliefs, even when they’re that strong, can change.
And so, I think just remembering that and noticing that there’s not one right way. And no matter what belief you’re thinking about, whether it’s something about diet or something about a religious belief or something about the right way to do a certain thing, any belief that you can kind of think of, you can find people who are doing it another way and it’s working out okay for them. And so, I think just noticing that, remembering that, and any time I start thinking, “They should do this,” you know, “They should be like this, I figured it out and this is the way,” that’s a good clue for me to kind of pause and get a little more curious about like, okay, this is probably my strong belief and not something that I need to give to everyone else.
But I think also there could be excitement about our strong beliefs that make it hard to not try to put that on everyone else, especially if we’ve been through a long period of learning and figuring out and trying to see, like, okay, what is the best diet? And then we start eating this way and we feel great and we want to convince everyone in the world. And so that comes from a good place. But once you start to see the kind of rubs in the relationship, either with your kids or other people in your lives, I think that’s interesting. It’s just another place to do that navigating of our relationships.
PAM: I think what helped me, because thinking back, that deschooling season of our journey when we’re questioning so many things, so it sparked, Erika, when you said it feels like a truth, right? And so, what was helping me was also exploring what we’ve come to describe as people are different.
Because it’s so easy to just assume other people are experiencing the world the same way we are, right? Because that is the only lens we have. So, the idea that people are different, that people could be experiencing things differently. We talk about sometimes not putting ourselves in their shoes, but looking through their eyes. All those ideas alongside, they helped me understand how a strong belief could be my truth. Instead of the truth.
And that it didn’t diminish it just because it was my truth. It’s a powerful thing, because now that self-awareness that people are different, I can now really own and embrace what’s working for me. So it was just really helpful to be able to see that separation that helped me more embrace my strong belief without feeling I had to give it up, because it wasn’t the truth. Well, then, what is the truth? It’s like, it’s okay that it works for me. And there are some really good reasons why it may not work for someone else. It may not work for my child.
Whether it’s from personality things, or just experiences, or it’s a different world 20 years later than when I was whatever age. There’s so many different aspects to it. And once you start to see the context, right? We talk about context so much. Then being able to bring that to this strong beliefs conversation going on in my head was really helpful.
ANNA: Yeah, I think the people are different thing is so critical here. And I feel like my kids definitely led the way with this paradigm shift for me. And even in little ways, like we experience temperature different. So, my mom was always like, have a coat on the kids, you know, that’s a thing. That’s a good parent. You’re bringing coats and putting coats on your kids. Not in Miami, but this is like up here where I live. And so I’m thinking, okay, that’s what you do.
But then I had a child that just ran hot. Did not want to wear shoes, did not want to wear coats. And I’m like, okay, why do I have a belief that somehow this is tied to like good parenting? And so, just that little bit of, she’s experiencing this exact same situation differently, even though that’s not a super strong belief, it started to crack that open for me to be like, okay, we actually do really have different experiences of the world.
We really do. Even something that, I mean, well, the temperature saying this shouldn’t that mean that you’re cold? But no, it doesn’t, because we’re all so different. And then it starts to go, oh, I’m really grounded outside and feel great when I move my body outside. This child doesn’t. It’s itchy and it’s scratchy and it’s warm and it doesn’t feel good and they don’t like it. Oh, okay. But aren’t we supposed to do this?
So then, it was just like slowly, this crack just got wider and wider as I realized we really do experience the world so differently. And then I feel like Pam, because you’ve been talking about open and curious for so long, that’s what I switched to. Like, okay, so if it’s not what I think it’s supposed to be, if it’s not, there’s this one right way, I want to be curious about how we’re finding our right ways and what that looks like.
And so it was, it was a really fascinating process for me. I really do remember these steps along the way, because I had a lot of strong opinions. I still do, but I was much more militant about them in my twenties, in early life for sure.
ERIKA. Yeah. I was thinking it feels like this is something that grows in with age, it becomes easier to see that everyone has their own beliefs as I get older, where in those college years and a little beyond that, it was like, no, there’s one right way and I know what it is. And so, that’s funny.
And I was thinking about this conversation also, once you start thinking about, what are my own strong beliefs? It’s possible that some of them are so externally influenced, that maybe they’re not even our own strong beliefs. Maybe they’re just part of a culture that we’re trying to be a part of. I’m thinking things like kids need to be outdoors or kids should go to bed early or things that you may see around you in parenting circles or with parent friends.
But if you sit down and really start to think about it, maybe those aren’t my actual strong beliefs. Maybe it’s just something that I’m hearing a lot and so that it starts to feel like it’s important. And so, yeah, just anytime if my kid’s pushing against being outside because it doesn’t feel good and it’s so hot and humid and sticky and terrible, it’s like, okay, so which is more important? The going outside and pushing that or is listening to them and knowing that people are different? I mean, there are still people enjoying being outside during this season in Miami and we aren’t and that’s okay.
But if I was going to take on that belief of, this is so important and everyone needs to spend time outside, it could get in the way of my relationship with my kids.
PAM: Yeah, I think that’s such a great point that some of our strong beliefs maybe were just adopted as the conventional wisdom that we hear all the time. So, that’s why it is so valuable to just take that moment to ask ourselves, where is that coming from? And is it something like that makes sense to me?
That was one of the things I did a lot of questioning about as we came to unschooling, which was like, so what does my experience look like? At first it was my experience with school growing up, that came with me wholesale, but what exactly did that look like? Which parts worked better for me? Which ones were more challenging? So taking the conventional wisdom around school and then asking, is that really true? And then looking back at my own literal experience to see what I could discover and then start to understand what it actually looked like to me and what I believed about it versus just the conventional story that I had just kind of adopted wholesale.
But it’s not like we can do this with everything all the time, right? It’s pretty challenging work and also, I mean, that’s what conventional wisdom is for, helping you move quickly through something. Oh, well, most people do it this way. I don’t think that’s going to make a big mess and we do it and totally good. Those are our shortcuts.
But it’s when they start to do things, right? Like rub in a relationship or end us up in a place where we’re not feeling comfortable anymore after we do the thing, like this isn’t working for me as I was hoping. And so, that is one other aspect I wanted to bring up too is when our strong beliefs get woven in with our personal values. Like, I value being open, as in sharing a level of details. Or I want us like to be an outdoor family. I want us to be out doing things or I want us to have dinners together or like whatever it is that we feel is a personal value but to recognize when we like a value like that actually isn’t just our own, right? It’s not a personal value. It includes other people when you have a family that you think should all be having dinner together and it can be so tricky.
I definitely had that and tried to do that, right? But navigating a value that requires other people to participate in it, oh my gosh, that’s when the rubs can start, right? And you can start to realize and question, is this really something that’s important to me? Why is it important to me? What does it look like? Because you start putting expectations on others and then you start looking through their eyes and you can see, oh I can see why this isn’t working for them, etc. It’s just like another, as you were saying, Erika, another good clue that we might want to revisit something and is it and just trying to think through like is this a value? Is this a belief? How am I bringing that into the world? Who am I expecting to not just take my belief but participate in my belief?
ANNA: Right. And I’m so glad you brought this one up. I definitely wanted you to, because I think it’s so critical. And I hope I’m going to articulate this in a way that makes sense, but there was an example on the Network around this that was interesting, because the strong belief that was kind of praised as a personal value was that everyone needs to contribute to the family as a whole. But it was rubbing. And so, it was causing friction and causing problems.
And you brought this up that that has to be tricky to have this personal belief that you need other people to participate in in order for it to feel good. And what I think is important for me to recognize is when I put it into a personal value which is really this strong belief that’s come and I now I’ve reframed it as a personal value it kind of shuts down the learning for me and for those around me, because I can kind of stand on my high horse of personal value. Like, this is this thing and it is a value that we should all hold to be good people. You can just hear it. It’s like rhetoric, almost. And it’s stopping me from seeing anything else.
And so, that was the clue for me of, oh okay if my personal value is to contribute in this way I can do that, right? That is something that I can do and show up. But if I’m wanting someone else to, I’m not taking them into consideration because we’re not even having a conversation about it. I’ve just already decided that I need you to.
And so, what was cool about the situation in the Network is they really started having different kinds of conversations and they started figuring out how to meet all the needs and they started breaking it down into, okay who feels which way about what things what feels harder? Let’s learn about each other. And so, there was all this rich learning and it became so much richer than standing here on this place of, I’m right because this is this personal value.
And so, I love that additional learning about each other. And to me these are things that are just so important about learning to live with other human beings in general and it’s not about whatever the particular value is, because we all have different ones. And like you said, Erika, it could be the early bird gets the worm so everybody needs to go to bed early and get up early, so they’re filtering from all of these cultural narratives. But then we create it as a value that you’re a better person if you’re doing that, if you’re out there getting this. And so, I think it would just be really fun for people to think about, where do I have this strong belief and is it about diet or sleep or parenting or whatever? And again, it’s not about letting go of the strong belief, because you know I’m a huge advocate for children I have a lot of strong beliefs about how I would love all children to be treated, but if I stand there I’m not learning, I’m not reaching, I’m not connecting with anybody. And so, that’s kind of what sticks out for me, and so I love that you brought that point up.
ERIKA: Yeah, I really liked that conversation on the Network, too, and I feel like what was interesting about it is that if I feel like I have a value of everyone in the family contributes and that feels like very important and sacred and wonderful to me, then I think everyone else should also feel that way and that the work that they do to contribute is coming because we have that same shared value/belief. And so, it’s coming from this deeper place.
And so, then that’s why it rubs, because if they’re not doing chores, it doesn’t just mean they were busy, it means they don’t value the family in the same way that I do. Because it’s equating two things that aren’t necessarily equal. And so, if the thing is we need to get all the chores done around the house, that’s one conversation. If it’s, I like to feel connected as a family, that’s an entirely different conversation where we could figure out other ways to feel connected to each other that don’t have to be we’re all working together to clean the house.
Because obviously people are going to have different opinions about what feels good. And so, yeah it was just super interesting and fun to unpack some of these beliefs for ourselves.
PAM: Yeah exactly. And I think what you mentioned there, Erika, too, is it just bubbled up for me how often as well that whole productivity conversation comes up. Because, oh if I can make this thing mean this and this and this that’s effective and efficient and like we bundle it all together and hand it to somebody else. But they don’t know all these nuanced meanings and all the little tick boxes that we’re checking off in our head that this means and they’re just like maybe doing the thing.
ERIKA: Like for a family dinner, I could totally picture that, where someone in the family is like, well I’m not hungry, so I don’t want to eat right now. But then it’s like, no but to me, it’s everything. This is our only moment of connection and it’s so important and deep. And so, yeah a lot more conversations and peeling apart the parts that you’re wanting.
ANNA: Right! Because, in that situation, are we even communicating that? So, we have it in our head that the family dinner means we’re all valuing each other and finding out about each other’s day, but have we said that? Or are we just saying, come to dinner? Because again, that child who’s not hungry may be like, oh but if you want to hear about my day or I could hear about your day, that might be fine. But it’s interesting to think about how much we do in our head with these ideas and how much we’re putting on it, which maybe we aren’t even communicating. And that’s why those conversations can be so helpful to figure out what are the priorities for each person. And how do we make sure we meet those in a way that feels good to everybody?
ERIKA: Well, this one has been a lot of fun! We hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an aha moment or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. If you enjoy these kinds of conversations I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such an amazing group of people connecting, having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives and you can learn more at the Network tab on livingjoyfully.ca. We hope to meet you there.And you can also check out our new Substack at whenschoolisntworking.substack.com. Thank you for listening and we’ll see you next time.
ANNA AND PAM: Bye!
EU132 Flashback: Deschooling Two Cultures with Iris Chen
Sep 25, 2025
In this episode, we’re sharing a conversation that Pam had with Iris Chen in 2018. At the time, Iris was new to unschooling her two sons in China and was writing blog posts about her experience at her website, Untigering. Pam and Iris talked about why she and her husband decided to move to China, her family’s move to unschooling, what unschooling in China looks like, deschooling expectations around achievement, feeling like an outsider in both Chinese and American societies, and lots more!
We hope you enjoy the conversation!
QUESTIONS FOR IRIS
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I love how you describe your blog, untigering.com, on your about page: “Untigering is a blog about my adventures of trying to be parent in the tension of my Chineseness and Americanness. It’s about me moving away from being a typical tiger mom, but still wanting to hold on to my cultural heritage. It’s about figuring out what I believe about identity, family, and success as an outsider to both societies.” Let’s start with your shifting definition of success. You and your husband were well on your way to fulfilling the “American Dream” when you guys did a complete 180. How did that come about?
And then you had children. How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I’m really curious about unschooling in China. Can you share a bit about your experience and the pros and cons you see?
You have a great blog post about the value of letting go of expectations, especially ones around achievement. When a child dives into an interest it’s so easy for us to start envisioning that as their lifelong passion and career, like we need to rationalize to ourselves that it’s okay to let them have at it. Maybe we try to convince ourselves we’re just being supportive, but it can quickly backfire, can’t it?
I’d love to talk some more about your experience with the tension of feeling like an outsider in both Chinese and American societies. Can you share your thoughts around the process of weaving together your cultural heritage with what you’re discovering makes sense to you about children, learning, parenting, and family? What does that look like for you?
You recently published a blog post titled, ‘Unschooling as an Asian American is an Act of Resistance.’ I thought it was a great piece and was hoping you’d share your thoughts about it here.
What is your favourite thing about unschooling right now?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca, and today I’m here with Iris Chen. Hi Iris!
IRIS: Hello Pam.
PAM: Hello! Iris is an unschooling mom and I came across her work a few months ago. I really enjoyed reading around her website, untigering.com, and I was super excited when she agreed to come on the podcast!
So, to get us started Iris …
Can you share with us a little bit about you and your family?
IRIS: Sure! So, I am a Chinese American, and I was born in the States and grew up in the States and Canada actually. After I got married, we moved out to China to teach English, and then we had two boys out there in China.
And I’ve only been unschooling for about a year but have really just fallen in love with it.
PAM: Oh, that’s awesome, yeah, and it’s doesn’t take too long once you start diving in, does it? If it’s for you, if it’s a good match, it just sucks you right in, right?
IRIS: Yes, yes.
PAM: So, I love how you describe your blog, untigering.com, in your about page and I just wanted to read a little quote from it.
“Untigering is about my adventures of me trying to be an parent in the tension of my Chineseness and Americanness. It’s about me wanting to move away from being a tiger mom, but still wanting to hold on to my cultural heritage. It’s about figuring out what I believe about identity, family and success, as an outsider to both societies.”
And look! I got goosebumps again just as I was reading it.
Let’s start with your shifting definition of success. That’s a big one we talk about quite a bit here on the podcast, and as you mentioned, you and your husband were well on your way to fulfilling the “American Dream” when you did that complete 180 and moved to China. I’m really interested in hearing how that came about.
IRIS: Yeah!
So, we lived in the Silicon Valley. It’s a very driven, very ambitious culture here, and, at that time, my husband had been working for five years as an electrical engineer, and was doing well, and we were living a very comfortable, good life.
But I think we just wanted something different; we wanted something meaningful. We wanted to be of service somewhere. And we wanted a sense of adventure too, something different. And so, we went to China just planning on teaching English for just a year—we didn’t expect on staying out for very long.
We were going to give it a year and have a good time with it. But once we got out there, we just fell in love with it—fell in love with the people and the culture. I mean we are both Chinese, but yeah, just really falling in love with the people and the culture there. And ended up staying for the next 15 years and have been there ever since!
PAM: Was the biggest piece when you were talking about wanting to feel like you were doing service kinds of work, helping people—that was something you felt was missing? Was that a big chunk of it?
IRIS: Yeah.
I think sometimes when you stay in your own culture, you are stuck in these scripts or these tracks that ‘everybody around you is doing this,’ ‘everybody else is buying their house and having children,’ or whatever. And I think we just wanted to be intentional about the choices we made—we didn’t want to just do what everybody else was doing. But we also wanted to make intentional choices about what we wanted to do with our lives.
PAM: That’s cool! So, it was noticing that you on this track, I guess, the definition of success for people, right? And you guys were rocking that.
IRIS: Yeah, yeah, we were doing well…
PAM: And it became time to question it. Is that how?
IRIS: Yeah, Definitely. And not to say that that is wrong, but are we being intentional and mindful about that choice. For us, we just felt like that wasn’t our path, that wasn’t our calling. We wanted something different for our lives.
PAM: I love that point too, because, just because it’s conventional doesn’t mean that it’s wrong, right? Like, you said, just knowing which path is feeling good for you and is working for you, right?
IRIS: Right, exactly! I feel that follows really closely with unschooling too. It’s not that you can’t have a conventional education, or you can’t go to college. It’s not about that. It’s about doing it intentionally and because it’s meaningful and purposeful for you. Don’t because it’s just with you do.
PAM: I love that word, purposeful, because that shows the intention behind it, right? Because unschooling lives can run the gamut for young adults. And some, when you’re looking from the outside, can look very conventional, and some can look very unconventional, but they are all, either way, lived with intention and purpose. I love that.
IRIS: Yes yes yes.
PAM: I love that.
So, you guys went, and you spent your year there, in China, and you had children. I’m curious to see how that phase went, and then how you discovered unschooling and what your move to unschooling looked like. You said that was about a year ago?
IRIS: Yeah. I had this blog called untigering, because I think I was a typical tiger mom. Like, I had very high standards for what I wanted my kids to do and to study. It was my full intention to send them—well, at first we were considering conventional homeschooling, and then we were thinking about sending them to local, Chinese school, because we were living in China. We thought that if we send them to local school, they will be fluent; they will be bilingual in both Chinese and English, and that was sort of like a high priority for me, so we were really trying to get them into a local school.
But that didn’t really work out because they didn’t have enough space for foreigners, so we went another option where we went to like a local, private Chinese school. And I think we had a good experience there, but after a few years there, I felt that there was a lot about the schooling mindset that I didn’t agree with—that didn’t resonate with me. Because I had sort of part-time homeschooled them when they were younger, I felt that there was just a lot of wasted time, a lot of busy work. A lot of it was meaningless, that you just felt like you had to do as part of school.
And I was also teaching there at that school, and I was sucked into those types of patterns too, even though I didn’t believe in them, like giving homework just to give homework, or seeing what the results of grades like a mark did. They just cared about looking at the grade, they didn’t care about whether or not they understood the material. Or, even seeing my kids. They did really well in that environment, but then noticing that they were doing things more for the affirmation of the teacher; like, they were trying to get recognition and saying, “Look! Look at this!” And comparisons and stuff like that.
So, I was noticing, even though they were doing well, attitudes that were inadvertently passed on to them because of this environment. I had not really been exposed to unschooling, but I listened to a parenting conference and one of the speakers was Scott Noelle who is part of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education, I think, and he wasn’t really talking about unschooling, but at the end of his talk, he referenced it.
Then I went to the website and read what self-directed education was about. I just really resonated with it and felt like, “Oh, this is something that I really believe in; or I want to believe in.” It was a very radical way—at least for me—of looking at education and sort of letting go of the reins. But there was something very appealing for me, especially since, at the time, I had to think of other options, because the school that I was sending my kids to was shutting down.
Pretty much my only option was to homeschool, and yet I was really stressed by that idea because I knew that if I took a schooling mindset and applied it to homeschooling, that would just create so much stress in my family life and for my kids because I’d just be this really controlling mom trying to get them to do their work. And I didn’t want to do that!
And so, once I discovered unschooling, yeah, I think I just really resonated with it, and was excited about what that meant for my relationship with my kids and a way that we could homeschool that would just work for us.
PAM: That’s cool! Yeah!
You were mentioning that you were teaching at the school and you were doing all the things that were expected. You mentioned, giving homework, paying attention to grades, and using that as a measure etc. And it’s so interesting to see that, and you were doing it because you had to in that situation, and then imagining having to do that at home, because it wasn’t something that you really believed in. Is that kind of how it felt, like you would have to bring that home?
IRIS: Yeah, definitely. And actually, in the school environment, I felt frustrated, because I was behaving in ways that I didn’t believe in either. Like, maybe I was just putting on that teacher hat and feeling like I had to be very authoritarian in some ways, like, “sit in your seat, pay attention, follow along,” you know…
PAM: Yeah, you were playing that role rather than being yourself.
IRIS: Yeah. Right. Like, interacting with them in the way that I would if they were just my kids or we were just home together. So, just the role of being a teacher and being in that role meant something to me, where I needed to be the one imparting information and they needed to absorb it or whatever, so…
PAM: And I guess it might be a little bit easier trying to do that within the institution because all the teachers are doing it, whereas at home, ‘Oh now it will just be me trying to play that role.’ That could be a lot harder!
IRIS: I don’t think my kids would like it, would respond well to it either, me always wearing the teacher hat.
PAM: Yeah, that’s such a good point too. So, did the school close? Did you guys finish out they year there, and then the school closed, and then you kind of transitioned into it at home?
IRIS: Yes. So, the school closed and we transitioned to what we were doing at home. A lot of the kids—it was a private, local school, and so all of the kids are pretty much local Chinese kids—they went back to their different situations, like, to a local school, or a private school, or to other options. But yeah, for us, we ended up homeschooling.
PAM: Did you pretty much end up unschooling at home from the beginning?
IRIS: At that point, yeah. It was sort of like we had our summer off and then we started.
At the beginning, I was like, “There’s a few things that we are going to do,” so, I wasn’t in total “jump in the deep end.” We were still in the process of deschooling. So, I was like, “We still gotta do math.” You know, “We’re Asians, we do math!” At that point, I was not yet ready to let go of that and felt like that needed to be taught. And then we did other things like Chinese class and piano class, but other than that, I was really able to sort of let the rest of it go.
I would read to them—sometimes I would pick a book or they would pick a book and I would read aloud to them. But the rest of the day was pretty open and they could do what they wanted to do. But I think after a few weeks into it, because of my changing views and my philosophy of unschooling, making them do math didn’t make sense to me anymore. Because, if I truly believe that kids can learn through life and learn naturally in ways that are meaningful for them, then why was I making them sit and fill out these worksheets that didn’t have meaning for them?
And I also read, I think it was a Peter Gray article about learning math, and how kids in the future if they want to go into a field that requires math, that they can actually learn it really quickly, because they already have the skills to know how to learn. So, they don’t have to spend their entire childhood spending hours and hours doing workbooks and learning math, they can just go on and learn it really quickly if they want to. And so, I think hearing those things and wrestling with it a little more allowed me to let go of the math. So yeah, I no longer require them do math. That was part of my deschooling process.
PAM: Oh absolutely. I think whatever “the thing” is for us—whether it’s math, or maybe it’s reading, or spelling. That was something that I held onto for a little while, just for the first couple of weeks. Because, whatever that one thing is, then we see them all the rest of the time, and see how much they are learning, and we see them in action. And we’re continuing to learn and read ourselves. So, I think that’s a pretty normal transition time, because there’s always that one last thing that it’s hard for us to let go of. But as we keep going just a few weeks, it starts to gel together and we can kind of release that last big thing, right?
IRIS: Yeah. Absolutely.
The other two things that I was holding onto was Chinese—Chinese language lessons—and piano. And we live in China, so it sort of made sense. And with piano, that is something that they had wanted to do when they were younger, but it’s been four years and we were still having them do it, and sometimes there was a lot of tension around piano practice and stuff like that. So, it wasn’t until more recently, maybe a couple of months ago, where we actually again had to question why we were continuing those activities and whether or not those activities were things that our kids wanted to do.
So, we put them before them and asked, “Do you want to continue? These are the reasons that we think, from our perspective, but what do you guys think?” And it was interesting, because they didn’t really want to continue with the Chinese lessons, but they did want to continue with the piano. That was actually really affirming to us in a way, because we had thought that maybe if we didn’t force them to do it that they wouldn’t do either. But to know that once they had the option to consider for themselves and really tap into their own desires, that they realized that, “I do really want to continue with the piano.” So, now as we move forward, at least with the piano, they can continue with enjoyment, and not feeling like it’s not mom and dad making me do it, but that they are in control.
PAM: That’s a really great point. It is so interesting to see them, executing their agency, I guess, in making choices. And it’s nice to know that you get to that point in the relationship—it might have been a few months till you guys felt like you could ask that question and get a real answer from them; because at first, it could be very reactionary. Like you said, we figured at first it could be like “No I don’t want to do anything because you were making me do that.” But to actually take the time to think about it and to make a choice for what really works for them, right?
IRIS: Right, that’s a really good point.
I think sometimes they might react because we have been so controlling and we’ve robbed them of that agency for so long, so, once they have agency they’re like, “Ok, well, I’m just going to rebel, or I’m just going to do my own thing and not do what I know you want me to do.”
But yeah, I think that can be a process too, allowing them to do that until they get to the point where there is that trust and they are like, “Oh, mom and dad honor my choices, and maybe some of what I want to do is what mom and dad want me to do, and that’s okay.”
PAM: Yeah, that’s such a huge process—I call it deschooling for us—but also for the kids too because it’s building that relationship and that trust back in, right? Because if they say no to everything that’s ok too. And when you ask, it’s about being ok with the no. And none of these noes are forever. They can always, like you said, later on, say, “Hey, you know what, I think maybe I do want to pick that back up.”
But now they’ve gotten to a point in the relationship that they know they are making that choice for themselves, not to please you, and you know that too.
IRIS: So, that was something that both my husband and I had to be ok with, it like, “Ok, if they say no to both of these things, we have to be ok with this, rather than trying to manipulate them to choose something.” Being ok with the no.
I think with unschooling we are always hoping that they will say yes to something, that they will grab onto something that they really love, but I think that for kids who haven’t been given a lot of freedom, I think the first choice is to say no, and they have to have the freedom to do that.
PAM: That finally helps them to feel powerful when they haven’t felt like they’ve had a lot of power.
I’m really curious to learn more about unschooling in China. I was hoping you could share a bit about your experience and kind of like the pros and cons that you see about unschooling there.
IRIS: Yeah, I actually wrote a blog post about this, and I would be interested to know if there are any other unschoolers in China. I have no idea.
But I think one of the really challenging things is the easy access to information because we have a firewall. It’s really hard to get information online, and I feel like probably for a lot of unschoolers, a lot of the information they get is online. So, that is sometimes really challenging for us. We can’t get on YouTube or Twitter or Instagram or Facebook without a VPN—a virtual private network. Sometimes the Internet makes it hard to get all those things. I think that is a challenge.
I think another thing is just the cultural values is just very high on academics. It’s definitely the whole society is very focused on children doing well in school—getting the good grades, doing well on the tests. We are in an environment that really pushes those types of values. So, we’re pretty weird to them. So that’s also, I guess, another challenge.
And I think there’s also the lack of affordable resources. Whereas here I feel like there’s the library, the community center, there’s the free days at the museum, there’s nature, there’s a lot to work with, and there’s also a community—a pretty strong unschooling or homeschooling community.
I think in China there aren’t a lot of free resources, because most families only have one child and they are willing to pay a lot of money for their child to do cool stuff. And so, a lot of things cost a lot of money, so in that way there aren’t a lot of affordable resources, in my opinion. We do have a homeschooling community, which I’m very, very thankful for, but not necessarily unschooling, so not very many people with the same perspective on schooling.
So those are some of the cons, but those can also be pros too, in my mind. Just the fact that because they culture emphasizes so strongly on academics, people actually see the detrimental parts of that. They see how the system is really broken and they don’t want that for their kids, but their choices are limited and it’s pretty risky for them to try other things. So, in some ways they see a more extreme example of the negative things we see in schooling in the west. They know something needs to change, or something isn’t right here. They can understand the value of more choice, more freedom, more agency. Like, when I tell my friends about it, it’s something that sounds really amazing, but it’s too outside of the box for them at this point.
And I think also the bicultural aspect of living oversees is something that’s built-in for us. This sense of learning from another culture, learning a different language, eating different types of foods. Sort of like the worldschooling thing, right? We are learning from life and our perspective isn’t just based on our own experience or our own culture—you’re exposed to different people and different cultures. So that’s a big one too.
PAM: That’s really interesting. Especially the part that academics are such a big focus, and there’s so much pressure on the kids, they really see the negative effects. And yes, I can see that yeah, it’s totally too out of the box to step away from it, but I can imagine them wanting to figure out ways to support their kids, while still putting the pressure on? You know what I mean? It seems it’s quite a dichotomy, but I can see how, “This is what we have to do, this kind of pressure, but I’m going to help you to live with it, because this is just the way it has to be,” right?
IRIS: Yeah, there’s definitely that attitude, it’s like, “Well, this is the way it is. How can I help and support you? And I know it’s really stressful and unfair, but this is the way it is.”
So, I feel that I recognize that I have a lot of privilege in this in terms of the choices that I have as a foreigner living in America, and, even if I was in America, I’m very thankful for the privilege to not have to send my kids to school. So, I really try to not try to push unschooling upon my Chinese friends, because I know that that’s an unfair standard for them, I guess. All I know is that I believe in it, and I’m going for it, and I will support you in whatever choices that you make because I know that you are doing what’s best for your child too.
PAM: Exactly, because everybody’s choices to make right? And they see you living it. You don’t have to convince them or change their minds or anything. Just by seeing you living it they know it’s an option. I can’t imagine trying to put pressure on that or trying to convince them. That won’t help at all, will it?
IRISI: I have talked to some local moms who have chosen alternative ways of doing education and I’m so proud of them. I mean, it’s a really big risk and a really big jump for them. So, I do want to support them as much as I can and to help them to think about education in a different way so that it’s not so scary for them, because it is really scary for them to make choices like that.
PAM: And I mean, that’s the thing about living out in the world as you do—people know you’re there when they have questions or are even just curious. Not even that they are planning a move in the near future, but just curious to learn a little bit more and ask questions. That’s awesome that you’re speaking with them and sharing your experience. That’s awesome. And so, how often do you guys visit in the States then?
IRIS: We come back every summer. I’m not sure how my kids feel. I mean, we grew up in the States, so we are very comfortable in both cultures. I wonder how my kids feel about it? But they love visiting the States and seeing family and everything. We come back every summer for about two months.
PAM: That’s awesome. I will definitely share a link to that blog post.
You also have a great blog post about letting go of expectations especially around achievement—as we’ve been talking about already—but when a child dives into an interest, it’s so easy for us to envision this as “Oh, ok, piano! This is their life-long passion and they can make a career out of it!” And I feel like we almost rationalize to ourselves that it’s ok to let them have at it because, ‘This could be their big career, this could be what they do forever.’ And maybe we realize that that could be pushing a little bit too much, and we try to convince ourselves that we are just supporting him. But that can quickly backfire, can’t it?
IRIS: Yes. I think sometimes that our version of support is actually in the guise of support, but we are actually coming in with our own exceptions, like “Oh, they are going to be amazing at this!” Or, “They are going to go to the Olympics!” Or, “They are going to win an amazing prize!” But we’re actually coming in with our own expectations, and in a lot of ways it’s still about achievement and outside affirmation rather than about the joy and the process of learning something new.
So, maybe part of the appeal of unschooling for me in the beginning was like, ‘Oh, these kids are doing amazing things and they are following their passions, but I think I just read this headline by Idzie Desmarais who writes “I’m Unschooled…” What does she write?
PAM: I’m Unschooled. Yes, I Can Write.
IRIS: Yes, I can write. Yes! And it’s like, sometimes our kids are unexceptional, and why do we have this pressure that we put on our kids to be exceptional and to be a genius at a young age? I mean, some are, and that’s great, but how just to accept our kids where they’re at and just to be fellow sojourners with them in the process of their learning.
I think something that I’m not actually good at right now is actually empowering them and giving them the resources. Sometimes I’m just like, “Oh, just use the free app and see how much you get out of it.” But I don’t know if that’s bad either, because if they really are into it, then they will let me know, and then I will hopefully get them the resources. Maybe in the meantime they can just dabble and that’s ok too.
PAM: Yeah, I think that’s a great point, and I kinda think of it as a dance. I often call it the dance of parenting, because it’s like, you don’t want to overpower them with stuff, and step on their toes and kind of take over like you’re directing, like you’re leading—like in dance terms. But you also want to react to their lead, right? As long as you are reasonably comfortable that in the relationship, if they want more, they’ll say something.
And for us, that’s part of making sure we’re connected, staying connected. Asking them, “How’s that free app going? Did you finish all the stuff that was available there? Did you want a little bit more?” Not always expecting them to come to you. So, again, it’s the dance, right?
You don’t expect them to come, but you don’t want to push too hard, so that they feel like you’re controlling or like you’ve got some kind of expectation hiding in there. So yeah, it’s just the push and pull, back and forth. It’s living together.
IRIS: So, I think that’s something that I really had to learn to step back and hold my tongue and really not try to strew too hard. Like, we go to the library and there’s all these books that I think they might be interested in, and I like ask them, “Do you want to read this?” And they slip through and they are like, “Nope.” And I have to be ok with that! Maybe in the past I would have been like, “Well, I’m going to borrow it anyways and read it to you.” And I’m just backing off and saying. “It’s ok, you’re reading a lot of other stuff.”
My boys are really into coding and gaming and stuff, and so, we are back in the States and I know some people at gaming companies, people who are coders and stuff like that. And so, I asked them, do you want me to ask if you can visit this gaming company or whatever. And I thought this would be really fun for them and they are like, “Ehhhh.” So, there are ways that I’m trying to open doors for them and help them improve or whatever, but they are just not there yet, and so I have to be ok with that.
PAM: I love that example because I had that so many times over the years. Because, they are at a place, and you can kind of see next steps, a few steps down, but I came to realize that that’s a few steps down the path that I envision, right?
So, we are all surprised when I say, ‘I have this way to contact this person, that’s a few steps down. Would you like to go hang out with them, meet them,’ whatever, and they are like, ‘no thanks.’ Because we have no idea what path is their’s, and even if they’re ready to take a next step—maybe they are completely comfortable where they are.
It’s a lot of our work, isn’t it? Thinking that through, figuring that out, realizing that not all of these plans, all these possibilities that we are envisioning for them around the spot that they are in, may be completely different from what they are, right?
IRIS: And my kids are like eight and ten. So, I have to realize that they are still young and there’s no need to box them in yet. See, the tiger mom in me. See, I still need to do that, to untiger.
PAM: Well yeah, because they have this time, if they have the interest, they could be rocking it a few years from now, right? But but but…
IRIS: Exactly. I realize a lot of it is about my own aspirations, my own projections for them, so I need to let that go…
PAM: Because it’s our envisioning their achievement at a young age. So again, it’s our thinking, our conventional definition of success. And it can sneak up on us in so many different ways, can’t it?
IRIS: Yep yep.
PAM: Um, let’s see. Yes!
I have been looking forward to this question, about your experience with the tension of feeling like an outsider in both Chinese and American societies. I was wondering if you’d share your thoughts about weaving together your cultural heritage with what you’re discovering now makes sense with what you’re learning now about children and learning and parenting and family. I was just hoping to know what that kind of looks like for you now? How do you weave that together?
IRIS: Sure. Yeah, It’s a really big question, and I’m still in process. I just went to watch this play last night called Soft Power, and it’s like a, they call it a Chinese musical about America, so it’s written by an Asian American, but it’s sort of like a Chinese view of what America is like.
And there are some scenes in it where, it’s like, as an Asian American in America, I’m never American enough, I’m not western enough, I’m not white enough. And in China, I’m not Chinese enough—like, my Chinese isn’t good enough, my ways of communicating aren’t Chinese enough. And so, in both culture, we are outsiders, or there’s feelings of not being enough, not belonging or whatever.
But I think there is also value in that, in that we can sort of step back and be observers of both cultures, so that we can sort of critique both cultures but also celebrate both cultures so that I don’t have to feel defensive about America. If there’s like something about America that’s gone terribly wrong, I don’t have to say, “Oh, I’m an American. I need to defend it.” or I don’t need to be patriotic or defend it. And same with Chinese culture. If something says something bad about Chinese culture, I can also accept it or deconstruct it or whatever because I’m a little bit of an outsider.
And so, I’m finding that being in this position as an Asian American, I can be a lot more intentional about the things from different cultures that I am incorporating into my family life and into my parenting, so, it doesn’t have to be fully western, or and it doesn’t have to be fully Chinese. Like, nowadays we are more of a global society, and I think if we had the humility to learn from each other, that there are ways that we can learn from different cultures.
I’m just reading all these articles about the Mayan culture in Mexico, and how their children are very different from American children, and how can we learn from that culture, and just how the blessing of being bicultural is that we can be a lot more intentional about the things that we take from each culture.
For example, Chinese culture, the values that we have, the focus on family is very strong, and respect and responsibility and just working hard, and these are things that I associate with Chinese culture. And those are good values, I believe in those values, but I think the how—the way we get to that—is also important, and so maybe the how is a more western approach, because the Chinese way of getting to these values is often through patriarchy, through authoritarianism, through shame.
Those are maybe the ways that sort of get embedded into the culture in a lot of ways, and now that I can see that that’s not how I want to get to those values, I can find other ways to get to those values that are more respectful and provide more agency and freedom. Those are still values that I want to honor and instill in my family, but it’s just a matter of how we get there.
PAM: Yeah, I loved that. I loved the realization that you can still get to the same place, but a different way, with a different path. It’s not, ‘If you don’t use these authoritarian shame control tools, you’ll never get there.’ Like, that’s the message that they use to continue parenting and just structuring society these ways. But to realize that you can still get there but in different way, that’s eye opening, right?
IRIS: Yeah, yeah, definitely.
I think—and I’m just speaking for myself as an Asian American—we don’t have a lot of models or examples that we have seen of a family dynamic that operates like that. I think that, at least for me, I’m feeling my way through.
Like, we have the typical white, western family, but in my experience, Asian families, the way we interact, the dynamics are a little bit different. Just feeling our way through so that we can uphold our Asian values and the things that we love about our Asian culture, while doing it in a respectful and honoring way. That seems very un-Asian in some ways.
PAM: I’m really curious. You were talking about being bicultural and the advantage in that you could choose what resonated with you from both cultures. So, it became more about, you’re already open to choices, it sounds like, right? Did that kind of help when you discovered unschooling, which is focused on choices? Did that help a bit that you were already picking and choosing things that were working for you, that this was just kind of another thing that you were going to pick?
IRIS: I think so! I think that living overseas made our lifestyle, very intentional. Because we didn’t totally fit into that culture, and we weren’t going to just bring American culture over there either, right? So, it was definitely we made very intentional choices about how we were going to live, and the aspects of American culture that we wanted to bring over that were important to us, but ways that we wanted to incorporate the culture around us too. And so I think that did give us the freedom to be more intentional and purposeful—those words keep coming up!—about the choices we made with schooling.
So, maybe if we had lived here in the States we wouldn’t have had to question it was much, because that’s just the way everyone does it, but because we had to be really intentional about that as we lived overseas. In some ways it opens the doors for us for a lot more options in some ways, because we aren’t stuck in a certain track.
PAM: I can’t remember, I’m going to butcher the quote completely, but you know “once your mind opens to a new idea, right? Or grows from a new idea, it can never go back.” Like, once you see one choice and you make a little bit different choice, all of a sudden you see more of them everywhere.
IRIS: Yeah.
PAM: Well, that’s beautiful.
You recently published a blog post titled, ‘Unschooling as an Asian American is an Act of Resistance.’ I thought it was a great piece, Iris, and I was hoping you’d share your thoughts about it here.
IRIS: That blog post was about how, as a Chinese American specifically, it adds a different layer to my decision to unschool, and I think that’s true for a lot of people of color. It’s not solely about educational choice, that there is a component of resisting racism in it. So, part of it for me was about resisting.
There are three thing I was resisting, and the first one was resisting cultural pressures, and I talked about this already a little bit, about Chinese culture in particular emphasizes a lot on academics, like, the test-based system pretty much originated in China. So, really rejecting that view of what education looks like, so from the Asian side, resisting those cultural pressures of having high academics or going to an Ivy League school or having a certain type of career. So, I’m resisting those pressures on that side, which as a culture and maybe my extended family, they are like “What are you doing? That’s very strange what you’re doing!”
And I think also as a second generation immigrant, where a lot of our families have moved to the west to provide more opportunities, to provide these educational opportunities, and then if you don’t take them, they feel like, “Why? What did we sacrifice all that for?” So, there’s a lot of pressure on that side of it.
I think there is also the resistance of Asian stereotypes. Where maybe there’s views of like the stereotypical Asian nerd, or you see Jeremy Lin, who’s a Chinese American basketball player. He has faced a lot of racism because people just don’t see him as athletic. People just don’t see Asians as athletic, or attractive, or as outspoken, or as a leader. So, there are these ways that society stereotypes Asians as not having these opportunities, especially in a schooling environment.
So, there’s ways that we can achieve. Like, if we were on the academic route and we’re smart and that follows the stereotype so people can accept that, but if you don’t want to follow that stereotype, like if you aren’t super academic but you really enjoy dance, or you want to be a football player or whatever it is, there are stereotypes that prevent you from achieving those things in that environment.
I feel that unschooling is a way outside of that. That we can provide different opportunities that hopefully can resist some of those stereotypes and not have kids boxed into being a certain type of Asian. So, there’s that.
And then I think the last one was the curriculum, and the very white-centric, very patriotic, American, information that is given in most western schooling environments is very western-centric. And I think that we are realizing more and more that the story we are telling each other isn’t the whole truth, and that there are many different perspectives out there on the history. So, not only stories about our country or about the world that are very euro-centric, but pretty much all of curriculum is. Or even sports—most schools don’t necessarily have Asian sports like badminton, but they will have basketball or golf, things that are more associated with western things. Or the music that is played in band, or just a lot of different things that are just typical, white-centric instead of a more global, multicultural, view of the world. And so, unschooling can allow us to expose them to whatever resonates with them, and it doesn’t have to be just that one canon that we are used to.
PAM: Yeah, that’s so narrow, isn’t it? The curriculum, just in general. And yeah, you don’t really realize it because, if you’re on that path, you just absorb it because that is what we are supposed to do. Somebody has said, “This is what we cover,” and somebody has said “This is the angle of the story that we are going to cover.”
I loved the idea of it’s also being a resistance to all that—conventional isn’t even the right word, stereotypical probably is, for lack of a better word—white culture that’s there, and all of the other stories are ignored. And I love that idea of it also being a big act of resistance of that main cultural story.
That the world is so much bigger, so much wider. And that we can bring that world to the kids. But also, just standing up and choosing that it’s important to us. It’s our choice too for our families. That this is an important way that we want to be in the world and that we want to share with our children. Does that makes sense?
IRIS: Yeah, definitely. And where they can be sort of the protagonist of their own stories, whereas like, if we grow up in the typical American schooling system, we are never the protagonist of our own story system, we are never the protagonist in our own stories. The stories that we read, there are very few, there are more and more, but very few books that are required reading at that age, that tell stories about Asian Americans or Asians.
PAM: I love that point too, and I’ll share a link to that too.
I really wanted to know what your favorite thing about unschooling is right now?
IRIS: There are so many things, but I really think it’s not so much just about schooling, but it’s really a whole lifestyle sometimes, so I just really love how it gives me so many opportunities to connect with my children, and just the relationship that we have with one another and the growing respect we have for one another. And just enjoying each other.
Whereas, it’s not about herding my kids through the day, getting them to one class or that class, it’s really about just enjoying life together. It’s a really slow pace that allows us the opportunity to just connect and enjoy one another. So, I’m really thankful for that.
PAM: Oh, I love that. And you don’t realize how fast that pace is until you step away, do you think? I found that I appreciated that slowness and that ability to be in relationship and be in the moment with them way more than I even expected.
IRIS: Yeah, yeah, and I think that’s sort of my personality too, I’m more of a homebody I like things to be slower. I get overwhelmed with too many things. But, yeah, just really enjoying that opportunity to build relationship with them.
PAM: That’s awesome. Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me Iris. I’m so glad you said yes. I had so much fun!
IRIS: I had a lot of fun too. Thank you for asking me Pam.
PAM: Before we go, where is the best place for people to connect with you online?
IRIS: My blog is untigering.com and I also have a facebook page that’s Untigering. I also started a facebook group for parents who are or have been tiger parents, and that’s called Untigering Parents, and then on twitter I am @untigeringmom.
PAM: Excellent. I will put all those links in the show notes for people too. And thanks so much. Have a great day. Say hi to everyone. You guys are in the States now, right?
IRIS: Yes, we are.
PAM: Yay. Thank you! Bye!
IRIS: Ok, bye!
EU391: Foundations: Boundaries, Comfort Zones, and Capacity
Sep 11, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Boundaries, Comfort Zones, and Capacity.
The idea of boundaries comes up pretty often in conventional circles, often through the lens of self-care, encouraging people to set boundaries with their kids, their partners, their parents, and so forth, and to stay strong in defending them. But in this episode, we’re digging into the language of boundaries and exploring some alternative ways of communicating our needs and learning about the important people in our lives.
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
Think of a boundary you hold right now with your partner or a close friend. What might be gained from having some conversations around it? Might it give them some more helpful information about you? Could it help you feel more seen and heard in the relationship?
How does the idea of using comfort zones to better understand and communicate your needs land with you?
How often do you operate outside of your capacity to thrive?
Can you think of times that you didn’t trust someone else’s definition of their capacity? How did it play out? Did it impact your relationship?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully podcast. We are happy you’re interested in exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
And in today’s episode, we are going to talk about boundaries, comfort zones, and capacity. And it may end up being a bit longer than usual, but we are really excited to have this conversation. There are some big paradigm shifts around these ideas that can really have a positive impact on your relationships.
Now, our focus with this podcast is on cultivating connected, trusting, and respectful relationships with our partner, with our children, with anyone we choose to have that level of a relationship with. And we soon discover that that means deeply understanding ourselves so that we can more gracefully navigate the edges where we engage with others. So, that’s really the foundation of this conversation.
And to start with, let’s dive into the idea of boundaries, because it comes up pretty often in conventional circles, often through the lens of self-care, encouraging individuals to set strong boundaries with their partners, for their parents, to set boundaries with their kids, and just to stay strong in defending them.
And the motivation behind that idea makes a lot of sense. It’s to encourage us to not be manipulated into doing things that we don’t want to do. That makes a lot of sense. But the solution proposed of setting and defending boundaries can often create challenges and disconnection in our relationship. Can’t it?
ANNA: Yes! I just don’t find the boundary language particularly helpful. So, the energy of it feels very final and it has this feeling of drawing a line in the sand and, “I’m going to defend that line to the death,” and also that somehow, I’m letting myself down if I don’t uphold it, which is just this double whammy coming at us.
PAM: Exactly.
ANNA: So, the alternative I found is to look at the moment in front of me, to be honest about where I am, what I can do in that moment, because it changes. There are things we can’t anticipate about the situations we’re faced with.
And I think, especially with my loved ones, I want to have an energy of curiosity and connection. Standing on the other side of an intensely drawn boundary just doesn’t have the same feel to me. And this could be a language thing. I’m definitely a word person and I tend to respond energetically to words. So, I look to my language to help me cultivate the energy I want to bring and the person I want to be in a situation. That’s why these words are important to me and why I really love teasing apart these nuances.
PAM: Yes, yes. I find it very helpful to consider my language, as well, including the language I use when thinking or talking to myself. When I use the word “boundaries,” does it mean a hard stop to me? When I envision someone approaching it and approaching me, am I looking at the line or am I looking at the person?
Because what a pre-drawn line doesn’t do is consider the context of the moment. Am I feeling resourced and centered? Are they? How’s our day been going? What does their request look like through their eyes? What does it look like through my eyes? What constraints may be at play? Can we get curious together about ways to navigate it this time?
Because I think one of the things we worry about is, if I do it this time, I’ll have to do it every time. “There’s that boundary. I moved that boundary and now it’s forever there.” But that is not true. We are not giving tacit permission forever more. We’re chatting with them about this particular moment and that is how we learn more about each other.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. Exactly. And keeping in mind that context keeps it from feeling arbitrary to the other person involved as well. We’re reacting together to the context of the situation, and that’s where the learning’s happening.
And I do think boundaries can have a place when we’re faced with toxic relationships. This can be friends or even family from our family of origin. When a relationship is harming us, when we find ourselves tied in knots thinking about it, when we see it impacting our mental health or happiness, boundaries can be a helpful step to distance ourselves enough to see the situation more clearly. Even that doesn’t have to be a forever step, but it can be a self-preservation step to gain perspective and to decide if this relationship is one that will work for us going forward.
But if we’re choosing to spend our life with someone, I truly believe that boundary language just tends to shut down communication. It doesn’t leave room for finding solutions that feel good to both parties. And I think it’s important to realize that this is not about not expressing or meeting our needs, but when we do it in relationship, it looks so different.
If we want to have a consensual relationship where the parties involved are heard and seen and we find agreeable solutions, standing behind a hard boundary can get in the way of that. And I’ve found that I can honor who I am and still be open and curious to finding solutions that feel good to everyone involved.
PAM: Yes! I think that is such an important distinction. We’re talking about relationships with the people in our lives with whom we want to cultivate strong, connected, and trusting relationships.
So, when it comes to extended family or people at work, a boundary can be a useful tool to quickly communicate our needs to someone. But with those we want a closer and more intimate relationship with, a boundary can get in the way of that. We tend to pull that out instead of having a conversation.
But it’s in those conversations where we come to better understand each other, where we cultivate connections, where we build trust. That space is where relationships flourish.
ANNA: Yes. And so, another thing that I’ve noticed, I call the pendulum. For much of our early life, we’re basically subject to others in a variety of different ways. We’re told what to do, how to do it, often subjugating our needs and preferences. And somewhere along the line, often in our thirties and forties, we have this awakening and we realize, “Wait a minute! My needs are important here, too!”
And so, you can go into this intense period of advocating for your needs. And I think this is when the strong boundary language that we hear around really resonates with people. “Yes! This feels awesome!” But I’ve also seen that as we get a bit older that things soften and we realize that we don’t have to defend our needs to the death, that we can honor ourselves and honor another, and that solutions are really there to be found.
And I want to say very clearly that there’s no right and wrong about this. There’s no timeline about any of it. It’s just an interesting pattern and I think it can help to be aware of it and maybe watch for it. Are we swinging way over here? Do we want to come back maybe more towards the center? See how it’s feeling as we play with unpacking any baggage we have in this area.
And I think pretty much all of us have some baggage in this area.
PAM: Yeah, no, I do love the metaphor or the image of the pendulum, and absolutely it can be a valuable part of our journey, a helpful part, to swing right up to the very edge, because then we’re gaining experience with what that feels like, and we notice the pieces that aren’t working.
And when we understand those kinds of patterns, it can be helpful for us, too, to help us recognize where we might be on the journey and use that information to help us just decide where we want to go next.
But I do love that idea of the patterns and just paying attention, because, for me, I enjoy looking for that and seeing those bigger picture patterns of how things flow.
And you mentioned the baggage that we can bring. Because, for me, as I thought about how the idea of boundaries feels for me, and thinking back to when I was first playing around with this, I realized that I grew up steep in the conventional culture of competition. So, as I started thinking about this myself, that’s one of the places I went.
So, when I thought about how I anticipated engaging with others in terms of boundaries, it really spiked my defensive energy. As soon as I was feeling defensive, I saw the other person, whether it was my child, partner, whoever I was engaged with, I saw them as the opposition. Like, “You’re the enemy, because I need to defend this boundary. This is a win-lose situation.”
And time and again after having brought that energy to many a conversation, just like you were saying, I learned through experience that when I did that, especially with someone that I love, that perspective and energy just hindered our interaction. It got in the way of us moving forward.
I noticed that my defensiveness raised their defensiveness, which meant that we were both less empathetic. We were just defending harder and harder. And we were each just focused on our own bits and we were only seeing it through our own lens. We listened to the other person not to hear those new bits of information that curiosity can bring and that we notice. We were listening to them so that we could find the things that we could twist in support of the position that we were defending.
So, as I sat with the discomfort of these two seemingly contradictory ideas, “I need boundaries so that people don’t walk all over me,” and, “I want to be connected to this person,” I came to see that, for me, the image of holding a boundary sparks that defensive energy, which negatively impacts my connection with my loved ones.
So, even a rule or a boundary that made sense to me, what it did was shut down so much rich conversation and learning and my opportunity to learn more things about these people in my life, things that I would have never discovered if I didn’t have that conversation in the first place. But those conversations didn’t bubble up if it was just like, “No, you can’t do that. You can’t do that.”
ANNA: Right. And that’s the thing. We’re talking about a very different style of communication and problem solving, and so I hope it’s clear that as we’re looking at it, because we have this one side, you the zero-sum game, defend your position at all costs. That’s pretty common in our culture. We see it in governments to toddlers.
And then here, we’re talking about listening, stating our needs, listening to someone else’s needs, having those conversations, learning more about each other, moving forward together on the same team. It’s so different, but it’s so much more pleasant and so rich with the discoveries about each other and where we can go from there.
PAM: Absolutely. And what helped encourage me to have those conversations was moving away from the idea of boundaries. And instead, I started using the idea of comfort zones. And what that shift from boundaries to comfort zones reminded me to do was to bring my sense of self. So, it’s not about, “I have no boundaries now, do whatever,” again. It’s never about taking our needs out of the equation. It’s more fully bringing our needs into the moment and into that conversation without having to draw that line in the sand.
So, boundaries feel external to me while comfort zones feel internal. Comfort zones remind me to open up and lean in rather than to stand there right behind the line.
ANNA: Right. And, for me, it’s that line in the sand that I wanted to avoid. And with comfort zones, I just like the feel of it, because we do talk about stretching and growing our comfort zones, and I think all of my relationships have helped me do that.
I think we can come into all of our relationships with some pretty rigid ideas of how things should be. And that can stem from our childhood experiences, the prevailing relationship ideas around us, what’s being modeled for us. But those rigid beliefs don’t take into account the actual humans that we’re living with, how they see the world, what feels good to them, how they process information, what they want to accomplish and learn. And that’s where the curiosity and the communication that we’re talking about comes into play.
I don’t have to stretch my comfort zone, but I want to be open to examining it, especially if it’s somehow putting a limit on someone else. And so, that’s why, in general, I just prefer to look at needs. If we have a situation where we’re at an impasse, if we switch the focus to the underlying needs, then we have more room to find the creative solutions that feel good to both of us. So, I like the feel of that again. It’s just a totally different paradigm.
PAM: It really is. And I love the way you framed that as needs. For me, that shift was that these conversations really ended up being less about the thing, the thing that we were in conflict about, and just more about the people involved, which fully included me, and that’s where the needs come in.
Being curious about what the person is needing or wanting to do and understanding the motivation behind that.
Why is that the next step that makes the most sense to them? And why is that next step right at the edge of my comfort zone? Why is that needling at me? And when we better understand those pieces, we can better explain our perspective and needs to them, which gives them the opportunity to understand us better.
And then, from there, maybe they give us more information that we didn’t think of, information that addresses our need. Maybe we give them a piece of information that they missed, and together we find a different way to meet their need. There’s just so much more space for people to move when you take out the competitive nature of that hard line and just start playing, just start thinking, just start sharing what your needs are, what you’re wanting to accomplish, and seeing where that goes. We can be so much more creative when you take that competitive nature out, I think.
ANNA: Right! Because, as humans, if we’re backed into a corner, we’ll defend something to the death even if we don’t agree with it. It’s just this reaction when someone’s coming at us to start defending. But you see that very different exchange that you were just talking about. It’s like, “Well, here’s what I’m feeling worried about.” “Oh, okay. Well, what about this then? What about that?” We’re working together to try to make both of us feel comfortable, both of us feel good moving forward, and it’s just so different.
PAM: Yeah, and I like how it feels, understanding that I’m choosing to stretch my comfort zone rather than naming it in my self-talk as, “I failed to defend my boundary.” It’s night and day how that feels. “I failed,” or “I chose.” And we can also choose to just not stretch, but we can choose to operate completely outside our comfort zone for a while. Sometimes a situation needs me to do something that in any other circumstances I would not choose to do, but this is where I am right now, and that’s not a failure either.
ANNA: Right. And I think relationships give us so many opportunities to do that, to stretch, but also to just step outside for a minute to take care of business. But I always want to ground myself in the choice. And you mentioned it before.
So, I’m not great at parties. Again, this is a well-known fact. If David wants to go to a party with his friends, it will no doubt stretch my comfort zone. But instead of feeling pressured or as if I need to set a boundary around it, I can first ground myself in the fact that I always have a choice. And then I can also feel that choice and I can bring into play my whys.
In this case, I want to support him. He thinks it’ll be a fun night. And so, with some further conversation, we can figure out a way for it to feel good to us both. Maybe for me, that’s knowing where it will be, who will be there, how long will we need to stay. Should I drive separately? If that doesn’t feel good, can we agree not to stay too late?
That conversation helps us learn more about each other. He’s learning what my concerns are, also what my tender areas are, and I’m learning why it’s important to him and what parts he’s looking forward to and why he wants to go in the first place. And if I just shut that down summarily, “I don’t go to parties, I don’t like them,” we’d miss this chance to dig into that and to find something that feels good to both of us.
PAM: Yes. And that is the beauty of comfort zones for me versus boundaries. It encourages me to actually pay attention to the moment, to the context of the moment, versus, this is my line. This is always my line.
Conversations are so much richer and our relationship connections are strengthened, not strained. I love that piece. When we have that boundary, “I don’t go to parties,” that’s just what we pull out. But remembering my why, and everybody’s why, I can support the why and the joy and all those pieces.
And there are times when I’m feeling resourced, when I’m just in a great place and I can stretch my comfort zone a bit and we can enjoy this thing together. Maybe we’re not enjoying the same pieces, but we can jigger things around so that there are also pieces that work for me. That’s so much richer and there’s just so many more experiences in our lives, like not literally having to do things, but our worlds are bigger when we know more about each other, when we can navigate those pieces.
Okay, so there’s one more aspect that we wanted to explore, and that’s the idea of capacity. I feel it fits so beautifully with this conversation of boundaries and comfort zones, because sometimes we do have a pretty hard limit on what we can physically or emotionally take on in a particular moment, and it can feel a bit more definitive than a comfort zone.
So, for example, having a migraine or being very tired can definitely impact our ability to engage. So, even if we’re not able to stretch right now, I think the idea of capacity just feels more informative and less confrontational. It feels more supportive of the conversations that we’re talking about than a boundary or a limit, or, “I can’t do this.”
It quickly communicates to ourselves and to the others involved in the conversation what we are feeling that we are and aren’t able to take on in this moment. It’s more information about us, again. And capacity can be a great lens to use for us to check in with ourselves and just really feel what’s up.
If our first reaction is, “Oh my god, no! I don’t want to go to a party!” Oh, where did that really strong reaction come from? Oh, maybe my capacity’s really low and I need to do something to address that.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. Yes. Capacity just feels so much more descriptive to me and it’s much more about the moment that we’re in, because my capacity at the end of a long day is very different from my capacity in the morning. And there can be so many things at play that come into this piece of capacity. Sleep, money, time, illness, all of these different factors.
But what I want to do with all exchanges with the people I love is to keep us on the same side. They aren’t trying to thwart me or harm me. We’re all just trying to get our needs met. And as we keep those lines of communication open, we build trust in each other to work together to help meet all of our needs.
And another idea that a friend introduced to me related to capacity is that we can operate within our capacity and survive, but we might not be able to thrive. So, we’re kind of on the edge of our capacity and we can physically get it done, but it might be taking an emotional toll or even a physical toll, so that when we keep choice in that equation, we can choose to operate within our capacity to thrive. We can communicate that to the people in our lives and help them do the same.
So, I can honor who I am and still support my partner or child, and they can honor who they are and still consider those around them. It’s really important to me to honor someone else’s comfort zone or their personal definition of capacity, even if I don’t understand it or I think they could do more.
This, again, comes into play with our partners and our children. Our honoring of this helps them develop a strong sense of what works for them and their why. I want to trust their process and that they will stretch when it feels right to them. And so, maybe it’s helpful next time we bump up against someone when we think they could do a bit more than maybe they are, is to consider that maybe they’re operating within their capacity to thrive, not their capacity to survive. And wouldn’t it be beautiful if we could all stay in that thriving zone as much as possible?
Because there are going to absolutely be times where we are pushed way outside of it to deal with an emergency or because something has happened around us that we can’t control. But what if, when we see our loved one not doing something that we think they could, we give them that generous assumption that it’s really just them knowing themselves, knowing that whatever it is may push them over an edge that is into survival mode versus thriving. I just love that framing of it as we look at another person and maybe, hopefully it stops the judgment.
PAM: Oh yes. I love looking at things through their eyes, which we had talked about earlier. And even when we don’t understand why they’re making the choices they’re making, remembering that we don’t need to, that it is making sense to them, even if we think that they should be able to do X, Y, or Z.
It doesn’t matter. What matters and what’s interesting, that’s where my curiosity goes, is, “Ooh. That’s feeling really good to them.” And remembering that their choices really aren’t about me. They are not trying to piss me off with this choice. There is some reason for them.
So, I love that distinction between thriving and surviving. Because when we honor those choices, it just gives us another piece of the picture of who they are and understanding that there can be so many reasons why for them. Capacity can be a reason why they aren’t up for it or don’t want to stretch or do the thing that you know that they are capable of doing sometimes.
And it’s especially helpful to question the boundaries that are handed to us by society. One that we see held up often in conventional culture is, “I’m not going to do something for someone else that they can do for themselves.” Oh my gosh. “They need to learn how to take care of themselves.” You see it more often with children, but absolutely you see it with adults, too, that if we do it for them, we are being taken advantage of.
ANNA: But really, we’re just missing these opportunities to deepen that relationship. And then what I’ve seen, and I know you’ve seen it, too, is that when I’m feeling out of sorts and I’m just not wanting to get my own water or whatever it is, both my partner and my kids were happy to bring it over to me because that’s the relationship that we cultivated.
I don’t want to die on a hill of, “I’m not going to do something for you, because you can do it for yourself.” I do things for people all the time that they can absolutely do for themselves. I do it from a place of love and because it’s within my capacity. And when it’s not, I know they’ve got my back. And these skills are critical in all relationships, understanding it’s about learning to communicate more about my needs versus expecting them to understand it or stand behind this strongly-drawn boundary with no explanation. It’s just more information and transparency. The more we have, the easier it is to be in relationship. And, for me, the human experience is relationships.
PAM: It’s relationships. I know. And when you think about it, the more information that you have, it is so often so much easier to find that path through those pieces of information. If I only have two pieces, “They want to do this,” and, “I don’t want them to do this,” how do you find a path between the chasm of those two things?
But as we share a little bit more information back and forth, we’re narrowing in on the path that we can travel between those. Sometimes it takes three sentences and off we go, we’ve got it figured out. And sometimes it takes longer conversations, maybe over days and weeks, but we can find our way.
ANNA: I mean, it’s just a quick way for me to go, “Hmm. Okay. I want to turn this around a little bit. I want to look at what’s happening to get us back on the same side,” because even when it feels really hard, and it may take a couple weeks to figure out something that’s really big that we’re trying to figure out as a family or a couple, if we’re both over here together working on the problem, it feels so much better than being on these separate sides with this giant decision in front of us, and we’re not really communicating about what our capacity or comfort zones are or any of those pieces. And it feels isolating and tough. But when we’re together, even if it takes us time, it just feels better. It’s about being open about it and examining that and seeing what makes sense to you and it’s so individual.
PAM: Yeah, it’s so individual. It’s so rich. And as we talked about in an earlier episode, where do we want to spend our time? Do I want to spend my time on the same team working together? Finding a way? Because when you’re working together and finding your way together, you’re both invested in this path at the end of it, rather than one powering over another, convincing you to do it this way, or us convincing them to do it this way. But then there’s tears at the relationship. And then we need to invest the work in, in repairs.
So, for this week, we have some fun questions for you to ponder around the ideas of boundaries, comfort zones, and capacities.
The first is, think of a boundary you hold right now with your partner or a close friend. What might be gained from having some conversations around it? Might it give them some more helpful information about you, help you feel more seen and heard in the relationship?
I think that’s another big piece. A boundary only shares that little line of information. It doesn’t share all the little pieces of me that came up with that in the first place.
ANNA: And can we really be understood if they don’t understand those other pieces? They can still honor that boundary. And maybe that feels okay, but with a partner who I’m in love with and this is who I want to be with, that deeper understanding of why that is a rub for me would be so much more important to me than them just honoring what might feel like an arbitrary boundary to them.
PAM: Exactly. Without that information, it can feel like an arbitrary boundary. And absolutely, they can still respect it, but there is a richness that’s missing then that’s the only piece of communication.
Okay, so next, how does the idea of using comfort zones to better understand and communicate your needs land with you? Does that make sense? Maybe try that framework and that language next time and see how it unfolds. Remember, as we talked about, let’s play with this. Let’s see. Nothing is a forever commitment. It’s like, “Oh my gosh, I’m going to try this comfort zone thing, and now I can never use any other language.” No. Play with it.
ANNA: We’re just having fun. We’re just learning things. We’re just trying to learn more about ourselves.
PAM: Yes, yes. Okay. Next one. How often do you operate outside of your capacity to thrive? Another great question, just to dive into that self-awareness piece. It may not be something that we communicate very often, but understanding it about ourselves, noticing how often we are stepping outside of our capacity to thrive more in survival mode. And then that also can help us understand why we’re feeling tired, why we don’t feel like we have a lot of energy, what kind of self-care pieces that we can bring in there. Anyway, it’s a great question to start with. How often do you operate outside of your capacity to thrive?
ANNA: Because I think it also impacts our relationships. So, our culture values this operating at just survival mode. And so, it’s something we all fall into, schools and work and all the things that we’re doing. And so, it is a really interesting question to say, “Am I able to thrive and have the relationships that I want and do the things that bring joy to me? And what can I change?” So, it’s like, “Am I operating outside of that and then what would that look like?” So, I think, yeah, that’s going to be really interesting.
PAM: Yes. And our last one, can you think of times that you didn’t trust someone else’s definition of their capacity? Ooh, that’s a good one. How did it play out? Did it impact your relationship? It’s very curious to see what other people’s lens of their capacity is. As you were saying, are they just living through the cultural expectation that we survive, we go till we drop, put it all in, we are productive to the max. Are they bringing that in?
ANNA: And I want to add to this one a little bit, that sometimes when we are in that survival mode, when we are pushing, pushing, pushing, we can have resentment towards someone that’s choosing differently. And that resentment may not even make a lot of sense to us, but I think when you look at it through this lens, it’s like, oh, wait a minute. Do I really want to be resentful or passing judgment on someone that’s actually taking care of their mental health and doing this for self-care, just because I’m running my nose to the grindstone?
So, I think it’s really interesting. For me, again, it’s this awareness. It’s like, when we name these things, we’re able to distance ourselves. It doesn’t feel like it’s all who we are. We can go, “Okay, this is something I can examine. I can play with it. I can see how it feels.” You don’t have to make changes, but playing with it just gives you so much more information. And especially if you see it causing a problem in a relationship, it’s very much worth your time to look at those pieces.
PAM: Yeah. Oh, that’s one of the reasons why we are so excited to be sharing these questions, because we are not trying to get rid of some rules or paradigms and then being prescriptive about how, now you must do it this way. No, let’s play with these ideas. These are things that we’ve found helpful in our relationships, paradigm shifts that have helped us. There is no expectation that it will work out any particular way for anyone else, but it is so worth the time to play with it.
ANNA: And especially if you’re feeling pinches, because I think that’s the thing, if our relationships are humming along, then we’ve got a good understanding. Whatever we’re doing is working.
But when we start to feel the pinch, when we start to feel a distance, when we have a rupture for whatever reason, using these things that we’re talking about can help us really kind of zero in versus standing in a place of hurt or not really knowing how to make the repair or not knowing how to change it even if we can make the repair, because we don’t know how we got there.
And so, these pieces allow us to play with that and to look at it and be like, “Okay, I’m going to be more intentional about this piece for these relationships that are important to me.”
PAM: Yeah. And for the moving forward piece, like standing there, “I don’t know how we got there,” and two weeks later, “I don’t know how we got there.”
ANNA: We’re here again!
PAM: Okay. Thank you so much for listening and we will see you next time. Bye.
ANNA: Bye bye.
EU390: When School Isn’t Working
Aug 28, 2025
On this episode of Exploring Unschooling, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about when school isn’t working. In the northern hemisphere, many children are going “back to school” and so, we wanted to share some thoughts about what can happen when school just isn’t working for your child.
In our conversation, we talked about changes you might notice in your child, about the choices that we have when it comes to living and learning, and about the value of community during that big transition away from mainstream schooling.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts today, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. In this episode, we’re going to be talking about what you might do when school isn’t working for your child. But before we dive in, I’d just like to take a moment to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network.
There is just so much value in walking alongside others on this journey, particularly any kind of unconventional journey like when school isn’t working for our child, because while everyone’s journey is unique, many of us face similar obstacles and challenges. And that is where the power of community shines in feeling seen and heard by others.
In the Network, you can learn from the experiences of other parents on similar journeys, draw inspiration from their a-ha moments, and gain insights from the unique and creative ways they navigate both their own and their family’s needs. To learn more, just follow the link in the show notes. And Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would. Oh goodness. This topic has been coming up a lot over the last few months, really this year, and we just thought it was important to create a space to talk about it. I’m excited about today, because the truth is school doesn’t work for everyone.
Instead of the message that people tend to hear, which is, “There’s something wrong with your child. Let’s do X, Y, or Z to fix your child,” we wanted to say, it’s okay. It’s okay if a particular environment doesn’t work for your child. Parents will tie themselves up in knots trying to make it work and make themselves sick thinking that there’s something wrong with their child or that they’ve done something wrong as a parent, when again, it really just is an environment that doesn’t work for everyone.
And when we think about how people are different, which if you’ve been here any amount of time, you know we talk about a lot, it can help so much in this situation. Because we just are so different. Our brains process information differently. We prioritize things differently. We have different sensitivities and capacities and all of it is just fine.
The journey is in learning more about ourselves and what we need to thrive. And often that just can’t happen in a one size fits all environment. And honestly, how could one size fit all? We’re so different. It’s amazing that it works as much as it does, and we know there are a lot of issues along the way, even for those where it “works”.
I feel like when we think about people and how we work, some people need to move to think, pacing around helps them really solidify an idea. Others like music to help calm a busy mind and that focuses them on the task at hand. Some people like to deep dive into a subject and are not coming up for air for weeks to understand all of the nuances. Others like to flit around and find patterns. They’re pulling from different arenas, to get this bigger web of learning and picture for themselves. None of those types are served in a school environment where it’s, “Sit still. Be quiet. Do this now.” Bell rings, “Do something completely different now.” That’s the way they play the game there. And it doesn’t work for a lot of brains.
And as soon as we turn a discerning eye to it, we can see why they need to do it that way. It often boils down to crowd management. And this is not about teachers. Teachers are incredible.They’re devoting their lives to creating a wonderful environment, but it just can’t meet the needs of all children. I mean, it just can’t.
So, we see then that it’s not about something being wrong with our child, but it’s more about what our particular child needs to thrive and learn. And it just might not be able to happen in a traditional school environment.
The good news is there are options. Whether it’s an alternative school that maybe can address particular needs of a child or homeschooling or unschooling, there are so many different ways to find what works. Because we’re learning creatures. In a safe, affirming environment, we have almost an unlimited capacity to learn.
Here, we talk a lot about unschooling, because it is what worked for our families. And I do believe it provides a great environment for us to learn more about ourselves and what we need to thrive. Then with that knowledge, we can take that into all sorts of environments and find our own unique path.
I feel passionate about this particular thing because we’ve met so many parents along the way on the Network and in other realms and they are feeling so terrible. And I just want them to know that there’s nothing wrong with a child that doesn’t fit in traditional school.
Seeing children shine for being exactly who they are is a beautiful gift that changes that child. And honestly, it changes us, too. And I’m going to even say it changes the world. So, I’m pretty passionate about this.
ERIKA: I think it does change the world. I don’t even think that’s an exaggeration. This is such a beautiful topic. I would love to pass along the message that there is nothing wrong with you. There’s nothing wrong with your family. There’s nothing wrong with your child if you’re finding that school is not a fit. It just makes sense. People are so different.
It makes sense that the one-size-fits-all model is not going to work. At the beginning of my unschooling journey, and I think for a lot of people, there are these huge paradigm shifts. When you’re first starting to just even consider, “Should I, or can I, opt out of this system?”
I remember reading John Holt and reading John Taylor Gatto and really, Gatto in particular is very vehement in his arguments against school. And as someone who went to a lot of school and did very well, I feel like reading those kinds of alternative voices did help me a lot in those beginning days.
They helped me to wrap my head around this huge paradigm shift, realizing I didn’t really think about all of those negative pieces when I was just doing what I was told to do and achieving in that system. My children are what sparked me to do that investigation and dive into those topics.
But it did help me to listen to this podcast, to read Pam’s books, and all of these other voices giving me alternatives to what I had always heard my entire life growing up. And so, I don’t know if scary is quite the right word, but it was a really big moment in my brain.
I felt like school worked for me. I thought it was going to work for my kids. Now that I’m looking at it, maybe it didn’t work as well for me as I thought it did. I can now see new possibilities for my children and especially when I’m looking at kids who are neurodiverse, who have very particular interests and strong interests. I was just picturing that kind of bustling, busy, loud school environment and just not seeing how that could work well for my sensitive first child.
And the journey began there. But it is fun to know how many options there are. And to me, the way that I view unschooling is it’s like we have every option now. If they do want to go back to school, that’s okay too. Because it’s all about learning, learning more about ourselves, learning more about our kids, and then making choices that feel good and feel empowering to us and being able to shift when things aren’t working. So, yeah, I love it.
PAM: Yes. Love it. Love it. And I think that is a place that we get to too in that, at first, I didn’t even know it was a choice. So, for me, that was one of the reasons when, way back when, when I started writing and sharing a little bit more online. It was just so people knew it was a choice. That was an a-ha moment. Mind blown. Like, oh, they don’t have to go to school. This was, I was just doing the calculations, 23 years ago. 23 years ago. It is so interesting when you can recognize, oh, it is a choice. It doesn’t have to be that way.
And then you can get to that place of learning, like you said, Erika, that these other choices are valid too, that it’s not a failure. I didn’t fail because this environment doesn’t fit for my kids. And a lot of the messaging still is around fixing the kids and getting the kids ready so that they are ready to fit into this environment, et cetera.
But yes, there are more and more voices now and it’s much more well known that these are options and these don’t work for everyone, each one doesn’t work for everybody. And then, if the kids do come home or you just choose not to go, and like you said, Erika, it is totally cool too if they at some point decide they want to try it. At that point, it’s not about school or not school, it’s about what works for this child? What would this child like to do? What things do they want to try? I like to think of learning as a big buffet table and school is a plate on the table, that is a choice you can make.
But before I learned about this, before my mind was blown, it was the only plate on the table. That’s all I knew, right? But now there are so many plates. There is truly a buffet there, and you’re less tied to a particular choice and it’s more about helping each person, us included, because we don’t stop learning just because we’re adults, right? Seeing what choice we want to make in this moment and trying it out and knowing we still have a choice. We can try something and we’re not getting out of it what we thought we were going to get out of it, or we did for a while and now it’s no longer working. That’s totally okay. We can change our mind or we can say that’s enough of that dish. It comes back to our choices.
And I came to that understanding and realization for my kids through learning that school was a choice, and coming to the point to see that when school’s not working, it’s not about blaming the child and needing to fix the child.
This environment, like you said, Anna, is set up this way because it’s efficient. Teachers are doing their best with the environment as it is and stretching it. When my kids went to school, we had teachers that worked with us, but still there’s only so much they can do.
There’s the constrained environment of, these are the hours, these are how many kids are in a class. All those pieces. So, it really was, for me, just getting through that initial tendency to blame or to feel like it was a failure to move away from it and to recognize that buffet table that’s really there and that those choices all have value, more or less, just depending on the person who’s at the table trying to decide what they want to partake of in this moment.
ANNA: I love that, because I feel like it’s an empowering place, to realize that it’s a choice and we get to choose. Because I think environments that are big systems like that, I think of medical systems, but also the school system, they drive off of a sense of urgency. And so it’s very much like, “You have to do it this way.” There’s one way and you’ve got to do it and you’ve got to do it now, or there are going to be dire consequences. So, there’s a lot of language that is directed at parents that feels very intense and scary. “If you don’t do this, it’ll never happen.”
And that’s what’s so valuable about the Network, but also these podcasts, but other environments as well. But in the Network, you see all of these children who have learned to read and who are pursuing their passions and who are doing all these different things that did not follow that one very narrow course that school lays out. And so, it can help you build confidence. And that’s looking more externally.
Because I would also say, just look at your child, because look at what kids learn without any help at all. Maybe not any help but facilitation, but learning to walk, learning to talk, all the things that happen before school even comes into the picture. Just ground into, okay, I have this unique child in front of me. Look at how much they love this thing.
And especially, and I love that you mentioned neurodiversity because, if you have a child that’s deep diving into this passion about dinosaurs or trains or something that they love, you see the learning that’s happening. It just doesn’t happen to be fitting into what they need at school. It’s not across these multiple things. But what we talk about in the network and what you know, being around other people that are living this lifestyle can help you see the web of learning that’s coming out from those individual interests.
The web of learning that child is creating as they understand where the trains go and how the trains are built, and who’s running the trains and all the things. That is actually what learning is. So yes, in a school environment, they need to make it. What’s the word?
Conform? They need to make a system that they can plug people into, but we have the ability in our individual families to create the environment where we each can thrive. And I think even if you just take a minute to think about just the people in your immediate family. Look at the differences there.
I think that, again, will help you see it. Because I can think about my husband who is a very tactile, experiential learner, and he’s brilliant, but it’s different from me. I like to read, I like to take in information that way. I’m not really an auditory learner. And then I look at this daughter and she learns this way and this daughter, and I realize there are so many ways that we can learn and move through the world. I think as soon as you recognize that choice, like you said, Pam, it just opens up everything.
ERIKA: I love that you mentioned that, individualized versus standardized. And I think even in school, they want it to be individualized. If it could be, that would be the dream, but it’s just not feasible. There are too many kids, not enough teachers. You just can’t make everything individualized for every kid. And so, by doing it on our own and just following our children’s interests, we’re able to make their lives a perfectly individualized instruction plan, if you wanted to call it that.
That looks nothing like school, but is allowing them to dive so deep into the things that are interesting to them. And I know on the podcast in the past we’ve talked about learning and school learning and natural learning. In school they’re really pulling the skills out away from, from the context. That’s something that is hard for many children. If growing up it felt like math is so hard and doesn’t make sense, it’s probably because in school it’s completely divorced from any reason to do it, any kind of context at all.
And so what’s great about taking the learning out of school is that then context is everything. If, if there’s a reason to learn something, then they learn it. There’s a reason to read, which there is in every field. There’s a reason to want to read. And so, then they want to read and they learn how to read.
I’ve seen that happen over and over again with other children that I know as well. And just the feeling that I have from watching my children get to these big learning moments in their own way. In a way that they have ownership of that. It’s just so amazing and beautiful that my kids feel like they have done it on their own. I don’t think they would say they taught themselves to read because the word taught doesn’t really even make sense. But it’s they did that themselves. They know how to read because they figured out how to read. And of course I have played a big role in it, but that’s not what they remember.
They remember that they figured it out. It made sense to them. And so, when you’re coming out of the school environment or starting to question school, it might be those things like, but what about math? And what about the reading? And I don’t know, my child isn’t meeting these benchmarks and how are they going to do it?
It really is just a complete paradigm shift to realize there’s plenty of time and people don’t need to learn things on the same timetable. Following our interests is a path towards learning these underlying skills that will be necessary, for anything that you want to do in life. And learning them with that context makes it so much easier to learn.
PAM: Yeah, I love that piece because I think when we can recognize that school isn’t working for our child and even look for alternative ways, choose homeschooling, choose unschooling, etc., but so much of that journey away is our work to do our paradigm shifts because. School can often be so ingrained for us.
So even if we take our kid out, we can be looking for learning that looks like school learning. We can be looking for progress that looks like school progress because learning in school feels so linear. So step by step by step and learning in action really doesn’t look that way. It can look like
soaking up like a whole bunch and then looking stagnant for a while as it percolates, processes in the background and builds our web of understanding, our connections, that context.
Or something’s hard right now, it’s just not clicking right now. And then maybe just moving on to something else. And then we are finding the next step is this, and the next step is this and you’ll see them get there, but it will look so different. It can come from somewhere different and then just zoom up. It can be months and months and months, and then all of a sudden, a whole bunch happens, big leaps. So, it really doesn’t look like school learning.
Marks go up and down and people have good, easy seasons and harder seasons at school. It’s not so much that it fits with everybody, but it is the way it needs to be presented because we have so many days and we have so many topics that we have to cover. So, it gets chunked out that way, very linearly.
And we have a big group of kids, so math does look like a worksheet. It doesn’t look like how we use numbers out in the world because we don’t have a lot of time to create those situations. But we can create worksheets where you can practice those skills.
So it is that shift for us. Not only choosing not to send our kids to school. But also then it comes to understanding that the way we thought learning looked, the way it looks in school, the way it’s marked, graded in school, etc. It looks really different when we take out the school environment or take the child out of the school environment. We need to also take all the school think and school lenses that we’re using and, and find new ones.
Because when we look to our child and we engage with our child and we watch them in action, we see this learning in action. And it’s not that it’s not happening, it just looks very different. I remember like people fresh from bringing their kids home and they’re like, they’re not learning anything. Yes, I know it doesn’t look like they’re learning anything, but that’s because you’ve got your school glasses on and you’re only looking for learning that looks like learning does in school. But actually, if you try to take those off and look at what they are doing. You can see it.
It just doesn’t happen to look that way, the way school tells us it will look. It’s so fun.
ANNA: I think looking at ourselves, I loved that you said that Erika, you even took the lens looking back at your own journey because you were super successful in school. Most people from the outside would say it worked for you, but you were able to look at it and go, oh, maybe not.
But it’s interesting, because it reminds me of a story with my dad who was an engineer and he did well in school and did graduate work and all the things, but he was also just so engaged and loved learning. And so when my kids were young and I had all the unschooling books everywhere, all over the house, he would read them and we’d have conversations when they were little and he said, ‘School was fine for me. But I can see that it wouldn’t work for everyone and how different it would be if there were choices.’ Because he had friends that he thought of how different it would’ve been for them to not be carrying the weight of thinking there was something wrong with them because they didn’t fit in the environment.
But he said, we just didn’t really have another way to look at it. And so I loved that he could recognize that because again, some people do fine but others don’t and there’s nothing wrong with them. Those are brilliant minds that just look at things in a different way and that linear path, I mean it’s more narrow regardless. I think people that even do well on the linear path, it’s fine, but if they were to stay there, their life would be a little bit boring. But I think they take it and then they move beyond it, especially after school. But there are some kids that just want to move beyond from the beginning. They look at things differently and take information in differently.
And so allowing that context and for things to make sense and having conversations really understanding how our brain works is just so valuable. I would love for people that are thinking about this to get excited. To think, this thing that I’m looking at, maybe it has been judged as a failure or that something’s wrong. But I can get excited about learning about myself and about my child.
We can find the ways that work for us. So because it really is so fun and amazing, and I think community can be helpful, that is why we talk about the network, especially in these situations where you’re making a big transition because really seeing the thoughtful, amazing, brilliant other people and what they’re learning and what’s happening for their families and what’s happening with their children can just really just bolster and give us this beautiful space to share our own journey with people who understand.
ERIKA: Right, especially if the environment we’re currently in does not have much space for alternative thinking. Finding the people that you can have those deeper conversations with when you’re first doing all of that questioning, I think is really amazing. And of course the network is an awesome place for it.
I was also thinking that it’s a fun little exercise to think back about what you remember from school. Because for me that was a big one where it was like, okay, wait, I could say that it’s so important that they learn all these things, but then do I remember those things and does it matter now?
Just little thinking experiments like that to think about, what are my big takeaways from being in school? And what did I get out of it? I think we’ve talked a lot of times about the unschooling journey and how it just opens our brains up to questioning everything.
And this moment of being curious and wondering, is school really the best option for my kid? It can be that moment of, let me question this and then let me question this. And then everything opens up. And what I’ve found is that in the meantime, the kids just keep on living their best life.
And because they already know what they wanna do, you know? And so if we can support them in the things that they really love to do. And then we see that, okay, when they’re really having fun, they’re learning a whole lot. Um, like that really was a, that was a big turning point for me.
And I remember having the realization that I could follow their happiness and joy.
We are having a really great life. They are learning so much. If I’m constantly there as the support in helping them live their best, most joyful life, I don’t know, that became my focus, especially when they were young, when I was turning away from the idea of putting them into school.
That was a new thing for me to focus on. And when I saw them, just getting so excited and pumped up about a certain topic or whatever, and then they wanted to learn more and then I could bring something else. Those moments were so fun and really gave me confidence in our decision to not go to school.
ANNA: And just to build on something you said real quickly before we wrap up, kids are learning before they go to school. You can see it. Again, acquiring language, walking, colors, animals, all the things. And we as adults are learning long after school as well. And so when you can just go, oh yeah, I don’t have to go to school to learn something and put yourself into that process of, what do I need when I’m interested in something, what do I do? I gather information, I find a mentor. Whatever the things are, then you start to realize they don’t have a lock on learning. That’s what our culture wants us to think, that you can only learn in this one type of environment.
But there are so many examples across the spectrum of how we all learn at different ages without that one environment. So, you can let go of that weight and really find what works for you and your family.
PAM: Yeah, and I think what Erika was saying, leaning into our kids, that’s the great next step because that’s what helps us see, like you’re saying, there’s not one way to learn in this age range, right?
Recognizing that we do it before and we do it after, and then leaning into seeing our kids doing it to help us realize and recognize how much learning happens even without school. So, like I was talking about earlier, looking for learning to look like school. We don’t need it.
And when we lean in and watch our kids, we see they have their interests. They’re thrilled to have the time now to dive deeper into things if they’re leaving school. It’s just beautiful to watch and just helps us shift and really open up. We realize what learning looks like and it’s just so beautiful and fun.
ERIKA: Can I share one more thought? I just was thinking maybe we could also put a few links in the show notes to Deschooling, a few deschooling episodes. Because that word deschooling is what we use to describe that process of getting rid of some of those school thoughts. That might be a good next step as well.
PAM: Yes, we will put those in the show notes. That’s awesome. Thank you. And thank you so much to both of you. What a very fun conversation. And as we mentioned, we invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network to dive into these kinds of conversations anytime with other kind and thoughtful parents, and we are very excited to welcome you. To learn more and join us, just follow the link in those show notes. Wishing everyone a very lovely day!
EU110FB: Unschooling Dads and Music with Alan Marshall
Aug 14, 2025
In this episode, we’re sharing a conversation that Pam had with unschooling dad Alan Marshall in 2018. At the time, Alan was a professional musician and a university music professor with three kids at home. Pam and Alan talked about his family’s journey to unschooling, his eldest’s transition to junior high, ways to approach music lessons, and advice for dads just starting out with unschooling.
We hope you enjoy the conversation!
QUESTIONS FOR ALAN
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and how did your family’s choice to embrace unschooling unfold?
You’ve been unschooling for almost a decade now. What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Your eldest chose to go to junior high school a couple of years ago. How did she find the transition, and have found it challenging to weave school and your unschooling principles together?
You’re also a university professor, teaching music, and I’d love to dive into that with you. When a child expresses interest in music or an instrument, so often the first thing parents jump to is lessons. Piano lessons. Guitar lessons. Violin lessons. In your experience, is that the best first step?
When a child has expressed an interest in an instrument and parents have rented or purchased one, the conventional advice is for us to strongly encourage them to practice regularly, if not daily. Yet that can soon be met with growing resistance. What are your tips for navigating that situation?
In the bigger picture, how do you see unschooling and learning music—or any other art—weaving together?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hi everyone, I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and today I’m here with Alan Marshall. Hi Alan!
ALAN: Hello.
PAM: Hello! Alan is an unschooling dad, a professional musician, and a university professor. I’ve come across him online, and I’m really excited to get to chat with him in person! To get us started …
Can you share with us a little bit about you and your family?
ALAN: Sure. My wife Melody and I are both musicians, and we have three kids. Our oldest daughter is Adie, our middle daughter is Kate, and our youngest son is Gabriel. They are fourteen, nine, and five years old.
We have been unschooling from the very beginning. We started learning about the principles of unschooling back when our oldest, Adie, was first born. And we did a lot of research at that time and decided that we would unschool when she became school age. So, all of our children started unschooling from the beginning of when they would have gone to school, which here, where we live, we live in Oklahoma, is age five. We live in Oklahoma in the US, in a fairly small community, in southeastern Oklahoma. Ada, Oklahoma.
How did you come across unschooling, when your first child was born? Or around that time. I’m always curious as to where people actually hear it.
ALAN: Around that time, yes. Just a few months old.
I had thought about the idea of homeschooling, and so started to do some research online with the idea that we might homeschool. And before too long, came across a lot of resources about unschooling and found that really appealing, and so got a lot of information when our oldest was really young, and started to apply the principles of unschooling very early.
For all intents and purposes, from birth, in terms of sleep times and sleep patterns and baby wearing and unlimited nursing and, so, that’s something that’s been part of how we parented from the beginning.
PAM: Oh, that’s really wonderful. So when school age came, your days didn’t really change at all, did they?
ALAN: No they didn’t at all. Where we live in Oklahoma the school requirements are really easy. You literally don’t have to do anything. You just don’t ever sign up for school, and there’s no other requirements. So, for us, there was really no change that came when they became school age.
PAM: And now, you guys have been unschooling for almost a decade. Right?
ALAN: Right on 10 years…Yes.
PAM: Ah, yay. Good math!
ALAN: Our oldest became school age in ‘08. Age five here, compulsory kindergarten. She could have gone to compulsory kindergarten, but that is not required here.
What has surprised you the most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
ALAN: Well, there have been a lot of common surprises as far as how things are for the children. Learning things in ways that my wife and I grew up believing sort of tacitly, aren’t possible. Like learning to read in a week.
With our oldest daughter, something that was really surprising for me, even after doing research and understanding the principles behind it, the fact that my daughter just decided to set her own bedtime at a very early age, without being coerced or told or even had it mentioned to her, really, as I pointed to before, was just not on the list of possibilities. But starting at about age seven-ish, seven or eight or so, she just decided that she wanted to go to bed about nine o’clock every night and to wake up at about six in the morning every morning, and that’s what she still does all the time today.
The common point of view is that that’s really not possible, that if you let somebody, or a child, stay up as long as they want, they will just stay up late all the time, for their entire life, and then sleep in, unless they’re given a reason not to. But for some people, maybe that’s true, but for her, she prefers to go to bed early and to wake up early.
There were some humorous times that we had early on that we would ask if she would be willing to stay up a little later so that we wouldn’t need get up quite so early in the morning, back when we would need to get up with her to be safe, and you had the inconvenience of needing to get up at six in the morning with her, either my wife or I, because that’s what she preferred.
PAM: It’s so fun to see how they explore just all their choices, right? All their options and find what is unique to them. I always love hearing about all of the individual kids, because they’ve all hit on things that, like you said, totally unexpected, but they work so well for the individual, don’t they?
ALAN: Yeah. And it ended up working great for what she prefers to do and her priorities. It works perfectly for her. I’m kind of a night owl, so it doesn’t always work perfectly for me. We work that out.
You had asked what was surprising. Something else I think is surprising and continues to kind of surprise me is kind of how deep school-ish thinking and school-ish thoughts kind of run, for us as the parents. About the time that I think I really understand and really have it all down and feel like I know how unschooling should work—and it is good that I have some confidence having done it for a long time—but I always discover a new schoolish thought, or hear my father speaking, hear my father’s words coming out of my mouth, inadvertently, and have to rededicate myself to thinking differently and to doing things differently.
Again, you know, intellectually I knew that that would probably be the case, from having thought about it and read about it for a long time. But then something like that will happen and it’s a surprise, like, “Yes, indeed, it’s ingrained in me!”
PAM: That’s such a great point! Exactly, you don’t realize it. It’s buried really deep inside, and then things happen and all of the sudden it’s been chipped free and out it pops. Like you said, I know, you can realize it intellectually, but I think something that’s been helpful is to also be nice to myself when that happens, you know what I mean? You need to work on it and everything, but not beat yourself up. Because that gets in the way of moving through it, doesn’t it? That just adds yet another layer you have to work through.
ALAN: Oh yeah, absolutely. I don’t think it’s really helpful to feel like it’s not a big deal, like “All parents are like that. It’s just the way it’s meant to be.” That’s not good. But also, it’s not good to be so down on yourself that you made a mistake, that you don’t have the emotional ability to correct the mistake, to do better next time.
PAM: Yeah. You’re not like throwing up your hands, “I can’t do any better and this is just the way it is, right? Like you said, it’s amazing what you can find down there that’s like ‘WOW!’
ALAN: My oldest is 14, so puberty and the teenage years have recently brought out some of those surprising “Oh yes, here’s my dad, coming out.”
PAM: I know. And it’s true that as they reach different milestones, different ages, you just reach things that, in the context of unschooling, just haven’t come up before. Even as young adults, there’s so many conventional messages that we’ve grown up with that we all encounter along the way.
Your eldest chose to go to junior high school a couple of years ago. I was wondering if you could share a little bit about how she found that transition and whether or not you guys find it challenging to weave school and your unschooling principles together.
ALAN: Well, the transition for Adie has been surprisingly easy and positive for her. I’ve told a few people who I’ve talked to about it that unschooling was the perfect preparation for her to go to school because her attitude about school is just very different than any of her peers. I mean noticeably, very different.
If you go to talk to any of the teachers, to hear them talk about a student who wants to be there is really eye opening. Just the excitement they feel, to be able to have her there, because she truly wants to be there. That this was a decision that she made one her own—that this was what she wanted to do. And she has been, by any measure, successful so far in doing that. It’s been a positive experience for her, but also the feedback that we get from the school is that she’s wonderful. That she’s great. And I think that’s because she had a choice, she wants to do it.
And this was something that we made a careful decision about. It was actually a few years between when she first started expressing an interest in it. We explored it then, and then we took some time to really help her understand what it is, and to be sure that this is really the choice she wanted to make, that she really understood what would be expected of her, and that she had all the information, and that she didn’t have any misinformation about what school was like, where she might be surprised by things not be what she was really wanting.
But it turns out, for her—I think she’s pretty rare, but for her—it’s exactly what she wants. She wants to learn in that environment. She really likes structure, so she thrives on the rules and the structure. For her it’s really something that she enjoys. And because she could stop at any time, I think that makes it easier for her to submit herself to that structure. Because…
PAM: Absolutely. She’s got choice, right?
ALAN: There is no doubt in her mind that if she ever decided that she didn’t want to do that, she immediately could stop that. That really makes all the difference. And to experience that with somebody I’m close to and that I know—it’s really a revelation. Like I said, even for me, it was a surprise.
And she’s caught up in school, in what would seem like record time. When she first went to school, she couldn’t write at all. Like, she had literally never written anything more than her name. And it was just a few weeks, and she was writing like all of her peers can. And she’s taking algebra this year. She had a little help with math her first year, kind of individual tutoring a little bit, and now she’s taking algebra.
And I remember just a few days ago, she asked me to help her with some homework, because I was good at math in school, so I’m kind of the math parent, you know, kind of, “go ask your father.” And she was doing some kind of algebra thing that I’ve never heard of, and I was like, “I’m sorry. I don’t know if I can help you with this. When I was in school I didn’t really do this.”
So, she taught me to do it. And you know she’s doing the equations and stuff, and she’s like, “Well, you just do it like this.” So, she’s completely caught up. There was no effect of her not going to school that I know of, that I can think of or have heard about. A few weeks, a few months, and she’s just like any other peers, which of course you hear about quite often, what you learn, particularly in the early years in school, you can learn in a few months, if you want to, and she needed to, so she learned it!
PAM: Exactly. So, did she do much preparation schoolwork wise?
ALAN: She didn’t do any preparation.
PAM: Yeah. I just wanted to get that out there.
ALAN: I mean, literally nothing. She’s a late reader, and she learned to read not because she was going to go to school, but because she got a phone. She learned to read a few months before she went to school, just because she had exposure to letters and words visually. She would look up how to spell things on her phone, and that went on for maybe three weeks or so, and then she could read. So, I guess you could say she prepared by learning to read but she wasn’t thinking, ‘I need to prepare to learn to read because I am going to go to school.’ She just thought, ‘I need to learn to read because I want to read my phone.’ So, she just did it.
PAM: Exactly. A reason. A personal reason.
ALAN: Yes.
How have you and Melody found how to weaving that schedule into your lives? I would assume you don’t bring a lot of the school’s expectations into it, right?
ALAN: Of course not.
PAM: And that’s kind of the end of it, right?
ALAN: Yeah, and really, I kind of avoid knowing what her grades are. I don’t want that kind of school-ish thinking to kind of invade my attitudes. So, I just try to keep myself kind of ignorant of all that.
I mean, there have been some minor inconveniences in scheduling and getting her everyplace. She rides the bus, so she’s at school before I wake up in the morning, and she’s home in the afternoon. In many ways, I’m unaware of most of the school things.
Another impressive thing that she’s done to go to school, to decide she wants to go to school, she has completely done it independently. She makes her own lunch, she gets herself up, she goes to the bus. She’s responsible. She’s just taken responsibility for everything she needs to do to do it. Because, in her world, that’s just how you do it. It just didn’t occur to her to do anything other that everything she needed to do to do this thing that she wanted to—that was important to her.
So, in a lot of ways, because of her and because of her initiative, it hasn’t been too much of an inconvenience, or hasn’t interfered very much at all with what we want to do with our other children who are still unschooling. She just leaves in the morning comes back in the afternoon and joins us when she gets home, and everything is as it was before.
And so, again, I think we are fortunate with the way things are structured here where we live, that there’s not a lot of expectations on parents who have parents in school who we might think of as unreasonable or getting in the way or being heavy handed.
And we try to be involved in an appropriate way—go talk to the teachers and show our interest and support her, so we are not keeping it at arm’s length, or anything like that, but we don’t have a lot of pressure on us to do certain things. There have been some minor expenses involved with, as you’d expect.
PAM: That’s cool, and that’s such a great point: to be supportive of her and as involved as she’d like you to be, without that tipping over into expectations. Which is one of the reasons why you’re not interested in seeing the grades and stuff like that—you’re being careful not to tip over into having expectations or even, I guess, letting it play with your mind. As in, it’s just easy to think of: ‘good grades, that’s wonderful’ or ‘bad grades, uh oh.’ You know what I mean? It can affect your interactions.
ALAN: Yeah. The danger is that I could be really proud if she got As or something, and the impact that that could have on then, if I’m really proud, or if I’m sort of being effusive about that, and then sometime she doesn’t get As, or something, than what message is that sending, that that’s what’s important. It would probably be subtle, I would probably wouldn’t be obvious about it because I’m an unschooler, but there could probably be some subtle message sent there.
PAM: I know! Even not school-wise, with other things that my kids choose to do, I am careful to be as excited for them as they are for their accomplishment, because once you get into that, ‘Oh, I’m proud of you for…’ it kind of becomes about us. And then, you’re right—next time, if it doesn’t work out so well, then you’re stuck, and you’ve set yourself up for that judgement. Because it feels like a judgement coming from you, rather than support and excitement for them having accomplished whatever it is that they wanted to. It’s a subtle but really important difference, isn’t it?
ALAN: Yeah.
PAM: OK, now I wanted to dive into your experience as a professor teaching music. Because I think that music is another area that is really interesting to think of how we might bring an unschooling context to that. I came up with a couple examples that I have seen questions about over the years, and I wanted to get your perspective on them.
When a child expresses an interest in music or in an instrument, so often the first thing we jump to is lessons, because it’s often not something that we are personally skilled at. So, we sign them up for guitar lessons or piano lessons or violin lessons. I was wondering, in your experience, whether or not that’s the best first step when a child expresses an interest?
ALAN: I would say that it really depends on the situation very much. I would be really hesitant to make a blanket statement like, “Lessons are always the best thing to start with,’ or “Never start with lessons—that’s a disaster,” or that unschoolers should never have their children take lessons, because I think it really depends on the interest of the child and how the child acquired that interest.
It also depends on the reality of how you can learn to play the instrument, or whatever musical or artistic endeavor you’re doing. If you get interested in playing the harp, you know, the classical harp. That’s hard, that’s fairly hard to do on your own, for fun. It’s a very expensive instrument, it’s very specialized. Probably the best way to learn how to play the harp is to find somebody who already can play the harp and have them help you. Now, that doesn’t mean you have to give that person a cheque and have them give you formal lessons for 60 minutes per week, necessarily. But if you want to do something that specialized, you’re probably going to have to find somebody to help.
But the guitar, you can go on YouTube, and even if you don’t know anything about playing guitar, or anything about music, your child can go on YouTube and get free guitar lessons 24 hours a day. Guitars are more ubiquitous and inexpensive, and I think we all know of people—people who aren’t even unschoolers—who just learn to play the guitar for fun. And they don’t necessarily need formal lessons. They might want to take formal lessons at some point, or they might be a rock star and never need a lesson in their life.
So, it depends a lot on each individual situation, the temperament of the child—or the person who’s wanting to learn, doesn’t always have to be children. Adults can learn instruments and learn music too. And enjoy music too.
And also, the availability of lessons. And how, in your individual situation, taking lessons could involve pressure that isn’t helpful from the teacher. Sometimes the culture of music education is not as helpful as it could be in some places as in other places. If you can find a teacher who’s willing to work with your child and make it fun for them and not put pressure on them, then lessons could be a really great experience for them. But if you are in a situation where, it’s all practice, “You have to practice five hours a day, and I’m the teacher and you’re the student and you have to do what I say,”—they’re very regimented—taking lessons could decrease their interest in music rather than nurturing it.
I hate to give such a non-definite answer, but …
PAM: I’ve gotta say, it’s really an unschooling kind of answer, right, because it depends on the individual!
ALAN: What I can offer as a musician that non-musicians may not know is, how much it depends. There are a lot of variables, and if you’re not a musician, you may not think about those variables.
I think it depends on the person too! I mean there are people who are like, “I want to be a concert pianist one day!” Rather than, “I’d like to play piano for fun sometimes.” And there are probably more people doing it just for fun than people who are really serious about it. Understanding, there’s a lot of in between too, it’s on a spectrum.
And understand really what the interest is. I think that really might be the most important thing, is really getting into the details of what the interest is. To play the piano or sing or play the clarinet—that’s not specific enough of an interest of an understanding of what the interest is that the child has. Why do you want to play the clarinet? What kind of music? For how long, maybe? Even though it’s okay to change your mind about that. So, I would encourage getting lots of information about what your child wants and also about what the situation is and what the possibilities are.
The thing about lessons is that it’s perfectly legal to stop taking them. I would encourage making short-term arrangements at first. Like, “Hey, we want to try this for a couple weeks and see how it works.” Like, “Could I just pay for a few lessons and see if she or he likes it?” Rather than making a big, long term commitment.
PAM: I think that’s such a great point, about just meshing with the culture of that teacher or that music school or whatever. Because so often I think that we can latch on to ‘we’ve heard something good about it’ or ‘it’s the closest music school’ or ‘it’s the only one in town!’ or whatever, and we can try to get our child to fit into that environment, right?
So, if they tell us “They have to practice for X amounts of hours,” or “They have to start with this book and don’t skip ahead—they have to start with lesson one,” you think you have to. It almost puts us back in a student role, right? And then were like, “Oh, we gotta do this, we gotta do this” and all the sudden we are pushing that on our child.
You really can pick and choose the environment that meshes well with your child, and, like you said, what are they looking for. Are they looking to just be able to play and make some music that they recognize? Or do they have bigger goals with it? that kind of stuff. So, the conversation is with them, and what they are seeing in the future of this interest, and then finding the environment that meshes well with them, right? Does that make sense?
ALAN: Yeah. Absolutely, right.
And I think sometimes when it’s something we are not experienced with ourselves, like if somebody’s not a musician, it might be music. For others, it might be something else that they don’t have a lot of background in. That could be a time for caution, to not let other people tell you how it should be because they supposedly know more. And sometimes musicians, I’m afraid, can be a little bit bad about that, about using their expertise to sort of impose their view of how things should be on others, because, “You don’t know about music and I do!” And so, this is how it should be. “How would you know? You can’t even play an an instrument yourself.”
It helps to just have the confidence to say “I appreciate your expertise and your knowledge, but this is what’s going to work better for my child, so I’m going to find a situation that works best for them.”
PAM: That’s a great point, and that’s basically the next question.
Tips for navigating situations with the conventional advice of encouraging practice, or “Do it this way! I have this expertise!”
PAM: Like, yes, absolutely, you know your child, and what your child is wanting out of this situation and it’s ok to bring that with you, right? So, even though you aren’t the expert in guitar or piano or whatever, it’s ok to say, “You know what, he wants to have fun, and it’s ok if you follow his lead.”
I know I’ve done that a couple of times, that with karate, it’s like, “No, it’s not a big pressure for the next belt, I want him to enjoy! It takes as long as it takes!” I remember once, it was a computer programming camp, and there weren’t many students who came in the summer, and I said, you know what, don’t worry about it, you don’t have to show me some working program at the end of the week. Just do whatever he wants to do and don’t worry about it.
I didn’t know either one of those things in any detail, but I knew what my child was wanting out of the experience. Because that’s where the best learning is going to happen, too and that’s where they are going to learn more about how they feel about whatever the activity is that they are doing.
Maybe they’re more excited and they want to continue with lessons, or maybe they find, ‘This is enough for now,’ etc. But I think they get a better experience with what they’re interested in. It’s an interest of theirs and if they enjoy it, that’s my goal, rather than whatever steps of progress they have set out, I guess to prove that they are doing their jobs, maybe?
ALAN: Yeah. I suppose they are used to needing to provide evidence to justify the expense. So sometimes it could be as easy as letting them know, “You don’t need to justify your work. I’m just happy that they are having the experience and that’s enough.”
PAM: Yeah, that’s great.
I was wondering how, in the bigger picture, you see music and, or really any, art weaving together with unschooling?
ALAN: Well, you were talking about practice, and that made me think about the idea of formal practice.
And actually, I would discourage, particularly someone starting to do music and most other arts from doing practice. I would say, ‘don’t practice.’ And really, I think the problem is formal practice. Like, ‘I’m going to sit down now, and I’m going to practice the piano for an hour because it’s my practice time.’ Because I think that just doing that is pretty doomed to be counterproductive.
In my opinion, as a musician, and somebody who wants to help people who want to learn about music, that has discouraged a lot more music making than it’s helped. For most people, if you start by saying, ‘I’m going to practice an hour a day,’ even if they are motivated, even if they want to do it, that is often not the best way to help them learn about music.
I think it is much better to get involved in music-making, and if you child wants to be involved in music, for example, or in any art form, particularly something that involves performing, getting involved yourself in music-making with your child in some way, I think that might be the unschooling way to do it—not, whether or not you take lessons, or whether or not the child chooses to take lessons or that’s the best option for them. I wouldn’t just send my child off and just say, “Go take lessons,” and then pay your money and then, “You’ve learned your music from the lessons and you’re done,” but get involved with them. Help them find ways to create opportunities. Cause that’s what real practice is.
I don’t know if you’ve heard of Malcolm Gladwell’s “thousand hour rule”…
PAM: 10,000 hours, yeah.
ALAN: 10,000 hours, Yeah, I wish it was a thousand hours!
PAM: I know, right?
ALAN: 10, 000 hour rule.
You have to have 10,000 hours in order to master something. I don’t know if that’s true or not. It’s certainly true that practice is important. You aren’t going to get 10,000 hours of practice sitting down and forcing yourself to practice an hour a day or five hours a day. You’re going to find ways to not really do it if it’s drudgery—and that’s even if you want to do it.
You’re not going to practice an hour a day if you don’t want to. You might tinkle around on the keyboard and seem like you’re practicing so you don’t get in trouble, but you’re not going to practice. But if you’re involved in making music that you’re interested in and you care about, than that counts as practice, particularly if you’re doing it with other people.
PAM: I love that. If you are just weaving it into your life. So, becoming a part of that experience with your child. Like, not sending them off to lessons, but even if it’s, “Let’s sing some songs together,” or, “I’ll sing while you play on the piano.” Making it just something that you’re doing with them so that they’re doing it, not “I have to sit for an hour and practice my scales.”
ALAN: And I’d say, if you can, if your child is learning an instrument—and I understand that some people have bad experiences with learning instruments and they really don’t want to do that, so I understand that that’s really not everybody’s choice—but what could be greater than “I’ll learn to play the violin too, because I’ve always wanted to, and then maybe someday we can play some violin duets together.”
So, the ideal is that you’re actually physically there doing it with them. You could find them opportunities, help find groups they can play in. They could sing in a choir, or play with a band or an orchestra, some community bands and choirs and orchestras, they take you and your child, maybe, if you can, if you play—if you don’t, that’s ok too.
And then, often, if you’re doing that, then lessons come up naturally. Like, “Oh, I want to be able to do this and I can’t. Could I take some lessons so that somebody could help be able to do this better? Because now I’m really interested in it.” And I think, often, that’s a better way to get to lessons than, “I’ve always wanted to play this instrument so I’m going to go get lessons.”
Again, I don’t want to say that that’s never ok, because, actually, my daughter had wanted to play the flute, and she actually said, “I want to take flute lessons.” First time she ever played the flute was at her lessons. Again, that was very specific situation, she had a very definite idea of what she wanted to do and how she wanted to do it.
But my daughter loves to sing. She kind of inherited that. My wife and I are both professional singers. She wanted to sing, and it was because we are a musical family, it was just really part of the background always. She just started singing with us in choir, in church choir, and just started doing little performances. She’d learn a song, and then she’d find a way to perform it.
And then, after she’d done that for a good three or four years—starting very small, doing it very occasionally and then doing it more and more—then she decided she wanted to take voice lessons, as a continuation of that. It can happen both ways, but in both cases, we are with our daughter, making music, almost every day.
It’s not just musical families that can do that. For anything, you can find a way to do that. And to me that, for the arts, for anything, that’s the unschooling principle that can be the most valuable. And, if your child is interested, it can eventually lead to that traditional, ‘wins a contest’ or something. Eventually something like that will happen, but if you just aim for that from the beginning, it’s less likely to happen, and much less fun along the way.
PAM: That’s so true. When you’ve got a goal, like something that you want to accomplish, it’s just more intrinsically motivating to get there, when it’s not something that’s 10,000 steps away, you know what I mean?
Something that is achievable, it’s on the edge of your competence, so you need to learn to get there, so you’re motivated. It’s something that you want to do so you’ll pick up the instrument or the art or whatever it is, whenever you have a moment, because you want to, right? So, rather than, ‘I need to do this for one hour because someday I want to be able to do X,’ if you’re excited to get to that step that you can just see really close, you’ll do it whenever you have a moment.
My son Michael, he’s somebody who wanted to learn the guitar, and he has learned through YouTube. And I sit in the other room, and I don’t know if he’s playing music, or he’s literally playing it himself. So that has been a good experience for him.
We went into the local music store a couple of years ago now, because he finally gotten to a place where he actually wanted his own guitar. We had a few lying around, and he wanted his own guitar, so we went to the local shop and he talked to the guy for an hour, and he had a grand old time picking out his own guitar. But he comes from home from work, and he gets home 11:30, 12 at night, and I wake up and hear him playing—he picks it up whenever he’s got the time. There’s just something, whenever someone tells you you have to do something, that you resist, that instead of that hour, you find that, whenever you have an hour, you just dive into it. It’s just a different mindset.
ALAN: And I don’t think that anybody has ever become truly a master at something or really great at something or achieved something remarkable, in music or in any other field, by forcing themselves to be interested in it. You don’t practice 10,000 hours or whatever it is, in order to become interested in being a musician. You practice the 10,000 hours because you’re interested.
PAM: That’s a great point, yeah.
ALAN: And there’s a lot of evidence that a lot of the talents that people have actually comes from that intense interest and practice. That a lot of people who are so talented that they practice more than anyone else, but to them, it doesn’t seem like practice, so it comes naturally.
PAM: Yeah, they’re just doing it, right?
ALAN: Yeah, it seems like an amazing talent, right? And it’s not necessarily that you couldn’t have that talent too, it’s just that you’re not that interested. You’re doing something else that you’re talented at.
PAM: Exactly. And that comes back to choice again.
ALAN: I wouldn’t want anyone to feel like in order for a child to be interested in music that they have to have the, sort of, genetic background in being a good musician. That could be one way to get interested in music. Your child could be a great musician even if you’re not. It’s possible. But you just have to let your child decide for themselves, to discover whether they have that gift, and also whether they want to pursue that gift. And it’s ok if they don’t! But don’t assume it can’t be done because it’s not you.
PAM: And you know something that I’ve found through unschooling, I have found an interest in so many things that I did not know that I would enjoy before having kids by being introduced to it by them. And then, all of the sudden, “Wow, this is fun!” and “I’d love to do this with you” etc. So, like you said, even if you’re not musical, and even if you don’t think you could be music, when you keep that open mind and support and try to engage in things they are interested in, you may be surprised at all of the interesting things that are out there in the world that you may find yourself enjoying. When you keep an open mind, our kids introduce us to so many fascinating things that we wouldn’t have ever imagined we’d be interested in. Have you found that?
ALAN: Yes! For me, my youngest son, he’s only five years old, but he’s only interested in boy things. You know, trucks and guns and so. I’ve always been a music nerd and not that interested in those sorts of things, but now I’m starting to explore that side of myself which I didn’t really even know existed.
Just by, you know, video games. I’ve never played a video game in my life! So, I’m helping him play his video games, just in the natural course of just helping him do what he wants to do, I’m having some different experiences, so it’ll be fun to find out if that continues.
PAM: Our children expand our world so much, I think. OK, now we’ll get to that last question.
As an unschooling dad, I was wondering what piece of advice you’d like to share with other dads who are maybe considering unschooling or just starting out on this journey.
ALAN: For me, the thing that I’ve had to try to be conscious of the most, and I think this is related to my gender, as far as I can tell—to the extent that I am self-aware, I think this might be gender related—I have to really think about being involved day-to-day, moment-to-moment, with my kids.
This may not be something that all men share, but, in my example growing up, the male parent was maybe a little bit at a distance. Kinda maybe didn’t do the day-to-day, nitty-gritty work of parenting, always. That’s not necessarily because of traditional gender roles only. Sometimes it can be more subtle than that.
I’m kind of the stay-at-home parent, my wife and I switch off—we both work, but she works more than I do. So, I would be considered the stay-at-home parent if you had to name one of us as the stay-at-home parent. But even though I’m the one at home often—kind of reversing that traditional gender role—still there’s more subtle male gender role thing of, “You kids play, and I’ll go do my adult stuff over here.”
I don’t know, for me, I’ve found that I really need to be aware of that. And to make a conscious decision to, ‘I’m going to do this a little differently than what was shown to me when I was younger, or what the cultural expectations might still be.’ Even though I’m not a traditional dad, in the moment, when I’m actually interacting with my children, I need to decide that I’m not going to be the traditional male—I’m going to be playful, I’m going to joke around, I’m going to do guy-stuff with my son, even if that’s not my immediate natural inclination.
So that’s what occurs to me that it might be helpful to talk about with other men, to maybe be aware of that tendency. Whether you’re a traditional sort of bread winner and you come home in the evening and see your kids in the evening, or even if you are a stay-at-home dad and you’re the primary caregiver, that might be going on. That dynamic might be there.
I just think that’s something that might be worth considering.
PAM: Yeah, that’s a great point. And the tendency, especially if our kids our occupied and doing things, the tendency is to pull back and do our own things. There’s just so much that we get out of that connection when we do engage with them, right? So, you’re finding that to be a positive experience, yeah?
ALAN: Yes, absolutely, yes!
I wouldn’t want to force myself to do it in an, ‘I’ve gotta go play with the kids now so that I can be a good unschooler,’ way. That’s not an attitude that would be helpful at all, I don’t think. More just, when the opportunity arises, you know, go out of your comfort zone a little.
And also use your partner as an example. My wife is sort of always just been great with kids, so she is just silly with small children just to make interacting with them fun—if I can just be silly, I can make a joke or make things into a game I can get things going so that I can have some interaction and get something out of that. Observing moms, and particularly my wife, and learning a different way of doing things—it might be a little different than what I’m used to, but to avoid doing it in a resentful way. Not like it’s a job, like “I’m required to do this much interaction with the kids in order to be a good modern dad.”
PAM: Back to ticking off those boxes.
ALAN: I don’t think that would be helpful. But the time you do spend with them, just kind of expand your idea of what that means a little bit.
PAM: That’s such a really great point, Alan. Thank you for bringing that up.
And I want to thank you for taking the time to talk with me today! I really appreciate it. Especially your perspective on music and lessons, and I always love hearing about other families and their unschooling experiences. So, thank you very much.
ALAN: Thank you. Thanks for asking me!
PAM: It was wonderful!
And before we got, where is the best place for people to connect with you online.
ALAN: Facebook, that’s the best, easiest place to find me. Alan Marshall. A-L-A-N Marshall. And I’m in Radical Unschooling Info.
PAM: I will put those links in the show notes. Thank you very much! Have a wonderful day!
ALAN: You too. I appreciate it.
EU389: Foundations: Consent and Consensual Living
Jul 31, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Consent and Consensual Living.
Consent is really the backbone of everything we talk about. Everyone, regardless of age, wants agency. When we can shift away from control, because we truly can’t control other people, we move from a power-over dynamic to a collaboration paradigm, leading to more connected relationships.
We hope today’s episode sparks some fun insights for you!
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
What does consent mean to you? How do you see it weaving together with agency?
Think about a recent argument you had and how you expressed yourself. Could you reframe/reword some of what you said as an “I” message? That can be both less confrontational and more accurate. For example, instead of, “You’re not listening to me!” maybe try, “I don’t feel heard.” Rather than getting stuck in an endless round of “Yes, I am”/”No, you’re not”, it encourages the conversation to go deeper.
What barriers do you see to living consensually? How would it feel to just set them aside?
This week, practice contemplating the underlying need that your friend or partner is trying to meet through their actions.
TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello again and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We’re excited you’re interested in exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
So, in today’s episode, we’re talking about consent and living consensually, and I have to say, this is one of my very favorite topics. It is really the backbone of everything that we talk about. When we understand that everyone, no matter their age, wants agency, and that we truly have no control over another, we move from a power-over dynamic to a collaboration paradigm.
And it’s interesting, because I think intellectually most of us would agree that consent is important, that we should never push past another person’s consent. And yet, in our desire to control outcomes, we often do, and this is especially true for children. And yet, how can we expect children to honor consent as adults if they have never experienced what it means to work together to find solutions to that feel good to both parties?
And it comes into play in adult relationships as well, in subtle and sometimes not so subtle ways. We look to change people. We have expectations and agendas that we push without regard for who that person is and what they want and what they value.
PAM: Yeah, exactly. And for me, consent and by extension, living consensually, was one of those ideas that once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it. I soon recognized how often I was trying to very subtly wield control to move through situations in ways that made sense to me, especially interactions with my partner and my kids. And looking through this new lens, I notice now how disconnecting those control tactics were for my relationships. Basically, someone was almost always disappointed or disgruntled in a family of five.
But I also observed that many of our interactions were steeped in power. And at their root, they were about me, often very politely, but I was convincing, coercing, or guilting the other person into doing what I wanted them to do. Gee, that calls back to our last episode as well, doesn’t it?
ANNA: Yeah. It does!
PAM: And I realized how draining that was. My understanding of consent grew exponentially once I realized it wasn’t about me convincing someone to agree to do the things my way. That’s consent, right? Instead, it was so much more about seeing through their eyes and recognizing that there are many valid paths forward, not just mine. Consent meant working together collaboratively to figure out an often new path forward that made sense still and felt good to everyone involved.
ANNA: Yeah, right. It definitely hearkens back to that episode and also to when we talked about how different people can be, because when we push our agenda without consideration of how the other person feels or moves through the world, when we have ultimatums or even just expectations that are kindly and politely put out there, we’re taking away that other person’s agency, and that is just not a solid place from which to build a strong relationship.
Humans want autonomy. They want to have agency over their lives. So instead, we can learn about one another. We can commit to deeply understanding what makes each of us tick. We can set up an environment where we find solutions to problems together, trusting that we’ll keep at it until both parties feel good about the plan.
And that’s really the core of choosing to live consensually. The process involves listening and validating, being able to clearly articulate our own needs, but in “I” messages, not demands. After everyone feels heard and seen, that’s where we can cultivate this open curious mindset, this brainstorming-type idea about how to solve the situation at hand. At that point, we’re all on the same team. We’re working together to solve for all the needs, instead of standing on opposite sides, defending and advocating only for our own needs.
And a big part of this is understanding that there are almost always underlying needs at play. So, very often, a conflict is sitting at one level that can feel impossible to solve. One person wants to go out, the other wants to stay home. Where do we go with that? But if we peel back a layer to see the underlying needs, then we have more to work with. We have more options to consider. But we can’t get there if we’re stuck in that place of thinking their actions are about us, if we think our partner is just being difficult, if we’re taking it personally. There are needs on both sides of that argument and understanding those opens up the options.
So, maybe one wants to just really see their friends. So, could the friends come over instead? The other had a long day and just needs some downtime. Is allowing a bit more time before going out the fix? Solutions are everywhere when we assume positive intent on all sides and start working together to understand each other and the situation more.
That quick reminder that they’re just humans trying to meet a need helps us remain connected and curious. And now we have a puzzle to solve together, instead of two or more people digging in their heels on opposite sides of this surface-level disagreement.
PAM: Yes, yes, yes. And, for me, it made all the difference in the world when I felt we were truly all on the same team, trying to figure out a way to move forward that met each of our needs. It was such a big energetic, feeling difference. So, we can just take a moment to envision what that might feel like. So, when each person feels seen and heard and trust that their needs will ultimately be met, it is so energizing. It opens up so many creative possibilities, rather than locking two people, as you said, into that battle until one comes out the winner. There’s a winner and loser in that situation. Who has the power? Who can convince the other one to do it their way?
It definitely takes time and patience and practice to bring consent into our everyday relationships, but it really is life-changing. I do want to acknowledge the time that these conversations can take as you work together to figure out those underlying needs, to figure out a path forward that works for everyone. But the other path, which is the argument, the power struggles, and then the aftermath of needing to repair the relationship, that takes up time, too. So, which process feels better to experience with those you love, trust and collaboration or judgment and power struggles?
ANNA: Oh my gosh, yes. So, that right there was really a big part of me wanting to move in this direction. It takes time and energy to argue one’s position and to try to win everything, energy that I found draining and disconnecting. And I knew I didn’t want to live in that energy every day. It felt very assaulting to me.
What I found was how rewarding and connecting it was to live in a house with no top-down agendas, no punishment or control, just connection and collaboration, whether it was with David or if it involved our kids. We were all invested in helping each other meet our needs and do the things that we wanted to do. That deep level of trust that you will be supported and unconditionally loved is the energy I want to cultivate and bask in every day.
And so, somewhat related, over the years, David has had a lot of hobbies that people would consider dangerous. They’re a part of who he is, and I’ve always wanted to support him in those pursuits, even when I didn’t understand it. And by putting that out there, what I found in return is someone who supports all my wild hair ideas and whom I trust will always be there for me.
That is worth so much more than me trying to control who he is and shape him into someone who may feel safer and easier for me. That’s my work to do and, for me, it was rooted in gratitude for the time we have together and letting go of fear. Because fear is so often the root of control and letting that go allows us to find gratitude and connection to truly love those around us for who they are and how they move through the world. And that unconditional acceptance was what we both wanted to continue when we had children.
And honestly, raising children in a consensual environment where we were all trusted and supported, where we learned to understand and express our needs and knew we would be heard and that solutions would be found, has been one of the greatest experiences of my life.
PAM: It’s been a life-changing and amazing experience, and I wanted to take a moment to talk a bit more about unconditional love and acceptance. I love that phrase. And, for me, it doesn’t feel like throwing my hands up in the air and thinking, whatever! Whatever they want to do!
I think when we hear unconditional at first, that can be what we think. Okay. No conditions. I have no input. Whatever they want to do, just off they go.
For me, unconditional means without expectations, so without conditions, not withholding our love and affection if the person makes a choice that we don’t agree with, even more so not using judgment and shame as tools to try to get them to change their mind.
But not having conditions doesn’t mean not trying to understand them as a person, like we have been talking about. If they make a choice that doesn’t make sense to us, unconditional love doesn’t mean we think, “Whatever. I still love you. Off you go,” and then burying our feelings of concern.
So, instead we can be more open and curious. We can learn more. Maybe it’s in direct conversation with them or by paying extra attention to how the choice unfolds for them. How are they navigating it? What are they enjoying about it? I am so curious. What the heck do you enjoy? But either way, we learn more about them. We have a better understanding of who they are as a person.
Because even if we often say, “I love you!” it is hard for someone to feel loved for who they are if they don’t feel seen and heard. They think, “Sure, they said they love me, but they don’t really understand who I am.”
Being in relationship with a person means understanding who they are, which also isn’t a one and done thing. We all grow and change over time. To embrace consent and consensual living in our relationships with the people we love is to choose to be curious about who they are as a person, because that is a great place to start just right there. Like, who is this person?
ANNA: Right. And like you said, when we say, whatever, I love you, whatever, do whatever. That doesn’t feel good. So, even if I don’t understand something, I can ask questions and just like we’ve been talking about over these last few weeks, learn more about them. And then as we leave ourselves open to that, we’re seeing through their eyes. We’re starting to see like, okay, it does make sense that they love this. I see how that’s feeding them. I see what they love about it.
And so, that moves us from this place of, okay, I’m not going to stop them, to, I’m celebrating who they are. And that switch is so big, moving to celebrating. Even when it’s something we may not participate in ourselves or fully understand, we do understand through their eyes what they’re getting from.
PAM: Yes. And we can connect. So, maybe it’s a thing that, “Yeah, I don’t want to join you in your thing. I’m glad that you love it.” But where we can also really deeply connect with them is thinking about something that we love that much. So, when we know that, it’s like how much I love this thing, then I can get a real feel and sense for how much they’re enjoying the thing we’re doing, and less about having conversations later about the facts of what happened.
It can be, “I bet you had so much fun.” You can talk about the energy, you can talk about the experience. That’s where you can connect with them and share and celebrate them. I love that point that you shared about getting to the place where you can celebrate their love of the thing. You can celebrate their choices without having to make the same choice, without having to join them, but we can celebrate that energy and knowing how it feels for ourselves, too.
ANNA: Yes. I just love how you’re saying that, because that’s the piece. We can celebrate how much joy it brings to them. We can celebrate their excitement about something, even if we can’t celebrate the individual piece of it, because we maybe don’t understand it or it doesn’t appeal to us. But that’s irrelevant. When someone you love lights up about something, be it a child or your partner or your friend, that’s energy we can get on board with. And celebrating someone for something like that, it builds this deep trust and bond, that I’m seen by this person that they really see me and it’s just really beautiful. So, I love that.
So, let’s give a few questions to ponder as we’re thinking about consent and living consensually with your loved ones for this week. What does consent mean to you? How do you see it weaving together with agency? I think this is going to be good.
PAM: Yeah. That is so interesting, that connection between those two things. And just thinking about agency, is that something I want to step on? How does it feel to have agency? To have choice? How does consent weave in with that. I think that’ll be really fun to play with.
ANNA: Yeah, to peel a little of that back. Okay. So, think about a recent argument you had and how you expressed yourself. Could you reframe or reword some of what you said as an “I” message? That can be both less confrontational and more accurate. So, for example, instead of saying, “You’re not listening to me,” maybe try, “I don’t feel heard.” Rather than getting stuck in the endless round of, “Yes, I am listening.” “No, you’re not listening,” and we have this meta fight that starts happening, it encourages the conversation to go deeper. “Why are you not feeling heard? I don’t understand. I want to understand.” It just takes it to a different place.
PAM: Yeah. And that’s a great example of getting to the underlying needs, because so often, we can take that need and jump to the solution and share the solution. Not feeling heard, the solution is for them to listen to me. So, I say, “You’re not listening to me.” But they feel that they are. So, that doesn’t click for them. So, if you go to the root, to the need, the need is, I’m not feeling heard. Then maybe there is a different way. It’s less confrontational and it’s also more fundamentally accurate.
I’m not feeling heard. That’s where we are. If you can come up with new and interesting ways for me to feel heard or for me to see that you’re hearing what I’m saying, that’s where the rub is right now. I don’t need to give them the solution that I think they need to do.
ANNA: Right, Exactly. Because again, that gets us in that meta argument, which just never ends well. Okay, so, what barriers do you see to living consensually? And how would it feel to set them aside? And I think this one’s important, because I think for most of us growing up, we may not have had choices and consent in all areas our life. So, it’s not necessarily something that we have a lot of experience with, but I think you can feel the difference. And so, I think even just the thought experiment of setting it aside, what would it look like to have this collaborative relationship with all the people that I live with? How would I feel?
Think of the areas that rub or that feel draining for you in your day. Would changing that paradigm soften some of that? I think that’ll be interesting.
And the last one is, this week, practice contemplating the underlying need that your friend or partner is trying to meet through their actions. I think write out some examples so that you can start to see patterns, because we can see patterns of, when they’re tired, they get a little grumpier. It can be hungry. It can be things like that. And it can just be, oh, okay, this one thing kind of triggers this same type of argument each time, so there must be something else under it.
And so, I think when we start to look for patterns, when we start to think about it, for me, behaviors are always a reflection of a need. So, when we see a behavior, whether we like it or don’t like it, look at what’s the need that’s playing out here? And so, when this is not in a charged situation, as well, then we start to just be better at recognizing the behaviors as a reflection of needs. And then we get better at it. Like we said, it’s just practice and learning. And so, then we don’t get stuck at that rubbing point of the behavior.
PAM: And I think it is so valuable for us to start with contemplating it, because if you all of a sudden start, when you’re having a conversation or conflict with someone, saying, well, what is the need underneath? Why are you asking for that? That can be off putting. And they’re not thinking in that way yet, so they may well not be able to answer that question for you.
But when we start thinking that way, like that example that we just talked about, you’re not listening, but I want to feel heard, when we start practicing that, over time we get better with identifying those. And the other piece being, I also love your patterns note, because there can also be patterns to when those things bubble up for them and we can even play with addressing those needs.
When somebody starts to feel a little bit grumpy and you’ve seen over time that it’s often when they haven’t eaten or anything, even if we just like grab a glass of water or whatever, bring a drink, bring a quick snack. Don’t say anything. Just hand it to them while you’re starting into the conversation and just see how that goes, back to the playing with it.
But yeah, being able to contemplate it ourselves and start to see it without putting expectations on other people to meet us right there. When we start doing this, they will get curious. We will have opportunities outside of the charged moments to mention these things. So, it’s something we can all get to, but again, needs time to practice, needs time to just kind of soak in the ethos.
ANNA: And having that self awareness piece. When when I make it have an action, what’s my driving need? What need am I trying to meet with this action? From simple things like I’m calling a friend. “Hey, I’m feeling lonely, or I’m feeling like I want to be heard by someone, or I’m just wanting to connect.” It can be anything. But if we start to just understand that the behaviors are always driven by a need, it just gets easier and faster to recognize them.
PAM: It does. It does so much. Okay. Okay. Thank you so much for listening everyone, and we will see you next time. Bye.
ANNA: Bye bye.
EU388: Bids for Connection
Jul 17, 2025
Join Pam, Anna, and Erika to talk about bids for connection. John and Julie Gottman from the Gottman Institute coined the term “bids for connection” to describe many moments through our days when people in our lives try to connect with us.
In our conversation, we talked about what those bids can look like (sometimes it doesn’t feel connecting at all!), what turning towards, turning away, and turning against a bid feels like, and we shared lots of examples from our own lives. Getting curious and looking through this new lens can really help strengthen our relationships with the people we love.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello and welcome. I’m Anna Brown, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Hello. And if you are here with us and enjoying the podcast, I invite you to join us at the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such a beautiful, supportive space filled with intentional people exploring ideas and sharing their journeys, and it just fills me up so much and I just want everyone to experience that.
You can learn more about the network at the Living Joyfully Shop, which also has resources and support in the forms of books, courses, and coaching as well. You can find the link in the show notes. In today’s podcast, we will be talking about bids for connection.
I love this reframe. It has helped me so many times, so I’m really looking forward to this discussion and I think Erika’s gonna get us started.
ERIKA: I would love to. I just love this topic so much and I would like to give a brief introduction to the idea of bids for connection. Doctors John and Julie Gottman from the Gottman Institute have been studying relationships for many decades, and they came up with this concept of bids for connection as a way of viewing our interactions with the people we love as opportunities for validation and connection. So a bid for connection is just a little action. Something someone says that indicates that another person would like to connect with us.
It could look like someone saying, look at this, or I’m exhausted. Or it could be a hug or a request for help, or a loud sigh. It’s basically an opportunity to make a choice in how we respond and the Gottmans describe three possible directions we could take. So the first is called turning towards, which means enthusiastically meeting the bid with connection, looking towards the person, responding with validation, increasing those feelings of connection. The person is feeling seen and heard, and the relationship is strengthened.
The second is called turning away, which could look like just staying mostly unengaged by the bid. So maybe just continuing to look at whatever you were already working on. Glancing up for a second to say, mm-hmm. Or wait a minute. Something like that. Sometimes it feels like this is the best that we can respond in this moment, but over time that type of response will lead to disconnection in the relationship and the person can feel rebuffed or like you’re not very interested in them.
And then the third is called turning against, which is usually the result of being in a state of overwhelm. So turning against would look like aggressively rejecting the bid for connection. Like, can’t you see I’m busy? Or, oh, here we go, what now? Or rolling your eyes. So turning against damages the relationship and makes it more likely that the person is not going to make future bids for connection.
So I found some examples of what these three options might look like with a couple different bids.
So if someone says, can you come here for a minute? Turning towards, might be, sure what’s up? Turning away. Might be, in a minute. I’m almost done with this. And turning against might be, can’t you see? I’m watching the game here. You can imagine how different those three responses would feel.
If someone says, whoa, check out that view. Turning towards might be looking at the view and saying, whoa, that’s amazing. And turning away might be like not really looking up at all and saying, mm-hmm. And turning against might be really, you had me look up for that?!
I thought that one was kind of an obvious example. But this next one was super interesting.
So say if someone says. I’m exhausted. Turning towards might be. Is there anything I can do to help you feel more rested? Turning away might be, I know me too. And turning against might be, you don’t think I’m tired, and so I thought the turning away was more subtle in this case, since basically saying “me too” might feel validating in some ways.
But I think the point in turning towards is really to keep the focus on the person who’s making the bid and making sure that they’re validated in their experience first. And so rather than turn it around and immediately make it about both of us being tired, validating them first may feel the most connecting.
And one of the aspects that I find so interesting about this topic is just how varied the bids for connection could look like. That sigh just walking in the room and sitting down, getting louder and louder, which some children will do or asking for help. The possibilities are really endless. And there was a great network thread about bids for connection that looked like requests for help getting food, which I think we see a lot with our kids.
So anyway, I love this topic and I’m super excited to dive with you both.
PAM: Yes. I love this topic too, and I remember so many conversations over the years and the big aha moment for me when we first started using this lens of bids for connection was that defining things that felt like an upset kid or that felt like more of a challenge, right? Just seeing it as the challenge, but then realizing, oh, really, I can frame it as a bid for connection because they’re wanting help with it or maybe they’re expressing more frustration than they really feel because they want to make sure that the bid connects.
They’re just trying to get some interaction. So I found that to be a super useful way to look at it. And also, if I ever in the back of my mind said they can do that themselves, why are they asking me to get them a drink or make a sandwich or, pass me that thing that is like five feet from them that they could get up and get, reframing that and understanding that really so often it is more about connecting and interacting with me than it is about the thing.
Because they could just get up and get it if it was just about the thing. And just through the experience of responding as it was a bid, turning toward it and seeing how fruitful choosing that action was. The connection that actually followed, just reinforced the idea that so often these really were bids for connecting with me or with someone else. Right. So I think it’s such a useful lens to bring to our days.
ANNA: Yeah. I love that point, what you just were talking about there, because I think sometimes people will ask and wonder, how do I cultivate these close, connected relationships? Or we’re not in a good place and what do I do?
Or it’s a teenager and it’s feeling harder. This lens is so helpful because it is so rare that a teen is going to come up and say, Hey, I want to talk to you and have some attention now. Let’s make a connection. It is going to be sitting in the room, walking in, and in my case, she’ll come sit and sit. Just sit. And so, then it’s like, oh, okay. She’s wanting a little bit of connection with others. Or It can feel like a demand. Like why? You’re right next to the water. I’m way over here. Why can’t you get the water, you know? Oh, they want me to look up from what I’m doing.
So, I think there are a couple steps that were helpful to me when I would hear something that kind of plucked me the wrong way, you know, something that maybe felt like a demand. I would look at the whole context, am I present with them? Am I busy with something else? Is that something they feel like will get my attention away from what I’m doing?
And so then I can check in and make a choice. But like you said, what I loved about what you just said, Pam was when we choose to lean into these bids, even when they feel a little unconventional or not like what we’re expecting. It’s so fruitful. You just see it opens up or the energy changes or a conversation that maybe wouldn’t have happened unfolds.
And with my quiet one that comes and sits down, it takes a long time, but then she gets to what she wants to talk about. And if I short circuited that, because I’m like, why are you here? You’re not saying a word, then I’d never get to, I’m worried about this thing or this thing happened and I’m kind of excited about it, or whatever the thing is that she wants to share.
It’s just a really fun lens to bring to all of these interactions and because my kids are older now, but when you have little kids and you’re doing all the things, it can be really hard when there are lots of bids for connection coming at you.
And so I tried to be mindful. I knew that every second I couldn’t drop everything and turn towards them. That sometimes that just wasn’t a reality when you had a baby with a diaper, you’re in the middle of changing. And so instead of that, like you were talking about earlier, Erika, In a minute, I’ll be there in a minute. That kind of has a rushed or hurried or annoyed tone to it. Even if my hands were deep in something, just making eye contact, smiling and, oh my gosh, I cannot wait to see that. I will be right there. I need to do X. Give them more information.
That narration that we talk about. So that they know, okay, it’s not that I’m valuing this thing, I’m doing more. It’s that I’m in the middle of it and I need to finish it to get it to a place where I can stop. But wow, am I interested in you and what you’re bringing to me. And I think that can make it feel so different.
So don’t be hard on yourself if you can’t just stop everything and turn straight into the bid, but you can do that little tweak of the eye contact, the smile, the turning towards, even if you have to finish something.
ERIKA: Oh yeah. I love that slight adjustment to make the turning away feel more connecting as well, because it’s in between turning towards and turning away and then making sure to follow through when we do have time.
That follow through is like a mini repair that improves the connection again. So maybe I couldn’t immediately do the thing. But if I’ve had a pattern of turning away and being busy and being busy, then making the repair of, and now I have time and I’m going to do it, it can help. But also noticing if we have a pattern of turning against, if things have been really hard, and then making that repair and watching for opportunities to turn towards.
I think that’s what it’s all about. Just noticing. And I love what you brought up too, about it being a good place to start when you want to improve your relationships. Just using this lens as a place to start. It’s never going to be a bad thing to assume that everything’s a bid for connection.
You might as well just start there, and just see if maybe the more I turn towards all these little things, that I’ll just strengthen our connection. When I think about those ones that are harder, when someone’s being super grumpy, when someone is snapping at us, when someone is sighing or whatever the things are that can sometimes trigger us, when we’re busy ourselves, showing kindness and turning towards those hard moments for other people, I think it has so many positive outcomes to the relationship. I know when I’m having a hard time if someone can respond to me with love and kindness instead of getting irritated that I’m being snappy or whatever it is, it just feels better.
These are just like little shifts that can make such a huge difference in our connection with our people.
PAM: Okay, so two things. Number one, yes, understanding when it’s a much sharper kind of bid for connection back to then it’s just little reminders to help us process and move through.
For me, it helps to remember that, okay, this is much more about them than it is about me. Something’s up, something’s frustrating, and if I can turn toward that and help them move through it, then that is relationship building. And then the piece you said Erika, about, just for a while, especially if we’re feeling disconnected, assume that everything is a bid for connection is brilliant.
And then the following through piece, right? Because that’s where the trust is built. It’s not a dismissive statement when, maybe we connect, we’re excited about it. And we’ll be able to come when we’re finished. This thing, like narrating what’s going on and following through with that is again, connecting.
Because that builds trust. It doesn’t need to be immediate, but that you can trust what I say. You can trust that I will follow through or I will come and say, oh, this thing came up and, but just keep following through. So keep responding to the bids, keep following through, and then the narrating piece.
When we can’t turn toward it, in that moment, we can still make it a connecting moment. We can still look them in the eyes, unless we’re using a knife, but we can stop. Just stop cutting for a second. Because sometimes we can get so in our head and we’re wanting to, we’ve got this task that we’re doing and we’re wanting to finish it.
But taking that moment, if that relationship is a priority, that can help us remember and remind ourselves, yeah, this is something that I want to do and life is not a race. I don’t need to be completely focused on one thing to the detriment of everything else.
And then switch. It just helps me with so many layers of moments in the day.
ANNA: I love it as a trust building piece, right? That this is how we do it. Because it’s work to build trust. Trust, and especially if it’s been broken or there’s been some kind of a rupture, this is such a great way to build that trust, to build that rapport.
But I really loved, oh no, did I just lose it? I may have lost it, but it was about… I did. I lost it. I’m sorry. I’m gonna come back ’cause it was important. I’m going to get it again.
ERIKA: Okay. One thing that popped into my head was that sometimes, especially when I had little kids, their request for help could also be an indication that something about the environment is making it difficult for them to do the thing.
So even though this is not related to bids for connection, I wanted to mention it, just because it can be draining when kids are asking us for things all day, every day. And so I think it’s both like I’m always going to want to turn towards, but maybe part of what I’m turning towards is with curiosity to figure out is there a reason why getting water is hard for them?
And trying to make those changes in the environment so that they’re feeling like things are doable for them if they’re wanting to do it. And so maybe they’re asking you for water all the time, but it’s because the fridge squirted water on them once and now they’re afraid to use it.
There could be any number of reasons for an individual person. And so, figuring out a solution for that, being available, being curious, turning towards them, but then also digging a little deeper. I feel like that helps strengthen our connection and then also helps empower them if there are those kinds of things that are trickier.
ANNA: Yeah, I mean I think that really changes, really enhances the connection, right? Because if it is a problem, something happens, you tuning in and showing them they are important to me. I want to understand why this is feeling hard. Is there something I can do that feels really connecting?
But I did remember what I was going to say, which was when you were saying to look at everything as a bid for connection.
What I think is so fun about that is we can kind of get in our head, or maybe it’s just me, but I think it happens to other people where we feel like they’re trying to thwart us, or why is everybody making everything so difficult? Why are there so many demands on me? Why does it have to be me?
And that’s about me, obviously. What’s my capacity in that moment, but when I can change it to, they’re not trying to thwart me. They actually want to connect with me, and maybe I’ve made that hard because I’ve been busy doing other things, and so they’re getting a little grumpy and trying a couple different things, playing around with ways they can connect, but it has such a different energy to think, I don’t need to be exasperated here.
This is somebody I love and they’re wanting to connect with me, and gosh, I’m going to take this opportunity to sit down and help them tie their shoes, even though they can tie their shoes. Or I’m going to get them that glass of water because I can use it as time for me to calm down and get a glass of water and then come back and give it to them.
And so, I love that reframe. I think it can really help us when we get caught in our head thinking people are trying to thwart me. It can really help me just calm down and remember, actually these are people that I love and they want to connect with me and I want to connect with them. And yes, maybe we’re having a difficult day or we’re all at low capacity. And that’s okay. I love the narration reminder. Again, if we can narrate a little bit more about that, it helps. So, the bids for connections are not always smooth and perfect, you know? But they’re there. And when we look at them through that lens, I feel like we’re looking at the people around us with love.
PAM: Yeah, I love that. And there was another piece too, as you were talking there, feeling all these bids coming in, bids coming in. And also remember that we can put out bids for connection as well. The thing that helps me anyway, when I think of it that way, through that lens is like, I am lightly putting out these bids, and for me it just helps not to have expectations attached to them.
It’s just so handy and then handy and helpful for me to even notice like we’re talking about that capacity piece and feeling overwhelmed. We too get to notice when we might like to connect with somebody else when we’re in a space where it’s like, it would be nice to just go chat with somebody.
Even change where my head is right now because maybe I’m having a hard time. Getting out of something that I was super focused on, et cetera, something like that. So to remember that it’s a tool that I can use as well is super helpful and helpful for me too when I know that I’m actively wanting to do that, to take that moment to see through the eyes of the person I’m wanting to connect with.
Come to them because the goal is the connection. I’m not trying to accomplish anything in particular, other than that connection. So, if I’m feeling a little disconnected from my kids, it’s not inviting them to come do something that I like to do.
My bid for connection can be to come and join in what they’re doing, because that’s what I’m looking for. I’m looking for the connection, and the easiest way to do that is to join somebody in what they’re already doing. Or offering up something that we enjoy doing together, et cetera, so that it’s about the connection, not about me per se.
That was always a very useful kind of mindset shift for me.
ERIKA: I love that it feels kind of like reframing all of that stuff coming at us in such a way that then you can feel almost excited about it. Because it’s going to build my relationship with them. This is something I can use to increase our connection.
So, yeah. I love that.
ANNA: Yeah. I love that. And really loved Pam, you talking about us putting bids out and I think one of the things of just recognizing this whole idea, because we do it almost unconsciously, right? Where we’re needing connection, we’re stuck in something and we do the, can you get me some water or can you do X, and maybe our partner’s like, uh, okay, but you’re next to the kitchen.
And so what has been helpful for me, and this goes back to narration. Is to start using more clear language about it. Like, Hey, I’m just needing to be taken care of for a minute. I’ve had a really hard call, or something’s been going on. And what’s interesting about that is it can help give everybody that language.
So it’s not unusual to just say, you know what? I just need to snuggle on the couch, or I just need your help with this or I need this. And so it’s interesting to think that we take something that’s kind of subconscious and we can bring it into the conscious with that narration and it really changes things.
And so, I love that piece that you’re talking about, being aware of our own bids for connection as well.
Okay, this was fun and I think everybody will be going, ding, ding, ding. There’s lots of things to think about in a new lens, to look around the house and into your relationships. I’m excited about that.
Thank you so much to the two of you for joining me today and for everyone listening, and again, I would love to invite you to check out the Living Joyfully Network and just join the conversation because it’s so much fun. See you next time!
EU286 Flashback: Connect with Courage with Roya Dedeaux
Jul 03, 2025
This week, we share a conversation that Pam had with Roya Dedeaux in 2021, diving into her book, Connect with Courage. Roya is a grown unschooler, a marriage and family therapist, and an unschooling mom of three, so she has lots of experience to draw from as she considers how children learn and thrive.
In her book, Roya describes the many benefits of supporting our children’s interests and the strong connections between parent and child that those positive interactions cultivate. She also details nineteen different barriers that can arise and walks readers through ways to find solutions. In their conversation, Pam and Roya talked about two of these barriers and how so much of it is our inner, emotional work to do to move past our fears and to a place of connection with our kids.
The conversation was energizing! Connect with Courage contains some powerful, life-changing ideas. We hope you enjoy the conversation!
QUESTIONS FOR ROYA
As a quick refresher, can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
I’m thrilled to have recently published your book, Connect with Courage: Practical Ways to Release Fear and Find Joy in the Places Your Children Take You. I really love the book, and I think it may well be life-changing for many parents. Let’s start off with this: why is the connection between parent and child so important?
When it comes to connecting with our kids through supporting their interests and passions, lots of things can get in our way! And that’s where our work as parents comes in, which is why the many exercises you’ve included to walk parents through these challenges are so helpful. In the book you work through nineteen common barriers, and I thought we could touch on a couple of them here. First, let’s dive into “I don’t understand why they enjoy it.” How can a parent work through that challenge?
Another barrier I hear parents complaining about pretty regularly, especially with younger kids, is that the thing their child likes to do is messy. There are a couple of aspects to that, aren’t there?
What do you love most about your unschooling lives right now?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and today I’m here with Roya Dedeaux. Hi, Roya!
ROYA: Hello, hello! How are you, Pam?
PAM: I am very well. Thank you. And, Roya, you were first on the podcast back in 2016, right? We did a Growing Up Unschooling episode, and now I’m very excited to have you back to talk about your new book Connect with Courage. So, to get us started, I thought a refresher would be great.
Can you share with us a little bit about you and your family? And what’s everybody into right now?
ROYA: Yeah, absolutely. The first thing though, I have to say, is thank you for publishing my book! That’s kind of a big deal and I really, really appreciate not only the time that you spent on it and the editing and the publishing, but also the esteemed company I’m in. It’s very exciting to be up on that list. So, thank you, Pam.
PAM: Oh, it was my pleasure. I love this book. I’m so excited to actually talk about it with you!
ROYA: So, we are in an interesting transition phase. I’m just coming back from maternity leave. I have a four-month-old now, so I’ve got a seven-year-old, a four-year-old, and a four-month-old. And we’ve been diving into the world of finding babysitters and getting me back to work.
As part of that maternity leave, we were able to go on a big, grand, 10-national-park RV trip, which was really exciting. We went to Dinosaur National Monument, because my son is super into everything dinosaur, wants to be a paleontologist. We also moved about five months ago and so, now we have a pool and a trampoline and a new neighborhood to explore.
So, it feels like a lot of big muscle movement summer days down here in Southern California, lots of swimming, lots of trampoline, gardening, cooking things and taking them to our neighbors, paying attention to all the birds. We know all the bird drama in the neighborhood. And we downloaded the Audubon app to watch birds. So, some of you listening might be in rural places where this isn’t a shocker, but I’m in Southern California, very close to LA, and so, it’s really fun to have a barn owl swoop down while we’re eating dinner. Lots of that kind of noticing happening.
PAM: Oh, that’s wonderful. That’s wonderful. So, dinosaurs, that’s a big thing. Paleontologist in action right now.
ROYA: Oh yes. And he got to touch actual dinosaur fossils and talk to very knowledgeable rangers and we saw bison and went in a cave and, oh, it was just an amazing, amazing trip.
So, my kids are just living their best little lives. And then, I am up to my eyebrows in getting back into the world of therapy and I also make and sell jewelry and I run online bazaars. So, I’ve been occupied with that in the best way possible. And then, of course, talking about selling the book and making a whole bunch of journals and publishing those on Amazon.
PAM: Yeah. Yeah. We’ll definitely put links to that stuff in the show notes, as well. So, let’s dive into your book. As I said, I am really thrilled to have been able to publish that. It was so much fun working with you on that, back and forth, and back and forth, for what seemed like many months as we both had life things come up. It was awesome. That’s one of the reasons why I do love working with unschooling parents, because we have our priorities and yet when we have the time, we dive in deep. It is a lot of fun.
But anyway, I think your book will definitely be very life-changing for a lot of parents. In fact, you don’t even specifically talk about unschooling in it, but why I was so excited to work with it is because so much of deschooling is our work to do, parents’ work to do, as they’re exploring what unschooling is and how to just cultivate that lifestyle, that learning lifestyle in their family. So, this book just meshes so well with that whole process.
I wanted to start off with a bit about your background and why you wanted to write this book and why connection between the parent and child is so very important.
ROYA: I’m the oldest of three girls. They’re three and then six years younger than me. And so, I finished out fourth grade in traditional public school and then I never went back to fifth grade. My parents decided not to send us back. There were lots of small reasons, but it boils down to they saw that our interest in things and our curiosity was being stamped out, whether by being forced to learn things we didn’t want to learn about, or by honestly other kids making fun of us that we wanted to spend all summer reading and that kind of thing. They just didn’t send us back to school. I never went back to fifth. Roxana never went back to second. And then I don’t think Rosie ever went to anything other than preschool.
So, then we just did all the things we were interested in and we didn’t have a lack of that. I’m a combination of a deep diver and a dabbler. I dive in completely, totally all the way into something for like three weeks and then I go onto the next thing. And we were busy. We were on swim teams and in Shakespeare theater groups, and I was really involved in ceramics, and we did a lot of theater, and we did Girl Scouts and soccer. We did a lot of things. And that’s just the outside activities. I was also passionately interested in candle making and crazy quilt sewing and journaling and photography and all the do-at-home kind of things.
My parents were phenomenal at supporting our interests and when I give parents examples now, I almost always can think back to an example of my parents helping me. So, I would be on hour 14 of making a zine, for example, in my bedroom. And I’d have just paper scattered out all around me and my mom would crack the door open. I’d be listening to the same Ani DiFranco CD on repeat for 24 hours. And my mom would crack the door open and slide a plate of food across and just be like, “Hi. How are you doing? Okay,” and leave. And I remember just being able to settle into that, like, this is what I’m doing and it’s what I love to do and it’s okay with everybody else.
And so, I grew up with that very solid knowledge that what I’m interested in is valuable. They didn’t interrupt me. They bragged about the things I was doing to other people, even if there were no trophies for the zines I was making. There was no quantifiable success marker.
PAM: Reward.
ROYA: Right, right. So, it wasn’t like, “Guess what? She got first in the amount of time she spent cutting pieces of paper up on her bedroom floor.” But I knew for a fact that they valued the choices I was making. So, I had that experience.
And then, fast forward, I go and I get a degree in recreation and leisure studies, which I used to tell people was like majoring in Girl Scouts. There’s the recreational activity side, like event management and outdoor recreation piece. But there’s also a philosophy side, the leisure philosophy, why play is important, why free time is important. All of those things that lined up so clearly with why we unschooled.
And so, that just felt like, “Oh! There’s language for this.” Other people have been studying this, not in the guise of doing away with school. It’s so strange to me that people don’t make that connection. But given all of these parameters, this thing is also important. I was finding language. I discovered the world of positive psychology. I went back to school to get my master’s in counseling, thinking one day I would have an art therapy camp.
And in that program, I discovered positive psychology and the theory of flow and Dr. Seligman and all of the actual research behind why play is important and why uninterrupted time is important and why settling in and being able to spend hours and hours of time on an interest is good for us.
So again, I was able to put language to these things that I knew from my upbringing and watching my sisters and all of our unschooling friends. And then I started private practice. And although at this point, the majority of my practice, I’d say is homeschoolers/unschoolers, that wasn’t always the case, because at the beginning I was just casting a wide net, putting myself out there in Psychology Today, please come and see me as a therapist. And I was working in community mental health as well and even with some court-ordered families, things like that.
And so, in my happy unschooling bubble, I had seen the positive side of supporting kids’ interests and what that can do for relationships and families. And then as I ventured out into the world of counseling, I saw the opposite and I saw all the places where struggles between parents and their kids could be traced back to not feeling valued or their interests being disparaged.
And I saw people with addiction issues who, when we dug deeper, it felt like they’d never felt a connection to something bigger than themselves. They never felt like they had purpose or drive. And I saw self-worth issues and self-esteem issues, because when they were younger, all of the important adults in their life told them that what they were interested in didn’t matter. And they internalized, “If I love this thing and I’m wrong for loving it, and then I must be wrong.” And then straight up just terrible, awful, neglectful, abusive situations where parents were insulting their children and disparaging their interests and it caused a lot of barriers.
So, in both places, I was seeing the importance here of a simple (but not always easy) solution to a lot of these things, which was when they’re young, start supporting them and support their interests. Be interested in what they’re interested in.
And so, then I started paying more attention to why is that so hard? Why do we struggle so much when a kid wants to watch hour four of that YouTube unboxing video? Why do we not want them to do that? And why do we all get all our backs up when our kids want to spend a couple more hours by Minecraft? And what are the fears and what stands in our way? And that is the book. It’s the long story, but that’s the book. It’s, this is important. Here’s why. Here’s what happens when it goes right. Here’s what happens when it goes wrong. And here are ways you can deal with those things that stand in your way.
PAM: Oh, I love that. I love that. That’s a great overview of why it’s so valuable to connect with your kids and to support their interests and their passions and even being okay. I think it can be hard to be okay with someone who’s a deep diver for three weeks and then comes back up and that it’s something completely different. It’s like, “Well, gee. I thought you wanted to a be a photographer!” And then all of a sudden you pull back out.
ROYA: And I think that’s the unschooling piece. And yeah, I never mentioned the word homeschooling or unschooling in the book, very purposefully. But I think that’s the part where unschooling parents have a little bit of a head start.
When you’re unschooling, you’re paying so close attention to your kids, you’re watching those patterns. You’re paying attention. Are their eyes lighting up to that? What can I strew in their path? It’s an active engagement thing. And so, I think that, for a lot of unschoolers, that piece of it, they don’t have to start from the paying attention part. They start from the implementation piece.
The paying attention is knowing, okay, we’ve seen this tree before. Maybe I’m not going to sign my kid up for an 18-week intensive course, no matter how interested in it they are, because I know that in three weeks, they’re going to stop doing that. And one of the struggles I have is, we paid the money, so I want them to keep going. So, let’s not put them in that situation to start with. So, it’s that paying attention.
PAM: Yeah, yeah. Paying attention to that bigger picture.
A good lovely chunk of the book is working through these common barriers that come up for us. So, we could touch on a couple of those and just dive in with people. I thought first we could dive into the barrier of, “I don’t understand why they enjoy it.”
So, the unboxing video example, right? Whatever it is, if we don’t understand why our kid is enjoying the thing, how can we work through that challenge for ourselves? Because it’s our challenge.
ROYA: It is. It’s totally our challenge.
And that’s one of the first things to do is to remember that we have however many years of messaging and bias and experience and baggage and all that stuff about that topic, perhaps, and your kid does not. Your kid comes to that thing pretty fresh.
So, we need to just remember that. I’m thinking about people who’ve been upset with their kids for loving Nerf guns, for example. You have all this whole big, giant trash bag full of, “But it’s violence and it’s this and it’s that.” And the kid is just like, “I don’t know. I like to point and shoot at things.”
So, it’s totally a different ballgame for them. So, that’s one thing I suggest to parents is try to really identify what’s your stuff and what’s theirs, because it’s probably yours. And you’re the grownup, so you have to do the work.
So, the other piece if you don’t understand, and of course there’s that we fear what we don’t understand, and often it’s about a new medium for things. We are storytellers. We are storytellers as humans and I see video game play, hours spent on YouTube or TikTok or whatever, we are still storytelling in those media. But if they’re new and if you don’t understand it, then it’s not familiar and you’re worried about all the unknown things.
So, you can make parallels. When people say, “Screen time is bad.” I require my clients that they go through and say, “Would I say the same thing of ‘paper time’? Would I say the same thing of ‘food time,’ ‘outdoor time,’ or, ‘inside time’?” And so, trying to find parallels can sometimes help you just work through some of that strange stigma that comes up in your brain.
Get to know the thing. If you’re like, “Oh my gosh. All they’re doing is they’re on TikTok.” I say this because I was up until 2:00 in the morning on TikTok, so that’s fresh. But if, “All they’re doing is TikTok. All they’re doing is TikTok,” go get on TikTok. Go see what it’s about. Go find out.
If you have an open relationship with your kid, I bet you could sit down next to them and say, “Hey, show me what you’re interested in.” So, asking them what it is about it that they love. Most of the kids I know who have a decent relationship with their parents are just absolutely dying for somebody to sit down and talk to them about the thing that they love to do.
I remember when I started at community college, I was 13 and I took a writing class. And I came home like, “Oh my gosh! This person is just going to read all my writing and talk to me about it?” It was so exciting. So, you can be that person for your kid. Sit down and listen to them talk about why that thing is so interesting to them. And if you don’t want to interrupt their time, for whatever reason, you can also sit down and just observe.
I very often ask parents to watch their kids and challenge them to make a list of 30 possible things that their kid might be getting out of whatever the activity is. And some, you might be able to see and some, you might have to go online and research or ask other people what it is. And, in that case, you might be guessing, but it’ll get the juices flowing for you to start thinking of these activities as beneficial.
Kids are not always going to get the same thing out of an activity that you think they ought to be getting to. And they’re not going to get it in the same way. I was just recording another podcast where I was talking about how I did ceramics for years and years, and I didn’t have any interest in glazing. Once I finished throwing the piece, I was done. I didn’t care about the finished product. I just wanted my hands in the clay and I very often would even give away my pieces.
I made hundreds of things and I’d give them away to other people to glaze and keep, because I was done with it. But if someone had forced me to do it, step-by-step, start to finish until it was absolutely over, and I had to pay attention to glazing and all that, I probably would have quit ceramics and it was a huge part of my life and I got a lot out of it.
Part of it is remembering that people are getting something, be assured of that. They’re getting something. If they’re choosing to spend their time there, it’s valuable in some way. Your job as the parent is to look for what that value is, remembering that it might be different than what you would get out of it and how you would get it out of it. Talk to them about it. Be a detective, look for clues, and work through your own stuff.
PAM: Yeah. Detective was what was coming to mind for me. Exactly. Because, for me, that was the fun piece. If you can start with knowing that they’re getting something out of it. Just as you said, they’re getting something. Something is drawing them to it. Something is keeping them there. And I just take it as my job as a detective, to be so curious and, “I wonder what it is!”
I love your idea of trying to come up with 30 things that it could be. I love that so much, because it can be such a wide range of things for people and we don’t even need to literally know what the one answer is, because coming up with 20 or 30 helps you realize that there are so many possibilities. There’s something. And then when we realize that, we get out of the tunnel vision of the one horrible thing that we’re thinking.
ROYA: Right. The one fear.
PAM: Yeah. Whatever our fear is, it’s like, oh, it can be so many other things. That’s just one possibility. So, now all of a sudden, it’s not this huge weight. Then we can relax some more and we can actually start kind of getting involved and participating and having fun.
ROYA: Yeah. And then it’s fun! Definitely.
I get parents who are distraught and there’s always stuff going on and I don’t want to minimize that at all, but we get so wrapped up in that one potential, fearful place, that it could be leading to this bad thing. Or it could be preventing them from success. We get so caught up in that, that we forget that this process is actually kind of a delight and it’s really fun to be a part of that. And parenting is kind of a sweet gig if you can look at it in that respect.
I just think about not just my kids, the places that we’ve been able to travel to, and the things that I’ve learned, and the projects we’ve done, and the joy that I get in them opening up and sharing their interests with me, is amazing. But also with my clients, I can’t even tell you the number of new TV shows I’ve watched, the number of awesome conversations I’ve had, the number of things I’ve tried, the number of connections they’ve made. It’s so fun to connect with people on that level.
And it’s fun to watch, too, because if you can get past the fear, and especially for parents who are worried about their kids spending all their time doing something, your kids are expert level at that thing. And it is really, really cool to talk to people who are experts about the subject that they’re expert in. And what I want for parents is to be able to get that fearful voice out of the way so they can enjoy that and talk to their expert level kids who are invested and passionate and know the language and can teach you about whole new worlds.
PAM: I know. I always felt like I was a student of life of my children. If I could get out of my head, that fear, that judgment piece, if I could get out and just be in the moment with them, oh my gosh. That is how I got experience with the lifestyle. And then, like you said, you bring that curiosity about the world and about other people and what they find interesting, you bring that with you to all the other people in your life and your world gets so much bigger.
Literally, I joined TikTok a few weeks ago. My kids are adults now, but it’s fun. The world is fun. And my daughter was starting to post on TikTok and I’m like, “I’d love to see what you’re making!” I’m making an account. I’m exploring. It’s fun. And when you can come with that lens of fun and curiosity, the world is just so much bigger, I think. And we can connect. You have now a way to connect with people, rather than saying, “You guys are all adults. I’m older now. I’m in my fifties. I don’t want to learn any new tech.” No. That’s not the way I want to go through my life.
ROYA: Right.
And ironically, the fear is usually about a safety thing, that that thing is gonna end up hurting my kid in some way. But connecting with your kid, every single study, homeschooling-related or not, shows that engagement with parents is the thing that helps keep people safe into adulthood.
It helps with substance use and it helps with risky situations and peer pressure and all of these things that we’re scared of for our kids, being able to have open communication with your parents is the thing that keeps you safe. And that’s not going to happen if you don’t find places to connect with them.
Sitting on the couch and watching YouTube, I mean, physically they’re safe. They might be seeing something that maybe I would choose not to let them be exposed to at a young age or whatever, but it’s okay to think dangerous thoughts. Just because you see it or think it doesn’t mean you are it or will go do it. And that gives you the opportunity to have those conversations and the support that you give when you value their choices pays off so much later on when physical safety is what we’re talking about. So, it’s not just the fun piece and the exciting piece and just getting along better day to day.
I get a lot of parents who come to me who talk about the struggle and the battle, and those kinds of words with their kids. So, not only is it just the light and fun and playful side, but it’s also actually safer and better for their success later when it is more serious and all the other pieces, too.
We learn better when we can be creative and we learn better when we’re playful. We learn better when things are not being forced upon us. And we can take what we learn, even if it’s on Minecraft, even if it’s in a video game, the things that we learn there generalize to other things. And I think that’s a big part that parents are scared of. When they don’t understand why a kid wants to spend their time doing this thing, they’re also worried about all the other things they might be missing out on.
And so, to that, I just like to remind parents, too, that just because you learned teamwork on a soccer field doesn’t mean you don’t use those things in other places. Just because you learned strategic thinking through Minecraft doesn’t mean you don’t use those abilities in other places.
And far more important is learning how you learn and, again, keeping that relationship really open with your parents and then it’ll take you other places. But parents get like, “But right now it’s not working like that!” And you gotta take a big breath.
PAM: Yeah.
And you learn better when you feel safe. Because when you’re feeling safe in your environment, in your home environment, or with your family, you feel much safer to explore, to try things that you might not have tried before, because you’re less fearful of being judged, being talked down to, being told to stop. And when you’re comfortable, you actually feel much safer to explore and learn.
When you’re fearful and you don’t know what they’re learning, coming up with all the different things that it could be, connecting with them helps you get a good idea of what it is that they’re enjoying. So, not only can you help by bringing in new things that are similar, like if they’re really enjoying the strategic aspect, if that’s what they’re loving in Minecraft is they’re loving figuring out strategy, somebody else is loving building things. If you just say, “They’re playing Minecraft for hours,” you don’t know what it is that they’re loving. And they could be very different things that you can bring into their world depending on what it is that they love.
So, as you’re building that connection, because they feel seen and heard from you when you’re starting to see and ask them those questions. “Oh! What strategy did you use for this? Oh, how did you build that thing?” depending on what it is, they’re feeling seen, they’re feeling heard, they’re feeling connected with you. They’re building trust in you. And that is where you can help them when you start coming up on these things that you’re fearful about. Whether it’s time or whatever that safety aspect is for you, or where they’re feeling uncomfortable. They feel connected with you to have those conversations.
ROYA: Right, right. And you just know them better and you know if they start to look around for what’s the next thing, “I don’t want to do just this,” then you can say, “Oh. Hey, I have this blah, blah, blah and it kind of reminded me of that thing.” Or strew it quietly or whatever it is that that you’re going to do with it.
But then, yeah, you’ve got things up to bat that are in line with what it is that they’re interested in already. And again, when we look at it from just our perspective, we can miss the mark on that a lot.
I was thinking about how my sister was really into baking and she was doing a bake around-the-world thing. And I made some comment about, “Oh, you should make cookies for the baby shower I’m hosting!” And I’m like, “I’ll pay you.” She goes, “I don’t want to decorate anything.” That was not at all what she wanted. It was not about decorating.
And so, for her, it was just a pathway to learning about all these different places around the world. If she were my kid, that’s a really different world that opens than cooking and cake decorating. It’s very different. Like, I’m going to go in that direction, not this other one. And I would never have known that if I had not talked to her about it and asked her about it and been open to it.
PAM: Exactly.
And because we might not know, it doesn’t mean not offering up things or sharing ideas or thoughts, because that’s how you learned. You said, “Oh, hey, what about this?” But your connection and the trust, she was comfortable saying, “No, you know what? That’s not something that would be interesting to me.” So, that’s how we learn more. It’s not about stepping back and just observing and seeing kind of where things go and trying to put the picture together in our heads. It’s a dance of all of those things. We also connect.
If your comments are always met with a “no”, or your suggestions are almost always met with a “no”, it’s like, “Hmm, I’m really off base here. I’m going to take a little bit more time to observe and figure it out.” Because then sometimes it can be our own baggage that we’re just not seeing a bigger picture. Or we have an expectation of where we think it should go. So, then we start trying to plant seeds that pull them in that direction. And so, then they’re always “no”.
But engaging and just trying to have those conversations just gives us more information and helps us learn about each other better.
ROYA: I think if parents are trying to engage and they’re being met with resistance, that’s a pretty good sign that in some way, even if it was an inadvertent, your kid has been feeling a little judged or they’re feeling protective of their interest and their time in that interest.
And so, for those parents, I do suggest trying to switch your language around, trying to make objective statements about things and not subjective ones. I do a lot of art in my therapy practice. And if someone draws something with all the colors and it’s filling up the page, if I say, “Wow, that looks chaotic,” that is all about my interpretation. For them, that might be like busy and bright and dynamic. And so, what I say is, “I noticed you used all of the colors,” and then they can fill in the gaps about what that means. But if I start with the assumption, then that’s not about them. That’s about me.
And so, for parents who are being met with resistance, I think it’s the same thing, where you can jump in, sit next to them, and make an observation as opposed to passing a judgment, even a kind judgment. “You chose that character three or four times.” Then you can leave that up to them to say, “Oh yeah, it’s my favorite one.”
Now you know something. And now you have just one more little bit of a bridge. I use the metaphor of bridges a lot. And I think that every time you can make that kind of connection with your kid, it’s like a rope bridge. That’s one piece of fiber that’s been extended. And then the more of those fibers you get, they twist together until it’s stronger and stronger and stronger. And then, you’re just running across, back and forth together. And you can make those kinds of little fibery bridges out all over the place.
What you don’t want to do is go through with scissors and cut those connections. So, making the observational statement or showing in other ways. It doesn’t have to all be talk. If you think of those love languages, show that you support them without making them discuss their thing. Sit next to them. Read your own book while they’re there. Bring them a blanket if it’s cold. Bring them some snacks. Take your noisy conversation somewhere else, help them clean up something that needs cleaning up if they could benefit from that, if they want that help. There are actions that you can take. It doesn’t all have to be interrogation-based.
PAM: No, I love that. One of the kids wasn’t big into words, but you can show so much through your actions and the choices.
I love the one that so many people don’t think of is taking your loud conversations to another space or something, just respecting their space, showing respect for the things that they’re choosing to do and the way that they do them, but just consideration as another human being in the world. You might be hungry, you might be thirsty, you might want some quiet, even taking siblings somewhere else to play when they look like they’re really focused on something that they’re doing, there is so much that we can do that also doesn’t need words.
ROYA: Yeah. And I think we get this bizarre message from the mainstream world that we’re not supposed to factor kids in when we’re talking about our resource allocation. That it’s only adults who are supposed to decide where we spend the money, how we spend our time, what the house is set up like, all of these resources in our lives.
But where we choose to put our resources says a lot about what we value. And that’s really what it is. It’s a symbol of our values. And so, if you’re trying to value your child and their interests and what is important to them, then you’ve got to take a really good look at where you’re spending your resources. Are you factoring them in and are you prioritizing them? And also, making rent and stuff. But I think a lot of families exclude their kids’ interests from the priority list. And very often, if we can work through the emotional side of things, then we can find the logistical pieces of where we’re putting our finite resources. We can look at that creatively. We can think about that.
And this can also be a game. When you get started looking at things divergently, you keep going. It snowballs. So, your dining room doesn’t have to be a dining room and you can look at different ways to use space and different ways to get your kids access to stuff. And that can be fun and, if you involve them in that process, then they can trust that you are trying to do that for them. And so, when it is a “no”, they understand it’s a “no”. And you all can help come up with creative solutions to hopefully find the “yes”.
PAM: I love that. And I just found that so fun when I could open up what felt like so many constraints and prioritize their needs. Because yeah, when you first come to it, it doesn’t even occur to you to think about it. But when I opened to unschooling and thought of that, it’s like, well, of course. And then it was just so much fun to play with. All of a sudden, rooms and what their functions were and how we used our spaces and the things we chose to bring into our lives and the places we chose, they are so capable of being involved in all of those conversations.
And like you said, when that trust builds, they really do come to realize that when things aren’t going to work out maybe for now, or we have to wait a little bit, or whatever, they understand it’s not about them. It’s not a judgment about them at all. It’s us working together and something’s in the way right now, but we’re not going to lose it. When we’ve built that trust, they understand that. They know it might just be waiting. It might not look exactly the way they envisioned it, all those pieces, but we’re all doing our best. We just trust that we’re all doing our best and working together.
ROYA: And side bonus, all those things are excellent learning opportunities. So, it’s a win-win.
PAM: And they’re skills that are lifelong useful for everyone. I mean, we’re learning them and figuring them out now, but our kids are just getting that head start. They really can take those things and work with them and play around and then they’re bringing them with them.
One more barrier I wanted just to dive into, because I do hear parents complaining pretty regularly, especially with younger kids, that the thing their child likes to do is messy.
It sounds simple. It sounds simple, but is that how you feel right now, Roya? Things are a little chaotic right now? There are a couple of aspects to it, aren’t there?
ROYA: There really are. And that’s the thing, too, that’s hard. And it was actually part of the challenge for me writing the book was I felt like I went back and forth a lot between the philosophy of things and then the, “Put your stuff in tubs,” the practical side of stuff. And that’s part of it is I think if the attitude is there and your own emotional barriers are dealt with, then you can think creatively about the practical solutions.
I think there’s a lot of people who want me to just tell them, here’s the one magical solution or way to just switch how you think about it. But it’s not just that. It’s a dance. And it matters who’s in your house. That’s part of it.
In the house I grew up in, the people cared about things differently than the house I live in now and the people I live with now. And so, part of it is factoring everybody in. The conversation about the resources and privilege that you have matters, too.
I have to say, it’s a lot easier now. We moved to a place with a lot more space and I have a door I can close and I can leave a whole desk full of things. Because I don’t want to have to clean up my earring stuff every time. I keep working on it and keep going. And so, that was an issue both logistically, because I have little kids who would get into it and it’s not my husband’s favorite thing to have every single surface covered in play.
And so, the fact that I have a room now with a door that closes is really helpful. I’m incredibly privileged to have that space. However, even in a place where I didn’t have that kind of space, there were creative things we could do. I used big tub lids a lot to work on, so I could pick it up and move it somewhere else or put it high on a shelf or cover it or things like that.
But again, the desire for harmony in my life was there, which helped come up with those creative solutions. Well, I guess what I have to say, it depends on where you’re at in your parenting journey, too. So, glean from this what do you will, listeners, because you’re all going to be in different places.
One thing to remember is that one person’s mess is not another person’s mess, right? If you can get down and look at it from the perspective of the kid in question, you might see things differently.
I think back to doing those zines, someone else might look at that and see all these scraps of trash all over. But those scraps of trash were the material I was going to glue back together and use and produce from. So, if someone had come in and talked about it as though it were trash, I would have been furious. And if someone had come in and just swept it all up and cleaned it up, that would have been rough.
Also, as I sat and worked, I sorted things. It wasn’t like I knew exactly what I wanted to cut and paste. It was trial and error and experimentation all over my floor and it would form something. And so, if I had to clean it up every 20 minutes, I would not have been able to make those connections. So, it was a magical little world of paper scraps down there.
And I’m looking at my desk right now and it looks a lot like that, but it’s now pieces of clay. And I’m working on canes now and I’m saving all the little scraps, because they’re going to be turned into something later. And one thing is going to lead to that and that and that. So, if someone came in and just swept it all away or made me clean up in between sessions, that would really, really hurt my creative process. So, one big thing is, it’s not just trash. It’s not just a mess. There are worlds in there.
The other thing is, everybody lives where you live. Everybody, I think, gets to be a factor in living in a happy, healthy, harmonious, rich unschooling life.
Mess really impacts my husband, for example. I think, for him, looking at a cluttered surface is a lot, for me, like hearing somebody chew. It makes me do that little neck twitchy thing. And it’s not helpful for our harmonious life for him to come home and have a mess everywhere. And so, we’ve had to have a lot of conversations and a lot of figuring out.
And so, I know that there are particular surfaces in our house that make a big impact. So, I try to make sure that those things, at least, get swept into tubs and put somewhere else for me to put away. I know that there might be days where it’s better to get the kids up and out so we don’t have a day where we’re making a lot of mess inside. There are different things to do.
For me, putting everything that a project needs in a tub is really helpful. I have probably a hundred pairs of scissors in this house, because so many different projects need a pair of scissors. I don’t have a scissor tub. I have a pair of scissors in every project tub, so that everything can just get stuck back in that tub and pulled back out again. Clear boxes, things with labels, doing stuff on a tarp, so you can pick it all up. I sweep everything, toys, dust, trash, I sweep everything and then the kids and I go through the pile and pull up the things we don’t want to get thrown away.
There’s a lot of that type of brainstorming. But our goal as a family is for the kids to have great tactile experiences and for nobody to want to bite somebody else at the end of the day. It’s a dance. It’s a combination. It’s valuing everybody. And it’s talking about how we can do this.
And maybe that particularly messy thing doesn’t have to happen right this moment. Maybe there’s a day that’s better for it. Or maybe there’s a place. We designate a place in the backyard that’s the mud pit. That’s the mud pit. And we’ve just always said that doesn’t have to get cleaned up ever. That’s the place for it. And now we’re good, because we have a designated spot. So, just conversations, lots of conversations about how do we all function together and live together.
Reframing, is it really mess? Remembering that mess is part of the creative process and that it’s actually healthy for our brains to make connections across things. So, it’s good for us to not just play with Legos, but to play with Legos and My Little Pony and Hatchimals and crayons and clay and sand all together.
Having those kinds of connections, tactilely and across subjects and interests, it develops healthy brains. And so, if you’re hovering over all the time and you’re saying, “Okay, oh, did you stop playing with that Hot Wheel car? Okay, we’re going to put it away now,” it actually does that scissor thing. It cuts off the connections before they can form.
So, as much as you can, if you can create a space where that can happen or create a way where you can spend most of your time doing that and the cleanup is minimal, go for it. I think it’s healthier.
I run across a fair number of parents who are desirous of living a minimalist lifestyle. And while I think that can be great for you as the adult, I definitely want to impress upon you that not everybody wants to throw away all their things and things are important to people and some of your kids are going to be curators.
I have a curator child. I have a collector child. He likes to collect things and sometimes he displays them and sometimes we leave them in a box for a year and he digs them out later and goes, “Oh, look at all those!” And then he’s interested in it again. So, we do a lot of tubs with a lot of labels and sometimes we rotate them and sometimes they’re all out on the floor all at once. And if I can pick them up, cool. I can help them with that. That’s the other piece is giving the gift of that to your kids can be a sweet and generous, wonderful thing. I have a lot of thoughts about mess too. It’s why I wrote a book.
PAM: I just want to encourage people. All the stuff we’ve been talking about, it’s in there. It’s in there! I love your book so much. All these things are connected, right?
ROYA: They are. And so, when I work with an individual family, we could come up with 50 solutions off the top of my head to that particular thing. But none of them are going to work lastingly or lovingly, unless you deal with the emotional side of it. Why does it bother you? What does it bring up for you? What’s your attitude related to it? Got to do that part first.
PAM: Yeah. Yep. And that is the beauty of working through the exercises. There are so many exercises in your book and you can skip around, too. “What’s the one that’s rubbing on me right now?” And I can go and I can dig into that.
You don’t need to dig into everything all at once, because it won’t mean as much. It is more helpful to dig into the thing that’s rubbing right now, because then it’s top of mind for you, and then you can really get into it and it’s helpful in the end.
Okay. We can talk about that forever. But, before we go, there will be links to the blog and links to all sorts of things in the show notes. Everybody can find that stuff there.
And I would like to know, what do you love most about your unschooling lives right now?
ROYA: You know what I’ve been thinking about lately is how grateful I am for all of the people who love my kids. And we got them through our unschooling life. I’m just thinking about the number of random things we get in the mail from other unschooling families who know and love our children.
My seven-year-old son’s favorite show right now is Brooklyn Nine-Nine and he loves it. And it’s like our special time. I love that show, too. And so, we try to get in an episode every day and he started talking about himself in the third person because of Terry on the show and it’s been leading to so many fun places and conversations.
And the other day, a friend of ours, and by the way, of course their youngest kid is like 21. So, all ages are all loving on our kids. And they sent us a couple of Brooklyn Nine-Nine t-shirts just out of the clear blue sky. And we have another set of friends who stumbled upon some pretty cool little dinosaur, dig the fossil out of the egg thing. And they sent those to us. Or they send us TikToks for the kids. “Oh, I know Wyatt’s interested in this. Oh, this reminded me of Lilyanne,” and they would not have those connections if we hadn’t been going to unschooling conferences, if we were not in a group of people who valued supporting their interests and seeing the connections that the kids are making.
And so, I think, yeah, right now I am absolutely just so grateful for the other humans who see and value the connections that the kids are making and their interests. I love them.
PAM: That is so beautiful. Yeah. That community. Especially since you’ve grown up unschooling yourself, unschooling conferences. The connections that you make with other families who value their kids, their connection with their kids, their relationships. And like you said, grown kids. It doesn’t matter. That relationship, that connection is there for life. It becomes a lifestyle, not something that ends once our kids are 18 and now it’s like, oh, off you go. Yeah. No, that’s beautiful.
Thank you so much, Roya. It was so much fun to chat with you about your book.
ROYA: Of course, Pam!
PAM: I am so excited for people to get that in their hands and just dive in, because that is really the most important thing. When you’re choosing unschooling is not just to stop there, that deschooling aspect, that work that we can do so that we can cultivate those strong relationships, those strong connections with our kids, because that is a foundation for our lives, to move forward.
ROYA: And one of the interesting things for me, too, even though I grew up unschooling, grew up talking about unschooling, my mom spoke and talked about unschooling all the time. But now that I have kids, it’s so interesting to me, too, that at every new age and stage, I feel like I have to have some measure of that all over again. That when they’re three, I got it. We’re good. I figured this stuff out. And then they hit the next stage and I’m like, oh, it’s striking me in a different way, because I’m a different person and they are a different person.
And so, I think that’s part of it, too, with the book. I wrote it hopefully for some replay value, as well, that you can keep going back, because different parts of it will hit you harder and different barriers will come up at different stages of life.
And, so when people say, “I did the deschooling,” I’m like, well. Did you?
PAM: I’m glad you’re feeling really good right now, but exactly. Things are going to happen from the outside. Your kids are going to hit different ages and things will come up. Things will bubble up. There’s kind of like the bulk of it, but the bulk of deschooling gets you to the place to realize, “Oh, this isn’t really going to end ever.”
ROYA: Right, because we’re always going to experience it differently, too, because it’s not like we’re static and things are happening with them. We’re part of this process, as well. So, the book is geared towards parents of kids of all ages. You can pick it up and flip through the barriers and find the one that speaks to you the most.
If you buy the book, there’s a workbook that you can actually write in and stuff that you can download and you can get access to that. And then, I’ve been doing these journals that if you go on my website or an Amazon, too, there are places to write and prompts for you to keep exploring and keep exploring. And then, I also have my practice. So again, if anybody is finding that they need some extra one-on-one time, I’m here.
PAM: That’s lovely. That’s wonderful. We will have links to all that, too. Thank you so much, Roya. Have a wonderful day!
ROYA: Thank you, Pam. I appreciate you and the work that you do so much.
PAM: Oh, thank you. Talk to you soon. Bye!
ROYA: Bye.
EU387: Foundations: Seeing Through Someone Else’s Eyes
Jun 19, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Seeing Through Someone Else’s Eyes.
“Seeing through someone else’s eyes” is a shift from the typical phrase, “walking in their shoes.” And it’s a valuable paradigm shift to consider when trying to learn more about the people in our lives. By considering people’s unique personalities, interests, and sensitivities, we can better understand their choices and avoid a lot of conflict and misunderstandings.
We hope you find this conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
Take a moment to think about a close friend or loved one. How would you describe their aspirations and goals, their strengths and weaknesses, and their interests and passions?
Pick an issue or challenge you recently navigated with family or friends. What did it look like through your eyes? Now try to see it through the eyes of someone else who was involved. How does it look different? How does it look the same? Why?
Remember a time you judged someone else about their choice or decision. Where did that judgment stem from? If you released that judgment and got more curious about why that choice made sense for them, how might things have played out differently?
Let’s explore the story of you. What are your current aspirations and goals? Strengths and weaknesses? Interests and passions? How do they inform the day to day choices you make?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are thrilled you’re interested in exploring relationships with us, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
And in today’s episode, we are going to talk about seeing through someone else’s eyes. This was another big paradigm shift for me in how I choose to be in relationship with others, because over the years, I have often heard the advice to walk in the other person’s shoes so that we can better understand them and what they’re experiencing.
But I discovered that, for me, that didn’t go quite far enough. So, I put myself in my partner’s shoes or my child’s shoes, see what challenges and constraints they were facing, and come up with what I thought was a great plan for moving forward. And then they didn’t agree. And I was like, “What? Why not? This is perfect!” I just didn’t understand why they wouldn’t follow my suggestions and I judged them negatively for their lack of cooperation. Like, “Let’s move through this, people! Here’s a great way to do it. You’re just being stubborn.” They must see how well my plan would work out.
So, when that wasn’t working, I dug into it more. And jumping off what we talked about last week about how different people are in so many ways, I realized that putting myself in someone else’s shoes meant that I was still using my experiences and perspectives, my ways of processing, and my preferred ways of engaging with the world. I was still filtering this new view of the world through the lenses that made sense to me.
I discovered that beyond walking in their shoes, I wanted to try seeing through their eyes. Oh my goodness! The picture is so much richer. It holds their experiences and preferences, how they prefer to process information, and how they prefer to engage with the world. It holds their aspirations and goals, their strengths and weaknesses, their interests and passions.
And their choices now made so much more sense to me, because I can see how they were the best choices for them. In the same situation, I, in their shoes, may well make a very different choice, but that is entirely because I’m me. Because people are different, when I want to connect with someone, when I want to more fully understand their experiences and support them as they move through their days, putting myself in their shoes isn’t as helpful as seeing it through their eyes.
ANNA: Oh my goodness. Yes! I really loved when I first heard you talking about this, because it really puts this very helpful visual on why my attempts at solving things for everybody falls a bit flat. And I love to solve things. And in my early days, my inclination was definitely to look at someone’s concern and set about finding a solution for them. And it was often rooted in how I would want to handle it, how would I want to move through it? But like you said, as soon as you start digging into this, really even at all, you see why it doesn’t work. And, as is so often the case, turning it around really helps me see why.
So, I have this close friend and she moves through the world in a very different way. She is a go-getter. She makes the call. She finishes the thing. She tells people what she needs in this very direct way. So, when I would share something with her, she would offer advice based on how she moves through the world and it would often just leave me feeling misunderstood, really. Disconnected.
It wasn’t that her ideas weren’t valid or even amazing, but they were not likely to work for me, because it just isn’t as easy for me to make that call to someone out of the blue or to be super direct about what I need from them. But when someone understands those pieces about me, they can help me find ways to get what I want that feel comfortable. Maybe there will be some stretching and that’s okay, but it’ll be grounded in who I am and give me the best chance of actually being able to do it and to solve the problem that’s in front of me to begin with.
So, that realization really helped me stop doing it to others. And instead, I focused on listening and learning and seeing through their eyes, helping them find ways that resonated with them and who they are and how they want to move through the world.
PAM: Yes. And I think it is really important to just note that seeing through someone else’s eyes is a skill that we get better with over time. We need to practice with releasing our lenses. Sometimes we’ve got lenses in there that we really don’t know that we have until we start pulling them away. And how can we not value our way of seeing it and being in the world as better? It goes back to last week’s episode. We’re all different, and that’s okay. One way isn’t better than the other, except that that’s our natural tendency to do it. So, it can be hard to just release that valuing, because it really is better for us.
And also, our relationships with our loved ones become more connected just because we come to better understand their aspirations and goals, their strengths and weaknesses, and their interests and passions, which means we can more accurately bring those aspects into the picture and vice versa. We are sharing ours and they learn more about us. It just takes time, doesn’t it? We always like to think, okay, this makes sense. I’m going to do this right now. Let’s go.
ANNA: Forever more! But it does take time and I think with everything, be gentle with ourselves as we figure it out. And do little steps, like starting with, “Well, this is how I might move through that.” Just that little qualification, being clear about that as opposed to saying, “I think you should do this,” which is sometimes where we go, but that’s a great start. That little qualification, “This is how I might move through that.” It leaves room for connection and learning more, because at that point, they can say, “I don’t think I could do that.” And then you’re able to learn more and have more of that conversation.
But dropping the judgment piece that you were just talking about, I think, is really the most important and sometimes the hardest. “Well, if they would just do it the way I want them to, it would be solved.” Well, if the “this” is not something that feels good to them, it won’t solve it and it actually will just leave the person feeling like there’s something wrong with them or that they’re completely misunderstood and it definitely can impact our connection and relationship. And there isn’t anything wrong with them. There isn’t only one way to do something. They just may not want to move through the world in the same way that I do.
So, we can let go of that judgment and commit to learning more about who they are and what feels best to them. Sharing our ideas, absolutely, but with this open, curious mindset that they might be seeing it in a very different way.
PAM: Yes. Exactly. This tool of seeing through their eyes, how it works, is also really helpful when we just want to understand a choice they’re making. Maybe they’re not looking for our input.
So, when we see a choice and it doesn’t make sense to us, maybe it’s not a choice we would ever make, but when we take a moment to see it through their eyes, all of a sudden it can make so much more sense.
And, that said, sometimes no matter how hard we try to see through their eyes, we just don’t understand why they want to do the thing they want to do. So, in those moments, what works for me is leaning on my understanding again, that people are different. And not taking things personally, like we talked about. They’re not making this choice to piss me off. They’re making it because it makes sense to them.
So, that helps me move through any judgment of them that I might be feeling, and instead get curious. Because judgment is not only disconnecting, it’s often a clue that I’m just missing something. So, I might ask more questions to try to better understand and absolutely, sometimes that helps. Sometimes I was just missing this little piece. It’s like, oh, yeah, okay. Yeah, that makes sense.
Sometimes they can’t explain things in a way though that makes sense to us. That again, doesn’t mean that they’re wrong. I can choose to trust them to make their own decisions, and we will all learn more as things unfold over time. That is beautiful. When we see how things unfold, when we see their next step and their next step, we see a bigger picture of what’s happening.
And if things do go a bit sideways for them, when I’m not bringing that judgmental energy of, “I told you so. I had a better idea,” when we’re not bringing that to the conversation, we can support them as they tweak their path over time to get where they want to go.
Or maybe I discover a new aspect of them that I didn’t know about. Maybe it’s a new aspiration that’s been bubbling up. Maybe it’s a fear, a new interest, a sensitivity, like we talked about before, that may be developing.
So, when we’re open and curious about the people that we’re in relationship with, we all grow and learn and change alongside each other, which is so much more connecting and fun than trying to coax and control each other to do what we think is best.
ANNA: So much yes. My goal is connection and part of that is understanding these differences and not only learning to understand, but the next step is really celebrating. And when we can celebrate even when we don’t fully understand, that makes such a difference. The world is richer for us all playing to our strengths and supporting one another to do that. This is especially true for the people we are choosing to share our life with. But, I mean, for me, it really goes for all people.
It’s back to that generous assumption and cultivating an open, curious mindset, so that we can begin to understand why people are seeing the world differently. Why are they choosing differently? And knowing that those different ways of seeing and doing are not attacks on our way of seeing and doing. Both can and do exist. And to be in relationship with someone, celebrating that instead of judging helps us avoid conflicts and misunderstanding, and it really deepens that trust and bond we have with each other, because we feel deeply understood, which is so important to us as humans, often.
PAM: So much. Just take a moment to sink into that and just feel, somebody knowing us to that level, which also includes us knowing ourselves. We kind of need to get there ourselves before we can even share those pieces of information with others. But, as you said, it does help us avoid so much conflict and misunderstanding and taking things personally and judging others and having expectations of others, and instead, deepens our connection, deepens our trust, deepens that whole bond that we have, within our whole family.
And then, as you said, it’s our choice how deep and strong a relationship we want with anybody who passes through our lives. So many of these tools are also useful, at least I have found, in my extended relationships as well.
So, here are some questions that you might want to ponder as you explore this really fun difference between walking in someone’s shoes and seeing through their eyes. So, the first one is, take a moment to think about a close friend or a loved one. How would you describe their aspirations and goals, their strengths and weaknesses, and their interests and passions? It’s really fun to do that. And then, you know what? It might be really fun to check in with them. And say, “Hey, this is what I’m thinking. This is how I’m seeing you. What have I nailed? What have I maybe gone a little sideways on?” It could spark a really, really fun conversation.
ANNA: Yeah. I think that’s a great conversation.
PAM: Yeah. Especially when we just come at it that way, rather than it coming out after a conflict or around a conflict or something. There is no energy and judgment in the air. It’s just like, let’s have this fun conversation. Okay. Next.
Pick an issue or challenge that you recently navigated with family or friends. What did it look like through your eyes? Now try to see it through the eyes of someone else who was involved. How does it look different? How does it look the same? Why do you think that is? Just start playing with that, as well. Where are the the places where you see the same things and where might we see things differently? And then maybe play it through a little bit more, like the choices that people made throughout whatever issue or challenge it was, do they make more sense to you now that you’re looking at it through their eyes?
ANNA: I think what happens when we do this piece, where we step back and go, how are they seeing it? It takes some of the charge out of it, because when we are only seeing through our eyes, we’re bulldozing down the tunnel to get to our end point. But when we step back and go, oh my gosh, I can see how they’re seeing that in a really different way, suddenly, the charge comes out of it and we can get on the same team. We can go, okay, I’m seeing it this way. You’re seeing it that way. Let’s talk about that. It just changes that whole dynamic of the head butting that can happen, you know?
PAM: Yeah. And just think how that helps everyone involved feel seen and heard, no matter what the end path is. When we recognize how other people are experiencing it, that can be so valuable. All right, next.
Remember a time you judged someone else about their choice or decision, and now let’s do a thought experiment with that. Where did that judgment stem from? If you released that judgment and got more curious about why that choice made sense for them, how might things have played out differently? One thing that’s important for us and why that playful attitude helps is it’s not valuable for us to judge our past actions and thoughts. We’re learning more now. We’re playing with things now. The stuff that we’re figuring out, we can bring with us into future encounters, future engagements, conflicts, choices, all those pieces.
So we can, in our own thought experiments, play around with anything. It’s okay that, man, I felt really judgey about that person that day or this thing that I saw. Maybe I know nobody who was involved, but it’s worth it to think, okay, where did that judgment come from? What does that mean for me? Why is that important to me? All those pieces can be really helpful for understanding ourselves and for making maybe different choices as we move forward.
ANNA: Right. That’s what I was going to say. I think when we play around with some of these ones in the past, again, this is not to judge how we handled something in the past. This is not to make ourselves feel bad. But it’s giving us a chance in a lower charged environment to look at that. And I think when we recognize where the judgment came in and recognize how it maybe didn’t serve us in that situation, when we feel it bubbling up when something comes up ahead of us, we can go, oh, okay, this judgment, do I want to look into this now? Do I want to dig back and peel some layers back now? And so, I think that practice can help us actually help in the moment or the things that are to come.
PAM: Exactly. And lastly, let’s explore the story of you. What are your current aspirations and goal, strengths and weaknesses, interests and passions? How do they inform the day-to-day choices you make? I think sometimes we can kind of disconnect. We can think of these big things like, what are my goals? What are my strengths? How do I like to do things? What are my passions? And yet, we don’t bring those down into our day-to-day. Or we don’t make the connection. They may be subconsciously directing our choices throughout the day, because our mind knows these are the things that we value.
But when we can recognize that, we can also notice that we’re making more progress than we think towards our goal, et cetera. So, understanding how all those pieces weave together can be so valuable for ourselves. So, it’s absolutely helpful to do this.
ANNA: Yeah, and I think, too, it kind of reminds me of the priorities episode, too, with that intentionality we’re bringing it, but I think what I really want to say about this question, and we’ll keep talking about this, we need to develop our own self-awareness in order to be able to communicate with our partners. So, in order to be able to say what’s important to us and what we’re doing so that they can understand, because none of us are mind readers. So, this work of really digging into, what am I excited about? What’s making me tick? How am I looking at these things? is so valuable on so many layers for us and for those in our lives.
PAM: Exactly. Yes. We hope you have so much fun with these questions and we would be happy to carry on the conversation, whether you want to comment on YouTube, whether you want to comment on Instagram. We would love to hear some of your processing through these questions if you’d like to share. And thank you so much for listening, and we will see you next time. Bye!
EU386: Building Confidence
Jun 05, 2025
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about building confidence. We had an interesting month in the Living Joyfully Network recently where we dove deep into this topic and it was fascinating how many layers we found to uncover. In this episode, we talk about letting go of comparisons, cultivating trust in ourselves and our children, remembering our ‘why’, and lots more.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone. I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Larrichia. Today we’re going to be talking about building confidence, which was a really interesting topic of conversation on the Network recently, and so I’m really excited to dive into that.
So, Pam, would you like to get us started with our conversation?
PAM: Sure, sure. I am excited to dive into this because confidence is an interesting topic and to see where it comes from and how we can build it and how it comes together.
Because there are actually many different aspects to building our confidence. So, I thought I would start with one shift that I found really fundamental to building my confidence and that was letting go of comparison. Especially when we first came to unschooling, it was really easy to compare myself and my family to others and kind of find myself wanting, and what would happen each and every time is it would just send me spinning, right?
I’d start questioning my choice. It’s like, why are we doing this and undermining my confidence in things working out, right? So as I came to notice that pattern, I dug a bit deeper. And soon realized that comparing myself or my kids to other people just invites judgment into the conversations that I’m having with myself.
As I’m processing and trying to figure things out. It ended up being more noise in my head that distracted me and even sometimes drowned out my own thoughts and perspectives, they could get really loud and I learned, I noticed, I know that my brain needs some time and some space to think things through.
I want to feel my feelings, want to understand my emotions, all those pieces. And I found I wasn’t getting to the processing pieces. I wasn’t developing that deeper level of self-awareness when I was staying stuck at that more superficial level of comparing myself to others and then just trying to fix those differences.
That was very surface level. Here’s what they’re doing and I feel I’m not doing it, so I should do that thing, right? There wasn’t a lot of learning in there for me. And I came to see that part of building confidence in myself is better understanding myself. So that little interesting nuance for me is that it is not about forever shutting out what others might share with me.
At first it just feels like judgment because I’m noticing it. But what I found in the longer run was that it was more about recognizing that what they’re sharing with me is merely information. I didn’t have to take that in as judgment. I didn’t have to compare myself immediately. I could just see what it was, because so often, as we’ve talked about before, that kind of information often tells us more about them.
Then it tells us about us, and that’s that pendulum swing we have talked about before as well. At first, we sometimes need to swing all the way to the other side to spend some quiet time without other voices so that we can start to more clearly hear our own. And when I think back, I definitely remember that when the kids left school. We pretty much cocooned as a whole family basically for about six months.
It was really helpful for me to remove myself from those outside voices for a while when I was so busy, learning so much about unschooling, learning about my kids, learning about myself. Because I noticed that when others expressed confusion, I immediately left to compare myself and my kids to them, and I immediately felt defensive and I didn’t yet have the language to express our new direction with any confidence.
So, letting go of comparisons with others. Really was a big first step for me on the way to building confidence in the whole shebang.
ANNA: In all the things. I think it’s so valuable to spend some time here thinking about what confidence looks like and feels like and how we can get there and cultivate it, because it really does change how you move through the world. When you’re feeling confident about your relationships, about your situation, about the decisions that you’re making, it changes everything.
It just doesn’t invite all of that. It just doesn’t invite it all in. I think it really changes our experience, so it’s worth digging in. I’m glad we’re doing that and I think comparison is such a great place to start because if we think about it, that’s so external. And like you said, surface level, whatever we’re seeing from other people is a tiny slice of their life.
Often what they’re choosing to put on Instagram, or even if it’s what they’re choosing to tell the story at Christmas, it’s very surface level. It’s cultivated to create an image and that’s great because I love them writing their story and feeling good about what’s working for them.
There’s no critique about that. It’s just me recognizing, oh, okay, that’s what’s happening for them. That’s interesting for them. That’s what’s going on. But also knowing it’s not the whole story, but what I can do is focus on my kids and see what’s happening here.
What do we love? What’s going on for us? And it really changes that piece because if I am out looking and comparing, I actually really am not present with my kids or with what’s happening in my life and in our home. And so that was the first thing for me, realizing just can almost energetically feel it pulling me away from actually where I want to be, which is present. Where I wanted to be at the time, present with my kids and looking at our life and enriching our life.
So, I do love that we’re starting, with letting go of comparison.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love this topic as a whole, this building confidence. It was interesting on the network to see people noticing it’s that lack of confidence that’s really causing a lot of the issues that are coming up in their unschooling lives.
When you have that feeling of, I have to do things like this and then, oh, but I should be doing this. And just kind of flailing around with this kind of decision making and then thinking we’re doing it wrong. We need to do it differently. It’s that lack of confidence. And so the letting go of comparisons is such a great little place to start looking.
Just because people are so different. And so I really think, at the beginning of my unschooling journey, I did not have that so clearly in my mind, this idea of people are different. But that’s such a huge paradigm shift that I think would’ve helped me with this earlier on if I had only understood that part because comparison doesn’t really make sense anymore once you realize how different people are.
And so what works for one person won’t work for another person. Then when we’re looking at what other people are doing, it’s just that information. It’s just noticing, there’s one thing that’s possible to do and see how it’s working for them or not working for them.
It has nothing to do with me, my kids, our family, or what’s going on with us? And so once we can tune in more to what’s true of my kids, what’s true of me, and really start making decisions that make sense to me, rather than trying to copy the decisions that someone else made that made sense to them.
It’s like all of a sudden that confidence starts building because I’m listening. This makes more sense. It’s not just following these steps that logically don’t make sense to my brain. And so, I just love that and just remembering like what you were saying, Anna, what we’re seeing of other people is also just one story of their lives.
That’s not the whole picture. And so yeah, that comparison is, it can really derail us along the path. I love the reminder to let go of that.
ANNA: I love what you said there about it just makes sense and I would even argue that it’s easier. Because I think if we’re trying to do something that works for someone else, we can feel like, this is hard, this is not flowing.
Why is this not feeling good? Why are we getting resistance here? What is happening? My kids don’t want to do that, or this is not happening. But when you’re really tuned in and doing what works for you, it’s like, oh, this feels easy. This feels fun. We’re still going to have our regular bumps, but it’s not going against the flow.
Something else that’s a part of this is. A trust, right? A trust in ourselves, a trust in our children, a trust in the decisions that we’re making so that when we have that really innate trust, if we are confident, we project that confidence outside of ourselves.
When we can think about it. How do we build that trust? A lot of that is really just being with our kids, just seeing what they’re doing, really bringing in what’s happening here. And look, they are learning, they are growing, we are improving our relationships. We are getting through hurdles.
And I think one piece of this, I want to say that I think happens more at the beginning of the journey, sometimes we’re trusting in our decision. I know I’ve made the right decision and now everything’s going to be great. I’ve pulled my kids out of school, or whatever change I’ve made and now it’s going to be great.
And it’s like, no, it’s not exactly that. We don’t get to do that. It’s more that we start building trust in our relationships. I think that’s why we talk so much about how to cultivate these relationships. Because the trust that I had was a very deep trust that we could figure anything out.
It was not about school or not school, it was about how we could figure out how to meet our needs, how to work together, how to move through difficult situations, how to move through conflict, how to move through things that life threw at us, and that deep trust was just unshakeable. Then when people would come at me with things they didn’t like what we were doing or didn’t understand what we were doing, I was so solid that I know us. I know our relationships. I know we can figure out what’s best. So, it’s not about a particular thing. Again, unschooling, going to school, doing whatever. It’s really about that. We are so in tune. We figure things out, we know what’s happening. We work together. If we have found a need that isn’t being met.
We’ll figure it out. So, that deep trust, I think, is a part of this too.
PAM: Yeah, and I think that trust flows so nicely after you can let go of those comparisons because now, I can see, I can hear my own voice. I can now lean, as you said, lean into the kids and as you mentioned Erika, that realization that people are different.
That just releases so much weight for other people’s, um, shares. And like you said, Anna, nobody’s trying to lie or fake things or anything. They’re just excitedly sharing what they’re wanting to share, et cetera. So yeah, that’s where we can now lean in and when we’re hearing our voice and now we can learn so much.
We can learn so much about our kids, ourselves, learn the tools and the processes to be in a relationship with them too. Figure things out. Right? And that is where I remember, like you were saying, that’s where we learn the language. So, that we can not feel defensive and also have the language to share if people are interested in learning more.
That confidence is building and building and building. When we’re shutting out those noises and now actually leaning in, hearing ourselves, our actual kids in front of us, and instead of just trying to copy other things, we’re actually in there learning these kinds of tools to be in relationship, to build connection.
And that’s where the trust comes. It’s like, oh look, we figured it out. We figured it out. Things went sideways and the world didn’t end, and we figured it out. Just through that experience for me anyway, it just built more and more trust and the confidence came along with it.
ERIKA: Oh, I really love the trust part. I’m just thinking, I think back in the old days, I would’ve thought confidence comes from thinking that I did everything right and so I can feel good about where I am and what I’m doing because I made all the correct decisions, you know? And so, trusting that there’s no one right way, and trusting that this is a long game, trusting that there’s plenty of time, those are the things that if I can trust in that, that’s going to be what builds my confidence because, there are going to be ups and downs.
There are going to be things that we think are going to work and then they don’t work, or they work for a while and then they don’t work. And so that doesn’t mean my confidence should be shattered. That just means, this is life. And so being confident is more about trusting that we can make it through when things don’t go the way that we expect them to or that this kind of longer game and plenty of time view of childhood, which I think is really kind of a radical change from the way we grew up.
A lot of us grew up in school. It makes it feel like there is definitely one right way and time is of the essence and you better check these things off in the correct order at the correct time. My trust in our unschooling journey has taken a lot of paradigm shifts in my own mindset in order to get to that place.
I wanted to also bring us to the idea of understanding our why. Because I think that’s such a huge part of building our confidence too. It’s something that I love. Every time we talk about it on the network, it’s always such an amazing, fun conversation to read why people came to unschooling.
What is the reason that they are doing this with their children? What did they see in their children that brought them here? What happened in our own lives that brought us to these ideas?
And so I think when we really dig in and start asking ourselves these questions like, why is unschooling appealing? Why are we doing the things we do with our kids? What makes our kids tick? Who are we, what things do we like to do in our lives?
Digging down to that, why gives us a lot more confidence and revisiting it can be a little confidence boost. When we are feeling a little bit shaky. That’s why we always go back to that, when people are feeling shaky, like what is your why?
And that grounds you back into that confidence about your decisions.
PAM: I think that has always been such a great tool. When I remember to do it, when I start getting knocked off, when my confidence is faltering, when I’m wobbling like that, once I remember that as a tool to help me rebuild things, it is always so valuable because fundamentally there is a reason for this choice in the first place.
And revisiting that reminds me, right? Oh yes, this is why we are doing this thing. And even playing around with it like, so what if we weren’t doing this thing anymore? That helps me remember, because like you’re saying, as things are flowing before. It can start to feel easier. Right? And you forget how challenging things might have been before you made these lifestyle changes.
And then if your confidence gets knocked for a bit and you kind of forget, go back to the beginning and really steep in that understanding why we made this choice. Even though this moment seems challenging, even though my confidence is a little knocked around right now, fundamentally, this is the life that I want to live with my family.
This is the kind of person I want to be, et cetera. It just really helps me reground really. I think that’s what it is, and that helps so much with my confidence.
ANNA: Yeah, and honestly that’s a tool we can use in any realm of our life. Because all of us are making thoughtful choices about how we want to move through the world.
And so right when something knocks that confidence a little bit, we can sometimes throw the baby out with the bath water, and question the whole decision. But I think if we can pause and take a little bit of time to say, okay, but why did I make this decision? And I love the point that you made, Pam, that it can feel easier.
So sometimes we forget because that is so true. And then it just takes that little bit of reflection to go, oh my gosh, we were living in a really difficult time before we made this decision. And look at all the things that have changed. So, this little bump is nothing compared to when we were kind of flailing around, figuring out what worked for all of the personalities and all of the different pieces and all of our brains.
So, I love that point because I think, again, when we get knocked by something. It just shakes us. And so we just start, why did I change? I need to go back and just take that time, pause, really soak in why.
I think it can be valuable to write it down, throughout the journey at different times because our whys can change, and even the decision can ultimately change. It’s not about you have a why, you make a decision, you stay with it forever. But as you tune into the why, you will fine tune the journey, which may involve changing parts of the decision. But it’s so important, I think, to just slow down when you’re feeling knocked by something, because then you’re going to get your confidence back and from that confident place you can all decide if this is still the path we want to take. And that just feels very different than deciding and then running.
PAM: Yeah, I think so. I remember those moments, I was going to say, especially early on, but I mean, you still can get knocked. But that’s why, that’s why I liked understanding our why. Sometimes we talked about remembering our why, but I like understanding because like you said, Anna, it can definitely change over time as we learn more, as we gain more experience with it.
It’s like, oh yeah, this is what I want. Revisiting it and like you said, even writing it down or wherever your brain likes to keep things. To just keep track or keep those things top of mind for a while. It is really helpful just to bring that back top of mind to help recover and build our confidence again.
And I think when we bring all that together, I know in my experience, that’s when, as my confidence comes back, as I’m remembering why we’re doing it, as I’ve sunk back into that trust that we’ve cultivated, I’ve let go of the voices recognize that people are different and the things they’re sharing are great for them.
That doesn’t automatically mean that they’re great for us anyway, through all that process, I really start to find my voice again because that’s one of the first things I lose when my confidence gets knocked, right? I can’t share with any enthusiasm because I am not confident in our choices or how things are going in this particular season.
So that, for me, is kind of a sign that my confidence is coming back and just having these various tools to help me find my voice again. And it’s, I really like that image because it’s finding our voice with the other outside world, extended family, whatever, but it’s also finding our voice again, maybe within our family.
That kind of knocked our confidence again. Knock our confidence so we can find ourselves again, ground ourselves again. And then that really does, at least for me, help me find my voice again so I can continue showing up in all the various moments of life.
ANNA: Right. And now I’m thinking it’s almost circular in a way, and that if you find that you have lost your voice or you’re feeling shaky about your voice, then I’m wondering is that because maybe I’m taking on other people’s expectations, or I’m trying to present something that maybe I don’t fully believe or that doesn’t fit with my family, or I’m trying to perform in a way, that’s what I’m supposed to do. And so then that gets you to start the process again, letting go of the comparisons, letting go of the side noises.
How do I build trust in myself and in my kids? And so I love that because I think from that grounded place of just trusting in your relationships and really understanding your family, you do have a voice. And whether you choose to shout it from the mountaintops or in a casual conversation or just your own self-talk, which is so important, you know that you have this strong self-talk of, like, look at this, look at what we’re creating. Look at what we’re creating together. Look at this life that we have. And so wherever it is, if you’re feeling shaky, then run through it again because you’ll get back there as you tune into your kids.
I really love that piece.
ERIKA: Yeah. Oh, me too. Finding our voice doesn’t mean we have to be going and telling everyone either. And so I think that’s a fun nuance that finding my voice, to me, really is that self-talk, inner voice, that to me is the most important one.
And so, just clarifying for myself why I’m doing the things I’m doing. Gaining that confidence and trust in my ability to do things and having that be reflected in my self-talk, that is really where that finding my voice comes from. And then I feel like that grounded, calm, confident self can succeed in any interaction, right?
It’s not like I need to share everything with every person I meet, but I’m feeling good about myself. I’m feeling okay and my decision’s feeling good. That grounded calm energy helps, Pam, like you were saying, in our own families, finding our voice in our own families.
I think it makes such a huge difference. With all of the kids’ ups and downs, just being able to be to know that we’ve got this, that kind of energy just feels so reassuring to them as well. And it just helps me in conversations with everyone. So, I really love the finding our voice piece.
This has been a really fun conversation and we hope you enjoyed it and maybe had an aha moment or picked up some new ideas to consider on your own journey. And if you enjoyed this type of conversation, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the different things we encounter in our unschooling lives.
And you can learn more by clicking on Network on livingjoyfully.ca at the top of the page, and we hope to meet you there. So thanks for listening, and we will see you next time.
EU163 Flashback: Growing Up Unschooling with Adrian Peace-Williams
May 22, 2025
This week, we share a conversation that Pam had with Adrian Peace-Williams back in 2019. At the time, she was 24 years old and in college. Pam and Adrian talked about her childhood unschooling, her choice to go to high school, her years of traveling the world after high school, where she was at the moment in her journey, and lots more. Her understanding of herself and her needs was so inspirational.
We hope you enjoy the conversation!
QUESTIONS FOR ADRIAN
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
Over the years, was there a time you found your unschooling lifestyle challenging? How did you move through that?
I know that you enjoy traveling. What is it that you love about it and can you tell us some of the trips you’ve been on?
You’re in college (university?) now and home for the holidays. What are you studying and how did you find the transition to school?
What do you appreciate most about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
What are your plans for the next year or two?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome, I am Pam Laricchia from LivingJoyfully.ca and today I am here with Adrian Peace-Williams. Hi, Adrian!
ADRIAN: Hi, Pam. How is it going?
PAM: It is going wonderfully. Adrian, if people do not know, is one of my friend Alex’s daughters. I have enjoyed getting little updates over the years as to what she has been up to. I am thrilled that she agreed to come on the podcast to talk about her experience growing up unschooling. So, to get us started Adrian …
Can you share a little bit about you and your family?
ADRIAN: Yes. I grew up in Nova Scotia and I have two sisters. I am the middle child and I am twenty-four at the moment. I was homeschooled up until I was fifteen then I decided to go to public school. I did that and that was a whole adventure. I am attending university. We live in the woods. I love being outside and reading books and learning and I love my sisters dearly and my parents as well of course.
Pam:
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
ADRIAN: It changed of course as I grew up but a theme for my whole life has been the outdoors. That was a big one for me when I was little too. Luckily, I did grow up surrounded by woods in a pretty rural location. I was able to go outside all the time and play in the woods.
My parents would facilitate that and bring home books on trees and birds and plants. I would kind of look at them and think this is cool but mostly just wanted to be outside. Now I am valuing those books a little bit more and turning more towards the books. I want to know all the details now.
Being outside was kind of an easy one. I could just be outside. I also loved drawing and painting and so I would do that a lot as a kid. Mum would often take us to art galleries so I could see different paintings. We had painting board games where we could pretend it was an art auction kind of thing. We actually did that the other day too.
PAM: Masterpiece, we loved that game.
ADRIAN: Yes, Masterpiece.
We would just draw and paint a lot. I went to a lot of art camps as well. We could choose what camps in the summer we wanted to go to and I would usually go to the visual arts and also theater too. I really enjoyed being in theater so I took some improv classes.
Again, mum and dad would say, “Okay these are all these classes you can take and here are your options.” I would always choose an arts one. I took painting classes. As I got older, I got involved in community theater which was amazing. One of them is just a woman’s group where they put on a variety show every year. The profits go to woman’s charities that they pick. So, I love that.
I liked to read too, so I would read a lot or get mum and dad to read to me. I loved reading so much. I would actually sit for so long and being read to, that mum and dad were like, “Okay I cannot read to you any more I am too tired.” I would want them to sit there for like six hours and just read to me. So, eventually I got more into audio books and then just reading to myself.
PAM: I remember that transition for my daughter, Lissy too. I was reading the Harry Potter books to them for the longest time, for hours. Then my voice would go and even water was not helping it. Then we found the audio books at the library and then, she could just go for hours and hours and hours.
ADRIAN: Yes, same. I think those were my main things that I love. Of course, just playing games and hanging with family. Canoeing, I loved camping too. I would always if there was an option of, “Hey what do we want to do as a family?” I would always choose to all go camping together and be outside. Nature awareness camps too, those I loved. I learned a lot through them.
PAM: That is awesome.
Was there a time over the years that you found your unschooling lifestyle challenging?
ADRIAN: Yes, I was thinking about this question, because of course life is challenging. And it is also hard to separate okay is this because I was homeschooled or unschooled or is this just because life is hard.
PAM: It is true, it is just about living, it is true.
ADRIAN: I think I thought about my transitions in life. And those, I think have been the hardest times for me. Transitioning from when I chose to go to high school. I was fifteen and kind of felt I needed something more but I did not know what that was. And so how do I move forward through that? Okay, what I am doing now is not quite working, how do I figure that out?
Then once I did graduate high school and was like okay, I have done this stage of my life, what is next? Then after traveling a lot I am like, okay I am ready to not travel but what is the next thing? It was these transitions I think, that have been the points in my life that was kind of hard to go through.
I think the things that helped me were remembering what brings me joy and what my values are and giving myself time to listen to myself. I think I learned I personally take a lot of time to come to decisions sometimes. It is important for me to give myself that time. And to remember that is okay to make a mistake and decide something and start it and then no this obviously is not the right thing. Then do something else and maybe that keeps happening and then eventually you will find it and you will love it.
PAM: Yes, you hone in on things over time but through your experiences right but I think that time piece is such an important point. Because you do have to keep giving yourself permission because that is not something society kind of in general supports, does it? It is like boom, boom, boom, right?
ADRIAN: Yes, and I think during those transition periods, sometimes I can feel this pressure. Okay, what are you going to do, what are you going to do now? I think remembering to protect myself from that and realize I am going through my own journey right now and that is okay and I do not need to please these people in society that think I need to being doing this or be doing that. I think giving myself time and just remembering yes, what brings me joy and trying to follow those things, trying to follow those paths.
PAM: I think that is such a great observation about what works for you. Knowing that it is okay to not know and that is okay to just kind of follow that joy. And say okay, ‘I think I am going to try this that might bring something into my life that I will value.’ Then it is like, no, that is enough. That is not what I was looking for out of that experience, right? We are, as a society, goal obsessed. I need to know where I am going and I need to doggedly pursue that all the time. And to change my mind or make mistakes are some horrific thing, you know.
ADRIAN: Yes.
PAM: Rather than just life experience and me getting to know myself better and what brings me joy better.
ADRIAN: I think I always thought if I am doing something that makes me happy, I will probably make the world a little more happy because I will be happy and that will just be spread.
PAM: It trickles out.
ADRIAN: I thought that was a good way to guide myself. But I think it might be different for other people too.
PAM: Oh yes and all you can share is your own experience, right?
ADRIAN: Yes
PAM: So yes, you mentioned that you know it was one of those transition pieces where you decided to try out high school.
Could you talk a little bit more about that experience? Parents might be curious about how you found that transition.
ADRIAN: Yes, it was really interesting actually and relatively easy, I guess. I think I was at a point where I had a couple of friends that had moved away and I was kind of lacking in my social community. I had a couple of friends who were in high school and thought you know what, this could be interesting, why not just try this. I think I went into it with a very casual mindset.
Which going back is a really interesting thing and not a lot of people have that experience with high school. It was like a summer camp or like a class, you know. I thought, I will just try this and see how it goes and if I do not like it, I can just stop because I am getting a perfectly great education.
PAM: Because you just can.
ADRIAN: Because I just can and so I think just having that relaxedness or relaxation around it was really helpful. I did not feel a lot of pressure necessarily. I think I had some misconceptions about high school. Like I thought okay these people have been in class learning their whole lives. I was curious to see what my skill level would be. Because we were very free in terms of our structured learning which is very different from high school.
When I went, I picked classes that I thought I would be interested in. Which were some art, some drama and some food science I think and an ocean science class. I realized that I know how to learn and they are teaching and so it was actually really easy. Oh, I just need to know how to listen and how to take notes or how to ask questions, how to talk to people and have fun. I got this, I know these things.
PAM: I love that.
ADRIAN: Yes, so it was really cool that I got to have that experience. I also had a lot of help too. My older sister also transitioned to high school and she was there and I had some good friends there so they were kind of able to help. I did know people so I was not going into this totally new space. And my teachers also were amazing.
My spelling and reading was not at the level of my other peers and they could have been much harder on me about my spelling but I think they knew that I understood all the material and they could see it was getting better and it was. I found that it easily got better really quickly and was fine. I also had lots of help from my community with that transition. I met lots of great people too. It was interesting to get to know a lot of people my own age. I think homeschooling I had a lot of friends that were a bit older and a bit younger and kind of usually hang out in a group of multi-aged people.
And so, then we were all the same age and it was interesting. I think I realized that Nova Scotia where I grew up is a different too. I was exposed to a very different community which I really valued. I think it made me realize that I knew myself a lot better than I thought I did. Or I did not even realize that I knew myself but when I was with a lot of other people that were still learning who they were it made me realize, ‘Oh, I have had this time to just be with myself and not always be comparing myself to people.’ Yes, I think I realized I had a bigger sense of self than I knew I did.
PAM: Yes.
ADRIAN: Which was really interesting. Yes. I went in at half way through grade ten and then I did eleven and twelve. By year twelve, I think hard part for me, I lost a bit of the mentality that my parents tried to teach me through homeschooling. I think I started caring too much about the things I did not actually care about. If that makes sense.
PAM: Yes, yes.
ADRIAN: Yes, but I am also glad that I had that experience too, I also learned from that. I think now I know a little bit. Okay this is what a public school can be like and this is what homeschooling can be like. Now I have these two perspectives which have been really valuable in my life as well.
PAM: That is so interesting. I love the way you were able to articulate that. Those are really great pieces to differentiate between the different kind of lifestyles and be able to choose it. And to choose to stay, to know that you could leave if you wanted to helps you almost be there to observe and to notice those things. You knew. It just feels like it is a choice. You come to the whole experience with a different mindset. A more open kind of mindset. It sounds like that helped you.
ADRIAN: Yes, completely.
PAM: Became more self-aware too about yourself within the bigger picture of it all, right?
ADRIAN: Yes, and I think it was a concept that a lot of my peers had never considered. When I was explaining, I am here to kind of try it, they were like, “What? Oh my god.” Some really interesting, fun conversations came out of it. It was almost comical because I am just doing this. It was good.
PAM: Oh yes. That is so interesting, so interesting. Okay so after your high school experience you ended up doing some extended traveling, right? And that was part of that transition out again.
I would love to hear a little bit about your traveling time. What is it that you loved about it? And maybe a little bit about the trips that you went on.
ADRIAN: Yes. I did a lot of traveling and I guess it was a transition. I was done with high school and I think I knew that I needed to ground myself a bit from that experience because towards the end I was feeling not quite myself. I was ready for a less structured learning environment.
I just got caught up and I was like, ‘Okay, I just need to see the world a little bit.’ Because I traveled a bit with my family when I was young and really liked it. Liked seeing new places and learning new things so yes, traveling sounded really good because what is the rest of the world doing. I am here but what else is going on.
So, I went to New Zealand with Unschooling Adventures which is run out of the states. I went there for six weeks. It was with a youth travel program, they organized the trip. We were in charge of certain things. The goal of it was to learn how to backpack and hike and travel as a young person and how to do that. And how to meet other young unschoolers or people who had been in public school—other young people who were wanting to travel and learn more about the world.
It was fantastic. We backpacked across the south island of New Zealand. I learned how to live out of a backpack and hike with one and how to cook on the trial and how to navigate from different places. How to stay in a hostel and all these traveling skills and also it just really reminded me that there are so many different ways to look at the world and be in the world.
It was really lovely after high school where I think my world view narrowed at the end. This really broadened it and my leaders especially were just amazing people and had great stories and great experiences that they shared with me. I was like, ‘YES! This is fantastic!’ It was perfect. It was what I needed. We were outside all the time hiking in the woods, which I loved.
So, that was a great experience. After I was like okay, I want to keep doing this. I was not done with this style of learning and traveling. I guess I thought this was really cool to just be able to live out of a backpack and this is all you need. I liked that idea of being really minimal because I think when you have less stuff you are able to see more and experience more because you are not caught up in a lot of the things that you have. But I wanted to challenge myself a little bit so I said okay, let’s do this on my own. Let’s not go with a travel program.
I thought Europe was a good place to start because a lot people speak some English but I also want to learn a bit of French and Spanish. My ancestors are from England and Whales and I thought it would be really interesting to go to Europe. So, I worked at a farm for a season and went in the winter. I booked my flight and packed by backpack, just one. I went to Europe for three months and booked some work stays, some work exchanges I should say.
I did that in New Zealand and was like oh this is a really cool way to get to know a place because I think it is really nice to stay with someone who lives in the place that you are visiting. I find it gets a more local perspective and you do not just feel like a tourist. You actually get to be in the place. So yes, I did some work exchanges on a farm and with a couple of families. I did some hiking and sight-seeing. My mom and my younger sister came to visit me for a little bit. I went to Spain and France and Italy and England.
PAM: Wow.
ADRIAN: It was fantastic. It was probably one of my most challenging trips. I learned a lot about myself because being alone in a foreign country with just a backpack you just, it is just like, ‘Okay…I am just doing this I guess and I need to figure it out. Where am I going to stay? How am I going to get there? How am I going to afford that? What am I going to eat?’
I feel like I started to connect more with my cooking because that was probably the first time that I was like really totally in charge of my own food. Which was interesting because before I was either living with my family where it was more collaborative or traveling with a group where it was more in a communal way. So, this was like, ‘Okay yes, I need to figure out how I want to eat and cook. Where am I going to do that, in hostels?’ You know and trains and meeting new people and speaking new languages. I definitely learned a lot.
I think my most important lesson from that trip was that people really matter to me. I went alone and I had this idea about proving something to myself, that I can do this alone. I remember standing looking at the Colosseum in Rome and being like okay this is really cool. I have seen this in tons of movies, this extremely famous thing, so much history. But I do not have anyone to share this with. So, what does this mean? It was kind of like, not much. This doesn’t really mean anything right now because I miss my sisters and yes, I just missed that connection of sharing with people.
PAM: Sharing an experience.
ADRIAN: It was really interesting, yes. But I think it was really good for me to go through those things alone and to realize those connections are really important to me.
PAM: Isn’t that a wonderful way to learn these things about ourselves, right? Is to have experiences. To have experiences that like you were talking about before, these are not mistakes or wrong. These are things we are learning along the way. That make us more whole because we are learning more about ourselves. Now that we know more, our next step can be closer toward the stuff that we know more about. Does that make sense?
ADRIAN: Totally, totally and so yes, my next traveling, I knew I wanted connections. I also realized that I really enjoyed learning Spanish. So, I went to Nicaragua and volunteered for about six weeks in the same place. Because I was also moving around a lot in Europe and that ended up being exhausting. I wanted to connect with one place and so I went and volunteered and got to know a community and people and took Spanish lessons and that was incredible.
It was awesome to really see into a different kind of world and speak a different language. It was on a permaculture farm for a bit so also following my interest of being outside and working with my hands. Then also working with kids a little bit and doing art too, I also like doing art. So, it was teaching art classes for about week and then working on a permaculture farm for about a month. It was lovely. I was like, ‘This is it!’ Because I am coming to this place and actually feeling like I am contributing to the community a little bit. Instead of just being a tourist. Which is also great to do sometimes; but it felt more meaningful to me to make those connections.
PAM: Yes, exactly it is all about the stuff that we are learning about ourselves and what is meaningful to us. Like you said before, it is not a judgement on other people making other choices because those are the choices that work for them. It is that whole piece that you figure out that we are all individuals and as we you know step towards our joy, does not mean that everybody else’s steps need to look same or that our steps are wrong because they look different. It is a bigger picture appreciation, isn’t it, for everybody doing what they love.
ADRIAN: Yes, and I think I came across, like you were saying, like everyone is following their own joy. Because a lot of my peers were going to university or college at that time and that was the mainstream that everyone was going towards. But, I kept choosing to not do that I guess and to keep working and traveling. I was working really hard in between all my trips. I think that was kind of cool for me because it taught me that I can keep making my own decisions and that is okay.
And to keep following what I love has turned out really well. It was nice, it was like a continual affirmation of yes, you can keep making your own choices and everyone is doing what they want to do and you do not have to do what other people are doing. Or you can and that is great too but as long as it feels right in your heart.
PAM: Yes, as long as it is your choice. Because now you have made the transition right now you are going to university, right?
So, do you want to talk a little bit about that transition and how that has been going for you?
ADRIAN: Yes, yes for sure. Now I am in university and there is also a certain relaxation about that. It is interesting to have been doing something that not a lot of other people are doing for it was about five years that I was working and traveling and now I am doing something where a lot of other people are doing that. And to notice being in those two different worlds is really interesting.
After traveling and working, I had been working was on organic farm and I loved it there. When I first started working on farms, I think it was my first job when I was twelve or something which was mostly weeding or mowing a lawn, it was just for pocket change.
I live in a rural place too so there are not a lot of other jobs available. But over the years I kept working on farms and a couple different farms and this one that I worked at for about five seasons now, I do not work there anymore but I did. Something about the farm, I think it was the perfect size and the family is amazing but I got to see the whole picture of the farm. I got to be a part of different parts of it which is something that I really like.
I think my brain likes to look at the big picture and then put different pieces into it and see how it all works together. I love being outside and working with my hands and I got to work at the farmer’s market where we sell our products and see how my work was connecting to the community. Which is something also I learned that I really value. Feeling like am helping my community and contributing to the world in a positive way.
Because I love being outside and I love being in the natural world I realized I guess, by working through this farm that it’s connected to a lot of the things that I love. I took a summer off and did more traveling in Canada. I did a road trip with my friend. The whole summer I was thinking about the farm. What is happening and what is growing and is this turning out? I miss it so much. I just realized that I love it but also that I had been working at this one farm for a while and feeling like, I wanted more of a challenge.
I need to make a shift so I am taking on more responsibility or like I am learning more. Because I feel like I know how to weed really fast and I know how to harvest but I want to know how do I plan this and what is happening in the soil. How do I market my produce or these more theoretical or different than just the day to day stuff? I was thinking bigger picture things and I was thinking I like learning with a group. I kind of just came to where yes, university is the way that I want to learn about this.
I also thought that I could just start reading books and start farming because you do not really need a degree to farm you can just do it and it will work or it won’t. I was kind of like, ‘No, I think I want this more structured way.’ I do like some structure in my learning. Yes, I wanted to be with other young people who were into farming. I knew we could have lots of conversations.
So, now I am going to Trent University in Peterborough, Ontario. I chose that program because it focuses on sustainable and alternative forms of agriculture which is what I am interested in. Instead of the more large scale industrial farming. I really, really like it. I was a little nervous but more just because I was moving to a different town and community. Also, because I have not been in kind of this system for a long time and how is that going to go. But really it was fine because I think I know how to learn and I know how to reach out for help.
Luckily, I have amazing parents that help me a lot and the school is great too. There are so many resources that I can use. It has been really good. I think the thing that has been important for me is to find peers that also have a similarish mindset around school. I was kind of like okay, what are my peers going to be like are they all going to be younger more like eighteen coming right out of high school? Will they be older, will they be mixed? But I found that it is more diverse actually with my program. I think a lot of people come to agriculture maybe at a bit of an older age instead of right out of high school. But, it is a diverse group which I really appreciate because they have lots of different perspectives that we can talk about. Not everyone wants to farm, some people are just interested in agriculture and food policy and some people do want to farm and some people they want to do livestock or vegetables so it is diverse which I really appreciate.
PAM: That is lovely. So, it sounds like you are enjoying that so far.
ADRIAN: Yes, I feel like the program has been really perfect because it is not very hands on but that is kind of great because I have already had a lot of hands on experience. I am taking an organic agricultural class next semester which I think is going to talk about policy and certification methods and then environmental implications of agriculture. So, how are agriculture and the environment related, which they completely are.
Last semester I took world food systems so looking at how does food move globally and how is it traded. I think that is really important for me to know. All the classes so far have been like, ‘Yes! This is what I need to know, this is important for me to learn.’ But I still do question how important graduating is to me. Because there are some classes that are required for my degree that I do not necessarily think will be extremely interesting. So, I am still trying to figure out, how important that piece of paper is to me and how valuable those classes will be. Is it not interesting because I do not know anything about it or because I haven’t tried it or is it because I really just do not want to take this class? How do I work with this? Because there still is a lot of pressure from within the university to get that degree. That is the whole program is setting you up to do, that is the point.
PAM: That is their job.
ADRIAN: Right that is their job but my point is learning and using this information to hopefully one day apply it to my life as a person growing food for my community. So, there are slightly different agendas happening here. It is sometimes tricky to balance that but so far it is good. I think it will be more towards the end of my degree when I how it will work. I do not ever want to sacrifice my time for something that I won’t necessarily care about because I think towards the end of high school that was what was happening. It was just doing this for someone else now not necessarily myself so it did not feel good. So, I am wary I guess and cautious to observer, this is what the university wants or this is what I want? Just make sure I keep on my path here.
PAM: Oh, Adrian I love all those questions you are asking yourself. That is perfect and that is how you are going to kind of feel your way through it. I mean, that is how you feel your way through life, right? Really because there are always pushes and pulls and things from various directions. You know, what it’s like to really get clear on what we want out of it. What you want out of it and the implications as you said, you know that tendency to easily get sucked into someone else’s agenda. That even sounds too harsh but other people’s agendas, they are everywhere. It is not necessarily a bad thing but being aware of it so that even if you choose to not lose sight of the fact that you are choosing, right?
ADRIAN: Yes.
PAM: Because you can easily kind of slip over into, I know I am not making these choices from a personal perspective anymore they are choices that have showed up here and I fell into it. You are asking yourself such wonderful questions, it is fascinating. Thanks so much for sharing.
What do you appreciate now, from your perspective at this moment, most about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up? Or just being free to live because like we were talking about before to label what is unschooling versus you know what is living, eventually it is just living your life doesn’t it.
ADRIAN: Yes, it does.
PAM:
What do you appreciate most about just being able to live your life just growing up?
ADRIAN: I think it is time and space that was really important for me. And freedom and not being constantly judged and evaluated on my decisions and choices. I was really, of course when we were working as a family so not totally free like I had to work with my sisters.
PAM: Yes, in the context.
ADRIAN: Yes, within the context but yes, the freedom to get to know myself. And I did not even know I was getting to know myself. I did not even realize that was happening until I was in a situation where that had not happened for people. I think yes, the space to just be, the space to have time to listen to myself and know and learn how to listen to myself. Learn how I work and how I learn what brings me joy, what does not, how do I deal with making these decisions? Having the time to even think about that. I do not want to take this class, okay why do I not want to take this class? So, the time; the time is so amazing. The time to just be and learn how to be. Be in relationship with nature and my family and my community. I think if I just explore, time to be a kid a play.
PAM: That leads nicely into our last question.
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are maybe just starting out on this journey?
ADRIAN: I thought about this question and it is tricky because I think every parent and every kid and every community and every environment is different so it is going to look different for everyone.
I think what I came to, the things that I have valued the most from my experience of being unschooled was the tools that I have now. I think being an unschooler got me and the parents that I have got me those tools. Like how do I listen? How do I communicate my needs? How do I listen to other people’s needs? How do I know how to ask questions when I do not know the answers? How do I go into a new situation feeling okay and feeling that I can do this?
Even if I do not know how to do it, I know what next steps are; how to figure it out. Okay, this did not work where do I go from here? How to live and how to love too. How to love myself and how to love other people. How to figure my way around a city and how to take care of other kids. How to have a conversation with an adult when I am there. I think knowing how to learn is much more important than knowing math or knowing how to write an essay perfectly.
Because if you know how to learn then you can go into most any situation and figure it out. And know how to have the confidence that that is okay. You know, teach your kid that it is okay to not know something, it is okay to be wrong or make mistakes and it is okay to do these things. Those are the situations where you learn.
Because if you know how to learn and you know how to fail, then you can do anything, I think.
Because if it is okay to keep failing eventually you are going get it and you are going to learn. How to love and work in a team.
And listen to your kid because they will tell you what they need even if it is not verbally. I think that yes, letting them be the leaders is really important too. Focusing on skills instead of specific things and then just following your kid I think are important things.
PAM: Oh, my goodness Adrian, thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today. It was so much fun, thank you, thank you.
ADRIAN: Yes, thank you too Pam it was really, really nice.
PAM: Oh, good I am glad you enjoyed it.
ADRIAN: Yes, it is fun, it is.
PAM: Best of luck next semester. I hope you really enjoy your classes.
ADRIAN: Thank you, thank you. Yes, I am excited.
PAM: Thanks again.
ADRIAN: Thanks Pam, bye.
EU385: Foundations: People Are Different
May 08, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, People Are Different.
It’s natural to assume that other people see the world in the same way we do, and that they experience and process things just like we do. But in reality, we are all unique. And while we are our own unique beings, there are some general traits that can be helpful to understand. Not understanding these simple differences can lead to a lot of hurt feelings and misunderstandings.
Pam and Anna talk about a few of the biggies that tend to come up in relationships, such as introversion and extroversion, internal and external processing, and sensitivities. Diving into some of these differences can be so helpful in understanding our loved ones and in avoiding some of the common miscommunication that can happen between us.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
Do you feel you are more introverted or extroverted? How about the most important people in your life? How do you see them and how do they see themselves?
Are you more of an internal or external processor? What about those around you? Have you seen this cause confusion before?
What areas of sensitivities or just preferences do you wish your partner or friends understood about you? Ask them if they have any that they’d like you to know.
What is your love language (physical touch, words of affirmation, gifts, quality time, acts of service)? Your partner’s? Your child’s?
ANNA: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast! We are excited you found us and are interested in exploring our relationships—who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world.
In today’s episode, we’re going to talk about how different people can be. I think it’s a human nature thing to just automatically assume that other people see and experience the world in the same way that we do. And in reality, we are all unique.
And while we really and truly are our own unique beings, there are some general traits that can be helpful to understand. Not understanding these simple differences can lead to a lot of hurt feelings and misunderstandings. So, I’m excited that we’re going to talk about a few of the biggies that tend to come up in relationships, especially.
Let’s start with introverts and extroverts. There are a lot of misconceptions about this one. Many think that people who are more introverted are shy and if they just got some skills, they would be extroverted. I’m here to say no. I’m an introvert. I am not at all shy. I can speak to a crowd of 500 people and not break a sweat, but put me at a party and I’m usually in another room with the dogs.
It’s interesting, because even if it’s a party where I do talk and make a lot of connections and have a wonderful time, when I come home, I’m tired, exhausted sometimes, and I just need some quiet space to decompress and bring back up my energy, while for my more extroverted friends, they are super recharged by the party and want to have more conversations. They’re raring to go!
And it’s good to keep in mind that this is a spectrum, but it’s still helpful to understand you and your partner’s tendencies when it comes to this, because how this plays out in relationships is that, if you have one who’s more one type than the other, it can be a lot of misunderstandings. The more introverted partner comes home from work and just wants to retreat, while the more extroverted partner is waiting at the door and they want to talk about their day and connect right away. And so, what can feel like a slight and even result in some hurt feelings is really just a personality difference. And it’s easily solved for by allowing some transition time and then connecting.
I have a close friend who’s an extrovert, big time, and she will actually start to have low energy and start feeling depressed, even thinks she’s coming down with some kind of an illness, and then we realize she hasn’t seen people in a couple days and a quick dose of in-person interaction and she perks right back up. So, understanding these bits can help us help each other and understand each other. And watching how our energy ebbs and flows with interaction is one clue.
PAM: Oh, definitely, definitely. I think the energy piece can be such a great clue about where you lie on that introvert/extrovert spectrum. And yes, remembering it’s a spectrum, not a slot, is very helpful.
So, after a group event, like say a family get-together, dinner with friends, or a holiday party, how do you feel? Just take a moment. Are you energized and excited to engage with more people or projects? You want to just get to the next thing? As soon as it’s over, are you happily just thinking, just looking around going, what can I do? What can I do? Or, do you feel, like you mentioned, Anna, fulfilled emotionally, yet drained energetically, ready for some alone time? Do you look forward to curling up with a book or a show to just recharge for a while?
And then, if that energy lens doesn’t resonate, just think of what you’d freely choose to do after hanging out with a group of friends for a few hours. Would you like to then hang out with another group of friends? Do you want to tackle a big project on your list? Well, then you’re likely higher on the extrovert side of the scale. And if either of those options made you shudder inside, you are probably more of an introvert.
Also, as you alluded to earlier, Anna, neither one is better than the other, but it is really helpful to understand that aspect of our personality and that of our friends and family, because if we don’t, it can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings and even taking the other person’s choices personally.
ANNA: Right. And that’s the big thing. We’re taking something personally that really has nothing to do with us.
And so, along these same lines, but not the same, is how we process information. So, people tend to be internal or external processors. Internal processors take ideas and they think about them for a long time, while they’re weighing options and coming up with a plan and just thinking all about it in their head. And when they tell you something, they tend to be ready to act on the idea. That’s a big difference. An external processor wants to see and hear the ideas in front of them, bouncing off other people. What kind of input are they going to get? “Let’s think about all these different things.”
And so, they’ll say things that they have no intention of doing, just to see how it feels. And if we don’t understand this, it really can lead to a lot of confusion.
So, my externally processing friend is talking about moving to Europe one day. So, in my mind, I’m planning the going away party. I’m thinking about how sad I’m going to be that they’re gone. And later, I realized that they just wanted to walk through that idea. They were nowhere near making a decision at all.
And, Pam, I’m here to say, if I say out loud that I’m moving somewhere, like the truck is lined up and the boxes will be arriving that day. There is no doubt. So, again, you can see how that could lead to conflicts and confusion if we don’t understand how the important people in our lives process information and what they need to process big decisions, be it space, or the listening ear.
PAM: Yes, yes, yes. This was such a big revelation for me. I still so clearly remember many years ago when my partner mentioned mid-week about going somewhere on the weekend. So, me, I went straight into planning mode, right? Boom, boom, boom. Let’s make this happen. And the next day, just asked him a quick question, and his earnest reply was, “What are you talking about?” And I was just flabbergasted. I’m like, “What? You said you wanted to do this!”
So, a quick conversation and I realized he had just been tossing that ball up in the air with zero investment in where it landed. Whereas I had already scooped it up and started running towards what I thought was the goal line. Let’s go there this weekend!
So, I learned to be less invested in the random balls and instead to just be curious about them, because I knew he was an external processor, to ask questions, to learn more. Are you looking for a change of scenery? What would you like to do there? Just playing with it with him, that helps him process what it might feel like.
And, of course, we don’t need to stick anybody in the box again of internal or external processor forever. But it can be really helpful to understand their tendency, so we are more able to join them where they are, whether it’s fantasizing and brainstorming, like with your friend, Anna, too, or getting ready to help tape up your boxes.
So, understanding that others may well process things differently than I do, I might preface my words so they come across more clearly. So, maybe I say, “I’m dreaming about moving to Europe. What do you think that might be like?” Or, “I’ve been thinking about changing careers for a while now, and I just found this great job I’d like to apply to. Can you help me tweak my resume?” I don’t think it really ever hurts to give people a little bit more context so they can better understand where we’re coming from and what we’re looking for. It helps us connect more quickly.
ANNA: Yes. And with all those pieces, they’re just things to consider, patterns to look for, ways to not take things personally, again, because that’s so often where we derail just because someone has a different process or experiences things in a different way. So, letting go of judging also that there maybe is one way or a better way or, “This is the way,” when we can let that go, it just really opens us up to that connection.
And so, one of the other things I wanted to touch on are sensitivities. Some people are just wired to experience more. They see more, smell more, take in more. And the situations that feel really easy for one person feel nearly impossible for another. And the confusion comes in when someone takes it personally when someone says something doesn’t work for them.
So, I have a hard time in cities. This is a well-known fact for anybody who knows me. The lights, the smells, the sounds, the energy from all the people. So, if someone asks me to go to a city, I would most likely say no pretty quickly. But it’s not a no to spending time with the person, necessarily. And so, I try to be clear, like you were talking about, and transparent, because it helps give them that additional information, which I think is probably always a good idea. Let’s provide some context and information.
But it really does help when we take the time to learn about each other’s preferences so that we can honor them and not take them personally.
PAM: Absolutely. Recognizing that we’re all different in the way we experience and engage with the world helps us sidestep so much of that judgment and unintentional hurts that happen so often.
So, when our introverted partner beelines for the couch to quietly watch some TV after a fun afternoon with extended family, it does not mean that they’re purposefully ignoring us or that they didn’t enjoy the afternoon. It really can just be about their need to recharge. It doesn’t need to be a reflection on us at all.
And when we ask our friend about joining us at the big local festival this weekend, “Yay!” and they say they need to think about it, that needn’t be a slight on us, either. Maybe they’re an internal processor and need to think through what a change in plans would mean for them, or maybe they’re an introvert and need to consider how much recovery time they’ll need after and whether they can work that in. And maybe they’re sensitive to the sounds and smells that come with a festival full of food carts and loud music, and need to consider some tools to help them navigate the environment reasonably comfortably for them.
And, as you mentioned, Anna, even if they decide not to join us, there is a very good chance that, too, is not about us. We can have a conversation about it with them and next time invite them to get together in a way that works better for them.
And the more we know about how we tick, the more easily we can have those kinds of conversations with others. We can share those little pieces of ourselves and open up the space for them to share more with us. And that way, they see that our choices aren’t judgments of them, but are examples of how we care for ourselves. What a difference it makes to our relationships to understand these fundamental differences between people.
ANNA: And, I mean, you would think we would know some of this, but really it is a surprise to a lot of people I talk to. It’s this, “Oh yeah, they do that! Now that makes sense.” And so, right, just putting these pieces together and thinking about it for ourselves, even, because that’s the thing, I think sometimes we don’t even have this awareness about ourselves. And so, that’s why I think it’s going to be really interesting this week to think about the important people in our lives, to think about ourselves. What do we know about them? What might we not know?
And so, here are our questions to reflect upon for this week. So, first, do you feel you’re more introverted or extroverted? How about the most important people in your life? How do you see them and how do they see themselves? And I want to point this out, because if people meet me in a work environment, they think I’m an extrovert. I took a Myers Briggs test in a corporate America job and they were like, something’s wrong there. I was the farthest on the introvert scale.
So, it’s not just how we see someone. Learn about them, because then you know, they may be able to be at this level, but it’s draining them. So, that piece is important.
Are you more of an internal or external processor? And what about those around you? And I think it would be curious to look at, have you seen this cause any confusion and peel back some areas where you’ve had some disagreements and think, “Ah, was this at play?” So, I think that could be really interesting.
What areas of sensitivities or just preferences do you wish that your partner or your friends understood about you? And then ask them if they have anything they’d like you to know. I think that’s interesting, because I think sometimes we think people just know these things about us, because we’re spending all this time together, but we don’t.
PAM: And then, there’s also that expectation we can have of our partner, too.
ANNA: To mind read.
PAM: Yeah. It’s like, okay, well they should have figured this out about me. No, let’s be open and share all the little pieces, not have expectations of others to figure it out on their own. That’s a big one, I think.
ANNA: Let’s keep sharing, keep that context coming. And lastly, we just wanted to make a quick mention about love languages. So, this idea was put forth by Gary Chapman in his book, that there are five love languages. We each tend to have a primary and a secondary. He lists them as physical touch, words of affirmation, gifts, acts of service, and quality time.
What that means is that we receive and feel love best when it’s expressed in our love language. It’s another way that people are different. And the challenge is that we often want to give love in the way that we want to receive it, which of course makes sense. But if the language of our loved one is different than ours, then it will sometimes miss the mark. So, following the link in the show notes, take the love language quiz if you haven’t, and figure out what’s your love language and your partner’s and your children even.
And then just look at, “Oh, is that at play with some of these pieces? Are they looking for these words of affirmation that maybe don’t come naturally to me or I don’t think about, or this quality time that in our busy lives we’re not able to prioritize as much and maybe we can prioritize that.”
So, it’s just going to be fun digging in to see, just to learn more about each other. And that’s the fun richness of relationships, where we’re learning about ourselves and each other.
PAM: Exactly. And I think this one will be really fun for people to play with, too, because one of my love languages is acts of service. So, for me, I love doing little things for people, but are they receiving that as an act of love or just like, “Oh yeah, that thing got done.” It’s not that that anybody’s reacting negatively, but it is it expressing what I’m trying to express through it as well?
So, it’s really interesting to then shift it and realize they may have other love languages and to then say, “Oh, well, how could I use their language to express?” And just play with that.
You’ll hear me say this many times through the podcast, I’m sure. Let’s play with things and see how they feel, see how they unfold. When we do something, it doesn’t mean we have to do it forever. It doesn’t mean we have to do it the same way forever. It doesn’t mean we ever have to do it again.
We learn so much when we just try something out and see what happens. It’s fun. That brings the fun and the playfulness to it.
ANNA: I do think relationships are fun and interesting and that playful, open, curious attitude is really what helps that, “Hey, we’re in this together. Let’s figure each other out. Let’s see how we want to move through the world.” So, yeah, I love it!
PAM: Yay! Well, thank you so much for listening, everyone, and we will see you next time. Bye.
ANNA: Bye.
EU384: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: The Stories We Tell Ourselves
Apr 24, 2025
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and this time, we’re talking about the stories we tell ourselves.
Stories is a topic that comes up a lot in conversations on the Living Joyfully Network. In fact, we had a monthly theme by that name! When we start to get curious about the stories we tell about our own lives, about other people and their intentions, about our children, and on and on, we realize just how powerful it can be to rewrite some of these stories! The stories we choose can empower us and give us confidence or they can pit us against others and make us miserable. We have the power to choose the stories we tell and there are endless possibilities!
We really enjoyed diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and I am joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello!
So, today we are diving into another unschooling stumbling block, and that’s the stories we tell ourselves. And I think this is such an interesting lens to bring to our days.
I know one of my favorite quotes about stories is from Jonathan Gotschall, in his book, The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human. He writes: “Story is for a human as water is for a fish – all encompassing and not quite palpable.” That resonates so much with me and I found it truly paradigm-shifting to begin recognizing the stories I was telling myself!
But before we dive in, I just want to take a moment to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. There is so much value in doing this deep personal work that the unschooling journey asks of us in community because while everybody’s journey absolutely is unique, many of us face similar obstacles and challenges, like recognizing the stories that we tell ourselves, and that is where the power of community shine in helping people feel seen and heard.
And in the Network you can learn from the experiences of other unschooling parents, draw inspiration from their aha moments, gain insights from the unique and creative ways that they navigate both their own and their families day-to-day needs. It is just a conversation that comes up quite regularly. To learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes.
So, Anna, we have just kind of gotten ourselves swimming in the water of stories. Would you like to get us started?
ANNA: Yes, I am ready. I feel like it’s big, so we’ll see. We’ll see where this ends up. But I do feel like understanding the roles that story plays in our lives can be so helpful.
We are humans. We write stories, so I love the quote, right? It’s everything. We just write stories. And I think it can be a helpful tool. So, this is not about trying to stop writing stories, one, that’s never going to happen. And two, it can be a helpful tool. For me, the story I tell about my life can help me cultivate the energy I want to have.
It can help me attract the people that I want to be around. I found for me, if I’m focused on everything’s doom and gloom and all the tough parts, I end up attracting more people that are stuck in those tough places and pointing out more tough problems that I have. But when I focus on the joy that’s there, even in those dark moments, I attract people who can see that too, or hold space for me in a different way.
That helps me stay in the energy that works best for me, and I can always switch it up and choose where I want to stay. But there’s something about that little bit of separation and knowing that it’s a choice and that the stories are a choice has just been critical to me and my growth and personal development.
And, but then there’s this other aspect of stories that I know we want to touch on, and it’s how we write stories about other people. So the challenge there comes when we don’t check in with the other people and we start to act from our story, the story that we’ve made up. And it can be really surprising and disconcerting to our partner or our friend who’s on the other end of that.
So just a quick kind of silly example is, let’s say David’s out of town and he tells me he’s going to text me that night. He’s on an overnight trip. Well, the text never comes. And so I might start writing stories. Well, does he not realize, he said he was going to text me?
Does he not care about me? He’s too busy having fun? I’m here holding down the fort and doing all the house stuff. I can start writing this story and then when he comes home. I might be snippy or annoyed, which could come as a complete surprise to him because he had no signal last night and he’s super excited to be home and to see me and to see the kids.
And so me operating from that story impacts our night, it impacts us coming back together. And if it’s a pattern of me doing that, it impacts the relationship. And so being aware of when I’m writing a story helps me pause and check in with myself and when possible, the other person involved. But in that situation, I couldn’t check in with him right away, but instead of just writing a story of, he doesn’t care about me, he’s just off doing whatever. I can say, I wonder if he has a signal or it’s weird that he hasn’t texted. I wonder what’s going on with him?
That’s where we talk about being open and curious. I don’t have all the answers. It’s not feeling great that I’m not getting a text, but what’s going on? And when I can come from that place to someone, it’s completely different. And sometimes, I’ll use the tool of, “The story I’m telling myself,” when I’m talking to someone so I can be like, “The story I’m telling myself is, you didn’t care at all that I was home. And you said you were going to text and you didn’t.”
Then he can recognize that’s about me. He can recognize like, oh my gosh, I can understand why you’d feel that way, but it doesn’t put him instantly on the defensive. Like, why didn’t you text? It gets us back into the I messages and that really helps with defensiveness.
And you know, I think it just helps us have a conversation that ends up not going sideways. We can just learn more about each other. And that again, is the beauty of being open and curious. I feel like there are so many aspects to stories and I feel like we all have a lot to say. So I’m going to pass it to you, Erika, and see what’s bubbling up there.
ERIKA: Okay, this is one of my absolute favorite topics. I just think the power of our stories is so amazing. And I only realized it was actually so deep and so important once I started exploring the idea in the Network. And so for me, the first step was just learning that I am telling stories. I don’t think I’d really consciously realized that until we talked about stories and it definitely hadn’t sunk in just how powerful they can be.
And I think when we’re in our heads and in our own experience and not aware that we are writing stories, the stories just feel like just the truth of what’s going on. I’m just observing and I know what’s happening. That’s what it feels like. And once you start thinking about this, then you’ll notice all the people around you who are believing that their stories are the whole truth as well.
You can just see it happen, and it’s one way that people become so disconnected from each other and it’s a big reason for a lot of relationship issues and ruptures. To me, when I’m in that, it feels like, I see what’s happening here. I’m smart. I know exactly why they did what they did, the meaning behind every little thing.
But the truth is that I don’t know. All I know really is how it felt to me and that first initial gut response of what this means. But I don’t know about the other person’s internal state or their version of the story unless I’m open and curious to learn more. And I feel like we could do a million examples in this episode, which might be fun, but just a benign example where you won’t really ever know the full truth.
I was thinking about just being in traffic. I could drive around Miami feeling attacked and hurt. If I tell the story that every person who’s cutting me off means to do it and they hate me and they’re rude, or I could tell the story that the people are busy and overwhelmed and maybe they’re uncomfortable driving, or they don’t know the area very well.
Maybe they’re running late or they really need to go to the bathroom. It’s not about me and I don’t need to tell the story that all these people are purposefully being mean to me. There’s a tiny chance that they are, but even then, there’s something going on for them that I don’t know about that led them to that choice.
And so, the story I tell myself as I’m driving helps me either feel peaceful and safe, or it can make me feel scared and upset. The fact that I have the ability to change the story gives me so much power. And obviously we won’t be pulling over and asking all the drivers about their versions of their story, though that would be super interesting.
But when we’re talking about situations with people we know and love, then we can be open and curious and ask questions to clarify. We can learn where those stories are way off base. And I love that line that you shared. Just say, “the story I’m telling myself is,” whatever. Because it really helps our partner hear us without getting defensive about it.
And it just opens up the conversation so we can see what things we’re missing. And I’m always missing things, because I’m only seeing things through my own lens. And so, we can just use our awareness of the existence of stories as a form of self-care and to make our days feel lighter. Realizing that we’re always telling a story about our own lives and intentionally tweaking it to make it feel better is just a really cool idea.
I know I’d love to share more about stories I’ve told myself, but I will pause for the moment, Pam.
PAM: I know we all just have so much to say! But yeah, I do want to just bubble that back up, Erika, what you were talking about with the traffic. It’s just a perfect example because you can see how we can tell the story and which one feels better. Which one sets us up for the next moment of our day and the next moment. We’re not telling lies to ourselves. Like you said, we don’t know. We’re not going to try to stop them and say, “Hey, why did you cut me off?” But self-care wise, what feels better? What sets up my day better? Because I’m the one I’m caring for. So, the story that I tell about things really is my choice.
And then the other piece that bubbled up for me that I love so much is that, and it goes to our people are different mantra, is really at first, before we recognize that these are all stories. They look like facts, right? This is the fact of the situation because I’m seeing it through my lens.
It must look the same to everybody else like that just happened, right? You all feel that same way in reaction to the thing that happened, right? It’s another layer of people are different because, people will see things differently. And of course people are different from different hair color and styles and, and everything.
But then personalities. But then to recognize that a situation that’s unfolding before you also incorporates and needs the idea that people are different because people are experiencing that same moment differently. And those are the stories. And when we recognize that, oh, this is how it looks to me, for me, it was adding the, to me until, Anna’s idea of stories came to life because, it’s different how other people see things, each of us are different in how we show up into a moment. So how we experience a moment differently, what it looks to us, how it feels to us, what it means to us is different for each person.
And to recognize that those are the stories that we’re all telling ourselves. And then to get to that next step of being, as you said, open and curious about what the story is for other people. That was just a huge paradigm shift for me. As I mentioned, right up top, it was like the world is so much bigger and more interesting, and now I don’t have to control, I don’t have to think other people are wrong, I don’t have to go in and fix things. I can learn instead of fix, right? There is no one right way. I don’t need to have an agenda. Like all those pieces that we talk about really fundamentally boil down to the stories that we tell ourselves, right?
ANNA: And we don’t have to defend or explain either, right?
I think it really leaves us open, it’s a much more reciprocal kind of relationship because we’re learning about each other. So it’s like, “Hey, this is the story I’m telling myself. This is how that was landing for me.” That gives you information about my sensitivities or how things land for me, or what feels easy and hard for me.
And then as I understand your story, I’m learning about you. And especially if you’re somebody that I care about and love, then that helps us relate. That helps us be aware of how things are landing and what’s happening and we can ask better questions and we can show up in the conversations differently.
But I do love the traffic example because it doesn’t even have to be something that we check. It’s still something we control. And I’ve said this before, but I always would tell my oldest, if you’re going to make up a story, make up a good one, because she would make up these stories that just were doom and gloom about everything.
And I’m like, you don’t have any idea if any of these things you’re saying are true are going to happen. And so how interesting to spend that energy creating something that’s going to make you feel a certain way, like you were saying Erika, maybe scared in traffic or feeling frustrated then going to the next moment angry and frustrated because you’ve had this traffic experience when you could change that story.
And sometimes in traffic I’ll do an over the top story. They have a baby. Their baby’s on the way. They’re trying to rush to the hospital, you know, just to kind of make myself laugh and get out of my head about it and just slow down because really what difference does it make if I’m a little bit later or one more car behind the other car?
But sometimes it takes me being silly and making up a story that kind of over the top to do that. But like you said, Erika, I loved that piece that before we’re even aware that stories exist and how integral they are to our day, it really does just feel like the facts, well, the facts are this, you said this, you did this, but we never know what someone else’s motivations are, what drove them, whether it’s from childhood trauma or from the context of something, of a conversation, they just walked out of another room and came into this room with that still weighing on them.
There’s so many things that go into, people are different and it’s just so important for me to leave space for that and just have it be this opportunity to learn about the people I care about. And story is such an important part of that.
ERIKA: And doesn’t it feel so closely tied to just the differences in our personalities, the type of stories that we’re going to tend to want to write? I think initially it doesn’t even really feel like we do have that choice. And it’s something that takes a little bit of thought and diving in and playing around with. I remember when I first joined the Network, one of the biggest a-ha moments right away was just the idea that people could have a different response to the same issue and have a different feeling.
The way I grew up, I have that vision of how my mom thought about things. Then I have my vision of my just natural emotional responses to things. And so the idea that maybe a child could say something that seems really scary or disturbing and that it would be okay for someone to not freak out.
I was just amazing, it’s okay to not freak out. I’ve never even heard of such a thing. And so just that idea of people are different. That kind of started to open me up to. It’s not like a foregone conclusion that I have to respond in this one way to something that happens. And, then I was also thinking about how, when you hear parents of young kids saying things like, they are doing this to annoy me.
They’re doing this because of something, and so we put intentions onto everyone, including little babies. We put these intentions on them like they’re doing it for this reason. And so when those kinds of thoughts pop up, that could be a little flag of, okay, I actually am not inside of their brain.
And so I don’t know what the intention is. And that reminds me of those underlying needs, like getting more to underlying needs or learning more about the context of the situation for someone else. Assuming everyone is doing the best that they can in the moment with what they know and with whatever context they’re dealing with.
All of those helpful thoughts. I feel like it’s like a calming thought to think everyone’s doing the best that they can in the moment, and that helps me get away from the story of everyone is doing everything to annoy me specifically, or to just make my life difficult, which, you know, in some moments it can feel like that.
PAM: I think that is such a huge one, Erika. I love that because it’s so true. It depends on our capacity, et cetera. You know, people are doing things that are frustrating around us and we are thinking, they know I don’t like that they’re doing that to piss me off. And it really feels like that’s the full story. That’s it, the facts.
Everybody around me is doing things that they know is just going to get me more and more frustrated. Like, why are the kids fighting again? And so to be able to shift the story to look for the underlying needs, to see that we are being triggered but it’s not about us.
If we can get to the story about, oh, you know, what’s happening for them because they’re the ones doing it and chances are they’re not doing it to piss us off, right? Stuff’s going on in their lives. There’s a whole different story going on for them. When we can start to recognize that, I think that really helps in our relationships.
And I wanted to mention one other layer underneath. I needed to learn about stories for other people, and understand their perspectives to then get to the layer of my self-talk and how I spoke to myself, the stories I told about myself, because those were very automatic.
If something went wrong, ah, I did that wrong again. Or, I’m a bad person. All those stories that we tell ourselves. To recognize that, this grace I’m giving to other people in recognizing that their story is different from mine and not assuming all sorts of things around it, I could also start to try and give myself that grace and tell the stories differently.
When I think about it a lot of people, when we start talking about stories, they kind of come to it with the impression at first that you’re just making things up. You’re just kind of lying to yourself so that it feels better, so that things look better, et cetera, et cetera.
When you recognize that that’s not what’s happening, that there is more than one way to see a situation, right? When you’re stuck thinking there’s one right way, you’re just putting your head in the sand or you think that when we write a different story that we are.
But when you recognize that there really are different ways, then you can bring that grace to yourself and how you choose to speak to yourself through situations, through anything that’s going on. For me, that was and continues to be, not just a challenge, but so helpful in moving through things because it actually resonates more deeply than just trying to guilt myself into something or trying to beat myself up.
Gotta do that better next time, or whatever the story is, but recognizing what’s actually going on. I learn more about myself and so I have more context. As I think you mentioned, I like slowing down to actually recognize what’s going on. I can give myself that grace instead of just beating myself up quickly because that is just the normal reaction that I’m used to.
Giving that space to recognize the context of things helps me have better, more accurate language and stories as to what’s going on, rather than just leaping to the typical story that I’ve always told myself.
ANNA: That makes sense. I love that connection with self-talk. I had written myself a note from what Erika was saying, but it actually fits with that too, which is basically our stories tell us a lot about ourselves.
It is kind of a litmus test of, okay, wow, I’m really writing stories that are very harsh towards myself or harsh towards someone else, or whatever it is. That tells me a lot about where I am, where my mindset is, what’s happening for me. I think it can be a really good clue that I’m needing some self-care.
I need to slow down. I need some help. I need some support because this is happening. So I think it is really interesting to look at our stories as giving us information about where we are, mentally. How we’re feeling, what’s happening for us. Because I think we all have generous hearts and we want to do that, but there are times where it feels really heavy and overwhelming, and we can start to write stories that just keep us in that space.
And so when we can step back and have that pause of like, wow, I’m being really harsh towards myself, or I’m not giving myself space, or I’m being really harsh towards this person in my life that I care about. Where’s that coming from? I think just that little bit of separation to recognize they are stories, it just starts this whole process of self-awareness and how we’re showing up in the world and all of those different pieces.
And just again, to repeat the piece of, everybody sees things so differently and there isn’t a right or wrong, but it is really freeing. Because Erika, we talked about this when we were having some of those epiphanies, it’s pretty amazing to think, okay, so then you get to decide does this way of thinking feel good to me? Does it work for me?
Because here are three other people that are doing it completely differently. And so how do I feel about that? Instead of thinking that there’s one way. One that came up early in the network was “worry equals love”. And it was really freeing for a lot of people to think it doesn’t have to be worry to be love.
You don’t have to be worried about everything to show that you’re loving your children or other people. And again, people have to find their place on that spectrum, but there are people all over that spectrum, you know? And so I think it’s so powerful. And so I just love that idea of using our stories as just a, hey, checking in with myself, what are the stories I’m telling myself about my life right now?
Because I have also found when I can switch it, that’s when I get out of the stuck place. That’s when things change. That’s when a new door opens up, that’s when something else happens. I. It’s a powerful, powerful tool.
ERIKA: One other thought popped into my head. I know this is stories we tell ourselves, but also stories we tell about ourselves to people.
That’s a big part of this as well, because, you kind of mentioned it at the beginning, Anna, but just like what you present about your life is you’re going to receive different responses based on different things, and this is something that I’m still working on for myself because I realized that I tended and still tend to want to tell the hard negative story about what I’m going through in my days. I think because of a desire for connection, wanting someone to care in response to that, but it is me ramping up the side of the story of things that are very challenging and downplaying the good things.
And that is one attempt at getting connection, but it’s not the only way to do it. And so it’s something to play around with. Like when Josh comes home from work, I’m telling the story of a great day. How does that type of connecting conversation feel in comparison to the, I need to make sure to tell him all the hard things that happened.
How does that feel? And it’s interesting because it’s all there. Like on any given day, both parts are there. I can choose to tell which version of the story I want to in that moment. And it’s just kind of getting curious about how it plays out differently with the different versions is interesting.
PAM: I’m glad you mentioned the word play there because, that’s exactly what bubbled up for me when you were talking because that’s so true. And the different context too. I know when we would be visiting extended family, et cetera, you know, and they’re asking, how’s it going?
The story that I chose to share in various contexts made a difference. Because even there, extended family loves you but have their opinions. We did an episode recently about, it’s not the unschooling, but for them they would see the big changes, the unschooling. So if I said I was having a hard time with this kid, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
The “answer” for them would be to send them to school. They would really be trying to help. It’s so fun to just play around with. I learned to change my story, and it’s not even that one’s right or wrong, it’s just selecting the part of the story of what I want to emphasize about our days, right? And picking out the pieces that these are the things that I want to share with this person or the, these people, et cetera.
And, just be more purposeful and intentional about it. And I say play because play with different aspects that you share and see how it feels. See what kind of reactions you get. That is another way to learn about the impact of the stories that we tell. So again, it’s not ignoring things, but it’s how we tell ourselves the story, how we tell others the stories of our days.
I think it just helps us to observe more, to see more of the things that are happening and not to give more weight to any one aspect, to any one particular part than all the rest. So, now you’ve got a much larger smorgasbord of stories to choose from, and you can go from one to the next, to the next, to the next, but play around with them and just get a sense for which feels good and which makes that connection that you’re looking for with the person that you’re talking to.
ANNA: That’s what I was going to say. I love that point, Erika, to look at the underlying needs, so stories are a tool, right? A tool to move through the world to get what we need to figure out these pieces.
But if we can understand what is our need that we’re trying to meet, then we can play around with the story that gets us there. Because depending on the person that you’re talking to, with that end of day story. They might be a nurturer, so they hear that kind of sad story about the day and swoop you up in a big hug and snuggle you.
But if they’re not that nurturing personality, that actually can be really off-putting, like, okay, I don’t know what to do. You’re upset, I don’t know what to do. That’s too hard. And so if connection is the goal now, if to be heard about your tough times is a goal. Okay, then we can figure that out.
But if it’s connection, then you know what? It might be sharing the amazing things that the kids did today. And then that brings that person closer because they feel excited to learn about that. So playing around with what need am I trying to meet? And then what story serves me and the situation? What do I want to present to help get that need met?
What gets me there? And same with the in-laws. What am I trying to do here? If I’m looking for support for unschooling or parenting or different things. Is this the environment where I want to tell the story about what’s happening in our life? Or do I want to do it in a place where people understand where I’m coming from or have information that might be interesting to my journey.
I think all of that’s really important, but I think the slowing down gets us there. What’s the need? What’s happening? What’s my point? And then playing around what, how, what can we do?
ERIKA: And just wrapping your head around the idea of, it’s not lying about your life. It’s all there.
It’s all there, all of these versions of the story are true. You’re not kidding yourself to tell a positive version of something. It is just super interesting and, and a lot to play around with.
PAM: So much to play around with. Well, thank you so much for joining us, everybody listening, Anna and Erika, it’s always such a pleasure and we all hope that you enjoyed our conversation around the idea of stories.
Now maybe you’re seeing some of the water that you’re swimming in. I think that’ll be really fun to play around with and consider joining us in the Living Joyfully Network where we dive into these kinds of topics regularly and with other kind and thoughtful unschooling parents. We have amazing families in the network and we are excited to welcome you to learn more and join us. Just follow the link in the show notes. We wish everyone a very lovely day.
ERIKA AND ANNA: Thanks. Bye bye. Take care.
EU105 Flashback: Unschooling Dads with Nick Hess
Apr 10, 2025
In this week’s flashback episode, we’re sharing an interview that Pam had in 2018 with Nick Hess.
At the time of the interview, Nick, also known online as The Unschool Dad, and his wife were unschooling their five children. They chatted about about his family’s move to unschooling, what it was about unschooling that resonated with him, what he found challenging, and surprising, about unschooling as it has unfolded in their lives, and lots more!
For thousands of years, humans learned naturally. When you let it happen and you get there, and you do not force it, you are just there helping them. And I think that is the important part, is that you have to be there. I mean, me and my wife are constantly with our children. You have to be there to help them, and guide them, answer their questions, or help them spell something. And when you are there, and you are just part of your children’s lives, you just see it all. You come together and it is truly a magical lifestyle that we live, it is just amazing. ~ Nick Hess
QUESTIONS FOR NICK
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I love hearing about what unschooling kids are up to. Can you share what your children are interested in right now?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What were the pieces that resonated with you and helped you feel more confident in choosing unschooling?
What has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
You post regularly on Facebook and Instagram as The Unschool Dad, sharing inspirational quotes as well as pics of your unschooling lives. I enjoy following you guys and I’d love to know what inspired you to start this project.
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hi everyone, I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and today I am here with Nick Hess. Hi Nick!
NICK: Hi, how are you?
PAM: I’m good, thank you.
If people don’t know, Nick is an unschooling dad with five children, and I said that because you may know him online as The Unschool Dad. He has an active Facebook page and he is on Instagram as well and it is always fun to catch all of the interesting pictures and quotes and stuff that he shares.
I am excited to learn more about his family’s unschooling experience, so to get us started, Nick …
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
NICK: Sure, I have been married to my wife for almost twenty years. We have five kids as you said, and my oldest is seventeen, Rosie, Isabella is thirteen, Nick Jr. who is eleven, Evangeline is nine, and Joshua, who is six.
PAM: Wow…
NICK: We have a lot of kids…
PAM: I would imagine that turns into a lot of fun, right?
NICK: Yes, it does.
PAM: Speaking of which, I do love hearing what unschooling kids are up to; it is always fun to see the kind of things that they are exploring.
I was hoping you might share what your kids are interested in right now.
NICK: Sure, it is mainly a lot of art in our house. I will start with my oldest daughter, Rosie, who is an active artist. A couple of years ago she was an illustrator for a children’s unschooling book, it is called, Bubbles and Puddles: Our Unschooling Adventure, by Kristie Howe. She drew all of the illustrations for the book and she just loves to draw. She was the first one who started drawing and it really led to the other ones sparking their interest in drawing.
My second daughter is a self-taught whale artist. Isabella draws orcas and all kinds of marine mammal life. It is just amazing; some of her pictures look like photos.
PAM: They do, yeah.
NICK: It is pretty amazing.
We just got back from California, actually. We took her to see some live dolphins off the coast. Hopefully she will get some inspiration from that.
Then my third son, Nick Jr., he is a chef; he loves to cook. I share his pictures as well, this kid could out-cook all of the adults I know. He makes everything from scratch and he is very passionate about it, that is one thing that he just loves to do. Most kids want toys and things like that, and he wants kitchen utensils.
Evangeline is another little artist. What is cool is that she started younger than my first two and she has her older sisters to help her out, so I am really excited to see what her drawings are going to look like as she progresses. She likes to draw a lot of original characters and things like that.
My fifth, Joshua, is a video game addict; he loves the challenge of video games, he is very competitive, whoever plays with him knows that he is going to be very competitive; he loves to win. He loves Epic Mickey 2 right now, he can play that game over and over again.
PAM: That is awesome. I remember trying the first Epic Mickey, that was really hard for me.
NICK: He will watch YouTube tutorials, and he works through that, before even six years old.
PAM: That is awesome. I love hearing what they are interested in because they just throw themselves into it! It’s not like “That’s my kids interest.” No, they are just human beings throwing themselves into whatever it is. It is just so fun to watch them, isn’t?
NICK: It is just their passion and it is just like, you see it—the freedom they have. They could be in school all day but why when they could be really learning their passion with things that really excite their soul and the freedom of being a human being just to do what you want, uninhibited.
It is amazing, it is truly magical to watch and I am truly honoured as a father that I am able to see it in my children.
PAM: I love that phrase you used, “excite their soul,” because that is what it looks like, isn’t’ it? I am speechless…
NICK: It is truly magical, sometimes it’s just, “Wow.”
PAM: I know, that is awesome.
I was hoping you could share with us what your family’s move to unschooling looked like.
NICK: Well actually, it is a pretty interesting journey.
I actually started when I was very young, I was in public school, and I was born and raised in Las Angeles, so I was in the California education system. I really disliked school. I was never bullied or anything, I had friends, I grew up with all the kids on my block. I had great friends, there was no problem with that, it just was boring to me, it was just a complete, utter bore. I knew there was always something better for me.
Then, when I was in the fourth grade, my dad wanted to go back east—he was originally from West Virginia and he wanted to go see his family, so he went and asked the school, “Hey, I am taking my son back east for a couple of months, is there any way you guys can put the work together so he can do it?” and they were like, “No, you just have to take him out and go register him wherever you are going.”
So, they took me out, but they did not register me in the new school, so I truly experienced what it was like to be living life without school, and it was amazing. So, from being very small in the fourth grade to realize what school was…we came back and they put me in, they put me right where I had left off, they did not tell me anything, they just put me back in the class like nothing ever happened. That really impacted me young; what the true meaning of school was and from then on it just really resonated with me what the school system was about.
PAM: So, have any of your children been to school at all?
NICK: They have not.
When we first started, we knew we were going to homeschool from the beginning, but we put the oldest in a homeschool program—a charter school that gave us a curriculum. The whole thing with that was that she was in kindergarten and the California state testing came along and she was fearful of the test and we told her, “We do not care what you score, you could write anything,” but the fear that kept coming across really made us think and realize what it was about.
During a homeschool group, someone introduced my wife to Thomas Jefferson Education, a book, and from that, she read a John Holt book, and just realized there was so much more out there than the schooling system.
PAM: That is really cool.
What were the pieces that resonated with you as she was reading John Holt and bringing those ideas into your lives? What were the pieces that helped you feel really confident about moving to unschooling?
NICK: Like I said, a lot with my own personal experience, and especially in high school.
My parents were very supportive of me and in high school I still had the same feelings of not wanting to be there, so I started ditching. I lived in LA, I had a bus pass that would take me anywhere in LA County, so I would take off. My parents didn’t know at first and I would go to the Tonight Show.
There was only one time I got stuck in downtown LA at 11:00 at night and I had to call my parents and tell them because they thought I was at a friends’ house. I am very grateful to my parents; they did not get mad, I had to wait for my dad to get off work and come and get me, but my parents always respected that. They always saw and knew that I was different, that it was a different journey for me, so I was really thankful that my parents were really respectful of me for that.
They let me drop out of my senior year. At the time I had no idea, but my dad got a job transfer to Honolulu. I was going to go register for high school but I did not really want to, I would rather explore Hawaii, and so it was really cool that they did not force me to go. I would surf and they let me get a job, so I got a job in my senior year of high school and I started exploring Hawaii and their culture, and it was really true life experience.
So, when it came to learning about John Holt and I mean, that man is amazing, just everything about what he writes really resonated with everything that we wanted for our children.
PAM: It is almost like a light bulb isn’t it? You knew it internally, but it did not really come out until you read that, and it is like “Well yeah, of course, that makes so much sense.”
NICK: Yeah. At first I thought, this kid would be in school and here I am, a high school drop out, and that there is a piece of a light bulb, there is so much once you realize and you see what life is about, a light bulb goes off and then you can’t look back.
I do not question unschooling. I can’t think of any other way as our family grows and everything about it encompasses our daily lives—it is just amazing.
PAM: And does that help you look back more positively too, on that high school time and your parents being ok with you exploring Hawaii, for example, instead of finishing high school and you getting a job and that kind of stuff? Do you look more positively on that now?
NICK: Definitely. There is the whole self-education movement and it has never stopped me from being who I wanted to be, and it is like many people say that you need to have a diploma, you need to have a degree, you need to have so many things in life to be successful, but to be honest, it has never stopped one thing I wanted in life. That degree or a job I needed, or my business; it has never been in the way. Actually being able to teach myself along the way has helped me more than I think school ever did for me.
PAM: That makes a lot of sense.
So then, what for you was the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling?
NICK: You know, I think it would have to be family, because me and my wife, we are pretty much always on the same page with a lot of things in life, but our family has been pretty unsupportive, like, “you guys are crazy.”
I think that was a challenge because you are just constantly having a Facebook post trigger somebody, and it is like, your cousin’s daughter is a teacher and she wants to fight with you. So, I think that was the biggest part, and as the years go by when people try to ask me or pick their unschooling fights, I am over it. If people get it, they get it, if they don’t, they don’t. I mean, I can talk to them.
So many people are just like, “How dare you? Kids need school,” and it is just like, I am at this point where I see it in my own life, I see it in my children’s lives, I see the incredible things my children do, it is just the family…it is hard because sometimes people are close to the family and it is just like when you finally get over caring what they think anymore and it is just like, “Hey we know what we are doing, at the end, you will see our kids flourish and everything,” and I think that is the whole point. I think the family was probably the hardest, the most challenging aspect of it overall, all those years ago when we started.
PAM: Did you find yourself, when you were first starting, kind of pulling away for awhile because you found that it was conflicting? I know for us, for awhile that first year we did less family occasions because they were so confrontational because it was new to them. They felt they could change our mind and I was still learning and getting comfortable, because I didn’t have experience yet. I hadn’t spent a year or two seeing my kids unschooling and knowing in my bones that this was awesome. We were just trying it out, so that was one of the things that helped us, did you find that as well?
NICK: I think one of the biggest things that was really helpful is that we moved from California and all of both sides of our families are in California. So basically, we only see them a couple of times a year so that daily thing, besides the Facebook posts, was really moving away to really be us, and really be who we are.
My parents have always been supportive of it and they moved to Arizona with us, and the whole support of that with us, my wife and us as a team, as a family, I think helped and that whole move really helped a lot where it was not this bombardment of it every day.
PAM: What was behind the move, was that something that just happened coincidentally?
NICK: Yes, it was.
PAM: It was a coincidence?
NICK: It was a coincidence. In our business we sell at fairs and festivals, and we were doing a couple of events in Arizona and just the cost of living in Arizona was much cheaper than California at the time. It was about 10 years ago, before the whole collapse of the economy and housing and everything here was just so much cheaper. It just so happened that at that ten-year mark, when the whole school thing was happening with my daughter, we were leaving and we moved here and that is when we really started our journey without school.
PAM: That is really interesting; that is cool how it worked out.
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
NICK: The most surprising thing would be how children teach us.
At first, I did not realize, when you are open and you have an open relationship with your children and you have a good relationship with your children, and you are your children’s friends—I mean, our children are our best friends—they truly teach you about everything.
There are some things that my son will come up to me and talk to me about something in World War II and he is only 11 and it’s like, “Oh wow, thank you for that information.” The knowledge they have, overall it is just amazing; just the facts and the things that they know. Truly I don’t believe that if my children were in school … the art, the creativity they have, I think it would be stifled. Because they would have to come home and do homework and then we would have to constantly be on them. The whole thing just allows them to be creative and let everything flow; just natural living.
PAM: I love that idea of flow, that is something that I was totally surprised by. Because before that, so much of our day is scheduled and organized and you think that being hands off and not having that schedule, you just kind of assume you will just sit around and do nothing unless we plan it, but that is so wrong.
NICK: Yes, definitely.
PAM: And you are right about how much they teach us, because once you are on equal footing as people, as human beings, and everybody is just sharing what they find interesting with each other, it is amazing all of the bits and pieces that they pick up and it is so lovely when you can say, “Thank you, I didn’t know that.” And that happens so often, doesn’t it?
NICK: Every day. Every day is something new, every day is truly about freedom to allow them to access things. To really access technology, to access the information on the internet. My younger kids; the little ones do not know how to read but they can talk to google and ask the little tablet anything they want in the world and that information is at your finger tips.
That is the amazing part, when they are curious about something like the election, we don’t really talk about politics, but they will come up to us and talk about politics or just a million things that you would not even think little kids would talk about, but that freedom and that flow is just so magical. Kids are interested in things, they are interested in the world, they are interested about a lot of things, and when you give them that freedom to explore the world, what it truly is, they explore and they learn and it is truly magical.
PAM: I love that word, magical, because it does seem like that, doesn’t it?
I mentioned earlier that you post regularly on Facebook and Instagram as ‘The Unschool Dad’ and you share a lot of great inspirational quotes as well as pictures from your unschooling lives. I really enjoy following you guys so I would love to know, what inspired you to start that project?
NICK: Actually, that was kind of a mistake. I just created the account one day, ‘The Unschool Dad,’ to share memes I liked, or quotes I liked off the internet, so I would not hurt people; I was tired of arguing with people, like I said.
One day, I had my mother’s cousin’s daughter, who was training to be a teacher, and they were just totally offended and it got into this big heated argument, so I was like, ‘You know what, I am just tired of this; these people just do not get it. I’m going to make a page, and I am just going to share memes that I see on the internet that I like so I can go back and look.’
Somehow one meme got shared and went viral and, all of a sudden, I had 1,000 followers and then 2,000 followers and now I have almost 47,000 followers and it is just word of mouth, I have never put anything into it. I would like to blog, but I do not really have the time. Probably eventually I will start blogging, to share our experiences as a family, but it is just really cool how it has grown.
Sometimes it is hard work to really keep up with it, but the messages I get, “Oh, thank you for showing us that this could be done,” that inspires me to do more to show people there is really another way, to give your children freedom, and I get more positive reactions. Like I said, I get pissed off at the teachers every once in awhile, but it is more positive than anything, just really helping families see another way to live their lives.
PAM: I love that it started because you were posting things on your personal page, right and that was sparking discussion so then when you made an unschooling focused one, you are more attracting people that are interested in that. That is brilliant.
NICK: With Instagram, it is more focused because it is people that want to see you. On Facebook sometimes the algorithms of Facebook share it to somebody that does not want to see it and somebody likes it and they will show it to somebody, a specific family member who goes, “Oh how dare you! What are you thinking? That’s child abuse.”
PAM: Less often?
NICK: So once again, I like Instagram. It is more directed at people that want to follow you; it doesn’t show up in somebody else’s newsfeed, so that helps a lot.
PAM: Very cool, and I loved your point about how sometimes that can be the first light bulb moment for someone, because those memes are like little seeds, aren’t they? They may just pass and pass and then they start to connect in the background for people and then they get more curious. I think it is lovely.
NICK: Yeah, definitely. Even some people have been like, “Oh wow, I never thought of that.” When you incorporate this unschooling and attachment parenting and peaceful parenting and overall just truly respecting children. When they see a child for who they are, a human being, and that is what it really comes down to.
We treat children like they are some kind of oddity, “Oh, you need to do this; for these 12 years you need to go to school and learn all of these things,” but truly, just for the human rights of a child, to see who they are, to really let them blossom, is magical.
PAM: That is so true. I mean, because we start with unschooling, but quickly we get to the foundation, like what simmers underneath that. Unschooling is built on these relationships with our children, and that is human—even if school has to be in the picture, you can still have respectful, trusting, loving human being based relationship with your child, right?
NICK: Yes, definitely. At the beginning of this school year, my children were interested in this online school, my eleven-year-old and nine-year-old. So, they asked us, and we respected their decision and we enrolled them. One of them did not start it; my daughter did not start it, she said forget it, and my son did it for a week but could not stand it. I respected their decision to try it, and they tried it and now he knows that he didn’t like it, but he had the chance to do it and it was just so time consuming.
There was a homeschool part with a curriculum where he had to sit there at least for 5 hours in front of the computer and did all their common core math and he realized what it was about and after a week he asked not to do it. It was truly amazing to let him make that decision about his schooling, not like “You have to do this.” At 10-11 years old that he knows he has the freedom to choose what he wants in life. My happiness comes from his happiness; what he wants to do. Really the pleasure of life is to see them happy.
PAM: Yeah, for me that where my Living Joyfully website came from. Because you realize that when you are pursuing those things that get us excited, that bring us joy, that make us happy, where even the negative things that happen and everything—that is all life. Those are experiences that mean something to us because we are pursuing them from our own volition, because we are interested. When we are pursuing the things that are fascinating to us, that is when we just learn so much no matter what happens in the end, right?
NICK: Yes, definitely.
Like, for example, with reading. I think this is probably a lot of people—it is good that we do not live around family because I never forced my children to read and the desire came from playing video games to chat, it is truly magical.
I think that the whole magical thing about unschooling is watching your child learn how to read naturally. And from being inspired from something they love, with my older two it was a big thing a couple of years ago. They had subscriptions but you had to chat with other people in the group and so they asked, “Hey, we want to read.” It is just truly magical; seeing their desire to learn. Most people are like, “Your kid is 10 and doesn’t know how to read yet,” but it seems like that is the age when my children really had the desire. We never had to force them, we just let it flow, and to see that flow of reading and see it naturally and from a passion, from their desires to learn how to read.
My daughter seems like she can write better than I can, and she never had any kind of formal curriculum on any of this, but I see them write and I see them talk. Especially my oldest—communicating with other people and I’m just like, “Wow, can you teach me?”
PAM: (Laughter) I know.
They are so focused within the curriculum in schools to teach the skill because, ‘this is a skill that you will need,’ but when you have the patience to follow that flow, the need for those skills comes up in life, naturally, doesn’t it? And to see them hit that … for them, picking up that skill is not about the skill, it is about satisfying the need, and they will pick up that skill along the way.
NICK: Yes, when you let it flow naturally, and just all of the things like math and all of the little things—I understand there are some children that pick up reading early, there are some children that want to read earlier—but when you see it and you let it flow through everything in life.
For thousands of years, humans learned naturally. When you let it happen and you get there, and you do not force it, you are just there helping them. And I think that is the important part, is that you have to be there. I mean, me and my wife are constantly with our children. You have to be there to help them, and guide them, answer their questions, or help them spell something. And when you are there, and you are just part of your children’s lives, you just see it all. You come together and it is truly a magical lifestyle that we live, it is just amazing.
PAM: And that is such a good point too, because, like you say, when you are with them, if they are not at a place where reading is going to come together for them, we are there to help them, to read for them, so that you do not hold a skill hostage on them, you know what I mean? “If you want that, you have got to figure out how to read.”
NICK: Actually, we had a problem like that; that is a perfect example.
We had a family member that came over and he has a college degree and he is into engineering and he got my son all of these different little engineering things and he told him (this was a couple of years ago), he said “I am not going to teach you because you can’t read.” We were flabbergasted. It was like, you missed a moment with this child that you could share all of your knowledge with, but you told him that because he cannot read you are not going to help him.
And it was just amazing that people think this way. He could have probably learned way more by you sitting there explaining to him the things, because then you are applying it to something that he is excited about in his life, but instead choosing not to connect with him. It was just crazy to us to think that somebody would say that.
PAM: Yeah, I know, it just makes no sense. Just because it is not something that comes up in our lives. Like you said, it was somebody from the outside coming in and sometimes it surprises you because it has been so long since you have seen that kind of approach or attitude towards kids, right?
NICK: Yeah, that is what has helped in moving away. I mean, 98% of my friends on Facebook are unschoolers, so over the years I have been surrounded and our friends are unschoolers, so when somebody outside approaches, it is just like, “Oh, we have been doing this for a long time, I think we know it works.”
PAM: And our last question, Nick.
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just started out on this journey?
NICK: I think the biggest thing and one of my favourite quotes by John Holt is to really trust children. “To trust children we must first learn to trust ourselves,” and, I think, just be open-minded, you know what I mean?
And I know I see this question a lot in groups. I do not really participate in groups, but I see them, or some friend will send me a message, asking like “How do I convince my husband to unschool?” or “My mother in law does not get it.” And I think that the biggest part for dads is to really trust your children and just be open-minded; but a supporter, be a listener.
I know sometimes dads go away for work and they are working a lot, so it is a lot of times the responsibility of the mom with the kids. Really listen to your spouse, your significant other on what is really going on. Be supportive. I mean, children are learning, when you give them that environment of freedom.
So many times our society says, “Not this, not this.” We constantly want to restrict, restrict, but children are very good at self-regulating when you give them the freedom to be on the internet and explore what they want. Let them explore; our future is technology.
Give them the freedom to be who they are, and I know many people, like my example, my passions, when you learn about your passions, you are learning about something new, you learn just like your children will learn. Just overall really trust, respect the child. Just respect and be supportive and unless there is some kind of developmental thing where your child is not learning, they will learn, they will get it as long as you are there, as long as one parent is there guiding them and directing them, they are learning and you are giving them that freedom to pursue what they want. They are going to learn.
PAM: I love that; I think that open-mindedness is so important because it is such a big leap. It is so unconventional at first, isn’t it? But if you can have that open-mindedness and just hold that trust for awhile and let things flow, you will see for yourself; all of these things will happen, won’t they?
NICK: Yes, definitely. Like I said, it is hard for some people to realize, like with that whole school thing, and then coming to something where you let children be free, it is a really hard decision, but it is really well worth it. It is really worth it just to see them and just to blossom into these amazing human beings, these amazing people.
And another thing I think that dads do, they think they need to be this father figure and set these rules in their house. But free your children from arbitrary rules, and just be your children’s friend. I have amazing relationships with my children. Our teenagers are amazing human beings. You see people complain about their teenagers and it is just like, I cannot complain. We are really friends. They are amazing.
When you give them freedom and you respect them, you have to be their friend and they will come to you. When my daughter has a problem, she comes to my wife or I, when she is sad. With any outside influence where they are bothered, they come to you, and that is the effect of unschooling I want, is that they come to us instead of finding some other kind of thing to fulfill their need. When they can know that they can come talk to us we can help them solve the problem or figure something out, and I think that is what the true experience is about.
PAM: Yeah. They know that we have their backs, right? That they are not going to be judged, they are not going to be … punished. I could not think of the word! It has been a long time!
But yeah, when you are on the same team, that does not mean that things are perfect or anything like that because stuff happens in life, things go wrong, but when they know you have their back, like you said, they are going to come to you. They know you have the experience, they know you love them, and they have this comfortable relationship with you to sort through things and to try to figure out a path forward, right?
NICK: I think that is the biggest thing that made my public schooling tolerable was that I knew my parents had my back, like from being very little, I was the youngest; my brothers and sisters were older and had already moved out, and my mom always had my back.
From when I was little, I remember being three or four, and we were somewhere and I was just looking at candy, and the lady said, “Don’t touch that,” and my mom immediately told that lady “Hey, don’t talk to my son like that.” So, from being very little, I knew my mom would stand up for me.
Throughout my school when I knew something was wrong, no matter if I was right or the school was right or if I was wrong, I could go home to my mom and my mom would be right down at the school telling them where to put it. That is very important, especially because I grew up in the inner city of LA; there were a lot of gangs and things like that and I could have been influenced any way, but I knew my parents were very supportive of me. That is true that that is the most important key in all of it, just being there for them, and helping them through life so they know they can come to you and not go somewhere else.
PAM: That is such a great point, Nick, and I think you are right; it boils down to that relationship in the end, doesn’t it? And that relationship lasts a lifetime, not just for the compulsory school years. You are building a life with them.
NICK: Yeah, it is a lifestyle. It is our whole life and a lot of people think this unschooling is an education method for your children, but it is not, it is life. Like my wife and I, when we first started going this way, it helped us question things in life. It made us better critical thinkers of so many other things in life, and we are learning and it is just amazing overall, the knowledge, and the things you start questioning over and over, and it is just like, it is a lifestyle. Everything encompasses your life; learning and growing, and questioning. It is just awesome.
PAM: That’s right. It is awesome.
Thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me today, Nick. I had so much fun, thank you!
NICK: Thank you for having me. And for having me share.
PAM: Yeah, I loved hearing a bit more about your story, that is great.
And before we go, where is the best place for people to connect with you online if they would like to follow along as well?
NICK: On Facebook, The Unschool Dad, or Instagram, at The Unschool Dad.
PAM: Perfect, and I will share links to that in the show notes.
Thank you so much, Nick, have a great day!
NICK: Bye.
EU383: Foundations: Connection
Mar 27, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the next Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Connection.
How connected we’re feeling to the people in our lives is a helpful barometer of our relationships. Feeling disconnected can be a sign that it’s time to more intentionally cultivate connecting moments.
Anna shares one of the questions that guides her decision-making: ‘Is what I’m about to do going to enhance or harm my connection with this person?’ We also explore the idea of bids for connection, which can be an enlightening lens through which to view our interactions.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
What does connection with another person feel like for you?
What are some ways you might connect with the people in your family? What do they love to do? What do you love to do? How might those overlap?
How do you typically react when an attempt to connect with someone goes unexpectedly?
Would that change if you framed it as learning something new about them?
What bids for connection do you notice and are you responding in the way you’d like to?
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are excited you found us, and are interested in exploring our relationships and who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we choose to move through the world. And in today’s episode, we are going to talk about connection.
So, connecting with another person on an emotional level creates a feeling of being in alignment with them, of understanding and appreciating each other in that moment. Regularly cultivating connection with someone builds a stronger and stronger relationship with them. You get to know and understand each other better. You come to anticipate their needs and they, yours.
So, for me, how connected I’m feeling to another person is kind of a barometer of our relationship. If I’m feeling disconnected, I more purposefully seek out connecting moments with them. A connecting moment might be sharing an activity together, from watching a movie, going for a walk, playing a game, whatever feels good together.
But the really important piece for it to be connecting is that the other person needs to enjoy it. This was something that I had to learn along the way. It’s not particularly connecting for me to cajole my partner into going for a walk with me if they don’t enjoy walks. They will likely spend a good chunk of that time looking forward to it being over, rather than enjoying each other’s company. They will just have that in the back of their mind. “Have we walked long enough? Have we walked far enough? When’s it time to turn back?”
So, if I want to connect with someone, whether it be a partner, child, friend, it is helpful to suggest an activity that they enjoy. They will also feel seen and heard by that. “Oh, they know how much I love to go for a walk. Yay!” Or, “to play that game, yay!” etc. That will help them feel seen as the person they are by me, because connecting with another person really is about seeing and celebrating them for who they are, not who I wish they were. That is a subtle but very important difference.
And in that space of enjoying an activity together, often we can both chat more freely and openly, learning more about what’s up in each other’s days, sharing what we’ve been enjoying, and what challenges we may be feeling. That is connecting with them. It doesn’t need to be anything big, doesn’t need to be anything special, but doing things together that we enjoy opens up that space for connecting and conversations and sharing little pieces of ourselves with each other.
So, what does connection look like for you, Anna?
ANNA: You know I’m excited to talk about connection! I keep connection as a lens for just about everything. I often ask myself, is what I’m about to say or do, going to enhance or harm my connection with this person? And if I’m honest about that and act from a place of choosing connection, conflicts are avoided. The lines of communication remain open. Because here’s the thing. So, I’m choosing to be in relationship with this person. I love them. I want us to enjoy our time together, so I want to take ownership of who I am. I want to act from a place of being the person that I want to be. And for me, that person is kind and compassionate and extends unconditional regard to my loved ones.
Do I fall short of that sometimes? Yes. Yes, I do.
But if I keep connection as the lens, if I check in about my actions before acting, I can choose to be that person more and more. And it becomes easier and easier.
The other thing about being connected that I want to talk about is that we’re on the same team. I talk to a lot of couples who are approaching disagreements or meeting their needs as basically this zero-sum game. When, instead, we keep our connection at the forefront, we’re able to approach problems and meeting each other’s needs as a puzzle that we’re solving together. We’re on the same side.
We can give each other that generous assumption, which is basically we love each other. We’re in this together. We want to help each other feel seen and heard. We want each of our needs to be met. Coming from that place leaves a world of possibilities that we cannot see when we’re tunneling in and defending our own needs without regard for the other in this oppositional, volleying back and forth, defend and receive.
PAM: Exactly. Feeling connected with another person really does feel like we’re on the same team. I love that. We are in alignment. We want to help each other get our needs met and work toward accomplishing our goals.
For me, that feeling of being on the same team makes all the difference in our interactions, in our connection. Conflicts, or even just conversations, aren’t that back and forth of offense and defense and winner and loser and how many times have they won and how many times have I lost, etc. It is just a team effort in creatively trying to meet everyone’s needs and wishes and help each other along. That just feels so much better, too.
ANNA: So much better.
PAM: One thing I also wanted to mention is that sometimes our attempts at connection may not land with the other person. They may even go sideways, like, what the heck? That is totally okay. Like really, that’s okay. It is not a failure. We don’t need to take that personally, as an attack on us. Again, like offense/defense.
In fact, same team, when you bring that lens, we can often use that to learn a bit more about them. Oh, what was it about that thing? Was it the activity that they weren’t interested in? Were they busy with somebody or something that’s important to them? Maybe they’re stressed about something that’s going on in their life, like a work issue. Something else has their focus. So, it doesn’t need to be a rejection of us. It’s like, oh, there’s other things going on in our life. And we can really be so quick to take everything personally. I definitely know that I can, but when I can take that moment to remember, no, it doesn’t need to be about me, per se. What else is going on? It is so interesting and so often, that’s really the case. They’re not trying to piss us off or trying to make us feel bad.
None of that.
ANNA: It’s not about us at all usually.
PAM: Exactly. Or in that moment, maybe we can learn a bit about ourselves or maybe both. Right? Maybe we put out-sized expectations on the other person. Maybe we didn’t end up enjoying the activity and we’re the one who’s distracted instead of engaged in the moment. Maybe we were tired, like we just felt like we needed to do this thing and we pushed ourselves to try and connect with them, but in the end, it didn’t turn out very well for us. Life happens. We learn from that experience and we try again.
We are always learning. There is just so much about each other. When we’re talking about relationships, there’s so much to learn, because we are different in each moment. When we’re tired, we’re different in that moment. The things that we can do are different, the conversations that we can have, but being more open and honest about those moments, it is so helpful for relationships.
And it also helps to be open to noticing when your partner or your child is trying to connect with you and try to be responsive in those moments.
If we are stuck in our heads, it can feel like we’re the only one prioritizing the relationship. We feel like we’re the only ones inviting and inviting. But if we can notice, so often, we may not realize what it is at first, but when they invite us to join them, chances are they are looking to connect with us. And it may look very different than how we might want to connect with them, but a connection is just as valuable either way.
And, in fact, it enhances relationship when the connections go both ways. There’s a term that we toss around, we learned about last year or so, was it? Bids for connection. You want to talk about that a little bit more?
ANNA: Yeah, I definitely want to touch on bids for connection. I think the idea comes from the Gottman Institute. The funny thing about them is they don’t always look straight forward like, “Hey, I want to feel closer to you now.” Sometimes it looks like picking a fight or a grumpy comment. Sometimes it looks like asking for something that we can do ourselves. “Hey, can you get me water, even though you have to walk in front of me to go get the water that I’m asking for?” Sometimes it looks like pulling away or getting quiet. And as we learn more about each other, we see the bids for what they are and the underlying need that they’re trying to meet. And then we can check in and respond with kindness and that can open up the lines of communication and avoid a situation where people don’t feel heard.
Love languages can also play a role here. Knowing how we give and receive love can help make sure that what we’re putting out is love is being received as such.
But with the bids, like you said, it’s so interesting, because we’ll be in our heads about, I want to make this relationship better, and maybe that person’s telling us a story from work and we’re actually still in our head thinking, “We’re not doing relationship things,” or we’re not doing the thing the way it looks in our head.
But really, wanting to share that bit from work or the child wanting to share the bit about their game, that is the bid for connection. That is them wanting to bring us into their world. And so, for me, I just want to keep really open to that. I just want to be open, so that I’m seeing that in the people that are around me that I love, and that I’m acknowledging that and I’m responding.
And yes, like you said earlier, sometimes we have capacity issues to deal with. Sometimes there just isn’t enough, or the time is not right, or we’re tired. But I find even in those situations, when I see the bid, I’m able to acknowledge the bid. Even if I can’t dive in fully to maybe what they’re needing for the, in that moment, it’s so much better than brushing it off.
PAM: Yes, when you can acknowledge it and be a bit transparent by saying, “Ah, that’s wonderful. I love that. I can’t wait to join you, or I can’t wait to hear that story. I’m just really tired right now. Can we do it in the morning? Can we do it after I’ve had a nap? Or I’m just going to sit here and have a tea or a coffee for a few minutes,” to acknowledge so that they feel seen and heard in that moment.
And there was one other thing that came up. So, as we’ve been talking this whole time about connection, and you touched on this and I think it’s super important, is the idea that we can have these visions in our head of what being in relationship means. And it can mean all sorts of fancy things in our head. We can have these visions of, we need to go out on a date every week, right? We need to go outside of the house, all these pieces. And the everyday connection doesn’t count. But, truly, in the everyday connection, that is the foundation. Those are the connections that we’re building.
It doesn’t mean we don’t do the bigger things. It just means the relationship isn’t on hold between the bigger things.
ANNA: Exactly. And this is what we were talking about that I said in the first episode that we’re going to keep repeating, it’s that outside voice, because I think we come into it maybe from movies, whatever, that we had this idea of what relationships look like, but it really is the everyday of just sharing the ups and downs and getting the things done around the house and just moving through our days together that builds that foundation, that then we can do all these other fun things and big things. Because the reality is, the big fun things are going to be sprinkled throughout our year. But if that’s what we’re pinning our hopes on, that’s not going to get us through. So, we have to figure out how to keep that connection alive and rich and wonderful in those everyday moments. And it is listening for those bids. It is being available.
PAM: Yes. And just think for a moment, when you have that connection going throughout your days, your every days, you’re already pretty well connected when those bigger moments come. And how much more fun are those when you’re already connected, instead of thinking-
ANNA: We’re going to get it there!
PAM: We have to go and relearn each other for our weekend away. Let’s reconnect, finally.
ANNA: Right. And isn’t that why some of those things go awry? Sometimes, we have this idea like, we’re going to have this amazing date, or we’re going to take this amazing trip and then it ends up falling flat. But I think so much of that is because maybe we haven’t been tending to those pieces in between, and so, we’re pinning our hopes on this big time away or this big thing, and it falls a little bit short.
So, yeah, I think that’s super interesting to watch for and think about.
PAM: Yes. Yes. Okay. So, I have some questions to share for people to ponder as they’re exploring connections, alongside all the ones we’ve already talked about.
So, what does connection with another person feel like for you?
What are some ways you might connect with the people in your family? What do they love to do? What do you love to do? What do you love to do together? How can these different things overlap? It doesn’t always need to be one thing. Sitting on the couch together or playing a game together, those are all perfectly wonderful ways to connect.
How do you typically react when an attempt to connect, a bid for connection that we’re putting out, goes unexpectedly? So, when you offer up, “Oh, let’s sit down and have a coffee together, or a tea together,” and they say no, how do you typically react? How does that feel? Would that change if you framed it as a learning something new about them? “Oh, I didn’t know they were really into the thing they were doing. Oh, I didn’t know that thing went strange at work today, and you’re really worried about that,” because those things going awry are actually opportunities to learn more.
And then, again, let’s think about the bits for connection coming the other way. Just keep an eye open for that over the next little while. I love what you said that the bids don’t always look perfect. As in, “Let’s do this together!” It can be, “Oh, my gosh, I had such a rough day at work. I want to vent about it.” That is a bid for connection. That is some support another person is looking for. And we can learn more about their lives. It can be a child really frustrated about something that went wrong and what they’re trying to do, and they come to you. That’s a bid for connection, for some support in what they are looking to do. Maybe it’s the infamous, “I’m bored,” you know? They’re just looking to chat with somebody for a while.
There are so many possibilities when you just open up and start looking for what might potentially be bids for connections, opportunities for connection.
ANNA: Absolutely.
PAM: Thank you so much for listening and we’ll see you next time. Bye.
EU382: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: It’s Not the Unschooling
Mar 13, 2025
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and this time, we’re talking about how it’s not the unschooling!
It can be really common for newer unschoolers to blame unschooling for the things that come up in their family lives. Unschooling was a big new change in their lives, and so it can feel like any problems that arise are probably due to that big new change. For conflicts about screen time or bedtime or food choices or communication, it might feel easier to blame unschooling, because then there’s something to change, something to fix, so that maybe the problem will go away.
But often when parents really dig down and are honest about what’s going on for their families, they will often find that it’s not really about unschooling. And so, examining this area can be really helpful when we come up against challenges or have areas of discomfort. In our conversation, we talked about how to approach the issues that come up in our lives regardless of whether our kids go to school or not, and the potential benefits of just forgetting about the word “unschooling” for a while!
It was a really fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hi everyone! I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis.
Today’s episode is called, It’s Not The Unschooling, and I’m really excited about this one. But Erika, do you want to get us started?
ERIKA: I do. I think it might sound a little funny on an unschooling podcast to have an episode called, It’s Not the Unschooling, but we actually had a monthly theme in the Network by this name a while back, because it can really be a helpful lens when we come up against challenges or have areas of discomfort.
So, I thought I would just introduce the idea. Basically, it can be really common, especially for newer unschoolers, but definitely not exclusively newer unschoolers, to blame unschooling for various issues that come up in their family lives. I mean, unschooling was this big new change in their lives, and so it can feel like any problems that arise are probably due to that big new change.
So, for example, conflicts about screen time or bedtime or food choices or communication when kids are making decisions or the family’s making decisions. It might feel easier to blame unschooling because then there’s something to change, something to fix, so that maybe the problem will go away. But often when parents really dig down and are honest about what’s going on for their families, they will often find that it’s not really about unschooling.
After all, unschooling, the way we describe it here is just living life. And so whether children are in school or not, whether you’re parenting in a more mainstream or authoritarian way or not, parents and children will still be figuring it out. How to manage screen time, what to eat, when and where to sleep, what decisions they’re going to make.
And so unschooling isn’t what causes those issues to exist, and we all will grapple with them in some way at some point as a family. And so often if I just play around with the thought of, would my kids being in school or would me being a strict authoritarian parent make this situation any easier? The answer is an easy no, it would only add more layers of difficulty.
And so what I love about what I learned through the network and through my own unschooling journey is that it encourages me to focus on how my relationships I have with my children are feeling and it actually makes navigating some of those more challenging parts of life easier.
Easier sometimes feels like not quite the right word, because it’s sometimes not easy at all, but I feel more supported and feel better moving through the issues because of the relationships that we have. And so I could feel good about my choices when I’m prioritizing my relationships and treating my children the way they want to be treated.
PAM: I love that very much and I am very excited about this topic because it was something that I experienced quite a bit as we moved to unschooling, because my kids were a little bit older, they were in school when I discovered unschooling. And I think one of the big pieces as I was playing around with it was recognizing that what unschooling did was open up so many more choices for me.
The first one, they don’t have to go to school. They don’t have to do this. I, as a parent, don’t have to do that. It opened up so many choices just through discovering and exploring what it meant.
It was the discovery of unschooling that opened up my eyes to the fact that this could be a choice, that there wasn’t just one right way. So it was easy for others looking in and just blame the unschooling. But what I realized exactly as you were saying, Erika, when I asked myself, but if they went back to school, how would this be different?
Because I realized it’s one of those cases where my eyes were open and I couldn’t just go back and close them because I changed something else. Even if they go to school, I know it’s still a choice. Now, I will forever know that that’s a choice. Same with all the other issues. It was for me, the unschooling journey that opened my eyes to so much of it, to the relationships, to even more consensual day-to-day living.
So, even though I could kind of point to unschooling as the catalyst, it wasn’t the fault of unschooling, things wouldn’t go back. I would not be comfortable going back to life before discovering it, even if at this point. At that point had they ever chosen or wanted to go back to school or life circumstances changed and they needed to go back to school for a while or, you know, whatever came up, I was now a changed person. I couldn’t go back to who I was before, but it still meant it wasn’t the fault of unschooling, right? Even if they went back to school, I would still need to make those parenting choices and have conversations with my partner and now conversations with my kids, et cetera, et cetera.
ANNA: Yeah, I think it’s so interesting. Why I am excited to talk about this is what we’ve seen, especially on the network, but really even back in the day of the Yahoo groups, when people came with we’re unschooling and this is terrible. This thing is terrible and we kept thinking, okay, but that’s not really the unschooling.
But what we noticed was that it was a place to get stuck. Right? It was a place where they lost all creativity and as soon as we all would start talking, it happens on the network too. We’d just start talking, well, have you talked to them about this? Or What does that feel like? Or, how’s that relationship going? Or what are these other contextual pieces that are happening in your family? Then you see them just open up a little bit. Because it’s not about the unschooling. We can just start talking about what’s working for our family, what’s working for each individual, what it does it feel like when we have these conversations. And so we kind of challenged people in that month to just kind of let go of the word unschooling, which again, like you said, Erika, it seems that people are going, wait a minute, isn’t this the unschooling podcast?
But it really is about life and relationships, at its core. I think if you find that the word is causing problems in your discussion, whether it be with your spouse or your mother-in-law or someone else, let it go because there isn’t one way to be an unschooler. And I think that’s another big piece.
I think when we are looking at that, where we’re kind of blaming the unschooling, we’re putting unschooling ahead of our connection with our kids or what’s actually happening for the individual people. And that’s what we want to be cautious about. And interesting. Pam, you and I have talked about this before, that unschooling wasn’t something that I talked about with my kids, it wasn’t like a day-to-day conversation, especially when they were younger. It really was just like you said, Erika, we’re living life and we’re figuring things out about each other, and we’re being in relationship and we’re exploring the world.
And so I think it’s so interesting to just let go of something that might be causing you to narrow in your focus. And so that’s why I’m excited to talk about it today too. Because I think especially if you’re finding there are some rubs with your partner or with people in your family, see if that’s at play because a lot of times it is.
ERIKA: I love that. And it kind of feels like two things. So, one is this word unschooling, is the word a trigger for someone in your family? Is the word a trigger for yourself? Does it bring up a lot of feelings of, I have to do something a certain way because that’s a sign that maybe there are some other layers wrapped up in there.
And then the other part is just reaching for what was familiar, reaching for what I knew as a kid, or the control, right? Because we’ve seen that when things are stressful, when you get overwhelmed, you want to grab for control. That’s just like a human impulse. What can I control to get a handle on this situation?
And so maybe you’ll find yourself thinking things would just be so much easier if I could just make my kids go to bed at eight. Would it help me make my life better if I could just control them in some way. And so it can feel like a solution when it first pops into your head that the solution might be, I just need more control.
But then if you really start thinking about what that means, it’s really about I’m going to stop listening to my kids. I don’t care what they say anymore. This is damaging my relationship with them if I go down that path of thinking control will make my life better.
It just feels like a possible solution if I’m getting super overwhelmed. And so I think reaching for that familiar, well other parents just tell their kids what to do and they have to do it. And that makes life easy. If I follow the full thought process of what that means, it means disconnecting from my kids.
It means going against the things that I believe about the world, that everyone knows what’s best for them and I want to support them in learning about themselves. And so it’s separate from even the word unschooling. Those are two different things. Either the reaching for control or the blaming, this word, this scary word of unschooling when you first get to it.
I think it’s really interesting and digging down beneath, what’s really going on for me? What’s the context that’s causing me to have this kind of strong response to the idea of unschooling?
PAM: And I think that’s just such a beautiful and important stage of the unschooling journey.
And as I was thinking about it at the beginning, because this was a bigger thing at the beginning of our journey, because everything seemed to point to unschooling like I was talking about before. And I loved your idea, Anna, about just not using the word, try to have conversations for a little bit without using that word because it kind of becomes a catchall.
But if you can get underneath it, to really better describe, it helped me with conversations with my partner because unschooling was often coming up, but it was like, oh, but it’s grown kind of beyond that. And I think another thing that can trip us up, and we have had a whole series on the podcast about unschooling rules, but sometimes we can pull up the, oh, if we’re unschooling, we do this right? And that can really trip us up too, because that’s us conflating so many of the ideas that kind of come with unschooling. So, parenting styles and relationships and all those tools and different aspects of life.
We talk about them, in a way that helps unschooling thrive, which is really just learning through living this life. That’s where you eventually get to. But I do think at the beginning you can want to do unschooling really well, want to be a great unschooling parent.
What does it mean? I have those check boxes, right? And then unschooling gets into our minds in every aspect. And then it is so tempting to blame the unschooling when we start to get frustrated. Why if I just, if they just listened, I’d have this perfect solution and everybody. This would go so much more smoothly if we just all did this one thing, which is that kind of slippery slope.
If you’re valuing relationships, if you want to make that a priority in your life, which is part of choosing unschooling, right? It’s really hard to have an authoritarian, relationship or parenting style with your kids and have unschooling thrive. So, really just trying to not use the word unschooling for a while can help you get to the foundations of what does this actually mean to me?
And yeah, go back and listen to the unschooling rules podcasts, too. Because it’s not like they’re wrong, it’s just that they don’t have the context. If we just jump to unschooling says we don’t have a bedtime. And then you just take that in. There is just so little context for you to get your feet wet and really understand what’s going on.
So for a while, just not using that word I think can be really helpful to recognize how much of it really isn’t the unschooling.
ANNA: It’s true. I want to go back to what you were talking about, Erika, because I think that was an important piece for me. Because we can go to that quick snap judgment of, well this wouldn’t be a problem if we did this, or this is why this is a problem.
Taking that extra time, slowing things down, and actually walking through what it would look like helped me understand where I wanted to spend my energy. So, if we look at just school to take an example. Well, if they were in school, then we wouldn’t have whatever this problem is or this sibling fight during the day or this, whatever thing’s been going on.
If I walked through that, I recognized we’d be bringing a whole host of other things into our life. And so did I want to be at service of this other institution, making our days and weeks and years rotate around that schedule? Did I want to be worrying about whether they’re going to do homework or this or that?
Or did I want to figure out this problem in front of me, which has nothing to do with school, or not school, which is just basically, maybe we need something. Maybe I need to be hearing what’s happening between my two girls, or we need to figure out something else in our life. And so for me, it was about where do I want to spend my energy?
Which speaks to what you were saying, Pam, and I want to spend my energy on creating strong relationships. I don’t want to spend my energy fitting into another system necessarily. And if my child said I want to go into the system, absolutely be there to support them, that feels very different.
But if I’m just getting frustrated and saying, oh, it’s because we’re unschooling. That’s why they’re staying up all night or doing X. And it’s interesting because I think when you’ve been in other worlds, we have unschooled all along because it just happened naturally for us. But in the early years, David was working in a corporate environment.
And would just hear about the nighttime frustrations and all the things that were happening with very mainstream families, choosing all the conventional paths. And so it really does help to walk through it.
That’s where it gets us stuck, right? It gets us stuck on, it’s the unschooling, when in fact these are broader issues when we’re talking about food and sleep and parenting and sibling relationships, and all of that has really nothing to do with unschooling.
An unschooling environment can actually make some of those things easier, but it’s not a cure all and it’s not the cause. So, watch for when your thoughts are being limited by that, to just say, is this really a problem that would exist if we weren’t unschooling? And what would it look like and what other things might it be inviting in if we did?
Because I think it just, and for me, that’s always, I always talk about just slowing it down, just giving myself a pause, thinking a little bit more about it, walking through some of those scenarios, how would I feel in those different scenarios before I just run with the snap judgment and say it’s the unschooling.
ERIKA: Yeah, I had a thought when you were talking about the belief that unschooling means everything’s always going to be easy and great. That also might be a barrier here. Where we’re thinking, if I am having a problem, it’s definitely that we’re doing unschooling wrong, or that unschooling is the issue.
Because we’re not supposed to have any problems anymore. I found unschooling, now it should be easy. And so that could be another little place where we could get stuck and just have to think through, do that thought experiment that always works for me. Would it be an easier or a better life for me and my kids if we did this, if we sent them to school, if whatever.
It just opens up so many thoughts. And then I also feel like what you were talking about went back to Pam’s thing about the unschooling journey changing us. It’s about opening our minds to all of the possibilities.
I know you’ve talked about this before Anna before, that kind of comfort and safety that comes from being in the system and not being responsible for the different decisions that you’re making. And so there could be something about those mainstream parents that David was hearing, where it’s like they don’t really feel like it’s on them though.
They’re having the bedtime struggles, but they’ve heard what you’re supposed to do and they’re doing what you’re supposed to do. And if it’s not working, it’s just, not my fault, nothing we could do. It’s just really hard and we can complain about it, but I think the unschooling journey opened my mind, like you were saying, Pam, to just all the choices.
These are the actual choices, and we don’t have to be doing the one way. There is no one right way. And so now that I know that, there isn’t really a way to go back to trusting the system to make all of the decisions for me, or believing that there’s a right way and trying to find it, that’s just not how I can think of it anymore.
And so, in that way, unschooling is to blame, but only in that, now I know about all the choices. I do think that part’s interesting.
PAM: Yeah, I love that it really does just kind of open your eyes to so much. At first I thought, especially since my kids were leaving school, okay, we’re not doing school so how are we going to learn instead?
But then through unschooling that first year, it just opened up a whole world of new choices and curiosity. Hopefully, I don’t forget. There were two things I wanted to mention. One is when we’re doing this processing, I always go back to the beginner’s mind. When I tunnel in and I hear myself saying things like, but what’s the right way?
What’s the best way? Is unschooling the best way and everybody should be doing it? If I’m using language like that, it’s a clue. I don’t have to tell myself I’m wrong at all, but I want to open up to more possibilities because then I’m looking only for the things that match the one thing that I think is the right answer.
And that just throws me off. I’m not going to really understand the context. We talk about context so much. I’m not really going to see the people, the actual real people in my family. Which kind of leads to the other point I wanted to make.
When you’re hearing those different stories from other parents. I think often the thought is, I’m following all the recommendations, doing all the right things to get them to go to sleep, et cetera, and they’re not going to sleep. Then they can start blaming their kids for being wrong. They are not doing this. There is something wrong with them. I’m telling them, you go and you lie down and you listen and the lights off and you’ll go to sleep.
And not seeing the thing that we talk about so much, that people are different. I remember trying to help my kids go to sleep before when they were in school. That whole kind of evening thing, trying to help them individually and how they liked to get to sleep.
But so many of the recommendations were like, you say goodnight, turn off the light, close the door. They’ve had their snack, they’ve had their drink. Blah, blah, blah, blah. And so then you really think that I’m doing all the right things. My kids are just not performing correctly.
It’s a fascinating piece. And yes. Think we just lost Erika there for a second.
ANNA: I know. So I’m hoping she’s going to, she’s going to pop back in, but I’m going to keep talking. Okay, good, she’s coming back to us. Something she said I thought was really important and there was one little nuance I wanted to add to it that got me sparked when she was talking.
So basically that piece of, sometimes it’s easier to hand over our responsibility to the system, right? Well we’re doing all the things we’re supposed to do, so then I’m not responsible. If they don’t get educated at school, it’s the school’s problem. It’s not here.
So I think it’s interesting to think about. I want to ask myself, am I wanting to offload some responsibility? But then another nuance to that is what’s so beautiful about what we describe and talk about is that it isn’t all on me. We’re each on our own journey and it is about helping and facilitating each other.
So it’s not like this one thing needs to have all the answers. And then if I’m going to let go of that system, then I have to have all the answers. Me, Anna, the mom, the whatever, you know? No. We are exploring this together. We’re figuring out what works together. And that’s why for me, whether they choose to go to school or not go to school is really irrelevant.
It really is just, are we supporting the path that we all are wanting to take and exploring things in the way that we want to explore? So I think watching that piece was helpful for me. Am I trying to not have the responsibility and then, okay, if I take it on am I taking on just my pieces or am I trying to take on everybody’s pieces thinking I’m the only person that can solve it, fix it.
Thinking I’m ultimately responsible. I think parents are handed that a lot in our culture, right? That you’re responsible for raising your children. I guess what I learned for myself and my core beliefs are just that again, we’re all humans on our own individual journey, and I love being there to walk with my kids, support them, and facilitate things. But in the end, I’m not responsible for their life. That’s really up to them, the choices they make, and I can provide information and I can support, and I can give them the context of what’s happening around. But ultimately what I see is that they’re quite capable of making those choices for themselves.
And so I think there’s some interesting pieces to explore there. If you find yourself wobbling a little bit to go, okay, wait, am I taking on too much? Am I wanting to give it away? Because what’s interesting is when we give it away to a system, we’re kind of giving away other people’s power as well. So is there a discussion there? I don’t know. That is just what sparked when you were talking, Erika, so I’m glad you’re back.
ERIKA: I don’t think I have more to add about that, but I do love the things we talked about, just noticing those little things where it’s rubbing or where I’m reaching for control, reaching for a solution, or the one right way. Any of those things, I think that is kind of a sign to start digging a little bit deeper.
PAM: I would take that and then not using the word unschooling for a while and see what you discover. I think that will be super interesting to see. Well, how else would I describe it? Because so much of it is just life and relationships and who we want to be.
ANNA: Yeah, absolutely. So, thank you both so much. And to everyone listening to this conversation. I really enjoyed it and I hope you did as well. And I hope you’ll consider joining us at the Living Joyfully Network. We love to dive into these kinds of topics and think about it in all the different ways, and we have such amazing families there that are into these discussions as well.
So we would love to welcome you. To learn more and to join us, just follow the link in the show notes. Thank you again for joining us. And thank you, the two of you. It was great to see you.
PAM: Thanks very much. Bye bye!
ERIKA: Bye!
EU036 Flashback: Deschooling with Lauren Seaver
Feb 27, 2025
In this week’s flashback episode, we’re sharing an interview that Pam had in 2016 with Lauren Seaver about deschooling.
At the time of the interview, Lauren Seaver was an unschooling mom to 9-year-old River. She first considered the possibility of homeschooling way back when she was in college to become a teacher. Life took some turns, but the opportunity to try out unschooling with River arose and it was a great fit. Pam met Lauren at the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit in New York and really enjoyed chatting with her about her deschooling experience!
I think my biggest concern was that our unschooling life didn’t match the picture of what unschooling looked like in my mind. I had these unschooling fantasies about what my own personal unschooling path would have looked like if I were unschooled as a child. Letting go of expectations was so huge for me to be able to really relish what was actually happening in our unschooling lives. ~ Lauren Seaver
QUESTIONS FOR LAUREN
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
What was the biggest concern that drove your choice to move to unschooling this last year?
What were some of your fears or uncertainties as you began unschooling?
What has your move to unschooling looked like? Pretty smooth? A few bumps? Have you talked to River specifically about it? Or have you found the changes to be more internal to you, with you choosing to change how you respond to River and the expectations you have of him?
Can you tell us a bit about how your definition of learning has changed since discovering unschooling?
Did you find a difference between understanding the principles of unschooling intellectually and living them day to day?
What changes have you seen in River since leaving school?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hi everyone, I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and today I’m here with Lauren Seaver. Hi, Lauren!
LAUREN: Hi Pam!
PAM: Just to introduce Lauren a bit to everyone, I had the pleasure of meeting her earlier this year at the Childhood Redefined Summit in Canandaigua, New York. Her enthusiasm for life is contagious and I’m so excited to dive into her deschooling experience, so let’s get started!
First can you share a bit with us about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
LAUREN: Yes. So I have one son, River, and he is nine years old and he is amazing and hilarious. He is a showman and he loves to dance and rap and ride bikes and play video games and he loves playing with his friends. We live with my boyfriend Aaron and our hamster Chewy. (Pam and Lauren laugh) Chewy is very important here. He really is.
And River also spends about two days a week at his Dad’s and stepmom’s house, so we are a blended family. His Dad and I separated when River was four but we have a really good relationship and River always had a great relationship with both of us and our partners so we’re just really lucky.
I also run my own business and when I’m working River usually is with my boyfriend Aaron or with his Dad. All of us have alternating schedules so it really makes unschooling doable while you’re working. We just feel really lucky.
We also live very close to my parents and my sister and our family is very supportive of unschooling which is so awesome. So that’s kind of us.
And the story of how we came into unschooling actually starts a long time ago, even before River was born. I was going to school to become a teacher so I was in college and as part of that I got to observe in a lot of different elementary classrooms and through that process I learned that not all teachers loved children and some teachers don’t even like children and it horrified me.
I thought, “oh wow, it’s almost like luck of the draw if you get a teacher that really likes children and loves learning,” and this was shocking to me. It was then while I was in college I thought maybe I should consider homeschooling because I love kids and I love learning. Gosh, wouldn’t it be fun to learn with my own kids! So already before meeting River’s Dad I was thinking homeschooling is where we’re going to go. I hadn’t heard of unschooling yet.
So then when I had River around five or six years later I had a home birth which is kind of alternative and with that home birth community there’s the attachment parenting community and all of that sort of leads into the homeschooling community. So it was almost like I had it all laid out for me. Through this attachment parenting community one of my friends recommended the Consensual Living yahoo group, which was created by Anna Brown from your podcast, and Pat Robinson, who are two amazing unschooling moms. And from there I learned of the Shine with Unschooling yahoo group, and the Always Learning yahoo group, and I was just like, “Oh, this is it! This is what I’ve been looking for!” Because I knew from my own experience as a teacher and as a person that we always, all of us, learn best when we are interested and passionately engaged in what we’re learning about and what we are doing, so it just was a no-brainer. Ok, we have to unschool, this is what we are going to do.
So that was the plan and so River was two at that time and I did a lot of paradigm shifting and we really lived in that manner as much as you can when they are so little. We didn’t limit TV or games or food or anything and that just seemed really normal and natural and it just worked. And you know, meeting River’s needs in creative ways and just living joyfully.
So that was great. And then when River was around four his Dad and I actually separated and then later divorced for all sorts of reasons, so everything kind of changed. I went to work full time out of the home and suddenly homeschooling and unschooling no longer seemed to be feasible. River had gone to this unique preschool that was two days a week in a homeschooling mom’s house and I was allowed sit next to him at the table and hang out and be there as long as he needed me. He really loved it so I was like well this wasn’t so bad maybe we can find a schooly option where he can go while I’m working.
We found a local school that was really alternative and their focus was very much on kids learning about what they were interested in and it almost had a democratic slant to it so I was like, “Alright, this could work.” He tried their summer camp for one day with the teacher that was with the youngest kids and he loved it so I thought, “Alright, let’s try it.” He ended up being in that lady’s classroom for two years and he loved it. He would run in every day. He would wake up and want to go to school and he loved it so much and I was like “Oh God, thank God, this is all working out.” Because all that I cared about was that he loved what he was doing because I knew that he would learn whatever he needed to learn as long as he was loving what he was doing.
And he and I are both pretty outgoing and love to be around people so I think that was part of what made this so fun for him. So the first two years were great and I was like, “Alright, this is great.” But then he began his third year of school and it was with a different teacher and this was second grade. He was seven and then turning eight that year. It was totally different. Everything changed. Even though this lady was really nice and the school still this alternative school, he didn’t love it anymore and half way through the year I was dragging him out of bed to get him to go to school. I felt like I was forcing him to go to school and that was against everything I believed in because I so deeply believe, then and now, that we learn best when we love what we are doing. It was clear that if I have to drag you out of bed you are not loving going here. I really felt like we needed a change. At this point I had quit my full time job and had just started my own business that would end up giving me a lot more flexibility and I brought up the idea of homeschooling to River.
He was like “No, no, I can’t. I want to be with my friends, I want to go to school. I really like it, it’s fine. No.” And so through the rest of the school year I just tried to support him as much as possible and kept bringing up the option of homeschooling. At the end of that year, which was, I think it ended in 2015, the school actually closed due to funding issues, and I said, “Ok, your school is closing, do you want to try homeschooling?” He was like, “Ok, let’s try homeschooling.”
As soon as school ended and we started homeschooling it was like, “Oh my god, this is amazing, this is what we have we been waiting for!” And we never looked back. He loved it and I loved it. So that’s our crazy, windy path to unschooling. I was always into it and wanted to do it and felt like we were supposed to, and then our lives were different and we didn’t see it as a possibility. So now we’ve been doing it for probably a year and three months I believe. Because I really count that, I count May of last year. In my heart, we started earlier. So that’s how we learned about it and now finally chose it.
PAM: That is awesome. I really loved hearing about how your perspective evolved through all that, the way you took those unschooling principles, or at least that perspective on learning and supporting each other, and have woven that into not only, as you said, your blended families and your extended family that is nearby, and right through always looking at River to guide you through those choices, right?
LAUREN: Absolutely. And I’m so grateful for that because that has been the foundation of our parenting and our lifestyle from the beginning. And I love that. It’s so wonderful. In all of my relationships, not just with River, it’s amazing. It’s very far reaching.
PAM: That was a wonderful story!
What was your biggest concern that drove your choice to move to unschooling?
LAUREN: So, like I said, River was not wanting to go to school. It changed from running in, to “I don’t want to get up.” The biggest issue I felt was reading. The school he was going to was really friendly and alternative. They have different, positive names for things, but he was basically in a remedial reading group and even though the teachers are kind and gentle, he still had reading homework and he felt this pressure to learn to read. He felt so much pressure way before he was ready and I knew this. I was like, “Wait, why are you pushing this? He will learn to read when he is ready. We don’t need to do this homework. We don’t need to do any of this stuff. It’s not helpful.”
I’m a passionate book lover and I knew that if he was just left alone to explore words and books and text and whatever, in whatever way it interested him, reading would come naturally whenever he was ready.
And I was really sad thinking that this kid who was so excited and awesome and hilarious and talented and enthusiastic was having a possibility for future love of learning squashed out of him by this experience, this emphasis that school was placing on this skill that he was not ready to learn.
I was heartbroken knowing he was feeling bad about himself, feeling bad about his own abilities around the idea of reading. When he would talk to me about it, the message he was receiving was basically you should be able to read these books right now and you are a failure because you can’t.
When I think back to it, I think, “How did I let him keep going to school?” Because it’s so awful. It was not the school’s intention. They were just trying to help him, but they are a school. They were like, “You need to learn this by this time.” That’s just how they think.
He would even say, “I’m bad at reading. I hate reading.” I was just like, “Oh, this is awful.” So that was my number one reason and then the other real reason was that I felt like I was supposed to be doing this all along and then this moment in our lives opened up where I realized, “Ok, now this is a real feasible time, a real possible time for us to do this, so let’s do it.” So that was a huge motivator.
PAM: Yeah, it was something in the back of your mind always and you were paying attention and you saw when those possibilities started to come together. Yeah, that’s cool. And what’s so interesting too is that whole reading piece. That was very much Lissy’s experience at school too. When she came home it was all, “I hate reading. I don’t want to read. I can’t read.” All those messages. And we just made sure to totally back off and it took about a year for her to move through, move past all those messages that she had gotten. She was in second grade when she left too.
LAUREN: The same as River, yeah. It’s amazing. It’s like if we could just as a culture look at people, just let them be. They’re going to get it, you just got to leave them alone. It adds all this unnecessary baggage. It’s so detrimental.
PAM: Yes, it is. You mentioned that you learned a lot about homeschooling and unschooling when River was young before he was going to school.
When you finally jumped into it—a year and three months ago—did you still have some fears and uncertainties?
LAUREN: Well, at first when we started we were literally returning to this homebirth and attachment parenting community. So the first feeling was, “Oh my god, we are home. This is so awesome.” And all these people are so weird like us, well, not like us but just sharing similar values. And seeing my old friends and his old friends and he was like: “I knew this kid when he was a baby.” It was really great. So I wasn’t even thinking of the fears then.
When I think about it, the first few months I think my biggest concern was that our unschooling life didn’t match the picture of what unschooling looked like in my mind. I had these unschooling fantasies about what my own personal unschooling path would have looked like if I were unschooled as a child.
I’m one of those people who throws themselves into whatever they are learning. When I was a kid I was into pioneer days, the mid-1800s and Westward Extension, and when I was into that, that was my whole life.
I had a pioneer dress with a bonnet I wore and I had the American Girl Doll and I read all the books. And all the books I read were about the Oregon trail and that time period. And I played the Oregon Trail Video Game and made food from that time period, all that. So I am the type who throws myself into stuff and it becomes my entire life. Then River and I started this unschooling path and I was noticing, “Wow, River doesn’t learn exactly how I learn.”
You’d think that wouldn’t be a big deal but, for whatever reason, I had envisioned something like it. When he was really interested in tornados and lightning, he didn’t want to be thrown into a world of weather. And I could get all the books out from the library about weather and he was like, “I’m not looking at those. I don’t care.” It was a really big deal for me to learn, “Oh wait a second, just because this is how I learn it doesn’t mean that’s how he’s going to learn, and just because I thought it was going to look this way doesn’t mean that’s what it’s going to look like.”
So I think just letting go of expectations was so huge for me to be able to really relish what was actually happening in our unschooling lives. So letting go of those shoulds and just being there and actually witnessing what was happening was what helped me to see “Oh my god, he is learning so much and look at the way he does it. It’s so fascinating. And what he is interested in.” So that was big for me.
So I don’t know if it’s as much fear as it is just letting go of baggage. I think that’s kind of a key piece in my unschooling experience and in our unschooling experience. Me letting go of baggage.
PAM: I think that’s such a great point, Lauren. Because when you mentioned the phrase “unschooling fantasies,” as parents we are learning about unschooling and we are excited enough about it to want to try it with our families. We build such a picture in our head of what it’s going to look like and truly it’s not surprising that it’s based in our own experience and how we would like to learn if we had this possibility. That’s such a great point.
Something to really pay attention to, to shift the focus to seeing how they like to live their days and how they like to learn, and supporting them. Of course, we are going to start from our own perspective, but to be open like you said to dropping those expectations and seeing what actually comes out of it, right?
LAUREN: I know for me, the shifting my focus from the imaginary child that I had envisioned before I had River, to being like, “Oh, this amazing, complex person in front of me who is his own person and actually just him and celebrating him,” versus like whatever I had expected, has been probably one of the biggest aspects of parenting that has been a growing process. Wow, they really pop out themselves and you just are there to witness them and support them as much as you can and love them. And grow by being around them.
PAM: It really is, it really is. I love the way you explain that. And that leads very nicely into our next question.
I’m wondering about what your move to unschooling has looked like, whether it has been pretty smooth, you know, you talked a bit about letting go of your expectations. Have you talked to River specifically about unschooling itself, the processes or principles behind it or have you found as you have been talking about the changes being more internal to you, so most of your focus has been on how you are choosing to observe River and how you are changing your responses to him and letting go of the expectations?
LAUREN: Yeah, definitely. I don’t think I talked to River much about it other than to support him and living everyday life and he knows we homeschool. I’m sure I used the word unschooling and said: “This is the kind of homeschooling we are doing.” Because there were points in the beginning when he was like, “Wait, aren’t we supposed to be doing something? Should I do some maths?” And I asked, “Do you want to?” And I might write out some questions for him if he really wanted me to at that time. And then he would say, “Ok, I know how to do this, that’s fine.” I think he had a couple of concerns in the very beginning but now he is just totally into it.
I think our foundation of unschooling friends has been very helpful, has helped us ease into this. He has just been loving life and exploring things of interest to him and it’s just better than I could have thought. It has been pretty seamless and the majority of the changes have totally been internal for me. And they continue to be. River is naturally really awesome at doing the things he loves and having fun which is where all of our learning is.
You don’t have to work on this stuff. Where 99% of the process is me again just letting go of my own baggage and assumptions and things that help me to better connect with him and better celebrate him and our lives. And I really think having a community of other unschooling parents locally as well as online to reach out to and explore my own stuff with has been really helpful.
And, like you said, I went to the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit with you and Anne and it really shifted my perspective so dramatically. It just really helped me to see things in such a more positive way and I only realized afterwards it had such an impact on me that I felt changed and I acted in a different manner. It’s hard for me to put into words but I noticed that I have a lot of power in our home. I could change the energy of our home with my own choices and the viewpoint I’m bringing into every interaction. That was amazing to me.
I really noticed if I shifted into a more positive, loving, peaceful place where I’m celebrating what’s happening, and what River’s celebrating, and what Aaron is celebrating—everything changes. It is mind-blowing that I really impact this family so much. We all do, but I have a lot of power inside of myself.
I think that’s my work as an unschooling parent: to do that work within myself that allows me to see and celebrate River for being him and his own unique self, and then to support him in ways that are best for him on whatever path that he chooses, and just our connection.
PAM: That’s lovely. I’m glad you enjoyed it!
LAUREN: I can’t explain it. The whole idea of “Oh, I paradigm-shifted back when he was two,” and I was like, “Oh, wait a second, there was way more to do…” (both laughing)
PAM: That’s awesome!
Can you tell us a bit about how your definition of learning has changed since discovering unschooling?
LAUREN: Well, it’s been an evolving process since I was in that teacher training program back however many years ago. I have to do the math for it’s a long time ago. I had a pretty unschooly definition of learning when River and I started homeschooling but when we started I still was making lists of the subjects to keep track of what we were covering for my own records and peace of mind. So if we played Uno or a game with a map I checked off “math” or “geography” thinking “Ok, we covered that today.” (laughs)
After a couple of months, I just dropped that stuff because when you are doing it you just start to see, “Oh my god, he is learning so much and so much more than I could ever write down.” And what really amazed me was our conversations and the depth with which we would explore questions and topics and just how much we were both learning together. I feel like I see learning in such a limitless manner now and that there are no have tos and no shoulds. It’s just choices and options. And there is no not-learning. You are always learning, it doesn’t matter: if we follow joy and try to live in a manner where we are most content, that’s going to be really fun learning. No matter what you are learning.
Something I love is that it’s so not just about River learning. It’s us learning as a family. River has really been into BMX biking for the past few months and that stemmed in part because my boyfriend Aaron was really into it. He was rekindling this passion from his childhood, which I think has a lot to do with our unschooling and I really think he was excited thinking about stuff and looking into his own passions because of it. And then we have an unschooling family friend. Our whole family were good friends with them, they are wonderful. They are huge into BMX biking too. So these relationships inspired a passion in River for it and now BMX biking is a way that he connects with my boyfriend Aaron and this other unschooling family and we all go to skate parks together and we watch BMX videos on YouTube to learn new tricks and he and I go on lots of bike rides and it leads to all sorts of conversations and all sorts of different things depending where we go. It’s just amazing. Learning just keeps happening based on whatever we like.
Another thing he and I are really into the musical “Hamilton” which we learned all about this summer from some people who loved it. So we bought the CDs and we started listening to it and falling in love with the music. River loves rap and he loves music. That really led him into wanting to explore past wars because there are these battle songs that are really awesome and that led us to go to a civil war re-enactment as a family. We are all learning about these different topics in our own ways and I just love being able to witness how our paths evolve from a single interest or question that one of us is exploring and then how they connect. So that whole limitless nature of learning. It just feels like it’s all about choices and following our joy.
PAM: That’s it. Those are beautiful stories.
LAUREN: I love that. It’s so fun! What I know now is that until we did it, I couldn’t know how beautiful it would be or how full and rich it could be. I just couldn’t know. Especially with a teaching background you might come into something thinking “Ok, we are going to learn this set list of things!” but with unschooling and with this idea of limitless learning, there are no boundaries. There is so much more to learn. I love that.
PAM: I love how each of your answers is leading into the next question! But before we get there, I love your phrase “limitless learning,” because that was the huge piece for me. When we started it was all about the learning. It was, “Ok, if they are not going to school I’m going to replace the learning somehow,” But that first year of just watching them and seeing it in action … I tried to journal, tried to write things down, and I would go for maybe a week and then there was just too much to write. It expanded into life. You just see the learning in every minute. Ok, let me read the next question. So that people know what we are talking about (laughs).
Did you find a difference between understanding the principles of unschooling intellectually and then living them day to day?
LAUREN: When I read this question I was like, “Yes, Yes, Yes …” I wrote “Yes” five times because this was a big surprise to me. I think I said this already but since I learned about it when he was two, I did my paradigm-shifting. I got this. We are just going to become unschoolers; this is awesome.
But then I realized I still have lots to unload through the process of doing it. I think for me, the biggest piece that I didn’t realize would be such a huge piece, even though I read all about it, was trust. And that trust is really essential to unschooling is, in a lot of ways, born out of the act of unschooling.
So kind of like the chicken and the egg: you can’t have the trust until you trust, but you develop the trust through trusting. I just feel like trusting him in his own path; I had to live that, in order to build that. I didn’t do it before we unschooled. The amount of trust that is needed and that comes out of unschooling has just blown me away and how that connects us and how he trusts me to support him in his learning about anything and everything.
If he comes to me with a question, an interest, or something that he just happens to say, he trusts that I’m going to listen and respect him and support him in learning more about it and finding the resources that he needs, and I trust that he will learn everything he needs to learn by following his passions and joy. I didn’t know how deeply we could trust each other and I didn’t know how connected we could become before we were unschooling. I read about it forever. That’s the way I learn. I love reading everything about a topic and then maybe I will act on it or maybe not. This was mind-blowing, the difference between actually living it versus just reading it. It was amazing.
PAM: I found the same thing. I mean the relationships just blew me away. I had no idea about the depths of trust and connection that you could have with another person. I don’t think I had that kind of connection with anyone.
Maybe that’s why when I ask in the Ten Questions episodes, “What is the best thing that you found when looking back on unschooling? What has been the most surprising or your favourite outcome of it?” Relationships has pretty much always been the answer because it’s just something you can’t get, you don’t understand when you get started until you develop it, right?
LAUREN: And I was shocked by that. Because we are so close. I’m closer to him than anyone. I just can’t believe how much closer—worlds closer—that we became through the process of unschooling. You just can’t know until you do it. It’s mind-blowing, really.
PAM: It’s true!
I was wondering if you could talk a bit about what changes you have seen in River since he left school?
LAUREN: Yes. He just loves his life. He loves homeschooling and unschooling and he will say to me regularly, “Mom, I love my life.” I’ve just seen him become happier and more confident and more flexible and more understanding, just a lot of changes. He will proudly tell anyone that he is homeschooled. Recently we went to a party and another kid asked: “So, did you go on any vacations this summer?” And he responded with, “Well, pretty much every day is a vacation for me.” He really feels like, “My life is so fun.”
One of the most interesting shifts that I have seen is that he has grown so much socially since we started homeschooling. I love it, I think that’s funny that so many people question about socialization. He gets along so much better with other kids now, which has not always been the easiest thing for him. I just feel like he has become more empathetic and understanding and I think that has a lot to do with all the unstructured play he gets to have with other homeschooled friends as well as friends in our apartment complex. He has so much time to just be with kids in an unstructured manner where no one is saying: “time to do this,” or “you guys need to interact in this way,” or even just someone micromanaging their conversations. He is playing in these unstructured settings, with me there to support as needed of course, but I’ve seen so much growth in those ways.
Another big thing I wanted to mention was the reading. He started reading half way through the year while simultaneously avoiding all books because of his negative school experience. When we first started unschooling, if we weren’t out connecting with friends and we were home, he mostly spent his time playing video games or watching YouTube. He just loved it. He really started learning how to read by doing stuff online that he really liked. He started reading probably six months into our unschooling journey and he would read signs in a drive-through, or read comments on YouTube, or read directions to a video game. He would type in words if he was looking for information, read the words on a YouTube lyric video song he liked. He really is into music. He would even have me pause it so he could read the whole thing and I remember him reading something with the word “champagne” in it and I was like, “Holy crap, he just read “champagne”.” (laughs)
And I feel like this experience of him reading on his own without any support of me besides, you know, I’m with him and I’m reading things when he asks me to, or typing in something for him on games, but without having someone sitting down with him and teaching him how to do it. I think this was super empowering for him after his school experience. And after that he started to go back to the library with me and he would read books to his friends at the library or at his cousin’s house and it’s just like he reclaimed it for himself and to me that’s so healing and so wonderful because that was my biggest concern that this bad experience would sit with him for life. I feel like that has been a major change over the past year. I don’t care that he can read or not. He is nine and he can take forever, I don’t care. But what I care about is that he owns it. And I really think he knows that: “Wow I did this on my own.” And I love that.
PAM: I think that’s a great point: owning the experience. Giving it back to them, to whatever timetable they end up having. But for it to be back in their court so that they have choices and control over it. That’s awesome!
What has been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
LAUREN: This question I thought was so hard because I feel like we haven’t had a lot of hardships with unschooling. Sometimes life can feel hard, but that’s not because of unschooling. We went from a lifestyle where River was in school for six hours and I was working out of the home for nine hours and then we come back home together at the end of the day and it was like we only had the worst of ourselves to give to each other. We were both grumpy and exhausted.
So going from that to a lifestyle where he is home so much more and I am home so much more and we are together so much more and there is no pressure to do stuff he doesn’t want to do and I’m working at a job that I love and we are both really fulfilled and happy. I feel like it’s only made everything better and easier and more wonderful. I think sometimes parenting can feel really hard, and living as a member of a family can feel hard, but unschooling actually makes all of it easier and better. So I didn’t have a good answer.
PAM: No, that’s a great answer! It’s great to hear your perspective.
LAUREN: It hasn’t been hard. It’s been awesome!
PAM: It’s been awesome! (both laugh)
We might have touched on this, but was has surprised you most about your journey so far?
LAUREN: For me especially, I come from that teaching background, and the biggest surprise for me about unschooling has been that unschooling is not really about learning. It’s not about education, and I mean that in a respectful way. I don’t mean to belittle the learning that River is doing and that I’m doing with our lives—we are learning so much more than I ever imagined we would learn—but it feels totally secondary: like a benefit that occurs along the way. To me unschooling is about living and about joy and about our relationships like you said before and that has been the biggest surprise for me.
When I was coming into it, I thought, “Oh this is how we are going to learn the things he needs to learn, just like he would have at school.” But instead, it’s “No, this is just our life and this is how we enjoy living.”
I was in a Facebook conversation with Anne Ohman and she wrote in a comment: “The Learning is a by-product of the Living.” And I was like “Yes, that’s exactly it!”
Just by living these wonderful, exciting lives—and you know we have our own issues and struggles at times, but living through all of life—we are learning so much. But that’s just a piece of it. It’s so beautiful and it’s so wonderful and it’s so rich and it’s so much about just us celebrating being together and our lives together and what we love. It’s about so much more than learning. That was a surprise to me.
PAM: Yeah, first we think of learning as the lowest common denominator. That’s why we go to school. For the learning, it’s for the learning. Yet once we start living it and seeing it in the wild, maybe you see there is actually more. There are roots to learning. There is a foundation of living and relationships and connecting and trust and everything that lies in the foundation beneath the learning. So instead of focusing on the learning, when we focus on creating that strong foundation, the learning is the by-product that just kind of bubbles up out of it.
LAUREN: It is so beautiful and I would never diminish the importance of that learning but it’s, like you said, the relationships. I’m just in awe of how close we are. It’s something I take for granted now, almost, how close we are. But it’s the by-product of unschooling and living this life. It’s so awesome! It’s so much more awesomer than I thought, and I already thought it would be awesome. (both laugh)
PAM: It’s awesomER!
LAUREN: It’s awesomer than I thought it would be, which is so great!
PAM: Oh, that’s awesome. I want to thank you so much for taking the time to speak with me, Lauren. That was so much fun!
LAUREN: I know! Thank you so much, Pam. Like I said I’m a throw-myself-in type of person and unschooling has been one of my big, huge passions, so it’s so fun to talk about it and to think about it and to explore it, because I won’t do that with River because it’s not really his big passion, so it’s so nice to talk to other people who are into it.
PAM: I know, that’s exactly it. You mentioned that earlier too. I didn’t use the word unschooling with my kids for a few years. I think when we went to the first conference it had unschooling in the name. Yeah, we are just not going to school, we are homeschooling, that’s that. They figured it out. They figure out life and living and just pursue it and we are the ones who do all the work, seeing how learning can really happen in everyday living.
Before we go, where is the best place for people to connect with you online?
LAUREN: Probably on Facebook, my name is Lauren Seaver. I love Facebook and I’m always putting fun stuff up there what we are doing.
PAM: Yeah, and they can send you a quick message saying they heard you on the podcast if they’d like to connect, right?
LAUREN: Yeah, absolutely.
PAM: Thank you so much again, and have a great day!
LAUREN: Oh, thank you so much, Pam. You have a wonderful day!
EU381: Foundations: Priorities
Feb 13, 2025
For this week’s episode, we’re sharing the first Foundations episode of the Living Joyfully Podcast with Pam and Anna, Priorities.
We are handed a set of priorities by society and our culture, but when we really consider ourselves and our personal values, we can see how individual our priorities can be! When we choose priorities that feel good to us, it becomes easier to make day-to-day choices that align with what is important to us.
We talk about how our relationships fit into our priorities (and—spoiler alert—they’re at the top of our lists!) and how prioritizing connection has become a focus for both of us as we tuned out the external noise and tuned into how we want to show up in the world.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE QUESTIONS
How can you quiet the outside noise so you can hear your own thoughts? Your inner voice?
What priorities make sense to you? Why?
Where do your relationships fall in your list of priorities?
Are your day to day actions lining up with your priorities? What changes, if any, would you make?
Do any of your priorities depend on other people’s actions and choices? If so, is there a way you could tweak them so that they focus on what you can control?
TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello and welcome to the Living Joyfully Podcast. We are so excited you found us and look forward to exploring our relationships, who we are in them, out of them, and what that means for how we move through the world. So, on today’s episode, we’re going to talk about priorities. And I love this as a starting place for the podcast, because it’s such an interesting topic to examine.
Priorities are so individual, and yet, so often, we’re handed a set of priorities from society. We’re handed definitions of success and where and how we should be spending our time.
And there are these heavy guardrails of judgment that we have to move through if we choose to deviate from these expected paths.
So, it can be really interesting, I’ve found, to dig into those outside voices, that judgment. What’s behind it? What purpose does it serve? And is it helping me get in touch with who I am and who I want to be in the world?
I think about the studies that they do when people are on their deathbed and they’re asked, is there anything that you would change? And consistently, they answer that they wished they had prioritized their relationships over achievements or the next promotion.
For me personally, I came to that realization for myself after our first child had a life-threatening after birth experience. Almost losing her really woke me up to the path I was on and to look at how I wanted to spend my time. And the answer for me was doing things I love with the people that I love. And that’s how I want to spend this time that I’m given. And understanding that has just been a huge guide for me ever since.
So, I’m curious, Pam, what’s it been like for you?
PAM: Well, it was having children that sparked my journey, as well. I found that those first few years were just filled with questions like who I wanted to be as a person and parent. And, having internalized so many of society’s goals and stories growing up, it took me a while, quite a while, to realize just how much choice I actually had.
I didn’t need to just dutifully take on the path and the priorities that were handed to me. I could figure out what I value and make those things a priority in my. And then, as I continued to ask more questions, I came to realize what would always be in my life, and it was my relationships. Jobs, hobbies, areas of interest, while definitely being integral parts of who I am, those would come and go over the years. They had been coming and going over the years. But my relationships with my family would always be in my life. They were and are a fundamental part of just my being in the world.
And so, since that aha moment, I have chosen to prioritize my relationships. And rather surprisingly, because you think I’m focusing on something, so I’m closing things down to this one thing, but I found that my life has been so much richer for it.
ANNA: Oh, my gosh. So much richer. I feel like when we have that foundation of strong, connected relationships, it’s just this really wonderful place from which we can explore the world and learn about ourselves. Because I think that might have been the most surprising piece for me, that as I focused on being in relationship with others, I learned so much about myself. It’s not always easy, but I’m grateful for it.
And so, as I’m thinking about this, we both got to this place where we didn’t want to be taking these priorities that were being handed to us. The next bit for me was realizing that others don’t want me to define their priorities either.
So, when we think about our partners or kids, it was really helpful to think, am I judging how they spend their time, the choices that they’re making? Because that judgment comes between us. We don’t learn why they’re making the choices they’re making. We miss the opportunity to really connect with them and who they are. It’s got this cloud of expectation and you’ll have some people that will buck against that expectation in really dramatic fashion. And then you’ll have others that really try to meet it, even if it’s not in alignment for them. But, either way, the connection is harmed and can be lost together.
So, I try not to be the outside voice that someone needs to shut out, but instead be someone who celebrates and just unconditionally supports the people in my life.
PAM: Absolutely. That was definitely yet another layer to peel back for me, realizing how valuable it was for me to contemplate and choose my priorities, but that didn’t mean my priorities were the best priorities for anyone else. It makes so much sense to me why my priorities are these and in this order, but no, everyone is a different person. And I remember the huge shift in my relationship with my spouse when I stopped trying to convince him that my priorities should be his priorities as well, which had looked like me trying to tell him what to do and when. And I was definitely nice about it. I wasn’t trying to bully him or anything, but as I thought about it, I was trying to convince him that I was right and vice versa. That’s where our conversations went. They were often about convincing each other that our priorities and choices were more right than the other person’s. There was definitely a winner and a loser.
But once I began to share my priorities without trying to convince him to adopt them, oh, my gosh. There was space for him to start sharing his without me judging them. Each of us was more able to be ourselves. We could just share and see how things landed. And then, that in turn helped us learn more about each other as we’d chat about the things that are important to us and why. And recognizing that his priorities are as important to him as mine are to me.
ANNA: It’s so true. I don’t know. We get stuck in our head, right? We get stuck in our head thinking everybody’s seeing things the same way. And so, yeah, I just love that next layer.
And I think then, I want to talk about, too, as we hone in on these priorities, it’s such a helpful lens to look at the day to day moments. So, in each moment, we have this opportunity to make choices. And understanding my priorities and then keeping them front of mind as I made choices throughout the day was critical to me, actually honoring them as priorities, versus just giving lip service to, “My relationships are important,” or whatever the thing might be.
So, what that would look like for me, it might be stopping what I’m doing to hear my child excitedly tell me about their game. It’s taking a walk after dinner with David to reconnect, because we’ve had some time apart that day. Because, truthfully, I could curl up with a book and get some work done at the computer, but I do want to tend to that relationship, that priority first. And what I found is that that connection serves us both as we move through the evening and through the subsequent days.
And another really big one for me, this was so huge, was learning to say no to outside requests that took me away from the people that I loved. And here’s the thing. Sometimes there are easy yeses and they feed me and they feel great and they feel great to those around me. But other times, what I noticed is that I was saying yes without really thinking about how it would impact me, my energy, what I would have left to give my family, the time it might take away from spending time with the important people in my life, all of those things.
I’m just seeing the person in front of me with the ask and saying, “Okay, I’ll help,” without really checking in. And using that lens really helped me realize that the time with them was what I wanted to prioritize, and so, I really needed to align my actions with that. So, that becomes the work, aligning our actions with what matters most to us.
PAM: Exactly. Yet another huge layer is, okay, I’ve got these priorities. It’s not sticking them on a post-it note and sticking them somewhere where I’ll see them. It’s, how do these weave into my days, my actual days? What do they look like in action?
And I wanted to mention, it is not about trying to guilt ourselves into making choices that align with our priorities. If we find ourselves doing that regularly, I think that might be a great clue just to revisit our priorities. Apparently, the things that I want to do in my day don’t align with what I thought my priorities were.
ANNA: That’s so interesting.
PAM: So, just revisit them. What you really choose to do in the moment, you want to do in the moment, those outer voices, right? Am I doing it, because I think I should? Or is this something that feels good, that I want to choose, that I choose to do, that I want to do? And you want the things that you choose to do to align with your priorities, as well. They weave together so much.
That said, though, it doesn’t mean that the choices are always easy. Like you were talking about, they aren’t often between a good thing and a bad thing, making the choice easy like, “Oh yeah, between this and this? No, no. This is definitely it.” Often, it’s between two or three lovely things, but that’s where knowing our priorities can be so helpful.
So, using your example, which I love, maybe after dinner I could take a walk with Rocco to reconnect, or I could clean up the kitchen a bit, maybe because it feels nice to me to walk into a tidy kitchen, or I could relax and read a bit. When I think about those choices, the first thing I might realize is that, those aren’t actually either/or things, right? I could do them all over the course of the evening. And taking a moment to consider my priorities helps me put them in an order that aligns with them.
So, maybe I have also learned that once I sit down to relax and read or watch a show, I often feel too tired for a walk after. So, there are a couple of solid reasons to tend to the relationship first for me. So, maybe our walk turns into us tidying the kitchen together as we finish up our conversation. And then we can each go to our own thing feeling refreshed and connected.
There are so many ways that things can unfold. And keeping our priorities in mind helps us choose the path that feels more fulfilling to us.
ANNA: Oh, my gosh, yes. And I think that’s such a great point about, if you’re feeling a rub during your day about, I want to do this, but it’s not aligning with these priorities I’ve set out, if you’re seeing that as a to-do list or a checklist and it’s not feeling good, woo, stop! Just stop right there. And revisit and go, “Wait a minute, are my priorities really lining up with who I want to be right now in this moment?”
And the thing is, they can change. Our priorities can change and they will as we go through different seasons of our lives, as we, grow and change and learn more things about ourselves. So, just looking for those little rub spots, I think, is important.
PAM: Speaking of those rubs, sometimes there are emergencies. There are urgent things in life that come up and I may absolutely choose to do those things. And I may choose to step far out of my comfort zone and do some things, but it’s the act of recognizing, oh yeah, this needs my attention immediately, very, very soon. I am going to do that. Priorities, again, it’s not a rule.
ANNA: No. Or a checklist.
PAM: Choice is right there. But priorities, there’s something that can help us make choices that, again, they feel fulfilling. They feel right. They feel good to us. They help us when we come to a point where there are various possibilities for the next moment.
So, I just think they are so valuable for us to recognize, because sometimes, too, our priorities may look quite mundane. Like relationships. “I see these people every day! Of course I’m in relationship with them. They live down the hall, they sleep down the hall.” So, it can feel like, why is it even worth making that a priority? But that’s the fun part. That’s why it’s so valuable to think about it, to think about the kind of person that I want to be, the kind of parent I want to be, the kind of partner I want to be. And when we’re thinking about it, we’ve got it top of mind as we go through our day. As things come up, as things unfold in front of us, we can make the choices that feel better for us, so that at the end of the day, it often feels just more fulfilling really.
ANNA: Right. And grounded, for me, because again, I think it’s interesting. I think they inform each other. The choice informs the priority. The priorities inform the choice. And so, just that awareness, like you said, top of mind, bringing that awareness, that can really help us. It’s a grounded feeling of like, I’m living the life that I want to live. I am being the person that I want to be and those are the things that I like to check in with myself about periodically. So, yeah, I love that.
Okay, so, we are going to leave you with some questions to ponder this week.
The first one is, how can you quiet the outside noise so you can hear your own thoughts, your inner voice? And so, this will be a big one, just thinking about, where are those voices coming from? What does it sound like for you? What does your voice sound like in contrast? So, just give a little time to sit with that and how you can shut those noises out.
The next one is, what priorities make sense to you and why? Because, like we said, it’s going to be different. There’s going to be seasons. There’s going to be things that shift around based on where you are in your life and what’s happening.
But, “Do they make sense to you?” is going give you a big clue as to, “Are they coming from outside voices versus, is it something that’s really bubbling up from inside of you? Where do your relationships fall in your list of priorities? And I think it’s just, again, it’s the mundane in some ways, like Pam was saying. And so, maybe sometimes relationships fall off as we’re thinking, “Oh, we’ve got this career thing we want to do,” or whatever, which are all wonderful things. There’s no good or bad here about what you’re pursuing or doing, but it’s just that check in. Where are they falling and is that where I want them? So, I think that’s just important to look at.
Next one is, are your day-to-day actions lining up with your priorities? What changes, if any, would you make? And that’s what we’re talking about, is you’re looking at the different choices you’re making throughout the day. Does it line up with your priorities? And again, keep in mind that it could be that the priorities need to change, or maybe you want to check in about your priorities as you’re making your choices. So, those, again, work together.
Do any of your priorities depend on other people’s actions and choices? And, if so, is there a way you could tweak them so that they focus on what you can control? And this goes back to what we were saying about nobody else wanting us to put our priorities on them. It’s that same kind of thing, because it’s like, if we are expecting someone else to move along with our priorities, it’s pretty much a recipe for upset or disconnection, because they’re going to have their own path there. So, really tuning into, are my priorities in alignment with me and things that I can control?
And, for me, what that looks like a lot of times is, am I being the person I want to be? So, my priority may be about a relationship that does involve somebody else, but what I control is how I show up for the relationship.
PAM: Exactly. Yeah. We don’t have control of how other people show up, but we can also be a wonderful model, as in, this is how we choose.
ANNA: Absolutely. So, check out the show notes for things we’ve mentioned in the episode, the episode transcript, and today’s questions. We’d love to hear what you discover. You can share your thoughts on a comment on the website or our episode post on Instagram @LivingJoyfullyPodcast. You’ll find that link in the show notes as well. Thank you so much for being here with us, and we’ll see you next time.
EU380: Revitalizing Our Nest
Jan 30, 2025
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about revitalizing our nests. Our homes are such an important part of our unschooling lives. We can get open and curious and creatively find ways to make the spaces in our home fit the individual people in our family. After all, people are different! We share examples from our own lives as well as offer food for thought as you reimagine your own home with your unique family in mind.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello to you both.
And today we’re going to be talking about revitalizing our nest, which was a very fun topic of conversation on the Network a while back. I’m really excited to dive into that. Pam, would you like to get us started with our conversation?
PAM: Yes, yes, yes, I would. I love the lens of revitalizing our nest and maybe even more for those of us who are right now in the depth of winter.
We are at -19 Celsius right now. So, we may be cocooning a bit more inside our nest during this season. As I was thinking about it, one of the biggest shifts for me around this idea was actually realizing that the focus of this nesting wasn’t to make our home into my version of perfect, but that what I actually wanted to do was make our nest inviting and enjoyable for each person in our family.
And all together now, everyone, people are different. So what makes a room inviting for one person may truly be overwhelming to another. It’s not really about making every room work for everyone, but making different spaces that have maybe different atmospheres and different functions. So overall, everyone has a handful of spaces that they love to be in and do the things that they love to do.
And as I was thinking about it, one of the memories that jumped out at me was just remembering how freeing and exciting it was when I first realized that what was called the dining room didn’t need to actually have a fancy dining table and chairs.
When my kids were younger, I had that revelation and it became the computer room. It had two desks, two computers, and a comfy couch. It actually became a hub of our home rather than the ghost town space it was before. The whole world really did open up allowing us to really make our home our nest. Rather than feeling weighed down by the obligation to make it look a certain way or that I had to take those messages or that when people came to visit, I needed to be able to show these various spaces off for that. Actually, we’re the ones living in it. What do we want it to be? And once that question and that kind of permission opened up to just make it the way we wanted it to be, oh my gosh. It has been fun ever since.
ANNA: That was definitely something I wanted to talk about too, because I think, again, we have these kinds of conventional ideas of what the spaces are used for. But wow. When you can throw that out, it really helps because, we had, I don’t even know if it’s called this everywhere, but a formal living room.
When you first come into the house, it’s this kind of small room to the side. I don’t know, in the old days, I guess you would entertain people there, but we made that the playroom, we called it the front room. It was right when you walked in the house, so everybody saw it and it was often covered with toys. It was so interesting because there was a part of me that was like, Ugh. And then really overwhelmingly the response was, what a cool room, or look at how you’re using that space, or oh my gosh, you can tell they have fun in there, you know? I think it opened up for other people that we can just look at the space and really make it our own.
And I think to that end, I like that idea of destinations and so even if you have a smaller space, it can be a nook in a room or a nook in a hall that you could create and throw a beanbag down or something else, like little spots that, depending on what that person needs you have a space.
Do they need quiet? Do they need stimulation? Do they need the TV? Do they need it to be dark? Really thinking about how you use the space, how your days flow, what the different people like and enjoy doing. I think it can be so valuable because we’re all so different.
We do want this space to serve all of us. And, like you said, we can’t make every room fit every person, but thinking along the lines of, we have a blank canvas of whatever the entire house is, what can we do? We co-slept for a very long time, so it was kind of a sleeping room and then we could utilize the other bedrooms that didn’t have beds for a period of time as more, play areas and places to store stuff.
And so it was just really interesting to open all of that up and think what do we need? What do the four of us need in this space to do, because we’re here all the time. Not all the time, we’re out about, but you know what I mean. We were there every day. And like you said, the visitor that comes periodically, once every few months is not the person I need to be catering to.
ERIKA: I’ve seen the same thing happen. In our house, we have a relatively small space for the four of us. And so, over time it’s taken creativity and just thinking outside the box. How do we make this work for what we need right now? And we had the same thing, where in the beginning when we were co-sleeping.
One bedroom was perfect because then we had only one room that had all that bed space taking up the whole room. That was so great because then I had another room that we called the toy room and that was just for playing with toys and then another room that was an office. In the beginning, it had the TV and everything was in there too.
And so, if someone, a stranger were to come into our house, it’s like, what is this? But for us, it made so much sense, especially in those young days. Then I remember a few years ago, I guess it’s more than a few at this point, when we just needed more space, the kids were getting bigger. We changed our bedroom to the master bedroom. So then it’s the bigger room for sleeping, smaller room for the office. But they still weren’t ready to sleep in their own rooms yet, so I’m like, why? We don’t need to waste that space on beds if they’re not going to be used. So, we just put more beds together in the big room and still had space for the toy room and the office.
And then now at this point, when they really do want their own room, we transformed those two rooms into their own bedrooms. And we have our bedroom, which now functions as an office as well. And so, it really was all these really major shifts that took a lot of creativity and thinking and planning.
But I think one of the things to realize about this kind of thinking about our homes is you are not going to be able to find a solution that will last forever because everyone’s always growing and changing, including us as adults, what we’re interested in doing, what kind of phase we’re in, what kind of spaces we need.
And so, just thinking of it in a really open way. I think it can be really fun. I don’t have to solve every problem for the rest of our lives with my planning, but what would really help us right now, to have what we need to be comfortable, One big thing that I’ve always liked since we had kids was to not have a coffee table in front of the couch, which most houses you go into have the coffee table in front of the couch.
But for me, having the open floor where kids would just run out and crash on the floor, lay out all their toys on the floor. Having that big floor space was so valuable. And so we still have a table, but it’s to the side. We can pull it in as needed. But just little things like that.
When you’re seeing and thinking about, how does my family actually use the house? What makes it more kid friendly or functional? That’s not even to mention all of our different ways of being. Who likes things more organized, who likes to see everything out? And so just kind of taking all of our individual personalities into account and the stages that we’re in, if it’s the little kids who want all that open space to run, that’s a different phase than the kid who wants the table to be working on Legos all day.
PAM: Yes. The Lego table! That definitely had a season. I built it and put edges on it. So that the Lego wouldn’t fall. And I think what I love about using the revitalizing our nest lens is just what you were talking about, Erika. It’s not that, we’re going to revitalize and then boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Figure it out, plan it out, do it. It’s more about noticing, are there things that somebody’s getting out and needing to set up regularly? Is there a way we can make, uh, I love the destination idea, Anna. Like make a destination for them so it’s super easy for them to slide in and slide out of an activity.
And that it’s all ages. It’s the same for adults. If we have a little something that brings us joy, that’s a little touch of self care. Like let’s make a little destination or a little spot where it’s easier for us to slide into, especially when the kids are younger and we can only catch a few minutes here, a few minutes there, maybe easily interrupted, et cetera.
So that just makes it easier for us as well. That is something, I love the point that it’s not something that ends either. I still love revitalizing little spaces. My room right here has kind of been my office, I prefer to call it my studio, but now two kitties have entered our lives and now it’s also the kitten home.
Things are always migrating and changing. People are coming, people are staying, people are going. It’s such a helpful lens to just keep at the back of my mind, just to keep our space working for us. Just to notice, oh, like this is feeling a little stagnant. This space isn’t feeling inviting anymore. Nobody’s been to this little destination corner in a while. Nobody’s interested in that anymore. What else could we make it? How could we transform that to be a little bit more inviting?
So many pieces to consider, not only personalities but we can think of creating an atmosphere. Lighting and sound is something that we consider very often when we’re trying to cultivate a welcoming space for someone. I’ve got a little speaker right here. That I can just put some background noise on, or maybe a little bit of music, whatever works for the person.
Where do you want to sink into and how can we help do that? It helps us learn a little bit more about each other, how we grow and change. Ah, that’s not so interesting anymore. Let’s try this. The lighting is the same. Even smells. Oh, I don’t have it. I had a little essential oil very nearby yesterday.
I was like, oh, that is so nice. Sniff, sniff. All those pieces are part of revitalizing our nest, considering ourselves and every member of the family so that they too have spaces that feel welcoming, that feel like they were made for them, that fit them like a glove for whatever particular activity that they’re interested in doing in the moment.
That make sense?
ANNA: Yeah, for sure. And I think it’s interesting because a couple things are coming to mind, so I’ll see if I can keep track of them. That creativity right, of what’s happening, what do we need? But the little niceties, let’s get a new fluffy blanket. Let’s do things that just kind of make the space pop or fun.
And when you were talking, it reminded me of a very old thread on the network called Paints Out. Where we talked about having things accessible. And what reminded me was when you said as adults too, what’s our season and what’s happening for us? And I just remember, I played the guitar at the time, having the guitar out in a stand that I could just easily pick it up.
And then having a spot where when they were in an art phase, it was super easy to clean, easy to get out, it kind of had its own space. And then like you said, we might notice, you know what, that’s kind of languishing. We don’t have to throw the paints out, but maybe we utilize that space as something else.
Maybe we’re doing a little bit more with games or it’s a puzzle table or it ends up turning into something else. And so keeping an eye on that. I always found that kind of fun. Because I do like the organizational project and so. It was fun to think about what we are into now. And like you said, it’s such a connecting activity because we’re really looking at them.
We’re really in tune with how their day is flowing and what’s happening for them and for ourselves. What do I like to do? Oh, I like to have some kind of peaceful, neat space where I can have my Rasa in the morning or when I’m checking emails. So then, okay, what? How can I create that for myself?
And then what do they do when they get up and what does that look like? I think that’s really fun to think about because sometimes when we’re trying to keep everything neat or organized, it’s all put away and it’s kind of out of sight out of mind. So it was fun to find creative ways that met my need for some order, and for accessibility.
I think that can be a lot of fun. And, also just to take the destination piece. Outside, if you happen to have any kind of outside space, whether it’s small or large, it was fun for us to think about, oh, a sandbox or a water table. We lived in a more temperate climate, so we could be outside a lot of the year.
And so, having those little destinations again made it easy to move towards something. I found with younger kids being outside helped us if things were getting a little dicey inside. And having those destinations to move us towards something, was so helpful. And so I like that idea of we have things to move towards, whether it’s inside the house or out of the house.
That helps us transition. If we’re having a little funky stuff and people are getting grumpy and maybe we need a snack, let’s all go do this. And we have that space that’s kind of carved out for us to have snacks or eat popsicles or whatever. I think it can be a really fun activity, a connecting activity to figure out how we wanna use the space that we have.
ERIKA: Yeah, I had actually written down “paints out” too. That’s funny that we both thought of it. So, this conversation on the network about paints out was so great because it started with the idea of this little toddler having her easel, paper and paints just ready all the time and the mom was noticing how much more painting was happening and then the question became, what are we doing as adults to have our activities ready to go?
I really do love that and it’s something else to think about for each member of the family. What are the things that you have to just keep taking out again and again and is there a way to make it more accessible? Are there things that you know that your kids are loving to do but they don’t think of it because everything’s always put away. Being creative and brainstorming about how to have those things be more accessible.
And then I was thinking, as far as the organization goes, with our small space, I always wanted to have things have a place to go so it felt like we could clean it up and it will be organized and we’ll know where to find everything.
And so we used a lot of these medium-sized plastic bins that are clear, that have locking lids on them and we put labels on them. And so it made cleaning up toys really easy. But it also meant that when the kids are looking at their shelves, they see their things. And that helps them with the inspiration of, what do I want to play with today?
It was easy for them too. They’re not huge bins, so they could just take things in and out. We used those for almost everything. And then some of the bigger toys were in fabric bins. And so, just thinking about what are the things that you would like for your kids to have easy access to, putting kid dishes on a low open shelf.
The things where they keep asking to get to them. If you have the kid dishes up in a cabinet, then every time they want water, they’re having to ask for help. That would be one little clue. Maybe I can make this easier on everyone by having it more accessible at a place that they could reach. Putting their snacks at a low level, things like that.
Noticing if there are things I keep reaching for when I’m doing something. If I’m doing my crafting at the living room coffee table, and every time I need scissors, I have to go over to my office to grab the scissors and bring them back out. Okay, maybe I need scissors to be in this station. So it’s just little things like that, noticing what are those things that I have to keep going to get or that the kids keep asking me to get this thing.
Those might be the little places to try to get creative. I was thinking also in our living room, since I do like that open floor, we’ve really liked having a folding table that we can take out for things like games and puzzles and Lego and stuff, that we could put it away when we’re done and still have that space. But have table space when we need it. So just little hacks like that.
PAM: Yes. I love looking for clues as in, what do I keep getting asked for? If you’re someone who loves organization and efficiency, you can use that lens as part of figuring out how it might be helpful to revitalize your nest because when our kids have that ability to reach things and get things and do the things, that gives them a sense of agency and control over their days that they’re not always being stopped and having to go ask for this and that. I think that is just a super helpful lens when you’re looking at things.
And then the scissors thing, that is something I’ve been hearing lately and kind of considering, maybe I want two or three of certain things to be in those spots where I need them. Because I am easily distracted and if I have to go to another room to get scissors, chances are it’ll be 30 minutes before I get back to where I started and I will not have the scissors.
And I’ll go, that’s why I got up! That was it. Scissors. I’m back on track now. So, yes, I find that just so fun, to use those lenses to look at our days and to see how we can set up our days to flow, because that is just more fun. And when we can stay in our flow of what we’re doing. That’s super fun too.
ANNA: It’s funny with things like scissors though, because they’re not that expensive and yet we’re thinking, oh, do we really need more. Yes, get scissors or things that you notice you’re using a lot. Get the extra pens, get the extra set of whatever if you can, because a lot of times we’re just not thinking how disruptive it is to go get things.
And especially if you have somebody that gets distracted. Who knows what’s going to happen by the time they get back. I love the snack example too. I remember during another thread on the network, we had some really cool pictures of people’s spaces and how they did snacks and specific snack areas and how it solved problems like, opening the refrigerator and felt like it was open too long and not knowing what things were for dinner or whatever, but having specific areas and specific bins and just made it so accessible and easy.
And just think of the areas that rub, I feel like in the last few pod podcasts we talked about, looking at where does it rub? And then okay, what’s happening there? Where’s the rub coming from and is there a solution that might make that easier? Even if it’s outside the box, even if it’s adding an extra little fridge somewhere or something that you might not think of normally.
So I really love that. And another thing I wanted to bring to mind is the idea of preferences, because we all have preferences, right? We talked about how we’re all different, and these preferences, maybe for clean spaces or a clean countertop, or maybe it’s to have everything out. I think sometimes so much of what we talk about with people are different is just don’t take someone else’s personality personally.
Because that’s where we go awry. And when we can recognize that those preferences are often rooted in what actually soothes us, what works for our brain, what makes sense for us to stay regulated, then we’re not judging that they want it differently than we do.
We’re actually able to have a conversation about, okay, you like to see everything out. I need a clean table that calms my brain when I see that surface. What can we do? Then we get creative to meet everybody’s needs. And again, every particular space in a house may not meet everybody’s needs.
But for me, if I had a spot that I could keep organized, if I was starting to feel dysregulated, I could move to that space and have all my calming tools there. And they had their space to play and do, even if it was right next to me, it was still okay. So, it’s not even about a massive amount of space, it’s more just about recognizing that each of those preferences and desires are valid and that it’s important to understand because it’s part of how we understand our brain. How we want to move through the world and what works for us.
And I think if we have spaces that end up creating dysregulation, we may not even realize that that’s what the problem is. We just think, we’re having behavior problems, or we’re just not getting along. Or there’s so much fighting. But maybe there’s actually some root causes and we can figure out about what helps us feel good in the space.
I just wanted to bring that piece. And whether we’re dealing with neurodiversity or neurotypical, I think we all have preferences and we all have different brains that need different things.
ERIKA: Yeah, and like you both were saying earlier, it’s just such a good opportunity to learn more about ourselves and to learn more about our family members. And I feel like once you bring them in on these kinds of conversations about how different things feel to them, you just can learn so much about the differences of each person.
I remember commenting or noticing with the kids, it feels like when the living room’s just this open canvas that you get a burst of inspiration and come up with all kinds of ideas of things to play. And so when I would notice that everything’s getting a little messy and crowded and kids seem to not really know what to do, I could suggest, should we just clean everything up?
And then maybe you’ll have that feeling of a new idea of what I could bring into this space. But then, realizing that for me, it might feel better to have everything behind a cabinet door, but if the kids aren’t seeing their things and then not getting inspired to play with their toys, they’re missing out on so much fun and all of their interests by me trying to tuck everything away.
And so that’s why it was important to keep that balance between, we can put it away, but I want you to still be able to see what you have. It also reminded me of when they were little, I heard the advice about putting some things in storage and giving them one type of thing at a time..
But then I realized that my kids love combining all the things. I would’ve missed out on so much creativity if I was giving them a limited set of things to pull from. And so for me, it was worth it to have more to clean up for them to be able to combine the cars with the animals, with the characters. Maya loved packing up all the toys in bags, mixing them all together.
Each bag will have one of everything, which is just so hard to put everything back away, but so fun for her in that moment and so, realizing even now she says, the more things in my field of view the better. I just love having an abundance of stuff. And so even adults, some adults are maximalist and some adults are minimalists. And learning those differences has been really fun.
PAM: Yeah. And everything in between. But that brought back some memories. Erika, I love that, that clean canvas piece. I do remember sometimes when they had a big play area and we had the cupboard under the stairs that we had put shelves in and sorted in smaller bins, the different kinds of toys and things.
That was one of the things that they loved. They loved mixing all the things and all the excitement when I said, Hey, you know, after you guys go to bed tonight, do you want me to just clean up and reorganize downstairs and it’ll be nice and fresh in the morning? And they’d say, sure. Oh my gosh. They were just so excited in the morning to come down.
And that was a big piece. Reorganizing the things into their bins because now they knew where to find that car or that character. But things were now sorted and easier to find rather than trying to look through the whole room and seeing where the last time they had put it into a scene or something.
That was also a very fun gift for them and helping them clean and organize their rooms and just seeing how they want to put all this stuff together, or maybe they want their collection of this out so they can see all of the pieces. It’s creativity, learning about each other. There is really no downside to using this lens of creating a nest. Cultivating a nest that works for the people in the family, right?
ANNA: I love it.
ERIKA: Yeah, so this has been a lot of fun. I just love this topic and we hope you enjoyed our conversation as well and maybe had an aha moment or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey.
And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It is such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. You can learn more at living joyfully.ca/network and we all hope to meet you there.
So thanks for listening and we will see you next time. Bye!
EU379: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: Personal Hygiene
Jan 16, 2025
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and we’re talking about personal hygiene.
Questions and concerns about hygiene come up regularly in parenting circles and, in unschooling communities, this topic can sometimes trigger fear. We wanted to dive into personal hygiene to address some of the most common areas that parents mention and talk about how we can move through challenges or fears while still staying connected to our kids.
This was a really fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello! I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both.
Today we are diving into another unschooling stumbling block, personal hygiene, and I think this will be a fun one to discuss. But before we dive in, we want to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. There is so much value in doing this deep, personal work that the unschooling journey asks of us in community, because while everyone’s journey is absolutely unique, we all face similar obstacles and challenges.
For example, like navigating personal hygiene with our kids, and that is where the power of community shines. So to learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes. And now, Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would. So, this is one of those topics that comes up all the time. And I’m guessing it happens because it is kind of layered, right? And we have all of these outside voices at play, and I think we can also come into it, into parenting, into these beliefs with some preconceived notions about what is appropriate personal hygiene, what it is supposed to look like.
But not surprisingly, I am going to say that people are different. And what’s really cool about that related to this topic that we’re talking about, personal hygiene, is that you can find validation for just about any choice that you make out there, because we have the bathe everyday people. We have the bathe once a week people, we have people who wash their hair every time and others who don’t, and some that don’t ever use shampoo on their hair.
And then thinking about how it plays out differently in different cultures and around the world, I think that allows us to shut out the outside noise and tune into the person in front of us to actually find something that works and feels good to them and to us. Because I feel, just from all the many years of talking with unschooling families and just families in general that are not unschooling – I think most children go through an aversion to bathing season.
For some it can be really intense and there can be some serious sensory pieces involved that just makes bathing dysregulating and really feel scary and hard. And for others it just isn’t a priority because they’re having too much fun doing something else. And then I know lots who love their nightly bath and it’s not a big deal. And teeth brushing is not a problem. And it just works smoothly for them. So I think the big takeaway, and you know, we’re gonna dive into this, but I think it’s just knowing that there’s no one way to approach hygiene.
And so it really can leave space for us to find something that works for all of us. And I’ll talk a little bit more about my piece of that too, because I think that’s the key. It has to work for all of us, it has to feel comfortable for everybody in the family. And so when we can get creative and let go of that outside noise, that’s where it doesn’t have the weight.
ERIKA: Yeah, it is a big topic and it does come up so much, and I think it’s because there’s just so much fear in this topic. For adults and parents, because as parents we’re thinking, this is our responsibility. This is very important. This is, their lives are at stake. It could feel like this very high stakes area, along with maybe food.
These are the things that we think, this is very important. Right? Very important. But I think as we are feeling those feelings and thinking in that way, we have to start trying to see like how, I know you mentioned this all the time, Anna, about where the messages are coming from because I think it may be that we have our own personal fears about things that are hygiene related, but I bet a lot of it is coming from, What are people going to think about how my child’s hair is looking today? Or what are people going to think if I walk outside and they’re like this? Maybe it’s the judgment of our relatives. Maybe it’s just the judgment of strangers on the street. The fear of judgment of others can be really huge in this area.
And so then, like we were talking about in the last episode, that tunnel vision sets in, we’re not able to be open and curious about it. We’re tunneled in on, but it’s supposed to look this way. I really need to make sure my kid does it in this way because this is what everyone says is the safe, correct way to handle hygiene.
And so I think if we can, bring some playful energy to our day, if we can do that with hygiene, it just will help so much with letting us notice all the different possibilities. And then we can also be open to hearing what our children are saying about what’s not working for them, about these different things, about the teeth brushing, about the hair brushing, all the different things that are involved in taking care of their physical body. They know how it’s feeling for them. But if we get stuck on, I have to make you do it in this way, then we’re not hearing what the actual needs that they have are about. What sensory part is not feeling good, what timing of it is not feeling good.
Just thinking about brushing your teeth, there are so many different tools that are out there for brushing your teeth. It’s not just a toothbrush and toothpaste. There’s all different things. Once you can start getting creative about what doesn’t feel good about it: Is it the taste? Is it the texture? Is it taking too long?
There’s one saying it can brush your whole mouth in 10 seconds or something like that. It’s a whole mouth toothbrush. I have never tried that. But anyway, there are lots of possibilities if we can step out of the fear tunnel vision and into what are some other options here?
PAM: And I think you mentioned it’s just one of the biggest things when we first start thinking about it, or it was for me is recognizing, realizing that so many of the expectations that I had, that I was putting on my kids around this stuff were actually the result of expectations I was putting on myself to not feel judged by others.
If we just think, oh, it’s an at home day today, we don’t have to dress in these particular clothes. We can wear our pajamas. Just imagine what’s the difference between an at home and an outside day? That might be a great place just to start playing with it and playing with what expectations am I putting on myself that I need to do as a parent so that I’m not judged by other people.
For me, that was a big one, certainly at the beginning of the journey. And when I just continue to ask myself questions. We can put these expectations on us as adults as well, right? But we’re talking about our kids now, and these can be big things and they can cause so many rifts in our relationship and we can get that tunnel vision thinking we have to do it this one way.
And it feels like it takes like an hour. It takes an hour to get them dressed in the morning, takes an hour to brush their teeth at night, because it’s just this constant rub and trying to convince them. And I think that can be another great clue if we find ourselves trying to convince our kids, whether it’s a shower or toothbrushing, or to finish their plate or to wear these clothes.
When we find ourselves trying to convince them, those rubs are probably great places to start. And so yeah. Start to recognize, is that an expectation I’m holding? Why am I holding that expectation?
Your conversation, Anna, about the different cultures, how you can find people recommending and saying just about anything. They’re all different. So really can be what actually works for us instead of us fitting into a thing or a way of doing a thing.
What way actually works for us and helps us? Play around with different shampoos, dry hair, shampoos, different toothpaste, different toothbrushes, some sort of funky ten second full mouth brushing.
ANNA: I know, I’m curious about that now. We’re going to look it up.
What really struck me was something you said, Erika, just about the fear piece. This comes up a lot in a place like the network. So, this is a little plug for the network too, because someone will come with something that feels really weighty about personal hygiene, whether it’s a toothbrushing or knotted hair. With no idea what to do, “They don’t want to ever bathe!”.
And you can feel the weight, right? You can feel the fear, you can feel, they just feel so stuck. Because I think with fear, it’s the opposite of creativity, right? It completely shuts that down. We’re just so stuck. Stuck is the word that keeps coming to mind.
But what’s really cool about those threads is that then you’ll see this boom, boom, boom of people saying all the creative ways that they’ve fixed the hair, done the thing, made toothbrushing fun, did this or that, and then you feel the lightness come to that person. It’s not that any one of the answers are necessarily the right answer for their family, but the block is gone.
The fear is lifted. Oh, other people have to deal with this. Oh, there are lots of different ways to look at this problem and we can start getting creative. I feel like this relates to the podcast a couple weeks ago about being playful and, and for me it’s like feeling that in your body if you are feeling stuck.
It’s not going to go well, when we feel stuck. Just step away from the problem. If you’re feeling that in your body, step away and figure out how to lighten your energy. Bring some support to yourself. If you’re feeling concerned or worried, talk to someone else. And that’s why it’s nice to be able to talk to people that may also be in a similar situation, because then you’re going to get interesting, creative ideas that may actually work for your family.
But I think the big gift of it is just opening it up and realizing there are so many different ways to tackle this one problem that I thought there was only one way to get through it. And that one way is usually either something we’ve gotten from our family or we’ve read something that’s maybe a bit more dogmatic about washing or not washing.
Because you’re so right, Pam. There are a whole host of people that are like, don’t wash. You’re taking stuff off your skin. That’s really beneficial, and then there’s the other people that are like germs! We have to wash everything and so we can let all of that go and find what works for us and really tune into our kids.
I love that you said that, Erika, because they have things to share, and while baths may be a no-go, what if it is just for one small thing? I don’t like the temperature of the water, or I don’t like how it feels slippery on the bottom. We had that at some point. Just put a towel down. Yes, it gets wet and it’s messy, but if that feels better to them or that might feel worse, or they don’t, maybe like this itchy part, and then we can see the bath’s not the problem.
It was this other little thing that I wasn’t even hearing because I was just thinking we’ve got to do this. And so I love that. Slow it down, tune in and then the creativity comes and we learn, we learn so much more about each other.
ERIKA: I love that slow down part too. Because it’s whenever I’m getting into either trying to rush through or I’m stuck in that fear place, that’s when these things don’t work well.
Basically this is feeling like part two of the last podcast of bringing a playful energy and that is how this stuff gets easier. And, right, checking in with the people on the network about all of these topics is so incredible because anything that feels like this gigantic weight, scariest thing that we’ve ever been through, you type it on there and it’s like, oh yeah, my kids went through that phase as well.
And when you were talking about the kids’ needs again that just brought up that it could be things that aren’t even at all related to the hygiene thing itself. And so that’s why I think just getting completely, open, playful, open and curious mindset is so important.
Because it really could just be, I don’t like the way that you do this particular part of it. I don’t like how we are trying to brush my teeth right after having a drink or the drink doesn’t, water doesn’t taste good after I brush my teeth, so I need to drink first.
It could be just a million different possibilities of what are the things that are bothering them about these particular behaviors that we’re trying to make happen? We are just always learning more about our differences and so with my kids, I like to expand the possibilities and talk about it as in, some people like to do it this way, and I’ve heard that some people do this and I’ve heard that some people do this. Looking at all the different possibilities of what different people do might give them an idea of, okay, like I don’t like the way that mommy does it herself, but here are some other people who are doing things differently.
Just widening our view of what’s possible.
PAM: Yeah, that’s so helpful. And I think going back to that weight that we can feel when I can’t see anything, any possibility for moving forward, but I need to make this thing happen. I think it can often be because we are projecting that into the future.
They’re having a hard time. I can’t get them to brush their teeth the way I want them to brush their teeth now, and that’s just going to be this way forever. I have to solve it today or we’re never going to do it again. How are they going to get a job? They like to wear their pajamas all day. So being able to release that weight and remembering that people change. This is a season, like don’t sweat the small stuff. Phrasing, like these are just little pieces. Instead of looking at this day, look at a week, look at a month. Look back at previous seasons. Oh, I remember when they used to do this thing and I thought they would just do it forever, and now I noticed they hardly ever do it anymore. Sometimes looking back to recognize that things often move seasonally, that we grow and change, can help us from getting locked into I need to solve this thing right now, which takes away the playfulness, takes away the seeing other possibilities. Oh, some people do this, some people do this, some people do this. And you know, you might find something that’s totally uniquely you inside that whole spectrum of possibilities.
So yeah, I think just finding the way that works for you to release the weight around it. That doesn’t put so much pressure on it. It can just be so super helpful in just bringing, again, like we were talking about last time, the creativity to it. Right? And that’s where you can find their need. That’s where you’re now more open to having conversations and finding out what’s going on and where you can actually get playful and creative.
ANNA: Right, because it’s in that place again that we’re going to learn more and I think a piece that we’ve all touched on, but it’s just trusting there’s something there. There’s something there that is bothering them or isn’t working. And I think we can get stuck in, especially if we’re in that needing to check the box and get through the day mode.
When we have that more hurried energy, we can just feel like they are literally trying to thwart us. They’re just trying to do this thing to make my life terrible. When I find myself in that space, I’m like, okay, slow down, slow down. What’s happening? The world is not out to get me.
What can I do? And then again, like you said, Erika, it can be the tiniest thing that’s not even related, and I’m like, we can fix that. We can change that. But when I just have this frustrated energy of, we just have to do that, and I’m pushing, pushing, pushing. They don’t even want to speak up about what the thing is because, I don’t seem open to it.
I don’t seem open to really hearing and understanding what’s happening for them. And when we think of, sometimes I think it’s helpful to think about us as adults. We have these little quirky things that we do, we’ve all found our way that works for us with our hair or with our hygiene, teeth, or whatever the thing is.
And they’re discovering that for themselves and it’s going to be different for them. To give space and to honor that. I don’t know. Sometimes when we can see it in ourselves, it’s easier to go. Yeah, it makes sense that they’re going to have these particular things that they have to find and work through.
And, again, just being open to, tags feel bad to some people. And I know with my oldest, she’d always wanted to wear the softest pants and no tags and no nothing. I mean, really until she was a teen, I thought she’d always wear that.
The pajama comment reminded me, Pam, because we just kind of went with clothes that were like pajamas. They were super soft, super comfortable because that’s what helped her nervous system be able to handle things. And then she became a teenager and wanted to wear jeans and she was fine. And it switched. And I’m like, okay. And even if she never had, it wouldn’t matter, she was listening to her body, she was learning what helped her feel better in different situations.
And that’s kind of cool, right? So, if I can get out of my head and step back and watch it, then I can enjoy this process of this human finding, what works for them in the world.
ERIKA: I’m trusting that they have the information about themselves and we can be interested in that.
And I was thinking too, how narration might be something nice to do in this area as well. Because I think a lot of times it’s this top down giving orders in the area of hygiene. But if it could be more like, you know, something I’ve noticed about myself is when I’m more stressed out, I get stinkier armpits. Is that something weird or interesting? And so, just talking about hygiene things like, my teeth feel so nice and clean after I brush them at night or whatever. Just anything that’s my experience of my own hygiene practices. Then it starts to get them to think about how it feels to them. What do I like about it, how do I feel after I take a shower, have a bath or whatever. And so, I think it’s kind of related to sharing other people’s ideas too. But I think especially just for me, rather than talking about I think you should do this, I could say, well, I do this because then I feel like this.
PAM: Yeah. And I think that is such a great place to just start asking ourselves some questions too, like is it maybe that we are trying to direct them to take care of hygiene the way that we do it? Or are there some places that we’re kind of disappointed in ourselves and we have this perfect idea of, we wish we could meet and so we’ll get our kids to at least meet it?
Because then they won’t have the same problem that we have with, oh damn, I wish I had another, a shower today. So, to be able to even think about it as narrating. Has us thinking about it and sometimes maybe giving ourselves more grace around it and recognizing that, again, it’s a journey. Maybe what I’m doing right now is working for me, and then something switches up someday and I change up.
How I process hygiene for myself, et cetera. So understanding and seeing how that has changed for us over time can also help us open it up for our kids as well, and really help them find what works for them versus whatever story works for us. Or that we wish worked for us, and then trying to translate that and get them to follow it. Just recognizing the challenge of that in the whole, people are a different world.
ANNA: Yeah and the stinky armpits reminded me that sometimes it’s actually, when we’re trying to find a mutually agreeable solution, there are issues, right? So I am hypersensitive to smell. And there was a teen, early teen period where I was like, this is very hard for me to have stinky people that are coming around.
But instead of, you need to do this, you need to do that, it was that narration. I know, I’m so sensitive to smell. This is hard for me right now. What can we figure out. Then they can recognize that’s about me and what’s happening for me. Versus there’s something wrong, me pointing the finger. And so it’s okay to have conversations with those “I” messages about what is feeling good or what’s working or what’s hard. And you know, I also had girls that had long hair and I found it stressful to be combing their hair if they weren’t doing it. It was getting knotted and I could express, this is feeling stressful for me. What can we do? I want to support you and what you want your hair to like, but then you’re coming to me telling me to brush it. So it was, how do we all work in this together?
And that’s where the conversations come. And when you bring that lighter, playful energy to it, nobody’s left feeling bad about it. It’s more just like, okay, how do we solve this so that it feels okay? And I think that’s why we talk so much about checking that energy. So you can see it’s kind of this layered process of peeling away the external voices, really tuning in and understanding about each other and what’s happening so we can figure out what’s actually rubbing.
And then it’s adding some narration about our process and then it’s conversations about are there solutions we can come up with that feel good to everybody? But you can’t rush it. You kind of have to do all the layers, so that you can get down to a light energy and engage in conversation that doesn’t have weight to it.
ERIKA: Right. Not the fear-based place, but the curious place. Because I’m thinking even just with hair, do you like having long hair or has it just gotten long and we haven’t talked about it? You know? And so finding out, is long hair important to you? Does it bother you when it’s getting all tangled like that?
Just giving the information that trimming it can sometimes make it easier to get some of those end tangles out. We could trim off some tangles. They’re not born knowing all the possibilities of things. And so I think that’s just part of our bringing that creativity and ideas to them, but without the “right answer”, without the agenda and the fear.
Then there’s tons of possibilities.
PAM: And then when you can get to that spot where it’s fun to brainstorm possibilities and sharing that without the weight, without the fear, but this is a possibility. This is a possibility. Anyway, thank you so much to both of you.
That was a very fun and interesting conversation, and I hope people found it useful. And remember we’ve mentioned the Living Joyfully Network a few times in this call because these are very, typical, normal kinds of conversations and challenges to run into. You can join us there to dive deeper into any of these kinds of everyday topics.
And we will be very excited to welcome you! Just follow the link in the show notes. Wishing everyone a lovely day. Bye bye!
EU378: Bringing a Playful Energy to Our Days
Jan 02, 2025
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore bringing a playful energy to our days. Shifting to a playful energy can be helpful when we’re feeling stuck, with spinning thoughts, worrying about the future, or focused on external expectations. We can cultivate a lightness and curiosity that helps us get creative and come up with many possibilities to help us face the situations in front of us. Play is also the natural way that children process their lives. So, bringing a playful energy into our days can help us connect with our kids, as well!
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, everyone! I am Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Hello!
PAM AND ERIKA: Hi!
ANNA: Today we’re going to be talking about bringing a playful energy to our days, and I don’t know, I think this is going to be a lot of fun. So, Erika, do you want to get us started?
ERIKA: I do! And Happy New Year to everyone! Yes. I just love this time of year and how it can really inspire me to bring a bit more intention into my daily routine. I really feel like this idea, bringing a playful energy to our days, could be such a fun intention to explore. And, Pam, you’ve certainly encouraged me through this podcast over the years to play with ideas and to play with possibilities. And getting open and curious often feels like being playful.
And so, I did want to start out just by reminding us all that people are different, and one person’s definition of bringing a playful energy to our days is going to look different from another. And so, pretend play, being silly, exploring characters, getting right in there with our little kids in their imaginary worlds can come really easily to some parents and it’s not easy for others. And that’s okay, because we’re not talking about one right way or one definition of being playful. And so, I’m excited to see how many different areas we’ll end up talking about today.
But for me, bringing a playful energy means really lightening up my own energy about something. So, when I get bogged down by outside expectations or by fears about the future or anything like that, I can get into that tunnel vision mode, which is the opposite of having a playful energy. And so, when I start thinking about all the things that have to happen or what should be happening or what I have to do and what the kids should be doing, that’s just not a light place to be. And so, being open and curious, remembering that there’s not one right way for things to happen, bringing a more playful approach to my days just lightens me up and I can see more possibilities. I can connect more easily with the people around me. I can think, huh, I wonder what’s going to happen next. Or, I wonder what we could do here. Let’s just try something. And that is this light energy that can help me move forward.
Whereas the heavy energy of, we have to do this and I have to figure out the right way to do this, feels like it’s weighing me down and honestly can make me super grumpy. And that’s not even to mention how bringing playfulness into our days can help make things so much smoother and more fun for our kids.
PAM: I am really excited to talk about this. And I think that was one of the things that really brought this top of mind for me, having talked about it for years now, because I found it so helpful for shifting my energy and my perspective and bringing me into the moment. When I’m future-focused and trying to figure all the things out, it just brought me back to my kids.
And then from there, I learned how helpful it was even for me when I’m trying to process and move through my own things because, for me, the shift from having to figure everything out, I just get so very tunneled vision to try and find that one right answer, even if I’m not telling myself there’s one right answer for all humanity. Even trying to find one right answer that works for me can be very tunneling. I’m just so quickly throwing things out. Nope, nope, not that, not that, not that boom, boom, boom. Whereas when I can shift to that playfulness, I can be more open and curious about the thing.
Everything doesn’t look like a no to me. It’s like, oh, I wonder? Or, what if? Or, how might that unfold? I hadn’t even thought of that! And that playfulness, too, lets me bring more things to my kids, to my partner. It’s like looking for a little bit more input and then I start sharing a little bit more, and then it doesn’t look as dire as it originally was for myself.
And, like you said, alongside all the cool things that playfully engaging with my kids brings. That’s a whole other part of this conversation, but we’ll start with how it feels for us.
ANNA: Yeah. That’s definitely where I want to start. I do want to acknowledge what Erika said, too, about people are different. Pretend play did not come easy for me. So, I do think when people hear this, they’re like, but what if I’m not that playful person that looks like X? I think we will talk about that a little bit.
But really what I’m more interested in and what resonated for me about this topic was exactly what we’re talking about, how to shift our energy. And for me, I remember just trying to be mindful about if it felt like a difficult day, it felt like something, it’s that quick check-in with my body, like, whoa, I’m feeling a lot of weight. I feel a lot of heaviness. Something’s happening. And then I can just go, wait a minute, where’s that coming from? Look outside a little bit. And then bring in that playful energy.
And I think our kids lead the way. I think if we turn to them, they’re most likely laughing or playing or doing something or enjoying something or can easily be tickled if we just bring in some fun energy, especially with little kids.
And so, I think for me it was more just watching my energy, because I felt like my energy really impacted the whole house. And so, if I was carrying a lot of weight about something and maybe it was even unrelated to the kids, it was still helpful for me to check in with that and go, whoa, that thing is impacting the way I’m interacting with the people in my life. So, I would like to either set that aside so I can have some special time to think about it or address it. But then how do I lean back into the joy of having little kids?
And I think we get tied up in, there’s a lot of work feeding people and doing all the things. We can get weighed down by that, but it’s pretty amazing when you look at these little beings that are telling us all kinds of things, hopping around the house, so excited about the tiniest things, discovering things for the first time. That really helped me get to that playful energy was just watching their wonder and excitement about things and then recognizing, okay, that’s a choice I can make. And so, that really would shift things for me.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that. Kids are typically masters of play when they’re young. And so, it really can be so inspiring to see how they’re able to figure out a playful, fun way to do basically anything. And I like the idea that if we’re talking about bringing a playful energy to our days, it doesn’t mean now our days are just a hundred percent fun. It’s not that we have to turn everything into fun. But maybe starting to notice, what are the things that come up in a typical day for me where I start to close in and get stressed out. What are my triggers?
And so, for me, it could be trying to get somewhere at a certain time. I feel this sense of panic, and I’m sure that comes from childhood and having to be in certain places at certain times. But if I think about my life now, if I can logically walk myself through it, these are not emergency situations 99 times out of a hundred. And so, it really is my own trigger, based not on something that’s happening in this moment, but just based on fear from the past. And so, I think those are moments, if I can identify the triggering things for me, those are the best spots to start playing around with it.
What about when that’s starting to happen, I’m going to try to bring in a more playful energy about it? And reminding myself there’s plenty of time and all those soothing mantras. There is space to give this a little bit of room and to be more playful and curious about what could happen.
And so, as adults with a lot of background and baggage that we’re carrying with us to this point, there are a lot of these little triggers through the day. And it could be things like mess. It could be being too tired. It could be cooking. That’s a big one for me. Like, what am I going to serve everyone? And it can bring up panic. And so, those are the spots where I especially want to start thinking about, how could I be a little bit more playful in this area?
PAM: I love the idea of starting with triggers, because it’s like, okay, I’m going to be more playful. Where do you start with that? But where things rub or where things are triggered, those are great places to start. And I remember, for me, I usually start with some internal processing and figuring it out myself before I start trying to bring it to other people. Because I can’t really quite explain it yet or I don’t understand it. Like you were saying, so much of it is tools or reactions or things that we’ve built over the years to survive in various environments that we were in.
Like you mentioned, when we were growing up, if getting out the door was something that was a stress on the family, I just internalized that and have that with me. But to take a little bit of time to say, oh, the environment we have now is different than the environment then. We are different people. I can understand those feelings and that reaction, but is that something that’s serving me now? And that’s where I can start.
Now I can bring that more playful approach to thinking about other possibilities. And when I’m in a space where I understand enough that I’m open to possibilities, that’s a great time for me to start bringing it to others, because now I can actually hear it. I’m less putting it through that filter that I was owning and holding so tightly and more open to other possibilities.
And so many times, having these conversations with my kids, even when they were younger, gave me so many new ideas. We talk so much about how capable kids are at all ages. Even if it seems like something that would never work, oh my gosh, just sitting with their idea for a second can make another connection and another connection. It’s like, oh yeah, maybe it’s the energy that came with their idea. We don’t have to take everything absolutely literally, but just to pull it all together.
That’s why I love the brainstorming mindset, open and curious, see what happens. It doesn’t literally need to be something that comes up in that conversation, but those ideas connect to something else and something else and something else, and then we can see a new solution. And, for me, playfulness also means trying something and seeing what happens and then tweaking and trying something.
When I say play with it or when I remind myself to play with, it’s not like, okay, I’m going to play with the ideas until I get that one right thing that seems like it’ll be perfect, and then I’m going to do that thing. And then if it doesn’t work perfectly, I’ve failed. That whole process failed. But no, if I can think of the process as something playful, it’s like, oh, that seems pretty cool. Let’s try that. See what happens. Then you’re learning another little piece about some aspect or constraint of the challenge and then tweak it a little bit more and tweak it a little bit more.
People are different and people are always changing. You’re not going to get like one right answer that’s going to be playful and fun and then we’re going to move on to something else with our lives. Now this is our life and this is how things are unfolding. So,bringing that playful energy to it helps me not put so many expectations on myself and all the people around me, right?
ANNA: Yeah, and I think I love starting with triggers. And I think starting with where things are rubbing. A big one for a lot of people are transitions. And what’s interesting about that, if you have a child that struggles with transitions, it can weigh on you, right? You’re going to the event, the playground, whatever it is, and you’re thinking, this is great and then we’re going to have this terrible transition. And that’s that piece I was talking about before. Watch when you’re carrying weight like that, because you’re creating the story before it’s even started.
And that doesn’t mean that you can click a switch and transitions are easy, but it opens us up to find different ways and to try different things. And it’s going to be different every time. But it can be literally playful, like piggyback rides to the car or we would do a race to tree or we’d find these fun things to move towards. Moving towards something versus, we have to leave this thing you’re loving so much and do nothing, which is kind of how it feels in their mind. But it’s like, okay, let’s move towards something that’s fun.
But I think we get that playful creativity when we’re not carrying the weight of, this is going to be hard. This is so terrible. We’re so bad at this. You can just feel yourself shrinking in on, we’re going to make a scene and people are going to be worried about it, or whatever’s going to happen. And I think I talked about this somewhere recently, but just when we are calm in that space and bringing that lightness to it, even if our child is struggling in that moment, people are just calmed by that. They’re like, oh, you’ve got this. Yes, we’re a little bit upset about this transition, but you are still there engaging with your child. You are still there finding ways to move through it.
So, it’s literal play sometimes, but it is that playing with, I’m going to try this this time. Okay, that didn’t work. We’re going to try this next time. But not putting a lot of weight on each of those decisions either, not putting weight on, this has to be the thing that works. Or when we find something that works, it has to work forever. It just doesn’t work that way.
And so, I think it’s probably a culturally ingrained idea that we’re going to find the right answer and it’s going to work forever. That really limits us when we’re working with other people, because humans are different and challenging and have different things that mean things to them and different things they want to do, different ways they want to move through the world. So, I just love that check on my energy of, what am I bringing to this maybe historical, challenging bit of our life?
ERIKA: If you have a feeling of dread about certain things that happen in your life, those may also be good spots to look at or, or times when your child is always upset or that you’re always having conflict about a certain area.
And I love the idea that play means, let’s try something different this time. And when you go into that, let’s try something different this time with a playful energy. Then you’re not attached to the outcome of that thing. And so, that’s where you’re able to really just brainstorm, try something that you would’ve never tried before, and then see what happens.
And so I think, as we are getting to know these people, our children who are growing and changing, we’re always learning more about who they are. We’re always growing ourselves and learning about who we are and just getting more information. And so, it makes sense that we are not going to know from the beginning how all of these things are going to play out.
Having that playful energy about the conflicts, about the rubs that we find along the way, I think just helps so much. And I’m thinking it’s from the little things like leaving the park with young kids and they don’t want to leave yet. It’s so hard to validate if I’m stuck in my head telling a terrible story about how awful this is, and I knew this was going to happen, and here we go again and like all those kind of feelings.
But if I can be playful about, you know, what’s coming next and get myself into the place of validating them, it can go so much more smoothly than if I shut down on my side and they have a hard time on their side.
But then also I was thinking of harder things like, you know, when our teens are having really dark thoughts and really a difficult time. How can I bring play into those moments that are just like tearing my heart out? But it’s true that lightening up my energy is still going to be a better choice in those moments. And it’s not easy to hear your children say things that are really upsetting or that they’re having a very difficult time. But trying to move myself away from the future fear, tunnel vision, that sense of dread and to trust, what’s going to happen next? There are so many possibilities. Let’s try something new. That more playful place is going to help in all kinds of circumstances.
ANNA: Yeah. I’m going to just jump on that teen piece real quick because I think it is so important. And what I’ve noticed, and this can even be with the younger kids, but especially with teens, when they bring us something heavy or that feels really big to them, and whatever the thing is might be really big, they are looking to us to see, is this going to break us? Are we going to say, whew, we’re throwing up our hands. This is too much. Or are we going to stand there with that confidence and knowing and trust and leaning in? Because they’re testing the waters. This thing’s feeling really big. And what is it going to do to this person that I love, who I trust and who tends to lead me through these things in the past?
And so, I think that is so important to check our energy in those situations. And if we need support outside of that dyad with our teen, then that’s great. Get the support, because whoa, they shared some heavy things and that was hard. We can get validation and support ourselves, but when we can be just much more clear and open with our energy.
And I’m substituting creative energy with playful in some situations. So, in some situations maybe it’s more just like a lighter creative energy with that trust built in that you were talking about. And so, sometimes, again, we’re literally talking about play and making it fun and laughing and doing, and sometimes it just is bringing that lighter, creative, even more problem solving kind of energy, which still has this playful aspect to it.
PAM: Yeah, that is what came up for me, too. It’s like, oh, maybe we should just revisit the idea of playful for a moment. Because as we’ve been talking about it as this lighter energy, more open and curious doesn’t necessarily, and certainly not always mean jokey and fun in the typical sense of, oh, that’s hard. Let’s go play a game. That’s not what we’re meaning when we talk about playful energy.
But playful really works for me as a term for bringing that lighter, creative, open and curious kind of energy to a moment. And then it means I’m open to seeing and feeling what the other person in that interaction is feeling and going through, to help get a sense of what direction might be helpful, but yes. That grounded energy in more challenging times is so helpful for us and for the other person, especially a teen. Like, yes, I see you. This is hard and we can do it. We can do it. That energy is just so helpful when somebody is just feeling hopeless or just like, I can’t see a path forward.
And we don’t need to have the answer or the path to have that grounded and curious energy when we’re interacting with them or even when we’re thinking about it. Because if we don’t, we get caught again in that tunnel vision. Oh my gosh. We need to solve this as soon as possible. Or terrible things are going to happen. But yeah, bringing that openness to it, that curiosity, but that grounded, solid, playful, compassionate, all those terms, it’s so much more helpful than getting caught up in the swirl of things.
ANNA: Yeah. Before we go, I’m going to just bring us around to, just again, playfulness, right? And lighten it up just a little bit, because I think sometimes with kids, we get in the adult mindset of, I just tell you what to do and you’re going to do it. Go brush your teeth, it’s time to brush your teeth. Or, do this. We’re getting in this check the box mode or whatever our personality is. And it really can be fun to bring in actual play, especially for younger kids. So again, this is looking at those rub areas to think, what can I do to make this fun?
And it’s tickle monster or silly toothbrush or the airplane things or the whatever. There are so many fun ways to connect and move through the world, and I think our kids really give us that little check when we’re getting too serious, because they can put on the brakes if we are getting too serious. You see them dig in. And so, it’s just a reminder that that doesn’t mean we have to double down and push harder and try to really force. It can be a little wake up call of like, hey, why are we not bringing a lighter energy to this? Why are we bringing this weight? So, I just wanted to bring it around for little kids too, because the teens are important, absolutely. And so are the little kids, that playful piece.
ERIKA: Right. And I just remember so many times where what it will feel like from my perspective is like I’m getting stuck in my head with what we have to do next and trying to move us towards what we have to do next or thinking about something I have to do. And that’s pulling me out of the moment. And I could notice myself not being able to listen to them quite as much and I’m not quite paying attention to what they’re doing and what they’re saying. And so, being playful allows me to notice that too much thinking is going on. I’m looking back at them, and then once I start interacting with them, that’s how all the transitions got easier.
Transitions are hard when I can’t hear anything they’re saying. We’re doing this, we’re doing this. Let’s keep moving. Like, what you’re doing isn’t important. We just have to keep moving. That’s when my transitions would really go off the rails. But if I could be engaged with what they’re doing, talking to them about it, interacting, asking about the characters, asking about what they’re doing, really getting into what they’re focusing on, then we could get out the door, because they’re happily talking to me about the things that they’re interested in and wanting to do. And so, it really is for me the tool of stopping the spinning thoughts in my own head and bringing myself back into the present moment with the kids who are basically always in the present moment.
And so, that’s really great. I could just look at them and that’s the present moment. And so, I just had so much fun playing around with what could be difficult transitions, but now it really is just fun, like, okay, we’re all exploring this topic or we’re all talking about this funny thing, or whatever it is, playing a game on the way out the door.
PAM: I’m playfully coming up with that. I love the transition example, because that is just a huge piece. And the learning and remembering to go to them and engage. We are part of it. It’s not us trying to manage their transition. We are all transitioning out the door or to a different activity or to people showing up, just a change of circumstance.
And it was just a world of difference to recognize and to be like, oh, okay. I’ll actually come in and join you where you are and engage, whether it’s, like you were mentioning Erika, starting up a conversation that we can continue as we move on. Or maybe it’s like really engaging with them and understanding, sharing in whatever joy they’ve been getting from whatever activities they’re doing as you’re helping them close it down or get to a spot where they feel comfortable stopping. And doing it playfully with intention and full choice rather than, oh, this is another thing on my plate that I need to do to get us there. No, this is life. We’re changing activities.
So, just being there with them. And Anna, that reminder about literal play, whether it’s brushing teeth or whatever it is. There’s a Pokemon app for teeth. There are just so many fun ways to really figure out like what is that’s a bit of the challenge. It can also be the transition, too, having to brush your teeth, just all those pieces are pieces we can play with and just try things out. For me, that was the biggest thing. Just try a little something out. And see how it goes. And there we’re playing with it.
ERIKA: And just allowing ourselves as adults to actually play the things, too. To play Roblox, play Minecraft, play with the toys, check out the things, see what lights up that inner child in ourselves. I feel like those practices, too, just make our lives more fun and help our kids see the fun in us, which, I think, really helps our relationships too.
ANNA: Yeah, that’s what I was going to say. Just to wrap it all up, I love how what is weaving into this conversation is the connection we talk about so much and learning about one another. Because when we’re slowing down and connecting and figuring out what the rubs are and finding playful solutions, we’re learning about each other. We’re learning about ourselves, we’re learning about our kids, and that’s what we always talk about. So, I love that. It just weaves all together. And I feel like this was a fun and important conversation.
So, thanks to you both and thank you for listening. We hope you found it helpful on your unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would really love the Living Joyfully Network. You can learn more about it by clicking on Network at livingjoyfully.ca. We hope to see you there. Take care, everybody.
PAM AND ERIKA: Bye!
EU377: Consent and Autonomy
Dec 19, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika dive into consent and autonomy. Moving towards respecting our children’s autonomy and consent is typically an important part of the unschooling journey. In our conversation, we talk about independence vs autonomy, looking for underlying needs, questioning societal messages, and moving from control to connection with our children.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone. I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-host, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia.
I’m so excited because this week we’re exploring consent and autonomy, and I really think these are just such deep topics with so many layers, and maybe it becomes a bit more complicated to consider consent and autonomy when we’re in a holiday season or when we are surrounded by our families of origin.
Maybe it feels like there are more external expectations on us and our kids, and so I think it’s a great time to dive into this topic. Pam, would you like to get us started on our conversation?
PAM: Sure, I would love to. And I do love how the ideas of consent and autonomy weave together, and also how this flows from our last podcast episode about weaving our needs into the conversation. So, I think that’s going to be a really fun conversation as well.
With unschooling, we do prioritize giving our children choices and supporting their autonomy. But what truly lies at the heart of that is consent. In fact, consent lives at the forefront of pretty much every interaction we have with kids. Now, I know as adults we often talk about consent in a sexual context, but when we try on the lens of a child’s consent to do things throughout their day, I think it really can be so eye-opening, and a real paradigm shift.
I notice when I override their consent, what I’m often doing is not giving them the space to consider whether or not they want to do the thing, right? Maybe it’s because I think of it as a given. They’ve always wanted to do this before. We’re just going to do it. Or maybe I’m in a hurry and feel like I don’t have time for the conversations.
It’s not a callous thing. It’s usually more of a, I didn’t even really think about it kind of thing. That’s why it’s interesting to just start using that lens throughout our day. Because it can definitely have consequences if we are not really considering their consent.
One can be eroding the trust in our relationship. It’s harder to trust someone when it feels like they’re railroading you to do things to keep themselves on track. Right? It’s not even asking, leaving the child not feeling seen and heard, because really they aren’t.
Our needs are kind of overriding what’s going on. And another can be that they start to internalize this and think that they’re wrong to want to do the thing that they want to do, the choice that they want to make in that moment. And that can start to dampen down their inner voice. What they want to do in the moment or what they feel about the moment if we keep jumping in without giving them the space to process that and bring that into the conversation and fully consent to what they’re doing.
Well, if my parent thinks that I should be doing this, because they’re saying, let’s go do this, let’s go do this. We’re going to go do this now. What I’m thinking must be wrong. Or I’m wrong for wanting to, or not wanting to do those things that are expected of me.
And then they can lose their voice that way, I think.
ANNA: I think it just erodes that understanding of ourselves because I think that dissonance is actually what causes a lot of stress and anxiety in people of all ages. And we can carry into adulthood.
And that is this, they’re telling me that either what I want to do or don’t want to do is wrong. But I’m feeling it deep inside of me that I don’t want to go do that thing or that I really want to stay focused on this one thing in front of me. It just erodes this trust in our inner voice and our knowing about ourselves.
And I think that is just a really slippery slope. And I know as the parent that’s often coming from a really loving place, like, we’re going to have so much fun, or it’s going to be great, or we want to all be together. We’re not going in there thinking, I am eroding your voice, or I want you to feel bad about yourself.
No, we’re coming in with this love and excitement about the plan. Or maybe a feeling of, I know better than you. I can see this longer picture, but to me, it’s worse having them doubt or question that inner voice because that serves them so much throughout their life to really hear and listen to that.
I think it’s also a safety thing. I think it’s a personal development thing. I think it’s related to relationships and how they show up in relationships later. So to me it’s so foundational, this idea of consent and it was really consent that led me on this path. I do not like to be controlled. So consent is something that really, even before I had kids, was really important to me.
And so then it was this new area to test and because it’s different with kids, right? Because we do have these ideas, I think we talked about it on the last podcast of – it’s my time. I’m going to be able to do the things I want to do. But then you have this fully formed human that has very strong ideas about what they want to do.
And it did not take me long again, because I don’t personally like to be controlled to go, oh, okay. I don’t want to be the person that’s controlling them and not allowing them to listen to their voice, to not hear them, because I know how terrible that feels.
The whole idea of consent is so important to me, and it is wrapped up and weaves nicely with autonomy because that is this idea of, what do we want to do? What feels good? How do we want to move forward? I feel like this topic is so vast, though, so I have so many things I want to say, but I’ll see what you’re thinking, Erika, before I just keep going, there’s so much I want to say!
ERIKA: Right. And the more we think about it, I think the more things pop up. I remember the episode where we talked about cultivating our children’s inner voices or allowing space for that to develop and how important that is to me.
When I’m thinking about this topic, I’m remembering how it felt to be a kid. It is so powerful to just go back to even four and 5-year-old me, little me. And I can remember knowing what felt good, knowing what felt scary, knowing that I knew for myself what felt right and what didn’t.
And so having the space to express that as a kid is so huge. And then having someone who actually will believe your experience, believe that you could have a different opinion than someone else. And then to tell you that that’s okay. That is just the biggest gift that we could give to someone. And I really think that it is what will help them trust their inner voice.
And from my perspective as a parent, it’s fun because I’m learning about someone who I haven’t met before, which is my child. This person who is their own person through and through, and they know what they want. They know what feels bad and what feels good. And so, just cultivating that curiosity from the parent perspective.
What could I learn about my child today? What are they going to show me about how they want their life to be? Rather than me coming in saying, I know how children are supposed to be, or, I know what I like and so therefore you like it. I know that you do because it’s great
Talking over their inner voice disconnects them. It breaks that trust they have in us. And, the more that I can hold space, leave space for them to say, I know you’re loving this, but I don’t like it, they just trust me so much more and then I’m learning about them and it’s so rewarding, I think as a parent.
PAM: I like rewarding, what a lovely word. What I find so fascinating is when we railroad over their consent, what we’re really doing too is interfering with their learning, like the choice that they want to make in that moment, what they do or don’t want to do. They will learn the most by having that experience, not by us stopping them from having that experience.
What we’re thinking might be, I don’t think you’re going to like that and you really want to go. That’s going to mean X, Y, Z, whatever story we tell ourselves about it. But you know what, if they really want to try this thing, they want to do this thing. If they can do that, they are going to learn so much in that moment.
It’s like us telling somebody else what we think the outcome will be for them. And you know what? We are not them. Right? And how often have we just taken at face value, something somebody tells us as like, yeah, you won’t like that, or you’ll love this, et cetera. It doesn’t feel good to us, doesn’t feel good to someone at any age.
When we are wanting an experience, we will learn the most by having it, and then we can say, I did not like this, X, Y, Z about it. I really learned that because I have the experience, I now have the context. I’m now making those connections in my own head, building my body of knowledge around myself and I’m gaining self-awareness.
It’s like, oh, I didn’t think it would be this way. Right? Or, I loved it, et cetera. It really helps with learning. So when we’re in that experience, it really makes connections for us. It really helps us understand ourselves and the things we do and don’t like to do.
So, when we step in, even with the biggest heart because we don’t want them to be upset or we don’t feel we have the energy for an overloaded environment or something like that. Those are considerations, but also the more we can help them have the experiences they are looking to have, the more they will learn.
So, not walking over their consent also means they will be learning something that is close to their heart right now because this is a choice that they’re wanting to make right now and that will help them take the next step. Instead of having to keep asking for that step over and over and over, they’re just kind of stuck in their learning at that point because we’re not helping them bring more in around what they’re learning.
ANNA: I love that learning point and I think we talk about consent and autonomy a lot. There’s other conversations, definitely on the network and I think even some other podcasts have hints of it as well. But I think this is just another opportunity to examine, to really look in and think about our thinking.
Because if you were to ask any person, do you want to push through your child’s consent? Most likely the answer is no, because that doesn’t sound good. We’ve all learned that consent is important and we need to understand it. And we have an expectation that teenagers will understand it and that other adults will understand it.
And we see it play out in ways and we are upset about it, where we feel like our consent has been violated. So we would say no. But this is where we can examine, but am I doing it again with this big heart thinking I know best, or thinking that if I just do this, then push them a little bit here or just not worry about that they don’t want to do that there, then it’s going to be okay. So to maybe flip it on the other side, I think we all want compassionate people, right? We want our kids to be compassionate and kind and this is where it starts, this right here. This one piece to me is so critical in having a world that’s filled with compassion, because when we can slow things down to really hear what’s happening to someone. I’m thinking of 4-year-old Erika who knows what she needs and wants in that situation. What a different world it is when someone says, Hey, I get that. I get that you don’t want to do that, or you’re seeing it differently than I am, or that you don’t like it right now because it’s right now, and she might like it later, so I don’t have to future trip on, oh, she’s not doing this one thing, and she’ll never do it.
I can just say, I want to honor you where you are. Because again, that’s where compassion is born. And then that child wants to offer that to the next person and the next person, and it spreads from there. So I think just pausing and slowing down and maybe a little examining about what it is that we want to be fostering in our environment.
What is it that we want to be learning about, because it’s learning for me too, because it’s hard to live with other people. It’s hard to take everybody into consideration and all of those pieces. But then there’s so much reward to it and so much learning.
That’s what makes it doable for me. Because I think some people think I can’t do that. It takes too much time. Or I don’t have the bandwidth, but when I really think about what are my core values and what am I wanting to foster and create, then it makes that easy.
It makes taking that time easy, it makes spending that little bit of extra energy so much easier.
ERIKA: That’s why the work for us to do is our internal work. And being resourced, being given that time and space in my own mind is enough to leave that room for them to express what they’re feeling about a situation.
It does take intention and it does take patience. And that’s why I think that weaving in our needs from last time is also so critical here because it really is when I feel like I’m in a rush, I feel like I’m doing a million things, those are the moments that I’m the most likely to push through someone’s consent because it’s just one more thing on my plate. That’s what it feels like, you know?
We’re trying to get out the door and now they’re saying that they are worried about going. How do I have time to deal with that conversation? And so that really is the time to remember the why. The most important thing that I could do in this life is this. These conversations with the kids, leaving the space for them to have their feelings and to figure out what feels good moving forward.
And so, yeah, I just think it is all my work to do. And we were probably not modeled much of this as kids and growing up in a really controlling environment of school. And so, it’s just a lot of intention that has to come from me.
PAM: Yeah. I love the way you expressed that, Erika, that this is our intention.
This really is the important work that I want to choose to do in these moments and to feel reasonable enough that you can make that shift right in the moment when we recognize that somebody is feeling like their consent is being pushed on. And, if one of the things we were wanting to talk about that I feel is so important is not only not pushing their consent, but it’s in support of their autonomy, right.
Of them making choices. And like I was talking about before, making these choices is reflecting who they are in that moment and what they’re wanting or not wanting to do, right? We want to give them choices so that they can then pursue who they are and explore who they are and the things that they like to do.
That’s life. But one of the fascinating things is, I remember having those moments and when I’m feeling a little under-resourced too, right? Is that they want their autonomy, they want to do the thing, well then they can go and do it, right? So it’s thinking about autonomy versus independence.
We can easily make that little quick connection. That autonomy means doing it themselves. If they want to make that choice, then they can do it. It’s their responsibility to follow through and do the thing then. But yeah, autonomy and independence are very different things.
We don’t need to have the expectation that they can independently do the things that they’re wanting to do. If we are wanting to support them in pursuing their interests and learning about their interests and learning about themselves. It is for us to help them do the things. And the lovely thing is, when we’re there with them, we can help them process, right?
They have someone to talk to about this. They don’t feel judged about saying, I really wanted to come do this thing and we’ve been here a half hour and I really want to go home now because this is not what I expected. Verses it’s not okay. You wanted to come here, so we’re coming here for the whole thing.
I love the word interdependence. We are helping them explore the things that they’re interested in and as we talked about last time, weaving our lives together, we are all wanting to do the things and it’s about all of us. Everyone’s consent, everyone’s autonomy, and weaving together the things that we’re wanting to do, not wanting to do, and finding a way as much as we can, and without that pressure of time.
So maybe if there is something that I want to do but it doesn’t fit right now. Is it okay if it’s tomorrow? Often it can be, there isn’t an emergency. And that perspective also comes with experience. So, sometimes things feel super urgent for our kids and we can understand that. And help them gain those moments because that’s something that will come with time too.
But anyway, yeah, autonomy and independence are completely different.
ANNA: Very different things. I know we have a podcast on the independence agenda, and I think it’s important to revisit that too, to recognize that there is really a difference. I think consent weaves in, so it’s so interesting how they’re all so interrelated and how different it feels to have that interdependence than to have either an independence agenda or this control.
The control paradigm of a parent telling a child what to do. I had a client that was recently sharing a story that I think is related, so I’m going to go for it for just a second. She has a strong independence agenda that we talk about a lot. And I was like, tell me where that came from. What comes to mind from when you were younger?
And she shared a story of how they were very young children and they were told they had to go rake the whole yard. They had this giant yard and they had to rake the whole yard, two young children. And then the parents came out and it wasn’t good enough and said, you’ll do it again.
This was even though it had taken them hours to do. And they were just so devastated and had to do this again. And she’s said, but you know, I guess we learned we just have to do it right the first time and that it was just on us. I said, what would it have felt like if they had come out and said, oh, you know what, there’s still some leaves here let’s all get them up together.
She just stopped for a second and said, I think I would’ve felt really loved and like I’m not alone. Because that’s the thing, right? What are we valuing? And again, this is may be a ‘people are different’ thing too, but what are the values?
We’ve talked about this before. Maybe independence is a value. But I think it’s worth examining, are there unintended consequences to when we’re putting that on someone else? I think we can want our own independence. We can want our own autonomy, but when we’re deciding for someone else that that’s what they need, that’s where we’re pushing through consent, potentially. That’s where we’re potentially changing the relationship. And so I think it’s also valuable to just slow down, dig in a little bit and see, does this really align with what I’m feeling inside? Or am I just repeating outside messages and then putting it on the kids in front of me?
ERIKA: It’s where the agenda becomes more important than anything else. But is that really what we want? Or is that again, this role of the good parent that we’re trying to fill? I think that’s super interesting. And then I was also thinking, just a note for the parents of young children.
I feel like this consent and autonomy can be the most challenging during those very young years because a lot of the big reactions that toddlers and little kids can have about things don’t feel logical at all. That was a challenge for me, and I see it being a challenge for a lot of parents with little kids.
I clearly see what’s going on and they’re having this big reaction that doesn’t really make any sense logically to an adult mind. And so I don’t know. I don’t particularly have advice, but I’m just thinking, solidarity with the parents of young children. And then also, for a young child, these big feelings are real.
And so I think giving the space for them to have them, taking them seriously,that’s the biggest thing you can do. Because it’s the worst feeling to have a big emotion about something, which I still do have big emotions about some things. And then to have someone say. You don’t feel like that. You don’t need to feel like that. You shouldn’t feel like that.
It’s so invalidating. And so, doing this work of listening, leaving space, and letting even the littlest kids have their feelings and not pushing through that, I think is such amazing work.
ANNA: Right, because I want to say that, because I have that logical brain too, and it can be hard, why are we freaking out about the blue sippy cup versus the pink sippy cup? Can we just want a sippy cup?
But what I found is that when I could check that and go, okay, but what’s really happening here? It is a big emotion about something. And oftentimes there are contextual pieces or you know, HALT They’re hungry, they’re angry, they’re lonely, they’re tired.
Something else that’s going on, something else at play. And so when we can really hear, and validate that you want this particular blue sippy cup, we need to find it and clean it, even though we have 20 other sippy cups right here. You see that energy comes down because if we stay in our place of, we’re going to out logic over the 2-year-old, it’s not a winning proposition.
It’s just going to, things are just going to escalate. But like you said, we can see it as adults too. It’s like someone telling us, well that’s not logical for you to be upset about this thing or anxious about this thing, or worried about this thing. That doesn’t feel connecting and it doesn’t help you go, okay, well yeah, I’m not going to worry about it now because you told me not to.
ERIKA: Yeah. Oh my gosh. So I’m just thinking, there could be a lot of times when I’m at a heightened emotion and so if we are moving forward with this plan that I’m feeling scared about or upset about, and we’re going to do it anyway, it feels like my consent is not being respected in that moment. But really all it would take is for someone to hear my concerns. Let’s talk through my concerns, validate that it’s okay, that I’m feeling the way that I feel. Then maybe I really am okay moving forward. I just needed to be heard first.
And so with consent, I think sometimes it can happen where we think my kid doesn’t want to do this, so I guess we can’t do it. And then that’s the end of the conversation. Rather than, my kid doesn’t want to do this. Let’s get curious. What are the reasons? Let’s try to figure it out. Let’s validate. Problem solve, be creative, and then maybe the event actually does happen because everyone feels heard and we’re able to figure out a way that it actually feels okay.
PAM: Yeah, I think those conversations are the most interesting because again, as we’ve talked about so much, it’s not about having the outcome in mind. It really is understanding the context for each person. If something somebody super does or super doesn’t want to do, that is part of the context of the conversation. I can say, yeah, well this was interesting to me, but I’m not super committed and it doesn’t matter per se. and then if I am super committed, then we get curious, we talk about what it is that they’re uncomfortable with or imagining or envisioning, just so that we can get a clearer picture of what it’s going to be and see if there’s a way to mesh them together.
And then if we don’t find that way, then look for other ways, can somebody else come and stay with them? Can they stay on their own? Depending on their age. There are so many possibilities when we take our mind off the tunnel of this one initial outcome that we saw as the initial path.
And we discover there are so many ways. So many times over the years I found new ways to get to something with my kids because they’ve had these really cool ideas.
ANNA: Right, and we’re not having to give up something. I think this really does relate back to the other podcasts we’ve done, but it also relates to what you said at the top of this show, Erika, which is, the holidays are a good example and things where we don’t have to give up what we want to understand what’s happening for everyone.
But it again, if we tunnel in on this one outcome, okay, we’re all going to march into family dinner and we’re going to sit there and it’s going to look like this because that’s what we do. That may not work. But when we get to each individual’s preferences, hey, I like talking to this person. I like seeing the tree. I like looking at the lights.I like talking to grandma. I like playing the card game.
Then we can figure out how we can do those things. So it’s not about giving up what we are wanting to do, to honor someone’s consent. It’s really about just weaving all of it together. And again, with very young children, it’s sometimes just giving them space for those big emotions.
And being playful about it. I’m thinking of leaving the park at the playground. That can be hard, you know? And then instead of thinking, okay, I’m going to have to drag them to the car, or are we going to stay here for the rest of our lives because they don’t want to leave. There’s a middle ground of letting them have that emotion and validating.
You don’t want to leave, we’ve had so much fun! We would always race to the tree and race to the other tree and we’d be working our way closer to the car or piggybacks to the car or things like that, just recognize that some transitions are harder for some kids. And I think you said this Erika earlier, and Pam, this is where the learning is.
This is where we’re learning about each other. It’s hard to leave something where we’re having fun or it’s hard to leave something that we’re engaged in. That doesn’t mean we can never do it. It just means that we’re taking time to be heard and seen and it just feels so different. It just really feels so different and so connected.
And again, I believe that then that is what ripples out into the world because now they have this template of, it’s really nice to feel seen and heard and I want to see and hear the people in my life.
ERIKA: And remembering that everybody’s differences are okay and that’s just so amazing in a family, not writing the story that, oh, because you know, my kid doesn’t want to be in this crowded family event, means they don’t care about family, or they don’t like family traditions or, some big story when it’s really just, it’s a lot of stimulation or it’s a lot of people trying to talk to you and it’s overwhelming. And so, just leaving space for everyone to be themselves. It’s kind of great.
Well, this has been so much fun and we hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an aha moment like I did, or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network.
It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. You can learn more at living joyfully.ca/network. We hope to meet you there. Thanks for listening, and we will see you next time.
Bye bye!
EU376: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: Weaving In Our Needs
Dec 05, 2024
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and we’re talking about weaving in our needs.
When we first come to unschooling, it’s common to start questioning the traditional roles of parent and child. Maybe we go from seeing adult needs as the priority and then we swing on the pendulum over to meeting all of our children’s needs as the priority and let ours fall by the wayside.
But eventually, ignoring our own needs is a recipe for burnout and resentment. We can work to incorporate everyone’s needs into the family conversation, because we are all different and all of our needs matter.
This was a really fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hi to you both.
We are going to be diving into another unschooling stumbling block today, which is weaving our needs into our days. And I think this is a big one. I remember this one. And while as always, it’s not cut and dried, it is definitely an important part of just living together as a family and noticing overwhelm, hopefully before it becomes burnout.
But before we dive in, we want to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. There is just so much value in doing that deep personal work that the unschooling journey asks of us in community, because while everyone’s journey is definitely unique, we all face similar obstacles and challenges and stumbling blocks, and that’s where the power of community shines.
In the network, you can learn from the experiences of other unschooling parents. Draw inspiration from their aha moments, gain insights from the unique and creative ways that they navigate both their own and their family’s day-to-Day needs. It is a conversation that comes up very regularly. To learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes.
Now, Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would, I’m glad we’re talking about this because you’re right. I think it’s an important understanding and really it’s a paradigm shift when we’re moving to unschooling or more connection-focused parenting, because typically we’re a very adult focused world.
The needs of adults tend to get the most attention, and kids are kind of along for the ride. We hear things like, they can adjust and then their resilience is praised and adults know best anyway. And all of these kinds of pieces that we’ve all steeped in and heard in our own childhood.
But once you open your mind and heart to really seeing children as fully formed humans on their own journey, it brings everything into question. We start to see how often kids are discounted, how their feelings are dismissed, and how they aren’t trusted to know themselves. Letting go of those ideas and seeing children as capable and trustworthy, it’s beautiful. It’s a powerful shift along the journey to prioritizing connection and supporting autonomy.
I do think we have to be careful because while it’s great to notice and correct for this power imbalance, we don’t need to tip too far the other way because we’re still imbalanced. We’re still actually in that whole power paradigm, it’s just another person feeling disempowered.
So sometimes, that pendulum swing to the other side is necessary to find the center ground that honors all the parties involved. But we don’t need to hang out there too long. And recognizing we’re hanging out there, I think, can be really important to making that shift to everyone’s needs being valued, because when we find the center, we realize that everyone can have their needs met.
It’s not a race, it’s not a competition. We can create an environment grounded in trust and understanding that all of our needs are valid and together we can find a way. I feel like there are a lot of aspects to dig into, but I’m going to stop here. And Erika, we’ll go to you. What bubbled up for you when you were thinking about this idea?
ERIKA: Yeah, I really saw that same pendulum swing idea when I was reading about this topic as well, because as we’re growing up, we don’t have any power. We can’t wait to be an adult because then finally we get to make our own decisions. Our needs will finally be important. We’ll finally get our say.
And so it could be natural to step into parenthood with that view of, now, finally, I’m in charge. My needs are the most important. And then when we start to notice how different our children are from us, how much they already know about themselves, and if we’re curious about giving them their autonomy, I do think it can be a huge pendulum swing to, oh my gosh, I’m just going to support all of their needs all the time, and I’ll just forget about mine because I’m an adult.
I can handle it. So, I do think that can be a recipe for that kind of martyrdom and resentment that can start to come up where we think, I do everything for them and I never get to meet any of my needs. And that really is not the goal of unschooling, to have that feeling that I never meet my own needs.
And so I do think this is a paradigm shift to, we are all humans. We all have needs and we all can get our needs met in this kind of community, in this family. And so, it’s kind of revolutionary and I think it’s a journey to get from, I’m the boss to, my kids are the boss to wait a second, there is no boss. We’re all working together. And it’s just so valuable once you can get to that place.
PAM: I do love that there’s just the imagery of the paradigm and the pendulum swing. Right? And I encourage people to use such loving language for themselves, right?
Not like, oh crap, I went too far, or I’m not doing enough. The way we are using it as something that we’re recognizing, using it as a clue. Oh, okay. This is something that I want to think a little bit more about, that I want to consider some more. That’s one of the things we love about this podcast is just sharing some observations and some stumbling blocks that we have seen along the way that people kind of bump into, stumble over, that are great clues that there’s something more that you can consider here.
And as you guys were talking, something that bubbled up for me, another consideration as we’re trying. I swung really far and I am quite happy with supporting my kids and everything, but I’m starting to feel overwhelmed. I’m starting to feel like nobody hears me, nobody considers me.
I am feeling exhausted, maybe a little bit mildly, like all those pieces, and I want to come and find a way to bring my needs into the conversation. One thing that I think is really important or valuable, helpful to consider at that point is the idea of fairness, because bringing our needs back into the conversation doesn’t mean, well, I did three things for you, so now I get to do three things for me.
That’s another layer that’s just going to interfere with figuring things out. Because now I need to start thinking about, what are my needs? And then you’re thinking about expectations. You’re thinking about those societal conversations like, is it that I need to go to the spa once a month?
But no, it can be, what is it that I actually need? What is it in this particular situation? What is more fundamentally my personality, that I feel like I’ve been dampening? What do I need to bring into the conversation in an ongoing way? Is it certain situations or environments or places that trigger something for me?
We talk quite a bit about narrating, that’s where that can start to be helpful in sharing. So it’s not that I need to bring my needs to the table all the time. It may be that I’m just sharing these pieces of me, so that other people get to learn a bit more about me. Because if I’m just taking care of everybody else’s needs, nobody’s learning much about me, right?
That is part of starting to bring things in but not like tit for tat I did this, now you get to do this. It really has so much to do with people are different and what our fundamental needs are and seasons because there are seasons where somebody might have a heavier load of needs for a while, right?
And it’s not wrong to consider that and make choices with that in mind as well. There’s just so much in there, isn’t it?
ANNA: There’s so much and I love that because fair is not equal. So, watch for those kinds of old tropes that we can bring in, that can end up again being a disconnect. But I actually think that one of the first steps for us in this process is to really tune in and understand what our needs are, be able to articulate them because if we think back and we were children in an environment where our needs were not valued or really taken into consideration as much,how we didn’t even learn to express them. And so what can tend to happen is that it builds up, it builds up, it builds up.
This is regardless of unschooling, and then it comes out as this explosion of you’re not helping me or nobody’s hearing me because maybe that’s what it sometimes took in childhood, the big explosion to get the attention. And so what I love about this is it’s just this time for introspection and learning more self-awareness.
And recognizing this is niggling a little bit, or this isn’t feeling good. Or watching for some pebbles of feeling more tired, or feeling not as engaged and what do those things look like? And then being able to narrate a bit more. I love that you mentioned that because I think it’s so important because that’s how we learn about each other.
And then also, again, just to be able to articulate because that’s what this process looks like when you get further down the road is just everybody being able to, casually without energy, articulate their needs. It doesn’t have to be a blow up.
It’s like, Hey, this is what I’m feeling now and this trust that we can develop that these other people care and we’re going to figure it out together. It’s not that it’s one or the other. And so, yeah, I think that’s going to be really interesting. But I do think that’s the first place to go is really, What are my needs and what do they look like?
And I love the piece that you said, Pam, about, don’t borrow your needs from what society’s telling you your needs are. Things like, you need to have date night, you need to go to the spa once a month. You need to do all of this stuff. Maybe, maybe those are things that feel good to you.
But those two particular things did not feel good to me, so that wasn’t where my needs were. And so, you really have to shut out the noise to tune in and know yourself. I’m an introvert. I need this time. What does that look like? What fits within the context of my life, where it is now and this season?
Which I think is very valid because it changes. We’ve seen lots of seasons over these 20 some years of kids. I love just digging in and learning more about yourself because I feel like sometimes we haven’t really been given that opportunity at all.
ERIKA: Right, right. I think that’s why it’s such a big paradigm shift or so challenging in the beginning because we’re not really tuned in. We may be more in the role of parent than tuned in to ourselves as unique individuals and thinking about how people are different. But I just love that as we start narrating, even for ourselves, telling ourselves what we are feeling and what’s going on for us and just recognizing the context of the moment. It’s just so valuable for us to learn about ourselves. And then it’s little clues that our family is learning about us as well.
If I can start my saying, I didn’t get great sleep. I’m thinking we need to keep meals kind of simple today. That’s a little thing that I can say in the morning that just gives everyone the idea of, okay, we’re not making the lasagna, but then it’s not a big deal. We will do it on another day when I have more energy. But just giving them a heads up about my context and how I’m feeling.
And then you’re right, that then everyone else starts to learn or say, okay, I can do that for me too. You know what, I’m feeling really grumpy about this. I am not in the mood for that anymore. The more individuals you have in your family, the more complicated it can get. But even with just my family of four, we all thought we’d be in the mood to do this, and then something comes up, someone’s not feeling good, or someone’s feeling like they need some rest or whatever it is, and so just the more we can talk about that, the more I think everyone’s needs kind of weave together.
And I love that the title of this one is like weaving in our needs. Because that’s what it feels like. It’s not something that we can schedule everything well in advance. Because the context of the moment is what determines what I actually need.
PAM: I love that. That’s beautiful. Okay, I’m going to try and remember the two things that bubbled. Number one in us not even often recognizing our needs at first. And knowing there’s a need and meeting a need, those are two separate things, but I think something we’ve been talking about in the network lately, is our kids as our guides, and I was thinking of the pendulum swing and not being hard on ourselves if we have swung really far.
And I love just that whole power paradigm thing. But if we swung there, I think our kids can be great examples of sharing what they need. Right? So they will tell you, I don’t want to do that, or I need to do this, I need to do this. The language depends on their age and all that kind of stuff and personalities.
But I feel like often they are just more grounded in knowing in the moment what their need is. So sometimes they are just a great example to look to and just say, well, if they can express it, maybe I can express it. Ooh, they know what they’re needing in this moment, and we see the context of the moment too.
And that’s all interesting fodder that we can use to think. And for ourselves, like we were saying to even discover what our need is, there may be a moment where we’re feeling off. We’re feeling a little gnarly. It’s like, oh, is that low energy? Is that because what I’m being asked to do is something I don’t really like to do? There could be so many reasons why we’re feeling off in that moment, and it is so worth understanding because we can’t meet that need until we really understand what it is. If we think it’s because we’re exhausted and we get more rest, et cetera, and then it still bothers us next time. We can keep exploring. Try things, play with things, but what we’re doing is learning about ourselves and that increased self-awareness is so helpful.
And I too love the weaving in our needs because truly, like you were saying, Erika, we can’t know ahead. We can in general know that we enjoy things and they will fill our cup, et cetera, and so we can try and find work time, making space and time to do those things. But it doesn’t mean that until that thing happens, I just have to grin and bear it right until the next time I can go to the coffee shop with my friend.
And again, there’s zero judgment on whatever refills our cup or that we enjoy in the moment, anything that brings us energy. But it’s funny at what actually works for us as an individual and then finding ways to weave it into the little things even into our days, whether we have younger kids, older kids, etc.
Maybe somebody’s going through something and there’s lots of heavy conversations. In those times, even especially, it’s important to weave little bits of meeting our needs, little bits of self care, like all those pieces in. And so to not put all this pressure on these bigger things to meet our needs, but rather notice, what if I have my favorite tea or if I go for a walk around the house or if I read two pages of my book? What are the things that just help you ground and recenter and feel a little bit cared for, and then you can share that with the people around. I’m going to go sit and read my book for 10 minutes, then I’ll come and help you with this thing. It’s those narrating pieces.
Because when you weave it into your day, it’s like an ongoing thing of value, versus, you can do all you want to me, I will do everything. And then once a month I get to go off and do my own thing. That really doesn’t work long term, and really doesn’t help them understand the other person. And the message is they need a break from us. Because we’re a lot.
But then of course when we’re there, it’s almost like they need more, right? Because it’s like, okay, well I know that they’re there for me. I’ll get them to do all the things. because then they’ll get their escape. It’s just like a different message than just weaving in our needs
ANNA: It’s a very different message. And it was funny because I just jotted the note in front of me while Erika was talking. The pressure that it puts on that time. If it’s going to be this time away. Or this thing, where everything has to be perfect, right? We feel this tension about making it the best we can because it’s going to be the thing that has to refill our cup.
And what we’ve learned so much and talked about so much in the network is that it really is those little moments that actually do so much more for our nervous system and for our ability to be present. And what you just said, Pam, was important to me. I didn’t want that to be the message, that I need a break from you because that seems to put some kind of responsibility on them too, that they’re too much or there’s something wrong and it’s like, no, I need to figure out how to take care of my needs.
And so switching gears just a tiny bit, going to the practical, I think one of the things that helps with this is to not have that specific outcome in mind. So not thinking that self-care looks like this, or meeting my needs looks like that. So if we take even a specific need, you know, it’s like, okay, there’s different ways to meet that.
This is one you and I have talked about before, Pam, but we both liked writing, and in my head, writing before I had kids was a long block of time with nobody around me. Often it was late at night and it was quiet time and the house was quiet or the apartment was quiet.
Then I had kids and that time didn’t exist. There was a part of me that thought, I guess I’m not writing anymore, or that’s not going to be a part of my life anymore. But it’s opening to actually, what can I do? And it ended up being shorter articles or different things or journaling and I realized, I can fit this in.
But when I was so fixated on it had to look this one way. I ended up feeling disappointed. I probably had an energy about it. It didn’t feel good. And so really letting go of the specific outcome to get into what is it that I enjoy about the particular thing, whatever it is, what is it about it that feeds me?
What is it that I really enjoy? And so for me, it’s playing around, intellectual thought, thinking and putting something down on paper and being able to explain something in a way that makes sense to me and to other people, that’s really fun for me. And so, okay, I can still do that. And so I think that’s a practical piece of it, is to really watch for those set outcomes so that you can get more creative.
That’s what I love about this process when we’re involving everyone, we’re creating this climate of being creative and solving for these different needs in different ways. And you see it play out with every member of the family, and that gets pretty fun.
PAM: Can I jump in for a second? Because what bubbled up for me there too is the value of our environment.
So, part of it is figuring out what was it that I liked about the thing. Because I’m like, oh, okay. I really enjoyed this thing. And it was writing for me too, that was a big one. And then it’s like, okay, but what is it that I enjoy? I’m all disappointed because I can’t make it look the way I feel like it needs to look for me.
But once I can move through. Then let’s be a little bit curious, a little bit creative. Let’s brainstorm some ways. And for me, it’s useful to brainstorm as in specifically not discounting every idea I have immediately, before I start to process and discount things. I like to have, I don’t know, at least 10 or 20 ideas in front of me because then they run the gamut, right?
That just kind of breaks the ice for me. I really want it to look this one way. So, that is super helpful for me, the brainstorming piece. Then thinking this way might work. And then it’s setting up my environment to make it as easy as possible for me to pop into that.
Because typically, especially with younger kids, but having kids, your pockets are typically smaller. Like you were saying, late at night or early in the morning while everybody’s sleeping. I remember you talked about Anna, about having your guitar close by.
And I would have my headphones and I had my desk. One of my ideas was I’ll just put my desk downstairs and people will know where I am and they can come. But, oh my gosh, after about a week, that did not feel good. To me, it just felt two separate, too disconnected. So then I popped it up in the middle of the house where everybody was going to be wandering by, and I had some headphones, right?
That way, I wasn’t distracted by every little noise that I heard of somebody playing or whatever, whatever. But they could easily talk to me, they would see me. I would see them walking by and they could grab my attention easily if need be. What we’re doing is sharing our needs. Just by the fact that we’re setting up our environment.
If you want to go write for half an hour, because I know I’m going to be playing away. Our family, our kids want to support us. In the seasons that they can when their needs aren’t heightened or anything, but when they know and when we’re setting up our environment for that it’s obvious, right?
And they’ve got their toys out, they’ve got their things all over the place. Our things can be part of the family too. And then it’s just all of us weaving throughout the day doing the things we want, coming together, splitting apart, maybe a couple over here, just weaving our days together to meet those.
And you know, we feel more seen and heard when our things that we like to do are actually seen by the people and appreciated. Not that we expect them to do them with us or have the same interest, but we can all appreciate everyone’s interests, understanding that we all have things that we like to do. That makes sense.
ERIKA: Anna, when you were bringing up the creativity, it was funny because the note I had written that I wanted to talk about next is that, the creativity that I think this requires in order to meet four people’s needs in a family. We have to be creative about what that can look like.
And it can’t just be one person with the vision of what it should look like with all the ideas and then everyone just follows along, because that isn’t everyone getting their own needs met. And so I think when we talk about everyone’s different needs and meeting them, one thing that can be a stumbling block too, is just the feeling of well, my need is for you to do this.
And so, when we start labeling that our need is for people to do something differently or something for us, then we’re losing the point of the need. Iit is my need and maybe there are people who can help me meet my needs but we can be creative and figure out a way that works for everyone.
That’s not my need, if it is requiring you to do this. I forget what we call that, but basically like it can go from talking about needs to really just trying to control everyone to make the environment the way that feels the most comfortable to us, you know? And so if my need is for quiet, my answer could be for everyone to be quiet.
But really, if I’m creative and if we come up with a family solution that works for everyone, it might not be that they’re quiet. It might be that I find a different place to be or headphones like you’re talking about before. There’s lots of different options. Once we can open up to creative problem solving, rather than just going in with, my need is for you to not need me right now, or whatever might come up in our heads.
ANNA: But I think that’s about not really being able to articulate our needs, not really understanding the process of what our need is and that we’re responsible for it. And I think that’s a practice thing, you know? I think that really, that’s almost that little red flag or reminder that I still have some more work to do to figure out what my actual need here is. Because if it’s to control other people and that’s going to make me happy, you’ll find that that’s a slippery slope that doesn’t really end up working out like you think it will.
But when we can be real clear about what’s happening, we start to see other options. I think also what’s important about that piece is when we put it on someone else, we can be met with defensiveness or it sets up a dynamic that doesn’t feel as good.
But when I can say, gosh, my head is hurting and I just feel like I need quiet right now because it’s just been such a long day. Then they’re more inclined to say. Oh, I want to help you with that. I can see that you’re hurting or that that doesn’t feel good, but if I’m like, you are too loud, you need to quiet down without giving information about what’s happening for me, then it becomes, okay, wait, you’re saying there’s something wrong with me. You’re saying that I’m doing something wrong or bad, and it creates that defensiveness, or either shame depending on the personality and the child. So just that extra step to really own it is so important. But I think we don’t do that because we haven’t felt our needs were valid.
So, it’s a hard place to go to say, is this need of mind for quiet valid? It’s almost easier to lash out with more of an anger or control piece because that may be what we’re used to seeing. So it’s cool to unpack that and see what’s really happening there?
ERIKA: Yeah, that was just making me think that it’s part of the pendulum swing too.
When we get too far over, now the kids are having most of, or all of their needs met and we’re ignoring ourselves and trying not to have needs. Then we get that agitation and resentment and then it comes out as, you guys need to do this, you need to stop doing that. Stop being loud, go to sleep, all these things.
I think it’s just kind of getting into that more middle spot on the pendulum where it’s not about controlling the other person, but I’ve been resourcing myself enough that I’m not having those explosions of everyone here needs to change what they’re doing because I have a need right now.
PAM: So often those explosions are out of the blue to them, right? Because we’re trying to hold it back, hold it back, hold it back, and then it just comes bubbling out and they’re like, what the heck? We’ve been doing this for 30 minutes and now all of a sudden it’s bothering you. And then if we don’t give the context, it’s like, oh, is it about me?
There’s just so many mixed messages that can happen there. And yeah, let’s get back to that pendulum swing, and I think what can be really helpful. What I found helpful is as I’m trying to explore and find that middle rhythm, it really was as I’m trying to figure out my needs, it really was bringing that playful attitude to them because it’s like, okay, I think this is my need, and I think something like this will help.
And then we have that conversation. And like you’re saying, not with a specific outcome, but with understanding. Do you have any ideas on how this can help? That doesn’t mean that’s an answer forever. Whenever we find ourselves in that same situation, like you said, we just may discover, oh, you know what? That didn’t really help as much as I thought it would. I don’t feel as resourced. I don’t feel like my need was met.
Oh, maybe I hadn’t identified it quite yet, but we’ll be sitting there stewing for ages forever trying, if we wait until we are sure we’ve got to the root of our need. It’s okay to play with it a bit and to bring that lighter energy to it because it is just so much easier to have a conversation about this with someone who is energetically lighter because when the conversation’s heavy, it can feel like it’s a yes or a no kind of thing.
It doesn’t feel like a brainstorming conversation where everybody’s going to be heard and considered. It’s more of an energy okay, we can keep sharing ideas, but until they match the idea you have in your head, you’re not going to agree to it anyway. So why bother having that?
ANNA: That’s my mother-in-law. She keeps asking the question until she gets the answer she wants. So yes, and it’s hard and you can see where she’s coming from, but it’s so hard to have that discussion because it’s not a back and forth. It’s not a, how are you feeling about this? What can we do? There isn’t creativity to it.
It really can feel fun when we are just figuring it out and sometimes it’s hard. Sometimes there’s high emotions because people are feeling very attached to what they need to do in that moment, or the timelines feel pinched or tight, but there is just this underlying trust of, even if it’s hard in this moment we’re going to figure it out. We’re going to keep at it. We’re going to stretch the timeline sometimes because sometimes we can’t do everything in one moment, but we can do it over a series of time.
I think sometimes for our needs too, looking at the seasons is important and maybe there’s something I’m interested in doing that doesn’t fit this season, but what else could give me a great feeling or could be fun or stimulating for me that does fit into this season?
So it’s not over attaching to one particular way. That’s what I think you’re talking about Pam. The playfulness and creativity comes into play. And again, that being modeled, that happens for everyone. So, then if you had a child that’s focused on doing this one thing with that as the culture, they may be able to say, okay, I really want to do that, but I guess I can wait till Saturday when we have more time or your partner’s here, and let’s do this other thing now.
And because they know we’re going to follow up, we’re going to find a way to do it. And we want to do that for ourselves as well. Just know that we’re not going to keep stuffing the needs down.
We’re going to keep looking and finding those creative ways that fit in our family at this time.
ERIKA: I just want to bring it back one more time to make sure that we’re really digging down though to know that this is our need and not the role of the mom that I’m supposed to be or whatever other kind of external things we might have.
Because I think it could be super distracting to be like, I need to be doing these million things in December to get ready for the holidays because that’s what a good mom would do or whatever kind of ideas we might have in our minds.
So really tuning into, what do I really love? What do I really like? What really fills me up? And then encouraging everyone else in the family to do the same. That’s when we really get to the real needs.
PAM: The why behind it. I think that helps. I will remember to link in the show notes, I have a blog post called, Are You Playing the Role of Mother?
It kind of digs into that. It’s really interesting stuff to think about. I love that. All right! Thank you so much for joining us, everyone. We hope you enjoyed our conversation around the value and the importance and the playfulness of weaving our needs into our family’s conversation. And if that’s whet your appetite to explore it more deeply, we invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network.
Imagine no longer feeling so alone in your family’s choices. Imagine being part of a group of like-minded individuals who acknowledge and encourage, and encourage you as we walk alongside each other on this amazing journey. We are so excited to welcome you. To learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes. And wishing everyone a lovely day. Bye! ERIKA: Bye! ANNA: Take care!
EU375: Supporting Our Children’s Inner Voices
Nov 21, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika dive into supporting our children’s inner voices. External messages and cultural roles can disconnect us from our internal wisdom and knowing. Our unschooling lives give us an opportunity to provide time and space for our children to really tune into their inner voices, and showing them that we are curious about their opinions and letting them know that they know best about themselves can lead to increased self awareness and stronger relationships.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Larrichia and Erika Ellis. Today we’re going to be talking about allowing space for our children to cultivate their own inner voice. Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would love to. This is fun because I know that I have mentioned my own children’s inner voices many times on the podcast before, and I think cultivating the space for them to tune into those inner voices is one of the most important things that I can do as a parent.
So when we talk about our inner voice or our children’s inner voices, I think it really relates to the idea that people are different, which is something we’re always mentioning. Our thoughts and our feelings, our bodily sensations and so much more, are unique to us individually. And so, the inner voice is messages from our thoughts, our feelings, and our bodies that tell us what feels good to us, what works well for us, what makes sense for us.
It could be described as our intuition or our gut, like the phrase, listen to your gut or our heart, like the phrase, follow your heart. But the key I think, to all of these is that it’s so internal. It’s unique to us as individuals and no one else can know what our inner voice is saying, but us.
And so, if as parents, we’re constantly telling our children what they should feel and think, or implying that there’s a right way to feel and think about things, our children can become disconnected from what they feel and think for themselves. And I think it’s a pretty common experience in school to kind of lose touch with that inner voice because there are just so many external voices telling children what to do and what is best and what is right.
And so, when we’re talking about unschooling, that is one of the really valuable things I think that we can offer our children is that space and time to cultivate that inner knowing and really encourage them to tune into that inner voice, reassure them that everyone’s experience is different and that they’re the ones who truly know themselves deeply.
And I think having someone there who really believes in their ability to make decisions and believes that they can tune into what works for them, is just super empowering for children as they grow and learn. So, I’m excited to talk about this.
PAM: I’m thinking back to when the kids came home from school we were together all the time. When I think about this, the skill I had to learn and really embrace was patience. They left school, so they had that environment. I had relatively recently left work, all those outer voices were strong.
So to have the patience to hold this space for all of us to actually see what bubbles up for us. I mean, it was hard and it was the most amazing and revealing thing. Over time, wow, it’s amazing where we go when we leave space for this. And also it’s amazing the time that it takes.
We were just so used to the busyness and focusing on accomplishing all these things. We want to do this, well, if we want to do this, then we gotta do this, this, this, and this. It’s just so easy to flip into that kind of busyness mode, that accomplishment mode. But to have that patience and hold up that space for everyone, it was life changing.
These are human beings. This is how wonderfully we can move through the world when we have that chance to actually see what bubbles up. Listen to our inner voice, just absorb what’s going on and make that next choice moving forward.
Even when we’re in the flow. To get into the flow of whatever it is that we’re doing in the moment and just to see where it takes us. It was just very beautiful.
ANNA: So many things that I want to say based on what you just said, but I’m going to go in this direction before I lose it, which was, I think a starting point for me was also to learn to listen to my own inner voice. Because I have a belief, I don’t know if it’s true or not true, but I have a belief that our true inner voice doesn’t seek to control others.
And so when I would see myself saying, you should do this, you should do that, that was actually a voice outside of myself that I had incorporated as an inner voice. That was the society or from my family or from people outside of me or from school. I was just this vessel to pass it on to the next generation.
And that’s the piece I wanted to be hyper aware of. And when I really started to tune into what’s my inner voice, what is my priority here? Who do I want to be in the world? You all have heard me say that a million times. Who do I want to be in the world? That really changed because then I could share what worked for me, I could share what was happening for me, but it didn’t have that energy or that judgment of what the other person was doing.
So I felt like by me really becoming clear on what my inner voice was telling me, it allowed the space for those around me to hear theirs. And my children never went to school.
And so what I saw was that they really led the way for me, right? Because I feel like we all come into the world knowing who we are and what we want to do and how we want to move in that moment. There’s lots of growth ahead. Obviously I’m still growing, but I think we really do have a good sense of ourselves when we come in and that kind of gets chipped away at by various environments or whatever we were exposed to.
But I found that they had a strong sense of that. And when I could not be this vessel of society’s ‘have tos’, I learned from them and it just came very naturally.
ERIKA: I love that so much. That’s amazing. I feel like a lot of times we may have something that feels like our inner voice. But once we start peeling back the layers, once we start thinking about where did this belief come from? Do I really believe it? There are a lot of these things that were just super ingrained, since childhood, societal messages and so, starting with yourself and starting with, what is my actual inner voice saying?
It helps me be curious about everyone else’s and knowing that people are different and everyone’s inner voice is saying something different. And when you said that they start their lives with that strong inner voice, I think that’s so true and it reminds me of “difficult toddlers”, you know, once they start to have their opinions about things and it can be frustrating sometimes for parents. They are thinking they have to try to make them do this thing and they don’t want to do this thing.
But if we can trust that they know what works for them and really value learning more about them and being curious about what their inner voice is telling them and taking that seriously, then I think that builds trust. We talked about it recently as well. Just showing them, yes, I care about what your body and your mind is saying about this thing.
If you’re feeling unsafe in this situation, if you’re feeling like this is not exciting for you, this is not interesting for you. Any of those things, where kids may be giving us a clear message of, I don’t like this. If we can show them that it matters. Your opinion about this is important and I want to learn more about what’s going on for you in that situation. I think that will just really strengthen the relationship too.
PAM: Oh yeah. I think it really, really does. It helps them feel seen and heard. It helps us learn more about them and helps them build trust in themselves. And confidence in themselves.
And another thing I wanted to pick up along those lines is when we talk about supporting them and helping them listen to their inner voices, that does not mean everything is going to go perfectly. It’s back to that open and curious and to recognizing that we’re learning about ourselves and we’re learning about things.
We’re learning about our world, our environment, the people that we live with. It doesn’t mean that everything, that every choice that they make is going to unfold the way they expected, right? That’s how we are learning more. I thought it was going to go this way. And it really went in a completely different direction.
And maybe I’m super not happy about that right now. But it doesn’t mean it’s wrong, and it doesn’t mean that I should have jumped in and stopped them from following that choice or doing that thing, right?
ANNA: That just sparked something to me because also the reverse. So, bear with me. The stakes are a little bit lower when they’re younger, and sometimes we’ll hear people say, well, I pushed them to do the thing they didn’t want to do, and they ended up having fun. They ended up enjoying it. And so, that’s an interesting thing because right. And there’s nothing wrong about that necessarily. But I think it’s interesting when you look at it through this lens because it kind of chips away.
And so while you were saying, sometimes they do something and it goes awry, maybe sometimes they make a choice not to go somewhere and they have a regret later, or they think, maybe I would’ve liked that. Or their sibling went and had fun and they feel bad. But that’s learning. That’s them learning about themselves versus thinking, I don’t make good decisions, so someone else needs to make the decision for me. I don’t know what’s best for me, so someone else needs to do it.
So it’s not about the mistake, that’s where the learning is. And so if we can, when the stakes are low, really allow that in childhood, they’re building this resilience, this understanding of themselves how to change and pivot when they realize, I wish I’d done that, or I wish I hadn’t done that, or whatever the case might be. We’re giving them an opportunity to learn more about themselves because the stakes get higher, and what I didn’t want is for them to be second guessing those feelings of safety.
When the stakes are higher in the future, I really wanted them to tune into that inner voice and if it meant them not going to the event with us, which was probably neither here nor there, if that helped them build that understanding of themselves and that trust in their voice, that worth way more than the show or the photo op or the family Christmas, you know?
And so I think just really looking at this broader picture and bringing this lens to it, thinking about how do we develop an inner voice? How do we develop a strong inner voice that serves us? I think that’s really fascinating when we look at these relationships.
ERIKA: Those conversations can be so interesting too. And I’ve had lots of those situations where it feels like there’s something in their inner voice that’s saying they might not be interested in this thing, but it’s not a strong No, it’s a, I don’t really know enough about it.
There’s all this nuance to it. So I really feel like if we can go into the conversations without the agenda of, my way’s the right way. I have to try to convince them as hard as I can to do this thing. Then they might be open enough to have conversations where we can ask, what is it about it that feels bad?
What is it about it that you are interested in? And just kind of figure out what the pieces are. I might have told this story before, but when we were at this trampoline place, I just had the sense that Oliver would love to jump on the trampoline, but he was standing on the edge and saying he could not do it.
And so we just kept watching and looking and I was saying, it looks like you know you’re interested in it or it looks like that might be fun for you. You love jumping, kind of thing. And so in the end he did end up doing it, but it was this whole process of, let me hear the concerns. Let’s talk about what it’s like.
Let’s look around and see how safe it seems. And I think in that case it was probably because there were so many other kids there. And so just reassuring him that I was right there and I wouldn’t be leaving. That was the big thing for him at that time. But I wouldn’t have known that necessarily.
He could have been scared he was going to get hurt or he could have been worried about any number of things. And so I think that’s what’s kind of interesting about this is the conversations and what you can learn about, about your kids.
PAM: What helped me do that was that patience lens. To just be patient. And as I’ve learned later, not having an agenda. Because the conversations aren’t like that. Those conversations aren’t very fruitful if they feel like they have a leading energy, even if we don’t say the words, because the energy is just so big. It’s not just about the word.
So even if we don’t try to convince them, there’s a tone, a rising end to the question. There is just a leading energy when it’s something that we think would be good for them. And the other piece I wanted to mention that I think is so valuable is that we can also feel like at this moment that maybe we’ll never come to a trampoline place again. Like this has to happen now. And the idea, Anna, that there’s plenty of time, your plenty of time mantra, that we have talked about on the podcast before. It’s okay to say no and regret doesn’t mean it was a mistake.
This is all just learning. Next time you can make a different choice. Right? And I think that it’s something that’s beautiful for them to bring with them as they get older and situations become a little more nuanced. Situations may have more implications.
But there still is plenty of time. A similar choice is probably going to come up again. And what you’re learning from whatever your choice is and however it unfolds, is knowledge you will be able to bring with you. The next time a similar situation arises because it really will.
ANNA: Yeah, yeah, for sure. We’ll get lots of chances. I’m going to go back to the trampoline example because I think what’s so beautiful about that is, and I think it can be kind of a litmus test. Is, am I leading them towards an outcome? Am I leading him towards jumping or am I leading him towards understanding himself better?
And that was really what you were describing there. So, I just wanted to put words to it because what you were helping him do was tease out the pieces of, this feels scary, or I’m not sure about that. Or what about this? And that’s helping him listen to his inner voice, maybe giving words to some things he might not have experience with.
But it wasn’t with the idea that I’m going to talk you into jumping because I know you’re going to like jumping. You saw a little glimmer of, I think he’s interested in this. I want to dig in a little bit more. And I think that’s just that litmus test. Do I have this outcome that I think is best or am I really just giving them, like we’re talking about in this whole episode, space to cultivate that inner voice, listen to it, ask some questions, and move forward no matter what, because maybe that time he wasn’t going to be ready. He wanted to take all that in and next time you’d come back he’d be ready to do the jump. And that would’ve been just fine too. So I love that piece.
And I think that’s the nuance of are we leading them towards an outcome we want or are we giving them space to really hear themselves and recognizing that, yes, sometimes, we can all get confused and feel a little nervous about this thing. And then I can talk to somebody that helps me figure out how I’m feeling. So, I think that’s a beautiful nuance.
ERIKA: Yes. And that made me think about the conversations that we have really help us. Even just a regular conversation. So maybe not even in that high stakes moment is what I’m thinking about, right?
Not when we’re standing on the edge of a trampoline, but when we’re just hanging out, having conversations where we’re showing that people have different feelings and opinions about things. People are different. And really talking to our kids about how people are different.
Maybe not even using myself as an example because I know sometimes there’s some weight to that of like, this is what I think is best. Right? And so then kids can be influenced thinking, oh, well mom likes that. But just saying, this guy feels nervous about going off the curb on the street. This other guy climbs up Yosemite with no ropes.
So people have different feelings about safety and climbing, things like that. And so then when we’re in places. Where they’re listening to their bodies and listening to themselves about, does this feel safe to me? They have that experience of some people feel really comfortable with this, some people don’t, and that’s okay.
How do I feel? And opinions about things too, asking their opinions about things rather than saying, this is good, this is bad. This is what I like, and so therefore you should like it. And I really think it’s a red flag that I’m not listening to their inner voice if I find myself trying really hard to convince them to do something.
So, I can recognize that and realize that I have a bit of an expectation. I’m just hoping that they’ll like this thing, that I have stopped listening to what their real opinions are about it.
PAM: I think that is super, super valuable because it does not help to put expectations of perfection on ourselves, right?
It’s like, what are the clues that, for me, I might be pushing past something that I have the intention of not doing. Who do I want to be? What kind of parent do I want to be? Just noticing even after an interaction. Because things are going to go sideways with our kids. They are going to feel like we pushed them or we were trying to convince them even if we didn’t mean to. But that’s a learning experience for us too. Looking at the exchange.
Did it feel like I kind of tipped over a line? How was I feeling? What was it? What was my capacity? Maybe I’m looking for bigger picture patterns in my life, just to find the clues to help me be the person that I want to be. And I want to be someone who cultivates and supports my child listening to and learning their inner voice. I know you’re talking about putting words to their inner voice, because sometimes it’s just a feeling.
That’s what processing is. It’s figuring out and putting words to the things that we’re feeling that are bubbling up for us. Maybe our inner voice is trying to communicate with us or trying to just knock on our brain for a moment. So,I think that it is a beautiful thing to be able to look for the little clues in our lives because they are unique to us.
People are different again. And what are the little pieces that can help me find a moment to just help myself switch a little bit to be more of the person I want to be in the moment because yeah, it’s never perfect. And to put an expectation on our relationship that things are going to be perfect doesn’t help.
That changes our inner voice as well, because all of a sudden trying to meet expectations which are out there or even if they’re expectations we’re putting on ourselves, they’re outside weights that we’re putting on. Right. And that tamps down any inner voices and then we have more work to do.
ANNA: Right. I think that when you have that feeling like you were describing Erika, because we’ve all had it, like I’m pushing a little bit hard here. That’s my cue to ask. where’s that coming from? Because again, I really do believe our inner voice doesn’t seek to control others. I think that’s outside expectations.
I think that’s baggage that we’re hearing. And so that’s my first little clue. And that’s why I say ‘there’s plenty of time’ all the time because it slows me down. If there’s plenty of time for them to try this thing, do this thing, I can slow down and tease apart what are the expectations I’m bringing to it, what kind of outside voices are influencing me in this moment?
And so remembering there is plenty of time is key for me. You two know, I use it all the time to just slow myself down because I can just get on a track and I really do miss the little cues from the people around me.
ERIKA: And I feel like it’s even harder to remember that there’s plenty of time if the decisions feel more intense, maybe things related to their health or things about food or if they’re having an interest that feels scary to us.
These more activating moments with our kids where it feels like if I can’t convince them that I know what’s right, things might just go off the rails. Even in those times, there’s plenty of time is super helpful. And remembering that their inner voice applies to things like their body’s health and what they should eat and what they’re interested in.
All of those things too. And people are different in those areas as well. And so if we can just still keep some of that open, curious mindset, even in those heavier weighted areas that we may feel like we have super strong beliefs about. That’s just going to help them feel supported and know that they can trust us to do this processing and figure out what works for them.
PAM: For me, that’s what it boils down to. That patience lens was so helpful. Plenty of time is helpful. Being open and curious helps me with patience. All those ideas just weave together for me when it comes to helping each person listen to, hear or act from, even if they don’t quite understand their inner voice but to make the choices that feel best in this moment. Within what’s going on for them and what’s going on around them.
ANNA: Because I think that creating that environment is part of letting them know there’s plenty of time. You may be getting some mixed messages inside of you. Slow it down and take your time because your body’s going to tell you, you’re going to learn things and it’s okay to try. I’m grateful for this episode because I think it is really something that we all want, we want our kids to listen to their inner voice.
But bringing some intention to what it looks like to create that space is really cool.
ERIKA: Can I add one more little thing I just thought of?
ANNA: Yes, please!
ERIKA: Okay. So, for those things like health and food and scary interests and things that have weight, but also the expectations of outside people also can feel like a weight.
And so one thing that I want to remind myself is that listening to your inner voice is more important than what some outside person is thinking about what you’re doing. As an example, if they’re feeling like there’s too many people in here and that they need to leave, but this is at a family party, to me, it’s more important that they are tuning into that and knowing that they’re feeling overwhelmed and stepping away, rather than worrying about disappointing these other family members. And so, really valuing that inner voice development in the kids more than what the outside people are saying.
ANNA: And I think something that happens there is we actually give people permission to do that themselves. I definitely would have that with my oldest. I would just frame it like, I love it that she knows herself so well that she needs some space right now.
And I mean, invariably somebody would say. I wish I was better at that, or, there are times I want to get out of here and then it becomes light and laughter. Whereas I have absolutely had the feelings you’re talking about there too, where I’m thinking, are we hurting somebody’s feelings? Is the host going to think we don’t like them?
But that’s outside, right? My inner voice isn’t trying to control anyone and can share those beautiful connecting pieces. That outside voice is when I’m trying to control all the things. And so it’s just that litmus test.
PAM: And those were moments when, over time, where I would just step in and I would just actively share the positive perspective, right?
It’s protective of the person who just needs to do whatever it is they need to do. Also, like you were saying, it’s planting that seed that it’s okay. And I’m almost talking to myself when I am talking about how that’s a positive thing and a great thing to do.
Like they say, I wish I could and I say, I wish I could.
ANNA: Oh my goodness. Okay. As always, so much fun, you two. Thank you both for being here, and thank you to everyone who is listening. We hope you found it helpful on your unschooling journey and just your journey in life in general. And if these kinds of conversations are fun for you, please, please, please join us at the Living Joyfully Network.
We have so much fun and so many interesting conversations. I get so much out of it every day. I am so grateful for it. We would love to see you there and you can learn more about it in the show notes. You can visit livingjoyfully.ca/network. We hope to see you there and thanks so much for listening!
EU374: Beyond the Golden Rule
Nov 07, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the popular maxim known as the Golden Rule, which states, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Once we realize how different people are, however, we can see how treating others how we would like to be treated may fall short in our relationships. We dive into an updated version, “Treat others how they would like to be treated,” which really means learning more about the people we care about. Using this phrase as a guide can serve to deepen our relationships and strengthen our feelings of connection.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone. I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello, to you both. And today we’re going to talk about life beyond the Golden Rule. I’m looking forward to diving into this one. Pam, would you like to get us started?
PAM: Sure. And to get us all started on the same foot, The Golden Rule is basically – treat others as you would like them to treat you. It’s kind of wrapping it up, and I do think that can be a great start on the journey of exploring and choosing how we treat other people.
It’s a reminder to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes to imagine how we’d like to be treated in those circumstances. And that comes with the assumption built into it that we treat ourselves reasonably nicely and then consider doing that instead of reacting more negatively. Right? It is just a nice reminder to treat people nicely, and I think it’s got that nice hook of putting yourself in the situation.
What we want to talk about today is taking that next step beyond the golden rule. I think it is to bring in what is becoming one of our mantras. People are different. Because in some situations, even in many situations, the way that I’d like to be treated may be very different from how someone else would like to be treated.
I mean, as I was thinking about this, it reminded me of a question you asked recently in the network, Anna, how do you like to be comforted when you’re sad or upset? It’s been so interesting to read the replies to that, right? Because while there are definitely some similarities between the answers, there are definitely some distinct differences and so many nuances.
Because we’re real people. So what helps me move beyond the golden rule really is to try to see the situation through their eyes. That’s that next little shift that helps me. So if I was them, what would this look like? What would it feel like? Doing that means considering their personality, their likes, their dislikes, their strengths, the things they find challenging.
All those pieces that make up who they are. And then from there, I feel much better equipped to empathize with them, to validate their view of things. And we’re in that space to share suggestions that are a better fit for them, rather than sharing the things I’d want to do in their shoes. So, it is just that little flip that really helps take it beyond the golden rule of putting myself into everybody else’s shoes and what I would like to happen, so that the world is all about me.
And then recognizing that people are different. And in this situation, what does it look like to the other person?
ANNA: I do feel like it’s a great place for people to start, right? Because it’s that idea of being kinder and thinking, how would I want to be treated?
And that gives you that little bit of pause, which is always so important. I remember when I was first thinking about this, which has been, gosh, like 25 years ago now. I switched it to – treat everyone how they want to be treated. That was my quick around. I love now that we have over the years really gone into what you talk about, Pam, which is again, seeing through their eyes.
Because I think whatever visual helps you to really pull back a little bit and understand them. So, wondering, how do they want to be treated? That’s where we can get curious, right? We can think, we are different and we can leave space for what they want in this moment?
Because that question was a perfect example from the network. Some wanted to be left alone, some wanted to be held, some wanted to be talked to, some to process. And that’s just with one tiny little thing of how do you like to be comforted in a situation? There’s so many ways of how you want to interact?
What kind of jobs do you want? What kind of places do you want to go? How do you like to spend your time? All of these things come into play when we think about how we move through situations differently. And if we are thinking, I want to treat them how I want to be treated, we’re going to miss a lot.
And I think it can actually be really disconnecting, which is sad because that’s not the intent behind the golden rule. It isn’t to create a disconnect, but I think if you think about it, it really can. If someone is treating you in the way that they want to be treated, but it doesn’t feel like they see you or really are honoring you, or know who you are at that moment, it can feel really disconnecting.
ERIKA: Oh, I really like that. And, when I was thinking about the intention that a lot of us have, as unschooling parents with our kids and with our families, we really do intend to have this deep connection, these strong relationships.
And so if that’s the intention, then we have to go beyond the golden rule to really hearing what the other person likes, what really works for them. Sometimes it’s an easier thing to just be like, well, what would I like in this situation? And then we’ll just assume that’s what everyone likes and just do that.
So it may take a little bit more time and digging and curiosity and asking the people, how did it feel when I did that? What would work better for you in that situation? Like that question in the network, How do you like to be comforted is so huge and it reminds me, if I’m sick I want attention and if my husband’s sick he wants to be left alone. And that is just one part of life. This one small thing where if I treat him the way I want to be treated, I would be doting on him all day and giving him a lot of attention and asking him about his symptoms and trying to figure things out. Because that’s what feels better to me.
But if he leaves me alone, which he does, or if I am too in his business, which I would tend to do for him, it’s like we are missing what actually really feels good to each other. I think I could come up with a million examples of just little differences between me and my kids, me and my husband, where if I were to put myself in their shoes, I’m going to make a completely different decision than they will.
PAM: I love that you brought up intention because that’s a really huge piece of it. What is my intention here? That helps me broaden my perspective when I am considering and talking to them and asking them. And we can write stories. If I was putting myself in your shoes, if I’m sick and wanting people to come and ask and to talk about symptoms and to try and help and somebody isn’t coming, we can be telling the story to ourselves that they don’t care. They’re just happy for me to be sick, Versus understanding other people and where they’re coming from. So it doesn’t mean that we’re all perfectly acting. You know what I mean? But it is such a great reminder, even in those moments when we’re literally not connecting and talking to people to understand that the story that we’re writing might not be what’s actually going on.
ANNA: Yeah, that’s definitely where I was going. Which is just, then it creates the stories, right? Then we write the story of what it means, but it’s really the same piece in that we’re writing the story of what would that action mean if we were doing it. So what would the action mean of me not checking on you if I were doing it, so if in your case, Erika it might mean that you don’t like the person. You don’t have time for them or whatever. It might be the reason you would ignore someone if they were not feeling well. But for Josh, that’s not at all what he’s thinking.
And I’m more like him in that I just want to be left alone. I like check-ins periodically if I’m super sick. But not a lot of questions and a lot of other things. Because it just feels like weight to me. But that’s what’s so cool about this is you can see just even this little exchange in conversation, we’re learning more about each other and so when we can bring that kind of curiosity to it and no weight about what it means or thinking there’s one right way or any of those pieces, it becomes kind of fun to figure out and ask the questions.
And I think sometimes maybe we haven’t been encouraged to ask the questions or to be curious. We kind of had this idea of, okay, a person’s sick, you take care of them in X, Y, Z way. Maybe our parents passed that on to us or we got it from movies or wherever. But isn’t it kind of neat to just say, what do you want when you’re not feeling good? And here’s what I want and here’s what I’ve been thinking about and just opening up more lines of communication to kind of understand these deeper pieces. Because I think sometimes as humans or especially now, we may think that people aren’t interested in those things, but our closest people really are interested and I think if we model that, being interested in them, it really can help.
ERIKA: I like rewriting it to, what you were saying, Anna. Try to treat others as they want to be treated themselves. But, right. I think maybe it feels like they would tell me if it wasn’t working for them. You may have to get extra curious and really just check in with the people, which I just think would bring so much to the relationship too. Because that’s the thing that I love about it, let’s learn more about the people in our lives. It’s just so interesting. And the more that we can just be curious and ask these questions, when I did that, how did it feel? And that may feel like a question that has never been asked in your whole life. And so it may feel a little bit awkward to have conversations like that, but it really is how you figure out more about the people in your lives and the people that you want to be close to.
So I think that kind of a shortcut of the golden rule when you’re just out in public, pushing your shopping cart to the side because that’s what you would like for other people to do. Those kinds of things work. But when it’s these close connections and people that you really want to be close to. Then asking the questions and just checking in and giving them the narration of, when I am having this situation, I love it when other people do this or, I really feel supported when you do this for me. Just to give information. I think it’s just another thing that can help us deepen our relationships.
PAM: I really think that helps so much with the connection, the understanding, the empathy, the ability to see through someone else’s eyes more deeply because, we’re guessing, we’re trying. And then you’ve got some who aren’t so much into conversations, so then you’re like trying something and seeing what the reaction, how does that unfold and trying different things.
It doesn’t literally need to be conversations, but the exchange of information being open and curious about it, whether you’re looking for clues or you’re asking questions. I think one little thing that was helpful for me was if someone was sick and not feeling well, when someone’s off or it’s a challenging moment, in the actual moment isn’t a great time to have the conversation.
But it doesn’t mean we don’t, we can talk about it a little bit later and then to be able to bring that understanding next time. When Rocco’s sick, and he likes to be checked on and I’m more of a, I’ll let you know if I need something.
We can make that little joke. It can lighten because, I’m seeing this through your eyes and I want to treat you the way you would like to be treated. And I have the capacity to do this, so it’s a deeper level we were talking about, of those stronger relationships.
To be able to even just on a meta level, discuss this depth of understanding we have of the other person and bring that into the conversation as well, because we can also change over time.
ANNA: Right. I feel like it might feel more awkward than it is. Because as you all were talking, I was thinking I do tend to like to be left alone in a lot of different situations.
But really, I think if someone asked me a question like that, I would feel pretty seen by that. Because it’s not like they’re pushing something on me. They’re asking, Hey, what would feel good to you? Or did this feel okay? Or, this is what I’m thinking or what I like. That would be interesting to me.
That would be an interesting conversation. I might not want it to be really, really long. But I think I would feel really seen by that. So it’s interesting to think even when you know you have a child that maybe doesn’t like to have big, long conversations. Sometimes I wonder if that’s because we are kind of inserting our piece into the communication of that conversation maybe a little bit more strongly, and maybe ‘not liking conversations, is a sign we’re not hearing them.
We’re not giving them a chance to say what’s happening for them. So, I don’t know. I think it’s interesting to just play with the idea. Again, it’s just learning more about each other and learning more about how we want to have these conversations? Is it better to have some kind of trial and error and do different things?
Is it better to have that conversation before or after, or a little bit during, you know, that’s the fun of learning to live with other people and figuring out what makes sense.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that. And it’s kind of inspiring me to maybe ask that question a little bit more often with my kids. Because I think one thing that can happen is, we get in the role of parent or, this is how I’ve always done it. But we know that our kids change as they grow. And so, it totally makes sense to keep checking in. Even if you used to love this, is it still feeling good? Or, I really love when someone does this, how does it feel to you? Just those little curious questions to get to know them better.
PAM: Yeah. And I think I really like that perspective of not just like, okay, I know you now, even with other adults, even with your partner, because I know myself, things change over time. The way I like to show up to things, the things that I like to show up for, the things that have kind of run their course and now I’m not really interested in them as much anymore.
Just helping other people understand us. And just sharing, like you were talking about narrating there before, Erika. Like just being able to share those little pieces along the way so that we continue to understand and even celebrate those changes. Not make someone feel bad that they have changed.
You don’t like that anymore. We used to have so much fun doing that together. I’m going to miss that. Versus really diving into who they are right now.
ANNA: Right. We’re making a big deal otherwise. I just thought of an example from my life. So in the early years, everyone that knows me would have said, Anna doesn’t like to hug. Pam, you probably even knew that about me from 25 years ago. It’s interesting, as I did work on my trauma and my pieces, turns out that I do actually like to hug people, especially people that I’m close to or friends with or really in a lot of different environments. But because it was like a thing, people make a big deal about it – wait! You don’t like that! And so, then it’s just like, okay, nope, I don’t like it. Forget it. It doesn’t give me room to change or grow. And so, I think that’s the piece, right? The open and curious piece of not assigning, whether it’s how we would see the situation or how we think they would see the situation.
Get more information or leave space for it to unfold. And I think that is just worth so much more than just the golden rule and ending there. But I also like what you said too, Erika, just about the golden rule, out in the supermarket. It makes a lot of sense. It’s a very good place to start. I want to be kind to people. I would like them to be kind to me. That feels nice. And then in my closer relationships, in my more intimate relationships, what’s that next step to really deepen that connection and understanding of each other.
ERIKA: Well, this has been a lot of fun. I really love this topic, so I hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an a-ha moment or got some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these types of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. You can learn more at living joyfully.ca/network and we hope to meet you there. So, thanks for listening, and we will see you next time.
EU373: Navigating Disagreements with Our Partner
Oct 24, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about navigating disagreements with our partner. No matter how harmonious your relationship, disagreements will inevitably come up between two people. We share some tools that can help us navigate disagreements and give a few examples from our own lives where these have come into play.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Welcome to you both!
Today we are going to talk about navigating disagreements with our partner because that’s something that happens. We’re different people after all. But before we dive in, we would like to invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network.
There is so much value in doing that deep personal work that the Unschooling journey asks of us in community because while everyone’s journey is definitely unique, we all face similar obstacles and challenges, and I think that’s where the power of community shines because you are no longer alone. You are part of a group of like-minded individuals who are on a similar journey, who acknowledge and encourage you.
As you walk alongside each other you can learn from their experiences, draw inspiration from their aha moments, gain insights from the unique and creative ways they navigate their family’s day-to-day needs and disagreements with their partner. It’s not just about getting answers to your questions. It’s about exchanging ideas, broadening perspectives, and just feeling part of something bigger.
One of our members, Carolyn shared, “The Living Joyfully Network is truly a global community of strangers who become friends, a group of people who are living intentionally, hearing each other, holding space for one another, supporting one another, lifting each other up and inspiring one another.”
And, I just got goosebumps again because that’s how I feel when I step into the Network every day.
So to learn more and join us, just follow the link in the show notes.
And now Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would! I feel like learning how to navigate disagreements is so important for any relationship because there are going to be times when we don’t see eye to eye and finding ways to express our needs and to really hear the other person is critical to finding mutually agreeable solutions and just living joyfully together.
Not surprisingly, I’m going to start with understanding that people are different. We really see the world differently. We prioritize different things. We have different histories and triggers that show up in different places in our lives.
And so when we start there, I think it allows us to not bring defensiveness into the equation when there’s a disagreement. We can be curious like, okay, wow, they’re seeing this really differently than I am, what’s going on? I want to understand, versus they’re seeing this differently, there’s something wrong with me, I’ve done something wrong. This is when we’re making it about us. And so I think that really understanding differences and getting excited and curious about it is a big, big important first step in this idea of navigating these disagreements.
Remember, this is somebody that you love. This is a partner, someone you’ve chosen to spend your life with. And I mean, I want to understand my partner. I want him to feel seen and heard, and you both want to feel comfortable with the decisions you’re making as a family because that just feels better.
It just feels better when you can get to that place of understanding each other. And the tools that we talk about so often come into play. Honestly, I’m not even sure if we can cover them all, so maybe we’ll just pick a few really important ones. The first one that really comes to mind for me when we have a disagreement is validation.
Because that’s our chance to really hear and to validate what your partner is telling you. And remember, you do not have to agree with somebody to validate their experience and you don’t have to change your mind to find a solution. Because I think that’s where we dig in. Thinking, I’ve been researching unschooling for years and they don’t know anything and I’m just going to dig my heels in.
But we’re missing that nuance of what’s happening for that other person. When we get defensive about it, when we dig our heels in. We don’t have to change our mind to really hear. This is feeling hard for you. This isn’t making sense for you. You’re feeling worried or nervous about this.
Validation helps move from that surface level statement to what the underlying needs are, and what I found is that, so often in that space of underlying needs, there’s common ground. We love our kids, we want our kids to feel good and to have a good life. We can find that common ground.
And from there then we’re able to move towards, okay, and how do we get to that? How do we navigate all of those pieces? Remembering that their concerns are a reflection of what’s happening for them. It’s not a commentary or a criticism of you. I think that’s important because it may be reflecting a little bit of disconnection.
Maybe your partner happens to work outside of the home and maybe doesn’t have the connection that you have, and so those concerns are a reflection of that. It’s not a commentary about you, it really is just. Oh wow. They don’t see these pieces. I want them to feel safe and comfortable, you know?
And so I think just that little bit of shifting your mindset around it and moving to that place of listening and validating really can help the energy of those conversations come down and it becomes this collaboration.
ERIKA: Yeah, the defensiveness is the enemy of validation.
That’s the thing that just makes it so hard in that moment. So, noticing that defensiveness in myself as a red flag, this is something where something is triggering me with what they’re saying. How can I move through that so that I can validate?
What people bump up against with validation is ideas like, but I know that this is better. I have to try to convince the other person. I have to try to convince my partner because otherwise, it’s all going to go off the rails. I know that this is important and I need to convince, and so, let me convince. I just need to figure out the right thing to say, to convince and defend my way and convince them.
It’s just the opposite of validating. But we need to remember that validation isn’t changing our mind. It’s not giving up. It’s not like now everything’s going to be just how they want it to be. It really is just about lowering the intensity of the conversation, having our partner feel understood and heard, and really being honest about our own vulnerable concerns and worries too. Because I think a lot of times if my husband has a concern about bedtime or whatever and tells me about it, I probably have concerns too. But my reaction is going to be to defend and say we’re doing this right and I know the way.
But really if we can both come at it as, okay, I have these concerns too. You have these concerns, this is real, and we are having these fears come up and it’s safe to talk about it. It’s safe to acknowledge you are having fears come up. And just really hearing, and validating means reflecting back what they’re saying and showing that you heard what they said and what they’re feeling.
I think it’s about understanding ourselves better, seeing what is a trigger and what’s causing defensiveness in ourselves, and then also knowing that the same thing is happening for them. They’re having their own triggers and having their own things that are being brought up from whatever their past is.
I think just being aware that all of that is happening underneath helps me come to it without that defensiveness. We’re just two different people. We have a lot of history of our own that’s coming into this and can we just take a moment to listen to each other?
PAM: Yeah, In my experience when I was not able to get to that validation place, where I just got stuck in that defensive place, we really were just batting it back and forth, trying to find the right words to convince the other person that we were right.
And it was just however long we managed to stay at it. Us just trying to say the exact same thing in a bit of different words, right? Trying to convince the other one why our way of looking at the thing was better or more right or whatever. And theirs was wrong.
We were stuck in that somebody’s right, somebody’s wrong. Somebody has to give in. Somebody has to win. Somebody has to lose. That whole dynamic. But yes, my understanding of an ability to engage in validation shifted hugely when I realized or learned from Anna and the world at that time, that I didn’t have to agree with what they were saying to be able to validate their experience. That was a game changer for me because it helped me to recognize the importance and the value of seeing situations and circumstances through their eyes as well as my own. Understanding myself to a new level. And triggers, those are always a big piece of it too. Recognizing triggers our own, and understanding they’re from our past experiences and they are our truth, right?
But coming to recognize that their perspective is as valid to them as mine is, to me. Releasing that whole right wrong dynamic and judgment piece is hard. Because the way we see things is absolutely our truth, right? But that was really the way. When the other person, and think about ourselves. When we feel seen and heard, it’s like, oh, like I can put down the shield, I can put down the defensiveness.
It’s like, okay, you hear me. You see my energy in reaction to whatever has come up. And now I feel like I can be so much more open. And I find that when the other person feels seen and heard, like that’s when we can move out of discussions about this moment. Like, we’re not stuck here and actually start to meet each other where we are.
So, that’s what was going through my mind, Anna, when you were talking about our partners being out of the house a good chunk of the day. They don’t see X, Y, and Z. So it’s not me trying to convince them and bat them over the head. It’s me meeting them with, if I didn’t know that, I would think that too. If I didn’t see all these other little pieces, like I can meet them where they are.
And then that’s where our more fruitful conversations that actually make some progress will be. That’s where we can talk about ourselves as human beings, as in people are different. This is the way I saw the thing. This is the way you saw the thing. Again, not right, wrong, not judging, but understanding the different perspectives.
And when we feel seen and heard, we can be so much more open to how things might unfold from there. We don’t have to come up with an answer. I think that’s the other thing in a disagreement, maybe where we want to move forward is let’s keep this in the back of our minds and then we’ll be maybe messaging each other over the next week or two.
Because now that that’s bubbling up for us, we’re going to be paying a little bit more attention. We’re going to be noticing the things in front of us that relate to whatever we’re having a disagreement about, right? And then we can come to a more commonplace together that incorporates all our pieces.
When the energy is down and we’re not feeling that defensiveness, we can be more open. It doesn’t have to be our solution. And it may end up being how we move forward weeks and months, is not the way either one of us first came to it. The disagreement, right? It’s like a new way makes sense..
This makes sense to you, and together we can walk down this path, but when you’re stuck in that defensiveness stage, you’re never going to be able to, or very rarely going to be able to get to the common path forward. The path that works for both of you. And validation really is that first step to take the energy out of that defensiveness.
ANNA: Right. Right. And it does help move us from that black and white right and wrong paradigm. I think it’s so critical and all of these pieces that we’re going to talk about are related, but I’m just going to highlight it. It’s assuming positive intent, which we talk about a lot as well.
And what I’ve found is that it helps give me a little bit of a pause.Okay, let me just turn my thinking brain on versus my defensive maybe more primal brain. I just want to assume positive intent. They’re trying to figure something out.
They’re trying to understand something about our family, or they love their kids, or they love me. And it’s interesting because I’ve had people say. How can it be positive intent if they’re grumping about this or whatever? The next step of assuming positive intent is they’re doing the best they can in that moment.
Something is dysregulating to them and they are trying to figure out how to feel more regulated. Like they’re trying to figure out how, what can I control or do that will make me feel better? So when I can recognize, oh, that’s it. I can have so much more compassion. So again, it’s not about me, that’s information about them and their state of mind and what’s happening for them.
And me actually coming in with that defensive energy can just cause them to double down. Everything just kind of derails from there. And so when I can come from an assuming positive intent, compassionate space. It opens things up and I think that validation is that first step because that’s when we can feel heard. If we don’t feel heard, most likely you’re going to get louder.
And so, if we can feel heard, then a lot of times it can bring that energy down. And when I’m assuming positive intent, it’s easier to validate. For some people this is more of a trigger than others, but I definitely have a friend, who if she feels we are not giving her a generous assumption, it is very hurtful because she knows she’s coming from a place with a big heart trying to solve something.
And so if someone makes a judgment about her, thinking that she’s not coming from that place, it’s really hurtful and it derails. And this trust that we talked about a few weeks ago, it really derails that. So when we can come to someone assuming positive intent, they feel that energy, they feel that connection.
They feel understood and see we are trying, and that we’re trying to have a conversation and we want to help them get regulated and feel better to move through this upset. And so I think for me, assuming positive intent is just, it’s a reminder. It slows me down, it connects me with the person I want to be, which is to show up with compassion for the people in my life.
And so I think it’s another one that I just wanted us to highlight today.
ERIKA: It’s a huge one for me and a challenging one for me. What happens in my life is, maybe Josh will make a meal that has something that I said I don’t like. And then rather than assume positive intent, which is that he’s trying to make a good meal for everyone.
I assume, I write a story that he doesn’t care about me, he wants to serve things I don’t like. I mean, this is when I’m at my low points. So assuming positive intent to me is, it’s not about me. I need to tell people what’s going on for me. People can’t read your mind. That part to me works right into assuming positive intent. So if I haven’t shared that something’s bothering me and someone does it. It’s not because they’re trying to hurt me, it’s because they can’t read my mind. And so assuming positive intent is a way to avoid getting defensive.
And so then that’s the path towards then being able to validate and have more productive conversations. I used to bristle at the idea of it’s not about me because I feel like I just want it to be about me, and why wouldn’t it be about me? Why wouldn’t he know everything about what I like and what I need and be able to read my mind and be able to predict what would be good for me?
This is major work for me to do in relationship, and it just helps so much. If I can think, okay, that’s a different person, not inside of my mind, another person who’s doing the absolute best that he can at all times. And assuming that what he’s doing is, is either trying to help himself feel better, trying to help the family, or just making the decisions that he thinks are the best in the moment. Then I can open up communication rather than shutting down, assuming the worst and getting really worried about everything in that way. So yeah, assuming positive intent is a bit of a growth area for me.
I also want to mention a funny validation story, which is that I was talking to Anna one day and she was giving examples of how she had validated someone else and I was like, oh, I just feel so much better, me in that moment. Just hearing the words of validation, you have so much going on. This has been so hard. Just those things where it really feels like someone is seeing and hearing you. It helps so much to bring people’s anxiety, energy, all of that down. So anyway, I thought it was really funny that you don’t even really have to be directly validated to just have that type of language just to feel so good.
PAM: Yeah, being in that energy really helps the ground. So many things are weaving together. I think we can get caught up in looking for perfection. I remember at my lower points, just watching to see what they would do. The whole reading your mind thing, right? Well, they should know me well enough and I can just count all the things that they did wrong, that they should know that I don’t like that. Just making that bit all about me, but not sharing the expectation that I said this once, three months ago when we were out at a party. Where would this random piece of information about me go in their brain to stay there that now it would pop right back up. Anyway, that was interesting. Thanks for that little trip down memory lane.
But the really important piece I think of assuming positive intent is something you mentioned, Anna. In this moment, they’re doing their best in this moment because assuming positive intent doesn’t mean ignoring what actually happened and just assuming that it was meant positively and perfectly and lovingly. No, it’s what’s happening in this moment and that’s giving us information. Maybe last week when a very similar moment happened they reacted or responded beautifully, or their choice in that moment felt perfect to me. And then why this week are they making a different choice that is knocking me for a loop that I’m not happy with, et cetera. That doesn’t mean assuming positive intent doesn’t mean ignoring those people, those moments, right?
Having that expectation that once they’ve managed to do it the right way, that makes me feel good, so we don’t have a disagreement and from now on they’ll be able to do that thing. But because it is in the moment, it is so important to recognize maybe their capacity is down, maybe other things are bothering them.
That’s why we talk about context so much. So when they’re doing something differently than maybe before, that’s causing us to get our back up. It could just be something completely different. Right? So I found being able to assume that positive intent, even if their initial motivation in that moment wasn’t particularly positive, maybe they were trying to get a rise out of us or whatever, but that is so much more about them and something else that’s going on.
I don’t need to take the bait, so to speak. I can still assume positive intent, meaning that they’re doing the best they can in this moment. So the question becomes more, what is different about this moment? Is something up? Are you worried about something? That can be the direction that the conversation goes versus just the defensiveness. And why did you say that? Or why did you do that? Or, I don’t like peppers or whatever it is. Take the context. It’s not faking it or telling ourselves some erroneous story when we assume positive intent, even if maybe that’s not what they’re bringing because there’s a reason for whatever they’re bringing.
ANNA: I love that because, again, it’s not making it about us, it’s bringing that compassion to the moment. I think we can turn it around because sometimes that’s helpful for people. It’s helpful for me to go, okay, I’ve been dysregulated and I’ve said some pretty yucky things to people that I love and how different it is to be met with, Hey, are you okay? Or do you need something versus, don’t talk to me that way? Or, why are you being like this? Or you’re this terrible person? We are trying to do the best we can and when we’re dysregulated and under-resourced, it can come out in a harsh way. And so, I just want to be able to offer compassion especially with this person that we love and are sharing our life with because it moves us through things faster. Like we get back to our connection point, which is where we both feel safer and more comfortable.
And so it just leads us there, which I love. And now if you’re talking about a pattern of this that goes on for longer then looking at the context of what’s happening, there’s something else. But so often these are kind of isolated events when we get upset.
The next one I want to talk about is no set outcome. And we talk about this a lot when we’re talking about solving things with the whole family. Like when we’re talking about how we find solutions to things when we have people with these different needs.
But I think it really comes into play here because if we’re going into this disagreement thinking, okay, this has to be the solution for us, or we have failed and they’re thinking this has to be the solution or it’s not okay. It’s very hard to get anywhere with that. And this is again, about getting to those underlying needs because we can have this disagreement about bedtime or whatever it is. If we get to the underlying needs, we can often find that wiggle room for solutions.
Interestingly, I have found, even if both parties aren’t in agreement with this, it helps me not to come with an agenda, because even just that calms the energy a little bit. They don’t feel like they have to defend their position as harshly, like you said, Pam, like, how many ways can I say the same thing to defend my position, even if they’re not bought into this concept, but we are talking about someone you love. This is actually a conversation we can have. Hey, we’re going to figure this out. I want to hear everything you’re saying. And this is something we do with our kids too. This is feeling hard right now. I don’t know exactly how we’re going to get through it, but let’s just put all the options on the table because the big piece here is there’s no one right way.
So when we understand that we can, it’s easier to let go of that set outcome or this agenda that we’re moving towards. And when we put it in the context of unschooling, I think it can be interesting because, especially if we have one partner that’s like researching and diving in and listening to all the podcasts and doing all the things.
You get excited, right? You’re excited about all these pieces and you know how it’s going to work, and you know what the best unschooling way to be is. And you can imagine if you step back for a minute, how disorienting that can be to a partner that is not aware of all of these things that are happening and maybe is just getting little bits or pieces and it can actually feel super disconnecting because sometimes, people make dramatic changes as they’re going down this path.
And so the partner’s thinking, we were on the same page here and now suddenly something’s changed. And so when we can let go of that one right way to just to share that this is the piece that excites me. This is the piece that’s really connecting for me that I see with our kids, or that I see in our life.
Then you’re having a conversation versus a bulleted list of what we should do, and then they’re giving a bulleted list of what we should do. That’s the complete opposite. We’re losing that kind of interplay and the connection that probably brought you together however many years ago.
I think it’s just really important to watch for an agenda. Watch for thinking that there’s a set outcome of convincing, because as you said, Pam, we kind of tunnel in on how do we convince and we miss a lot of information about our partner, but also about the context of the situation and our individual lives. Because as you and I, all of us say so many times, there’s no one unschooling family.
There’s no list of unschooling rules. We did a whole podcast series that there’s not and so I think that piece can really help with these disagreements, especially if they’re around some of these parenting pieces or unschooling pieces, It can just stop that charged energy. Just really bring the energy back to, how do we solve this for our family?
Let’s figure out something that feels good to all of us.
ERIKA: When you first come to new ideas though, that excitement is really hard to contain. It’s hard to not just want to convince everyone in the world, like, come on, I just found the answer. Let’s do it. It’s challenging and so to me, no set outcome requires a pause in my own mind and thinking. I need to remind myself there’s not just one way. It’s going to be okay, however it works out. And being open and curious, that’s it. But it is hard. I feel it being challenging in my mind because I will get really pumped up about an idea. I will want to convince, I will want to share how amazing it is. And if I don’t get a response that they immediately see it, it is amazing and let’s do it, Then it can be really hard to move through.
And so, it’s internal work and practices of calming myself to say there’s space for different ideas. There’s not one right way. Even if we disagree, we can move through this. That if he has different ideas than me, that doesn’t mean that my ideas are wrong, but it just means there’s more communication that needs to happen.
So, I really value the idea of no set outcomes, but find it challenging at times.
PAM: Yes. So very challenging. I think for me, part of the work when I’m moving to that, just bubbled up while you were talking, Erika. When it’s that energy that we were feeling, this is so exciting, let’s do this.
I want to talk myself through this probably isn’t the only way to get that energy. What I want is that excitement and that energy and that direction, but like to keep that at the forefront versus the plan, the one plan I came up with to get there. To recognize that there are so many ways and plans and that’s the whole thing. Not holding out that agenda, that set outcome or to me it’s that set path. To get there. When I can be more open to the possibilities. Again, like you’re saying, it doesn’t mean giving in or giving up or, or any of those, common ways to describe it.
But what that does is help, and you talked about this earlier, Anna, is just peeling back those layers to find and meet them where they are. Where is our common ground? Let’s find that common ground first. And then from there we can each feel the next step.
And then, from that common ground, we can so often take baby steps. Steps that make sense to both of us. It’s like, okay, so I see that mountain over there and that’s the direction I want to go. But maybe we’ll like to take this little jog in the path for a little while and jog and jog if we can stay in that common ground and then the baby step, and then see what comes from the baby step.
Maybe then we’re each learning and experiencing pieces and then the next baby step makes sense and the next baby step and then you can look up and say, oh yeah, we’re getting there. We took three steps and we’re a step closer but they’re feeling the same way.
Even if their mountain’s over here and yours is over here, we’re taking baby steps together and coming to a place and we’re both understanding each other a little bit better and a little bit better, because it doesn’t mean that we have to come up with the path and the answer to this maybe huge life changing, decision, choice, disagreement, whatever it is.
We can take baby steps and check in, and we may find that we were just using different words and internally we were a lot closer than we imagined. But especially when you’re stuck in that defensiveness, you feel like you have to go to the opposite because you need more power.
So I need to be so strong to get you to come my way. But maybe I really didn’t need to hold to that so tightly. This little bit. I can do that a little bit. Baby steps kind of became my mantra with my partner.
Okay, well what’s the next baby step that makes sense to both of us, and then see where we are.
ANNA: Oh, I love that. And I’m going to take your little metaphor a bit further. So you’re walking towards your mountain and they’re walking towards their mountain. I love the baby steps, but I think what happens is you make a new mountain in the middle that serves your unique family and then you really are walking towards the same place. It’s not exactly what you thought because maybe you were in this mindset of this is what unschooling looks like, or whatever the thing is, and this is what parenting looks like to them.
But we found something that fits for our unique children, for our unique relationship, and that’s really beautiful. That is just that process of slowing that down. It’s so worth it because this is our life. These are the people that we’re spending our lives with. That is ultimately going to be what defines our life is our relationships and how we are moving through all of these different pieces.
So I really, really love that. I feel like these three things that we went over really give everybody a very big head start into how you could change that dynamic with a discussion that’s maybe feeling charged.
Or even if you’re feeling attacked at first about something, you can see, okay, I can breathe through this. We can figure this piece out and bring that different energy to it. And so, do we want to do like one through a quick example or what do you think?
ERIKA: Well, I had a couple parts of this that I don’t think we’ve mentioned yet and we could do an example of something that comes up. Disagreements can feel huge, something like a major difference in parenting style or it could be something small like the dining room table has a craft project on it. It’s bothering the other person. Little things that can blow up or big things that can blow up.
One thing that I feel like might be the biggest shift to make is to switch from saying you always, or you did two, “I” messages and Anna, you remind everyone about this all the time, but “I” messages are so valuable in these relationships with our partners because as soon as someone says you left this stuff on the table. Why do you always do that? Immediately the other person’s defenses are up. Immediately. You can’t help it. If somebody says you something, it’s going to raise those defenses. And so saying, I am feeling so overwhelmed today, I really could use a clean dining room table to serve dinner helps so much. Your partner can hear that and it’s not going to cause that same defensiveness as, why do you always leave stuff on the table? These are little things, but they can cause days long arguments, just based on that kind of communication style.
PAM: Yes, that is huge. I love that. And that’s such a lovely thing to bring to the whole process, right? I love the distinction you made there between the little everyday things because those can build and build into big, explosive moments. And that’s kind of where we fall into patterns. Because we bumped into it today and we bump into it three days from now and we bump into it at the end of the week. It’s like, oh, you always do X, Y, Z. Right? And that explodes out. But as we talked about a lot with the narration and the I messages, then it’s something about us, and then they don’t immediately feel judged and the need to defend themselves.
They can be like, oh, okay, they’re feeling this. and I wonder where that’s coming from. They can do their own processing to recognize because I always go back to context, but the context for them may be that they had a project out and then some emergency came up and then they got really busy for a couple of days.
So, two or three of our experiences of that are part of the bigger context of something that’s going on for them. It’s not, I’m going to leave this on the table just to piss them off. Very rarely is the choice actually motivated by just to piss them off.
ANNA: That’s our assuming positive intent, they’re not doing it to upset us.
PAM: See, it all comes together so critically. I love how these tools apply no matter the situation, whether it’s a typical one like screens, food, bedtime, and the whole kind of parenting paradigm shift that comes with moving to unschooling and embracing unschooling. To just the little everyday moments of the shoes at the front door and the stuff on the table and all the little pieces.
To be able to take these tools of validation and assuming positive intent in the moment and not having a set outcome. Maybe the outcome in that moment is, let’s have a picnic on the floor because I really need to finish this thing and I’ll be able to do it tomorrow.
But it would be amazing if we could just leave it here on the table for now. I’m not giving in when I choose, let’s like have a picnic. Let’s make the best of this moment. Because that can be fun too, so that we’re not doing it begrudgingly. We’re not doing it with this energy of, you owe me that.
We’re just embracing something different and it wasn’t what our choice was at the beginning, but as we learn more, because we’ve gone through the process of having that little discussion, we can come up with something that seems fun for everybody too.
ANNA: And I mean I’m all about intentional language and so I do think those “I” messages can help.
And again, this works even if you don’t have somebody that understands and uses those same tools because when they come at you with the “you are” message. Then we can recognize that it’s about their dysregulation. That’s where their head is at this moment. They’re feeling really upset about the table, or they’re feeling really defensive that we’re trying to take their project down thinking we’re in the right because we need a clean table.
You know? That’s where if we can use these tools to just assume positive intent, wow. What they said at us was really intense. That’s about them. How can we move forward with curiosity and with validation to maybe bring that energy down?
Because then I think once you bring that energy down, then they’re able to say, I just haven’t had time to finish it. I have had so many things back to back. And then we get more context, then we get more understanding about why it’s there. But again, as soon as we go to defense mode it derails. Ideally we’re talking about this as a family, how to use “I” messages and how to own our pieces of what’s happening because of the things on the table or because of when dinner is or because of what bedtime looks like or any of those pieces.
And so, just think of any example in your head and walk through the same process, whether it’s a little or big, and you’ll see that it can change the energy and you’ll learn so much more about your partner and your kids and so much more about yourself because you’ll be articulating why something’s important to you and you’re having a conversation that looks a little bit different than just making assumptions about it.
PAM: Yeah. I gotta say, one thing that really bubbled up for me. There is that understanding of somebody else and their triggers that can help us nip disagreements in the bud before they even bubble up. Because we can understand the things that are triggers or stressful for them, and we can, when we’re using up the table and we know, we can already narrate that to put them at ease before it starts to bother them to the point where they’re going to need to explode into a disagreement of sorts or like bring that negative energy to it, because then they can see, right? Oh yeah, they’re doing it for this reason. It’s not to piss me off or they have a need for this, et cetera.
And we can do that “I” messaging narrating along the way beforehand too because as we learn more about each other, well this’ll be an important thing to mention to somebody ahead of time, maybe before they see it or as they’re seeing it or something like that. We can even just be sharing our lives together in ways that the “I” messages can help them feel seen and heard.
ERIKA: Right. I love that.
Okay, what about if you have a dysregulated partner and they just come into the room like, things need to change around here. We need to do more things as a family. Why are they always on their screens, et cetera.
What is the first step of validating that person to lower this energy?
ANNA: I think I would just start with, Oh my gosh. Tell me more. What’s happening? I can see that you’re just so upset about it. Has something specific happened? And maybe they’ll be like, no, it’s just everything.
It’s just been all week. All I’ve seen is this and blah, blah, blah. And just say, that sounds so hard. And I miss you, and tell me more. It’s been a really tough week. Maybe we can give some context too, because sometimes that can help. Like I know how hard you’ve been working this week.
I know that the lawnmower broke and then we had this water leak, and I know these things have been happening, and it has felt like we’ve been super disconnected as a family. We can validate that piece. Pull out that piece that they’re wanting the family to get together, they’re feeling disconnected because so often these kinds of things are coming from a feeling of being disconnected and so we can really validate. You’re just feeling really disconnected from us and I mean, gosh, we haven’t seen you all week, or whatever it is.
But you’ll see just the slight change in energy because we’re not fighting them on it. We’re not saying, well, where have you been? Or what have you been doing? Whatever it is. So I think that’s where I start, tell me more. I want to understand. That sounds really hard.
I know we haven’t seen you much or we’re feeling disconnected, or I would love for us to do more things as a family. Because even that, so even we can say, I would love for us to do more things as a family, doesn’t mean we’re going to be turning off all the computers, or we’re going to never do whatever the things that are being stated.
I would always love for us to do more things as a family, find that little piece that’s a yes, and then I think we can get to the solution of that later. We have to bring the energy down so that we can be creative in that moment. PAM: And I find too, especially when they’re coming with the messages about the family, it’s so often about disconnection or they’re not feeling part of the family, they’re feeling disconnected in some way.
So, yes, validating that piece and something that I found to be really useful. What does the day look like? For you, what would a great day look like for you? Like a great moment. And that helps them feel seen and heard when you’re open to hearing, because we were talking about it.
Getting to the root, peeling back the layers, finding the common ground. Because like you said, I love hanging out together and spending time together. And when I can ask questions with curiosity and love to let them explain how they’re seeing things. That’s a common ground.
And then one, the energy is clearer and we feel connected in that moment. Like you said, it doesn’t mean that we have to stop everything else that we’re doing. I just want to be able to hang out with, with child A, B, C, whatever, and, and do things together.
But then that’s when you can start to facilitate. Maybe it’s a board game, because then we can bring our experience as to the things that we already know they do enjoy together. Maybe there is a show or a movie that they enjoy, because when they start to express what connection looks like or feels like to them, then they have opened themselves up too.
Because so often the answer to that is not something specific like at eight o’clock, I want them to come out and ride a bike with me, and then when we get back, we’re going to go get our gloves and we’re going to throw a ball. It’s more like I just want to do stuff with them, right? I want them to enjoy the stuff that we do together. I don’t want to feel like they’re trying to get it done and get away from me. Like those pieces. So that’s where you can move to conversations about what do you guys like doing together? And they can realize the screens don’t become part of the conversation at that point. It’s about connecting, right? Then it can come up there is this show that you guys love, or this YouTube channel or this video game. And then that helps them and you can help them find a way. But the thing is, what you can help them with is recognizing that they do want something that both people enjoy doing. It doesn’t have to look like just their vision. I wish I had a child that loved to go ride bikes with me. We can validate, I know you love doing that. You know you’re a happy person and then you find the things that you enjoy doing with this child and with this child.
If we were feeling a little disconnected, having a pizza night and Mario party where we all came together. It wasn’t about the video game, it was about the connection, about hanging around together.
And the frustration doesn’t need to be part of the conversation per se. It’s not like, no screens forever. You get to the root for them. They want to connect. When we’re frustrated, the always and the nevers come up. The clues when you hear those kinds of words. Okay, let’s just not, we’re not even having that actual conversation right now. We’re validating, we’re peeling back, we’re getting down to what is the root of that always and never. And when they can feel seen and heard around that, then they can be more open to all the possibilities of meeting it and those always and nevers may well be beautiful maybes.
ERIKA: Right. And getting to the needs underneath. It’s just this conversation journey to go on together. But I feel that first step is not making their feelings wrong, not making their emotions wrong. Because when people come into a conversation with that kind of energy, they’re expecting a fight. That’s kind of what they’re coming in for and so if we don’t fight back, if instead you say, It makes sense that you’re upset. It makes sense that you’re feeling disconnected. Your feelings are valid and let’s talk about what’s going on for you.
I think in many cases, people coming in with that energy would appreciate just being able to talk about how overwhelming things are for them in general at that time. Just tell me about what’s stressing you out, because I can tell that something’s going on.
Just the power of that, of us not getting our defenses up and just being able to validate and say that it’s okay. It’s okay to be upset about things. It’s okay to feel disconnected. Figuring out those underlying needs and how to meet them all together with kids and connection. If you really can get to that, I’m just feeling disconnected, then that opens things up.There’s a million ways that we could figure out that problem.
And if you’re willing to do things with the kids that they like to do, you’re going to get that connection back. And so if we have the vision that they never want to do this thing I want to do with them. If I have that conversation and realize. What I really want is to feel connected. I really want to have fun with them.
Then maybe I could go, okay, it’s a little disappointing that they are not into this thing that I’m into, but what if I can try out what they’re interested in and then we can connect in a way that feels really good to them and you. Then you build that relationship and add up those good experiences together.
PAM: Yeah. I was helping them sort their priorities. Like, you love this thing. And you want to connect with your kids. Those can be two separate things. Like I said, you can go off and go mountain biking or whatever it is that you love to do and you can connect.
If connecting with your kids is the priority, find something that you both enjoy doing together. You don’t need to lump them together or kill two birds with one stone, whatever metaphor you want to use. They don’t have to go together so that you can efficiently do the thing you love and connect with your child. I mean, yes, there is some disappointment and we have this vision.
We wish we all love doing these things and we could all do this together. But yeah, that’s our personal journey and that’s what we can help them tease apart, when we get to how we meet our needs.
ANNA: Okay a few things. So then that reminded me. I think the paradigm shift is instead of we’re a family doing all the things, we’re an outdoor family, we’re a musical family.
What if the culture of the family is, we are a family that supports each other in doing the things that we love, because that actually feels good. I think so often with adults that have maybe not been heard when they were younger. They kind of want to be, this is my time, we’re going to do the things I want to do.
But it’s like, oh my gosh, we can all do the things that we want to do and we can support each other and feel connected in that. So I think that’s kind of an interesting paradigm shift. But what I wanted to say before that was just a quick reminder. Because we talk about this with kids, it’s the big language piece.
So when they come at you with that big language, everything’s going to hell in a hand basket. This is the worst. They’re this. They’re never going to do anything. They’re never going to amount to anything. Oh my goodness, recognize that it is just big language for the emotions inside. And like you said, probably so much about the overwhelm they’re experiencing from something going on in their life.
Maybe there’s other things in all of our lives or in the family’s life that’s really feeling hard. Just like with the kids, just let that big language slide over and go, wow, this person is upset. And I want to understand. And when we can change that to just not focus on the words.
because that’s kind of what you were saying too, Pam, that reminded me, when we focus on the words, we actually aren’t getting at what the needs are necessarily because taking the iPads isn’t going to connect them. So if the need is connection, we’ve actually focused on the words and probably made it worse.
And so just letting the words slide over to really hear and validate and bring that energy down gets us to that underlying need.
PAM: I love that. Right. So yes, it’s beautiful. Thank you so much for joining us. We hope that you enjoyed our conversation, our longer conversation this week, and maybe even picked up a nugget or two for navigating disagreements with your partner and generally with anyone in your life that you love.
Wishing everyone a wonderful day. Thanks, Anna. Thanks, Erika. Take care!
EU372: Building Trust with Our Kids
Oct 10, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about building trust with our children. We regularly mention trust on the podcast, as we’ve found that trust is the foundation of the strong relationships that help unschooling thrive.
We had a lot of fun talking about ways to build trust in and with our children. We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello everyone! I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and today I am joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both.
Today we’re going to be talking about how to build trust with our kids. It’s such a critical part of the process. That foundation of trust helps us navigate all that life throws at us, keeping our connection at the forefront. So, I’m excited about this one. Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would. I really love this topic, because trust is something that comes up so often in the podcast conversations, in Network conversations. It’s a big part of what makes unschooling, in quotes, “work”. And it’s a big part of what we mean when we talk about strong relationships that we’re cultivating with our kids.
And trust is really a two part thing. It’s my kids trusting me. I want my kids to trust me, to know that I’ll follow through with what I say and that I will listen to them when they tell me about who they are. But it’s also me trusting my kids. I want to trust that they know what works best for them, that they are on their own path.
And so trust is going in both directions and for me it’s such an important focus to build trust and to avoid doing things that would undermine trust. I know we have a lot of different aspects of building trust that we will dive into. But what came to mind first to me was one of the tricky parts about it, which is that you can’t just say, “Trust me,” to your kids, and then they’ll trust you.
Trust is really something that builds over time and it takes patience and it’s more about our actions than it is about our words, which can be difficult. It takes more intention. And it’s something that comes as a feeling from within the other person, in this case, our kids, and we don’t have any control over whether they’re feeling that or not.
So, we can’t rush the process. It just takes the time that it takes. I think if there’s been a history of us pushing through their consent or a history of my child not feeling heard or seen by me, then trust could take even a longer time to build. I think that each step we’re taking, each intentional trust building step that we’re taking, along that path to being a more trustworthy parent, to being more trusting of them just adds, it’s building that relationship, building strength into the relationship. And that trust will just grow from there, one interaction to the next.
PAM: That was a huge one for me, understanding that trust is something that I build through my actions. I think that’s something that can trip us up, especially in the beginning when you realize, oh maybe my child doesn’t trust me.
They’re not doing X, Y, Z, or acting like they trust me. And that can feel like, oh no. Oh no. But the shift to, okay, I want to be a person that my child trusts, what does that look like? How can I actually do those things? I don’t literally need to go up to them and say, do you trust me? That would be a weird question to ask yet.
It’s one of those things where it’s through my actions and through their actions. That’s how we’re communicating about trust. Versus the actual meta conversations about it. The fascinating thing is the timetable, right? It’s not our timetable to control, even though that’s what we’re trying, we’re trying to build trust with them.
We want them to trust us. And we can even talk about why, when it comes to life, you want someone to trust you so that they will come to you when they need help. They won’t try to figure things out on their own. But same with learning, right? When you first come to unschooling, looking about learning that strong and trusting relationship is so valuable for learning too.
Because they’ll come, they’ll feel more comfortable coming to you with the questions. Instead of worrying that maybe this is a dumb question or worrying about being judged. Thinking that, my mom won’t like that. I’m interested in this thing, so I need to hide that.
When you want a more engaged and open relationship, trust is an important part of it, and to take the timetable out of it entirely. And Anna, you say, be the parent that I want to be now and, and I want to be a parent who’s trusted by my child and my partner. So that’s how this person acts. You don’t wait till they trust you.
And once you trust me, then I’m going to be a trustworthy person. No, it goes the other way. I need to be that trustworthy person upfront and eventually, on their timetable, they will come to trust us as much as they will. And it’s so interesting to see, that’s your feedback from them.
If you see them hiding things more and you feel it’s more out of a worry about your reactions, then you can be a little more cognizant of your reactions. Try to take that little beat and instead of reacting more, give myself a couple choices in this moment rather than just react.
Maybe my instincts are something that I’m trying to move through a little bit.
ANNA: A couple things that came to mind from what you all said. There’s two things I’m hoping I’m going to remember, but one is. I think we can also be paralyzed by this piece of, it’s going to take time and what do we do?
Or there’s been a problem. And so I think it’s really important to let it sink in that this is not about being perfect. This is not about never making mistakes, that it really is about showing up for the repair. Because that builds trust too. When there’s a problem they know I’m going to come back.
They know I’m going to come back and figure out, how do I repair it? And it really creates a climate where they can do the same, because there’s going to be times when they impact our trust in them, but then we know we can make the repair. And so as much as it’s about building trust, it’s about learning how to make a repair too.
And so I think that can lighten some of the panic about, how do I always be perfect with my words? How do I always follow through perfectly? How do I always do this? Let go of that and instead think, how do I just stay connected? You know? How do I make a repair? How do I recognize it? And I love what you just said too there, Pam, about that little barometer, like you’re going to get messages about not trusting, just like I’m sure you can think of other relationships that you’re in where you give messages to someone that you don’t trust them. We can think about how we are in relationships that maybe we feel trusted or maybe we don’t, and kind of recognize how that looks.
The other thing that came up from what you were saying, Pam, that I think is absolutely critical is letting go of judgment. I think our culture is very quick to judge things. It’s kind of a shortcut, right? Like, oh, that’s good, this is bad. That’s this, this is that. And so we make this snap judgment, and I think it’s so important to take that beat, like you said, to just be curious about what they’re bringing to us, because nothing’s happening in that exact moment when they’re bringing us something that maybe feels a little scary or feels like it’s not a good idea.
Let’s be curious. Let’s lean in, let go of that judgment because you’re so right, Pam. And that piece alone, I think does the most damage because they won’t come to us. They won’t come to us if they think, she isn’t going to like it or, I’m going to get judged about it, or they feel like, she’s not going to like me.
Because when we start judging what they’re doing, and maybe this is getting a little off track, but I think it’s related. When we judge, even if they’re watching YouTube or they’re doing something that maybe we don’t understand or like, when we are judging, really and truly kids are taking that in as you’re judging me, you don’t like me. Because I like this thing and you don’t like me.
And so. Really working. And I mean, it was work for me too, to just let go of that judgment and just really have that open and curious mindset. It makes such a difference when we’re doing this kind of cultivating and building trust.
ERIKA: Yeah. Yeah. I love that. And here’s so many places where I think when kids are young Maybe we get into a routine of just making decisions for them. And so I think it can, over time, build a culture of, they don’t hear me.
I think it is important, just as the child gets older and starts being more aware of having opinions about these things. Realizing, I’m different. I have my own interests, I have my own things I want to do. As your child is growing and as you’re trying to build trust with them, things like being honest with them about what’s really happening. Giving them the whole picture rather than trying to just convince them to go on an outing, really giving them the whole picture of this is what it’s going to be like, this is what’s going to be expected of you, and those kind of of things.
I feel like those are the things that really build trust. Where it’s like, okay, I trust that my parent is going to be honest with me and tell me what’s really going on. And I think for a lot of kids in mainstream parenting, that is not a priority.
Giving kids the truth, giving them the whole picture, that kind of thing. Allowing space for their experience to be true for them and not judging how they’re feeling about things. That builds trust. I can come to you and tell you that I don’t like this, and you’re not going to say, yes you do. You always have. Everyone likes this and just blow off their opinions about things. I think a little signal for me sometimes that I am not being trustworthy, is if my kids say, you didn’t tell me that was going to happen. Why didn’t you tell me that was coming up? Why didn’t you tell me we were doing that today?
Life gets busy. Sometimes I forget to communicate everything but that communication and really including our kids in what’s going on in their own lives. I feel like that is part of trust building, helping them feel prepared for things, not blindsided by things.
Being there when you say that you’re going to be there, following through if you say, I can’t do it now, but I’ll do it later, and then following through on that. Those are little things that make a huge difference in building trust and making sure that they feel like they’re a priority in your life too.
And then when you’re trusting in them, that builds their trust in you too. So, I love how all of these actions and these intentional ways that we can relate to our kids, build on each other to create that stronger relationship.
PAM: Yeah. Oh, I love all those, the little list.
Because I think that was really helpful, for me anyway. Was thinking about what actions can help as I built trust. And that was a great list there. And one of the things, and I’m going to pull it out because I think you mentioned it, Erika, but it’s the being responsive piece of it.
To trust that we will help them in the moment, to be consistently available. This is not something that, okay, I’m going to drop everything and, and off we go. As they get older, they’re doing more things on their own.
They need our help less often, but when they need it being responsive in the moment is really helpful. But also as you mentioned, it doesn’t mean dropping everything. There’s context, there’s our lives going on around us. So even if I can help you in 10 minutes. But it’s showing up 10 minutes later, or learning not to say 10 minutes to say when I finish the thing, because I always underestimate how long it will take to do something.
So that’s part of knowing ourselves, right? As we’re talking with them and figuring things out. But that openness is so useful too, because then, even in that sentence, oh, I’m, I am right in the middle of doing this. As soon as I’m done, I think it’ll be 10 minutes. I’ll come and check in and watch what you wanted to share, or we’ll go do this thing, whatever it is that they’re coming and wanting.
Because right in that moment, in that 15 seconds, they recognize that our delay is about the thing that we’re doing. It’s not about me trying to put off. Because I don’t like what they’re asking for.
And like you said, Anna, they will take that personally. If they don’t like this thing that I like, then they don’t like me, is so often the message that they’re absorbing from it. So, taking that 15, 20 seconds to just explain what’s up for us and then following through. Because like you both said, that’s where the trust is built, right? Trust doesn’t mean immediate reaction. Sometimes it does, but trust is like that.
They can trust that what we say, we will follow through on that we mean it, right? And that builds trust. When they recognize, oh, this is about them, not about me. Then they don’t take that weight with them and ruminate for 10 minutes until we manage to show up. All those little pieces are so valuable.
But yeah, it’s not about us being perfect, you know? It’s not about us being immediately responsive. Trust is so much bigger than that, I feel. And when we can understand ourselves that little bit, as well as how they might see it, seeing the moment through their eyes. Like if they come running in super excited and I’m like, oh, 10 minutes, and they’re like, no, it’s happening right now, then yes, I’m going to make that choice.
For the most part, unless I’m in the middle of an emergency, I’m going to make that choice because now I’ve got a little bit more information that tells me the priority of it, right? And I can shift. It’s not me giving in. It’s not me making a mistake in any way. If it goes sideways, we can repair. That’s, like you said, where the trust is actually built.
ANNA: What you’re describing, that narration, I think is so important because when we’re able to just say a little bit more about the steps there, it also helps them have freedom to have more steps. And so it even can be a question like when that comes up, hey, will 10 minutes work?
I’m trying to finish this. Tell me what’s happening, get a little bit more information and have a little bit more of a conversation. And then, like you said, they’ll see. Oh, this is not about her not wanting to do this. It’s about something that she’s trying to finish. But I will say a piece of that too, like just part of my journey, it was really to pause, because I can get focused on what I’m doing in the moment.
It’s a little bit hard to pull myself out. Really, I did a lot of work to be available when they’re coming, especially teenagers. We’ve talked about this before, Pam. Like, when a teenager comes in front of you, I’m just like, drop it. If it’s not an emergency call or something, I’m just drop it and want to be present.
Because what I’ve seen with teenagers is they tend, if they don’t get the response, they just tend to go back off and you’ve missed the opportunity, you know? And so part of building trust is that piece of being available. It’s not about, like you said, I’m throwing away and not thinking about my life.
It really is about priorities and for me, in those moments, my priority was being there for that person in my life, and especially teens I feel like, but really all kids. I feel like teens are going through such a hard time. There are so many things going on with them and it can feel so hard at times.
And so, I think it just felt really reassuring to know I could show up for that and make that a priority. So, I think that piece is important, but that narration of just what’s happening in my head for them is that little bit of a step that lets them know, oh, this isn’t about me.
She’s doing something and then showing up, and then following through, and then sitting down and just really sinking into that moment with whatever they want to share, whether it’s upset or a funny game, or a cat meme or whatever the thing is. Because that’s that bid for connection too, right.
ERIKA: Just being able to be present for whatever they’re bringing, I feel like is a big part of trust with my kids. We’ve had moments in the past where maybe my son will say, I didn’t want to tell you about that because I know you don’t like that. Or I know you would have a reaction to it, and so I don’t want to talk about that.
And so for me, those are little things of like, okay, I need to control my reactions a little bit more, or I’m bringing too much of an emotional response when something comes up. And, so just being more intentional about giving space for whatever they’re going to bring.
It’s such a good feeling to be that person for them that they can come with anything. And so that is something that I focus on a lot and that feeling that they can tell me something privately, something important and sensitive and things they’re still just figuring out and that I can hold that.
And that just builds their trust in me. And the fact that I can it’s okay if they’re upset, it’s okay if they’re angry, it’s okay. I can hold all of those emotions. And so this is, as we always say, unschooling is our work to do this. Having them trust us is a lot our work to do.
Releasing and working through our triggers, grounding ourselves to the place where when they come with whatever they’re coming with, we can be there as this steady presence. I think what you’re talking about with the teen years, that’s just so huge for me with my kids right now who are 13 and 15, they really just need me to be able to be there when they need me, be there when they need to talk something out. Otherwise they’re just going to be thinking of it in their heads sitting in their rooms worrying about things. And so for our relationship, having them trust me with their most sensitive conversations is just so huge.
PAM: Exactly my experience too. And it just felt like the way you framed it as priorities, Anna, which came with kind of the shift in the timetable because when they’re younger, they’re like here all the time and you’re coming across them all the time. But then as teens, even if they’re not literally out and about with other things, they’re actively engaging on their own with other things so that when a time pops up in their day, week, or month where they’re coming to us. This is the opportunity, right? This is the time because there is less time when we can go and interrupt or just engage with them. So it’s less about our timetable and more about theirs. So that is how I easily made that the priority when they came because this is the opportunity right now.
This is when we can connect and engage and I can, for the most part, 95% of the time just rearrange that moment for myself.Whatever I’m into, I can, let that sit for a bit. To engage because my priority is that relationship and that connection. One other piece that I wanted to talk about a little bit was because this trust relationship I find so interesting and their trust in me, I found grew along or I was able to cultivate that better when I was also cultivating my trust in my kids. It’s a two way street. So it was for me, just quickly, one of the things that helped me cultivate my trust in them was just by getting to know them, right? Understanding their personality, their motivations, their goals, their interests.
I could understand them better and their choices. Once I understood them better, things didn’t feel like they were out of the blue so much. Right? This makes total sense for them. If I didn’t understand them, it would be like, oh my gosh that came right out of left field and I’d feel like I was being batted around.
Being open and approachable we were just talking about with teens, but really inviting our children to come to us whenever they want our help and making that a priority for ourselves. And because that’s how we get to know them better, right? That’s how we get to understand what their current motivations are, what their goals are, the things that they’re feeling challenged by or frustrated with.
And by giving them some space, like you talked about space a little bit earlier, Erika, just seeing their choices and how things play out as they explore and learn. If we jump in, even if we’re not telling them what to do, if we jump in with our suggestions, then those kind of end up being the suggestions on the plate.
But if we can give them that space. To come up with some suggestions on their own. Unless they’re literally coming to us and saying, Hey, I’m feeling stuck. What do you think? It’s not, oh no, you go figure that out on your own. But if we don’t jump in with things, we give them some more space and we see how they approach things.
We see some ideas that they come up with. We see how those unfold for them, and we are learning more about them. They’re learning more about themselves too. The beautiful thing, as I deepened my trust in them, I could really see the consistency of their choices and what made so much sense for them. I could see things better through their eyes than me putting myself in that situation. And if I was a kid, if I was 12 years old at this moment, this is what it would feel like. It’s very different for them. They’ve had a whole different life. They’ve had support and love and all that kind of stuff.
But anyway, ultimately what I wanted to get to is what happens is that trust as they get older, as they’re making choices in the future, even if I didn’t understand them in that moment, I could trust them more. Because it’s like, oh, when I know more, or when I see how it will make sense to me because the last few years have not been nothing but out of the blue experiences.
But if I see that time after time, I’ve understood their perspective and where their choices are coming from. In that moment, I can react with so much more trust when I don’t yet understand it, because I know that it will make sense.
Sometimes maybe their trust doesn’t even make sense to them in the moment, but for us to show up, trusting and open and having conversations with them, that will become clear for them too. Like my instinct is drawing me to this thing. I’m not quite sure why I’m going to like it. I can support that. And help them explore it and figure out why it’s calling to them.
For that, my trust in them, it really reflects back their trust in me at the same time. Right. I really feel like it’s a spiral.
ANNA: I want to kind of combine the two things that the two of you said, which is, I really think it’s so important to get to know them because I think one of the common stumbling blocks you see is that. We really do put ourselves with our childhood and who we were in those situations into their situations.
Whether it’s friends at the park, whether it’s some kind of an upset about something, whether it’s some kind of doing something, it is just always a recipe for disaster because they’ve had such a different life than we do, no matter what, even if you were unschooled, which is probably unlikely.
They’ve still had such a different life and so, that time that you’re talking about Pam, to just really get to know them and watch their choices and hear about them and not insert yourself or what your choice would be, and let that unfold is so critical because I think, again, we can bring this energy of, oh my gosh, if I were doing this or if this had happened to me, I would feel X or I would need this. And it really short circuits their process of understanding themselves and understanding the situation. And when I’ve talked to people about this, it really can calm them. They have different tools, they have a different experience, and then we can let that unfold.
What I love is that it’s fun to get to know them. Right? I mean, that’s kind of the fun part of this. Understanding we’re all so different. It really just helps kind of hammer that in. This thing that felt hard for me at 15, actually doesn’t feel hard to them and this thing that felt easy to me feels hard to them.
And so we can share that and talk about it and understand each other. I just think it’s a really beautiful part of it is getting to know who they are and that builds trust because they don’t think we’re trying to insert our way, because it makes no sense to them. Right? It makes no sense to them when we’re activated by something that isn’t activating them.
And so I think that this back and forth trust and that narration can help them understand, that’s about you and here’s what’s happening for me. So yeah, I loved that, that point.
ERIKA: Yeah. This is bringing up, there’s no one right way. Dropping the judgment.
It’s a long game. There’s plenty of time. Because I feel like sometimes in this parent position I can be like, oh no, they’re doing this. I better tell them that’s not good. I better try to make it so that it works out. But then that is just undermining their trust in themselves and undermining my trust in them.
And so, keeping in mind that everyone’s different. There’s not one right way to do things. This is a long game. There’s plenty of time for them to get where they’re going. It just slows everything down for me. I can listen to what they’re saying, look at what they’re doing without rushing to that judgment, giving myself time to get to know who they are.
I love that. Then our trust in them helps them have trust in themselves. It’s all growing trust, which is just amazing.
PAM: Yes. It’s a beautiful circle and I love all those little bits. Like those are why, those are little mantras that we often mention.
Even the group of them worked together so nicely to help bring down our own energy and something you said, let me see if I can remember, Erika, that we are trying to get things to work out perfectly for them. That was another big aha moment for me. It doesn’t mean I don’t try, if I recognize how I might be able to help set something up that will work, that I suspect might work better for them.
I do my best, but also to be able to, once I’ve done that, just release it to see how it unfolds and to not feel like things are going to go sideways. Things are going to go sideways. Like you were talking about Anna before with the repair piece.
There is nothing wrong. We haven’t failed when things go sideways. We will all learn little pieces. Maybe I’ll learn that. Gee, I tried and I set it up this way and oops, that actually knocked against what they were trying to accomplish because I kind of thought it was something different.
I kind of thought it was six months ago, child, and now it’s today’s child who has grown and changed and maybe more internally than I had yet recognized, and this was my moment when I recognize that they have grown beyond that, or they have shifted in what they’re interested in or what they’re trying to get out of this activity.
So we can do our best in the moment, which includes our capacity and all those pieces. And then it unfolds the way it unfolds, and we learn from that and we put that in our toolbox, and that comes with us next time, right? But we can get so caught up in trying to make things that work out perfectly and then feel bad.
If they don’t like it, it’s our responsibility. No, it’s life and things are going to go sideways. And if, if things often go sideways, it’s like, okay, I really have a few things that I am just trying to do repeatedly that are not working. If it’s happening often that’s a pattern and a clue for me to revisit my foundations, et cetera.
But expecting the pendulums to swing the other way and for me to always be on and get it right is an unrealistic expectation too.
ANNA: Right? And I think so much about that when we’re looking at their life. It’s making it about us. Maybe we’re uncomfortable with what they’re going through.
Maybe they’re saying things that, again, are bringing us back to that moment, or we’re projecting it out into the future. But as soon as we start that we’re making it about us and that harms trust because they don’t need to be carrying our weight from our teenagehood. They don’t need to be carrying some bizarre weight we have about being the perfect parent. And if we didn’t, if we were the perfect parent, that nothing would go sideways. That’s so much about us. And so I love that you said it earlier, Erika. It’s just like, this is our work to do. This is our work to do. And in doing that, again, I think our kids really sense that and see it, and I think all the people in our life do when we’re able to just let people experience their life, be there as a support, but not judging, not making it about us, not inserting ourselves in that narrative. I really like thinking about it in that way.
PAM: Love that.
ANNA: Yep. Well, this was fun and I think it was a really important conversation so thank you both and thanks for listening, and we hope you found it helpful on your unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you’d love the Living Joyfully Network. You can learn more about it at livingjoyfully.ca/network. We’d love to see you there and look forward to seeing you on the next podcast. Thanks so much. Bye!
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and we’re talking about transitional ages and seasons.
While there is definitely not one path through childhood, there are common transitional ages where major changes typically occur. In this episode, we talk about some shifts that happen from the toddler to child years, big kid to preteens, teenage years, and moving into young adulthood. Brain development, body growth, and personality changes can sometimes leave us feeling like we’re meeting a whole new person! We talked about how our unschooling lives help support these transitional times, too, with unconditional love, curiosity, and strong relationships.
It was a really fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. And today, we’re diving into another unschooling stumbling block, which is transitional ages and seasons. And I’m really excited for this conversation.
But before we begin, I wanted to give a quick plug to the Living Joyfully Network, which has really been life-changing for me in so many ways. On the Network, we have amazing discussions about so many topics, since our community has such a wide variety of experiences. And I just love the community so much, because everyone there is really learning and growing and being so intentional with their families. And I think it can just be such a wonderful support, especially during this back-to-school season, when questions and fears sometimes come up.
And so, if you’d like to learn more about the Network and check it out for yourself, you can visit the link in the show notes. And we would love to meet you! So, Pam, would you like to get us started?
PAM: Sure. I absolutely would. And yeah, I am really looking forward to diving into these transitional ages and seasons. Because in our experience, we have really seen it play out in many, many different unschooling families over the years that there are patterns of these transitional seasons or ages as our children just move through these different stages of their lives. And these can be challenging times for our child and for us as things change. Because change is a constant, but also a challenge, because we’re figuring new things out. And I just want to mention, it’s less about actual ages. We’re not going to say, at this age or at this age, what your child should be doing. But it’s more about when the particular child experiences the shift. And that these shifts are part of life. So, that’s why we really wanted to dive into them. And we thought we’d start with the transition from toddler to child.
And now, thinking back, it’s been a while now, but with younger kids, a lot of our time and effort is taken up with hands-on care, from changing diapers to making food, to managing toys and games, and keeping them occupied. And their learning is quite transparent. We see them exploring their environment. We see them learning how to use their toys. We see them learning how to eat, learning how to talk, walk, like all those pieces.
So, as they start to get a little bit older, they typically need less hands-on care. And it becomes more about supporting them as they pursue their curiosity and their interests. And while it can still be busy for us, because we’re shifting from keeping them alive to being more engaged in the activities that they want to do day to day, it can be a bit of a challenge for us to notice that, to start giving them that space to make some more choices that they might be interested in. So, in the past, we’ve been able to help them and it’s just flowed. And now they might be more resistant. And we may start to recognize that they may think or want to do things differently than us.
It’s just really fascinating. And it can be tricky for us also, because they are still so much in the moment. They want to play this thing, they want to do this thing. They are right there. And we need to spend a lot of time learning about each other and just finding our rhythms, because it’s less about us when we bring the food out. Now they can be more actively saying, I’m hungry now. Just all those little pieces. Or, I’m not tired. Now that they’re more verbal, they have more ways to express their feelings and their thoughts and so, we learn to step back a little bit and work with them and learn more about them. And it’s a really fun time, but definitely can be a transition.
ANNA: Right. And I think, with the younger kids, with babies and toddlers, I mean, it’s such an intense time. Because we’re tired and we’re maybe not getting much sleep. And it is a lot about just keeping this little human alive. And there’s so much joy there and so much delight. And this transition happens and our days look a little bit different and we can start to recognize that pushback. So, I love the way you said that. Because I think especially for those of us who are doing a lot of the caretaking of the children, we’re just so connected to those babies and toddlers in many ways. And it’s such a dependent relationship. And then you start to see that independence and agency asserting itself and they do look at the world a little bit differently.
And then we start seeing that people are different. And honestly, I believe even babies and toddlers will assert themselves, but it does have a different feel to it. When getting a little bit older, and I think for those of us who we’re talking about in an unschooling environment, when it becomes that more typical school age or preschool age, we start to kind of go, wait. Should we be doing these things or should it look a different way?
I read John Holt really early on. He was influential in my journey with this. And I love just looking at that toddler and very young child and seeing how much they were learning and seeing how natural it was to learn a language and cultural expectations and understandings and all of these pieces and recognize that that’s just something as humans we can carry through. But I think it is important to watch in ourselves, are we bringing something to it?
Because it’s like, okay, now they would be meeting this milestone, or they should be doing this or this, looking externally versus looking at the child in front of you. So, I think there’s a lot of things that go on with this transition, both in our heads and for the actual child that’s growing and changing.
ERIKA: I definitely found that to be true. I have strong memories of my oldest turning 2, 3, 4, and just having these feelings of, I’m supposed to be doing something, that he needs to be really learning now.
Like, it’s time. And I mean, really that was just all because of the culture that I was surrounded by. When I started hearing that the friends are going to school or different things like that. And so, it was interesting to see that in myself and be like, on one hand I am seeing all the learning that he is doing, and our lives are great and fine. And then on the other hand, these fears are popping up of, but should he be doing this?
And so, I think that transition from toddlers to children for me felt like having kids on my body at all times to now being able to watch them. They’re not right on me, but I’m watching them do things. And I just remember having long days of sitting and watching them explore things and setting things out for them to explore and it’s a different phase of life. And you see all the changes that they’re going through in their brains and just in what they want to do and seeing their personalities come out and their voice, like you were saying, Pam. Now they’re able to really tell us about their feelings, tell us about their ideas.
And so, as that begins, it’s a big transition for us as parents, because we go from really just caretaking and responding to physical needs and things like that, to now it’s another person and it’s this relationship of like, what do they need and what do I need, what do they want to do, and what can I do? What do I have the capacity for? So, yeah, that was a big transition age for me, and I loved it.
ANNA: Yeah, all the different times and seasons are so fun and interesting and so much to learn for myself and for kids. And so, now we’ll move into the next phase which is a bit broad, but that older child to pre-teen, because so much is happening during that time as well.
And I found, and as Pam was talking about our experiences with probably thousands of families at this point, age eight and nine seemed to be a big transition age for kids in terms of, you went from that toddler to being engaged in the moment doing things and really just having fun and playing. And then there’s something about eight, nine where for some kids it’s the first hints that we’ll see other phases of this as they get older. But the first hint of, there’s this bigger world and am I safe? And what’s happening?
And I love the way you said it too, Erika, it’s like we’re tending to these physical needs and some emotional needs, too. But I think it starts getting more complex as we get to that eight to 10. It’s the beginning of that and then it amps up even more in terms of just how they relate to other people. They’re curious about that. They see other people. They’re not quite as focused in the moment in front of them as more understanding of social dynamics and other things that are happening. And so, this age is the start of that. And so, I think it’s interesting, because in so many ways it’s less hands on and then in other ways it actually gets more intense as they get older in terms of, the stakes seem a little bit higher or the conversations are a little bit more intense.
So, I’m interested about to talk about this stage, too, because this one also leads us into the start of hormones as well.
PAM: Yeah. I do remember that season as they do start to like, just notice there is more than like the family. And there’s this bigger world out there, and it is really interesting to put the focus on helping them as they figure it out. As we talk about so much, there is this way that our culture is, it’s almost like exposure therapy, as in, as they’re noticing these things, we want to help them get used to it. Because yes, you are going to be seeing people. Yes, you are going to be going out and doing these things. That is what life’s about. So, if you are struggling with that, let’s do that more so you get used to it. Versus helping them process and move through the transition at their speed.
We had times when somebody did not want to be going out. They wanted to be staying home. They felt much more comfortable there. And that outside world was looking a bit scary to be out and about, and even maybe fears of other people, people in their family being out and about. They’re starting to recognize, or they’ve had some experiences with people passing on or things like that, or accidents happening, that they’re becoming cognizant of some more of the risk as well, so it really was a time of change. And again, it differs per child.
But we have definitely seen that pattern where anxiety and stress comes with recognizing that bigger picture. So, to be able to quiet those outer voices and really focus on our child and help them through the experience and stages, to be there processing, too.
I remember that was a time when we were just pulling into our comfort zone. We were cocooning sometimes and really just making their space comfortable for them, because I didn’t want to put more anxiety and more stress on top of what they were already processing and trying to work through. The more I could get rid of all of that, then the more they could sit with what they were feeling about that new piece, the bigger world, bigger stuff happens out there, all those pieces. So, just to give them the space to sit with that without loading school on top of it, without loading all the stress of making them do these things. It was just so very helpful. And yes, a pretty darn common thing, I think.
ERIKA: Yeah. I feel like it comes up for some families as, I don’t know what’s going on with my kid. Something is different. Something has changed. They’re not having fun doing the same things they used to. There’s maybe an increased seriousness that can happen sometimes with kids in that age. But it makes sense. It’s just that increased awareness of everything, putting themselves into some kind of place in the world. And so, that’s big and it’s a lot of big thoughts that can come up.
And so, I feel like I want to mention now, though it applies to every stage, just the idea of meeting the child in front of you each day rather than coming to them with, I know who you are. Don’t write the story of who they are. Just see who you’re going to meet today. Because there are these transitional times where you don’t really know what to expect. And to give them this space to just be who they are each day is really amazing for them. That it’s okay. It’s okay that some days they wake up and they have a lot of fears and anxiety about things, or they wake up and they’re like, I don’t think I want to do the same game that I’ve been really having fun with. It doesn’t seem as fun to me right now, and I’m not sure what I want to do next.
Those kinds of feelings of, I’m not as interested in what I used to be interested in, can sometimes almost feel like a, “What’s wrong with me?” kind of moment for a child. And so, us being there with patience and understanding and validation of, this happens and it’s happened to me and it’s common and it’s normal and we have plenty of time, like we talked about in the last episode, to let new things bubble up. And as you grow, as we all grow and change, our interests will change. Our mind, our brains will change. We’ll get new ideas and new things, new feelings about our lives. And so, yeah, I found that time to be super interesting with my kids. But now we’re a little bit beyond that. So, are you ready for teenagers? Should I move on to teen?
ANNA: I think we can.
ERIKA: Okay, so, my youngest is now 13, my oldest is 15. So, this young teenager age, I feel like does seem to flow and make sense from that eight, nine, becoming aware of the bigger world. Then we come into this young teenager age. But there is something special about adolescence that is different than that preteen phase and a lot of new feelings come up. A lot of brain development happens. A ton of brain development happens. And so, it really can, in many cases, feel like, who is my child? Who is this person? It’s like meeting a new person. Not everyone is quite so dramatic, but for me, I do feel like there were huge things that were like, okay, I thought you were like that and now you’re like this. And so, I have been reading this book by Dr. Dan Siegel called Brainstorm, which is about the adolescent brain. And so, he says adolescence is from maybe 12 years old to 24. So, it’s really quite a long period of this really expanding brain, changing brain.
And a couple of the things that he mentions that are special about teenagers are this emotional spark. So that’s that moodiness that we talk about with the hormones and, just lots of strong emotions. Maybe we feel sometimes like we’re back in the toddler days of “tantrums” or feeling strong emotions, where they’re just overtaken with emotion. Social engagement becomes a lot more important to them. Novelty seeking and then creative exploration, which is what we see in teenagers.
And so, I don’t know. I really am loving this phase. I’ve heard a lot from other unschooling parents that the teenage years are just so, so much fun, because we are giving the kids space to really figure out who they are rather than trying to control and direct their path. And I think that that feels, so far to me, like the key to this phase.
ANNA: Yeah. The no expectations, because I actually loved having teens. I loved teens even before I had teens. So, I was kind of excited, because I just think teens are so amazing. They’re thinking all the time about all these different things and they have all these cool ideas and new perspectives. They haven’t been weighed down by time like the rest of us have. And so, it’s really fun to really get into that.
But I do want to say, I also probably did the most work on myself during that time, in that I had to separate myself in terms of recognizing that they’re on their own journey and I can’t control that journey.
When we have this baby that we can pop in the sling and go, we are their comfort because that’s all they want is to be close to us. And that’s it. It’s harder when there’s things we can’t comfort right away. We had some dark times during our teen years and that was okay, too, but it was a lot of work to go, this is okay, this is the human experience and I want to be here. And like you said, just meeting the person in front of me with unconditional love and acceptance along the way.
But there are a couple of broader things I just want to throw out. I have two girls. They’re old now. But I’ve seen a lot of girls in that age and that particular age can be really intense. And I think it can be for boys, too, but it seems to play out a little bit differently. And maybe it’s just personalities more than gender, but that kind of 12 to 15, 16 age can be intense, because they’re pulling away, they’re coming back, they’re pulling away, they’re mad, there’s all the hormones. Their bodies are changing dramatically. It’s a really intense and challenging time. And the moment I got caught up in myself about it was when we had trouble, like if I’m making it about me or I’m getting my feelings hurt or those kind of things. That’s where we would derail.
When I just recognize, this is really hard. What they’re experiencing and learning about themselves and about the world is really hard and if I could give space for that, it just made it so much easier. And again, easy is relative.
But what I also found is they do come out of the other side of it. Because I do feel like there were dramatic personality changes that I noticed during that time as they’re trying things on and figuring out who they are and getting a little bit more moody and dark, and then they come out of it and you’re like, oh, this is cool because it’s bits of the child that you knew and it’s bits of this younger teenager that you saw developing. And then it’s bits of this older person that will come. And it’s such a special experience. I think we get, as unschoolers and choosing to be together all of this time, to see that human development in that way and it’s just really special. And I think if we don’t get caught up in the expectations or trying to tunnel in, it can make a really big difference.
PAM: I loved your point of the different parts of it, the pulling away, the more out and about, and then the coming in, the out and in, knowing that there’s a safe space to come back to and recenter and reground.
But what was really interesting was, for me anyway, you can feel like, okay, they’re teens, they’re pretty self-sufficient now. They can get their own food, they can go to sleep and they can get dressed, all those pieces, and they’re going out and about more. And so you can kind of feel like, oh, okay, now I’m not needed so much and I can go out and do all the things. But what I learned was, and we’ve talked about this before, but I found I was actually needed just as much during this time, but it looked different because it wasn’t a day-to-day, ongoing need. It was more like not needed for a day, a week, a month, three months, and then needed every day for another period of time as they came back in and they were processing and they were figuring stuff out.
That’s why I think it’s so much about our work for ourselves at this time, because the questions aren’t, how do I do this? I want to go do this thing. Can you pick up this thing for me? So, it was less about interests and more about themselves and processing who they want to be and how they fit into the world, and how they engage with other people and the work to separate ourselves and to really be able to see it through their eyes and understand who they are and who they’re wanting to become, and not judging that.
As they’re trying on different, maybe different personality pieces, maybe just different lenses to see something and go, oh my gosh, I would never have that take on that situation, but they aren’t owning that. It’s not like, they’re looking at it this way, so therefore that’s the way they’re going to look at it forever. No, they are exploring, exploring. They’re learning. They’re trying things on, they’re figuring stuff out.
So, when we can separate feeling like we are being judged by them and we can just really see them for who they are and, like you’re saying, who is this person this morning? That’s okay, because they are just trying on so many things and putting things together. And as you were saying, as they come out the other side, they’re picking up what resonated. Like, I missed that part of me as a child. Because maybe they’re ignoring it for a while and they’re trying other pieces. But they might realize they miss that piece of and think, that’s something I want to bring with me as I move forward. And I found this new piece and I really like that. And right now I want to to mix that in.
So, yeah, you never know what mix you’re going to get each day, which was just so curious and fun. And it was just so interesting and fascinating to tag along and learn all the different things that they were pursuing, they were trying on. Also, absolutely not easy at times, but when it wasn’t easy, that felt like time for me to work on myself. It’s also not easy for them, so understanding that. Then I also not only work on myself, not bring me in it, but to be able to help them process and move through that, whether they’re internal processors or external processors.
For an internal processor, maybe it’s me giving them space, maybe it’s me just showing extra care during that time. And after they’ve processed it internally, being open and available for any conversation they want to have at that point. Or the external processor is talking about it again and again and over and over and over and over, so it’s so different for each child. It’s so different for a child at different points. It’s a beautiful, beautiful season. And I don’t like thinking about as hard, but it kept me on my toes. It kept me reminding myself who I wanted to be. It kept me just being open, being curious, being empathetic, and just seeing through another person’s eyes and that has never steered me wrong, child, teen, or adult.
ERIKA: I had something pop in my mind while I was thinking about that. I remember my mom recently talking about my teen years. All three of us, my brother, sister and I, are really close in age and so, she had a lot of the intensity of teenagehood all at once together. And she said that, at first, it was really shocking how much our emotions, our kind of emotional explosions had suddenly increased, and it just felt like it was all the time this heightened emotion. And so, at first, she was getting amped up with us, like we were angry, and so, then she’s trying to meet us there and she’d get angry and upset and we’d like have these fights, arguments, or whatever.
And then, she said, “But then I realized how quickly you would move through that emotional outburst and I would still be sitting here like, what just happened? And still feeling upset.” And she’s like, “So, I just stopped going on the emotional ride and I was just like, they’re okay.” And so, I think that’s like that not taking it personally, and letting them have their experience, but not getting worked up into it where it’s like I have to solve everything or I need to get myself all worked up and heightened. And so, being that calm presence, being there at the end of it, being there to support through it, those things are super important to me with my teens now.
ANNA: I like the rollercoaster analogy. It’s like we can be right there next watching and being there when they get off, but we don’t have to ride that, because honestly, I did do that at times and ended up feeling like I’d been run over by a truck. Then they’re off doing fine. And I’m like, wait a minute.
And so, then I had that recovery time, but it wasn’t my journey. It wasn’t mine to do. But I could still be there.
And that reminded me of something that came up as you all were talking is just the connection and supporting autonomy and agency we do when they’re younger really lends itself to this time, because that foundation is so helpful during the teen years. Because as they go off, they do come back and when something happens that doesn’t feel great or off or whatever, they know that there’s no judgment and that they can talk about it and that we’ll be there.
And I think that was such an important part for me, because I felt they were safer that way. Because some people worry about safety in this and I felt so good about our connection that I knew they would come back if they needed something and I was there with that unconditional, loving presence.
And so, that’s what I wanted to work on. I wanted to make sure I was doing the work for myself that I could show up in that way. And I thought it helped us through those times, because again, there’s a lot lability and the going off and coming back. It’s a really beautiful time though. And again, I learned so much about myself and I learned so much just about being in relationship with other humans.
PAM: I know. I think so. And I think it’s also just to point out, too, when we talk about it. Feeling good, et cetera, but it’s not about, oh, I’m feeling good and ultimately they’re gonna make choices that I’m comfortable with. No, and that’s what I think as you were, were talking there, Anna, I too felt like the relationship and the connection was the foundation that I needed and the nonjudgmental environment.
It doesn’t mean therefore I have to agree with every choice that they make. I can say, I would never make that choice. That choice like just fills me with discomfort. Yet, seeing through your eyes, I can see how they got there. Even if they wouldn’t make that choice again. It’s not about us being totally comfortable with every choice that they make or everything that they do, but knowing or feeling that they have a space that they can come back to, even when they’re like, holy crap, this did not go the way I was expecting.
Off they went towards something or this relationship that they thought would go one way and it went completely sideways. It’s not about them being totally happy with how things go and us being totally happy with how they’re moving through their days. But that foundation of the relationship, so that they know there’s a place they can come to, to process that, to talk about that, where they can get support and help and ideas for moving through for where they find themselves now.
I think that, foundationally, is what we found to be helpful so that they didn’t feel like, now, I’ve screwed up and I’m on my own. Which just means there’s a much greater chance that it’s just going to keep going more and more sideways. So, they find the spot where it’s like, oh, okay, I think I need some input. I think I would like some help, whatever. Whether it’s just conversation or like, come pick me up. Any of those moments that we have that relationship where they at least feel comfortable enough to do that.
Okay. So, are we ready? Oh, you want to add more?
ANNA: Okay. I think I’m going to do this here and I’m a little bit worried it may go sideways, but we’re going to try, because this is something I heard a really long time ago and there are parts of the language of it that I don’t love, but it actually was helpful to me. And that was, when we’re looking at the learning of unschooled children as they grow, I remember somebody saying, and this was 25 years ago probably, that in the beginning when they’re young and they’re toddlers and they’re young, they are ahead. You see them. They’re just learning machines. You see the learning. It’s so easy to see all the things that they’re learning and doing, and you just see like, wow. They’re not being pinned in by first grade that you have to do. They’re learning about bones and paleontology and all these things when they’re young.
And then there’s this middle age where they look more behind and basically it’s because there’s a lot of language at school, in terms of particular math functions or these kind of things that actually don’t apply to everyday life. They’re things that we aren’t even using now. And so, our kids, when they’re in that kind of middle age that we’re talking about now, this kind of preteen, early teen age, they’re just diving deep into their interests, which may or may not include the quadratic equation that the neighbors are talking about. And so, then it’s like, oh, okay, are they behind now?
And then this next phase that we’re about to go to, Pam, with this kind of older age. You see like, oh wow. What they know is how to learn, how to figure things out, how to be in the world, how to be in relationship, how to go and pursue the things that they’re interested in, because that’s what they’ve been fostering all along. And so, then they look ahead again, because then you’ve got these people that are struggling in college, because they were supposed to go there, but they don’t know what they want to do and they don’t really have a sense of who they are. And so, I don’t know. It was kind of helpful for me and I’ve seen it play out over the years.
And it’s part of what we talked about last time in the Plenty of Time episode. It’s a long game. And so, if you’re taking any slice along the way, whether it’s, oh, look how much they know, and how amazing, if you’re hanging on to those external pieces, you’re going to find yourself not in the best place. But if you look at it as a long game of like, what’s happening? Am I showing up for this person that’s showing up in front of me? Are we connected? Am I facilitating? Are we living our life? I just wanted to share it, because it was interesting and helpful to me at different times. So, I’m putting it out there and now we can go down to you.
ERIKA: Well, I was just going to say, it’s like a description of the outside messages that we’ll receive, The outside messages we’ll receive when they’re so little are like, oh my gosh, they’re so amazing. And then as they get bigger, but do they know the math? All these times tables or whatever. And then, the next one is like, wow, this young adult is so amazing. So, the outside messages that we receive at these different transition times are so strong and so particular and so cultural. And so, it’ll trigger those memories in us, of us at those different ages. And it just brings up so much. So, this is our internal work to do to put it all in perspective.
ANNA: It’s a long game to put it all in perspective. That’s what I wanted to get from it, because I think there’s value to understanding that those messages are rooted in something different and we’re looking at it in a very different way. This is a long game, this whole human experience.
PAM: Yes. And depending on when you start unschooling, you get all those early messages like, oh man, that’s amazing, and everything. And it can really throw you for a loop when it’s like, okay, now they’re talking about their science experiments and their more detailed math and all those pieces. The curriculum changes to what is apparently more advanced, et cetera. Our child is into whatever their interest is and maybe that interest looks schoolish, but maybe it doesn’t. So, it’s so helpful and fascinating for us to, again, do that personal work to see, are we using those external messages to validate ourselves and our choice to do this? Because that’ll eventually shoot you in the foot at some point one way or the other.
This last transition we are talking about is teen into young adult years. I loved your adolescence piece, Erika, up to the age of 24. I can totally see that. And I will put in the show notes a link to our podcast episode earlier about What’s So Magical About Age 18? because that is a whole other world of outside messages that come up during this transition.
Like, okay, but what about college? But what job are they getting? All those pieces that that can come up and it’s yet another stage of work for us to do. But also, back to supporting our kids. And the thing is now they’ve hit an age where they too hear all those messages.
So, there’s processing sometimes for them to do as well. But also, maybe they’ve found their thing, but also they’re still exploring. Again, it doesn’t need to be, oh, you’re 18 and now you need to look like this. It’s like, oh my gosh. You can keep being you because you are awesome and to be able to support them through that.
If you find yourself being buffeted around by outside messages, those are clues. It’s like, okay, I need to do some work and figure out why I’m being affected by all these outer messages and find that foundation. Because unschooling, from my blog posts to these hundreds of podcast episodes, it really is about being a human in the world. It really is. It eventually, quickly, becomes not really about school at all. School or not school isn’t really the fundamental question. So, just to help them and support them and engage with them as they make these transitions and it’s not really age-dependent. It really is to do with the person and what they want to explore next.
And the piece of personality is so interesting. We’ve got lots of years to look back on. And we can start to see the threads. When you were interested in that thing, I thought it was about that thing, but really it was just about this slice of that thing and now I can see how you grabbed these various slices and brought them together and now I can see how you’re wanting to move forward in this direction. It’s super interesting and fascinating. And also we’re not going to label you and say, now you are this for the rest of your life.
It is a really fun stage. But again, there’s just so much. There’s so much with moving out. There’s so much with college. Doors aren’t closed, either, as much because we don’t have that expectation that at 18 you do this and then you do this. It’s much more about them feeling it out and seeing what feels good for them, and I hesitate to say, feels good for them, because for people listening that might be like, oh, well they’re not going to do anything hard if they’re only going to do what feels good. But that’s not really what it is.
Because it can feel good to do really challenging things, because I want the thing on the other side. So, doing things that feel good doesn’t mean that they’re always easy, which I think people can equate with, especially in the young adult years. It’s easy maybe to make the culturally acceptable choices and there’s processing in making other kinds of choices. But man, sometimes those other choices just fit that person like a glove.
ERIKA: Yeah. I really do recommend that other episode for sure, because that was a really good in-depth conversation of this age period. But just what comes to mind for me is that learning is lifelong. There’s no finish line. I think I talked about on that one the idea of, how’s this child going to turn out when they’re an adult? That idea. It’s not about turning out, because we’re all still learning and growing and changing and so, I’m still turning out. I feel like that’s the thing to keep grounding in when we have the young adult children. It’s just like, you still have all the options. You still are allowed to grow and change and there’s no one right way.
ANNA: And that’s the piece for me, too. And I love that you mentioned the threads, Pam, because I even think about my own life and the different jobs and careers and interests that I’ve had over my 55 years. It’s like, oh, there are these interesting threads. And I think that can be really cool. But it didn’t always look traditional. It didn’t always look like what they sell you, that you’re going to go to college and get one job and you’ll have a job until you retire. This is not really how it works anymore, even for our generation, and much less so for the people behind us. And I think that is something that I really have enjoyed watching.
And when you were talking about it feels good, I mean, I will say there’s been times for both of my adult kids that hasn’t felt good. They’re trying to figure out like, I don’t know, this doesn’t feel good. What do I want to do? And that’s part of it, too, because I’ve been there as well. What do I want to do next? Does this make sense? Am I happy in in the choices that I’ve made? How do I want to do it?
And so, what I love and what I’m trying to just leave space for them to see is that yeah, that’s life. We have these opportunities and these times and we can figure things out. And if we don’t like it, we can switch and pivot.
In the work that I do now working with individuals and couples and families, I see so many older adults that are not so happy that really have gone along someone else’s path and it didn’t serve them. And so, I do think this time for our kids who are growing up into adulthood and figuring it out, it can be bumpy still. But there’s a connection piece that’s different and there’s just this understanding that there’s not one right way and that we can try different things and that that’s okay. There’s no judgment about that. And so, that piece I really love about what we can bring to everyone, because I think really everyone wants that unconditional love and acceptance.
And so, I love being able to offer that to these teens and young adults where it can feel so fraught. I have a client right now who is in college about to graduate and, oh my gosh. I just feel for her. She has a traditional mainstream upbringing, but it’s not even that. It’s just it’s such a big, weighty time. She’s putting so much weight on everything. And when I’m introducing to her the idea of, it’s okay for you to change your mind, like you could do that for a little while and then change your mind. She’s like, what? And so, I love just introducing that idea to all of us, that we don’t have to bring so much weight to everything.
I think my kids taught me that, too, when they were little, like, we don’t have to bring so much weight to all the decisions. We can learn and pivot no matter what happens.
ERIKA: I had one other thing pop into my mind, which is, for all these different transitional ages and these seasons that we go through, sometimes there could be something that feels really challenging, and so, we resist it or we want them to get through that phase, get through that season, or, “I just can’t wait till the next age, because this is so challenging.” You know what I mean? And we’ve talked about this on the Network so many times and probably on the podcast too, but just the idea that nothing lasts forever, but being okay with it lasting forever is often the key for it to be able to change.
So, the more we’re holding onto, I just hope they change, sometimes the less likely it is for them to move through that. And so, I think we can do that for ourselves as adults when our lives are challenging and we’re going through a hard time, but we can also do it when our kids are going through a hard time. Just coming to that acceptance of, even if this lasts forever, we’re going to make it through and sometimes, just that release can help bring a different mindset. You give yourself space to be more open and curious about what can happen.
ANNA: Yeah. We’re exactly where we need to be.
PAM: Exactly. And I love that you brought that up, because that has been my experience. When things would just get so like, oh my gosh, when is this going to be over? Not that I’m saying that to them, but I’m feeling it. When I can get to a place of, the world isn’t over even if it’s like this forever, then I can release the need for change and get back to that openness and see. All of a sudden, I see more possibilities with things being this way. And it might be magic, but that energy I have with them and my engagement with them obviously must be different somehow.
Even if I feel like I’m not really saying anything different, the energy that I’m bringing to it is, because so often, yes, that felt like it was the catalyst in them being able to release, too. We must have been energetically stuck with each other and now they could release anything they were feeling from me and just really feel into themselves and they would find like just a new baby step in a new direction. It’s fascinating to see an action, isn’t it?
All right, so I think we have covered this one enough. I want to thank everybody very much for joining us. I hope you found something interesting in this conversation. I really enjoyed talking about the different seasons alongside each other, because then we get to see the threads that are common to these different stages, even though they can look very, very different.
And please remember to check out the Living Joyfully Network, because I know Erika talked about how much she loved that, but I know Anna and I do, too. There are amazing families in there. Our kids are long grown adults and we still find it just so fascinating to be engaging with parents who are intentional and who’ve had wide ranging different lives and experiences. So, it is a lovely place. And we definitely invite you to join us there and we wish everyone a lovely week. Talk to you soon. Bye bye!
EU370: There’s Plenty of Time
Sep 12, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about one of Anna’s favorite sayings, “There’s plenty of time.” This mindset shift is so helpful in many different circumstances, making it a very useful tool!
We talk about using it in busy moments, when thinking about learning and child development, and even in more urgent situations. This mindset shift to “there’s plenty of time” can help can help bring clarity and calm and shift us out of fear-based tunnel vision.
We had a lot of fun talking about it and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and I am joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both!
ANNA AND ERIKA: Hello!
PAM: So, today we are going to dive into the mindset shift that has been invaluable to me over the years, and that’s that there’s plenty of time. It is something that I still regularly need to remind myself, particularly when challenging times arise. Because what it does is it helps me transition out of the tunnel vision that fear or challenge inspires in me. It’s like, oh my gosh, this thing happened. I’ve got to fix it. I’ve got to move as quick as possible. And it helps me get out of that mode and into more open and curious, so that I can lean more into the situation, into what’s actually going on, who’s involved. Because truly, even though so many things that go sideways feel like emergencies, they’re not. So, that is what we are going to be diving into.
And now, Anna, since I learned about this mindset shift from you many, many years ago, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would! Yeah, it is funny, because so many people associate this with me. Actually, a friend from the Network made me this card. So, if you’re on YouTube you’ll see this. Maybe we can post it. But it’s this really nice little embroidery on a card that says Plenty of Time, because I say it so often. And it’s just because of me, because I really need to.
We live in a culture that has a really strong sense of urgency and brings sense of urgency to everything from academics to when you’re in the medical system to when you’re just in your day to day, and with growth and development or anything. There’s just this imposed sense of urgency. And I think my personality just really gets caught up in that. I’m kind of a go go gal anyway. And so, I just get going and I just have this urgency. And what I’ve found is that in some arenas, it serves me. I get a lot of things done. But in relationships, it was really causing problems, because I was rolling over people and not really getting to know them or understand or take the pause that I needed to to really understand a situation. I was making assumptions. I was looking at it through my eyes only.
And a lot of times, it felt like things were so off or were having a big conflict and years ago, I was like, what’s happening? Why is this? Why is this feeling hard? And then I recognized, then I brought this mantra in for myself. It’s like, there’s plenty of time. I don’t have to solve everything right now. There really isn’t a sense of urgency. It’s so often just manufactured. And as soon as I say that to myself, okay, there’s plenty of time, I just feel my energy come down. I just feel so much calmer and then I’m really able to use the other tools that we talk about so often, just listening and validating and leaving space and all of those pieces.
And so, it comes into play in so many ways. So, it’s going to be fun to talk about it and see what it means to the two of you, but that’s really what it is for me. It’s about shedding that sense of urgency that I’ve been handed and can get caught up in, but especially bringing it into relationships and problem solving. Because everybody feels so much more comfortable and seen and calm. And what I’ve found is that when I can bring that calm to a situation, it just changes it.
ERIKA: Absolutely. Yeah. I love the phrase. I love using it. And one thing I really love about it is it applies to everything. Because it really is just about calming myself. And so, it doesn’t matter if I’m doing future tripping, scary things about, this is going to be terrible in five years or whatever, or if it’s just in this moment, we have to get to the meeting or we have to go to the restaurant, or whatever it is. So, it’s all those little day-to-day moments. And also it applies to, why aren’t they reading fluently yet? You know what I mean? How are they going to be able to do their laundry and stuff?
So, anytime those fears get in mind, there’s plenty of time, feels like taking a deep breath. It feels like giving myself space to get out of that tunnel vision and get out of that fear vision that I can get into just because of stress of life.
And so, I was thinking that part of why we have this urgency, or maybe it’s a symptom, but in school, right? So, you do a class and then the bell rings and you’d have another class, and then the bell rings and you have another class. And so, we get trained into this, onto the next thing, onto the next thing. Like we should always be moving forward with this quickness. And so, the plenty of time idea to me feels so good and healthy and it’s like giving a gift to my kids to give them space to not say, okay, onto the next thing. Onto the next. Like, that’s enough of that, let’s move on. There’s plenty of time. They can spend as much time as they need on what they want to do. And we don’t have to be in a rush and fall into that sense of urgency.
PAM: I love that you brought that school lens to it, too, because as you were talking there, it reminded me not just from class to class to class, but how much of our lives in school are timed. Tests are timed. Everything that you do is pointing towards, I need to do this quickly. The quicker I can fill out my test, the more of it I’ve done and the higher mark I get. Doing things quickly is held up as the goal, right? So, it is a surprisingly big shift to release that need, that urgency, to dig into why it feels urgent. Is it because I just want to do it fast so that I look like I did it successfully?
And then for me, another piece, or another layer as I pulled back that urgency thing, it was, I discovered more often than not, it was because I was feeling uncomfortable in the situation. So, there was discomfort and it was more about trying to make myself comfortable again in whatever the situation was. I wanted to solve it fast so that I looked good, but also I was uncomfortable with this nebulousness or this unsolved piece of our lives. And so, getting more comfortable with discomfort, not seeing discomfort as a bad thing, but seeing it as just like part of the process it, I came to see it was where I could get to that curious thing.
Now, if I just sat there and did nothing and just tried to pretend that it would go away, my discomfort was just extended. And then we just got more and more uncomfortable, because we weren’t really talking about it, and we weren’t really making any movement forward. I was going to say progress, but then that brings in judgment to it. But it’s that idea.
But it was so valuable to me to be able to take that step back, to be able to say, you know what? I can sit with this discomfort for a while. I can get curious, I can learn more things. Like you were saying, Anna, we learn so much when we actually start looking at the people involved and observing their reactions, actually hearing what they’re sharing. Actually processing enough for myself so I can share what I’m feeling or thinking in a way that isn’t judgmental about what other people are feeling, but just another thread through the situation.
Because the other valuable piece of that is then other people don’t feel so defensive, like they have to dig in and defend whatever their perspective is or whatever direction they are thinking they’d like it to unfold. And we can just release a lot of that tension so that we can have just more conversations around it.
But if we don’t think there’s plenty of time to have those conversations, we’re like, okay, like this is the best solution. This is our fastest way. You’ll like this. Trust me. And we hold onto that so tightly. Even if we don’t force people to do it, our energy comes with, this is the best solution. And in our conversations, we’re picking out the pieces that align with that. Oh yes, you said this, see that fits with this that I’m wanting to do. And what we’re trying to do is navigate everybody else to come to the conclusion that our path was the best versus actually working with each other. But that takes time, doesn’t it?
ANNA: Right. And I think it’s so helpful to just unpack that idea that faster is better and even an efficiency lens. Because I live with someone who has an efficiency lens about certain things and it’s really interesting to see the rub of that. It’s like, where’s it coming from? What is that idea that the straight path is better, it’s faster? Where does that come from? Because I think in a lot of situations, outside of ourselves, it’s serving someone else. In school, it’s serving just that we’ve got to keep moving and we’ve got to keep getting 30 kids turned out of this and getting them through the test.
And I was always that super fast test taker. I’m a super fast eater. I just really bought all into this fast is better and efficiency lens. And again, I think there are times when it serves me, but I really do think I missed a lot in those days. I think I didn’t retain that material, because I really was just quickly going through the test to spit it back out.
And what I loved about watching my kids when they were younger and as they grew up was just, it was a richer experience where they really took time with things and made mistakes. We talk about this where it’s like, “made mistakes” is kind of a school concept again, but for them, it was just like, ooh, try this and pivot here and do this.
And when you just really embody this sense that there’s plenty of time, there is no wrong way. And with each turn and with each choice that you make, you’re learning something about yourself, about the people that you’re with, even about the particular subject, do I like this? Do I not like this? Do I want to do it a different way? And I just feel like I short-circuited a lot of that learning for myself when I was younger. I feel like my kids gave me that back to just recognize, like, yeah, I just want to slow it down so that I can connect with the people so that I can learn more about myself.
I feel like that’s another piece of this is when we’re on that fast track, it can distract us a little bit from looking at ourselves and understanding our own pieces. And I’ve definitely been guilty of that. And so, I feel like as I’ve gotten older, and then as my kids kind of taught me this lesson, it was like, oh, okay. It goes back to what you’re saying, Pam, sitting with discomfort, because sometimes when we’re learning things about ourselves, it’s a little uncomfortable. But learning that, hey, I can sit with this and learn more about myself. And maybe it’s because I’m getting older, but it’s like, now I feel like that’s why we’re here. That’s what this human journey is all about. And so, I love this little quick reminder. Because, like you said, Erika, it’s like taking a deep breath and whew, here we are.
ERIKA: Yeah. As you both were talking, I was thinking about life with little kids. I feel like this is where this first came to mind was life with little kids. Because imagine when you go for a walk with a little kid, you take one step out the door and they are looking at something and it just feels like it’s going to take forever, and why are we stopped here? That kind of thing. And so, I feel like, a lot of us have had that experience of like, oh my gosh, my toddler just wants to do this same thing for hours and hours, and how can we get through it?
And so, I think that was the beginning of, deep breath. There’s no rush. We don’t have to move on to the next thing. But once you can get in that head space of, there’s plenty of time and let’s just see how things unfold, I don’t need to direct, I don’t need to point out the right way to do something or the thing that I think is important or whatever, and just kind of letting things unfold for our kids. They can learn so much more. They can learn more about themselves, they can learn more about the things that they’re interested in.
And so, I think that sense of urgency or that checklist that we might have in our mind of the next thing. Well, they learned how to do this, so then the next thing is this, having that mental checklist and that sense of urgency really gets in the way of them creating their own learning journey.
And I think the same thing applies to us. And we had many years of really not knowing that there’s plenty of time and not having the space to learn about ourselves. And so, that deep breath and that time and settling our brains down to be like, it doesn’t have to be the next thing. Just focusing on what’s in this moment and relaxing into this moment, it’s just so powerful.
PAM: It’s so powerful. And I just love how you can take this little nugget and apply it everywhere. We talked about relationships. We’ve talked about challenges, talked about learning. It’s just so vastly valuable in all of those spaces to be able to peel back that layer. For me, that’s part of the transition to like lifelong learning from school, curriculum-based learning. There’s plenty of time for that thing to bubble up and there’s plenty of time for them to stay stuck with this one thing that they’re really focused on right now.
It just applies everywhere and it’s a valuable little thing just to bring to our days and really explore just that push that we feel. Because we can feel it in so many ways. And as I just think back over my days, it’s just like, okay, this and then this and then this. But truly there is so little that is an emergency. We can take the time to actually engage with it, to sit with it for a little bit. And as you both said, we just learn so much when we do that. I learned so much from watching my kids and I really had to go back to that beginning place and not just figure it out myself, because when I looked to them, I could see it in action. I could see them taking the time and I’m like, oh. Why aren’t they wanting to do this and this?
Sometimes I tried offering things, but I was also cognizant enough to, when I got some pushback or just like completely ignored, not to have expectations around things, especially when we bring them to our kids. Because they may be in a place where even though that could be really cool and interesting to them, right now they’re still here. There’s plenty of time for them to notice that thing.
So, for me, it’s just like, I can plant a seed and then maybe the next day or the next month or two years down the road, it’s like, hey, remember when you mentioned this thing? I’d like to hear more about that.
So, there’s plenty of time just works in just about any situation. You can use it just about every day in our society.
ANNA: It does! And I know sometimes, people will ask, what do I do? I’m frustrated or I’m not showing up in the way I want to. Or, we’re having these conflicts. And they just want to know, what’s going on? What are some options? And I think this piece is really a great place to start. Because I think anytime we’re under time pressure, and I think it’s probably worse for some personalities, mine being one of them, but time pressure builds this feeling like, I want to do a good job, I want to get there on time. All these other outside messages that I’ve had.
What I found is, again, I wasn’t showing up as the person I wanted to when I was bringing that sense of urgency under that time pressure. And so, I think it’s a great place to start to just go, okay, so we’re having an interaction, like you were saying, Erika, we’re trying to get out the door or something, and I feel myself like getting a little energy about it, and what if I just change it?
And that’s the kind of situation I would use it, in like, you know what? There’s actually plenty of time. And my energy would come down. The kids’ energy would come down. David’s energy would come down. And we’d get out the door. And so, I think it’s just when you find yourself feeling that feeling, especially if there’s a tightness to it, just see how it feels to breathe into, there’s actually plenty of time.
Because, like you said, Pam, the amount of times that it’s an actual emergency, you’re not even going to be thinking. You’re going to act. You’re going to pull that kid out of the road. You’re going to do the thing that you need to do. You’re going to take care of the wound. Whatever the thing is happening, that’s an actual emergency. There won’t be time to be getting irritated with people or thinking about what’s happening in your head. So, that’s the clue to me that, wait a minute, this is about me. And what happens if I bring that different energy?
ERIKA: I was thinking about the emergencies, too, and honestly it helps then, too. If you feel like you’re freaking out and there are too many things. It’s like, there’s plenty of time. It’s my reminder, too, it’s just one step at a time. So, I know I have these moments, not emergencies, but say I’m hungry and then they’re also hungry. And then also the phone rings. And the dog needs to go out. All these things could pile up in a split second where it felt like everything was fine and now everything is busy. And so, if in that moment when I start to feel myself getting overwhelmed, I could just be like, there’s plenty of time, one thing at a time, one step at a time, it just helps in every situation.
PAM: Yeah, it’s true. It really does. And I think it’s just such a great reminder that we have agency, because so often when things like that are piling up on us, we feel like all we can do is react. But I think the shift that there’s plenty of time helps me. It helps me ground. It helps me center. It helps me process a little bit so that I feel more like I’m responding. Because like you’re both saying, when we react, we bring so much negative energy to the situation. And then people start reacting to us, and then it’s just like this ping pong ball of stress that goes back and forth and back and forth and back and forth till we’re all completely frustrated.
And somebody says, well then we’re not going. And too bad. But, oh my gosh, when I could remember to bring that energy of, there’s plenty of time, so that everybody’s energy is down, we would actually get out faster than if I was trying to prod everybody, like literally time-wise faster and feeling so much better, when I wasn’t constantly prodding people and prodding people and instead I was supporting, asking, do you need some help with this? Just not getting in people’s way, not constantly poking them. I think when I’m feeling an urgency, I’m poking people and then they’re just like, screw that. Or they’re poking back.
ANNA: Putting up a wall. PAM: Exactly. The wall goes up and then we move slower. ANNA: Right. I’m going to repeat something you said, Erika, just because I think it’s so important. I love this. We’re talking about how to use it in these moments, but it’s both, right? It’s using it in those intense moments, but it is also that there’s plenty of time to learn the things that they need to learn. There’s plenty of time for relationships and friendships to develop and grow later on. Because we can get stuck in our heads about, but do they have enough friends or are they doing enough this or this or that?
And so, that was another time I found it so valuable was just like, but actually this is a long game. If we’re lucky enough, we have a long life to figure all of these pieces out. And if it’s a short life, then even more I want to be just doing what we love and enjoying each other. So, it really helped calm me from both sides. And so, I love again that it’s useful in these moments and it’s also useful when we get in a spiral that’s a little more, out there, future worry, esoteric.
PAM: Yes. Me too. Well, thank you so much to everyone for joining us. We hope that you enjoyed our conversation and even picked up a nugget or two for your unschooling journey and, let’s face it, life and living, because this is just something fundamental, I think, to human beings, or at least to those of us who grew up in that more conventional school-based environment where the pressure came to do things fast and do things right, don’t make mistakes. All that stuff really plays into that fear and that urgency we feel.
So, just reminding ourselves that we have plenty of time and playing with that throughout the day in all sorts of situations can really help us see some really fun layers where we can apply it and it can be useful.
We wish everyone a lovely week. Thanks so much! Bye!
EU369: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: People Are Different
Aug 29, 2024
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and we’re talking about how people are different.
“People are different” has become a common refrain on the Exploring Unschooling Podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network and for good reason! Once we sink into the reality that people are truly so different—their priorities, their brains, their interests, the way they express themselves, their likes and dislikes, their bodies, their personalities, and so on—it becomes so much easier to assume positive intent and to meet people where they are. We can more easily see through their eyes and understand that there’s no one right way.
We’ve been really excited to dive more deeply into this idea. It was a very fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both.
PAM AND ERIKA: Hello!
ANNA: So, today I’m very excited. We’re going to be talking about the idea that people are different. And while it sounds simple, it is so layered and not understanding it can definitely be a stumbling block in our relationships. And once you really embrace it, I feel like it becomes so fun just noticing all the ways and finding ways to apply this lens.
So, we’re going to have a lot of fun talking about that today. I think it takes some of the mystery and frustration out of other people’s behavior when we recognize, oh, this is a people are different thing. We tend to think everyone sees and experiences the world in the same way, and so when they don’t, it can actually cause some friction. So, I’m very excited to dive into this very broad topic with both of you. Erika, do you want to get us started?
ERIKA: I would love to. This might be one of my most favorite topics to talk about these days, and I’m just really excited to see what we are able to touch on today, while also knowing that there will be so much more that we won’t even get to, because it is such a big, rich topic to explore once we start thinking about it. And so, I really think that we started putting that “people are different” lens into words in the past few years because of some deep dives that we have all done individually and together, probably partly inspired by the deep conversations we have on the Network around personalities and learning about the different people there.
And I think we can, on a surface level, say, “People are different,” and everyone would agree like, “Well, yeah, of course.” But the deeper stuff, like, “No, people are really different,” can take a while to wrap our heads around.
And so, for example, the way our brains work is different and our personalities and temperaments are different. Of course, everyone has different past experiences and maybe past trauma that impacts what they do today, and so that contributes to our differences. Our go-to defense mechanisms and our reactions to things and all the beliefs we have about the world can just be so, so different.
That’s not even to mention fun things like our interests and what lights us up, and our bodies and what makes our bodies feel good, our curiosity and what our curiosity leads us to. So, if you just start to think about putting all these different aspects of ourselves together into one complex human, it’s no wonder that so many times we could feel like it’s so hard to communicate or it’s hard to understand why other people are making such different decisions from what we would do, but it’s just because we’re all so different.
PAM: We’re all so different. And for me, I just love to keep coming back to this idea, like you were saying, there’s just so many layers to it. Introvert, extrovert, just to grab something that’s pretty common for people to consider. “Oh yeah. They don’t like going out as much.” Or, “They like to be around people all the time.” When you just use that lens on its own, when you bring it to any moment, it can help you understand people a little bit more. It can help you understand that they don’t want to hang out in big crowds for long times, but also, when they’re at home with a small number of people, it’s so energizing. To see that lens in each moment helps you understand their reactions.
People are different. Even with an introversion, there are so many differences and layers. What helps them? What kinds of situations are worth it? All those pieces. So, when you just start digging into that a little bit, you find so many nuances.
When we first came to unschooling and I first started thinking about this stuff, when my kids made different choices than me, it would not make sense. Like, “But, A, B, C, like of course D!” Until I actually started to look at them as a human being, as a whole human being, understanding that they are truly different from me and understanding that me reaching D as a conclusion and them reaching E as a conclusion are both absolutely fundamentally true. D would work better for me and E would work better for them. So, now how can we work together and find an F that has enough of D and enough of E that we’re all pretty happy with this plan? And off we go down the F path.
And then, like you were talking, layer after layer after layer. There is just so much that makes up a human being that can be different from us, and it just helped me not be frustrated, not feeling like, oh, I need to explain this again, because they must not be getting it, because it makes utter and complete sense to me.
ANNA: Right. I think that’s what I love about it. And we get at it at different ways, but I feel like this is a really quick thing that comes to mind that pulls me to a place of curiosity, because if I find myself feeling frustrated or like, why are they making that choice? Or if I start taking something personally about the way somebody’s doing something, I can quickly go, wait a minute! Is this a “people are different” thing? And I can just pause a second and give a little bit of space to bring curiosity to it.
Because I think we really do so quickly go to thinking that everybody sees the world the same way that we do, and that, “Of course that would be the solution!” And so, yes, over the years we’ve kind of dabbled around these things. “Oh, well, but I’m an introvert and I have this friend that’s an extrovert and she does things differently than I do,” but it’s so much deeper than that. And I love that you touched on it, Erika, too, that we all bring our past traumas, our past history, our past learning. So, it doesn’t even have to be trauma, but a lot of us have some trauma that we’re bringing into the moment. But it’s just our experiences. What was our family like? Where did we grow up culturally? What did we learn?
And it’s so interesting when you start having these conversations with people, because it could be things that you wouldn’t even think would be at odds. I was talking to a Network member friend about this, and she really loves walkable cities. And she just said it to me, “But if everybody could live in a walkable city, they would see how amazing it is!” And I’m like, no. I’m like, “If everybody could live in the woods, they would see how amazing it is!” And so, we just laughed about it, because we both are so passionate about the things we’ve learned about ourselves.
And I think it ties in with our unschooling journey so well because that’s the environment we want to create, where our kids can learn these things about themselves, have this self-awareness that it took a lot of us a long time to figure out. Because I pushed through a lot of things about myself, because it didn’t maybe fit the mold. And so, then it takes time to realize what’s true for us. And so, I love that environment where we can learn what we like and don’t like, what works for us and doesn’t work for us. How we process something, what we need to be able to process something. Do we need quiet? Do we need noise? Do we need headphones? Pam wears headphones and thinks about things. That’s amazing to me. I cannot have multiple inputs like that as I’m trying to form a thought. I love music and headphones, but not for when I’m thinking or working.
So, you can go, “Oh, my kids are listening to music, but I see them doing something.” And for me, before this understanding, I might’ve gone, “They’re not doing anything productive. There’s no way they could be because they’ve got headphones on.” And then I meet Pam and she’s like, “I need to have music going, or other things happening.” And it’s like, oh my gosh, how cool. And so, in that little example that I gave, what I want to watch there is my judgment about it. I want to watch my judgment about someone else, because if I bring curiosity, then I can learn more. “Tell me about that. Do you love listening to the music when you’re doing it? What are you listening to? What feels the best?” And then we connect.
ERIKA: I love it so much. And I think we could come up with a million little tiny examples like that. I’m just thinking with the noise and having some sounds going on. Maya says that same thing. She’s like, “It’s too quiet in here. I just need some sounds going on.” And for me, it’s the opposite. But it’s the same thing in so many different areas. And so, one way to approach that with curiosity is to do that paradigm shift of “there’s no one right way.” Because we can get stuck there, like, “I figured out the right way.”
Here’s another, more hormonal example. At night, it’s cold. That’s my experience. In the morning, it is hot. That’s also my experience. Now, Josh, he has a completely opposite experience at night. He is dying of heat, but I could try to convince him that doesn’t make sense. It’s cold at night and it gets hot in the morning. And he’d be like, no, that makes no sense. And so, realizing that’s my experience, what I’ve learned from my own life is there is not the one right way.
It helps our relationships so much, because it helps us to assume positive intent about another person. It helps us to put our picture of them into greater clarity if we can be open and curious about what they’re telling us about their own experience, rather than going straight to shutting it down by saying, “But I have already figured it out and I already know what’s right.”
And so, anything from tiny things like, we’re going outside and they’re saying they’re not hot and I’m saying I am. I mean this temperature difference, it’s seems like a small thing, but it can cause fights in families. Because yeah, we think that our experience should be everyone’s experience, but you could see that could ripple out to what people should eat, the way that they should have their room organized, how they should be spending their time, what time they should wake up, what time they should eat, just every little thing. It’s like, what if we could just be curious about, how does it feel to you? What is your experience in this area?
PAM: Yes. I love that, because, for me, the hot/cold is a great example, because that almost feels like a fact. Somebody comes back to us, “I’m cold, people! How can you not be cold? There’s something wrong with you.” And I think that one of the shifts that helped me was, like you were saying, assuming positive intent. They’re not trying to judge me just because their answer’s different. It doesn’t make me wrong. I don’t have to defend myself. I don’t have to get defensive about it. I can be curious about it. It’s like, wow. This room feels so different to each of us. And that is something that we laugh a lot about here, because I run very hot and use no blankets, no nothing at night. And Rocco was all tucked in.
But the one I wanted to bring up, too, because examples are just so fun, this was one that was a really useful shift for me when I recognized it, and that was the internal processor and external processor. And that started even before I had kids. Coming to recognize, oh my gosh, how different is that? Somebody wants to talk through it and they’re not telling me what their answer is. They’re just telling me a whole bunch of ideas. It’s like, oh, I don’t need to go prep for that. Because for me, as an internal processor, for the vast majority of things, I’ll think about things, put on my headphones, have a good walk, have a good think. “Yeah, this makes sense, this makes sense, this makes sense.” So, by the time I mention it to somebody else, it’s like, let’s do this.
Whereas for other people, more external processors, they want to hear it. They want to maybe get some reaction. They want to talk about it with somebody else. Talk about the five different possibilities to eventually kind of land on the one. So, when they come out with something, I have to remember, it behooves me to save myself from future disappointment or frustration because I went off and did X, Y, Z to get everything ready for the thing. And they’re like, oh yeah, that was yesterday.
ANNA: What was that? Yeah. Right. I work with a lot of couples. And oddly enough, many internal processors marry or partner up with external processors. And this is a very new idea to a lot of people. They’re always so fascinated when I start to talk about it with them. But the key to this working is not taking it personally.
So, what can happen is the internal processor goes off to think about the idea that was presented and then the other person, whether this is a child or a partner that goes off, is thinking, “They don’t care about me. They don’t understand. They don’t think this is important. They’re not thinking about this.” Because to them, thinking about an idea and processing it and prioritizing, means talking about it. It means talking about all the iterations, all the different things.
For that internal processor when they’re being bombarded by that, they can feel like, you’re not giving me any time. Why are all these ideas coming out? You’re all over the board. And then they’re taking that personally. But as soon as we understand this about each other, and again, this is for kids and partners, it’s like, oh, okay. I need to give them a little bit of space. I presented them with this idea of, what we want to do this weekend? Or, what’s coming up? Or, do we want to try this as a family? Let’s give them some ideas. Because then they’ll come back. Then they’ll come back and want to have a conversation, but they need that time.
And when I talk to companies about this, it’s the same. For employers, you’re going to get the best out of your employees when you give them the time to process in the way that they need to process. If we push somebody to do it a different way, we’re not going to get their best, because that’s the whole point is that our brains work differently. And I think when we can celebrate that and not take it personally, it just really, really changes things. So, that piece of not taking it personally is so important.
ERIKA: Don’t take someone’s personality personally. Is that what people say? I love that so much. But that was reminding me about where some of this can come from. If you imagine someone creating a curriculum and they’re an external processor, they’re going to say, and then the students should externally process about this is the way that they’ll learn. You can see how that would totally happen, where it’s like., the way that you learn is by speaking your ideas out loud to someone and having them reflect back what they’ve heard. And it’s like, yeah, some people, for some people that works great. And then for others that will be so uncomfortable.
And so, I think the message that we can learn through mainstream culture can feel like, okay, we realize that there are differences in people sometimes, but we should try to fix that. Or we should figure out the best way and get people to fit into this mold of whoever is basically in power or in charge and what makes sense to them.
And so, we’ve had explorations about all these different personality things, like the Enneagram or Myers-Briggs test, the strengths finder, all these different things that give us more information about how our own brains work. And I feel like once we see, oh, people have come up with these different groupings and you can read them and be like, oh yeah, I’m not like that at all. But there are some people who are. Then it just expanded the possibilities in my mind of what is okay, what is possible, how people are, and it makes it feel like it’s easier to accept other people how they are and, like we were saying earlier, assuming positive intent about what they do.
PAM: Accept other people as they are. And also accept ourselves as we are. Because it’s like, oh, I keep trying to fix this, because everybody talks about how bubbly extroverts are just lovely, amazing. And I have bubbly extrovert friends. And also, it’s draining. And you absolutely want to do the thing, but you need the recovery time too. And you may feel bad about that sometimes. And so, seeing how different people can be helps me be like, oh, it’s okay for me to just be me. I don’t need to fix myself to be these different ways, because it’s just okay that we all are different.
And then one tool I wanted to bring up that I found really helpful, particularly with my kids is, there was always this phrase to put yourself in someone else’s shoes. And I would try to do that. And I found as I was doing that, as my kids left school, they were home more and I was trying to figure out all this, looking for the learning and the curiosity and what their interests were. And I would find myself putting myself in their shoes and I’m like, A, B, C, I would choose D. And I realized over time that it wasn’t so helpful for me to be in their shoes if I was trying to empathize with them and if I was trying to understand their choices. It wasn’t helping me understand their choices.
So, the little tool that worked for me was to see things through their eyes. And when I used that language for myself, it helped me remember to go into their brain and to remember what their interests were, to remember their personality pieces, to remember how their brain likes to immerse itself in things and how it processes, all these people that are different pieces. It reminded me to bring their pieces in, instead of my pieces. Because me stepping into their shoes was just me putting all my personality and brain into that situation, and of course I’m going to make different choices. But when I could look through their eyes and see what it looked like to them, I came to understand their choices so much better.
So, it didn’t seem like something out of the blue. It’s like, oh, of course that would look interesting. Of course, they would make this choice. It just really helped me better understand them. Then I could connect better. I could empathize with them. I could validate. I could support their choices with the understanding that me being a different person would make a different choice, but their choice makes complete sense for them. That was a really helpful to tool for me to kind of make that distinction.
ANNA: And I think part of that, and it’s kind of what you’re describing, but maybe a little bit different, is just it helps us communicate. So, we talk about narration a lot, but I think when we understand these differences, if I feel like I’m having trouble communicating with someone and maybe I can’t even pinpoint the difference, because I’m still locked into how I’m seeing the situation, I can step back and narrate a little bit to go, okay, so I’m not sure if this is how you’re seeing it, but here’s how it’s feeling to me and here’s what I’m thinking I need to do. It’s less threatening than me trying to direct us to do the thing. It’s opening up for them to say, “Oh wow, no, I don’t see it that way at all. I really think we need to do this,” and then we can have an interesting conversation. But I feel like we can’t even get to that place of communicating if we’re stuck in our story of, there’s one right way.
And I love that you mentioned that, Erika, because that’s the key, right? To know there is never one right way. And even with things that seem like, but what about this? Because, like you said, some of these things seem like facts, it’s cold. How is that not a fact? Well, bodies are different, you know? And so, it isn’t a fact. And so, I love that piece of just remembering there’s not one right way. We all are so different. So, I’m going to slow my communication down a little bit. I’m going to say a little bit more about what’s happening in my mind, especially with the people I want to be in close relationship with, because they’re going to learn more about me, I’m going to learn more about them, and we’re going to have a lot less headbutting as we’re trying to move towards something, because we’re slowing that down a little bit.
ERIKA: Yeah. I love that. And I think that slowing down is really key, because our go-tos are so automatic and so fast. It’s very easy to assume we’re all there, we’re all on the same page. We all got to the same conclusion. You know what I mean? And so, I was thinking that it can make you feel uneasy when you start to realize how different someone else who is close to you is from you. When we first have children, it might feel like they’re going to just be little me, they’re going to be like us. And as we start to learn how different they are, I think it can be a challenge at times.
But then, I can rewrite that story for myself, too. It’s not difficult. It’s fun and this is really what makes life interesting. It’s not about finding people who are exactly, precisely like me in every way in order to have met my match, or in order to get along. It’s more about having fun figuring people out and learning about each other and our differences. And just imagining that every person in the world is this complex, unique human being, it’s kind of exciting. But yeah, I can sometimes fall in that trap of like, I just want someone who understands everything about how I am. But it’s too complicated. There’s too much. But that’s okay. That’s just part of the richness of life, that everyone will bring all of their own things to every moment.
PAM: Like you said earlier, it’s that shift to getting curious. It’s giving ourselves that space for that shift, because yes, I think that can be so much about where we are in the moment, too, when things feel overwhelming. Oh my gosh, they just do this. Why this one? But we can take that moment to remember, people are different. And I think it helps, too, having worked through it. We’ve talked about this a lot before, like you said, how much fun it ends up being. How we end up in places that we, on our own, could never have imagined. And it’s super cool and fun, and my life is richer and my world is wider.
And yes, it took some energy and yes, maybe I don’t always have the capacity for it, but when I can do it, it is amazing and it’s worth the time to make that shift, to look through their eyes, to get curious about, why doesn’t that sound interesting? And knowing the personalities, that people are different. Because maybe you don’t ask your child, why is that interesting to you? Because it would feel judgmental just in the way that things are phrased like that. But last month in the Network, our topic was intentional language and that just reaches everywhere. Because people are different, words mean different things to them. There are so many layers to this.
ANNA: So many layers. And I’m going to bring the judgment piece back again, because I think it can be when we’re feeling judgmental about someone, we’re most likely here. We’re talking about our kids or our partner, but really anyone, it’s a really great time to pause and say, where’s that coming from? Because I would argue that probably a big chunk of the time, it’s coming from a belief that they’re not doing it the way we would do it. And then when we recognize, oh, there isn’t the one right way, people are just different. I mean, gosh, letting go of that judgment is so valuable to relationships because it really is so surprising to the person on the other end. Because their way of processing and working has been working for them all these years. And now you’re coming in saying it’s wrong and passing judgment. It’s surprising. And so it can be disconnecting.
And so, I think it’s just so important when those little red flags of, like, am I being frustrated by this conversation? Or am I not understanding something? Or am I passing judgment about something?That’s when I want to stop and change that lens. Bring this people are different lens, bring that curiosity, because it really just makes such a difference.
And when we think about our kids, if we’re judging how they’re spending their time or how they’re moving through their day, this came up with another person not too long ago where, I think they were judging the way the kids spent the day, because they were thinking, “What would I do if I had this free environment? This free environment where I didn’t have to go to school?” And they were putting their child self in this environment that they had created thinking these are all the things that I would do and it would be amazing. And the kids were not doing any of them. “They’re over there doing this thing that I don’t like at all.” But it’s like, oh, but this is what they’re doing with the freedom. This is what they are being drawn to in this moment.
And so again, when we see ourselves like bringing that judgment lens, it’s like, can we let that go and just go, huh, I’m curious about this? I want to understand and recognize that might be what I would do, but it’s not what they’re doing and there’s really good reason for that because we’re all so very different.
ERIKA: Yeah, it’s like when we’re thinking, “Well, you should,” just any “should,” like they should do this. He should do that. That’s a really good little red flag, because it pops into my head all the time. I think it’s a really natural thing to think, because I have good ideas about what I would do and so then it just feels like, and they should as well, but that would be a good red flag to catch.
And then I wanted to mention a little a-ha moment I had with Josh. So, my husband and I have different personalities. We have a lot in common, but there are a lot of big differences. And so, one of the things is, he was talking about his frustration with some people at work, and he’s just like, people just want to be happy. I don’t understand why they’re making these choices or whatever. And so, his big belief about the world is that all people, their main thing is that they want to be happy.
And I was like, okay, but that’s your belief about the world. Not everybody’s number one thing is to be happy people. Their number one thing may be to make an impact on the world. Some people, their number one thing is to be safe. There are so many possible different number one things, but from his perspective, it’s like, that doesn’t make any sense. Why would anyone not that number one thing to be happy, have fun, and just be happy. And so, it sounds really good to him. That was an a-ha moment, I think, for both of us being like, okay, so that’s why some of these behaviors of other people just make no sense and can be so frustrating.
And it also goes a long way to explain why he would make the choices he makes in his life. And so, I think that if you’re a curious sort of person and interested in diving deeper into these personality things, like asking those questions of yourself, like what are those core, important things to me? And then just ask other people like, what are the things for you? Because I just think you’d be really surprised by how different even people who you get along really well with, even people who you have these close relationships with, just how different people are.
PAM: Yeah. And being a partner. Because it’s been forever and it’s very typical. Anyway, it is like the way you pack the dishwasher, it’s like there’s one way, there is one right way. It’s like, but this is the most efficient, and so, I think it’s super fun. That’s when we’ve been going back and forth. It’s there’s not just one way. And so, if you like it this way and that’s super important to you, I’ll keep my hands off it.
But the interesting piece, I think, for me, too, is just to open that up for ourselves, to recognize, does this feel like I’m doing this the one right way? It ties in with what you’re saying here. This is the one way for me. Why is that? What are those pieces that feel really good when I put this dish here and this dish here? And why do I put knives this way or this way, or whatever it is. What is it that’s feeling good about the thing that I’m doing that feels good for me?
Which then opens up that lens to, oh, like that really aligns with my personality, with who I am as a person, with the way I like to do things. And that helps me recognize through that people are different lens that other people, some people don’t have efficiency at the top of their list.
There are just so many different lenses. It doesn’t have to be the fastest way. It doesn’t have to be the shiniest way. And that gets us to recognizing the messages, too, that we’ve absorbed, the whole cultural productivity efficiency. That is a shining gold star that one must shoot for throughout anything that you’re doing during the day. And it’s just so fascinating. I think it can be helpful for us to observe that in ourselves. That helps us peel it back or knock away a little bit again so that we can recognize it’s not just one right way.
ANNA: And I think that speaks to what Erika said, where school is kind of trying to force us to that one place. And so, I think it’s really interesting to actually do some introspection about, okay, is that priority that I’ve set here really about how my brain works and how I work, or is it what I think I’m supposed to do? Because that’s a whole other layer of it. But, right, I love the dishwasher example, and it reminded me of a friend that, I mean, this is even hard for me to say these words. Okay. So, she would take the utensils from the dishwasher and just dump them in the drawer. Just dumped ’em all in the drawer. And so, you would just open the drawer and you’d fish around to get out a fork or whatever. This is very stressful for me and I don’t feel like I’m overly organized, but I’m like, I want the forks in the fork area, want the knives in the knife area. But it was so not a priority for her. She just was like, but why would you waste your time doing that when you could be doing fun things?
I’m guessing she probably has that Josh and David thing. Like why when you could be doing fun things? And I’m like, oh. But I don’t see it as a waste of like, it just doesn’t seem like it takes that much time. But again, this piece of people are different, we just prioritize things differently. There are just different things. And our priorities can change. There may be a time when there’s a lot going on in my life where I really do need some calm, clean surfaces, or I need a little bit less stimulation, and then other times where I’m fine. And so, that’s where, if we can keep that curiosity, we can keep that open communication going. We’re not taking it personally, we’re not getting frustrated. We’re just recognizing that we’re all so different.
ERIKA: Yeah. And just how fast is it to just dump the dump that silverware in there! That’s really the fastest way! It hadn’t even occurred to me, but that is incredibly much faster than what I do. So funny. But they’ve never had problems with it. But if you do have the partner who wants to be super organized, like I fall into the trap sometimes of being like, he’s doing that because he doesn’t like me, because he doesn’t care about my feelings, is why he does it that way. You know what I mean? So, that’s the taking it extremely personally. I could be like, oh my gosh, she’s dumping all that silverware in there, because she doesn’t care at all about how I feel about the drawer. But it’s like, no, it doesn’t even occur to her.
ANNA: Right! I think that is such a fun example to end on, and that it’s fun to think about all the different ways that we’re different and all the different ways that we prioritize things. And that it isn’t saying something about someone else, it’s only saying something about us. And so, when we can stay there, gosh, it just really revolutionizes all the relationships.
PAM: All the relationships. It really does. Because then you can embrace and celebrate somebody else’s way of doing things and choices that they make without like feeling like you are wrong or that it says something about you. It’s like, this is so you and that’s amazing and I’m so excited that you’re discovering this and exploring, expressing whatever it is, whether it’s through actions, choices, dress, everything. And then I go back to, we’re all human beings. And we’re each one of us different and just keep peeling back those layers because every time someone’s like, huh, why? Oh, people are different. Let’s tap that for a little bit and see. Where does that lead me? Because oh, it leads beautiful places, doesn’t it?
ANNA: It really does. So, I’m excited for people to take this lens and see what happens. So, leave us some comments, reach out, and I just appreciate the two of you so much. I love talking about these ideas with you and thinking about all the different ways that it is valuable in our lives. And if you all listening love these conversations, we really would love to have you at the Living Joyfully Network. We have a lot of fun conversations and so many a-ha moments and it just fills me up so much.
So, you can find a link for that in the show notes. Thank you so much for joining us today!
PAM: Have a great day. See you all later. Bye!
ERIKA: Bye!
EU368: Curiosity-Led Learning
Aug 15, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about curiosity-led learning. We thought this would be a fun topic to dive into during this back-to-school season! Focusing on curiosity—our own and our kids’—can be so grounding.
In this episode, we explore the definition of learning, how school-based learning looks different than learning through unschooling, and how we’ve seen curiosity at play in our families.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello to you both. ANNA AND PAM: Hello! ERIKA: Pam, would you like to get us started with our topic for today, which is curiosity-led learning?
PAM: Yes, I would love to! Because I feel like this is one of the first big paradigm shifts that people encounter and that I encountered when I began exploring unschooling in earnest. But even if you’ve been unschooling for years, I would not be surprised of just listening in on this conversation reveals yet another layer that you can peel back around the value of curiosity-led learning.
Like, “Oh, it applies here, too.” I’m still getting those little layers. As you encounter it out in the wild in our lives, there’s always, always more layers.
But culturally, the message is that learning must be led by curricula, that there’s a step-by-step, linear process that needs to be followed for “real” learning to happen, and that learning is hard, that it’s challenging. Here’s the next step. Learn this. Here’s the next step.
And what unschooling does is encourage us to ask ourselves, is that the only way to learn? Because some people pick things up that way. We all went through school that way, and we learned what we did. And then it’s always fun to look back and think, how much did I remember? How do I define learning? Is that really learning? If really I can just do it on a worksheet, but I have no idea how to bring that into my days and into my life? It is just a beautiful, beautiful paradigm shift when you start looking, oh, are there other ways to learn? Is this other learning that I’m doing just because I love this thing, does it discount the learning I’m doing about it? If it’s not hard, is it learning? There are just so many ways to look at it. And then when we give ourselves enough space to start questioning it and start looking at, okay, well, I know this was really fun, but I have been learning lots and it’s been useful learning for me, does that count? And just start looking at it through that lens and recognizing things like, oh my gosh, it doesn’t feel hard. Even though you may notice other people saying, “Oh my gosh. How did you learn all that? That depth of knowledge,” et cetera. And they’re talking about it being difficult, whereas it feels much easier to us because we were interested in it in the first place because our curiosity was guiding us and we’re like, oh, yes, I want more. I want more. I want more.
When we start to notice all those little different aspects of it and start to bring that all together, we start to play with, what does curiosity-led learning look like? And wow, it’s pretty darn amazing. It really is valuable. It’s like all the things. And we can start to replace what is curriculum-led, what somebody else thinks we should be learning with what we’re interested in learning. And it just opens up this whole box. It’s just removes the box on what learning can look like for us. Can’t it?
ANNA: Yeah. For me, I think what’s so interesting is I feel like this is actually the natural process, how we all, as adults learn. Like, “Okay, there’s something that I want to do and so what do I need to know in order to do that thing?” And so, then it’s the relevant pieces that maybe I want to take up this hobby and I need to learn this, or maybe I want to take this particular job and gosh, I better learn these things. But it’s so relevant. So, for me it’s about bringing that “relevant” piece to it.
And you kind of mentioned this, where the retaining comes in, because when it’s something that we’re using every day or is relevant to something that we’re interested in, we actually do retain it, because we’re practicing, we’re using, we’re tweaking all the time. And so, I think that piece is so interesting that school has kind of separated that and made it very irrelevant.
So, we’re learning and putting things on a piece of paper. We don’t really understand why. And so, what I learned in school was really how to do that, how to take and memorize information and give it to them in the form that they wanted. It’s interesting to me now as an adult, sometimes I’ll think about something that was covered in school and I’m like, that’s why they wanted that to be covered, but it meant nothing to me in the 30 years in between. But now I’m like, now that it’s relevant, I can go back and refresh. I don’t remember it from then, but I can go back and refresh. But I thought, oh, how interesting. Because somebody somewhere thought this was important in their life. And so, they wanted kids to know it. But I don’t feel like humans learn that way.
ERIKA: Right. It’s so interesting, isn’t it? I just feel like what has happened is that the way that schools do things has become the definition of what learning is, but if you really think about it, it doesn’t work. Our brains do not work that way. But if we think learning is, someone tells you what you need to know, it’s in this order, it’s these important things, these facts at this age, whatever, then the curiosity part, it never even gets looked at or considered. It’s not even a consideration at all.
But we know from ourselves, from watching our kids, just from looking at people, like you’ve seen the glazed-over eyes of kids in class. Certainly. I mean, certainly over the years I have seen that as a teacher and I’ve seen it as a student and information is not getting in there. So, as far as just choosing to teach someone something that they’re not interested in, that’s not causing learning to happen. And so, I really think we need to just change the definition. Don’t call it learning if all you’re doing is having someone lecture to someone else about something that they don’t want to know. That’s not learning.
And so, I feel like a lot of the “learning” that I did in school was that temporary, memorize it, cram it in my brain, get it out onto the paper for the test, and then it’s gone. And so, now I can look back and just be like, what was the use of that time for me, other than, like you said, learning to memorize, learning to take tests, that kind of thing?
Thankfully, when I was in school, I was so interested in doing well in school, that that itself kind of became my interest. And so, learning the things in class to do on the test, that process was more my interest, because I wanted to get the good grades. My kids do not have this personality. And so, with them, it just has to be curiosity-led. I can’t see another way. They don’t want to learn things that they’re not interested in. And so, then the fun part is then how fun, natural, easy, all the things, they will dive so deeply into things that they’re interested in. And so, now I see it as the only way for learning to happen is through curiosity.
PAM: Yeah. It’s really how you define learning, right? Is learning the regurgitation piece for the grades, is it the retention piece we’ll get to? And for those peeling back more layers, do we even need to look at learning? That’s a topic for another conversation. But there were two or three pieces that I really wanted to pull out, Erika, from what you said there. One was, let’s call it something else. And you know what popped to mind was, let’s call that teaching. Just because teaching is done doesn’t mean learning is happening. Teaching is somebody else telling people, you’re going to know this and this is the process to get this answer, and this is a noun, etc. And so, the teaching happens whether or not the learning happens, like you’re saying, Erika, I love the distinction of, what came to be my interest was getting good grades, which is then again, another conversation. But that is what helped you move through the school process, exist in that environment, take stuff in from the teaching, and then spew it out on the test for the grades. Totally, totally fine.
And what is super interesting, and what I found, like you mentioned too, Anna, is that the retention just isn’t there when you’re not using it or interested in it. Because for me, one of the big shifts with this shift to curiosity-led learning was looking at learning from my child’s perspective. That helped me start to recognize when it was actually learning I was talking about and not teaching. And to make that distinction between the two. Sometimes my kids are interested in learning something and want some information, but the interest is there first and then they’re going to soak it in. They’re going to ask questions. They’re going to ask, but, but why, but how? And then you get into that conversation, they pick up what they’re interested in. That helps them make that next connection and that next connection and then they move on. And it doesn’t have to be a week’s worth of worksheets and repetition, because they were ready to soak that in. And then the other piece that I really enjoy when I think about learning, because so much of the school as we were talking about, is that linear curricula. You learn this and then learn this and then learn this. Like, this is the best way to put this knowledge together. But my preference over the years has really become thinking of learning more as a web of connections of like, oh, there’s this piece and this piece and this piece. Because truly, when you break subjects down, there is really so much crossover in the real world. There is math all over the place. There’s math in poetry, in words, there’s math in geography. There’s just so much crossover. Once you start breaking them into the silos of subjects, you lose that richness, whereas when you’re following your curiosity and just seeing where it leads you, you may end up over in one subject for a couple of days and then back into another subject, but you are making connections between it all.
There’s just a much bigger, deeper richness to the learning that happens when you’re following the things that you’re curious about, the things that you’re interested in. It doesn’t mean that you’re not going to do the hard things. I think that’s one of the little stumbling blocks that can come up when people are first learning about, well, if we are just going to follow our interests, we’re never going to do anything hard, because if something looks hard, I’m not going to be interested.
Well, look at your kids. And actually notice, so often, when they’re frustrated, that’s because they’re wanting to do something that’s hard for them right now, but they want to do it, so they’re going to keep going. Even if you wish, like, okay, let’s go do something else for a while because you’re uncomfortable with the frustration. But no, there’s beauty in that frustration as well. And of course, we want to support, give space, hold all those pieces for them. But it’s not wrong to be frustrated. It doesn’t mean they’re not a good learner, because they’re frustrated. It means none of those things. It means, oh they’re really determined in this moment. And how can I help them, if they’re looking for some help, to start putting something together? What’s that little connection they’re missing in their web, right?
ANNA: Yeah. Something you said, Erika, it was about the learning. I think it’s really helpful if people find themselves saying things like, I don’t think they’re learning anything, they’re playing games all the time, or they’re building forts all the time, they’re not learning. I think this is really important to really ask yourself, what do I think learning means? Am I only looking at it through this lens of, “Well, they’re not sitting down doing fractions or times tables,” because really, learning as humans is so much broader than that.
And so, I loved how you pointed out that we’ve taken this system that’s really a subset and hasn’t always been around to define this concept that is just really innate to humans. We are just learning machines. How do we survive the day? How do we get through this? That is what we do. And so, I think when you hear yourself saying things like that go, oh wait a minute. What am I defining as learning and why? And this is important. There’s no right or wrong answer. It’s just a little examination. I think it’s important.
One of the things I also wanted to say was about the doing hard things, because we said it’s easier when it’s led by our curiosity. But it can be hard, right? It can be frustrating. It can take time. And that’s okay too, because what you’ll see is there’s this drive to figure out and sometimes walk away from it and then sometimes come back. But it’s just so much more natural and I love that.
And then another thing Pam reminded me of, so Pam is amazing at technology and systems and all of these things. I am not as much. I’m not terrible, but if you put me in that world, I’m not as good at it. And so, I really don’t retain all the, of all the different pieces, even about things I use pretty regularly, because it just isn’t a passion area for me. And so, I think it’s just knowing about ourselves and thinking, yeah, that’s kind of how it works. If I need to know, I can Google it. I can figure it out. I can ask Pam. She may be like, “She’s asking me again!” But it’s okay, you know? So, I think just thinking about how we do things and then recognizing that our kids are human, too, doing things, it can really help when we get stuck in this place.
ERIKA: Right, exactly. I just feel like once we start thinking about ourselves and how we actually really learn, it becomes this different way that we can look at our kids. And I think sometimes when we first go into parenting, first go into the idea of how children learn, it’s just old tapes of what we’ve been told over the years of, school is the place you learn. You have to know these things. This is what it should look like. And so, I loved my unschooling journey for that process of questioning that and being like, wait a second. If I can learn things, anything I want, now, they can also learn anything they want at any time. And there’s just a lot of freedom in that.
And then I was also thinking, a lot of people have had the experience, too, in school of like, maybe they do hit on a topic that you might be interested in, and then they say, that’s enough of that, let’s move on to something else. And so, that’s a really huge benefit of unschooling is just like, oh my gosh. I found something I want to do. Can I do more of this? And the answer’s always yes. And they can just dive as deeply as they want. And so, then we meet really interesting children who have so much knowledge in this one super deep area that’s just incredible. And so, they may not have all of their whatever other skills that the school would be looking for at that age, but they have spent their time learning about something that’s so important and interesting to them. And from there, whatever they want to do in life, it becomes obvious what they might be curious about next.
And so, I find that so much with my kids who are now young teenagers. They used to be so focused on certain things and then now it’s different. It’s like they’re in a new phase. They’re finding new aspects of life that now they’re curious about and interested in. Like, how am I going to manage to do this in my life? I want to do this and I know that I need to learn more things to get there. You know? And so, it’s just a very different way. I felt very directed down a path, but it feels like for them, they’re making a path and seeing where they want to go, and then telling me, “I really want to work on my handwriting because that would really help me with this.” And I’m just like, yeah, that makes sense. It’s a completely different approach.
PAM: I want to jump in, because that’s what was bubbling in my head. Erika, you nailed it. There is one thing when you’re making the shift away from curriculum and into curiosity and interests is, it’s fascinating to note how much of the curriculum, certainly in the younger years is skill-based, like reading and math and handwriting, like those skills, whereas that’s not really what you’re going to see very often in unschooling lives, because they’re following their interests.
But what they’re doing instead of learning the skill, like, two plus two is four, and then now let’s take that into the world. Here’s how to read beginner books, now let’s take that into the world. Our kids are, like you said, they’re doing stuff and they’re like, oh, hey, like I’m playing this game and I’ve got these boss statistics I need to manage. I’m going to figure out how those numbers are working and what formulas back there. Or I really want to read this forum and yes, my parents, somebody’s helping me read it for a while and then I’m starting to pick it up, or I’m wanting to try and read because somebody doesn’t have time to or isn’t able to read for me for 12 hours. All those pieces.
So, our kids are doing the things in the world and picking up the skills along the way. They’re not like, I want to learn the skill and now I can finally go and play that game. Or now I can finally go and read this book. Or the handwriting. Yes. Go Anna.
ANNA: Well, it’s exactly this though. I’m just going to take the next step. Because what’s so incredible about that is, if we are really true and really honest with ourselves, we don’t know what skills are going to be needed for the next generation and for five years from now and for 10 years from now.
Because I think about the books that were the standard when I was in school, they probably wouldn’t even believe it if kids today read some of the stuff that they thought we needed to know then. And so, what’s so great when it’s coming the other direction, they’re able to take it way further than this curriculum can lead them, because that’s actually pinning them in. But if they’re following interests and creating new things and making new discoveries, and then getting the skills along the way. Yes, those skills can be foundational, but because they’re foundational, they’re always going to learn them. They’re just going to learn them through something that’s interesting and maybe taking them way beyond what we could have done with the curriculum. So, I love that so much.
PAM: For me, that was another one of the huge shifts, right? It was truly just understanding that, oh, it’s not that I’m throwing out the curriculum, and they will never learn how to spell and they’ll never learn how to read and their math skills will be atrocious. Each of those things is so much bigger when you’re actually in the world. Back to what you were talking about at the very beginning, Anna, about just being in the world and living in the world, and we’re just picking up those skills. And yes, if they are actually foundational to living a human life wherever it is that we’re living, you are going to come across the need for them as you’re living.
ANNA: Absolutely. Right. That’s why they’re foundational. We don’t have to force it. And we don’t have to pull it out, because I feel like the way that schools can separate learning from life and reality almost makes it feel mysterious and difficult. Like, what does this mean? Why am I having to do it?
And like you said, the drills, the drills, the drills.
And what I found so interesting with my girls is, in our state at the time, we had to take a standardized test every couple years, I think. Maybe every year. It’s been a little while. But what was so interesting to me is they would be able to do all of these English things and looking at sentences and picking the right word. And I’m like, oh my gosh. I remember filling out those sheets with making the verb match the tense of the thing. And they never did that. They learned it from talking, being spoken to reading books, having books, read to them, playing games. They learned the language that was around them because they were in the world.
And I think that what’s empowering about that is I think they had a belief. I see it in them as adults, that they can figure things out, they can learn things. Whereas I think school kind of makes it mysterious, like, no, you have to be in this room and someone that’s an expert’s going to tell you, and then you’re going to have to really work hard and practice it to learn it. And I just don’t think that’s true. And so, what I love about unschooling is just that questioning. We can start questioning, is that true it? Does that make sense? Do I see that in my life as an adult? Does it really play out when I’m watching my kids organically learn? And that’s when I think things get really interesting.
ERIKA: I think the school model can just lead to people thinking that they can’t learn. Where really, it’s like, I can’t memorize stuff that I’m not interested in, which I think is just natural. Or like, I can’t memorize stuff that makes no sense to me and I can’t use it anywhere in my life. I think that’s reasonable, but to conclude that, then that means I can’t learn, it’s just so sad that that is the result of so much of school-style teaching.
I see it a little bit just culturally with my kids, where they’ll have some of these beliefs of like, I’m supposed to know this, or, well, in school they do this and I can’t do this, or I don’t know if I would be able to. And so, I mean, it’s interesting that those things still come up, even though they can make their own decisions and learn all kinds of things. And so, it’s just interesting to have those conversations with them about like, well, what are the things that you want to do? And thankfully, outside of school, there are an infinite number of ways to learn the things that they want to learn.
And so, we’re working through some new computer programs with Oliver and he took a look at one the other day and he was just like, I don’t think I can learn this. And I was like, it looks super overwhelming at first, but I’m sure that we can figure it out. Either someone who is an expert who could work with you on it or we could look up videos. There are just so many ways to learn.
I think, in some moments we run into those, “I’m not practiced at learning” kind of ideas that they have about it, but then it’s fun to point out to them, but that’s all you do. That really is what you’ve done your whole life. It just doesn’t feel like what it looks like in the stories or what you hear about with your friends who are in school.
ANNA: Right. And that what’s so important about that piece that you just puzzled there is, what I recognized was that my role was my energy about that. Because I think what can happen is, if you hear your child say, I don’t know how to do that, and this person knows how to do this and I don’t know how to do it, suddenly all of our tapes come and the mother-in-law’s tape and the thing going, oh, we failed them. We’ve done this. But really, it was just what you were saying. I was like, wait a minute. I’ve lived with you all these years. I’ve seen you learn things that I can’t even learn. Oh my gosh. We just need some different tools. If this is something you’re interested in now, then here’s the thing.
But they really look to me for my energy. So, if I brought heaviness about, oh my gosh, you don’t know how to do that and we better do this and that, or we need to jump back into that, I think it really would’ve changed that. And instead, it was just, like you said, just empowering them. Like, you are learning incredible things every day. You can learn whatever you want. Let’s figure out what you need and we’ll do it together. So, just watching that energy and making sure that I’m not letting the tapes from other people come into that relationship with my child.
PAM: Yeah. I think that’s definitely us doing our work and practicing, because, like you said, that just brings back all those messages. Oh, but if they were in school, they would’ve learned this in this grade and this in this grade, and taking that leap to the future as in how we learn as adults. And I think for me, the shift to just thinking of us all as human beings and wherever we are as a human being in this moment and what we’re interested in learning, and even if it feels overwhelming in the moment, like, oh my gosh, something I continue to do is use your time machine idea, Anna, which is when I’m something like, holy crap, I have no idea. I can just imagine in six months when I’m sitting here and just humming along, that’s going to be so cool. And that just kind of helps me take that next step. It’s like, oh yeah, give myself a bunch of time and I’ll just figure it out along the way. I’ll play with it. And that’s the way human beings learn, as you were mentioning earlier. So, to be able to take our messages and our fears around school and kids and to be able to just say, this is human beings and learning stuff. That helped me so much anyway to just move through those moments, because those cultural messages are everywhere. It’s not just that we learned them growing up and then now we have them. We also hear them all the time now. In this back-to-school season, we hear them even more. And it can have us questioning ourselves.
So, I think it’s so useful for us to do that bit of processing for ourselves, because as you said, Anna, the energy that we show up with can make all the difference. If we show up with, oh my gosh, something’s wrong, that needs fixing, or, oh my goodness, that looks like a lot of stuff to take in just one bite at a time, as they say, baby steps, whatever kind of language helps for them and helps for you as you move through it to remember like, this is just learning.
And I think it’s threaded through our entire conversation, but I don’t know that we’ve said it loud. We can learn something at every age. So, just because something in school is covered in grade four. I always go back to pioneer times, because that was when Joseph left school. That was one of the topics going on. It doesn’t matter at what age. It doesn’t even matter if, but whatever age something comes up about pioneer times, that that period of history, and they’re curious about it, they can learn it at any time. There is no need for it to be done at a certain age. You can see why that’s useful inside a school curriculum, because you don’t want like three years in a row for the teacher to love pioneer times, and they have to do it for three years in a row. They have to break it up that way, right? So, okay, this is the chunk. There’s often not much more logic than that. We’ve got this many years of history to cover, let’s do this much each year. Same with geography, same with so much of it, right? But we can learn anything at any age.
ANNA: Now I’m super curious what Canadian pioneer times are like. I’m going to have to look it up and learn at 55.
PAM: We loved visiting the Pioneer Village. I found it at the time because I was very new at unschooling and thought, well we can do this instead. This is how we can learn it, outside, because he was finding it interesting at the time. But it ended up being one of our favorite places to go as a family for the first two years. We got a park pass, so we could go any time. There’s no cars, so you could walk around. We would bring walkie talkies (before mobile phones) and play tag. Because we could all just be within this area and it wasn’t huge. We would give clues, I’m beside a big steeple, or I see horses, clues like that. And we would go and find each other and my gosh. We had so much fun in Pioneer Times for two years, like I said, at least. And we go back there just for the memories. We went a couple years ago. Anyway, so that’s funny. Exactly. Any age, any age.
ERIKA: And any topic! I love that so much. Well, this has been so much fun, as expected. We hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an a-ha moment or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It is such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our own unschooling lives. You can learn more about the Network at livingjoyfully.ca/network. We hope to meet you there! And thanks for listening. We’ll see you next time! Bye!
Teachers Turned Unschoolers (EU282 Encore)
Aug 01, 2024
Let’s dive into a question I get pretty regularly, and that’s whether I have podcast episodes with unschooling parents that used to be teachers.
It’s fun to ponder the why behind the question. Does it seem like a strange leap to make? To me, choosing teaching indicates an interest in children and in learning, so to dive into that even more deeply with their own children through unschooling does seem like a rather natural next step to take.
But whatever the reason behind this pretty common question, the answer is a resounding yes! On the podcast to this point, there have been 22 guests who were, or are, teachers or university professors, who study education at the post-secondary level, or even teach education courses.
In this episode, I’ve gathered a few snippets from teachers turned unschoolers sharing about their experience and how that journey came about for them. It’s so interesting!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.
Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?
We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!
So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.
Anna, Erika, and I dive into listener questions! We talk about the fears and doubts that come up at the start of the unschooling journey, the idea of wanting to measure success, and what to do when a child is interested in a topic that seems too grown up for them.
And as I mention at the beginning of our conversation, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer. That’s because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
QUESTION SUMMARIES
We had a quick first question from Sabrina who was looking for interviews with single parents who are unschooling. Pam put together a reference page with episodes to check out.
Our second question is from Erin in New Jersey. She wonders how to get past some of the doubts she has about unschooling and the judgmental opinions of family and friends in order to trust herself. She also mentions feeling a need to measure success when it comes to unschooling and isn’t sure if that’s okay.
Our third question is from Joy in Ireland. Her eight-year-old son has a strong interest in war, weapons, fighting games, and history. Some of what he wants to watch and play is rated PG-13, which feels like it might be unsafe for him. She sees him learning so much from his interest, but worries that he might be desensitized to violence and that the more mature content could be harmful.
Our final question is from McKinzie. She is a third-generation teacher and is finding deschooling and trusting unschooling to be difficult, despite wholeheartedly agreeing with the concept. She specifically feels like teaching math and reading could be important, because she doesn’t want to “leave it to chance.”
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.
Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?
We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!
So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.
Anna, Erika, and I dive into listener questions! We talk about navigating sibling and friend relationships, the idea of self-regulation when it comes to technology, and the journey of finding community and connection for ourselves and our children.
And as I mention at the beginning of our conversation, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer. That’s because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
QUESTION SUMMARIES
Our first question is from Alison. There are shifts going on with her daughters’ relationship with each other and with their mutual friends. She wants to stand up for her younger daughter when she is being excluded and wants to help them without being pushy.
Our second question is from Belinda in Canada. Her six-year-old son wants to use the iPad more than she feels comfortable with. She believes he can’t self-regulate and wants to protect him from spending too much time on the iPad, while also wishing she didn’t feel that way.
Our final question is from Amelia in Utah. Her five-year-old daughter’s friends are all starting school and so, she’s looking for ideas about finding support and connections with other unschooling families.
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.
Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?
We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!
So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.
Exploring Unschooling Q&A (EU322 Encore)
Jun 20, 2024
Anna, Erika, and I dive into listener questions! We talk about cocooning and connecting with young teens, the mainstream concept of productivity and how we get curious about external messages of judgment, and the idea of an “ideal unschooler.”
And as I mention at the beginning of our conversation, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer. That’s because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
QUESTION SUMMARIES
Our first question comes from the comments on our last Q&A YouTube video. The viewer is feeling disconnected from their young teen and worrying about the time he’s spending gaming.
Our second question from Maya is concerning the concept of productivity. She wonders why it feels difficult to release her judgments about productivity and laziness.
Our final question relates to curiosity. The listener wonders if people who are more naturally curious about a wide variety of topics make better unschoolers and whether there is something they can do to help their younger two children who seem uninterested in following those curiosity trails.
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.
Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?
We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!
So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.
Exploring Unschooling Q&A (EU314 Encore)
Jun 06, 2024
Anna, Erika, and I dive into listener questions! We explore technology and “screen time,” deschooling, connection, and validation.
And as I mention at the beginning of our conversation, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer. That’s because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
QUESTION SUMMARIES
Our first question is from Ella, a new unschooling mom with three young children. As the family is deschooling, she’s noticing that the children are choosing to watch TV for a lot of the day. Her partner is uncomfortable with the situation and she wants to know about setting boundaries around TV time or how to find a balance of how her children are spending their free time.
Our second question from Tara is concerning avid video-gaming kids who used to spend more time playing outside. Tara feels stuck in a rut and like her children no longer want to do the things that they used to do. Often, when they do go outside, they love their time there, but it’s hard to get them out the door.
Our final question is from Nadia, who is trying to figure out how to support her children as they attend school at her ex-husband’s insistence. She’s wondering what her options are as she believes unschooling would be a better path for them, though it feels like she doesn’t have a choice given the circumstances.
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.
Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?
We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!
So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.
EU367: The Abundance Mindset
May 23, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the abundance mindset. We often find ourselves thinking about abundance versus scarcity in conversations on the podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network. In this episode, we dive into the many ways that shifting to abundance has helped us and our families with creative problem solving. We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, I’m Anna Brown with Living Joyfully, and today I am joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis.
ERIKA AND PAM: Hello! Hi!
ANNA: Today we’re going to be talking about the abundance mindset, how to cultivate it, and how it can help us on our unschooling journey. Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would! I love a mindset shift and the word abundance just feels so good to me, so I’m excited to dive into this one.
So, when we talk about abundance in our conversations on the podcast and on the Network, what we’re really talking about is a mindset. And when we’re cultivating that mindset of abundance, we open ourselves up to possibilities. We’re telling ourselves there’s plenty of time. We know that even if things don’t go as we initially imagined, that there are solutions and possibilities. It’s a feeling of keeping ourselves open.
And then the flip side of abundance is scarcity. And if we’re mentally in a place of scarcity, it can feel like there’s not enough time. We don’t have enough money. I can’t possibly do all the things that I need to do. We need to try to speed through things to get to the next thing. And so, a scarcity mindset is at play if I’m worried about the timeline of my children’s learning or if I’m feeling like a lot of pressure around making the proper decision in this moment.
And so, we end up using those two words a lot, abundance and scarcity to describe our mental states. And I think just recognizing when I’m getting stuck in that scarcity mode can help me to reframe and get to that more helpful mindset of abundance.
PAM: Yeah, I love that. It’s absolutely a mindset shift. And I think, like in your examples, it’s so great to remember that it applies to so much more than just money. Many conversations where you hear talk about scarcity and abundance mindset, they are in relation to money and income and those kinds of things. But yes, bigger picture, that same mindset shift can be so helpful to recognize, it’s a scarcity of time if you’re worried, oh, what are my kids learning? When are they going to learn this? And, oh my gosh, what if they don’t learn this?
When we shift to that lifelong learning perspective, and we recognize that, you know what? When something becomes interesting to them or important to them or just hits something that they’re wanting to accomplish or do, that’s when they can learn it and that’s when they will learn it with less effort. Or it doesn’t seem hard. It almost doesn’t seem like you’re learning, but that’s because you’ve got a reason for it. It’s become important. It’s not like, learn this now for some day. That’s hard, because, what are you going to connect that to? How’s that going to make sense?
But when you make that shift to lifelong learning, it takes that scarcity of time component away and helps you realize that there is an abundance and there’s a lifetime of it where things can bubble up along the way. So, I just find it really fun, too, when I’m stressed about something to ask if there is an abundance component to it or a scarcity component to it. Just because that starts helping me think about it in a little bit bigger picture. And that’s when there are possibilities and solutions versus the more tunnel vision that happens to me when I’m thinking scarcity.
ANNA: Yeah. And I think for me it’s really the same thing that you both just said, but it’s that energetic shift. Because, like you said, Erika, we can put it into those categories a lot. When I’m thinking about if I’m feeling some tightness or something, it’s like, ooh, what’s happening there? And then I recognize, oh, I’m bringing that scarcity energy to this. It is tunneling me in and I feel the contraction just even thinking about it. And so, that abundance is almost like the deep breath. It’s like, oh, okay, I’ve got time.
And it’s funny, because I’m glad you brought up plenty of time, because you know I say that all the time and it really is, to me, exactly abundance. It really centers me to, this is a long game. Whatever it is, even if it’s something that’s going to complete in the next week or two, it’s like this deep breath. There’s plenty of time. We’re going to work this out. And so, that energy that I bring to it is really what we’re talking about in terms of the paradigm shift today.
But there are specific things that come up that I think are fun to explore. And one of the big ones for me was the idea that everything didn’t have to come from me. I think as parents, especially when we have little kids, everything’s coming from me, food, and all the things. And so, this shift to recognizing like, oh, there’s a broader world here. There are more people in my kids’ lives. And I noticed them finding ways to make things happen that I didn’t know could happen, and I couldn’t find the path myself.
And so, that’s when, again, I realized I was tunneling in on, okay, they’re asking for something or wanting to do something, and I’m thinking there’s one path to this thing that they’re asking about. “I want to get a horse,” or, “I want to do,” whatever big idea thing they might have. And I’m thinking there’s one way. That’s tunneling me in.
And so, when I can breathe into, the world is big and abundant and there are so many different ways, then we just saw magical things happen, just interesting connections and meeting new people and things. And so, again, for me it was always about checking that energy, but recognizing that this is broader than just me having to say, oh, we don’t have the money for that, or we don’t have the time for that, or whatever might be the constraint.
ERIKA: Yeah, I, I actually was going to mention horses, because I feel like it’s just one of those potentially scary, big things that could come up. So, just imagine any kind of moment when your kid comes to you with an interest that just feels like, oh my god, we don’t have the money for this. We don’t have the time for this, or the space for this, or whatever it is. And so, I just love that. It’s not that you’re changing what you’re doing necessarily, it’s changing how you’re thinking about what you’re doing. And it’s opening that up.
And so, it really does feel like the scarcity view is that tunnel vision. I can only see that they said they want horseback riding lessons. I’m seeing that it’s going to look like this and it’s going to cost this and it’s going to take this time, and all these different things like that. There’s just that one path that I can first see and if I get stuck in, but that won’t work for us, then that’s it. That’s the end of it. And it feels like being trapped.
And so, then the abundance, and I mean, we’ve had this happen so many times in the Network where someone will bring, oh my gosh, I’m freaking out because my kid wants this. And it’s like, okay, but you’re in the scarcity mindset of, we can’t do it because of X, Y, Z. And so, switching to the abundance just feels like taking a broader view of the whole thing. Opening myself up to all the different ways that we could incorporate an interest or explore things without it costing money. Or like you’re saying, everything doesn’t have to come from me. It doesn’t mean that I have to be the one with all the answers. We could just start with being creative and exploring things and if I assume that abundance is actually there and that abundance is the reality, it just helps so much with that creativity and exploring all the different possible options.
PAM: I do think that is such a helpful step. I’m trying to think, to notice this shift, so for me it’s like I just need to notice when I’m uncomfortable about something or if you’re feeling that overwhelmed, just like you were describing there, Erika, like, oh my gosh, this is the path and we can’t do that. We can’t do that. So, it’s when I’m feeling uncomfortable, it’s like, okay, just ask myself some questions. Right? And then that’s when you remember. Because we all get stuck in that moment. I think it’s not that it never happens just because you know that there’s a difference between scarcity and abundance.
It’s like, okay, I need to find the clues for how I react to a feeling of scarcity. What does it look like for me? So that I can just be on the lookout for those little clues or triggers, or whatever you want to call them, that give you that, oh, okay, let’s just play around with this a little bit more.
Because then, yes, all that you guys were talking about. When we shift to that abundance, it is like remembering, oh, I don’t need to have all the solutions. We can have conversations. Because I have also found quite often when someone comes with an ask or I think of something and my immediate thought is thinking, oh, we can’t do that. Lack of time, lack of money, lack of like all the things. When you take that moment to have a conversation, that is often their solution to the need. Maybe it doesn’t need to look like that. We want to make it look like the way that they’re talking about, but when we can have conversations and get down to what are they wanting, like, I really want to dance. I really want to go horseback riding. You don’t have to jump to owning a horse to try out horseback riding.
So, in having those conversations, it goes back to our why not yes? Speaking of Four Pillars of Unschooling course, that’s when we can open up to the abundance, we can open up to the creative ideas, we can open up to other possible paths. And even recognizing the first baby step. Maybe the first baby step is going and just watching people and just getting to maybe meet a few horses. And then maybe it’s finding a place where maybe it’s just a ride, booking a ride, a trail ride, and you go and do that and is that fun? And then it’s like, oh, maybe lessons. That’s something that’s a little more regular.
There are so many baby steps along the way, and then at each step you can learn a little bit more about them. And with that abundance mindset, it’s not like each step has to be this one thing on this one path. The beautiful thing about seeing the abundance is like, oh, we see this one little step and let’s try it, get our feedback, see how it goes, and look at all the other possibilities that might exist along with this. Now we’ve had this experience and we know how it feels.
I think, too, the challenge in that shift as well is the plenty of time piece. We want to deliver as fast as possible, but when we’re like, oh no, we don’t need to jump to the end in the most efficient way, that’s when we start bubbling up around trust. It’s like, oh, I trust that things will unfold, baby step by baby step in some way, in that direction, but I don’t need to presuppose what it looks like in the end.
We’re going to learn so much each step of the way that we may tweak it and end up someplace different, but someplace better that’s more related to what the person was actually wanting versus how they verbally framed it the first time they mentioned it to us.
ANNA: Digging into those needs, I think, is so important. And something that you said earlier led me on a slight bit of a tangent, but it is about how to notice the blocks or switch, and that is to then to really feel like, okay, where’s that tightness coming from? Because this could be coming from a lot of places. Sometimes it can be coming from maybe a guilt of, we don’t have the money to do that right now, and am I harming my kids or am I holding them back somehow? And it’s like, no, but we have to process that. We have to process that, like, okay. That’s where that’s coming from.
Or sometimes maybe we weren’t heard as a child, and so it’s really important for us to hear our kids and we’re feeling like we’re not hearing them, but watch for those little triggers and just give yourself some moments around that, because like Pam said, it’s then we can lean back into the baby steps of, I can hear my child and we can have a conversation and we can be taking baby steps. We don’t have to jump all the way to the end and solve it and have this one solution that’s come out of it.
But give yourself some space around that, because I think you’ll feel it in your body if you’re feeling that tightness. Or if their big idea is making you, I mean, sometimes it might make you grumpy or a little snappy, like, oh, why is there another big idea that we’ve got to do? Recognize that there’s something there that I want to figure out and give myself some space and love around, because it is hard. There’s lots going on and kids have big ideas.
And so, just recognizing that there are so many ways to support them in cultivating the big ideas, moving towards the big ideas that doesn’t involve you having to step out of your comfort zone even. And maybe you will a little bit down the road, but it’s not like you have to leap out of it the minute an idea comes. Because like you said, there are needs under that idea that we can start to play with and have conversations. That helps the person feel heard, helps them feel seen, helps them really fine tune the idea because it may just be this idea thrown out and they want to fine tune it and understand it and have a conversation about it. And so, I just wanted to make sure I watched any kind of reactions that were about me, so that I wasn’t putting that on the situation or the discussion that was happening with my child.
ERIKA: Yeah. Oh my gosh, I love that. And I’m just thinking about how many places those triggers and messages could be coming from, just with social media and seeing other people’s lives and comparing that to our life, that could definitely trigger a feeling of scarcity or like, I should be doing it in a way that looks like this or just that comparison can cause that feeling of getting stuck there. But when the big ideas come, the more I can deep breathe myself through, it’s just conversations, it’s just exploration. We’re just being creative and cultivating that creativity and openness with that abundance mindset. That helps everyone in the family with every single thing.
It’s going to serve our children later if, when they think of something, they have that practice of not tunneling in on the one one way. It’s fun brainstorming and creatively thinking about things as a family. I feel like it’s just so valuable.
And it was making me also think that it’s super common, especially in a parent role or the adult role to feel the need to come in with a solution to solve the problem. And it’s all related, but everything doesn’t have to come from me. It just doesn’t occur to me at the beginning, because, well, I’m the parent and I’m the one with the money and so it’s really easy to accidentally come with a solution and not even almost realize that I’m doing it. And especially if they seem to have a very clear idea about what they want to do, too. It’s like, okay, we all are just tunneled in on this thing now. And it can cause this all to get stuck, I think, especially if it feels like something that’s just not doable because of money or anything else. But yeah, just remembering that I don’t need to come with a solution. Or if I notice myself coming with a solution, I can be like, oh wait, that was a solution. This doesn’t have to be the one way. It’s all such great learning for moving through problems and moving through life.
PAM: Yeah. They really are skills, for lack of a better word, but just gaining experience with different ways to move through things. To see that, I want a horse, is the first step, not the answer. And I found if that’s the family ethos and the way we process and move through things, I found after months, years of experience, that’s how they were processing, like you mentioned. They’re taking that out into the world with them and the way that they look at things, there is more creativity. There are possibilities. And also it’s not so much about the timeline. It’s not like I need everything to be done immediately. Because they’ve had so much experience growing up with that, let’s do the thing and let’s figure out a way to make it work. And checking in with the different contexts and the different constraints that are part of getting to whatever direction you’re wanting to go. There are just so many pieces. Anna?
ANNA: I got excited because of what you just said, which was the trust. And you mentioned it earlier, that it’s an important piece. And this is why. And it’s because there’s a trust. And like you said, Erika, it’s not just the big things like the horse, it’s the little things like the popsicles ran out. It’s the little things where we develop this trust of, we are going to figure this out. And the timeline is such a perfect thing, because it may not be immediately that we can get more popsicles, but they know that I’m not going to forget about it. I’m not brushing them off. I’m not just not going to think about it because we just went to the grocery store. We’re going to keep it top of mind. We’re going to remember it. We’re going to put it on the list. We’re going to make sure. We’re going to recognize that maybe we didn’t get enough popsicles last time. It’s just going to be this idea of like, oh, okay, what I’m saying is important and valued in my family, and there’s a trust that we’ll figure it out.
So, what I think you’ll see shift when that trust develops is they’re not coming at things with such a sense of urgency. Because I think if we don’t feel heard, and this is adults and kids alike, if we don’t feel heard, we get louder and maybe a little bit more insistent and maybe bring a little bit more sense of urgency.
Like, “You don’t understand how important this is to me.” But when we develop that trust, when we follow through and we keep having the conversations and we keep moving those baby steps towards it, it changes it, because we all can do that deep breath that I talked about at the beginning and go, yeah, we’re going to figure this out. There are lots of different ways to get there. And so, the way you said it, Pam, I was like, oh, that’s it. That’s why trust is so important. It’s not about solving it immediately. It is about just knowing we are hearing each other and we’re moving in that direction.
PAM: And I’ve got to say, the popsicle example is just beautiful. Let’s walk through that just a touch. You know, the, oh man, I’d like a popsicle and we’re out of them. We can say, oh, I’ll put it on the list for next time. But maybe we grocery shopped yesterday and we didn’t get enough and we had a whole bunch of friends over and we went through them faster than we expected. And when we have that trust in the relationship and they feel comfortable sharing, their reaction can be, oh, but I really want one now. There’s that urgency. Maybe it’s hot, maybe whatever. There doesn’t need to be a reason or an excuse or anything.
But then that’s a trust piece, too, that it’ll be like, oh, I can’t go right now, but I can go later today. When we realize, oh, a week from now, next time I’m running into town isn’t going to work for them. But that’s that trust piece, that they trust us that they can share without having to get louder and louder and louder. Because if they feel like we’re not hearing them, they are going to just be like, but no, but no. And then all sorts of chaos can unfold.
But when they trust that they could say no, I can’t wait till five days from now or three days from now, or even tomorrow sometimes. But when they know there’s that trust, they’ll actually check in with themselves and, and say they can wait. Or maybe, if you’re just getting into this, maybe they will need it now. But if we can deliver it now, and now and now, and they can trust that if now is real, we will do as much as possible. I find that then they can relax because they’ve got that trust. They see that when something’s urgent, we will do as much as we can to help them in that moment. But then once that trust develops, they can check in with themselves. It’s like, okay, yeah, you know what? I had two popsicles today, tomorrow is fine, and then maybe next grocery shopping is fine. It is just super fascinating to see that develop.
But yeah, I don’t want people to expect that immediately if they’re just making that shift now, because that trust takes some time to develop and we need to show that they can trust us right through our actions.
ANNA: Okay. One quick thing, Erika, because I know you have something to say, too, but this is about the popsicle. That takes a little bit of time to develop. Here’s the energy piece that we’re talking about. So, when that happens, we don’t have enough popsicles, whatever, I can be frustrated like, okay, we literally just went to the store. Why do we not have enough popsicles? I can get frustrated or I can be like, oh my gosh, it is so hot outside. We can’t get to the store right now, but let’s crush some ice. Let’s pour some stuff on it. Let’s make something. That’s that abundance, that energy shift that for me was so important, because I could get stuck in that place of like, okay, oh my gosh, I just went grocery shopping. I don’t want to go again. You know how I feel about grocery shopping? That’s not fun for me. But that’s me tunneling in, that’s me bringing that scarcity mindset when we can have fun with it. We still may need to get the popsicles down the road, maybe even tomorrow or whatever, but I’m bringing a lightness to it and a connection to it that feels better to me and it feels better to them.
PAM: And how fun might it be to make popsicles?
ERIKA: Stick a spoon in it and let’s see what happens. Now we also have an activity to do. But right. So, it’s the trust. It’s kids trusting that we are not just shutting things down because of our fears and our scarcity and our tunnel vision. So, there’s that trust that we’re going to creatively work through things together. But I think the other part of trust for the abundance mindset is us trusting in abundance itself.
And so, that has been such a big shift for me that really does help when I’m starting to have worries and fears about things, if I can come back to trusting there’s going to be a way to move through it, trusting that there are going to be plenty of possibilities and trusting in our capability to make things happen in one way or another.
And it won’t necessarily be that original vision that I thought was going to happen, but there are abundant possibilities. That is what really, just day to day, helps me move through our lives together.
PAM: That’s so brilliant. There are so many pieces. There’s an abundance of pieces to the abundance mindset. That energy piece that we can bring. I’ll start with noticing our triggers, noticing something that that tells us, oh, it might be helpful to look at this shift to see more possibilities.
The energy we bring to it, the trust that we’re developing, the openness to all sorts of possibilities. It really is the release. To the brainstorming side of it, maybe we suggest making the popsicles and they’re like, no, I need it now. And then you’re crushing ice maybe. But releasing that pressure of scarcity that we’re feeling, that is just so key, I think, to shifting to that energy, to that trust in abundance unfolding, even if we don’t know how in the moment it’s going to unfold. But that it’s happened before.
And I think one other piece that’s so helpful is each time, especially when you’re first working at this, is to make note when it works out. It’s like, oh, I had no idea that that’s where we’d end up. Because maybe we’re starting to talk about making juice and then they think of something else they want to freeze or they want to go play in the bath now, because we’re talking about liquid things. You just never know where it’s going to go.
But I think when we can find proof that it works, we have those little reminders. It’s like, oh yeah, this helped. Because that’s just something that helped me notice my triggers a little bit faster. And to be a little bit more like, oh yes, I want to try this mindset shift, because it’s kind of fun. So, there are just so many little pieces that can be involved, and that’s why we always talk about playing with things for ourselves. See which pieces work for you, because maybe not all of the pieces are meaningful to each person. Our triggers are definitely going to be different, because there will be a lot of things from our childhood and from conventional voices that we have taken in and absorbed that we’re going to be working through.
But it’s so fun to play with because, for me, it’s goes back to curiosity. When I can be curious about where it’s going to go, that is something that helps me make that shift to, oh, okay, let’s explore here rather than tunneling into Yes/No, we can or can’t do this particular thing.
ERIKA: Yeah, I was thinking that it’s harder to get to the abundance mindset if I am having a hard time personally, so if I’m in pain or if I’m sick, or if I haven’t had enough sleep, all those self-care pieces or the hungry, angry, lonely, tired, that we’ve talked about, the HALT pieces. All of those could potentially contribute to me getting in that scarcity mindset.
So, then I feel like my job is to notice, oh, it’s that. These are my reasons. Let me try to either take care of myself or be kind to myself that this is a hard moment, but it still is going to be helpful if I can try to shift to an abundance mindset. But those are going to be the more challenging times to get to that place for me.
ANNA: Right. And I feel like our energy does really set the stage. So, being aware of that helps, because again, if we’re going to a scarcity place, you’ll see your kids going to a scarcity place, which then maybe becomes more insistent or more frustrated or wanting something a certain way because it’s feeling scarce. Like, I’ve got to hone in on this, I have to have it right now, kind of thing.
But I think you’re so right that sometimes when our capacity’s low for whatever reason, that’s hard. But that’s when we talk about narration, because I think kids are more capable than we think. If we can say, okay, I know we can solve this, but right now I’m starving and I can’t think and I’m so tired. We are going to get to this. Just narrating a little bit about what’s happening can calm their nervous system to go, okay. They hear me. They’re not helping me right this moment, but they hear me and it’s important. So, that’s a little baby step we can do when we can’t like jump to just the creativity and the abundance if there’s some capacity issues. Just talk about it, you know?
PAM: Yeah. And that’s where the trust comes in as well. When we’ve built that trust and we have been able to share, narrate, and mention if we’re not feeling well or we’re tired or whatever, that they can hear those and take them in, because they don’t feel like we’re just trying to put them off.
ANNA: Right. And I would say definitely follow up. So, if you say something like, “Okay, I’m just too tired right now, it’s really late and I want to revisit it,” write it down, put it on the whiteboard, whatever your family does to show that we are going to revisit this first thing in the morning and do it. Because that’s how we develop the trust by following through, by being there, by remembering. And even they may have moved on. That’s okay, but you’re still there to say, “Hey, remember that thing you were talking about at 11:00 last night? Do you want to revisit it and figure out how we can do it?” And they may be like, “Oh no, I don’t care.” And that’s okay. But just, I wanted to make sure I was remembering to follow up and not just like, okay, I got them to be quiet and now I’m like not going back to that again.
PAM: Yeah. You don’t want to be just hoping that they don’t bring it up again, because that’s where you’re going to lose points in the trust. It really is all about the actions following the words. That’s where the trust is going to develop. When they know that you will follow through, then they don’t need that immediacy as much. Rather than, “I need it immediately, because if we wait six hours, you’re just going to have forgotten it.” Right? But when they can trust that we’ll come back to it, happily come back to it, so often they get it.
ANNA: Yes. Well, I loved this! It was very fun to dive into abundance and I think there is just lots to think about. Checking in with our triggers, watching the energy we’re bringing, see how it changes things. Play with it. I love that, Pam, let’s just play with it and see if it shifts anything in your house. I think that’ll be really fun.
So, thanks to you both for being here today. And thank you for listening. We hope you found it helpful on your unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, we know that you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It is such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about things and teasing out all the different nuances, and I just love it so much. So, you can learn more about that at livingjoyfully.ca/network and we hope to see you all there.
PAM AND ERIKA: Bye!
ANNA: Take care!
EU366: Talking Consent with Sara Davidson
May 09, 2024
Pam and Anna are joined by Living Joyfully Network member Sara Davidson to talk about what she’s been learning about consent.
Sara was previously on the podcast in episode 312. It was great to hear her family updates and to dive deep into the topic of consent. We talked about four different types of consent, enthusiastic, willing, unwilling, and coerced, and Sara shared some stories that illustrated these different types. We also explored some strategies and tools that have been helpful with our families as we try to live consensually together.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-host, Anna Brown, and our guest, Living Joyfully Network member Sara Davidson.
Hello to you all. On today’s episode, we have invited Sara to join us in talking about a topic that she’s been exploring deeply recently, which is consent, and I think this will be a really fun and interesting conversation.
Sara was first on the podcast a couple of years ago in episode 312, which we will link in the show notes. I encourage all our listeners to check out that episode and learn more about her journey to unschooling. We are very thrilled to have you back, Sara. It has been such a pleasure getting to know you on the Network these last few years.
I was just wondering, can you give us a bit of an update just to get the conversation started? How old are your kids now?
SARA: Oh, sure. I’d love to give an update. I believe that the last time we spoke on the podcast, my kiddos were 9 and 11, and now they are 12 and 14. In the last podcast episode, I talked about all the non-human animals that were part of our family and those have not changed except for we have one addition.
We rescued a bunny along the side of the road a couple months ago and ended up adopting them. And they are Bun Bun and they are a force of nature and we love them, but they have been quite an adventure. So, they are the new edition and our only animal edition.
Ryan and Izzy are my two kiddos and they have grown and changed so much. Some things have stayed the same. Yet they’re also almost completely different people than they were the last time I was a guest.
Ryan, he still really loves gaming. He’s into Roblox obbies and Total War, War Hammer 3 and Family Among Us. But what’s new is he’s just recently, like within the last year and a half, he’s started going on all my Saturday morning walks with the dog, which has led to this love of birding. He and I are really passionate birders. And we use this Merlin app to identify all the birds in our area.
Last year, he started getting interested in running. He set up his own training programs and he’s now run three 5K races all on his own, which has been really fun to watch. And he also started getting into football and he’s playing around with the idea of playing tackle league football, which would be the first organized sport that he’s ever done, if he decides to do that. So, that’s really cool.
Izzy’s 14. I don’t know if I mentioned that Ryan was my 12-year-old, but Izzy’s 14. She’s really into Microsoft Flight Simulator. She’s still very passionate about aviation, just like last time. She’s been running her own Discord server with some other homeschooling and unschooling kids that has a Minecraft server associated with that. And so, that’s really fun for them.
So, airplanes, airplanes, airplanes, everything airplanes. Whether it’s airports, the logistics behind it, the flying, everything, she’s into that. And then also into traveling. She recently started getting into planning for a future car and driving has been an exciting prospect for them. Also, current events and politics and riding their bike. So, those are Izzy’s interests right now, which is really fun.
And then, Joe’s still into Fortnite. He plays Fortnite. He’s still into soccer. But last time we talked it was the German soccer league, and now he’s shifted to the Italian soccer league as his favorite. He also likes building stuff with his hands.
And then for me right now, what’s bubbling is gardening. I have started all my plants from seed, which I’ve never done before. And birding and watercolor and stuff like that.
And so, those are our individual interests that have some overlap between family members. As a family unit, we are loving Exploding Kittens, which is a tablet-based game, Poetry for Neanderthals, which is an actual physical card game. We recently discovered that oranges and cream taste amazing together, like whipped cream with oranges. And so, now we’ve been having oranges and cream tea parties and I don’t know if that’s going to become a tradition, but it’s been really fun.
ANNA: I love that. There are so many fun things and it’s been fun to watch the different interests ebb and flow and I love it. I always enjoy the updates and what’s happening with you all doing all kinds of fun stuff.
PAM: About the oranges, last week, Mike and Jules made an orange-based salad, but oranges and marshmallow and some cream in there and some pineapple and coconut.
SARA: It’s similar!
ANNA: My mom makes that. It’s a southern thing, so that’s interesting. That’s considered a southern thing here. But I remember it. It had a lot going on for me at the time. But I love that.
Oh my goodness. Okay, so we’re going to dive right in, because I’m very excited. You have mentioned recently on the Network and to us that you’ve been exploring consent and willingness and how those two things weave together and all the little things that surround that.
And I was wondering if you could just share some of your exploration around that and what tools you’ve found helpful and the paradigm and the mindset shifts. Because I think it’s been an interesting journey from what I’ve heard already and I’m excited to talk about it with you.
SARA: Yes. I just wanted to start with why consent is such an interesting topic for me and why it feels so important. I feel like it’s one of those cornerstones, when we talk about building space for these connected relationships that we want to have with our immediate family, and then ultimately with the world. But let’s just keep it in the immediate family for now. Consent and willingness is the cornerstone of that, and the best and just most amazing and richest learning happens in that space of willingness and consent.
I’ve found a couple of tools that have been really helpful for me. They have things that order my brain a little bit. I have three tools that I’ll probably touch on while we’re talking, but the main one that I wanted to mention was the framework for consent that was created by a sex researcher named Emily Nagoski, who wrote the book Come As You Are. And I encountered this framework through Angela Chen’s work. Angela is the author of Ace.
So, Emily Nagoski developed some categories for consent that went along the lines of this enthusiastic, willing, unwilling, and coerced consent. What helped me with that is, first of all, I know Emily Nagoski was specifically writing this framework for physical touch and intimacy, but I feel like it really can expand outward to pretty much all relational interactions. And it gave me this more nuanced framework for consent beyond this binary like, yes, I’m consenting, or no, I’m not, which can feel really black and white and confusing at times when there’s so much of life that actually occurs in kind of a gray area.
And so, if it’s okay, I’d like to go ahead and share so we have a common language. I did adapt some of the definitions for each of these categories to make them broader, beyond just physical touch. But I’d like to go through each of those four categories if that’s okay.
ANNA: Yeah, absolutely!
SARA: Okay. So, the first was enthusiastic consent. And I’m going to read from my notes here. So, it’s when I want something for my own reasons, because it brings me joy. When I don’t fear the consequences of saying yes or saying no. When saying no means missing out on something I want. So, that’s enthusiastic consent.
Willing consent would be when I may care about something, but I don’t need to do it right now. When I would not otherwise choose it for myself, but I’m willing because someone else wants it and it’s okay with me. When I’m pretty sure saying yes will have an okay result. And I think maybe I’d regret saying no. Or when I believe that the desire to do something might begin after I say yes. So, that would be the willing consent area.
And then Angela Chen was really clear to point out that the next two categories of unwilling consent and coerced consent are only consent in the most literal sense, that someone did not yell out, “No!” For unwilling consent, it’s when I fear the consequences of saying no more than I fear the consequences of saying yes. When I feel not just an absence of desire to do something, but an absence of desire for desire. When I hope that by saying yes, you’ll stop bothering me or think that if I say no, you’ll only keep trying to persuade me. So, that was the unwilling consent.
And for coerced consent, we get into when you threaten me with harmful consequences if I say no. When I feel I’ll be hurt if I say yes, but that I’ll be hurt more if I say no. And when saying yes means experiencing something I actively dread.
So, those are the four. That’s the framework. And in my parenting journey, I have experienced all of those, and I would like to touch on how that’s shown up for me and what I am trying to foster in my family and then sometimes where I get a little tripped up.
PAM: Yeah. That would be lovely. There were a few places where I was vigorously nodding, if you’re watching on video, because there were a couple of pieces where I really liked the depth to which she went and grabbed some of those nuances. The frame through desire for the more enthusiastic ones, and then when you get down to the other two, I haven’t said no, but the feelings of coercion and how I’m framing that in my head, when I’m almost doing that pros and cons of, what are the consequences going to be? And even bringing in the consequences of both the yes and the no. Comparing them really makes it clear, at least for me, what she’s talking about. So, I love that.
ANNA: I love how it does bring those nuances in, because consent was a very big guidepost for me early on. We’ve been talking about autonomy in the Network this month, which I’ve found really enjoyable. For me, the word really was consent. But you’re right. As a binary, it’s a little bit tricky to fit into life, to explain to people, and to understand. And so, I really enjoyed the willingness definition, too, because there are times I make choices because you’re interested in doing that, and you’re important to me, and I know I’m not going to be harmed by it and I want to do that. And to me, that is still a consent that feels okay.
And then how different that energy is from those lower two on that spectrum. We’re dipping into this territory of actually, it doesn’t feel okay. Yeah, I may have shown up because I feel forced, or I feel worried, but it doesn’t feel the same. I really do love looking at those nuances, because that’s real life. There’s just a lot of nuance.
SARA: Yes. And I think between those top two, which were the enthusiastic and willing consent, and then the bottom two, which were the unwilling and coerced consent, it really isn’t what it looks like. It’s what it feels like.
And so, those top two are connecting. We’re connecting truly with ourselves. We’re connecting truly with the people in front of us. And it builds that relationship and trust. And then once you get moving into those bottom two, again, it’s a feeling. Because consent for one person looks completely different than consent for another. But if there’s that feeling of disconnect, then it’s a little red flag. Did we just tip into this area where we’re now disconnecting from each other and from ourselves?
PAM: Yeah. And I think another piece that’s so valuable, and it ties in with talking about autonomy this month too, is that it’s not a right/wrong, yes/no. It really is so individual. It’s not like, well, this is a situation where consent should be just fine, like we don’t need to discuss the nuances. Of course you want to come and do X, Y, Z with us. But even just planting that seed that it’s a spectrum, that it really is about the individual, and it’s really about the moment, too.
That willingness, using that framework really brings us into the moment. Right now, this is how it feels to me. And yet, it is so much about the feeling and the energy, because it’s so completely individual. It’s not about the question at hand really.
SARA: And so, if you all are okay with it. PAM: I was going to say, are you going to share some stories?
SARA: Yes. I’d like to start, because I have stories in every single one of these categories.
We’ll start with the really fun ones, which is the enthusiastic consent, which is again, where I want something for my own reasons, because it brings me joy. And what I’ve experienced, for me and for my kids and for my family, is like, this is our yes!! This is our internal, bright, sparkly, joyful, oh, I want that. That is enthusiastic consent. And I’ve learned how to spot that. I know what that feels like for me inside now. It’s really bright. And I can see it on my kids, too. I can see what their yes looks like in their body language and their facial expressions and the energy in their voice.
And so, it’s been really fun, because unschooling has given us this space to really learn what our yes is. What are we really drawn to? Where’s that joy? Where’s that sparkle? And then trying to figure out how to go and do that. Like, ooh, let’s follow that. How can we do that? And maybe we can do that in this moment. Maybe there needs to be some planning that happens. But those are when you get into the nuances and it’s really fun.
And it’s been interesting for me as a mom, because before unschooling I didn’t even know what my own yes felt like. And so, by watching my kids and experiencing that for myself, I’m like, oh, that’s what it feels like when I really am enthusiastic about some things. And I got a couple of stories, but I don’t know if you all want to add to that. PAM: I love stories.
SARA: So, the fun part about this yes is we get to follow it in unschooling and I feel like we have so much time and space to do that. And then sometimes it can feel a little challenging for me when somebody’s yes isn’t actually what they say. Or I actually can’t do it for them in the moment. I remember there was a time when Izzy really wanted to fly like a bird, and this was when they were really, really young. And I hadn’t heard about validation.
And I don’t even remember how I necessarily handled it, but it felt really hard for me when they’re like, mom, I want to fly like a bird. They just wanted to go to the front yard, spread their arms out, and just fly. And I think what my current self would say is, yeah, that would be a lot of validation. Like, oh my gosh, you just wish you could just go out to the front yard and take off and it’s so frustrating that you can’t.
And then that creativity, like, well, you may not be able to fly like a bird, but would you like to watch a video cam of a bird flying? Or maybe we could get you up in an airplane. Just something to get those creative juices of, that yes, as you imagined it, can’t quite happen, but there are so many other possibilities. First the validation of, that’s really hard. And then the creativity of, but how could we do other things that are also following that yes that you might feel.
And then the other piece, and this is my last story on the enthusiastic yes piece. My brain goes to challenges, because the good stuff just feels crazy and things are happening. There have been times where I’ve experienced an internal yes for something. In this case, I really wanted to go see my favorite movie in the movie theater. And I was just so drawn to do this. And my kiddos were adamant that they did not want me to leave the house. And I tried all different kinds of things. Like, okay, how could I honor this yes? How could I actually go do this thing that feels really good to me?
And through all of the back and forth, it became clear to me that it just wasn’t going to be something that my kids were going to be okay with. And in that moment, it was really about validating myself and how hard that felt. But then re-grounding in, okay, what are my choices? I could go to this movie and say, forget you guys. I really just have to go. Maybe I could choose that. But just re-grounding in what choices do I have? What is my why? And re-grounding in the abundance of time, like, maybe this movie will come back out in 10 years and I’ll get to see it then. My kids aren’t going to be this age forever, telling me that they desperately need me to stay in the house.
And then, for me, I ended up choosing connection. So, I was like, I really have this yes to go do this thing, yet my connection with my kids and honoring that relationship felt like where I needed to actually be and spend my time. So, I put the movie aside. But it did feel challenging there for a little bit to say that that yes needed to wait.
ANNA: That enthusiastic yes. It is fun. I loved the point you said early on, like you really had to figure out what that even felt like to you. Because I think so many of us, as we go through the system, we’re so externally focused, like, what do people need from us? What are we supposed to do in this environment? And so, I do think it’s a process to learn the enthusiastic yes.
And I feel like my kids really did lead the way for that for me as well. And so, I really started to see, oh, that’s what it feels like. But you’re right, sometimes there are these limitations or these contextual pieces that make that hard in the moment. But I think when we can really ground into it, feel it, check in with our why, it doesn’t have to be a negative story.
And I have a friend that always says to celebrate the closeness of the match. And so, sometimes it’s like, oh, okay, I couldn’t do it exactly like I thought I could, but I’m going to celebrate that I even figured out this was something that I wanted and that maybe I can do this piece of it, or I can do it in a different way. I can watch the movie when it comes on streaming, whatever that looks like. And so, I think it’s interesting just to think about what that looks like and then at the spectrum of how we react when we have that enthusiastic yes.
PAM: Yeah. I love that you revisited your priorities for yourself, because it’s still your choice, right? It was still your choice to make, so it was, I see the impact that my enthusiastic yes choice would have on those around me. And is that something I want to do? And it’s still a choice. Like you said, I could have gone and maybe you do your best to figure out a way that they would be comfortable enough. There’s no literal right or wrong in these moments.
But re-grounding in the fact that it’s our choice and not getting stuck in that yes/no, people are letting me go or not letting me go. This is still re-grounding in, it’s my choice to make, but as Anna was saying, looking into the context of it all. And is that context or are the consequences of me doing this enthusiastic yes in this moment in our lives, with the relationships, and the effect that it will have or will likely have on my relationships, those are all great questions.
So, if we think of it as yes/no, people aren’t letting us, we can get very resistant and very tunnel vision on trying to figure out how to convince them to let us do it, rather than taking the time to really reground in our choice and see the implications and play with those and see what’s really worth it. So, not choosing in the end doesn’t negate the fact that it was an enthusiastic yes. It’s embracing that really, but embracing it within the bigger picture of our lives.
And I feel, too, that some people might think, through the conventional framework, oh, you gave in. They know they can just get mad about something and you’ll change your mind, et cetera. And that may even be what it looks like to people from the outside looking in.
But when we recognize that we’ve grounded in that choice and we have chosen, like you said, to prioritize the relationship and connection and feeling like that was just too much of an impact to follow through on that enthusiastic yes right now, oh my gosh, the richness and the experience and the validation, without even words, the validation of who they are and how they’re feeling in that moment, just by us saying, okay, I understand. And what do they learn taking that forward, when the situation may be reversed other times, this is a conversation that we are all important. They know it was an enthusiastic yes, because you were trying to do it, so they understand that’s important to you.
SARA: And they still sometimes will be like, mom, I’m sorry you didn’t get to go to that movie. I’m like, I’m okay. I bought it and I watch it whenever I want.
PAM: Well, now you’ll get a VR headset, so you feel like you’re sitting in a huge movie theater watching it.
SARA: That’s right. I forgot about VR. Wow. Oh my goodness. Well, that’s all I had on the enthusiastic yes piece. So, I was going to move to the willing consent stories.
So, for willing consent, it’s when I’m pretty sure saying yes will have an okay result. And I think maybe I’d regret saying no. So, this is that more gray area. And I feel like how this looks in my family is a lot of back and forth. And usually what’s happening is one person has an enthusiastic yes for something, but it involves another person and they’re kind of like, nah, I don’t really want to do that. And so, for me, what works best in our family and every family’s going to look different, is I usually talk to each of my people in their own separate rooms. And I bounce around and I’m like, okay, this person said this. What do you think about that? Does that feel good to you? And I just keep cycling. And sometimes this takes a really, really long time.
But I tell myself, I think, Pam, you said it once, it’s like, this is the time that unschooling takes. I want to be part of this process, because this is where I learn all the juicy details. We really get down to the needs. We really figure out, well, why don’t you want to go out right now? Is it just because you don’t want to go out at all today? Or were you watching this video and there’s 15 minutes left and you just want to finish it and then you’d be willing? Or maybe you want to take your iPad with you. So, there’s just so many different nuances.
And so, I’m the hopper that just hops between my three people until we reach this consensus where everyone’s like, okay, yeah, I’m good with that. And how this feels in my body, the willing consent, it doesn’t feel like this big sparkly yes to me. But it feels light. It’s like, yeah, I can do that. And it’s like there’s no resistance, there’s no heaviness about it. And then I can see that for my kids as well. I can see that they’re not going, eh, sure. Or that they have that facial expression where they’re just kind of like, ah, whatever. But they’re actually like, okay. Yeah. And it’s this lighter, not sparkly yes. But an okay. Yeah, I’m good with that.
So, there have been some times where one of my kiddos had a binary just within themselves where they both want to do something and they also don’t want to do something. And so, I think Anna, you were the one who gave me words for this, which I found really helpful also with myself to be like, okay, so a part of you sounds like you really want to do this thing in this way, but it sounds like another part isn’t so sure. And so, what is this other part that’s not so sure? Is there something they’re worried about or is there something we can do to make that part more comfortable? And so, it’s kind of like a parts work piece.
And then the other piece about the willing consent I wanted to touch on is when there’s an actual need. Like, for instance, for my sparkly yes, I want to go to the movie, that wasn’t an absolute need of mine. I determined that I don’t really need this. It would be really nice to have. There are certain things that I needed to leave the house for, like food, or to go walk the dog, because we have a dog and that dog has needs and this is how we needed to fill that need. And I had strong resistance for me leaving for those events as well. And I had done some work around that and realized, no, this is actually something that I need to do for our family members, to keep our household running the way that we need it to run, to keep people fed.
And in that instance, and again, I think Anna, you gave me words for this, to help somebody who’s not in that willingness place yet, to validate them and say, I know how hard this is for you, to have me leave the house. How can we make it easier? Is there something that would make you feel more comfortable? Because I know when I leave, it’s hard for you.
And so, it wasn’t that I was just never leaving the house, but it was this delicate acknowledgement that this still isn’t okay for this person. And I can let them know, I see you, it’s not okay for you. But then we did find ways and it took years of iterations of, what if I went out this way or at this time, or called you here or took my pepper spray, and it was just an ongoing conversation of, this is hard for you. How can we make it feel better?
ANNA: Yeah. I love that. I think, Pam, you’re going to want to talk about talking to different people, because I know that was a big piece for you and we found that the same, like it doesn’t have to be this big family meeting that we’re all hashing out. Because sometimes, depending if we’re internal or external processors, leaving space for that, and so I love that piece of it.
I, of course, love the parts language, because I think it does help us identify like, okay, what does that part need to feel better? It gives us a little bit of a focus versus just, no, and I don’t know, and this back and forth of feeling so confused. And so, that language has been really helpful for me as well. And so, I love all of those pieces and that creativity to get to the willingness. So yeah, it’s not an enthusiastic yes for you to leave, but okay, let’s try this. Let’s try this. It’s like, yeah, I’m willing to try that. And I love that you said, too, that it changes. Because we may make agreements and like, okay, alright, I’m willing for you to go with these conditions, and that that feels better to me. And then it’s like, okay, there were still parts that felt hard, so we need to keep tweaking.
That’s what I love about, I called it consensual living, where we were really just understanding that we’re going to figure this out. There are lots of solutions to any given problem. And so, that trust that we’re going to be heard, we’re going to be seen, it’s not going to be ignored or pushed through. I really found that was the fountain of creativity, because when those basic needs of trust and being heard were met, then they were much more willing to get into that creative process. But when they were feeling unsteady, and I’ve seen it in other families where, if they’re going to push through it anyway, what difference does it make? You don’t see that creativity bubble up. And so, it can take a while to build that trust. But I love that description of how you did that.
PAM: Yeah, I was going to say, that trust and how that takes a while to cultivate, because they are giving us some trust in situations like you described, Sara, in that willingness is a trust that we’ll try this and we’ll see. It’s not like, okay, I have just committed to you doing this forever moving forward no matter how I feel.
And so, that trust that they didn’t just lock themselves into something is huge, because conventionally, so often we can be trying to convince them to let us do the thing and then the next time we’ve got to go out, it’s like, well last time I did X and you were fine with it, so it should be fine this time. Trusting that we won’t be bringing that kind of energy or using that kind of coercion, for lack of a better word.
It truly is about consent, but working together and trying to figure out a way to make it work and yes, definitely the going around to talk to them individually, because they were such different processors. It just took some needed longer conversations, some needed space to think more, and I could be there with them and give them that space and engage with them and pick out what they’ve shared, and then I can go to the next person and share it in their language. Because they may not yet understand, no matter their age, the other person’s language and what it actually means. So, I could understand each person’s language and re-frame what other people are saying. Not in their words, but in the words that would be meaningful or understood by the other person.
It was just the most beautiful investment and beautiful use of my time and energy, because it helped us, like you mentioned, Sara, we’re also telling them about their sibling or their other parent or myself, what we are feeling, thinking, how we’re experiencing it. So, they’re learning about us, too, everybody else, too, at the same time that they’re taking the time and the conversation to understand themselves and how they’re feeling affected or what their needs are, what they’re feeling right in this moment, or their constraints that they’re feeling.
So, they’re all figuring themselves out, and I’m learning more about them. It’s just this beautiful spiral that takes time, but as you’ve said so many times, Anna, that’s my time that I’m investing upfront versus the time that I’d have to invest later if we just plowed ahead, did the thing, and then we had meltdowns and upset that we’d have to process through after. So, it’s not like I do it or I don’t do it.
SARA: You’ll spend the energy one way or the other.
ANNA: Yeah. I would always rather have those conversations where I’m learning about them and they’re learning about me, versus trying to manage energy and make repairs and do all the things afterwards, which sometimes we get in a place where we have to do that. I think we’ll talk about those in those next two spots that you’re going to talk about. But if I can avoid it with some connection and stuff upfront, then I will. That is just me.
SARA: And this is where I think I wanted to throw in the second resource. I have read the first 25% of this book. But just knowing that it’s there, it’s really been helpful and it’s Are You Willing? by Marion Rose. And she has a willingness practice. I haven’t actually used Marion Rose’s specific practice, but she walks through her willingness practice.
What’s been helpful for me is, I’ve glanced through it and been like, oh, I can do this for myself to see if I can arrive at a willing consent. For example, I just did it last week when Ryan wanted to make homemade dog food and I really wanted to want to do that. But I noticed that I felt some heaviness and some resistance. And so, with this willingness practice, instead of being like, oh, I’m just going to ignore that, I’m feeling a little heavy and tense about some things, nebulously, and just go do the thing, I knew that that tightness would come out somehow in my interaction, while I was doing this dog food with him.
And so, I sat down and I’m like, what am I trying to protect? Why am I feeling tight? And I realized, oh, I was feeling tight, because I was worried that if I made dog food, I’d be too tired to make dinner and that I’d be on my feet a lot. And that that would mean that I would do this one type of cooking, but then I couldn’t provide for myself and the family later on. And then I was able, recognizing that, to come up with some ideas that would care for those things while I was making dog food with Ryan.
So, I was like, well, if I get tired on my feet, he’s pretty self-sufficient, I could just pull up a chair and sit. And also, while he’s making dog food, I could do some things that prepare me for my meal. So, I’m prepping for the dinner by cleaning up or whatever. And so, I worked through those tight spots and that friction to finally, I came to this point where I was like, yes, I would like to do that with Ryan. And it was this light feeling and there’s nothing that is feeling tight or tense or heavy to me about this yes.
And that’s where I knew, but that’s where it was so worth that upfront willingness work that I did. Because then when it came time to make that homemade dog food with Ryan, I was having so much fun and I wasn’t snipping about, oh, you made a mess here and now I have to clean it up. And it was just really light and it felt really nice and I knew I had cared for myself as well in this activity that I didn’t choose for myself.
ANNA: Yeah, to me, that really sounds like my practice of getting to the underlying need. Because we can have this first reaction of, I don’t want to do this, I want to do this. But then when we get to the underlying need, it’s like, I want to be able to make dinner later, or I don’t want the kitchen disaster, because I need the clean surface to start making dinner. Just knowing those things about myself and being able to articulate it at times, too, it sounds like that may have been a more internal process for you, but I found there were times it was helpful for me to articulate that process of me getting to my underlying need, depending on the situation, because it helped them do the same.
So, it’s like, oh, I want to make this special treat for the dog, because I’m really excited about something with Toby. Okay. That we might be able to do in a different way. Or, no, it’s this specific recipe that I want to make. Then we’re having a conversation where more solutions and creativity can come in, versus just staying up here with, make the dog food, don’t make the dog food. So, I like that. But it is interesting to tie it into this willingness piece. Do you want to share the tool with that?
SARA: It’s really just the book, Are You Willing? if people are curious about, what does that even look like? Marion Rose, she laid it out, I thought, in a really beautiful way. What do you ask yourself? What do you sense? Where’s your tightness? Do you have a part at play? And how do you care for that? And then find either your willingness or you might actually arrive at, actually, no, I’m not willing and here’s why. And can we do it a different time? Or whatever, which is fine too.
ANNA: And that’s okay too.
SARA: Pam, I think this was something you mentioned, so I’ve been playing around with this. There are certain things that I know are going to happen where I can maybe do some willingness work upfront before the event. And I knew this thing with Ryan, he had already been like, I want to do it tomorrow. And I was like, okay, I’m feeling a little tight about that. So, I knew I would like to maybe do some internal willingness work here.
But I think where I do a lot of the verbal processing, like what you were talking about is when someone comes to me. It’s more like, I haven’t had that upfront prep but I’m noticing I’m feeling tight and I’ll be like, oh, I noticed I’m a little tight about that. Just give me a moment. I would like to figure out what’s happening for me. And it’s maybe just like a, give me a moment. If you could just give me a moment and then I do sometimes verbally go through, hey, I can’t do this for you now. Could I do it in 15 minutes? Because I’m trying to finish this thing. And so, it’s more like live action processing versus the upfront. So, I’ve been playing around with which ones feel best in the moment for me to try to pull out.
PAM: Yeah. It depends on the context. How much time ahead do I know? But yeah, that is one thing that my family has known for many years. It’s like, okay, mom will need a couple of minutes to process. And there were times when I said, if you need an answer right away, it’s no, because that’s what I’m feeling. But if you give me a couple minutes to think it through, five minutes, then we’ll see where I’m at.
And that was just the processing that you were talking about, Sara, like what is the context of this? How is this going to spiral out to the rest of the day if they want to run out and do this thing now? And I had a different plan in my head of how the day was unfolding. I do need that minute to just play it out in my head and see if anything is effective.
Like in the dog food situation, I might think, oh, I’m going to think of the dinner that I was thinking we’d have in a couple nights, which is so much easier to make. I’ll switch that up and I’ll make an easier dinner. It reminded me to think. While he’s making the dog food, I can weave in some prep, because I’ve thought a little bit ahead of time. I know my window is going to be a bit shorter or my energy is going to be a bit less, et cetera. So, I can play with things. It’s just so valuable to have that time just to think things through. And like you were saying, then we’re less snippy or however that energy comes out.
And for me, that is the energy of being unsure of how things are going to go. And when I take that time to process, if I decide I’m unwilling, now I know why. And I can go and talk to them and maybe we can come up with a plan that shifts my willingness. Because when I say I’m unwilling because of X, Y, and Z impact, and they’re like, oh, the creative juices get flowing. Because we know we’re all on a team. And it’s not like, no, don’t try to convince me otherwise. It’s like, no, I’m not feeling able or up for it because of this and this. There have been times when they say, well, you can have a long nap tomorrow. There’s nothing going on. And maybe that is a possibility, but everybody’s working together.
And even when they say things like that, that gives me a clue about how enthusiastic they are, how important this is to them. And I may have thought this was just an idea that they had. And the more they try to come up with more ways to make it work, that gives me more information that, ooh, for some reason this is more important to them today than it was last week when they wanted to do the same thing or all those pieces. So, it just brings just so much more information into the context of the whole choice and conversation.
SARA: Yeah. And so, I think the next two were unwilling consent and coerced consent. And so, just really quickly, the unwilling consent was when I hope that by saying yes, you’ll stop bothering me. Or I think that if I say no, you’ll only keep trying to persuade me. I still find myself ever so often dipping my toe into this unwilling consent area. And I know I’ve done it, because I can sense that there’s a disconnect that’s happened.
And I guess, first, I just wanted to reiterate the importance to distinguish between this unwilling consent and consent, truly, it’s not what it looks like. It’s what it feels like. And I don’t know who said this, but I loved it so much. The difference is not necessarily one of action, but one of intention and agency.
So, when you’re in the first two categories, people feel like they have agency. The intention is, let’s keep our relationship. We want us all to be seen and heard. And then when you move down into unwilling consent, not all parties feel like they have agency. There’s a disconnect happening there, but that could look like anything or nothing at all. So, anyway, it’s not what it looks like. It’s what it feels like.
And so, where I tend to have little hangups is when I notice that I have an attachment of some kind, where I believe that there’s a better way or a right way, or someone should be thinking this way. And so, when I have this attachment, I’ve noticed that the stronger my attachment or expectation about something, the harder it is for me to gauge consent in the other person. The stronger I get like, this is the way it needs to be, I almost have blinders and I can’t actually tell if the other person is even consenting to the thing.
And so, this actually happened to me last week in consent in conversation, which was a new concept to me just a couple years ago. It’s like, wait, there’s consent in conversation? Because my husband revealed a gap in his knowledge and I was convinced that he needed to know this. Like, oh my gosh, you need to know this. And so, I proceeded to follow him through the house with all my talking. I even got out a book. I was like, it’s right here. Look, you need to know this.
And then the next day, I looked back on it and I was reflecting on that interaction and I was like, I have no clue if he actually was interested in anything that I just said there. And I very well could have gone over his consent to actually want to hear anything that I had to say. And in that instance, I went back to him and I said, I’m really sorry. I really thought you needed to know this. And I just realized that I didn’t even ask you if you were interested. I was like, how did that feel? Did you want to have that conversation? And then that was more like a repair, like, okay, I’m sorry.
But I go there sometimes and I get real sure that I’m right and by golly, I’m going to chase that person down. And I feel like this happens a lot with kids, where an adult will say, I have something and you need to hear it. And they just talk at the kid, which is like that Charlie Brown kind of wa wa thing. And so, I can still tend to do that, not so much with my kids, but I can trip into that with my husband at times and notice that I’m not looking for whether he’s really interested in this thing that I feel is really important.
And then the other piece that I wanted to throw in was the idea of self consent. Because I feel as though I have absorbed many cultural stories, ideas, beliefs, assumptions over the years that gave me a script for how I should or ought to act or behave, but didn’t actually ask me for my consent or willingness. And I’ve noticed that, as I’ve internalized some of these stories and I wasn’t aware of them, I would act in accordance with a story, but I was actually coercing myself into a choice that I didn’t think I had a choice.
And so, that’s where a willingness practice really comes in. And my red flags for that are when I start to say, oh, I have to do this, I ought to do this, I should do this. That’s my red flag that there may be a coercive story or some sort of limiting belief that I’m not aware of happening there for me under the surface and to really just keep peeling back and see where that leads for me.
And so, I just want to say the repair piece. I continue to notice at times where I’ll notice I’m pushing, and then on reflection I’ll be like, oh, I wasn’t sure if that person really wanted that for themselves. And that’s where the repair work comes in.
ANNA: Yeah. And the repair piece is so important. When you were talking about that, it reminded me, Pam, how we always talk about, if we have this tunnel vision to this outcome, that we miss so many signs. And I think you’re right. Some of those signs are the people going, wait a minute, we don’t want to be on the bullet train that you’re on that’s ending at this particular place. And so, I think that’s a really good reminder. And I think that self piece is interesting, too, because I would say that’s probably harder for me. I have a radar for pushing through people’s consent, but that piece of when the shoulds happen, I think the shoulds can tunnel us in.
When I’m in my head about that and then that tunnels me in, I feel like I’m probably missing things around me. And yes, the repair is, of course, so important and we all are going to make repairs. That’s a big piece of it, the trust.
PAM: Repairs are part of it. It’s not about having an expectation of ourselves that we will get good enough that we are never going to need to repair a connection ever again. That’s too much to put on ourselves. That’s not how human beings work, because we all are growing and changing. So, what does work in a relationship, in a connection, a way to engage with another person, what works for months then doesn’t work. And then we need to figure out a new way. Maybe it’s a new way to approach them, maybe it’s a new way to have conversations. Maybe they’re talking more in this season or now they’re not talking so much. So, I need to look more for clues in their behavior, clues in their reactions, all those different pieces.
So, repair is fully as important and valuable as the original act of connection itself. I did love the story of you chasing your husband down.
SARA: I’m a chaser.
PAM: So, there’s that understanding and that tunnel vision where we just can’t see, just because we’ve latched on to something. It was an enthusiastic yes for you to share this information, if we’re going to use this framework. Yet the processing piece to see, okay, so what is the impact for the people around me?
And then the self consent piece, that is such a great way to look at it, because, from growing up in the system, I can find myself saying, you should be able to do this. You have to do this. Why can’t you just get this bit done. And we can so often try to guilt ourselves or try to manipulate ourselves, coerce ourselves nicely, and it’s just for ourselves, to do these things.
But to take that moment to question, am I actually giving consent? Is this my inner voice or are these outer voices in my head that I’ve absorbed, that I’m using, totally bypassing my own consent and just thinking, I need to do this. I haven’t given myself a choice really. I’m just trying to find words in my head to convince myself to do this thing that I think I should do or should be able to do. So, yeah, to use that consent framework for ourselves is brilliant.
SARA: Yes. And the last category was the coerced consent. And I will say that, since we’ve moved to unschooling, this is not a place that I have gone, honestly. But for the first five years of my parenting journey, I was very steeped in the mainstream ideas of what it meant to be a parent and what that parent-child relationship should look like.
So, in the first five years, it might have looked something like, “If you don’t eat your vegetables, then you’re not going to get ice cream at the end of the dinner.” So, that kind of coercive way of managing that. And it was out of love for that child and believing that that was how to keep them healthy and safe. And so, my kids remember that.
They remember some of the coercion and so, when something like that comes up, usually they actually are teasing me about it. But I’ll just say, “You know, I’m really sorry that I did that to you. I was doing the best I could. I thought it was the right thing. I’m really sorry, because that just stunk.” And to apologize again and just repair and hear them, and then also to give myself a lot of grace, because I could beat myself up, which I do on occasion, but usually I was doing the best that I could with the information that I had, and I was an imperfect human and I’m still going to keep making mistakes. So, to really give myself a lot of grace for that time in my parenting journey where coerced consent was a part of our daily lives.
And I’m just really glad that it changed, because that was very disconnecting. Looking back, I can see how disconnecting that was. And I’m just so grateful for the path that we are on now, because it just feels so much better. Oh my gosh. It’s just so beautiful and amazing and I just am grateful every day for it. So, that was coerced consent.
ANNA: Right. And I think it is that piece, too, that if we find ourselves in that situation, you can change. At any moment, you can change and you can make those repairs and you can find that way and you can recognize, hey, is what I’m doing creating a disconnect? Is what I am doing really impacting this person?
And it happens even with the best intentions. Again, it’s not about beating anybody up. It is just that, wow. We can make those changes and I think it takes a lot to let go of those ideas. And so, I just really think that’s amazing that you were able to come from that place and just realize, no, this is not how I want to be with my kids. It’s beautiful.
SARA: I had some amazing guides. My kids. Well, I just wanted to say, though, with Anna, because sometimes I can feel a little pressured, because I’m like, oh, I didn’t quite do that as well as I would’ve liked to, in retrospect. But then realizing, the relationships I have with my kids are very resilient and they are so willing, if I’m honest about what happened and I’m honest about, hey, I really did make a mistake here and I have more information now and I don’t want to make that choice again, they really are so willing to be like, it’s okay, mom. And so, there’s really a resilience in that relationship that allows for these missteps and repairs. And I think it’s just that they see you wanting to repair and they see you hearing them.
ANNA: That’s what I was going to say, because I think you’re discounting yourself a little too much in that process. Because that piece of being able to apologize and recognize and make a repair, that is not easy for a lot of people, Sara.
And I don’t like to say that the parent did the best they could when it was this abusive thing for a long time. That doesn’t cut it, and, “Kids are resilient,” can also fall into that category that can feel bad. But they absolutely notice that authenticity of you coming back and saying, you know what? This didn’t feel good to me. And that’s what they’re recognizing. And that is you being able to say, hey, I bought into this and now I’m not. And so, I just want to give you kudos for that.
SARA: We’ve been homeschooling for eight years now and unschooling for six. And I’d say for that entire time it has been a very joyfully intense unpacking of all that I have absorbed all the years prior to that.
PAM: And I do think, too, like you just mentioned off the cuff a little bit ago about your kids being guides and this whole piece was a really big journey of untangling for me, because yes, I could watch my kids doing things and they were in a space where they could make a mistake and it was totally okay. I learned from them that it’s just like, oh, that didn’t work. Even if there was frustration involved, they went back to and they tried a different way. Whereas for me, it’s like, oh my gosh, if that was me, I would be embarrassed or if I wasn’t good at it, I’d want to quit, like, okay, I’m not good at this, after 20 minutes and just never try again because I wasn’t capable yet.
And to see that that’s not the only way. I just grew up feeling so judged and graded and, you need to get good grades and don’t let anybody see you do something that wouldn’t be a good grade, basically. You have to hide those pieces. So, looking at them and seeing that in action and yes, it’s that process you were mentioning, Anna, of getting to, it’s okay to do things and for them to not quite work out. I can still show up and try something else. I can still show up and repair. I can still show up and explain where my head was, but keep showing up. That’s the repair piece.
I think it’s like, if we have a disconnecting moment and maybe we do need a little bit of time to cool down, et cetera, but the coming back, the repair piece, without judgment even as much as I could, without shame. They taught me not to show up in that moment feeling shame for what happened, because what happened is what happened and we’re just going to figure out something from there and move forward.
And I do think it’s so valuable, too, for our kids to see us showing up in all the moments so they don’t feel like they need to hide the moments when things don’t go so well, because, oh, things only don’t go well for kids. Like, when I’m an adult, everything has to be perfect. You don’t want to be planting those kinds of seeds either. But every experience of us showing up to just say, oops, yeah, no, that didn’t feel good for me. And sometimes they say, I didn’t notice. There were lots of times where they say, I didn’t notice. Because I was the one feeling it, but I could share that.
It’s like, oh, okay, that’s another piece of information for me. It’s my reaction actually. It’s not about that situation, because what I felt from it is out of step with what the other people involved felt from it. So, that’s just more information for me to process, like, what was triggering that? So, it is so much about our work to do, to get to that spot, to that place where we can process and show up and repair, because that is not the message that many of us got growing up.
ANNA: I want to tie in one quick thing that has come up in the Network, too, about this enthusiastic yes. Because I think it would be helpful for people to think about when they’re going forward. Nora McDonald talked about it, but she was explaining some things about what was happening with her kids and recognizing that she was walking in a place of the willingness, but then when she saw the enthusiastic yes, it was like, oh, this is really different.
So, watching for that feel, because you talked about the feel earlier, Sara, I think it’s so important. Like, oh, this feels different. I think the conversation we had around it in the Network was about like, oh yeah, we could get them to the park day or to the co-op or to the thing. But it was hard and it felt challenging, but we got there and they had an okay time and it was fine.
But then when it was the enthusiastic yes, it was like they’re hopping in the car, they packed their snacks, they’re ready to go. And it’s like, oh, that’s what it can look like. So, for me, it’s about leaving space and slowing it down, because I do tend to be the go forward type, but slowing it down to give those enthusiastic yeses a chance to bubble up so that we can then act on those and find those and go, oh, there it is, versus my agenda or what I might be bringing to the moment or what I think we should be doing.
Which again, I have good ideas, but if I’m tunneling in, I’m missing some of that. And so, I think that was just one of the pieces of this whole framework that you’ve shared with us that I wanted to pull out, how it applies in our day-to-day life, too, and watching for those enthusiastic yeses from our kids.
PAM: Yeah. I think that energy makes such a big difference. And especially when we’re first coming to unschooling, for me anyway, I had these great plans. Oh, we’ll be able to do this and this and this because we’re not going to school anymore. And getting that willingness. “Yeah. Okay, we’ll go here. Okay, we’ll go here.”
But yes, recognizing all of a sudden when you hit on something where they finally suggested something and it’s like, wow, what a difference. And to give more space for those things to bubble up versus always trying to keep us busy so that it looks good on the outside to other people in our family who don’t really understand what we’re doing, but if I could list off that we went to these five places over the last seven days, they would be placated.
So, peeling back for myself as to why I was wanting to do these things where I was only getting some basic willingness to participate and they came along. But what that did was short circuit a lot of our chance for the more enthusiastic yes, because nobody had the time or the brain space to actually figure out what they really wanted to do.
ANNA: And there’s so much learning in the enthusiastic yes. Because if it’s a willingness, they’re coming along with my ideas, it’s really more about me. And even if they’re happily, willingly coming along, it’s still my idea. And so, it is short circuiting me learning about the person in front of me as well. Because when they’re guided by their enthusiastic yes, I’m learning what lights them up. And I felt like there are times when my excitement doesn’t leave space for that. And so, I think that was just a really interesting point around that.
PAM: All right, Sara, did we get all your stories today?
SARA: Yes. I just wanted to share one more resource. I won’t go into it in depth. I just wanted to mention it in case folks wanted to read more about consent. It was one more tool and it was Betty Martin’s Wheel of Consent. And I guess I can hold it up a little bit here for people on YouTube. Can you see that?
ANNA: Yep. Serve, take, accept, allow.
SARA: So, basically it’s a wheel broken into four quadrants that show the different relational experiences that we might have, falling into four categories of serve, take, allow and accept. And again, Betty Martin was focused on physical touch, but I have just found at times it’s so helpful, especially when I’m having a hangup in a certain area, to come back to this graphic and be like, oh, I’m having trouble in the allowing quadrant.
And it really helps me focus on that. And so, Betty Martin wrote a book called The Art of Receiving and Giving that really goes into the Wheel of Consent in depth. And then it’s also available online. And I just wanted to point to that, because it’s just been another framework that I’ve looked at and there have been a-ha moments just speckled throughout just by seeing this one graphic. So, I wanted to share that as well, but not go into any more depth on it.
ANNA: Thank you. And we’ll put all the resources in the show notes so that people can link to these different authors and these different concepts, because it is really fun to dig into all of it.
PAM: Yeah, it is. It’s so, so interesting just to take one lens and look at things through that framework. So, thank you so much for joining us, Sara. And to our listeners, we hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe even picked up a nugget or two that will help you on your unschooling journey, and in your relationships, and just using that consent lens in all sorts of aspects.
I love so much that the resources you’ve been sharing, Sara, were actually written in more of the sexual framework of consent. Yet, it really works in the relationship framework. And it really works for all ages. All our relationships, our adult relationships.
ANNA: I have one more quick thing. Because that’s the thing that’s so important about consent. If we are not learning about it when we’re young, if we’re not experiencing this with relationships, if we’re not understanding these pieces, why do we think that, at 18, these young men, women, and people are going to get it and then be able to have relationships that have consent? No.
It starts so much earlier than that. And so, that’s why it’s such a passion area for me, because I think it really is the seed of what creates these healthy relationships in adulthood.
SARA: For sure.
PAM: All right! If you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network. It is such an amazing group of people, connecting and having thoughtful conversations just like this, all about the things that we encounter in our unschooling lives. And you can learn more at livingjoyfully.ca/network. We hope to meet you there. Thank you very much for listening, and we’ll see you next time.
SARA AND ANNA: Bye!
EU365: The Independence Agenda
Apr 25, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika dive into a very interesting lens on parenting—the independence agenda. It’s fascinating to see how this seemingly reasonable goal of fostering our children’s independence can get in the way of not only our relationship with them, but their developing self-awareness and inner voice. We talk about how different people really are, define the terms independence and autonomy, explore how it’s the “agenda” part of the independence agenda that is the problem, and lots more.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and I am joined today by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to you both! ANNA AND ERIKA: Hi! Hello! PAM: And today we are going to dive into a very interesting lens on parenting, and that is the independence agenda. And it’s fascinating to see how this seemingly reasonable goal of fostering our children’s independence can get in the way of not only our relationship with them, but their developing self-awareness and inner voice. Anna, would you like to get us started talking about the independence agenda? ANNA: I would. So, I’ve thought about this a lot over the years. I feel like it first crossed my radar when I had babies. I started hearing this messaging, they need to learn to self-soothe, they should sleep by themselves, and, they’ll never be independent if you don’t push them. And that messaging just really rubbed me the wrong way. Partly it went against everything I’d learned about attachment in psychology in school, and mostly because I wanted nothing more than to be connected with these amazing humans that had come into my life. For me, I realized that I was more interested in exploring interdependence and what that could mean.
I think the richness in life is our connections and relationships. We aren’t meant to be these independent silos. Learning to be in relationship felt like a much more useful skill and lens for my kids to bring into their life and for me to continue to grow in that area, because I had a lot of baggage, thinking that I had to do it all by myself and that that was the goal. And I just didn’t really want to hand that to them, because I saw the ways that it didn’t serve me. And it’s so interesting, because we start to implement this idea and even train babies towards this independence in our culture just so early, and I think it might be a little bit more intense in the US. I’m kind of curious about that from our international audience.
But I think in other countries, they have their own pieces as well, and I just think it’s worth thinking about, where is it coming from? Who does it serve? For me, attachment theory was a much more useful lens. I found that from that securely attached place, my girls were able to explore the world and carve out lives for themselves. And so, there’s a lot here and a lot bubbling in my mind, but I’m interested to see where the conversation goes. So, what’s coming up for you, Erika?
ERIKA: Yeah, it’s such a rich and deep topic, I think. But one of the first things that popped to mind when I was thinking of the independence agenda is just that it sounds so ableist, too. It’s just not taking into account that people are different and independence, if there’s a timeline component to it, if there’s an agenda to it, which there is. Like what you’re talking about with babies, I remember there was a timeline, it was four months sleeping on their own, that kind of thing, then that is showing that what people are believing is that all babies are the same. And so, it’s just not true. And when you have a family of individual people with their individual differences, having that timeline, agenda of independence is just not going to fit.
I was also thinking that the idea of independence feels good when it’s coming from within a person for themselves. It makes me feel capable. It makes me feel like I can make my own decisions. I can do things. That’s a good feeling, but it’s coming from inside. It doesn’t feel good to have someone else tell me, you need to be able to do that by yourself. I’m not going to help you do that. That kind of thing feels like I’m alone. What if I can’t handle it?
And so, in mainstream parenting you might hear warnings like, I’m not going to be around to do this for you in 10 years, so you better learn how to do it by yourself. But that feels kind of ominous and threatening in the moment. And I just think there’s a lot of time typically for those skills to develop. And I just want my kids to know that I will help them. If I can, that’s what I will do. And it doesn’t matter what the age is and it doesn’t matter about some kind of a timeline.
So, I feel like if they’re forced into needing to do things for themselves earlier than we were expecting, for whatever reason, that they can figure that out. But in this moment, we’re all in it together. And everyone is different.
PAM: That everyone is different piece is fundamental and, for me, that “agenda” word is so important when we talk about the independence agenda. Because, as you’re saying, Erika, independence is cool. We can feel capable. It’s like, oh cool, I can do this thing myself, etc. Independence is not a bad thing, but it’s the agenda piece.
That’s like, I know when you should be able to do that thing independently or else there’s something wrong with you. But when we can lose the conventional timetable, the agenda piece, and look at supporting our child’s choices, which will include when they want to do things independently, and just be helping them along the way, what we’re doing is we’re validating, we’re supporting, we’re normalizing their unique timetable and how it unfolds for them. And that can surely look so different not only for different kids, even different children in the same family, just because people are different. And one might do this thing independently earlier than the other child, and then it’s the complete opposite for something else. Just because people are different and the things that each child is interested in are so different. So, you see their interests and then how they want to engage with them, when opportunities for independence arise, all those things will bubble together and they will take this beautiful, unique path to what independence means for them.
And I love your ableism point, too, Erika, and one does not even need to be labeled in any sense for there to be an artificial timeline on top of the things that they should or shouldn’t be able to do. To get to that point where you can understand that this is their life, this is their path, the way their life will unfold, and that choice for independence along it. It becomes so natural when you don’t use that as a lens, when you don’t have that independence agenda on top of it all, you see it unfold because it’s naturally what humans like to do. ANNA: Right, but I think it’s interesting to think of this independence as a goal, because that’s where it becomes this agenda piece. It’s this goal of independence. And I really wanted to peel that back, because I feel like, again, as humans, it’s the interdependence that helps us reach the places we want to reach and do the things we want to do. It’s this idea of, especially taking kids and, okay, you need to go recreate the wheel independently. We’re not going to help you. You’re not going to get any feedback. And I’m just like, is that real life? Because I have a partner that I’ve been with since I was very young, and we do things together. I’m not independently doing everything on my own. And I feel like having those relationships makes my life richer.
And so, is independence, this silo, the goal? Because, basically, the definition of independence is you’re not receiving help. You’re able to do it on your own without help. Is that the goal? Because I think when we push that on kids, it can leave them, like you’re saying, Erika, a little bit out in the cold feeling like, this is scary. And yet maybe they have these amazing goals that actually put them off into the world. But they would get there more easily and more comfortably by getting feedback and having support and help as they go. Pam?
PAM: Yeah, I’m just excited, because what bubbled up for me there is how valuable that interdependence piece is. I just always think of a child who can dress themselves and then therefore the parent expects them to dress themselves the next time. “You can do this, you can do this. You did this last week.” Whatever it is, “You did this last week.” But context means so much. And so, we can just think of that in our lives. Some days we have more energy. Some days we’re raring to go. Some days we’re not and we need more help. So, to have that in our network, to have that in our relationships.
As adults, how hard is it to ask for help? Because we have just been trained that, I should be able to do this by myself, and then we just dig ourselves a deeper and deeper hole, because either we don’t do the thing and then we feel bad that we didn’t do the thing, or we try to do the thing and it just takes the last ounce that we have. Oh my gosh, interdependence is so much more valuable at any age!
If our child’s like, “No, I don’t feel like picking an outfit and getting dressed,” and they’re not saying that nicely. They’re probably crying and whining. Those are clues for us. Oh, there is something different today that they’re just not feeling that they’re able to do this on their own. And what a gift for us to be able to help them in those moments. That’s the team, that’s the interdependence. And at any age, any age, just to normalize asking for help when you need it, it’s just so big.
ERIKA: Yeah. That’s exactly where I was going to go next. I had made a note of “needing help is not a bad thing,” and if our kids know what it’s like to feel they need help and ask for help and receive help, that will just make such a huge difference in their lives.
And so, when you were talking about the examples of context, so, something like being able to sleep on their own, that feels like once they can achieve it, now we’re good. Now they do that. And so, it can be triggering or bring up some things for us when it’s like, and now why are they not doing this? Why are they not doing the thing? And so, looking at the context and valuing that the child can come to me and say, “I’m having a hard time sleeping by myself now,” or, “I’m having a hard time falling asleep,” that’s showing us that something else is going on.
Maybe it’s brain development and now there’s all these new thoughts that are worrying them at night. There are always a lot of things going on, deeper things going on, and so I love using that as a clue to ask, what is the context? What is changing? What is growing about the kids that these things that they used to be able to do easily, now they’re saying they need help?
ANNA: Right. And I think it just translates into our adult lives, because I think all three of us have baggage in this area where it’s hard to ask for help, because we were trained in school and in whatever, that you need to do it on your own and no cheating, no this, no whatever.
I mean, “cheating” even! To call it that! In our normal lives, we all work together. And of course we collaborate and of course if I don’t know how to do this thing, Erika, help me do this thing. Wait a minute, Pam, I forgot how to do this thing. How do I do this thing? That’s natural. That makes us all better at the work that we’re doing, to be able to share our knowledge and skills. But we all grew up in this environment where you need to be by yourself at your desk and nobody can help you. And I really just wanted my kids to have a different feel of that, that it’s okay to ask for help and that, actually, we are stronger together.
PAM: It’s human resources, whatever kinds of resources that one finds one needs in this moment, not even needs, wants. I don’t have to justify it by saying I need this. I can want some help. I shouldn’t have to have excuses for it, right?
So, yeah, I think that whole independence thing is such a trigger for people. And I think a lot of the messaging is like, well, if we don’t make them do it, they won’t ever become independent, because independence is harder than being cared for.
But to me, that’s like, well, they won’t learn the hard things. They won’t learn algebra if we don’t make them learn algebra. It is all the same messaging. But, no. When human beings have the choice, there will be moments when they want to do things, if it has meaning in their life, and timetable wise, whenever it has meaning in their life. Human beings will choose to do the harder things when it’s theirs to choose.
And the context is everything. And the people are different is everything. Because what that looks like for them is what it looks like for them. That’s their truth. Not putting my expectations or my view of shoulds on top of all that. That just muddies the water. It damages our relationship. It stops me from learning who they actually are versus my vision of who I wish they were. All those pieces just get in the way. So, independence, to me, it’s just a thing. It’s just another aspect of living and I’m just going to help them explore their independence as they want to explore it.
ERIKA: Yeah. It’s like the scarcity of time feeling, where you’re jumping ahead to the future. Like, “This 4-year-old can’t put on his shoes. This is going to be terrible in 20 years,” not realizing this expanse of time that’s going to happen between now and then. And so, it’s about not letting those future fears interfere with what you’re doing with the child in front of you who is just on their own path.
ANNA: It’s those outside voices again. And we can just question them. Where are they coming from? Who is it serving? What does it mean? Why do we want that?
Because then I think that can just give us a clue of like, okay, that doesn’t have anything to do with this child in front of me, for sure. And really not even the partner in front of me or the friend in front of me, but for sure not this child in front of me.
And I think just to touch a tiny bit on those expectations, Pam, it’s like, if we have these expectations of what it looks like, we miss the learning about the actual person, because we’ve tunneled in on this expectation that they should be able to do X, Y, Z, or they should be living alone at this age, or they should be able to do this thing by this age.
We just miss who that person actually is and what their internal timetable is, and that they may be going in a completely different direction. I just don’t think it’s linear. And so, I think we miss that when we are focusing in on this linear path that so many of us grew up with. This is the progression, this is what it looks like. And I think so many of us weren’t served by that linear path, either, because I think that in reality, humans are very swirly. We do things in a very swirly way.
ERIKA: It reminding me of the little sheet that you get at a pediatrician’s office. They really do have these. These are the skills, these are the ages. Check them off one by one. And so, it can make you feel like, uh oh, this isn’t looking too good that my kid isn’t checking them off in the correct order and at the right speed. It’s really about blocking out that external stuff.
PAM: There’s a piece that comes up for me, too, that I think is an interesting question. Because in unschooling circles, we do talk a lot about autonomy, our child’s autonomy. And it’s like, well, if I’m not looking for independence, then they don’t have autonomy. But I think it’s so fascinating to think about those two, because they are not the same. Autonomy is not the same as independence. They’re very different.
When they want to make choices for themselves, they can make a choice that doesn’t look like independence for us, yet, that’s fully autonomous, because it is fully their choice in the moment.
So, if we want to talk a little bit about the theory behind it, the theory of self-determination, “Autonomy means that you have free will. That you can stand behind your actions and their values.” In other words, no one is forcing you to do something that you disagree with. “But independence means that you don’t need or accept help.” I want you to be independent. I want you to be able to do this by yourself and that you can do this without needing other people’s help. That is so different, right?
Autonomy does not require independence at all. You can absolutely be autonomous and still dependent on others or wanting others at some time (that’s the whole context piece) to help you and support you as you’re trying to do whatever the thing is. So, you can autonomously still act in accordance to your own belief and have free will and do all those things and still have the support and care of the people around you.
And, for me, that is the adult life that I want. I want to be supported by my network, by my community, by my family, whenever I need it, without having to justify it, without having to explain it. And that’s what we talk about so much when we talk about relationships and trust and connection and understanding each other. Because when that happens, we’re not questioning, we’re not judging. We’re just like, oh, somebody’s wanting some help. Boom. I’m there. I’ll help out. And they fully have autonomy when they’re making that choice, when they’re making that ask, when somebody notices and offers. We don’t jump in and do it for them, but we can offer, we can help, we can support. It’s so different.
ANNA: And I think when we force the independence agenda, which again is pretty common actually among mainstream families, and it’s coming from a place of love, so, “They need to know how to do their laundry.” “They need to be independent and doing their laundry. I’m not going to help them,” whatever. But what it ends up fostering, again, is this silo, like, “Well, you’re not going to help me. I’m not going to help you, and I’m not going to do this.” And so, that becomes the norm.
Because we’re teaching that independence is the value, like independence is where you have value. That’s a really dangerous, slippery slope to me. And like you said, Erika, it’s so ableist for sure. But it’s like, wait a minute. It’s so potentially damaging, I think, because it stops us from wanting to help the other person. And it could even be that we’re coming at that from kindness. Well, but we don’t want to hurt their independence, when in fact, who’s that serving? I’m curious. I have my own thoughts about it. We don’t need to get into that here, but I think it’s just really peeling that back, because is that what you want? Or do you want to foster, we help each other? We support each other as a family, as friends? Because, like you said, Pam, that’s what I want right now at 55. That’s what I want.
ERIKA: Right. And it makes so much sense. I feel like once you start thinking about it like that, if the message that my kids and my family get are that we all can ask for help and get it, that’s just great. That’s a great takeaway, because that will help them all the time. But if we’re giving them the message of, you did it by yourself, that’s so much better. That’s so much better. Like, finally you did it by yourself. I feel like that totally happened to me as a kid. And it’s common and it is from a place of mostly love and support, like, I want you to be able to feel good about yourself and do things by yourself. But then it creates a whole culture of adults who don’t know how to ask for help and push through to the point of overwhelm and stress.
And that word autonomy, I can see how people could get it confused with the independence part, just because autonomous, it kind of sounds like they’re doing things on their own. And, “I want them to have autonomy,” means they are just doing their things on their own. But it’s just a different thing. That’s not what it looks like. Autonomy is making choices and not being forced to do something that you don’t want to do. So, there is nuance and it’s so interesting.
ANNA: It really is.
PAM: That can be one of the messages when we first come to unschooling that can be confusing. It’s like, oh, I’m not supposed to help them. I’m not supposed to step in and teach them things, so I don’t know what else to do. I’m just going to step back, hands off, and expect them to figure things out on their own.
And then we started equating that independence, that autonomy, as doing it themselves versus just choosing what they want to do. And then that really gets in the way, I think, of developing the relationships with them, of being in connection, of developing that trust.
And I just want to jump back to that laundry example, because that’s a beautiful thing. I love that example, because it’s like, oh, this is something they need to know when they’re out on their own. So, I need to support them in doing that thing. And then once they learn it, they should keep doing it, because someday they’re going to be out and they’re going to have to do it for themselves all the time. So, it’s like they need all this training, like years of laundry to be able to do laundry when they’re on their own. And when you think of it through that lens, it’s funny for most people, but I mean, yes, it’s definitely out of a loving space. I want to help them, I want to support them, and we can just really get in our head with that. And I think it just does so much more damage than it helps.
Because you can go to YouTube and learn how to do some laundry in 10 minutes and boom, you’ve got something washed and with whatever machine you got in front of you and you’ve built critical thinking skills. In every episode we talk about critical thinking skills, like working through problems.
I remember a call from a laundromat from Lissy when she moved to New York City at 18. I was like, oh yeah, this is how you do that. Oh my gosh, it was a two-minute phone call. Because she was like, I have this question. This isn’t the same. Different machines, different place, different country, a whole different experience. It was totally okay. That wasn’t a failure of some sort of laundry training that I didn’t do over the previous 10 years that I was like, oh, that’s a big X in my parenting.
ANNA: How cool that she called though? Because I would say I, my mom was one of those moms that, she didn’t let us do the laundry. I think she thought we would mess it up. And so, I learned laundry on my own. There wasn’t even YouTube. We just had to trial and error it and figure it out when we were on our own. But I love that Lissy could just call and you weren’t there. You didn’t know the machine, but you could talk it through with her. Again, that’s interdependence.
It’s like, okay, you have a little bit more knowledge in this. I want to understand this, because this is a little bit different than what I’m used to. There’s no failure in that on any side, and that’s what I want to foster.
And I think there are just so many ways to support the autonomy and support the independence that’s coming from them. That’s where maybe they cross over, autonomy and independence. If that choice is them wanting to do things on their own. And so, I don’t know. I just think it’s so interesting to think about. What are we trying to do? And is this path really getting us there?
ERIKA: Yeah. That was a thought that popped up for me, when they want some independence. That’s the other side of this conversation. Sometimes the kids are really the ones pushing independence in an area where maybe we’re not quite ready for it. And that’s where it’s autonomy again, giving them the choice of having more independence in an area where we kind of want to say, oh no, that’s fine. We’ll keep doing it for you. I’ll keep doing your laundry, because I’m just not sure about letting you do that yet. And so, yeah, just the context, the people are different. Each child is going to, if they’re given the chance to have that autonomy, they will show you what they want to be independent in and at what time. That’s them creating their own journey.
PAM: And they also give you the clues as to how much they want to celebrate that thing. If we celebrate it, because we’re super excited that they did it independently and we subtly give the message that doing it independently is better than needing or wanting help for it, that can get in the way, again, as you were talking about. But yes, they may want to do something independently and they may think it’s cool. We don’t have to be the stone wall all the time when it comes to doing something independently or not.
But we can take our clues from them. How exciting is this for them? We can validate like, oh yeah, that’s amazing. So cool. How fun. Whatever words work for them. We can meet them where they are in that choice, in that moment, and in that level of excitement without the expectation, again, that it would be the same every time, without subtly relaying the message that, okay, we now expect them to do that same thing every time. All those pieces.
Because we can be looking to outside to tell us what to do so often. So, if I’m going to follow our whole Unschooling Rules series, the rules of unschooling say, I’m not going to teach them. I’m not going to tell them. So, then I’m going to step back. So, we’re looking for that rule that says, okay, but in this situation we do X. Okay, now here’s a little bit different situation. Now we do Y. But no, it doesn’t work that that. There aren’t rules for us. But if we just engage with the actual person in front of us in that moment, we have so many clues about how to engage with them, how to support them, how to validate them, how to meet them where they are in whatever level of excitement or frustration. We can understand who they are and just be with them. That is just so much more valuable than worrying about the rules. That’s our school mind. So, when you find yourself asking, but when they’re doing this and they’re feeling this, what should I do? Nope. Sorry. You’re going to have to just figure it out.
ANNA: But that’s back to what you said earlier where independence is not the bad word. What we’re calling into question is the agenda. The attachment to outcome. The expectations. And that’s what we’re calling into question here.
A friend recently was talking about supporting autonomy. That’s how she sees her role is as supporting her children’s autonomy. And so, they’re making choices. They’re wanting to do things and we’re supporting. So, it’s not the hands off, over here, you’re this autonomous being, doing things independently. It’s, yeah, we can be partners in that and I can support you in your individual choice and free will.
ERIKA: Right. And you can ask for help.
PAM: Yes! You can ask for help whenever you need it.
Thank you so much to both of you for this wonderful, wonderful conversation. And thank you to everyone for joining us. We hope you enjoyed this and that maybe you picked up a nugget or two that will be helpful on your unschooling journey.
We wish everyone a lovely week. Thanks so much.
ANNA: Take care.
ERIKA: Bye!
EU364: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: Including Kids in Decisions
Apr 11, 2024
We are back with another episode in our Unschooling Stumbling Blocks series and we’re talking about including kids in decisions.
There are many reasons why parents may rush through big decisions without giving children a chance to weigh in, but we’ve found that including kids in decisions provides us with useful questions and information, helps avoid dysregulation and melt downs, and results in so much learning for everyone in the family. Being a part of making important decisions now gives children experience that will help them when they have their own big decisions to make in the future. We also explored how important validation can be as we’re talking about making changes in a family.
It was a really fun conversation and we hope you find it helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hello to you both!
On today’s episode of Exploring Unschooling, we are diving into another unschooling stumbling block, which is including kids in decisions. I’m really excited to talk about this one, but first I wanted to give a quick plug to the Living Joyfully Network, which has really been life-changing for me in so many ways. On the Network, we have amazing discussions about so many topics, since our community has such a wide variety of experiences. I love the community so much, because everyone there is really learning and growing and being intentional with their families. If you’d like to learn more about the Network and check it out for yourself, you can visit livingjoyfully.ca/network or you can click the link in the show notes. We would love to meet you there.
And Pam, would you like to get us started talking about including kids in decisions?
PAM: I definitely would. This has really been a fascinating part of the unschooling journey for me and it grew out of just recognizing how capable my kids were. I mean, even before they left school, I respected their feelings and their needs. But it wasn’t until they were home and I was seeing them in action day in and day out that I came to see how truly capable they were of making choices. So, I saw how even if I wouldn’t make the same choice, the choice that they made made great sense for them. I got more and more comfortable with them making choices for themselves, and it was just brilliant to see it in action. Once you give them the space to do that instead of jumping in with, “Oh, well why don’t you do this? Oh, why don’t you do that?” it was really amazing to see.
And then let’s peel back another layer. It hit me that the decisions that parents typically make, that impact the whole family, we’re impacting them, even though I was making a decision. And so, that thought bubbled away alongside the thought of how capable my kids were of making decisions. And I was soon drawn to involving them in more choices, not just the ones that affected only them directly.
So, the first big one that I remember was about two years into our unschooling journey, and I went back and just quickly checked the dates and it started about two years in. And that’s when the idea of moving came up for us. So, I remember thinking that this is such a big decision, not just whether to move, but where to move. And it felt uncomfortable at first to fully involve the kids in the whole process. I worried that I would feel the need to override them at some point because they just couldn’t understand the nuance of this, or that, or the other thing that was involved. But I chose to step up and realize that this was my work to do. Let’s see how it goes. Put on that investigator’s hat and get curious about it.
Even though the process of finding a new home took about a year, fully involving them was amazing. They brought great questions with them, questions I didn’t think of asking, but were actually very relevant. They brought thoughtful feedback after touring properties and houses, and even if I didn’t have the same reaction as them, theirs made sense. Because now I was capable of seeing things through their eyes, so I could see how, yeah, that might feel a little off, or that might really excite them. So, their reactions and their feedback was awesome. Their enthusiasm inspired me to keep going when I was getting tired of this long, long search. And when they didn’t feel like participating at times, they trusted the rest of us to keep their needs top of mind at that point. Because we had been all working together. There wasn’t that power dynamic of parents and kids at that point. They trusted that they were being heard, that they were being considered. So, all in all, it was a very meaningful experience for me. You know how we talk about understanding something intellectually, but then getting it more deeply once we have our own experience of it unfolding in our lives? Well, after that experience, I understood in my bones that kids are capable of being included, as much as they are interested in, again, not at whatever level we expect them to be participating in it, but being able to participate as much as they wanted in those big family decisions. It reached every facet of our lives. It was just so meaningful for everyone and it just helped in so many ways that we will get into in this whole conversation, but like yes, an example of it in action.
ANNA: Right! And I think what’s so interesting is that it’s really stories in our head that it’s not going to be okay. Because we start thinking, like you said, they’re not going to understand the nuances, or they’re not going to get this, or they’re going to be more self-serving in what they’re wanting.
And then when we start peeling that back, it’s so interesting, because anytime we’re making a decision, we’re all kind of self-serving and thinking of what we want. We all have our thing top of mind. And so, what I loved about it, because we actually did a similar one with moving, and people did not understand, because in our case, we ended up not moving in large part because the girls weren’t ready to move. And people did not understand that. Like, what? Why are they getting to have the say in this big decision? And I was like, well, it is their life, too.
What I found was that they weren’t coming up from a place of being difficult or whatever. We were just able to talk about what it felt like to them. And then David and I were able to say, well, here are the things we’re concerned about. Here’s the things we’d have to change if we decided to not move versus move. Here’s these pieces.
And so, I feel like we talk about narration a lot and transparency, and I think that’s a big piece of that, because we can’t hold back the information and then think that anybody’s going to make a sound decision. And so, it’s so much about that interplay of sharing information. And this really goes back, for me, to each of us having the self-awareness to understand our needs, be able to communicate our needs, and then we’re working together to solve them. That’s really the dynamic that we tried to create, the environment that we tried to create in our family.
And so, it was interesting to see it play out. And so often, with little decisions and big, I learned so much more about them. They did bring incredible insights. They learned more about me, which was interesting, too. And I think they learned more just in general about how to approach a big decision and what are the different factors, and I felt like that has served them as they’ve been making big decisions in their own lives. ERIKA: At first, they don’t even know what big decisions there are to be made. And so, it really is just cool to get to have those experiences as they’re growing up. And I was just thinking, the mainstream expectation is just that adults get to make decisions, because they’re the ones who have the money. They’re the ones who have all the knowledge about all the parts and the kids better just not complain about whatever decision is made and go along with it.
And so, I see that play out all around me in our culture. But I also remember being a kid, and at that time I was intelligent, fully human, had my own ideas, and totally could have been a part of decision making.
And so, I think some of the reasons for not including them in decisions can be feeling like it just makes things harder. The more people you have adding into the conversation to make this big decision, it takes more time and now there are potentially more variables that are coming up. So, as an example, we have a couple of vehicles that are getting pretty old at this point, and I know at some point in the pretty near future we’re going to need to get a new family car. And it would be really easy for me to just say, I get to pick the car and I’ll just do it and then that’s that.
But I know that we spend time in the car and it’s their car. That’s their experience of traveling, too. And so, like both of you have brought up, they’ll bring up things that would never occur to me. And so, it actually helps me make a better decision when I find out the things that are important to them and the things that they think, but what about this? Like, I’m worried if we have a new car, we’re not going to have whatever the thing is that they like about the current car and if I don’t include them in the decision, I’ll never find that out. And then, it could be a problem later down the road.
And so, I think it’s wishful thinking that we would be able to make decisions on our own without including them, and that it’s all just going to be fine and they’re going to be fine and everyone will just be happy with it, because it’s important to them. These things are important, where they live, what we’re driving, what we’re eating, what our vacations look like. All of these things that feel like a whole family decision. And there’s just so much learning, like you’re talking about, for all of us.
ANNA: I think one of the things that comes to mind when you say that, and we talk about this in other contexts, too, is this idea that it’s easier. It’s easier for us to make the decision. But to me, it’s just putting the work to the back end, because then the decision is made, and now you maybe have dysregulated kids or upset kids or upset spouse if you’ve just made the decision unilaterally. And it’s like, that’s harder work to me. The work that you were talking about, Pam, in that long process of picking the house, it maybe took a little bit longer than if you’d just done it on your own, but that was such interesting work. Nobody was dysregulated in that work. You weren’t having to care for all the feelings. I mean, having conversations to care for the feelings, but so different than a dysregulated piece that could happen at the end when somebody’s uprooted from their environment and into another situation.
I’ve just heard so many people that it was just like, yep, I’m moving. And I remember it from my childhood. I still remember my friend being torn away from me. We talk about it all the time. Anyway, it’s just so interesting to think of this as easier, but is it easier?
PAM: I love that you always bring that up, Anna. When we have conversations around these things, the time invested beforehand or after and which feels better. And, for me, my mind so often goes to, like you were saying, Erika, it’s like more irons in the fire, more aspects to consider. The context grows, the more people are allowed to contribute to the context. Yet, for me, what I lean on is that, oh my gosh, the choice that we end up making is just, through my eyes, so much better. Even for me, right? Because I have missed things, like you were talking about, and it may not even be because I don’t care about it, it’s because I didn’t even tag it as something to consider. And when they tag something, I go, oh yeah, that’s a good point. So often, yes, it makes sense through their eyes.
And also, when I can understand it and I learn more about them and they learn more about me, but so often, the stuff that they bring up is also valuable for me and applicable to me. And that, in the end, when we make that choice together, looking back, I just see so many times that’s a better choice than the one I would’ve made unilaterally. So, that’s where my mind goes. But, absolutely, having to recover from having made a choice on my own, that is a whole other can of worms, too.
ERIKA: And all the parts joining into the context is so interesting, because whether or not you hear those parts, they’re there already. They already have their opinions about things, whether or not you’re asking them. And so, I think it’s just bringing all of the needs to light to help make the decision easier.
And I was also thinking about another decision that’s coming up for us is we all, I think, want to get a treadmill. All four of us do. And yet there’s still this process of trying to figure it out. It’s going to change the way our room is laid out. Do we all really understand that and how do we feel about that?
And so, I think Josh sometimes can be like, well, we want it. Come on, let’s just get it. Are we going to order it? And I’m just like, well, we haven’t seen what the room looks like yet. And I just know from previous experience, my kids are sensitive to change. And so, that’s just all part of our decision-making process now. Really thinking about, okay, let’s make sure we all really are settled in this and understand what it means and talk about all the possibilities, because once we start brainstorming, there are tons of possibilities.
ANNA: Okay. So, I’m going to take it in a slightly different direction. And, Erika, you may have to help me with this, but what I want to take it into, because I can hear the people out there saying, but sometimes, they have these attachments to things like, we can’t change the couch, or we can’t get the new rug, or the different things. And there’s this attachment that we don’t understand.
And somebody on the Network recently shared a TikTok from @youngmi, and so, Erika, I may need you to summarize what it was about, but that piece of just how we can brush through what they are saying when they have this attachment to the couch, we’re not giving attention to what it is they love about that.
In the moment, we just kind of get frustrated, so we go to that place of frustration like, “But the couch is 20 years old and it needs to go, and this is ridiculous.” We don’t leave space for those emotions. And I just think our kids really teach us these life lessons. And that’s kind of what that TikTok was about.
But do you remember what I’m talking about? The boba tea.
ERIKA: The mom was talking about her son having a really big emotional experience about her throwing away his last sip of boba tea. She said she could get him the exact same one again, same flavor. It’s going to be the same. And he was like, but it’s not the same one. That one is gone. And he’s crying and crying on the floor, and she’s just like, I don’t get it.
Then all of a sudden, she did get it. She was like, oh, he is just realizing this fact of life for the first time, that that cup, once it’s gone, is gone and there will never be another one of those cups. And so, it’s this really heavy existential realization. And he had it for the first time.
And so, once she realized that that was what had happened, that he was having this big a-ha moment about life, she was like, oh, I get it. That was the last one of that cup and it’s gone. And that is so, so sad. And he was like, yes. Finally, you understand what I mean. And he was able to move through it.
So, that’s the kind of validation that works, to actually move through. He felt like, yes, I was able to get you to understand what is going on for me emotionally. And she really did get it. And so, her message to other parents was just like, as kids are learning about what happens in life, these are really big and heavy concepts that they’re just realizing. And so, if they’re getting really upset about something that seems so little, it might be that it really means something much bigger and they’re realizing something big about life.
And so, with the couch and moving the room and not wanting to get rid of things, some of that feels so heavy and deep to them. And so, if we just keep saying, “That doesn’t make sense, it’s old, it’s whatever. Throwing it away is no big deal.” They’re not going to feel validated by that.
ANNA: Right. Because it’s impermanence, right? We’re learning it and we’ve had decades to wrap our head around how we lose things, things go away, and we have to change things and those different pieces. But for kids, it’s very new. This is the couch that they’ve known their whole life. This is the couch that they snuggle the dog on. This is the couch that means these things.
And so, I think what I learned was just to slow it down. And I talk about that a lot, because I can be like, get it done. I’m like, we got a new couch, let’s get it done. Let’s change the room, let’s paint it, let’s go. And it’s like, slow it down. Give everybody space to just wrap their head around it, because these concepts that I feel like we all still mess with and think about and think about in the larger terms of life, these are new concepts for them. And maybe it’s the first time they’re having to let go of something that’s important to them.
So, I don’t know. I just love that reminder. We’ve all been there with kids with this kind of attachment, but it doesn’t mean they’re not capable of making the decision, it’s just slowing it down and giving space for all those pieces.
PAM: It’s very funny. I’m just laughing, because just a couple of days ago, Rocco said something to me, very nice. He was trying to manage something and I was like, “You know? I’m not as attached to that as I was years ago.” It can be a different kind of conversation now.
And yes, I remember watching that TikTok and I got goosebumps again as you were describing it, Erika, because it’s like, but how would we know when something’s so big to them? But it’s in their reaction. If their reaction seems out of context or bigger than you would expect or anticipate, those are our clues. Those are our clues. Not that they don’t understand what’s going on, but maybe that they more deeply understand. And just remembering that this might be their first experience of X, Y, or Z.
So, seemingly out of proportion reactions are great clues for us to, like you said, Anna, slow down, take a moment. And it’s like, oh, what could this be meaning to them? Because she was just asking herself, why is this reaction going and going and going? Why can’t we just move through this? But that’s the whole point. She stuck with it. And she finally came to that realization like, oh, because we might think, why are they stuck? Why are they saying the same thing over and over? No, don’t take that couch. No, I want my old bubble tea, or whatever. It’s like, okay, I don’t have it yet. I don’t have it yet. It’s worth the effort and the time and the space to get to the place where we have it for so many reasons. Because now we’ve learned a little bit more about them. Now we can validate them, truly validate them, and they feel seen and heard and understood.
So, then they now can often more easily move through it. They don’t have to keep defending, don’t have to keep trying to explain, to explain, please see me, please see me, please hear what I’m saying. This means something to me. When we’re not dismissive, but we’re like, okay, I’m going to keep trying, I’m going to keep trying, I’m going to keep trying to get to that spot, and then trust builds there.
More connection builds there, more openness to care when it happens the next time, in something completely irrelevant, but it’s more experience that you are building as human beings together. So, it’s just so powerful when we can take that time to invest in the relationship, if you want to put it that way.
ANNA: And I think it gets to where we talk about underlying needs, too. So, we can have this conflict with a decision up at the surface, new couch, old couch, but then underneath that, it’s like, oh, when we slow down, when we take that time, we find out, how are we going to read on that couch? That couch looks different. Then it’s like, oh, well it’s about reading. Let’s create a reading nook that solves that. We can get stuck up here, and then we miss the reasons behind it on both sides. And I want to be able to articulate what my needs are to get the new couch or to whatever it is, so that then they were like, oh, okay, that makes sense.
But if we just stay up here at the authoritarian decision or the across-the-board decision, we lose some of that. And I think that’s what’s so interesting. And so, the question I always asked myself was, what is my attachment to not having them involved? What am I scared of of having them involved? What are the expectations that I have? Because those are the questions I want to ask myself when I feel that resistance to bringing them into a decision about something. And that work really served me, because again, I think it helped us stay in this place in our relationship where we both felt heard and seen as we were making these decisions that impacted all of us.
ERIKA: Right. It’s making me think, too, about that internal and external processing part. Sometimes, if you are an internal processor and you do a lot of figuring things out inside without the narration, without telling other people what’s going on in there, it can feel frustrating to be like, “But I’ve already figured out such a good solution to this problem, you guys. I wanted you to just say, yes, that’s perfect. Let’s move on.”
I think there’s that, and then there’s also just the sense of urgency that is so easy to have once you feel like there’s something that you want to move towards, it can be hard to pull back, but I don’t need to rush it. It’s okay to include these other people. It’s okay for it to take a little extra time. Because in most cases, decisions do not have to be made and executed on the day that it’s coming up.
And then I also think that including the kids in these family decisions, even though it’s more work on the front end, like you were saying, then they have investment in the end result. And so, I’ve found that to be so valuable. When we all feel like this was our decision, so many things can go more smoothly in the future. Where if it’s like, you did that and I didn’t want you to, we’ll be dealing with the repercussions of that forever. Like, you got rid of my thing when I wasn’t ready, or you didn’t listen to me about that. And so, really like including them in the conversations, even when it can feel frustrating, because I already figured everything out in my opinion, it helps.
PAM: I think that that is a great thing to remember. I’m so glad you brought that up, Erika, because it’s so true. We can, from a very loving space, there’s something that feels out of whack and we want to try and figure out a solution and us internal processors have thought it through and thought it through and thought it through and we finally came with this awesome idea and we don’t realize that if we haven’t talked about it, if we haven’t mentioned that we’re thinking about it, this is a completely new, out-of-the-blue idea to them. And I do not like out-of-the-blue ideas that are about to happen right now. I need a little bit of processing time. I need some time to just figure out, what are the implications for me of this thing happening?
So, it’s just so funny to think about it that way and just to recognize that if we’re not sharing what we’re thinking about, we don’t even know how much processing they’ll need around things or want around things or information they’ll want or what they may think of. And if we get that initial, “Oh, yay!” and do it really fast, but then two days later, it’s like, oh, but what about this and what about this? And you’re like, well, it’s gone now.
So, like you’re saying, most things, the vast majority of bigger decisions like this, family-related decisions, are not emergencies. They are not urgent. So, giving that space and time to everyone involved, not just inside our head, is just super, super valuable, I think. And it’s such a great point that it makes it so much easier later on, because everybody’s participating in the decision. We’ve had the time to think it through and like it’s like, okay, this is just the answer. It’s almost the afterthought.
ANNA: Right. And I want to touch on the piece that you just said about emergencies, because what we found is, this was our process of making decisions together and taking everybody’s into account and thinking about all the needs, so those times where there were emergent decisions, and they happened, like serious things happened, where it’s like, “We’ve got to make this decision right now. Get in the car, go. We’ve got something happening that’s intense,” it was just not a big deal, because they just knew and they just trusted. I gave them the information that I had. “This is what I feel like we’ve got to do.” And it was like, “Okay.” Because that’s that other piece that people go, “But if you give them that, then they’re going to always be like this.” And it was just not my experience.
The experience was that it built trust. When you were talking about that earlier, Pam, it builds trust in each other and that’s what then allows on either side to operate, whether you see they’re feeling something super emergent and I need to drop everything and go see what’s happening. And so, I think that’s another piece that I felt like was a side benefit that I wasn’t really sure how it would play out until it did.
ERIKA: I think they can really tell the difference. We may try to bring a super sense of urgency, like, but I need a new couch right now, because this couch is driving me crazy! But they know we’re not dealing with an emergency here. So, yeah, I like to remember to slow down when possible.
ANNA: But I also like that reminder about the processor, not just for us, because if we’re internally processing, but to think of the audience like, okay, do I have external processors that are going to want to bounce all the ideas off of me? And so, I need to kind of be ready for that to give space? Do I have somebody that’s going to go away for three days and I need to know that they actually are thinking about it and not think, oh, they don’t care because they went away for three days to think about it? And so, really knowing each other that way, and again, bringing some narration into it can really help us not get caught off guard by that.
PAM: And to not be thrown off if, the first few times through, family decisions are a little bit bumpy, because we’re learning about each other. We’re learning that somebody needs those three days of processing or however long. We are recognizing and learning that somebody will need to talk about it a lot, a lot more than if we’ve already figured out what we think the solution is and then they just need to say, but what about this? But what about this? Oh, what about this? And just to give ourselves that space for and the energy to be able to participate in that conversation, because you know it’s important for them. But we’re not going to learn that level, that depth of each other until we try it out. ANNA: Until you do it. Yes.
ERIKA: Exactly! Thank you so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed our conversation and picked up a nugget or two for your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I really think you’d love the Living Joyfully Network. You can learn more at livingjoyfully.ca/network. Have a great week everyone, and we’ll see you next time. Bye!
EU363: Deschooling
Mar 28, 2024
Deschooling is a bit of a buzzword in homeschooling and alternative education spaces at the moment. So, let’s dive in!
Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about the definition of the word, what that transition to unschooling can look like for parents and adults, the importance of letting go of expectations, some of the paradigm shifts that happen during deschooling, and how deschooling is something that we revisit over time as we reach new seasons in our children’s lives.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, everyone! I’m Anna Brown with Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Hello!
PAM AND ERIKA: Hello!
ANNA: Hello! So, today we are going to be talking about deschooling. It seems that lately it’s kind of popping up again and it’s a word that’s maybe reaching a bit of a wider audience as people start to pull away from traditional schools for a variety of reasons. But people have questions about it. So, we thought it would be helpful to talk about it again. And I know we’ve talked about it before, but just keep digging in about what it looks like, what it can help us with, how it’s an ongoing process. So, I think we all have a lot to say about this. But Erika, would you like to get us started?
ERIKA: I would, yes. So, I think deschooling really has become kind of a buzzword in homeschooling and alternative education spaces, as people are really looking at the ways that school isn’t working for their children. This word comes up. Most of the time, the word “deschooling” is referring to a process of examining schoolish assumptions and beliefs and questioning those. So, getting out of a school mindset, as well as decompressing and healing from any time that has been spent in school.
And I’ll give you a couple of examples of schoolish assumptions and beliefs that you might start to question during deschooling, so that you know what kind of things we’re talking about. So, like believing that learning can only happen in a classroom, or that reading has to be happening by a certain age, that children need to be around a bunch of other children their same age, that mistakes are to be avoided, that grades are the most important thing, that everyone should be following the same educational path, that you can’t be successful without college, that children have to be made to do things that they don’t want to do, and that there are certain topics that they need to learn at a certain age, or even that children need to be taught in order for them to learn. And so, you can see just by listening to those, that these are major mindset shifts that are happening.
Deschooling is a mental and physical transition away from school for us as parents and for our kids, and all of the thought processes and choices that are wrapped up in that transition. And I know that today, we want to dive into a few important points about deschooling. First, that it looks different for children and parents, and we can explore what that can look like.
And we also really want to emphasize, like Anna was saying, that this is not a one-and-done, checklist kind of thing, where you could check it off. Anytime a belief comes up or a new phase in our child’s life comes up, more deschooling can happen.
I heard a question recently that was something like, is it okay if I feel like we need to go back to deschooling? Is it okay that our life is still looking like this? And I think the mom was really referring to the amount of time it seemed to be taking for her child to decompress and heal from his time in school. It seemed like he wasn’t interested in the usual things, which is just so common. And so, I think it’s valuable to envision deschooling not as a phase with an end point, and to really sink into allowing that transition to take the time it does and be ready to question your beliefs and give plenty of time and space for healing along the way as things come up for your family. And I know you both probably have a lot to say about this topic, so I’m excited to see where our conversation goes.
PAM: I will say, a million things bubbled up while you’re talking there, Erika. It’s like, oh my gosh, yes.
Maybe I’ll start from the kids’ point of view, since I’m the only one who had kids in school going through this deschooling process for them. If I had to put a timeline on it, at least a year of deschooling. My kids were only in school for a handful of years. My eldest was in grade four or five, I don’t even remember, but one of those. But yes, the messages that they came home with were strong.
My daughter who enjoyed school, I was actually a little bit surprised when she said, “Yeah, sure, I would prefer to stay home. That’s great.” But she had gotten the message that she wasn’t a very good reader. And so, when she wasn’t being forced to read, it’s like, “I don’t read.” And don’t put books within 10 feet of this poor girl for those first months, because it’s like, “Oh, I don’t have to do that? Okay, I’m going to step back from that.”
I wrote a whole article, we’ll link to that, about her journey with reading. To watch her step back from that and then to come to it herself was super fascinating and interesting, to the moment when she’s like, “I’m a bookworm!” She declared that. You could just see the connection she’s making to like, “A year or so ago, I hated books. I hated reading. I would swear I couldn’t read,” all those pieces, but to give her the space to come to that, a lot of deschooling in there.
Same with my son, his challenge was writing. And I remember when he picked up a pencil. It was at least a year after he left school, he was like, “I haven’t written by hand in ages.” And it was a choice to finally pick it up, but so much trauma and crap all wrapped up in that from his school experience. Those were a little bit more obvious to me, but there is the whole host of other stuff about the environment and stuff that we might not know about. So, to give them that space to just decompress.
And we’ve got lots of stories in the archive of the podcast, even young adults talking about, “I laid on the couch for a year. I just needed to really decompress entirely,” and for us to judge, like, “Oh, your experience wasn’t that bad. Why haven’t you recovered this quickly?” It takes as long as it takes.
And that was a fascinating thing for me that ties to what you were saying, Erika, that there is no timeline. “Why is this coming back up? Why do I feel like we still have some more deschooling to do?”
For me, and I talked about it in my first book Free to Learn, which is my five biggest deschooling a-ha moments or paradigm shifts that were most valuable for me, but the light bulb moment of my initial deschooling phase was when I didn’t really care if I was done deschooling at all. It’s like, oh, this is just part of life. Stuff comes up, I’ve got another layer to peel back. Oh gee, this has been my work all along. And it’s like, oh, I haven’t really had to peel back a lot of stuff lately. I think we’re unschooling. We’re just jumping right in there. All is good. But it no longer was that checklist, another school mindset to work through. It’s like, oh, we need to do this and this and I can say I’m an unschooler when my deschooling’s done. All those messages. That’s what you’re going to be shedding for the next little while.
For my kids, because they were a little bit younger, nine and seven, and my youngest had only been in for a few months, it was really diving into play, because they had so much time at school that they had missed engaging with the things that they really liked to do at home. And I call this in my journey book “the belly of the whale transition,” because we really cocooned at home for probably at least six months to a year, just regrounding ourselves, just decompressing from all the, “We’ve got to be out there, we’ve got to do things on everybody else’s timetable.” Just exploring what our timetable looked like. I thought we’d be out doing all these things, because we can now. But no, really just to decompress and just sink into the things that we love to do while I was also peeling back all these layers.
I didn’t even realize how many questions, things that I had just absorbed of, this is the way things are. I know we have all, I’m sure, suggested many times when you come to unschooling or you decide, you know what? I want to try out this thing, to really give it that window, give it that six months to a year. Nothing’s going to happen that after a year, year and a half, five years, your kids can’t go back to school. Not to think of it as, this is a lifelong decision that we’re making to take the kids out of school. This is just something we’re trying out, but give it that window. Give yourself and your kids that window to decompress, to do some serious deschooling and just explore what does life look like instead?
ANNA: Yeah. I mean, I think it’s so huge. So, my kids never went to school, and so I would say what my experience with deschooling is much more about me, but I think it really fits for everyone, whether you’re taking your kids out or not. So much of it is about our own journey, because I was in school for a very long time and really I didn’t have a bad experience and I absorbed these different things from it. But like that checklist you went through, Erika, it’s just like, there are so many things that we don’t even realize that we’ve absorbed and taken in as the one way, the only way.
And so, while I was able to see my kids really just exploring learning, I found, for me, there was layer after layer after layer that would bubble up for me. And a lot of times it would be maybe a transition age or some kind of milestone that passed that looks a little bit different when you’re not in school and you’re not in certain environments that I would be like, okay, what’s bubbling up for me here? And have to do that work to pause and lean back into my kids. Look at what they’re doing, look at our life as it is versus how it’s comparing.
And so, I think that’s such a big piece of it, is just really understanding that it’s going to keep bubbling up, because we have been trained that this is the one way that it works and the one way that it can happen. But wow, when you can open that up even just a little bit, you see your kids healing, you see your own healing, you see generational trauma healing. It’s just so powerful to give that space, like you said, Pam, just don’t put anything on it. Just give it some space.
ERIKA: Yeah. I think it really sinks in how individual this deschooling journey would be for each child and each parent. If we’re thinking there’s a right way to do it, that’s going to be frustrating, you know? And so, for kids, you can look at that same list of beliefs and see, if a child’s been in school for a while, they’re going to be picking up on a lot of those beliefs themselves, but from their angle, from the student angle.
And so, it could be things like you were talking about of, I’m not good at this, or even as terrible as, I’m stupid or I’m not good at things. And those are really heavy messages that they may have internalized. And so, when there is that space now that they’re not being controlled, not being told to do all these things, it’s just space to start asking, who am I now? And that’s big stuff. That’s really big stuff. And so, it makes sense that it can take time. It makes sense that it might look like doing nothing. And I think that panics some parents at first, because they’re used to the school schedule and all of this activity happening and so much, where it’s so busy, never time for anything. And deschooling could look really like the opposite of that. It could look like we’re doing nothing. We’re just sitting here. They just want to watch TV.
But if you can think of it almost from a trauma lens of like, this is a healing that needs to be happening, then maybe it’s easier to give more space to that and just know that not every child is going to have that response to this transition, but some will. Everyone is different.
ANNA: And we’ve seen things in the network where people’s children, I mean four years down the road, will start remembering things or things can happen. So, it is so unique, that journey. And I think I want to just speak also briefly to, if you haven’t pulled them out yet, but you’re in this situation where something’s rubbing, which may have brought you here, to listen to this.
This is really just a call to trust yourself, because there’s some messages. Because I think all of us for different reasons, even though my kids never went to school, I thought they were going to, I got hit with these messages of, something’s not right here, something’s not going to work here. This doesn’t feel good to progress along this path that I thought was going to be okay.
And for you, Pam, I’m sure there were messages along the way. And so, I think, too, part of this is just really starting to trust in that voice inside of us. I think that’s part of the layers of deschooling too, is just getting to, you know your kids. You know them way better than any teacher, any school, any institution. You know what feels good to your family, and so that’s starting to build your why when you’re going to make a big decision to pull them out or not put them in, because sometimes it’s that, right? It’s this preschooler that I don’t think I can put them in, or they don’t want to go, or they go for a bit and then it feels terrible and they’re crying and we’re being told, oh, just leave them. They’ll be fine later on. It’s like, no, if your heart’s telling you something different, part of this is just setting aside those outside voices to really tune into what you know.
PAM: That really sounds exactly like my journey and it took a while before I discovered even the word homeschooling. I would tell my kids, sorry, you have to go to school. Let’s try and make this as fun as possible, or whatever. But for me, the root of it was, to speak to what you were talking about, Anna, was, when something didn’t feel right to me, I would just continue to question the premises. Why? Why do we have to do it? So, if the context, the constraint, is that school has to be part of our lives, how can we work with that.
So, I was working with schools, I was giving presentations to teachers, I was talking with principals, just doing all the things there. Trusting ourselves when something is not feeling right and just being, for me, open and curious. It even goes back then to why isn’t this working? Why isn’t this a fit? What’s up here? How can we play around, as we were talking about on the last episode with Kendel, how can we play with the environment?
And it was in that constant research, that constant trying to find how this might work for us, that I came across an article that mentioned homeschooling and I’m like, what the heck is that? And is that legal? Because that sounds awesome. And oh my gosh, it was not long before I found out it was legal.
It was not long before we said, let’s try this. Because that’s the piece. Just follow what you’re feeling, trust what you’re feeling, and start asking questions, because it’s okay to ask questions. We’re not going to be arrested for our thoughts. We can question those fundamental things that just feel so true, like that we only learn when somebody teaches us something. How are we going to learn something if somebody doesn’t teach us something? But my gosh, we could spend an hour talking just about that question.
But ask yourself questions. Just be open to the fact that there may be other answers than the one that we’re so used to, the one that we’ve just absorbed growing up, or the one that we were explicitly told, you have to go to school because you need to learn these things. It can really shake our foundations to start asking these kinds of questions. But, oh my gosh, it is so valuable.
It’s baby steps and it’s playing with things. Is that a possibility? We played with, oh look, yeah, we can bring them home. We can see how it goes. Rocco and I talked about that in an episode a long time ago. But that is the really interesting thing, when something doesn’t feel right, just keep at it. Keep trying to figure something out. When something’s not working for anyone in our family, for any of our kids, just keep diving into that and learn more and just grow your own web of understanding about what’s going on. It is a very interesting journey and I love the call to adventure. What is it that’s just not sitting well for us, and what can we do about that?
ERIKA: Right. Yeah. I like how you describe yours as being playful and taking these little steps. Because for me it felt more like just whooshing along, this knowledge explosion and all the big mindset shifts that happened for me in maybe the beginning year when I first started reading about unschooling. And so, it didn’t feel slow in my mind or like I was taking baby steps, but that’s why it’s the unschooling journey. It might be a different thing that gets us to start thinking about it. And so, in my case, it was that feeling of, I don’t think I can put this child in preschool. That’s step one. What happens next?
And so, I think that deschooling phase, if we can think of it like that, if we can give ourselves space to be learning without worrying about all the little details, like how’s it going to turn out and what do I need to be doing? And getting ourselves worked up in that question that I hate, which is, is it all going to work out? And just trying to stay in the moment with our process and letting our kids have their own process, so much goodness can come from that deschooling phase. So much learning, so much more connection, so much more trust. But it’s going to take putting your worrying, thinking brain, all of that stuff, to the side a bit to give all of the family members space.
ANNA: And I think acknowledging, too, that it is a big step. It’s a big step to step out of the norm, because when you said that, and I don’t like it either, is it all going to work out? kind of thing, we don’t know that about school either. And if you’re getting messages that something’s not working for your child in school, it’s probably leaning on the side of there’s going to be problems down the road.
But I think why people stay is, well, but that’s what I’m supposed to do. There’s maybe some safety in thinking it’s not all coming to us. And so, that’s part of the deschooling, too, to realize they’re on their own unique journey like you. It really is about keeping focused on the moment and what’s in front of you and what does this child need in this moment? And what do you need to heal and to reconnect?
And for us, the priority is always the relationship. So, we’ll always come back to that when we’re talking about it. But I think just give yourself that space and not walk too far down that road, because like you said, Pam, it could be five years and then you go back into a more formal environment of school or something else. And there’s no right or wrong way, no one path.
But I think the more you tune into your inner voice, that’s going to lead you and your child, again, to keep that connection strong, to get the most out of whatever the experience is. So, just listen to those niggling pieces.
But I do just want to acknowledge, I get it. That’s why we’re here. That’s why we have a Network that supports people, because it is a little scary to step outside of the norm, more so for some people than others, depending on your whole family situation, and the support you have in your life. So, it’s interesting to think about and just baby steps and taking the leap. Sometimes, it’s taking the leap. Either way, it’s okay.
PAM: Oh yeah. It depends on what lens or framework you’re thinking about. Because it does feel like a huge leap. Okay. So many things! Let’s go back to that question. I remember one of my big a-ha moments or paradigm shifts while I was deschooling was from that question, is it all going to work out? to, oh, if I focus on this moment in front of me and we work through this moment in front of me and then we have another moment and we work through that moment, it’s like, oh, but we are just compounding a bunch of moments in which we worked through things. So, we will just continue to do that however long into the future I want to worry about it. So, that really helped me get back to the moment, rather than tripping into the future. If I want everything to work out in the end, well darn it, I better make this moment work out.
Another piece that bubbled up is, I remember so much the journey of deciding to take the kids out of school. And how, oh my gosh, finally when I took them out, it felt like, okay, phew. We finally decided. We made this big leap and it felt like that was the end. We’re done now. But literally, that’s the start of the deschooling. It is like, oh my gosh, there is actually so much more. This is actually the call to adventure, okay, we’re homeschooling now. Again, keeping it light enough that it’s not like, oh my god, I have committed to my kids being home with me for their entire educational career or however you want to frame it at that time, but when you can take that pressure off and the weight of expectations that we can put on ourselves. Even though we feel like, oh, we’re done. We finally decided we did the thing. Yay. We can live now. It’s actually the beginning of the journey. I think that was another realization along the way. So fun.
And then the other thing I just wanted to mention that I learned when I was home with them and deep in this deschooling was how valuable it was to look to my kids, because they really were my guides on this journey. Yes, I talked about some of the messages that they had absorbed and that they were deschooling through, but with this space now to be themselves, to choose what they’re doing, so much of that I saw in action with them, eventually I was like, oh, but I could do that, too.
So, I was giving them all that space and then I was like, Pam, you need to do this, this, this. Get all that stuff. How am I going to fit it in? Nope, you’ve got to get this stuff done. To realize that I could look to them and see the way they were approaching their days and it’s like, oh, what a beautifully human way to go at their days. When they were doing something that they enjoyed doing, I could see that mistakes were no big deal. They were just, oh, that didn’t work. I’m going to try something else. That would’ve been the end of me. I was, okay, I can’t do that. If I’m not going to be good at that, let me go slink over here and do something else. Because obviously, as you mentioned, I had many more years of school where I had absorbed that message in that long list you were talking about, Erika, that mistakes are bad. And so, there were just so many things that I could learn through watching my kids that really helped me in my deschooling journey. Just to notice and to realize, to open up that these things were actually questions. They weren’t definitive. They weren’t, kids can do that and adults have to do this. To realize that, oh, it’s just about being human and we all have these choices on our plate, and how cool is that?
ERIKA: Yeah. It feels like some of these beliefs are almost a little barrier between you and the person or the connection or between you and the reality of the present moment. And questioning some of them feels kind of like removing that barrier. And I feel like that can happen when the kids are still in school. If you’re feeling like your connection with your kid is not that strong connection, I feel like these beliefs might be putting these barriers in between. So, when you can notice those things and think, what am I believing right now?
It’s almost like the role of mom and the role of student/child and all of these different rules that we have internalized because of our time living in the culture. It’s like, once you realize, oh, I’m believing that learning only happens in a classroom, and so, that’s why I’m treating my child like this, like it’s the most important thing. I really like how much it increases connection and strengthens the relationship when you start questioning these beliefs.
ANNA: Okay. And something you just said there made me think about the roles. I feel like we’re handed a lot of fear or this belief that we can’t do it and that we can’t handle it, especially if our kids maybe have special needs or have some special things going on with them. No, the experts. The experts. This is just something that’s drilled into us in school and our culture.
And so, again, I think the call for me is, I am with this child 24/7. I know. And I can get resources and I can bring other things in, but I just always watch for if someone’s trying to separate you in that way. Trying to say that you don’t know your child or, oh no, they can push through that, because they need this thing. And so, just watch for that messaging. Because I think it’s so strong.
And so, a big piece of this deschooling, I think, is owning our agency, taking back that agency, like, wait a minute, I do know who I am. I know who my child is. And I’m going to advocate for them. And again, whatever that environment is, whether they stay in an environment that’s in school or not, it can really change things.
But like you saw, Pam, you can go into that environment and try to advocate, advocate, advocate, but it just has its own set of rules. And if you don’t fit right into that, it can be really hard for kids.
PAM: Yeah, it’s its own set of constraints and that’s why I spent years. How can we inside these constraints, try to make this manageable? So yeah, very interesting.
And I’m still back to the kids as guides. And another reason why, when you choose to try this out, commit to it, I think that larger window is so valuable. We say at least six months, but a year, like give really a year, like as you’ve heard us all saying about a year. About a year, just as what our experience was, not as in that’s our recommendation, but through experience that seems to be at least the minimum span.
But what it does, like you were saying, is it gives us the opportunity as we’re observing our kids and connecting with them and hanging out with them to see how learning unfolds. Because so often, we’re deschooling, as in, our kids are not going to be in a classroom. I know how they learn in a classroom. They’ve got a curriculum and a teacher who tells them. Okay. How else are they going to learn?
But we need that space to see the natural learning unfold, to give them the time to dive into their interests and the things they’re interested in, and to see the connections, to see the next interest and what they brought from that, to see like all the different things growing and how their lives are unfolding. And through that, you just see the learning that’s happening. So, you need the space for that. It helps you trust the process. It helps you understand the process.
In the last episode, Kendel talked about it, too. You can read the books and you can understand it intellectually, but what a world of difference when you actually see it unfolding with your own children. That is just a deeper understanding, because you’ve got more connections now. I had these three things that made sense from the book or from the group, wherever. But then to be able to add context to that from your own life, it really solidifies it. It becomes a truth. That is part of the deschooling process as well. Like, okay, this all makes so much sense to me and I’m going to embrace this and jump in. And now let’s actually see how it unfolds for our family.
Because that’s the other really fascinating thing is in a classroom, everybody needs to adapt to the classroom process. They have their procedures, they have their methods, and we need to adapt to that. Whereas when we’re unschooling and we have that space, we don’t have 30 kids. We’ve got our handful of kids. And all of a sudden, we see how different each child is.
And that is another beautiful part of the deschooling journey is to see what learning looks like. How do they like to learn something when they have an interest? How do they dive into it? How do they deal with frustration? That’s a fascinating thing. I think you mentioned, Erika, they won’t do hard things if we don’t make them do things. Oh my gosh.
When your kid has the space to do the things that they are actually interested in, you will see them hit hard things. You will sometimes see them move on to something else completely. You will sometimes see them push right through as hard, through tears and frustration and anger and all the pieces and still go at it. It is just beautiful to see how different it is for each child. And again, then you start to apply that to yourself, too. It can look completely different for me, my partner. It just opens your eyes to humanness, I think.
ERIKA: It feels more like seeing and getting to know your child as who they are, rather than seeing them through this school lens or student lens or the deficit focus and all the things that going to school makes us focus on. And just thinking about like the fun of all that. I was thinking, deschooling also can be super fun. I know sometimes you talk about, when they first leave school, to just think about it as summer vacation, extended, to just keep going with that kind of mindset, because it’s like, if school didn’t exist, what would you do?
What are the things that are fun to do together? What are the things that would make you feel more connected? What are the things that your child has been just waiting to be able to do and hasn’t had the time to do? So, all of that can actually be really fun. There’s the healing and there’s all this thinking work that happens. But there’s also just the fun and love of getting reconnected and actually just doing the things that you all love to do.
ANNA: That just reminds me of maybe what you were talking about with the woman who asked the question. Sometimes we’re kind of like, is this okay? We’re having too much fun. Is this okay? And it’s like, yes, it’s okay. So, I do think that’s a piece of it.
PAM: Yeah, that’s exactly it. I said we were cocooning and for many people, that image would be somber and, oh, they’re not going out and doing things. Oh my gosh, they need to recover quickly. Yet, holy bananas. That was a lot of fun. We had so much fun. We learned so much about each other. We just had fun doing things together.
And yes, thanks for the reminder. Why it was that extended summer vacation camp was because they left in March break. So, it was a school holiday. They were home and I’m like, okay, if we’re going to do this, they don’t even need to go back. Why do they have to go back and finish this school year?
And Rocco was like, yeah, that’s true. So, we went and asked them and they didn’t. And then that’s what helped me. It’s like, okay, think of it as an extended summer vacation. We don’t need school stuff or anything, right through to the fall. I’ll worry about back to school season when that time comes around.
But that was a long enough stretch that yes, we were in it. We were enjoying ourselves. Even if it didn’t look anything at all like what I thought it would the day that I went around and ask them if they would rather stay home. “I just learned that you actually don’t have to go to school. Would you like to?” “Oh yeah.” That was a really helpful way for me to frame it.
Another way, and I think I’ve got a blog post about that, was thinking of it as a season of Saturdays. Because Saturdays are often the days when we’re not trying to get our kids up and we’re not like, oh, they’re sleeping in. They should be up doing things. Like, okay, now they’re not going to school, but they should be up doing things. So, if you had months and months of Saturdays in front of you, what would you do? And that helped me get to, as you were talking about, Erika, what are the fun things that we like to do?
We ended up going to the parks a lot in our cocooning, but it felt like a cocoon because we weren’t in the midst of a whole bunch of people. We just took our cocoon with us and we went out to the park and would just spend hours by the creek, looking at the trees, walking around. We could play at the playground in there during school hours. There was nobody there, but we could stay as long as we wanted. And we left when we wanted to leave, instead of looking at the clock and saying, okay, now we have to go.
So, whatever metaphor works to help you just release the expectations that you’re putting on yourself, and then, through that, putting on your kids. Because when I was worried and looking for things, I wasn’t as able to observe them and see what they were doing. Because I had that lens, that barrier between us, that I was looking for what I thought it should look like. I was looking for them to say, oh, I want to learn some spelling words. I remember that was when I was like, oh, what about spelling? Oh my gosh. But that all worked out. But that’s when the pieces come up for us.
But unless we’re watching them in action and we’re seeing them writing when they want to write … So, for my son, my eldest, it was not handwriting, but oh my gosh, he learned to type really fast, really quickly when he wanted to communicate online. But if I was always looking for the handwriting, because that was an issue before, so I need to take special care with that thing, I would not have noticed and realized, oh, communication’s the important thing, not whether or not he’s handwriting it. Look, he’s able to chat with people. He’s getting his ideas across. He’s picking up things from others who are writing to him, etc. I could open up my view, because I was looking and able to look at them more clearly and just see what they were doing.
ANNA: I think it’s that piece of letting go of the expectation, so that’s a piece we can watch. Like, do we have an expectation or even a vision of what it’s going to be like? Letting go of that as well, because then you can see it unfold.
But there was another piece about understanding that with reading, handwriting, some of these specific things that maybe the child is having a problem with, these are often very environmentally specific. They need you to be able to read directions in school. They need you to be able to communicate in a certain way. Because maybe now everybody has computers, but back in the day, you didn’t have computers in elementary school to communicate. And so, recognizing so much of the deficit focus, like you mentioned, which is so important, is really about the environment. So, when we change that environment, those are no longer deficits and the gifts can really rise to the top.
PAM: Totally. Gifts are the perfect way to think about it. Instead of going in with that, oh, what is it that they are having a hard time with? And I need to focus on helping them, versus looking for the strengths and the gifts and back to people are different, kids are different, the different ways that they still do things, still are totally capable of doing things. They don’t need those specific skills. Those were very much environmentally-related.
ERIKA: I think one of the tricky things about deschooling is if you’re constantly looking, like you were talking about, Pam, looking for them to ask for the activity that looks like school again. Like, I’m just waiting for things to just naturally start looking more like school again. And so, if we can look for different things instead, that would be more fun.
ANNA: Definitely. I love that. Thank you so much, both of you, for diving into this. It was fun to just take a look back and to just see how it still applies to so many things. And we just appreciate everyone that’s listening today and hope that you found it helpful on your unschooling journey or just your journey in general.
And I do want to say that if you enjoy these types of conversations, we love talking about it in the network, the Living Joyfully Network. When you’re taking that leap and it feels a little scary, it is nice to have a community around you of people who have done it, who are maybe a little bit ahead of you on their journey, who are right there with you. That can just feel so good to be around people that understand the words that you’re saying, understand what you’ve been through with your kids. So, we just really encourage you to check it out. We have a lot of fun there and I really enjoy it. So, you can learn more about that at LivingJoyfully.ca/network. We hope to see you there and just appreciate everybody. Thank you!
PAM AND ERIKA: Bye!
EU362: On the Journey with Kendel Ricker
Mar 14, 2024
We’re back with another On the Journey episode! We had a delightful conversation with Living Joyfully Network member Kendel Ricker. Kendel is an unschooling mom of two kids, 11 and 9, and she shared some of her journey with us.
Kendel’s own education included homeschooling, private school, and public school, as well as university and teachers’ college. Her experiences allowed her to really come to home education for her own children with confidence. From there, her path to unschooling was really led by her children and it has been magical!
We talked about releasing expectations and control, finding creative outlets as parents, supporting our children’s interests, and looking for the “glimmers” in our everyday lives.
It was a really beautiful discussion and we hope you find it helpful on your journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis, and our lovely guest, Kendel Ricker. Hello, everyone.
ERIKA, ANNA, KENDEL: Hello!
PAM: Kendel is an unschooling mom with two kids and a member of the Living Joyfully Network, and I am really excited to share some of your experience and insights with our listeners.
To get us started, I have a two-part question. First, can you tell us a little bit about you and your family and what everyone’s interested in right now? Because that’s always fun to hear. And then we would love to hear a bit about your story of how you came to unschooling.
KENDEL: Okay. Well, thank you so much for having me be part of this conversation. It’s so good to chat with you all. And I just wanted to say how thankful I am for this podcast over the years. It’s been really instrumental in helping me find this path. And these are some of my favorite episodes, where you bring on a parent who shares their journey, because it’s just such a point of connection with people all around the world, when you’re taking this path less traveled, to feel that community behind you. So, I hope that something I share today helps someone along that path like I have from listening to so many episodes like this.
A little bit about my family and myself, like you said, I have two kids, I call them affectionately “my little critters.” My daughter just turned 11 at the end of January, which is hard to believe. And then my son will be nine at the end of February. So, it’s that transition in the winter time where they switch over to the new age.
My daughter is really into birding right now. She can always be found with her adventure pack with binoculars and a compass and bird guides, and she just loves getting out into nature and doing things like swimming and kayaking and fossil hunting. And definitely, we look for opportunities to go try to find migratory birds to support that interest of hers. So, last year we went and saw about 1600 to 1800 tundra swans at a migratory zone. We’re always looking for opportunities like that. Or when there’s bird-type activities going on, like at conservation areas, we can go and be part of that.
And then she and I have actually really been enjoying a YouTube show. It’s called Brit Hikes Ontario. And so, he’s a British man and his wife, and they have set a 300 bird challenge for the year. So, we love watching that together, because it’s quite local to our area, the places they go. So, it’s really helping us learn to identify less common birds and then to see what months they’re passing through our area. So, we’ve been enjoying that together.
And, yeah, she also is a little bookworm. My dad for Christmas made her a window seat bench and a new bookshelf. So, many hours this winter she’s been with a cup of tea sitting at the window with her book. So, that’s been so fun to watch. And she also recently started taking art lessons and has always loved painting and drawing, and she also started violin lessons recently. And that’s been so lovely to watch unfold. So, that’s been cool.
And my son, who’s soon to be nine, his biggest passion is collecting vintage toys. So, he has quite a massive collection of vintage Fisher-Price, the mid-seventies era style. And he also loves the vintage Wrinkles Puppy puppets. I don’t know if you remember those from maybe the eighties. He has quite a few of those as well as a few moose and elephant style of those puppets. And he loves learning the history of those companies and learning all the different parts of the collection. And the fun is in trying to complete the sets, right?
And he also recently really got into western Playmobil and does these quite extensive small world setups. And recently, he’s been taking videos of them and I’ve helped him edit them with some western music in the background and some interesting effects. He loves that. And so, he’s my thrifting and antiquing buddy, too, because that’s a passion of mine, but he loves to come along and search out all the good deals on his vintage toys.
And then he also loves visiting local pioneer villages and heritage sites. And I guess that goes in with this interest in the western Playmobil sets. He sees a lot of these and he loves to go to local museums and see those artifacts and things.
And we all enjoy nature together. I think he loves it from a critter perspective. So, chipmunks, raccoons, squirrels. He likes to bring peanuts along and hide them in various places for the critters.
And then he’s also really into video games, and so is my daughter. And we mostly play them on the computer. And I think he’s a Minecraft whiz and, of course, one of his favorite things on there is we have a texture pack that’s Old Western. So, he loves to bring that to life on there and so creative. And then he also has started sketching old western buildings and he’s getting quite a cool sketch style, his own unique style, so yeah.
And then my husband, I did check in with him and say, how many years have we been married? We’ve been married for 14 years coming up in August, and he’s a structural engineer and he specializes mostly in bridges and we love doing nature stuff as a family together, kayaking and biking and hiking and again, visiting these local sites and just finding interesting things to do in our area. And we love going to provincial parks together. And in his free time, he does weightlifting and then video games as well.
And something him and my son really connect on is playing video games. So, for instance, they have one right now, I think it’s called Railway Tycoon, which would typically be a bit tricky for my son’s skill level. It’s quite complicated, but my son loves interacting with Ben while Ben’s playing. So, that’s so cool to watch unfold with them together.
And then there’s a game one of the moms in the Network suggested. It’s called Ultimate Chicken Horse. And we play it together as a family. And it is very fun and it has created a lot of laughter and it’s animals trying to get through obstacles that you set up to try and get each other and you have to make it difficult. So, that’s been really cool.
And, as for myself, I like photography. I did photography as a career for a number of years as well, so weddings and families and babies and stuff. But now I just do it as a hobby. And I love gardening and mostly I like planting a cutting flower garden, because then I like to bring them in and arrange them and take photos of them. So, that’s combining both of those passions. And I love to decorate for the seasons. I also like to thrift and antique those things and upcycle them to be part of the seasonal decor.
I think what takes a lot of my time and is also a passion of mine is just being an unschooling parent and creating activities and seasonal, fun things for the kids to do and looking for opportunities. And I love to plan events for our local home educating community. So, that’s takes up a lot of my time. Tomorrow, we have a Valentine’s party planned. We do like an annual Halloween party or Not Back to School party and forest meetups and field trips. So, I like to take that role for our community and create opportunities and friendships for my kids through it and put a lot of effort into that.
Right now, we’re also doing a reading club where it’s all very independent, but then we’ll get together at the end of March for a big reading celebration at our local library party. So, I enjoy doing that kind of thing as well.
ANNA: It just sounds so fun and I’m really excited about the seventies. That’s my era of Fisher-Price, so I have some old things that he might like, oh my gosh. I love that.
KENDEL: When we’re on online communities for that, it’s him and an older generation. And they just love seeing him enjoying it and sharing it, because they love seeing it being enjoyed by the next generation.
PAM: Yeah. I think that that is one of the things I love about these conversations. I understand why you love these episodes talking with other unschooling parents about their journeys and experiences, because it’s just so fun and fascinating to hear the different interests, because certainly in your first year, or even just thinking of homeschooling, but even unschooling especially, it’s like, what are my kids going to do? If they’re not going to school, what’s going to keep them busy? So, it’s just a lovely little window into anything that might catch their interest and just to see them.
And the other thing that really shines through for me as you talk about their different interests is, oh my gosh, how much time they have, because they’re not going to school, that they can have this varied set of interests that can weave together day to day. So, yes, that was lots of fun to hear about. So, moving on to your journey to unschooling.
KENDEL: Yes. Sometimes when I’m telling people in person, I actually start with the fact that I have had a lot of personal experience in both homeschooling, private, and public education. And so, I was homeschooled myself until grade two. And then I went to a private school from grade two to six, and then I homeschooled again for seven and eight, and then I went to a public high school until grade 12 and then did my undergrad at university and then eventually finished with teacher’s college.
So, that really does feel like part of my story, because it gave me an early experience with home education myself. And so, certain things that can be some of those first, immediate worries or concerns for parents when choosing home education, I knew that it was such a good fit for me. And I didn’t have that concern about socialization, because I had seen so many opportunities throughout my childhood, the two times that I did home educate, that there was so much to be part of and lots of quality friendships to be part of. And it was kind of a quality over quantity type thing. And that suited me really well. So, that set my mind at ease.
And then sometimes over the years, I’ve had a few people say, oh, well you’re a trained teacher and so, that’s what qualifies you to feel like you can home educate your children. And I actually feel like there was experience in public high school myself, and then there was getting that peek behind the curtain through my teaching placement through teachers’ college that showed me that there wasn’t anything particularly unattainable or magical about what’s done there. And, in fact, it probably built my confidence more in the fact that, with one-on-one, what all of those kids could have benefited from was one-on-one time with a supportive, loving parent or adult. So, it just gave me more encouragement that it was more attainable and doable because of that.
I’m sure you’ve heard from quite a few teachers-turned-unschoolers that it creates more unlearning that you have to do, because what I was mostly trained in was class management or how to get content across to a large group of children who don’t want to listen to you and how to get them the best grades possible type of thing. So, I feel like right away I have let parents know that I think that has caused me more unlearning and more of that peak behind the curtain that it’s manageable.
And then also having had private school and public school, I saw that even the private sector couldn’t provide what you can provide for your own children, which is unconditional love and support as a basis. And then so much more time, like you were mentioning, for them to just explore and see their curiosity unfold. That was my personal experience that made me feel like I could say when my kids were babies, I think I’m going to try home educating.
I think when I first started, I had a very different mindset. I did more classical homeschooling growing up. It was very much, here’s your curriculum books. And I was like, I can get done by noon and then have the rest of the day free. And so, I very much thought that would be what I do with my children. And then I had thought, oh, we have so much time in the afternoons then for all of these extracurricular activities to enrich their learning. My daughter, being the oldest, really fit well into that classical homeschooling model. I feel like she actually felt like we were playing school when baby brother was napping. And so, that really solidified, okay, this is the path for us.
And then once my son came of age to start doing more formal learning, I realized very quickly that he was much more hands-on, curiosity-led, experience-based. And he’s always been a questioner. And not in a defiant way, but just all the why’s, right? Like, why, why, why, why? And so, when you respect your children and you actually hear and take in what they’re saying and you’re not thinking, it’s just disrespect and, “because I said so,” you’re like, well, that is a good question. Why do we have to?
So, I think he was very instrumental in leading me down a more unschooling path or seeking out that lifestyle. And watching my kids and witnessing how they were learning and what was engaging to them and when they retained information when it was more enjoyable or learned from their own interest, that’s what kept helping me build the trust in this ever-evolving path towards more informal, just learning from life together all the time, kind of way.
And I think early on, a word that really stood out to me was Julie Bogart’s word “enchanted,” because that sat well with me when my kids were in those younger years of just looking for ways to make our everyday cozy and inviting and about connection and relationship and magical. Really seeing how quickly it was going and being like, I want this to be happy and magical, not filled with frustration. So, that was really helpful. And then, because I got sent down that path with my son questioning things, whereas my daughter was like, “We can keep playing school as long as you want, Mom,” I would then dive more into books and podcasts related to life without school type of topics, which really set me more on this path.
I think I knew about the term unschooling much earlier, like almost right away. And it was, oh, that’s not me. I’m going to do homeschooling, because it’s so much more, not less. So, I had a very skewed idea, as many people do, of what it is. But then as I got more and more into finding out information and hearing from other parents’ experiences, I was like, oh, okay. That’s what we are doing. I thought it was this big, bad “un” term, with a negative connotation, and realized, okay, that’s actually more so aligned with what we’re doing.
And so, I think that what guides our days is, connection as the number one, the relationship, learning to drop expectations of outcomes. And you talk about that a lot, but that’s been really big for me coming from that very schoolish teacher mentality of, okay, well we’re gonna home educate, but the expectations are still really high. That’s my responsibility as a parent. But learning that they reveal so much more amazing stuff when I’m not trying to get the outcome to be a very specific thing and just then really looking for what lights up my kids’ curiosity and then coming in and supporting that.
And I think another big thing I slowly move towards is, there’s no beginning. We’re not 9:00 AM till noon learning time. It’s so much more about 365. Sometimes, my daughter and I are having the best, deep conversations 10 o’clock at night. There’s just no beginning and end to when learning time is. It’s more of just a lifestyle.
And I think another key thing that I’ve implemented more over this course of coming more away from the structured, classical homeschooling is just more autonomy of choice, so when things are coming from my children and from their interests, it’s so much more beneficial, as it is for us adults. When you’re not being forced to think something cool or, “isn’t this neat?” It’s their choice. And they can learn to make those choices while they have this supportive, loving environment, too, instead of figuring that out once they’re out from our home and starting to finally get to make choices on their own.
PAM: I love that so much. Thank you very much for sharing the various insights that helped you along the way. A lot of them are very similar to mine, because my kids were in school for a while. I didn’t even know that homeschooling was legal then. And we live in the same area.
But I think that’s so fascinating to see that, like you said, as a teacher, you probably had more things to release because you had a picture of what learning “should” in quotes look like.
And I loved your insight, and I think this is something that I share quite a bit, when somebody’s curious about what we do, it’s the difference between a class of 30 kids and a family of a handful of kids maybe. They’ll ask, how do you know they’re learning? You don’t do tests! All those questions, they’re just super curious about. But to recognize that, oh yeah. I see why you need a test in a classroom. But when you get so much time one-on-one with them, as you were saying, oh my gosh, their learning shines. And when you’re connected and engaging with them, you see it in action. That’s the proof. They’re using new words. They’re sharing new things that they’re excited about. “Oh, I discovered this. Oh, look at this bird. All those little pieces are just part of your days.
I think we learn to value those and to see those as the markers. If we’re needing to look for the markers of learning, those are them. Not a mark on a test or a worksheet completed, but they are at least equivalent, but yes, as you shared from your experience, just hanging out with your kids, it’s like, oh, this is just amazingly beautiful.
ERIKA: I love the idea of the one-on-one connection and hearing about your children’s interests. It just makes me think, okay, there’s no school in the world that is going to have birding for 11-year-olds and Playmobil history and Fisher-Price history and these things.
But when they’re picking their own interests, you can see how much learning happens. And when you’re not focused on, “These are the only things that matter,” the whole world opens up with things to learn about. And I just love the joy that comes from that kind of learning.
And you started to talk about it a little bit, that work of letting go of thinking that we can control the outcomes or thinking that we can direct what our kids should be doing and that’s our inner work to do as parents to let go of some of those beliefs. It’s a mindset shift.
And so, I was wondering if we could dive in a little bit more to all the gifts that come from doing that inner work of letting go of control.
KENDEL: Yeah, that’s definitely, I think, just my base personality outside of even being a parent or a home educating parent. I know you guys are big into some of the Myers-Briggs and things and it’s the need to know what the future holds and security are really big for my personality.
So, it’s definitely been my work, as you said, Erika, to learn to let that go. And as my kids are becoming more of this middle aged childhood age, I’m seeing things that maybe I read early on in certain books that helped me, but now I’m seeing them in practice.
A big book for me when the kids were young, that really helped me shift my perspective from feeling like the responsibility as a parent was to control and to guide a certain outcome was Alison Gopnik’s The Gardener and the Carpenter. If anyone hasn’t read it, briefly, it’s, we’re not carpenters as parents and our children are a block of wood that we can have perfectly fashioned into a certain outcome, but instead we can look at ourselves as gardeners who are creating the environment for our children to flourish and they are going to be a spectacular flower or plant that’s already who they are. And we can just give it its needs, the basic needs and enrichment for it to grow. And so, that was super helpful, especially if you’re an unschooling parent, the biggest part of my responsibility sometimes I feel is the environment that we’re creating.
So, I was very easily and quickly able to visualize that as the garden that I can enrich with fertilizer and shelter from the storms and all these things. And so, that really helped me. And it was more theoretical at that point in terms of, okay, that’s the direction I want to go in. But then, as my children are growing older and I’m seeing them prove all that to me, it’s really helpful and it’s coming more into reality now.
Another book that really helped me set aside that feeling of, it was almost like you’re a good parent if you do have that control and you are trying to get your children to certain things, I let that go more so, I was reading, I think this podcast introduced Roya Dedeaux to me and her book Connect With Courage. That was so big to me, because I had kind of let go of that idea of, it’s my job to mold them into something, the carpenter mentality.
But then that book was specifically about hobbies and interests, which I think is an area where I still felt that bit of control because I’m the parent who knows what the options are. So, I have to continually be suggesting them all. And when I could lean into and realize that there were so many more, like I would suggest things and they would be like, maybe, and not be met with that instant yes. Through reading her book, I let go of some control over all that and I really realized then that there were so many more one hundred percent yes right away that were just the everyday things.
From an outsider’s perspective, I felt a lot of external pressure just in conversation with extended family or friends when what they know is to ask, oh, are they in karate, swimming, dance? What are they in? You have all this extra time as a home educator. I almost think I felt pressure that those things validated what I was doing. I think I realized that those are just the things people know about and what we’re doing is so much less known in terms of these little things that we talked about at the beginning of the podcast that are so magical and create hours and hours of learning and fun and interest for the children.
I really started to realize that it was more, like you were saying, about me needing to have that response of, these are what my kids are involved in. If I could let go of that feeling of needing them to be in any of those things to validate what we were doing, I had more time to listen for those little clues, like my daughter would be saying, when can we bake biscuits again? Oh, well, we’re too busy doing all these other things, so we’ll get to that. And my son, when are we going to the forest next? Oh, well after this and this. And so, if you fill your weeks with too much busy work that the kids might be somewhat enjoying but aren’t helping them figure out who they are and really fulfilling them.
I learned to really validate and celebrate all these little things as if I was on some sort of mission to show people these are even more valid than one of the 20 things you can choose from for kids, because look at the excitement and joy my kids are experiencing doing these smaller things that might not seem as spectacular.
And then just watching them throughout that process is what’s important, because you can think a lot of things. You can read a book and think maybe, and then you’ve just got to wait and see it play out. So, it was me stepping aside and letting that happen.
I have an example of that, as I was working through this for myself and getting more confident with not having this list of things I could tell people when they were asking, but really focus in on what I was saying earlier and saying, oh, he’s really into collecting this set right now, and all these mini things. And when people see how much you value it, then I just had to be happy with that and they can take it or leave it.
But when I stopped offering all these options and gave more time, my daughter came to me and said, I really want to play violin. And I was like, oh. That’s out of the blue. Okay. And so, my dad played violin, so she was familiar with the instrument and had tried it with him a few times.
And I love this example, because what Connect with Courage really helped me with was that there’s no set outcomes and then they can quit. If you let it be theirs and they take the ownership of it, they don’t feel all that pressure from us. Because it’s one thing, okay. She chose it. That’s great. But I could also then come in and make that a very different experience.
So, one thing that came up was only a month and a half or so into her learning violin, she had just started playing with the bow and just got off of the finger plucking and her teacher said that there was recital coming up. And so, she knew that either way she could say yes or no to be part of it. She hadn’t even ever played a song before and I was really surprised when she did say yes. But I think it’s because if I look at my experiences, maybe with music lessons, I could definitely feel a, “You will be part of this. You will stick with it, because we’ve paid for it.” There was pressure. And because she knows it’s totally hers and there’s no pressure either way, she was excited to be part of it.
Her teacher in her art class as well as in her violin class remarks that they can see a huge difference because they know she wants to be there and that she’s choosing it. I don’t require her to practice or nag her to do so. And so, it’s just one of the first big things where I’ve seen all of the work I’ve been doing for myself playing out within them and seeing the theory come to life and it’s like, okay, it does work. I’m seeing that she’s self-driven in it and thoroughly enjoying it.
And so, now the work will be if at whatever time she wants to quit, I need to be like, that’s great. Because I’m also learning that a no is just as value valuable as a yes or a continuing because you learn about yourself and practice with that is so crucial, I think, as part of becoming an adult, knowing when something’s a good fit. And knowing that it’s not invalid because at some point you quit even if you had such great potential. So, that’ll be my next little bit of carrying through the theory is being comfortable with whatever choices they’re making for themselves.
ERIKA: Yeah. Oh my gosh. I loved all of that so much. I feel like there’s so many little parts to pull out. I love that you recognized your personality pieces with the tending toward control. I think that’s so important to realize, like, I’m going to need an outlet for myself in this area. And maybe I could start to control the environment instead of the people. I feel like that’s so huge.
And then just with the people around you wondering, putting that pressure on you of like, what are the activities the kids are doing? They don’t know to ask about birding and Fisher-Price. It doesn’t make any sense. They only know these typical things that the kids might be involved in.
And so, I love the idea of giving the kids space for things to bubble up for them. And then, the violin example is just so beautiful. It’s a surprise. It’s even something that some parents would push their children to do and she’s choosing to do it herself with that space so that you know it’s just something that she’s interested in. So, I thought all of that was so beautiful.
ANNA: Yeah, the thing I wanted to pull out, and we’ve talked about this before, but it’s that piece when we step back and stop with our agenda, which is so common, because we’re trying to do the best job, we’re trying to be the best parent, but then that’s actually when we learn about them. That’s when those things bubble up from them and we actually start to see, oh, there are enthusiastic yeses. They’re there. They just might not have been for the list of things I had in mind.
And so, I love that reminder that it’s not like we’re going to step away and it’s just going to stay here. Other things will bubble up, but it’ll be coming from them. So, I think that’s just really beautiful. And I think that piece that Erika pulled out, too, about the other people, I actually think and I bet it has been your experience, too, that when you’re sharing those things that they enjoy, actually people are interested in talking about that. They just didn’t know. They just thought, oh, you only can do karate or this or that, or whatever, the standard violin. But seeing the birding and the other things can just bring that excitement to the conversation that’s so much more real. And I think that connection is so much more real, too. So, I don’t know. I just felt like that was really beautiful.
KENDEL: I just see that it opens up in them, oh, here’s all the things about me. We don’t have to stay on the surface level, too. I feel like maybe childhood gets viewed more like a procedure, like you go to school, and then what are your extracurriculars?
Another thing that really helped build my confidence over the years was literally soccer. In Ontario, Pam, it’s just what kids do in the summer. And so, they’ll say, my kid hates it, but it’s what there is to do and it’s good for them to be active, whatever the response was. And we already paid for it, so we’re staying in it.
And when I could see that and then reflect on my own childhood experiences of that pressure to stay in things, or the questions of, what would I have been doing alternatively if I had more choice? Those all just really helped me get over the concern of what it looks like to others, because it looks great to have the soccer trophy photo at the end of the summer, but when you talk to that parent, they’re like, “We had to drag them there every weekend or every Saturday.” And so, I’m like, you know what? And then that’s kind of a modern thing too, is all of all of social media, right? Getting past what it looks like from one photo and really not letting that determine what you’re going to do with your own family.
And, like I was saying, it uncovers the authentic level of adults, too, when they realize, oh yes, those are all valid things. I’ll share little things that I’m up to.
PAM: I, too, have a third of a season of soccer experience! But the piece in that area that stood out for me, you mentioned, Kendel, when you’re in those conversations with someone and you are sharing your excitement. You are excited as you share or like, this is so cool, they’re so into this thing! That almost gives them permission to release their judgment, because they’ve either got typical questions, what grade are you in? We encountered people whose favorite question once they knew we were homeschooling was, “Do you like your teacher?” And the laughter, the, “Ha ha. I set them up.”
But, oh my gosh, when we just share that bigger picture that doesn’t look like school, but we are enthusiastic and excited about our kids’ engagement with whatever the thing is, so often, that lights them up and almost gives them permission to start thinking about and sharing. And we can ask, what do you love to do for fun? We can just share those bits and then turn it over to them. And so often, that would just leave them for a second to think like, oh, for fun. I have work and I have this. And sometimes even our extracurricular activities as adults feel more like work, because we’ve scheduled them in. I’ve got to go do X, Y, Z. Just that reminder that, oh yeah, I enjoy doing that actually just brings back a little more to it.
And there was one other thing that I, I wanted to bring out again. When you were talking about having the list of, of things, oh, we can do this and this, and then you your days are full with busyness with these activities and they mention something that they’re interested in and then it takes a while for that to maybe bubble up. It took some time.
And you were talking about just freeing up the time to let that bubble up and become more of a priority, versus whatever list we have in our head that we think they would enjoy, et cetera. But how giving them the space to think about it and choose things that they’re interested in, but then to be able to engage in them soon, they learn so much more about themselves that way. Because this is something that’s catching their attention. And then when they can engage with it, they learn. Do I like the thing? Do I want to engage for a bit and quit? And the level of detail. How do I like to engage with this thing? Oh, we’ll try it this way. I’ll play violin with my grandfather for a while and that’s really cool. I’d like to dive into this a little bit more.
What we’re allowing with that space is for them to discover themselves, back to your gardener metaphor. We’re nurturing and helping them become the plants that they want to be. But unless they’re following the things that they’re interested in and exploring them the way they would like to explore it, and then taking what happens and deciding the next thing that they want to do with it or however, it’s hard for them to figure out who they want to be.
We have all these ideas and we can bombard them and let’s try this out, let’s try this out, let’s try this out. But when you give the space for it to bubble up within themselves, I just feel it’s so much richer and it’s just so much more fun to hang around with them when they’re doing stuff that they’re super into doing.
KENDEL: And I can see with the violin, even, if she finds a style she likes and her instructor’s amazing, but you don’t need to feel concreted into, well, you’ve said you wanted to. Even in terms of, if that no longer becomes a good fit, and she’s like, I know the basics now, I want to take it on my own.
Because part of part of my coming to all this was asking actual adults, too, what did you do as a kid? Did you want to? Do you resent it? What I found out was, of course, anything that they felt forced to do, even if their parents had good intention, it doesn’t stick with them through adulthood.
And it was the things that they really pushed for on their own once they finally felt of sense of autonomy that still has impacted their life or they still incorporated in their life in some way. And so, yeah, not getting stuck in anything, too. Oh, if that instructor’s not a good fit, let’s find a mentor or someone for you to play with. Or, oh, you enjoy playing as a group. Let’s find some other kids. Whatever it may be, letting them really know that they have choice in what it turns into as well, because then it’s going to be so much more rich and beautiful than we could plan for.
ANNA: Yeah, so much. And the piece that you said about that it may end and we don’t know what she’s getting out of it and what she’s going to take into the next thing, and so, just not having an energy around that, I think is really important.
ERIKA: I just loved it. I was just like, yes!
ANNA: Yes. We love it. Oh my goodness.
KENDEL: We’re focused on the violin, but what it’s bringing up, the first point that Pam was talking about, it brought up to me that I’m really being intentional about how when I am sharing about what both of them are doing, you were talking about the excitement you can get, and I’m making sure that I’m not verbally, or body language-wise, insinuating that because she’s taking a formal extracurricular activity with an instructor at the home, that that’s no more valid.
And so, I’m purposely being careful to make all of the experiences equally as important. And that’s more new for me, because I’m a big people pleaser, so it was giving people what they wanted to hear, or if it’s conventionally “Violin?! Wow, that’s amazing. Tell me all about it,” equally bragging up whatever small world my son created that week, or whatever he was doing, so it’s not seeing anything as on this hierarchy as well, because it’s about, like you were saying, Pam, the passion behind it, the interest, and you’ve all been saying what they’re getting out of it. That’s what’s important no matter what the activity is.
PAM: I think that is something that I found so interesting, because, even for interests that look conventional to people and that they can think, oh yes, that’s a thing. Like music lessons. So often, unschooled kids are coming at it with such a different perspective and energy, because they have agency in it. They’re not being told, “Yes, this is good for you. We really think you’ll enjoy it. You should have fun, you should practice,” with some future outcome in mind. Versus an unschooled kid who’s like, “Oh. That looks really interesting. I want to try it out.”
And like you were saying, even in her art class or her violin, the teachers, and that is a comment that I think we’ve all heard over the years when our kids engage in something in a more conventional setting, the teachers or instructors are just like, wow. It’s such a different energy. It’s such a different energy they’re showing up with. They are actually curious about learning the thing versus putting in the time because their parents brought them here and they need to stay. It’s just night and day.
When I think back on sharing that, that was such a beautiful point, Kendel, not to be more effusive about things that look more conventional, the people-pleasing aspect. It was good for me to remind myself that for the most part, number one, if I’m just meeting them and I’m never going to meet them again, whatever. But if it’s somebody who’s a little bit more part of our lives, then over time, they will see that there are various things that our kids are interested in and that we are just as excited about all the different things rather than the one that looks a little bit more conventional. And then they’re like, “Oh, she’s going to be a violinist in an orchestra,” kind of comments. It’s like, oh, maybe. We’ll see. I didn’t even think about that!
ANNA: All of the predictions.
PAM: But yeah, that “over time” piece I found just to be so helpful so that I could just ground in how we are now and what we’re doing now. And then next time it’ll be something different, et cetera.
And then I can just imagine that they’re building their picture of what our lives look like, because I can’t explain what our lives look like in one little conversation. So, it’s fun just to think of it as planting the seeds as we go.
ANNA: Yeah. I love that. One of the things I wanted to talk about, because I know that it’s something that you love, Kendel, is just cherishing the glimmers. And I love that, too. But I thought maybe you could tell us a little bit about what that looks like for you in your life and how it impacts your energy and connections, because I’m all about that. How do we keep that energy of connection? Because I think our kids really feed off of that, as well.
KENDEL: Yeah, the term glimmers, I think I came across it over the pandemic, probably on TikTok or Instagram. The basic idea is that it’s the opposite of triggers. And I think it gave an immediate word to something I was already doing as more of a gratitude practice of just finding those little tiny treasures among the mundane. Life can sometimes feel mundane. The chores, whatever, whatever. If we can find those little pockets of glimmers, it really helps build gratitude and contentment and peace.
And one way I love doing it, personally, I know, Anna, you are a photographer as well, and you have a really awesome camera. I don’t know what lenses you have, but birds and the moon and it’s just amazing. But I love to, say we’re walking down a path that’s seemingly all the same long grass on both sides of the path, I’ll be on a treasure hunt for that little purple thistle and that cool old fence post or whatever, and I’ll actually photograph it as a kind of gratitude practice.
And so, that’s a nice visual of like, it’s just a field of grass, but what little treasures, what little glimmers are lying in there? And so, I apply that just to everyday life, to build in gratitude and to be more in the moment. I can definitely always be far into the future in my head and it helps me ground back into the moment and really be thankful.
And another thing that recently I came across on, I think it was Wonder-Led Life’s Instagram feed. It was a quote that is, “It’s often more about what we aren’t doing than what we are doing.” And that was very similar to me. Again, it, like glimmers, gave a word to something that was meaningful to me in a way I go about life. So, that quote, it gave words to what I had been feeling lately, which was often reflecting on how our lives are quite different than the status quo of our culture. I would often be like, what would we be doing right now if we lived a more conventional life?
And realizing that by applying that, it’s often more about what we aren’t doing than what we are doing at different times throughout my days and weeks, it really focused me in on the moment and like, yes, we are doing this and this and this right now, but alternatively, we could be doing this. I found that really helpful. And I don’t know, it’s not groundbreaking, but for any parents out there, if they just implement that quote or that way of thinking for the various moments throughout their week, it really does build gratitude for all of the amazing things that this lifestyle can be.
So, whether it’s our slow morning routine together, instead of, well, what are we doing? Instead of focusing on that, you can think about, well, we’re not rushing, we’re not stressed, we’re not begging not to go somewhere or dragging the kids out of bed. So, it’s more about what we aren’t doing in that moment than technically what we are doing. And I think that you can really turn that on the flip side as well, and a lot of times we can compare our children to school children, our nieces and nephews or extended family and friends, and you have to realize that it’s often more about what they aren’t doing than what they are doing as well in the public school system or whatever.
What is lacking, even though, oh, wow, they’re reading really well or they’re getting that grade or whatever, that’s what they are doing, but that’s not meaning that there’s not this whole huge body of things that they don’t know and they’re missing out on or aren’t experiencing.
And so, in our home educating group in our local area, there’s quite a few people that come to home educating from school for various reasons. And so, when they start to feel that, am I enough? Am I doing good enough for my child? I’m comparing them to the kids that stayed in school that they’re still friends with, but I remind them there’s this whole mountain of things that they aren’t getting or that you’re able to provide them, social and emotional safety and mental health and all of these things that are so much more important than the academics. And it’ll all fall in line once all those things are taken care of.
So, that statement and the glimmers are looking for those little pockets of joy that bring you into the moment and the gratitude that comes from that. Thinking of all of the things that people just don’t even maybe know about that you get to experience day to day, which is so special.
ANNA: I love that piece, because I think for me, it’s the same. It’s, what are those things that bring me into the moment? And you’re right, photography is something I love and it is that. I feel like I notice things, because I’m thinking. And I just started recently painting more, and so I’m like, it’s the same thing. I look and I’m like, oh, I see the textures of that. And with the kids, it’s just noticing the little thing that lights them up or just the small, even mundane pieces of the day. I don’t know. When you bring that gratitude with it and noticing those little pieces, I just found it brought so much joy and connection, because I feel like everybody feels more seen in that way when we can notice those little things about the people in our life.
ERIKA: I think it’s that reminder to get out of the thinking brain more. It’s just so easy. We have so many things potentially to be thinking about and worrying about and all the things when we have children and when we’re thinking about learning and all of these things, and so, I just love glimmers as that reminder. The intention to be looking for glimmers through the day is just that reminder to get back out of my thinking brain into the moment, looking for things that just bring you some feeling of connection and joy. It feels really good.
PAM: I was just going to say it helped me feel grounded, like when you were talking about it, that really, it re-grounds me in the fact that everything is a choice. It reminds us that when we’re doing the things we’re doing, even if it feels routine, even if it feels mundane, to remember that this is a choice.
Just seeing the little things, noticing those, it’s like, oh yes, look, I can just celebrate again that we are choosing to do this versus the other things.
Because you can get like, “This is our day, this is what we do. We do this every morning,” and you can forget to celebrate that piece that, these are all the things that we’re not doing, because this is why. It grounds you back into your why, why we want to be here, why we’re making these choices. So, yeah, it’s such a fun practice, I think.
KENDEL: Yeah, I was just going to say, giving that word to it. I love what Erika said, it brings you out of your thinking mind, because I can get real stuck in there, and into the moment. But I also think it just translated throughout my life as a framework.
Because it’ll be, for instance, friendships and connections. I think thinking in that way has given me more guilt about being very intentional with what we do choose to do and with our limited amount of time for social time. You’re looking almost for people as they’re a glimmer in my life. Where am I going to cash in my limited amount of time in this world?
And you’re wanting it to be something that’s going to leave you energized and not depleted. So, it definitely just has been a framework of, I think, because my personality is the people pleaser, it helped me be like, it’s an active thing. Instead of feeling guilt and shame for being picky and choosy about, and intentional about your life, that is actively choosing something for our well-being, for our happiness, as opposed to feeling like it’s something you should be ashamed of doing because you just notice that you want to be filling your life with as much joy and happiness as possible in your limited amount of time. And so, you’re not settling for things. I think it’s really been a whole framework shift for me, if that makes sense.
PAM: Oh, thank you so much for joining us, Kendel. It was such a pleasure to speak with you. I’m really excited to share this with our listeners. And thank you, listeners, for joining us as well.
We hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe even picked up a nugget or two of connection or insight that you can use on your own unschooling journey.
And if you would like to have more conversations like this more often, we invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. It is such a supportive community. It’s full of conversations like this, all about the things big and small that we encounter in our unschooling lives. And you won’t have to preface every comment or question with, “I enjoy spending time with my kids.” So, learn more and join us at living joyfully.ca/network. We wish everyone a lovely week and look forward to welcoming you into the Network! Bye, everyone!
ANNA, ERIKA, AND KENDEL: Bye!
EU361: Siblings
Feb 29, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika explore the sibling dynamic and some of the questions that come up when unschooling families navigate sibling relationships. We talk about letting go of expectations, watching out for casting our children in roles, understanding our own triggers, and how “fair” doesn’t mean “equal.”
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and we are so glad you have joined us for this episode of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Anna Brown. Welcome to you both!
ANNA AND PAM: Hello! ERIKA: Hi! So, on today’s episode, we are diving into a really popular topic, and that is siblings. So many of the questions we receive on the podcast are about sibling relationships, and it’s also a huge topic of discussion on the Living Joyfully Network.
On the Network, members can share specific challenges they’re facing and it just opens up these amazing discussions since our community has such a wide variety of experiences. I know I always take something away from our conversations that helps me see things in my own life with my family in a new way. And everyone on the Network is really being intentional and open and curious, and that just creates such a great atmosphere for learning and growing as a parent and as a human.
And so, if you’d like to learn more about the Network and check it out for yourself, visit livingjoyfully.ca/network, because we would love to meet you.
And now onto our discussion for today, Siblings. Do you want to get us started, Pam?
PAM: Absolutely. I would love to get us started. And, knowing me, I think it can be so helpful to start with exploring our expectations, because there are so many conventional messages around siblings that we need to explore so that we can let them go.
We can’t skip this stage by saying to ourselves, “I release my expectations. I know I shouldn’t have them,” because trying to bury them that way won’t last long. They will bubble up in our energy. They will bubble up in our word choice. Even if we don’t consciously recognize that we’re bringing them in, they will bubble up, because they are part of our essence right now.
So, we need to do the work to discover the expectations that we personally hold and dig into them to understand where they come from, explore the implicit messages for our kids that we are subtly communicating, and just see if they actually make sense for us.
So, for example, I think an expectation that a lot of us hold, certainly when we first have kids, is that our kids will be the best of friends. Of course, our family will get along! Of course, the kids will be nice to one another and play together and help each other out! When they grow up, they will be the best of friends. Even if we didn’t get along with our siblings, we envision it’ll be different this time. It’ll be better for our kids. I think that’s a great one to pull apart a bit and just ask ourselves some questions. Why do we think that? Do we think that the shared genetics means that they’ll naturally get along? Or is it the close proximity? They live in the same house. They know each other so well. Of course they’ll develop deep and meaningful connections that will last them a lifetime.
Does telling them, “Be nice to one another! You’re siblings!” work? So, I think it starts to seem a little bit unrealistic when we peel back the layers around the connection between being siblings and being friends, because those are actually very different things, and so much so because people are different.
That genetic connection really isn’t going to take you far, I don’t think. People are incredibly and beautifully so different, aren’t they?
ANNA: Oh my gosh. This one’s a big one for me, just for my personal journey. I have two girls, now adults, but they are pretty close in age, like less than two years. And I would say, early on, they really were the best of friends and always playing together and it had this idealistic feel, with its own bumps along the way. And then when they got to the preteen, early teen years, I saw this need for them to define themselves separately.
They’re very different, like you said. I mean, could not be more different in every way. And at that stage it just really highlighted that. They wanted people that were more in line with different aspects of themselves. There were even times where it wasn’t like fighting necessarily, but there was a little bit of that, but it was more just this distance, and so I really had to do work, and it kind of hit me by surprise, to just really let that go. They may never be friends. They may not hang out together when they’re older like that. May not ever happen. And it was only then through that releasing that I was able to actually see them and facilitate what they needed at that time.
And they have a fine relationship now. They’re not the best of friends, but we enjoy being together as a family, all of those pieces. But I know that had I really harped on that and stayed there, I think it would’ve gotten really ugly. And so, I think just watching for when these things bubble up, like you said, there’s all these external messages and they can hit us at odd and different times and understanding that we’re all different and move through things differently is just so, so important.
ERIKA: Yeah. I feel like I benefited from your learning about this, because on the Network, I was able to hear a lot about the different phases that kids go through. And so, I definitely have noticed myself clinging to those times when they are playing so well together and making each other laugh so hard. And those moments just feel so great. And so, I had some fear, as they’re getting older, like, what if they stopped doing that? How’s that going to feel for me? I was afraid of that ending.
But I feel like it’s been less scary than I was anticipating, just because I’m so actively observing who they are every step of the way. And so, the decisions that they’re making now and the choices that they make and the way they’re relating to each other now just kind of make sense to me. I see who they are and I’m not putting my wishes or expectations or this fantasy life that I could imagine ahead of who they really are in reality, in this moment, as they’re growing.
And so, I think that’ll really help as they continue to grow and as their relationship continues to change over the next years. And so, that was one part.
But I think that’s not the only expectation even that we have potentially about siblings is that they’ll be friends. It’s like, the big brother who will be the protector or there’s all these different potential things that we’ve learned about as we are growing up and what we experienced maybe with our own siblings, like, what are the dynamics? What is the older sibling supposed to be like? And what’s the little baby sibling supposed to be like?
And so, just recognizing that so many of those things are just stories and cultural ideas that don’t really have anything to do with these actual different people who are right here showing us who they are.
ANNA: And that leads to one that I want to talk about that’s related and a little bit different and that is the roles that we tend to cast people in. And our brain can just do that for a lot of different reasons that we don’t even have to go into. But it is something to watch for, because it’s like that. The big brother’s going to be this. That’s one aspect of roles, but another one is these assumptions that we make about a person. “You’re the shy one. You’re the sporty one. You’re this one.” That really pits siblings against each other, because neither is feeling heard or none are feeling heard. None are feeling seen for who they truly are. And so, that piece you were talking about, Erika, where you see them, you know them, you celebrate who they are uniquely, that is actually what creates a family that feels good, because we’re all feeling heard and seen individually, without these expectations of, we are one way, we are another way.
I read the book Siblings Without Rivalry when my girls were very young, like infant and two, because I was going to get ahead of it, right? My partner, his relationship with his brother is terrible. And so, actually, I found the book interesting, because I could see his life playing out in that book. How the roles were cast, how it was created that they would hate each other. And ultimately, they’ve found their peace to some extent as they’ve gotten older. But it’s like, oh! It was not mal-intent at all, but it’s just not giving intentionality to, how am I showing up? Am I really tuning into who this unique person is in front of me?
PAM: I love that. So, it’s something that we’ve talked about, looking at your child as an individual. What do they like? Who are they? How do they move through the world? And how deep that is. That is so important in this topic, too, in sibling relationships, to be able to see them as an individual versus a role. Because yes, that role, then it’s like, does one parent prefer the sporty one? So, now we are going to have this closer relationship. Oh, we’re introverts. We’ll stay in and sit in a room, whatever, so it just messes with all the relationships. It messes with the sibling relationships. It can mess with parent-child relationships, which then affects the sibling relationships, because then it becomes competitive. When we start bringing roles in, we are not looking at the individual. It’s like, okay, we understand them. We’ve now got this definition for them that we can use in substitute, because it’s faster to think about sporty person than it is, this is my child that loves hockey or loves football and loves this part of it and wants to play it all the time. The individual nuances of sport are just so valuable in having a relationship with that person, in connecting with that person, and in supporting that person in the pieces that they enjoy.
And if we cast them so much in that role, we don’t think about them in the bigger picture. They may want to grow beyond it. It really makes it so hard for us to connect with the people in our family. And one thing that I love, and I guess we can link to it in the show notes, is the whole idea of a family of individuals. That idea hit me because I did a lot of processing around this, and the idea of our family as a family of individuals versus language that talks about, we are a family that does this or we are a family that does that. Not only casting the people into their own individual roles, we’re casting the family into a role that, we always get along with each other. We always do this or we are a sporty family and that poor one child that really is not interested just gets dragged along to all these events.
But that’s the great thing. Think about it through your family’s lens, the individuals that are in your family.
And for me, the a-ha moment that came out of that was recognizing that at first I was thinking about the idea of fairness. At holiday time or birthdays, they all get this number of gifts. Or if we go out, they all get this kind of thing. I spend the same amount when we travel here or we do this thing. So, when I started digging into that, it’s like, oh, they are such different people. If one of my kids wanted a baseball glove or something that supported their sport love, and then I was like, oh, I want to be fair. I don’t want them fighting over the thing. I give everybody a baseball glove, as an example, you can quickly see. The other child sticks that in the closet and it never comes out again.
So, for me, taking that idea of fair and alongside the idea that people are different, I started to realize that the question for me was more the idea of feeling equally loved. What would that look like for each child? Because when you start thinking of it through that lens, it would look very different for each child. So, in some seasons, one child will need more of your attention to actively process through a challenge that they’re going through maybe, and another child who’s loving that sport needs more of the family budget right now, because they’re traveling for games and stuff like that. And maybe another just needs more of your presence right now, because they’re embracing a cocooning season and just knowing that you’re there for them just helps them feel good.
And you can see how, in that situation, they would all feel equally loved. But how you are with them looks very, very different. And it’s that equally loved piece that helps keep that competition out of the sibling relationships. It helps them recognize that, oh, we all have value, we’re all loved, and we’re very different people, and it looks very different for each of us. So, there is just such depth to talking about sibling relationships, isn’t there?
ANNA: And we get there by seeing them as unique people and not the roles. That’s the work of how to get to that place of, what does that even feel like?
ERIKA: Right, because fair doesn’t really even make sense once you start to think that people are different. It’s not even a thing anymore.
And I feel like what’s interesting about the fairness part is it’s coming from the place of the parent showing love. That is the point of it. Like, I want to be doing a very good job as a parent, so I want to make sure that everything is fair.
And so, I grew up that way. And I made a really intentional choice to not ever bring any fairness language into my interactions with my own kids as they were growing up. And I really do think it made a big difference in their relationship. And I’m sure it’s personality-based, too. But I grew up with a lot of messages about making sure everything was equal and fair, and I see it with my mom when she interacts with my kids, like, “I can play with you for 10 minutes and then I’m going to go play with your sister for 10 minutes,” and she’ll do that without even really realizing what she’s doing, because it’s overwhelming to have both kids coming at her and she wants to make sure that they’re both getting their time. It’s coming from a place of caring about them and wanting to do a good job.
And yet then I see how, if that’s the way it is, over and over, it starts to be like, but it’s my turn. And that’s not fair. She got more minutes. And so, we just haven’t had that type of discussion with our kids. They don’t really do that. “But it’s not fair,” is not really something that we hear.
And so, I don’t think my natural state from birth would be to be competitive. I feel like I’ve always been super aware and concerned about other people’s feelings and would have wanted more of that type of relationship with my siblings, where I would’ve wanted them to get what they needed and celebrating people, all of our family, as different individuals and wanting to support each other in getting what we all needed.
But instead, it did turn more into, but now she got that, what do I get? Really making sure that we’re competing. And so, I don’t know. It does feel like something that’s learned, that fair means equal thing.
PAM: Yeah, I think they don’t think children are capable of supporting each other, of taking other people’s, their siblings’, needs into account. I think they do learn to compare and that is what unlikely through our language and through our loving wish, that we treat them all equal so that they all feel equally loved. But it’s not a comparison thing. It’s not a tit for tat thing.
It really is supporting them as the individual. Like your example, Erika, is just brilliant. Ten minutes each child, because, what if one child just wanted to show her something that would take three minutes and the other one wants to get into a deep discussion that would take 15? You’ve got practically 20 minutes each way, but you’ve left one kid who showed them for two minutes and then is bored trying to keep them occupied for the next seven minutes of the 10 minutes, and then the other one feels like, oh, I didn’t get enough time, but I wanted to show you a little bit more. So, they’re both left feeling like the connection wasn’t what they were looking for just because it was equally divided. It’s fascinating.
ANNA: It really is. And I do want to say, this is going to be a little bit of a counterpoint, but because I’m thinking of my own two girls very close in age, and I’m thinking of a friend with three girls very close in age, sometimes it did mean we needed two Switches or we needed three things, and it wasn’t so much about fair is equal.
It’s more like, but wait a minute! I want to play the new thing, too! And so, I had to let go of this idea or maybe this is another expectation, that siblings are going to share. Because no, not always. Sometimes we need two things and we need three things, because we’re all wanting to engage with whatever that thing is. So, this isn’t about these perfect children that are sitting there, but there is a mindset piece to it. So, I just wanted to throw that in there.
ERIKA: Right and if they have more of an experience of like, our needs are going to get met and what I care about is important, then they’re much more likely to be expressing what they want as what they actually want. And so, if Oliver says, “Why did Maya get that? I want that,” I believe him. It’s not about competing with her. It’s like, “I also want that.” And then that totally makes sense.
PAM: Yeah. Completely. Because it’s them being themselves and wanting to engage in the things that they’re interested in.
So, yeah, if somebody got one thing, that’s the difference. If you think about a family where fair is being determined as equal, they see somebody getting something else that’s popular, it’s like, I need to have that, too, so that you’re being fair. So, it’s a power thing. And they need it. And they want it and it sits in the shelf, but I got it through that expression of, yes. I have equal power in in this family. I will get those things.
But if somebody gets something and everybody’s loving it and they want more time with it, yes. You get another one and then maybe another one, and maybe one for the parent.
ANNA: Yeah and it wasn’t the Nintendo Switch back in the day. What is that thing, Pam, that we have? A DS. Yeah. So, all four of us had the DS, David, me, and the girls, because we all wanted to engage with it. And there were moments where I was like, this is ridiculous that we have four of these. And other times where I’m like, it brought us so much joy and was so fun and it just made a lot of sense. So, yeah, definitely that. Yeah. But can I go onto a different topic? One of the things I wanted to talk about, because it comes up a lot with siblings, we see it on the Network and other places is when there’s conflicts. So, we have the fights or the different things happening or escalations happening. And I just wanted to really talk about, for me, I can have a justice button. And so, I really had to watch for my own triggers. What was being triggered in me? Am I worried about the younger one? Am I feeling like this one’s taking advantage? Whatever it was.
I noticed all of that was not about what was in front of me. It was a lot about my own experience as a sibling, my own experience at school with those type of dynamics. And so, I really wanted to watch for those triggers, so that I could set that aside. Because what I wanted to bring to a potential conflict or an actual conflict was this neutral observer role, a facilitator, but not someone that’s passing judgment.
So, if I hear screaming in the other room, it’s coming in like, whoa, everybody’s upset. Let’s just take a pause. What’s going on? Tell me what’s happening. I wanted to bring that kind of calm energy of, I’m not passing a judgment about it.
And that helped so much. Then I could hear them. And I want to talk about validation later. I’ll let you guys talk in just a second, but bring that energy of, I want to understand and we’re going to work this out. And you mentioned that a little bit too, Erika. When we have that trust that I’m going to be heard, nobody’s going to be judging me, we’re going to figure this out, those conflicts can be deescalated much faster than in other environments where there’s judging and you have to defend and explain and you feel like you’re not being heard.
ERIKA: Yeah. The triggers are hard though. This is one of the really hard things, I think, about being a parent, because we’re not always or maybe ever conscious of all these different things that are trapped within us, these old wounds or old things that have happened. And so, to be unaware of that and then go into this new situation and realize, oh my gosh, I really am holding a lot of something uncomfortable about what’s happening here.
I’ve seen it play out with different parents really thinking that the older child should know better. The older child gets viewed as, well, they’re older, so they shouldn’t ever be doing this to the younger child or something. And expecting more from that older child than what makes sense for their age. And so, it helps to just be aware of the children where they are. They’re all doing the best they can, the same as we are, and just realizing that if we’re feeling something that’s so strong and heavy towards an interaction, it’s got to be something more within ourselves to peel back.
PAM: Yeah, I love that. Just noticing something’s bubbling up and it’s like, oh, maybe this feels bigger than the situation warrants.
When you have a second child, the first child just looks so much older. Even if they’re only four or they’re only five, you know? But all of a sudden, it’s like, oh, you are just so much bigger, so much more seemingly capable than this young one here. So, it’s back to expectations. We can put so many expectations on them, and maybe we’ve worked through it once or twice. “We’ve talked about this before! You don’t do that.” Meeting them where they are, and knowing and learning who they are and helping them process and move through the situation, it is just incredible. It’s night and day.
It’s so valuable to walk in without judgments or preconceived notions into a moment. Also, I think to walk in with no preconceived solution to it. If I walk in knowing, “Okay, this happened again, you should be doing this, and you should be doing that. And please remember what I said next time this happens. Do that again, please.” That’s just not how human beings tick. It’s not how they learn, memorizing someone else’s solution. It’s back to people are different. Memorizing how someone else moves most comfortably through a conflict just is not it. Sure, it’s great information to have, maybe, like, oh yeah, that’s how they like to move through it, but what works for me? I need to play with all sorts of different ways to move through it.
And I think it also becomes, again, back to the individual, for some kids being there and having the conversation together works. It helps move them through tit. I know for my kids for a while, as we were learning these tools, it was really helpful just to scatter when things got overwhelming and then I could talk to each of them individually. Because when we were together and we had moved to unschooling, there was that defensiveness, there was still a bit of that power dynamic where, “No, they don’t get to do that,” or, “I get to do that,” and it was hard to validate one child in front of somebody else. (We’ll get to validation next.) And so, to be able to talk to them individually and process individually and come up with plans, “Next time maybe, what would feel good? What might we try?”
And just to play with things and play with different ways to move through it. And that took time. That took months, years, and it doesn’t matter how long. I don’t want given amount of time. Like if I do this for this long, then this will be solved and we’ll move on to something else. Again, it’s the individual people in front of you. Some pieces of it they might pick up really quickly. Other pieces may take a lot of time for them to find their way through it, and then to be able to remember that when we’re in a heightened moment is even another step.
When we’re triggered, we know how hard it is to try and come back to this moment and be present with the other people in it, even as adults. All human beings are going to be challenged by that. To have the expectation that our kids will figure it out and then be able to do it for the rest of their lives, that’s just a pretty heavy one for them to hold.
ANNA: And so, I feel like this leads into validation from a lot of different directions, because I think when we understand our kids as unique creatures, their own people, that helps us with the validation piece. Because validation really is tuning into the individual in front of you. And it’s helpful to remember, we don’t have to agree or even understand their experience to hear and validate and show up for it.
And I’ve told this story many times before, but we had a friend over and the girls were young and screaming breaks out. I’m visiting with this old friend in one room and screaming breaks out in the other room and I go down there and she’s observing me, this friend who does not have kids.
And my oldest is like, “I hate her! I never want a sister!” The whole nine yards is coming out. Just all the big language. All the everything. And I just was calm with her. Like, “You just wish you’d never had a sister at all. You are just so angry right now and you just want her gone. You just don’t want a sister.” And just really validating those big, hard emotions. And she’s like, “Well. It’s not that. I just wish she would listen.” And she was able to move through, because I wasn’t scared by her big language. I didn’t go, “But you love her and she means well and she didn’t want to do this,” and the kind of explaining that we tend to do, because we can be protective for the young one who we love and that feels scary.
But five minutes, two minutes later, they’re back playing happily together. And my friend’s like, “What in the world just happened? How did we go from, I thought the house was going to burn down to, they’re just playing and laughing again?” And I was like, “She just needed to feel heard in that moment.” She was super frustrated. They’re young, they’re figuring things out, like super frustrated. And I could hear that, because I don’t have to take in and defend her sister. And like you said, sometimes it’s separating, so that I can validate little sister who’s like, “She is being mean, she’s doing this,” whatever it is.
But I think one of the pieces I want to get about validation when we’re talking about it with siblings is, even the hard stuff. Even the ugly stuff. Even the things like that, we need to validate and be with them, because that’s how we move through those hard emotions is by that validation.
PAM: The language that feels to us like it’s over the top, it may just be the language that they have. They’re just trying to express their emotions. But we have that nuance. So, when we can come to them and see and hear and validate, what we’re validating is the emotion, we’re validating them where they are. It’s not really about the language, right?
So, that’s how she could start to see, oh, well it’s this thing. But she needed to be heard that this thing was big for her. And they have a limited amount of language, depending on age, to be able to express that. So, they just pick the biggest words just to show. Validation is all about the other person. It is not about, “I am now saying that I agree with you. What a pain that other child is. Why did we even have them?” That’s not what we’re saying when we say, you never wanted to have a sibling, a brother or sister, whatever. It’s not what we’re saying when we’re validating.
We’re not agreeing because we validate. We are meeting them, showing them that we see them, that we see whatever it is, whatever energy that they’re having, emotion that they’re having in that moment. It just makes all the difference to feeling seen and heard. And through those conversations, that’s where they’re practicing the skills. It’s like, oh yeah, that wasn’t actually that. It was, “I wasn’t being heard.” And through a few times of that, then they can get first to the, “I’m not feeling heard,” but they need lots of time to practice that and to start identifying that, to find the nuances so they can start to recognize them, and then they can get to that place themselves. And then we meet them where they’re saying, “They’re not listening to me,” and then we work through that piece. It’s hard and it’s so beautiful, too.
ERIKA: Yeah. I feel like we’re getting to a point that I was hoping to make, which is just how often these sibling relationships are the fertile learning ground for how to interact with another human. And so, yeah, it’s challenging and they are coming without these skills, and yet here are all of these great opportunities. So, I feel like just knowing that and having that idea in my mind helps me in the moments of conflict. If I can think, this is what it’s all about. Navigating these conflicts and doing this well with them and validating them and really hearing them out and helping them learn to express themselves, helping them learn to narrate for themselves, all of those kinds of skills, it’s going to help them for the rest of their lives. Navigating conflict is not going to be something that goes away throughout life. And so, one of the values in having a sibling is these opportunities to learn some of these relating skills. And validating is so much easier, like you were saying, when we are looking at them as individuals and not in their roles and that can tend to be a place where I get stuck, if I’m thinking, but you don’t do that. Or, but you aren’t like that, or, but you should know better. And so, I love how all these things are connected in this topic.
PAM: Yeah, I love that point, Erika. The validation looks so different for each child, more than likely, and with our partner, but we’re talking about siblings today, but yes, it is so individual, because it really helps to know the individual to be able to play with the language. Again, it’s not, here are the steps to validating. Please do that next time your child is upset. We all wish there were rules or a procedure that we could follow that works for everybody. But we are all different. We are all individuals. And it can change over time and it changes over seasons and skills and as we change as human beings.
But it’s just so fascinating to recognize the value of it. For me, it goes back to our dance metaphor in relationships. I may say a little something that just doesn’t seem to quite land, but then I say something else and I keep trying. And that may be how I’m getting more information.
I also wanted to add, and I know we’ve talked about this before with validation and we’ll link to some of our older episodes, too, but also maybe in the moment, validation isn’t about words. For a couple of my kids when things were heightened, validation was about just being with them. Just being with the energy, meeting them with that energy. You alluded to that, Anna, too, just being that grounded presence where they know, “Hey, they can stay in the room even when I’m super upset. And I’m still okay and I will get through.” There are so many messages communicated when I can just be there with them and we’ll more than likely have short, long, lots of conversations later for the processing piece. But also just processing through the energy might be something that needs to be done in silence. Any additional energy that I bring just can’t be absorbed yet. Conversation can’t be had.
So, we might think that validation must be about conversation. I just wanted to say that it’s never just one thing. What does your child need in that moment? That is the most important thing, not some sort of process somebody told you about.
ANNA: Right. It really is. So, for me, it’s watching my own self, grounding myself, and then showing up however is needed, because we’re going to get those clues. We’re going to get clues from our child. If they’re wanting a conversation about it, if they’re just wanting us to be there, if they’re wanting us to help them pull out of a situation.
Because sometimes there’s this headbutting going on and they’re just needing our help to move things along and change things up or be with them. But I feel like I get there best to see those pieces when I’m grounded, when I’ve watched for my triggers, when I’m not coming into it with that activated energy.
ERIKA: Right. “I can handle this,” is a really good feeling. And I know as the upset person, it really feels so good to have someone who can be there for it, and that it feels like, this is okay. Even this is okay.
Parenting siblings benefits from so many of the tools that we talk about. So, validation, of course, narration, definitely, remembering the HALT, hungry, angry, lonely, tired, bringing in the context for our kids, these kinds of narration things.
And I feel like it has also helped when I reflect on past conflicts and show them how we have gotten through them. You know what I mean? This is something that has helped Oliver a lot, because he’ll be really stuck in the moment and feel so angry. And then if we can remember, “You’ve felt like this before. Do you remember that those feelings pass and that we can find a way to make things feel better?”
That memory usually helps settle his nervous system, because you can feel stuck in that moment of conflict and it can feel like you can’t escape. But, I was a kid once. I had siblings. I remember what it was like to feel so angry and so frustrated by them, and we move through it, and just using all of those skills helps so much.
ANNA: Yeah. I love that reminder, because it really is. I mean, that’s why we talk about the same things over and over again, because they apply to so many different situations. So, I’m going to give a quick shout out to the Living Joyfully Podcast, because we really talk about those tools in that specific way and just in relationships in general.
And, like you said, Erika, this is the first intense relationship for them with their sibling and with us and I think it’s made so much more valuable by our presence and by sharing these tools and by talking about things and by being that presence with them and helping them understand that. What I’ve seen with my kids, and we’ve talked about this before, is just that they take those tools that we were using to relate to each other and then use them with their friends and ultimately their partners and beyond and at work and all of these places. And I just thought, oh, these have really served them, these skills that I had to work on and figure out, too.
ERIKA: Right. And thinking of it as opportunities to use these skills also feels a lot better than hoping that these conflicts never happen and thinking that a perfect relationship is going to be the goal. If I can think more like, any conflict is going to be a chance for us to learn something new and practice these skills, that just feels so much nicer.
PAM: It really does. And holding out the idea that my destination is, “there will not be conflicts,” I think that’s another expectation we might be holding. Good to peel back and see what you think about that one. But yeah, the goal isn’t to never have conflict. It is exploring and finding the tools that work for you right now to help you navigate those moments, because yeah, that’s life.
ERIKA: Well, we have had a lot of fun diving into this topic, obviously, so thank you, Pam and Anna, and thank you to our listeners. We hope that you’ve found this conversation helpful on your unschooling journey.
Have a great week and we will see you next time! Bye!
ANNA AND PAM: Bye!
EU360: What’s So Magical About Age 18?
Feb 15, 2024
What’s so magical about age 18?
Pam, Anna, Erika, and our guest Erin dig into the transition from childhood to adulthood and what it means for our unschooled kids. It’s common for parents to bump up against some cultural beliefs about this phase of life and inadvertently put expectations on young adults. Strangers, friends, and family also all seem to be interested in the choices that our kids are making at this age! When we become aware of all of this messaging and remember that people are all different and unique, we can create a supportive environment for our young adult children to follow their own path. Erin is an unschooling mom with four children over 18 and member of the Living Joyfully Network. She was previously on the podcast in episode 285, which you can check out if you’d like to hear more about her story. And check out her website, everlearning.ca.
We’re so glad that she was able to join us for this discussion and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis and our wonderful guest, Erin. Hello, everyone!
So, Erin has been on the podcast before, back in episode 285, so please check that episode out to hear more details about her unschooling journey. But today, she’s joining us to explore the question, “What’s so magical about age 18?” which I am very excited to dive into.
Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I do want to get us started. Oh my goodness. I’m so glad we’re doing an episode about this age and season of life. I feel like it’s not talked about nearly enough. And there are so many parts at play. Culturally, we have this idea, I think, that once they’re 18, our work is done, but this really isn’t even about unschooling at all and it just couldn’t be further from the truth.
There’s this older labor bureau study from around 2007, 2008, that talked about age 27 being the average age where the majority of kids were living independently, so that’s age 27. And that’s just the majority, so this idea that everyone is on their own at 18 just isn’t true.
And I think letting go of that idea really helps us focus on the individuals in our family and what transitioning into adulthood is going to look like for them, because it’s so unique.
I think actually it’s easier for us in unschooling families to understand this, because our focus is on connection. It’s on relationships. And those relationships and connections last a lifetime. So, for us, the age is maybe a little less relevant, because we’re not product-focused.
But that said, when our kids start moving into adulthood, there’s a lot of messaging. It’s coming at them, it’s coming at us, messages about next steps and, “What do you want to do for the rest of your life?” And it can be this really stressful time.
And I think it can be fraught with triggers for us. I found that time in my own life to be stressful and I had a very conventional upbringing, but it was really important for me to separate my experience from my kids’ experience and I wanted to really protect the space and help quiet the noise as they navigated this time.
And so, I know we have so much to talk about, but those are the things that came to mind first, this cultural expectation and really understanding what’s bubbling up for us, because this is an age we all remember, whereas some of the earlier ages, we may not.
PAM: I remember the interesting piece, too, is, even though we have a different perspective on things because we’ve been unschooling and living unschooling, but there’s also the piece that, for me anyway, I was deep in the moment with them doing the things and everything and the “18” messages started coming more powerfully as my kids got older. So, when they were younger, it was like, I’ll worry about that years from now. And in general it was, I don’t have expectations anymore. But as 16, 17 started coming up and people are now asking different kinds of questions, “What college are they going to? What are they going to be doing?” all these pieces, those expectations started hitting me then.
So, it was another wave where I had to work through it again. What is it? Why are these messages throwing me off kilter? It would just have me wobble a bit and I’d be revisiting all sorts of pieces that brought that lifestyle and perspective into this new season of our lives there. ERIKA: This is going to be a really interesting conversation for me. So, my kids are 12 and 14 right now, and I’m just thinking that you don’t really know what your vision of “18” really means until you’re confronted with it. And so, I like the idea of thinking about it now and just being more aware that what people are going to be expecting is going to change, and even of what messages my kids have internalized about what it means to turn 18 and what it means to be an adult. Because I know that they do have some of those stories for themselves of like, when I grow up then this will happen or whatever, but not getting so hooked on that number, that age, because obviously things will change over the years. It’s not going to be that they wake up when they’re 18 and now everything they thought about being an adult is coming true.
ERIN: Yeah. I can relate so much to both of you, Anna and Pam, as far as, you’re humming along and you’ve done some of the work, and then there is this shift. It’s just a really interesting entrance into people’s perceptions of what adulthood should look like.
And so, I think last time we spoke on your podcast, Pam, I was talking about this period of time for several years where I really had this sweet spot, I would say, with our life and doing life without school. And I felt really confident. And as we got closer to “18,” it’s whenever people perceive the high school years as being over, suddenly, it’s a lot of questions is what it is. Because I found through a lot of the homeschool/unschool journey, people didn’t really know what we were doing, so they would ask some questions. It was almost so far from what they were used to that, unless it was good friends of mine or family that I could maybe talk a little bit more specifically with, there was a generality to the questions.
And then I think you come to this space that everybody’s pretty familiar with, right? Whether it’s the world of work or it’s college or university or whatever people are doing, moving out, driver’s licenses, all those kind of older things. Suddenly the conversations were different because they had some familiarity with that stage of life. One of the things that’s kind of neat about that, too, though, I find is that now that my youngest is 18, I’ve really officially moved out of that zone. There is a little bit more parallel at times in conversation I can have with people, because, as much as we might think that everybody has it all together and their kids’ path to doing whatever, I’m just finding in all kinds of places there is trepidation about what their kids are doing, if their kids are happy, if their kids are safe. And so, there’s some commonality, too, that we can have, which is nice.
ANNA: Yeah, that’s that piece, right? Because I think sometimes when we’re unschooling, we get caught in this belief that this is specific to unschooling, this concern that they’re not going to do this thing or it looks different. And I think you’re right. I think it’s very common. I think it’s really this commonality of everyone moving through it, because it is just such a time of change. And as parents, we’re letting go of pieces and things are happening. And so, I think it just can be really helpful as unschoolers to step out of this idea that it’s specific to that.
And then when we can let go of that, that’s when we can focus on the individuals. Because, Erin, you have several kids, Pam as well. I have two. And it’s been absolutely unique for each of our children. It has been so different and unique and that’s the cool part about it, too.
ERIN: And I think it gives other people a little bit of space. We’re having conversations and maybe asking each other how our kids are. And you can feel they are feeling that same nervousness that we all feel. And so, I think when we can just really give a lot of space and breadth and encouragement to whatever’s happening for their kids. I think maybe that’s what we can offer in those conversations. We’re not coming with judgment or preconceived ideas and I find that people maybe are feeling a little bit better for having those more open-ended conversations.
PAM: Yeah. And I think that that age comes in there, too. When we can bring the energy of, there isn’t a timetable. We don’t need to have this solved. Or our kids don’t need to have this solved. And I think, for me, the fun thing about those conversations was that piece, was that curiosity, that space you were talking about, Erin, where it can be like, oh yeah, they’re interested in this thing and they’re trying out this thing and they’re doing this thing that they’re enjoying. And it brings a conversation, for me anyway, back from the, “I have an 18-year-old or an almost 18-year-old,” to, look at this amazing person in front of me. When you can bring it back to the individual who’s there and talk about them.
Like you were saying, Anna, the way it unfolds is so unique to each person. And, for me, what helped me when I was starting to wobble was really just steeping again in “unschooling is a lifestyle.” And there doesn’t need to be this timetable, like back when it was about learning to read by a certain age and the idea that there was a timetable. I’ve been through those kinds of messages before, so I could tap back into that. It’s like, oh yeah, you know what? There doesn’t need to be a timetable for this either. I can lean into what they like to do. This is who I want to be as a parent. I still want to maintain a strong and trusting connection with them no matter their age.
Actually, it was reminding myself about all those pieces of the kind of parent I wanted to be that I honed through unschooling, and just realizing, or remembering yet again, that this is a lifestyle. This is what I’ve chosen for my family and for how I want to relate to them really. That, no matter our ages, and right now, my kids are all in their twenties and thirties, it’s still how I want to relate to them. It’s how I want to relate to human beings.
But there was definitely that time where I needed to process and remind myself of that, and then I could bring that easier energy to all those conversations. And yeah, sometimes you could just see them relax. When they’re chatting with me, it’s like all of a sudden they recognize that this isn’t a conversation with someone to whom they need to give the answers about what their child is doing, because those are the questions they’re typically getting, too. So, you could just see them relax a little bit. It’s like, oh yeah, this is the stuff they’re up to. And even just to help them relax a little bit on that, it made the conversations really interesting. ERIKA: I love that. I can totally picture that and how you’re talking about those earlier conversations, too. Anytime there’s that societal expectation on parents and on kids, everyone around is feeling that pressure. And so, it’s so nice to be able to be the one to help maybe relieve some of that pressure, at least in the conversations with us, because they’re probably just feeling a bit defensive about what their own kid is doing and worrying about being judged for what they are and are not doing yet. And so, yeah, I just love that. I love that we can question it and just be like, there is no one right way and people are different.
ANNA: Right. And that’s my PSA portion of this one is just stop it. We can be the generation that stops those questions at that age. Because when Afton, my oldest, was that age, she was traveling by herself and she was probably 18, 19 and I mean literally strangers on airplanes asking her, what college are you going to? Or, what are you doing now? Like, find other words. Connect with people about, what trip are you going on? What’s happening with you right now? What are you interested in?
And for those teens that are in that stage, what I would tell her is, turn it back around and say, what did you love about college? Are you working in the field that you went to college for? And turn it back to them. Because so often they were like, oh, I hated this. Or, oh no, I’ve done this. Or, oh, I didn’t do this. And it was a much more interesting conversation. And I don’t think there’s any kind of malice with the questions. I think it’s just that we don’t know how to ask questions of kids. What grade are you in? What’s your favorite subject? So, this is just another area to stretch and leave space for us all to be different and for there to be different paths.
ERIN: Yeah. I got thinking about that, Anna, when I was thinking about this topic. People are at a loss for other things to say and other things to ask, because most kids are in school for a good chunk of their day and their week. And so, it’s what people know.
And so, yeah, I agree with you. It’s not said with malice, but I know my kids have found it just really repetitive. Even if it’s something that they want to talk about, even if it’s a passion or an interest or something they’re feeling really comfortable about, it’s just like over and over. What other age is like this?
Can you imagine? Everywhere you go people are asking you like, what are you doing? What are your plans? And then what are you going to do with that? Because it’s not just, what are you doing? We had a line of questioning happening over the holidays and it didn’t stop there. Then it was sort of like, well, do you think that there’s money in that field? Do you think there’s security? It’s a lot of questions!
ANNA: That we would never ask anyone else. We’d never go to the neighbor and ask about their personal finances and have they really planned ahead for what’s going to happen next? We just wouldn’t do that. So, it’s such an interesting thing. ERIKA: There’s got to be something about the promise or the hopefulness of that age. They’re just starting to be an adult. And at this phase, we know so much about all of the trials and tribulations, all the decisions and all the things we’ve had to do, but looking at that fresh new adult who has all the decision-making in front of them, I think it probably makes people a little bit excited, a little bit concerned. A lot of things are brought up in us just because we remember. We know all that we’ve done from that age until now and I think a lot of people really like to pass along their words of wisdom or share the things that they’ve learned in order to help the next generation. So, I see why people get excited, but it’s so tiring as an 18-year-old to be like, oh my gosh, I have to explain myself to everyone now.
PAM: Yeah. That is such a good point. And I think back to our work as well, a big paradigm shift for me as we dove deeper into unschooling was holding back my two cents. Because it would get in the way of my kids’ exploration. It’s like, “Oh, should I be going in that direction?” It quiets their instincts, their motivation, their inner voice, however you want to phrase it. But if I could not jump in, “Oh yeah, this is really cool if you do it this way,” and learn how they may well do it differently, but I came to realize how much sense it made for them to do it that way.
And yet to recognize and realize that it’s the same. It doesn’t change because now they’re a young adult. Yes, I’ve learned these things. But you know what? It doesn’t mean those particular things would make their path any easier.
There’s that beautiful dance, that beautiful line of supporting them and helping them, and even pointing out things that we feel might be helpful, but again, without that expectation. And often, I found that I needed to give so much more space than I first anticipated to let things unfold, for them to pick up nuances, for them to understand themselves.
Because also, as we were saying earlier, there are so many ways their life is changing as well when they hit these ages, more opportunities are opening up. So, to give them that space to explore them and figure it out for themselves, while also being there to help. It’s not hands off. We’re always talking about that dance and that we’re not always going to get it perfect, but we’re going to get clues. If we jump in and they’re like, what? Or, no thanks, don’t wanna hear that. Or they immediately do something completely different. Not taking those things personally again.
It’s revisiting all these lessons that we’ve learned and recognizing that they apply to our kids as young adults, and then do it again as adult adults, wherever you decide you’re going to draw those lines. So, that is really fascinating to me. And something you always say, Anna, which is that there’s plenty of time. That is always such a great reminder, because if we remind ourselves about the individual in front of us, we can start to recognize how their timeline is unique to them. And it doesn’t need to be a rush. I don’t need to prove to other people. The priority is the child in front of me and their journey and their journey is a lifetime, to just keep reminding myself. We don’t need a deadline. We don’t need a deadline for anything.
So, there’s just so many different circumstances for each person’s life. It’s just so fun to hang out with them and see how it unfolds, even if it’s different, even if it’s like, that would not be a choice I would make or anything like that. It reminds me just to celebrate the person that they are and each time I just learn something more about them and I go, oh, damn. That’s pretty cool.
ANNA: And that it’s not a race and that this is a lifelong journey. And if we’re lucky, it’s pretty long. And so, I was just talking to a friend this morning and saying that disappointment is taking stock too soon. And I think that’s when we put these artificial deadlines that we’re measuring something. And really, it’s just the unfolding. It’s still unfolding for me at 55 years old. If we can embrace that piece.
And I will say, mine are now just turned 24 and 26, that societal pressure does ease. It’s pretty intense. It’s pretty specific to that timeframe of, like you were saying, Erin, 16 to 20, where it’s these milestones that people have in their own mind and then they just kind of are like, oh, they’re living their life doing their thing. It’s not so micromanaged.
But something else I wanted to say that’s almost the reverse of this is something that you said earlier, Erika, about how they’re taking in societal pieces and they’re taking in things about it. And so, something that I had to embrace, give some space for, was that they were going to maybe try things from motivations that I didn’t think were great, that were motivations from external pieces, societal pieces. But it’s like you were saying, Pam, that’s not my journey either. I can’t stop them from doing that, and I can’t guide them around that. They knew they weren’t getting pressure from me in particular and that they had my support and I could be there to facilitate, but I could see them at times making choices. And now looking back, we can have conversations about it and they’ve said like, yeah, I kind of wish I could go back and do some of that again. But we can’t change that for them. So again, I guess it’s the reminder of so much of this is our work to just recognize we can’t control the path.
ERIN: I’ve also been thinking about the idea of how much more space and time I shouldn’t say I’ve had to leave, but in order to have the relationships that I want to have, I’ve had to leave. And it’s not even that they necessarily need all that time, but just having enough margin to be available for some of those conversations. And I know we talk about this with teens for sure, but I think it continues. I think we were up till about 2:30 the other night, just kind of spontaneously, similar to what you were talking about. My son was just processing different things with his job and his path and management versus going a different route and just really thinking it through financially and all those kinds of things, too. And some of it was that balance, I guess, if you will, between what externally people are saying he should do, or not him specifically, but people, and then what he enjoys and the quality of life he wants to have. And that’s not a quick conversation apparently. It just went on and on. But he really needed to process that.
And you could see bits of that, being aware of what’s expected. And maybe it’s a little bit tricky when you’ve come up through a childhood where you have a lot of freedom and things aren’t very standard and it’s wonderful in one sense, but you are also very true to yourself when you grow up that way. And so, then there’s a little bit more of a rub between the external expectations. It’s more to sift through.
PAM: Yeah. I love that example, Erin, and that reminded me that something that I’ve picked up is a realization that, oh, this is what relationships are. Because it’s like, okay, they’re 18, even if they’re moving out and they’re doing other things, it’s like, I’m still not “done.” It’s still the processing. Because yes, they’re used to actually processing things as a human being, to not just to do what’s expected of them, but to think about it and consider it, making real choices as to whether it’s something they want to do and then maybe they do try it out and then later on they might change their mind. But that’s a conversation. That’s processing. Even as adults, how cool is it to be able to process, to continue to really move through your life with intention? Even if it’s like, I don’t have time, I’m just going to do this thing because it seems best to me, or that’s what everybody’s telling me to do, I’m going to try it out. They are just learning so much about themselves and that we have that relationship with them, that when they want to process and when they want to bounce ideas around or any of those pieces, that they trust and know that we will do that with them. So yeah, it was like, oh, adults out of the house. I’m done now with my parenting. And no, no. It’s like, oh these are the relationships that I wanted to have. And it is a lifelong thing. Oh, how interesting. ERIKA: And just the part about the lessons that we’ve learned and those things that we question now as adults, they might not be in a place to question that yet. And so, it makes sense that they’re going to have their own journey just as we did. Maybe they have a little bit of an advantage for listening to that inner voice, but there will still be a process of critically looking at society’s messages and expectations, listening to their inner voice, figuring out what works for them.
And so, I think it makes sense that young adults, sometimes even unschooling young adults, are like, “I think I’m going to try this thing that everyone else is doing,” and we could be, from our position, like, “But why? You don’t have to. You just don’t have to do that.” But I think it’s wasted energy for us to try to convince them about stuff that it’s taken us this long to come to. They just are going to be on their own journey with it. ANNA: Yeah. And I think it’s that being available. And Erin, just like your experience and yours, too, Pam, it is a time of intensity. And really, Erika, you’re already seeing it with your early teens, this need to process these big ideas and then go away and be doing things and then all of a sudden, yes, we’re here for the three-hour conversation.
And I think you’re right, Pam. It’s just relationships. When we think about the people we’re closest to that we want to process things with and we want to bounce things off of, how cool is it that we are that person for our adult children, these adults. And I don’t know. I love it and it can be intense at times. And I think partly that intensity for me comes from the triggers. I remember how intense it felt to be on our own now. Like, this is what’s happening. And then we’ve got to make all these decisions that seem really weighty and big.
And so, I do love what I see in them, Erin, like you said, a stronger connection to self. And also just that they are coming to me to talk about it. I didn’t go to my parents to talk about the stress I was under with some of this stuff. I just kind of felt like I had to do it. I just had to figure it out and do it. And so, I love that there’s more space for that collaboration, that community feel of relationships.
ERIN: And I wonder if some of that not going to your parents, because I think a lot of people have that experience, is that maybe we normalized that degree of stress. And it was like, well this is the stage of life I’m in. This is just how it needs to be. So, I don’t know. And there might be some of that, but it’s fun that they can play with that a little bit and think maybe there are some choices within this or some different options.
ANNA: Yeah. It’s cool.
PAM: It’s really cool to see the different kinds of choices that they make over time. And just like when they were younger, you see the learning and the things that they’re figuring out, not just through the processing, but just through the choices they’re making. Oh, we’re going to try this out. Well, something motivated you to try that thing out. And how interesting is that? And yeah, so there’s just so many pieces.
And I love that, for the most part, we remember, or re-remember that breadth of what it means to be a person, that we have revisited over time as we’ve wobbled with unschooling and gone back to looking at our kids and, oh yeah, look, they’re a complete human being. They have interests. They’re learning things all the time. I say learning things all the time, and then I worry, oh, people will look at their kid and think, oh, they’re not digging into this interest or anything like that. Because there are cocooning stages where it doesn’t look like they’re doing much, but oh my gosh, they’re learning so much about themselves just by existing in this season and seeing how things unfold and just getting curious, especially when their choices maybe don’t seem like they will work out the way they hoped they would work out. But how many times over the years, over their lifetime so far has it surprised me? So, like we were saying, I’m not going to jump in and say no, but I can sure be curious as to how it unfolds. ERIN: I have something that popped up just about choices that they make and so, on the one hand, I think you’d mentioned earlier on Anna, about triggers. This can be a period of time or a stage of life where there are a lot of triggers for us, and I know a lot of it is we want the best for our kids, but some of it is that external opinion of what they’re doing. But to a certain degree, I think we have to just observe how much is our own ego as well. Because you know people have been watching, right? People have been watching the homeschool journey. What is this strange thing that this family’s doing? How will the kids turn out?
And so, yeah, there is a certain amount of pressure on us that’s real and I think to be able to observe that, be aware of it. I’m curious. I’ve never asked my kids. I don’t know how much they feel that or if they even do. But yeah, it’s an odd thing that there’s this low-level observation happening.
ANNA: And it’s real. And I think, that’s why, for me, when I talk about this, because obviously we’ve been talking about it for many, many years now, I really do focus on, it’s about me being the person I want to be. I honestly don’t know what’s going to happen down the road or whatever. But I truly believe if I’m being the person I want to be, showing up in kindness and compassion and supporting, that that’s the best I can do. So, it’s like, for me, to really pull it away from the outcomes, because that’s their own personal journey. They’re going to take that journey and have all kinds of things about their childhood and other pieces. I will say, at this stage, I am grateful to have the relationships that I have with them and that we enjoy being with each other so much. But yeah, it’s so tricky. But the other piece did come back to me, which you touched on it a little bit, Pam, but it’s like, remember the tools, because I think sometimes when we move into this stage, suddenly you’ll see parents maybe double down on the conventional piece. Like, we’ve done all this stuff, now we’re going to college, or now it’s going to look like X, Y, Z.
And even if they go to college, what I love about the mindset we bring with unschooling is the curiosity. And it’s a tool. A college course is a tool. A welding course is a tool. Exploring Europe is a tool. All of it is valid and real and important. And so, I think it does take extra work, like you’re saying, Erin, for us to do that at that time, because the eyes are on us, all the eyes.
But for me it was just like, shut that out and focus on the individual in front of me. What’s making their heart sing? What is helping them move through this stage? Just thinking of our kids, how many do we have with all of us here? Eleven kids between us! So unique and different. Every single one of them is so different and this journey is so different and all just as cool and interesting as the next. ERIKA: When you said people are looking to see how the kids turn out, that triggers me so much, because I’m just like, what does turning out mean for a human? I’m still changing so much and growing and learning at this age, and so, I think keeping that front and center for me that there’s not a finish line and if there is one, there’s certainly not one at age 23. And so, just remembering that journey, there’s no turning out. And it doesn’t matter if you’re unschooling or if you’re in school or whatever, no matter how you grow, there’s still not a finish line as much as some people think that there is one.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. I would not want someone to think my journey ended at 23, even though it looked pretty conventional up till that point. Yuck. Oh my gosh, so much has happened since then and so much growth and that’s happening with each and every one of our children and all of the people out there.
PAM: That’s true. I just turn it back to myself each time. It’s like, oh yeah. I have changed so much in that time. I need to give everybody the grace to have their own journey.
ERIN: Yeah. Just one more thing on that, which is what I started to notice is it wasn’t even just the 18, it’s like people started to prepare for the 18 sometimes at 13, 14. And so, a lot of the people that we would have been together in the past, these memories of the kids on the hiking trails and the all the different things and just having a lot of fun together. And I really started to notice for quite a few people that joy just got swept right away in the teen years. They’d had all these wonderful years, some were traditionally homeschooling, some were unschooling, it didn’t really matter. They were all kind of finding their own joyful way of doing things. And then there was this period of time where suddenly the teens didn’t have time to get together.
Whether it was, I don’t know, just getting into a lot of structured courses or work or whatever and not that those are bad things and they can be what kids want to do and they can be really helpful. But I think it depends on the mindset. If it’s coming from that mindset of fear, “We need to prepare for 18,” it just felt a little bit sad to me to see some of that energy change.
ERIKA: That reminds me of the energy that changed when my kids were turning three and four. It’s these milestone places along the way. I remember my own mind going there. And it didn’t stay there for long, because it didn’t make a whole lot of sense. But I had thoughts of like, well, Oliver’s turning three, so things are going to have to get more serious around here. He’s really going to have to start learning.
And so, I think that high school thing is the same. It’s like, okay, they’re entering the high school years. Things have to get more serious. They have to start making decisions. And so, it’s just noticing when those more cultural things are popping up in my mind.
PAM: Because societally, when the goal is, more conventionally, college or university, high school is when you’ve got to start prepping for that, right? You’ve got to get the grades throughout your high school career to get into the school that you want. So, you can pretty easily see how that unfolds, why that starts bubbling up then. And when it bubbles up for us, I think it really is just noticing expectations and the fear that’s behind those expectations, as you were mentioning, Erin, that maybe when they were younger, we didn’t realize that we held, because there was no reason to think about it. It’s just so fascinating to me. We can think, oh yeah, college, they can choose whether or not they go. Yep. Done with that. Yet when the age starts, all of a sudden it’s like, oh, well, maybe just in case, maybe we should, all those pieces. So, I think it comes up in maybe how we talk with them. It comes up in our conversations outside our family. It comes up in the conversations they’re having with other people.
So, yeah, it is really worth the effort, I think, to just peel back the layers for ourselves when we just start to feel some shoulds and, “We have to do this,” when we feel those, it’s just such a great clue to dive in and just ask, “Do we have to? Why should we do that?”
Because even if we come to the point where, for us, yes, this feels like something I really want to happen, at least now we have the language and the understanding about ourselves and the self-awareness to be able to share at least, “I’m feeling,” to bring that to the conversation.
A conversation that starts with, “I’m kind of feeling this,” versus, “I think you should do this,” it’s a 180 degree difference as conversation starters, just to start feeling it with them and seeing what they’re feeling. And maybe we’re commiserating and maybe we’re coming up with some new ideas.
Maybe they’re thinking about things that we didn’t know about yet, and it’s like, oh, well that’s so much cooler. Because that is something else I realized. My plans, which were coming from expectations and, “This is how life should unfold,” just were never as creative and interesting as so many of the plans that they chose for themselves, because then all of a sudden it’s like, oh my gosh, that makes so much sense for you.
ERIN: Well, and naturally, often teens do become more serious and focused on something in particular or maybe just generally. So, I think, it isn’t to say that they don’t drive some of that focus, because they do. They get passionate about things and they want to learn, and I think they are interested in their future. And so, they will find steps that might make sense or pieces that they might be interested in. But I think it’s that idea of, what’s driving it? Is it external? Is it this fear that we are saying, okay. It’s time for things to get unpleasant. ANNA: Right. And I think that “there’s plenty of time” piece is a really good place to start, because even if we can let go of the artificial timelines of it, just because they choose not to go to college at 18 doesn’t mean they won’t at 22 or 28. So, if we can let go of the rigid timeline, just even that alone provides a little breathing room to learn more about ourselves, to make sure someone’s ready for that step. Make sure someone’s ready to do whatever the next thing is. And so, even that’s a piece of work we can catch in ourselves and go, okay, right. We don’t have to buy into artificial timelines.
Again, I think the piece is tuning into the individual who’s in front of you, what do they need, what makes sense for them? And really just being there and creating that space. I think that’s a great place to start with all of this. PAM: What bubbled up for me there, Anna, is just the reminder, not only tune into the individual and the things they’re interested in, but their personality and who they are in the world, how they like to engage with the world, to remember not only just introvert, extrovert, because we can be like, okay, now you should be doing this. We can start to see them as, “They’re adults now.” Group things. But introvert, extrovert. I was just reminded very strongly there of Michael’s more multi-passionate way of going, because he had applied and been accepted to college and had this job and was thinking about doing this thing and this thing. And it’s important for me not to get fixated on any one of those paths, because he’s just got so many possibilities that he loves. And again, just be curious to see how things unfold when these decision points come for now. For now. They can come again and again. But right now, oh, you know what? This is the path that he’s going to choose.
So, understanding that, for him, having so many different interests and paths and possibilities is just how he works and how he thrives. So, supporting that versus another child who’s just deeply into their passion and just diving into that deeper and deeper and deeper over the years. That is really cool, too. But to expect that out of another because their personality is so different, it just doesn’t work. Knowing the individual and their unique interests and everything, but again, the root is that people are different and their personalities and the way they approach their life is just another great thing to keep mind, I think. Any last words before we go? I think we’ve hit everything.
ANNA: I think we’ve definitely covered a lot. I think there’s just lots to think about with this one.
PAM: So much. Yeah. I love this age, because I feel like it’s another one of the big seasons. The toddlers into choosing unschooling and then the teen years and I think it’s just another season where there are so many expectations that we have absorbed growing up, and that society is bringing in on us. It’s just another time when I found I needed to just get more purposeful and ground back in my why and ground back in remembering who we are and who I wanted to be as a parent, but in relationship with the people in my family, regardless of their ages. So, yeah, I’m glad we’re exploring this.
ERIN: Sorry, one more. Something came to my mind. I was thinking that it was kind of funny timing that I think when I joined two or three online groups within a season and I think my youngest was 15 at the time and my oldest was 21 or something like that.
And it’s such a funny time to start like diving into these, but it’s been so helpful and it continues to be helpful. So, I don’t know, I guess I would just like to put that in as a word of encouragement that, I think I’ll be curious to see as time goes on, but I feel like more and more people are doing that.
I’m noticing there are a few of us who still are wanting to talk about these things and sort these things out, because it’s the same principles but new life stage. There’s still a lot to think through and work through in ourselves. So yeah, just wanted to put that out there that I found that really useful.
ANNA: I love it, because I mean, when we started the Network, both of our kids, Pam, were grown whatever, but it’s like, right, because it’s so much about the journey. For me, it’s so much about learning how I want to show up in all my relationships, including the ones with my adult kids. So, yeah, it’s really a very cool time.
PAM: And it’s just very inspirational. It just reminds me, again, like are you making choices in the direction of the person that you want to be, regardless of life stages? I just learned that these questions are just so valuable for me and the reminder to live intentionally, don’t just get on this path even though you chose this path and do the things, just get your little to-do list, but moving through my life with intention and just hanging out with people who are doing the same thing is just very inspiring. Day in and day out.
All right. Well, thank you so much. This has been a lot of fun and I hope everyone listening has found this conversation helpful on their unschooling journey. And yes, you can come leave comments on social, on the post on the website. We would love to hear what’s sparked for you about this idea of, oh my gosh, my kids are going to become adults, this magical age of 18, where it’s like, okay, I’m done. Y’all take care of yourself now.
And as we mentioned, we would love for you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network. You will find links to that in the show notes, and we wish you all a wonderful week and we’ll see you next time. Bye! Thanks, Erin!
EU359: Unschooling Stumbling Blocks: Quitting vs Sticking It Out
Feb 01, 2024
In this episode, we are starting a new series called Unschooling Stumbling Blocks, where we talk about common challenges on the unschooling journey.
For this first stumbling block, Pam, Anna, and Erika talk about “quitting” vs “sticking it out.” This idea comes up in parenting regardless of whether you’re unschooling or not. Do we need to teach our children to persevere? If we paid for lessons that aren’t feeling good to our child, is it okay for them to stop? We dig into the cultural beliefs, the sunk cost fallacy, and give some food for thought about all of the choices that we have.
It was really fun to discuss this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello! I am Anna Brown with Living Joyfully, and we are so glad you’ve joined us for this episode of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Welcome to you both.
PAM AND ERIKA: Hello! ANNA: Hello! Today, we are going to be talking about a common stumbling block. While not specific to unschooling, it does come up a lot in unschooling circles, and that is the idea of quitting versus sticking it out. I am very excited to have this conversation, because it’s such a valuable paradigm shift for all involved, and I remember it for myself and my work there, so I’m excited to talk about that. But, Erika, do you want to get us started? ERIKA: I do. So, yes, this idea does come up a lot, I think, both in mainstream parenting and in unschooling. And I think I want to start with what we’re referring to when we say quitting versus sticking it out and where those ideas or cultural beliefs might be coming from.
So, when people say quitting, most people are talking about when their children start an activity, a program, a class, taking lessons, doing a project, and then change their minds and want to stop. And then sticking it out is when, even if your child is no longer enjoying it or it feels boring or something inside them is telling them to stop or it’s feeling too hard, they keep going and either finish that project, the course, whatever. They keep attending the lessons that they signed up for.
And this is not just about children, either. We could find ourselves in these situations, too, where it can feel like we’re either “quitting” or we feel like we need to stick it out. And I find myself putting “quitting” in quotes every time I say it, because it just feels like it’s not a helpful word. It does not tell the whole story.
And one of the first things that pops into my mind when I hear these two options is that there are never just two options. Like, are these really the only two options, quitting or sticking it out? But maybe we can talk more about that later.
Anyway, where do these ideas come from? So, I think we have a cultural belief in laziness, which we’ve talked about before, and the idea of quitting feels like laziness. It can invoke a fear of failing or of being left behind, maybe not making enough money to survive in the world, some of these really big core fears. And then on the reverse side, we have the idea of sticking it out, which has really been romanticized in our culture. Grit. Toughness. Perseverance. These are ideals in our culture. And so, regardless of the circumstances or regardless of if it even makes any sense to stick it out, there is this inherent cultural value in staying with something that’s hard.
And so, I think these became loaded ideas and loaded words for people, which makes sense. It feels bad if we’re thinking our child will be judged as being lazy or if we think that these choices mean they won’t find success in life. But I know I’ve talked before about how laziness isn’t really a real thing and it bothers me to even say that word. And I think once we dig deeper into those beliefs and really tune into what is actually going on, then we can get to the root of those fears and rewrite the story for ourselves.
PAM: I want to say what comes to mind, too, as you were talking there, Erika, is I think we can feel like we need to teach our child how to stick it out. Like that that is something that’s teachable. And all those other messages, like you were saying, are more about guilting them into doing it, versus a skill.
One of the big a-ha moments for me was, oh, it’s not about teaching them to stick it out, because, “They committed to this.” We’re going to have a lot of air quotes going in this episode! But it’s more about exploring the world and finding the things that are so interesting to them that they choose to commit to them, they choose to stick it out, even if something’s frustrating for them. There’s a frustrating moment, but they know in the bigger picture this is something they want to do, and they’re so determined.
Sometimes we even get frustrated, because our kids are so determined to finish this game or to build this tower that keeps falling down and they’re getting upset, but we can’t get them to take a break. We can’t get them to stop. They still need to keep trying. That is determination, that internal motivation.
And so, when we’re thinking about interests and the things that our kids are trying out, it was so helpful for me to just frame these as choices and exploring the world for them to find the things that are interesting enough that they want to commit more fully, if that’s the way you want to phrase it.
So, it wasn’t about teaching it as a skill, it was about finding things that were innately something that they were more determined to push through. And the thing about the word “quitting,” Erika, yeah, it is very strong word, because really, for me, and it’s not something I would ever use. Because it’s choice. For me, it just, my choice is not to go this week or not to do the thing this week. So, we’ll get to that choice piece, but that was the most important thing, because when I go to choice, that reminds me about all the learning that happens. But anyway, I won’t jump too far ahead.
ANNA: But I think the language is important, right? Because I think the language really is setting the stage, because it’s like you said, Erika, I think when we get caught up in those cultural stories of, but the stick-to-it-iveness and the perseverance, and that’s how you get ahead.
And what I think is really interesting that I observed just in being an unschooling parent and having these more organic environments was that there really were lots of times when they were very focused on things that were of interest to them. And then it was like, oh, it’s the same for me.
When I’m really interested in something, I will stick to it. And when I’m not, it’s really hard. And I know, and this is my own personal journey, I did stick with things when I was younger that passed the point of my enjoyment. And what I realize in looking back is it actually didn’t serve me or the class or organization or other thing involved, because I was half checked out.
And so, a sports team is a good example for people, because they’re like, “But you’re there for the team! And you’re this and that.” And it’s like, yeah, they’re not there for the team if they’re already half checked out because this is not the sport for them or they’re uncomfortable with it. If it doesn’t feel good to them, that isn’t serving the team, because there are people on that team who really want to be there and can’t wait to get up in the morning to get to practice.
And so, can we just learn to honor people where they are? Because, like you said, Pam, then it becomes a process of finding, where are these slots? And there might be many, and there might be a particular lane, depending on your personality. It’s like, wow, when we can find those things that really get us excited to push through that frustration to figure it out, because it’s so interesting to us, I believe that’s where we serve the world, more so than this pushing ourselves along the lines of convention, which I don’t think serves anyone.
ERIKA: Yeah. I love that point of looking at it from our own experience. Can someone else make you persevere at something that you don’t want to do? And what are the results of that? Is that really the best decision for you?
And so, I know we have all seen our kids push through tons of discomfort and difficulty when it’s something that they’re really invested in. And so, I think it’s that judgment of their interests that gets in the way. This thing that they really are diving so deep into, we can’t even see it, because we’re looking tunnel vision at the things that are more valuable to us. And so, I really think any parent with children could find an example in their life of their kids not wanting to stop something that’s hard because they just want to keep trying and trying until they get it. And seeing that right there shows you that they have those abilities. It just depends on what activity they’re doing.
PAM: Yeah. It really is a transferable skill, if you want to think about it that way, that perseverance, that grit, all those buzzwords around that. It doesn’t matter. You can see it in whatever they’re doing. And I think you’re totally right there, Erika, that we can judge, like we don’t value it if it’s pushing through on something that we don’t value, but it is as meaningful for perseverance, because it’s meaningful to them and they can bring that energy to whatever is that meaningful to them.
I wanted to jump into one of the bigger areas where people can feel pushed to wanting their kids to stick it out is when they’ve paid for things. So, if they’ve paid for an activity, if they’ve paid for a team. Oh, and that reminded me. I remember so many times, when the kids that don’t want to be there, they’re out in the field looking up at the sky, they’re in the karate class, chatting with somebody else. In all the places, you can tell they don’t want to be there. And it’s just less fun for the people who really do want to be there and they’re taking up space.
Anyway, when we pay for the karate class or joining the baseball team or whatever it is, I think that is something that can trip us up, as well. And I know you talk a lot about the sunk cost fallacy, so I’m going to turn that over to you, Anna.
But one of the things that I noticed for myself at the beginning of our journey that was a big a-ha moment for me was that I didn’t need to jump to paid activities the moment my child had an interest in something. So, if it’s baseball, we can throw a ball around, we can have a bat. We can set up T-ball, we can explore it.
We can dance around the living room. We can go to public swim time. All these pieces. There are so many ways that we can help our child explore something before we put money on the table, if that’s something that can trip us up, if we find that’s a trigger for us. So, just to open up our creativity at the beginning. I think there’s an expert thing in there too, right? It’s like, oh, well, a coach needs to tell them how to do that. Or, a teacher needs to show them how to do it properly. They’ll get bad habits. All these little pieces.
So, I think it can be challenging if our kid expresses an interest in something and then the first thing we do is send them out to some sort of paid opportunity, and if that doesn’t work out for well for them the first few times, I think they will be less interested in expressing interest to us in things because we’ll just keep sending them out to do the thing and to do the thing.
ANNA: Right. That’s the piece. Okay. So, the two pieces I wanted to touch on, that is a big one, which is this unintended consequence of forcing someone to stick it out. And I think especially with kids, but really with anyone, it’s just people don’t do it to adults as often, is that you just stop being interested. You just stop wanting to try things, because, if I even dabble, they’re going to make me do piano lessons for the next three years. And so, just this unintended consequence of really stopping them from finding the thing that’s their passion and the thing that really speaks to them.
I do want just touch briefly on the sunk cost piece, because I’ve talked about it in a lot of places, but it was a really big shift for me, because I do want to be a good steward of our money. I want to be aware. We wanted our kids to understand that and have a sense of money.
But my husband is in finance and he very much talks to them a lot about money, so it was surprised me in a way when he was like, “It’s a sunk cost.” And I’m like, “Well, what do you mean?” He was like, “We’ve already paid it, so the money is gone. So, you can force them to go to something they don’t want to be in, and this unintended consequence potentially happens, or you can take them out. You’re not going to get the money back either way.”
And so, then it was like, oh. Then the shift for me was, we’re paying for the opportunity. We’re paying for the opportunity to try this. And so, if it was a large financial commitment, we would have conversations about it. Like, this is a large one, this one does have a long time frame. It’s expensive. Are there ways to try it for free or try something that’s maybe a little lower stakes if you aren’t sure?
So, you can absolutely have those conversations about being a good steward with the money, but realizing that, when we make the decision, we are paying for the opportunity, just really opened up a lot of free-ness for me. ERIKA: I think, along those lines, children, especially in younger ages, aren’t going to be able to wrap their head around the entire financial picture. And so, to expect that we say, “This course costs this money, do you really want to do it?” That’s not something that they’re going to be able to really understand, the whole depth of what that might mean for us as the keepers of the money. And that feeling of, oh, it’s going to be wasteful. I think so much of the conversations need to happen more in advance and with us as the parents realizing that the financial decisions are ours. We can’t put the decision to enroll them in that class on them, like, “You told me to spend this money on you and now look, you want to quit.” Because kids live in the moment, like you’re always saying. And so, their feelings about the activity are not going to be so tied into the amount of money that we, as the adults, chose to spend on it.
And so, I think that in the beginning, like Pam, you were talking about exploring the interest in ways that are not so expensive, is really important, because that way you are getting more information about what the child is interested in without having added weight for yourself of all this money that I have spent.
PAM: And you’re gaining more experience, too, with the environments as well. So, with the activity itself, for example, like with karate, when Michael was wanting to do that, we could do free trials. I can phone up and ask, can we try out a lesson or two or for a week just to see if it’s a good fit? Even if it’s a payment for a week, but it’s not a commitment for a year or for so many months or whatever.
Because that’s the other piece for our child, right? Again, it’s not about the money, but what is it about? It’s about the interest that they have, but it’s also how they want to engage with the interest. What is that environment? Is it very rigid and rules-based and adult-controlled? Sometimes that fits. Sometimes that’s what kids are excited about, that vibes with them, but sometimes it doesn’t.
So, there are so many other possibilities. You can check out different dojos, you can check out different dance studios, all these pieces lead to or give us more information before we commit any particular amount of money to it. The more information that we can all have just helps us reach a choice in the moment that seems to make more sense. More confidence. More confidence in the choice that we’re making, because we want to be as confident as we can. And yes, maybe three months from now it is just not working. But we haven’t pulled it out of the air and said, “Oh, here’s the closest studio or dojo and yes, they want you to commit for a year. And you said you wanted to go, here we are.” There’s just so much more information.
I think we kind of want to throw our hands up in the air and say, oh, I’m doing the best for my child. I’m finding the best dojo, or the best place. Again, that’s the external looking in, the external judgments or maybe somebody’s really good at marketing, but to remember that it’s our child, this particular child, and something that they’re interested in. And the goal is to help them learn, not to put a sticker on your car that says, we dance at whatever place.
ANNA: So, that tangentially reminds me of just how much learning is happening in all of these experiences, right? Because, even when someone decides to leave a particular environment, there’s so much that they’re learning about this interest. Like you said, how they want to engage with it. Is it this piece they like and don’t like? And so, what I wanted to be careful was to not put my piece on that by saying, you need to stay. Or even, you need to go. It wasn’t about me. It really needed to be about what they were learning.
And then we could talk about the fine tuning, because it was like, well, maybe I didn’t like this piece, but I really liked this piece. Okay, well that’s interesting. So, then if you look at it, that’s what we paid for. We paid for that fine tuning of knowledge. We didn’t pay necessarily for six weeks of a particular class. We paid for us to get this information about ourselves, how we want to engage with this particular interest.
And so, I think, again, just turning those things around and realizing, like we were talking about earlier, Erika, just turning it back to our own experiences. I do learn a lot from those things, and there are times that I’ve signed up for classes about a particular interest and ended up being like, this is not at all how I wanted to engage with this, but I learned things. Maybe I met someone that then we could do it differently. Or maybe I got just a few tools that I didn’t know about and I could take those and experiment with them myself. And so, it’s letting go of that judgment and just celebrating what we’re learning about ourselves or our kids are learning about themselves. ERIKA: Right, because self knowledge is such a great goal. To think of that as the end result of all these choices that we’re making and all the interests that we follow. We’re either going to learn more about ourselves, they’re going to learn more about themselves, we’re going to learn more about them. That has so much value.
As we’re talking about it, I’m thinking of a couple of lessons that I’ve learned in this area over the years. One very expensive, unfortunate one was I prepaid for a year of a trampoline location that we had never been to, because I’m like, it’s trampolines. This is fun, you know?
And so, they had a really great deal, but it wasn’t open yet. And so, I was like, you know what? I’ll just sign up for the year, because the kids love these other trampoline places. It’s going to be fine. And then we go on the first day and they have all these placards of rules posted everywhere, and it really triggered Oliver feeling like he might get in trouble. And he’s like, “I don’t like the people who work here. I don’t like the rules. I no longer like the color orange,” because that’s what they were wearing. It was very intense for him. He was like, “The entire place is everything wrong, and I don’t ever want to come back here again.”
And so, that hurt me a bit, just in my pocketbook and just feeling like, oh my gosh, mainly feeling like, why did I make that decision in advance knowing that there was this chance? But what I’m glad I didn’t do is blame him for it and try to guilt him into, “I paid a lot of money and we need to do this.” Because him knowing himself and being able to express that it was not a good fit for him and it did not feel like a safe place for him is so much more important than anything else really. Just that knowledge of himself and being able to make those choices.
And so, that was one that I definitely learned from where I was like, okay, so next time, we’re not going to rush into paying for things. We’ll just see. Take the free next step or the one-time, one-day pass next step and see how it goes. PAM: Yeah, I think it’s brilliant how much they and we learn in the situation, like you were saying before, that learning, when we can make that flip, all of a sudden, that’s worth it. Even for extraordinary amounts of money, it’s like, oh my gosh, we know each other better. They know themselves better.
And I think it might just be worth talking a little bit about how much we learn with the quitting piece. I think it’s like, okay, they learned they didn’t like this interest. But maybe that’s not what they learned in this moment, right? Oliver didn’t say, I hate trampoline. Now, there were a myriad of reasons why this place was not a good fit, but the fact there was a trampoline on the floor was not one of them.
But that’s exactly it. I remember, over the years, sometimes when an interest was a big thing and was taking up lots of hours and it was like, oh, maybe I want some more hours back. What would I do instead with that time? And to be able to play around with that. It’s like, oh, I wonder if I’m going to miss it. Do I miss it? There’s learning that happens long after the quitting that is just so valuable as well. It’s just so much about the interest. Are there other ways that I can pursue it? I remember when Lissy took a break from photography for six months and she came back and she’s like, “Oh my gosh. I thought I’d stopped learning and now I’d have to pick up where I left off, but I just learned so much just from the magazines I was looking through, the websites that I was on,” just all this other learning was bubbling around. And when she came back, she was a different person after those six months, after choosing to get back to it. So, we can think they quit, so now they’re not learning about that thing anymore. Oh my gosh. They may not be learning as much about that particular thing, but they are learning an intense amount about themselves.
Okay, Anna, go.
ANNA: But that just reminded me, we saw this several times over my girls’ childhood where an interest that was gangbusters, and this didn’t even have to do with money necessarily, but just this gangbusters interest like go, go, go. Then they would stop. Whoa, okay. That’s gone. And then six months, eight months, even a year or so later, suddenly it’s back. We’re bringing new things to it. It’s going to a different place. Maybe they took a different aspect of it. Maybe it’s the exact same, but we saw that so much, and so I would really watch myself to not go, oh, you stopped the, whatever it is, piano or the thing, or the whatever. Instead just being that observer of like, okay, this is where we are now. Interesting.
Because you really don’t know what kind of connections are happening. It’s like we talk about with the cocooning times. Things are happening in there. And pieces are being pulled together and things from different areas, and we just saw that over and over again.
So, just watch that judgment about stopping an activity or quitting or whatever, because there’s often just way more to the story. And even if, like you said, they never come back to that particular interest, there’s something in the thread of that that you will see echoed somewhere down the road, and so, it’s very cool to watch.
ERIKA: Right. I mean, that’s kind of what I was wanting to get to with that, there’s not just quitting and sticking it out. There’s a world of things that are in between those, and so, I think it’s really important to not write the story for them about what their, their conclusions are about this. So, maybe these piano lessons aren’t working right now, but if we start telling them, “I guess you’re not interested in piano anymore,” that’s not fair, because it probably is not that.
And then I just think it’s pretty common for us to write stories for children, culturally and try to pigeonhole them into their interests and things. And so, quitting can be a sign to us of like, oh, I guess that’s over. But like you were saying, that’s not what we see with real humans, and it’s not what we see with ourselves.
Just because we stop something at one point does not mean it’s not going to come back later. And so, just leaving so much space for that to happen and leaving the judgment behind when it comes to these choices that they’re making so that then they can decide for themselves. They can really have the space to think about, “But I did really like that part of it.” And then they can make another choice where that’s still part of their lives.
ANNA: Love that.
PAM: It is so worth our work to peel our way through those expectations that we have and to peel our way through what kind of conclusions we’re jumping to. Because yeah, when they quit something, as you’re saying, it’s not maybe that they are no longer interested in that. “I don’t want anything to do with it.” And when we can come and realize, oh, they’re not interested in that particular aspect or situation, way of exploring that interest at the time, but it doesn’t mean now they don’t like dance or whatever, just pulling something out of the air. Because after they quit lessons at a school, maybe they still like to watch musicals. Maybe they still want to dance around the living room.
There are just so many ways that we can still bring this into their lives. And if we’ve done the work so that we aren’t doing it with any expectations, that we fully support their choice to quit the thing, and we’re fully excited about the thing that we’re sharing and curious if they’re interested. And we don’t have expectations and energy around that, it’s just more exploration for them.
ERIKA: Yeah. I had one other thought when you were talking. When we are bringing too strong of opinions about their interests, then it’s hard for them to have the space to make their own decisions and choices about it. And so, I find that the less I label, the lighter my energy is, the less attached I am to what they’re doing, all of those parts, which are all just internal work that I have to do for myself, the more that they can make their own choice. Whereas if I’m trying to convince them to continue and I’m saying, we put all this money into this thing, or, oh, I thought you really liked that, just trying to convince and convince, then they are going to have to get stronger and stronger in their storytelling to themselves of, I don’t like this, I don’t want to do this.
And so, it’s always going to help for me to have a lighter energy about it and less attachment to outcome for them, because then there is that space for them to really be listening to themselves and making a decision rather than just reacting to my energy. ANNA: I think that’s right. Exactly. Then it becomes a reaction and it’s kind of confusing. And I think I want to go back to personalities that we talk about so often, because you can have the rebel personality who, the minute you start pushing them towards it, they’re going to back off even if they like it. You’re going to have the people-pleaser personality who is more like, mommy really loves it when I play piano, you know? And so, and it doesn’t even have to just be money or this, it could be like, you’re such a great pianist, you’re going to do this for the rest of your life. It can add this pressure.
And so. I think it becomes tricky, because I know sometimes then we have to back off. But for me that nuance is celebrating, letting them lead the way of what those conversations look like and celebrating when they’re celebrating, commiserating when they’re commiserating.
Just really let them be the guide of the energy. And so, I love that coming in with lighter energy, because I think we’re more apt to sense their energy when we’re not bringing in a lot of strong energy into the situation. I think it is a nuance. I think kids that do have a particular passion do like to be celebrated for it. They do like to know that we know how important it is to them. So, this isn’t necessarily a hands-off, don’t react, be a robot. It’s like you said, it’s just bringing more of a generous, kind, light energy and really picking up on what they’re putting out about it. I think it makes such a difference. PAM: Yeah, I think taking their lead on that. It’s not about being hands off and having them figure it out. Again, personality wise, how much processing they want to do externally with you. Celebrating the moments that are important to them, even if it’s like, yeah, I’ve heard that a hundred times on the piano, or whatever it is. When they’re excited about it, it’s something new for them, something has struck them and if I don’t know in particular what that thing is, it doesn’t matter. I can still match their energy. And if I don’t know why they’re frustrated, I can still commiserate with them, all those pieces. I can meet them where they are emotionally versus having some sort of fixed target or reward. It’s not about rewards, consequences, that kind of stuff.
I wanted to go back to outside voices. Like, “Oh, you’re going to be a photographer,” was the one I remember, because Lissy was into photography at a pretty early age. And I still remember my sister-in-law and I was telling her, oh yeah, she’s been taking pictures every day this week that she said, what’s going on? What’s Lissy doing? She’s like, oh, she’s going to be a photographer. That is conventionally the message. People just like to latch on and tell a story. Okay, here’s the story. She’s 13 years old and very into photography. She’s going to be a photographer. And those messages can be really challenging for kids. So, even having those kinds of conversations with them and holding that lightness around it. Just having a smile and a giggle and I just said, well, maybe, and changed the subject. Because maybe, but the expectations around it, there’s just so much more life in their interests and the staying with something or choosing not to do something in a particular moment is all just a rich part of life. I feel it’s just another learning thing, and maybe six months they come back to it. Maybe three years from now you’re looking back and you didn’t realize, but this thing they’re doing now, actually, it is related to that thing that they stopped doing, but they picked up on that aspect and that’s what they kept moving forward with, versus the way it looked through that particular interest. Maybe they found the root of it and now they’re doing it in another way, or learning more about it in other ways. It’s just so much richer than, in this moment, there’s an expectation that you stick it out because we make commitments and we follow through with our commitments. And worried that we have to teach them that, that that’s some skill, because look, the only time we need to make them stick it out is when it’s something they don’t like. It’s just so fascinating to think about, isn’t it?
ANNA: It really is. And I just think that language is so important. I think watching for our own triggers about this, like how we were treated as kids, what it’s bringing up for us. Are we thinking that the grandparents aren’t going to like that they’ve quit piano? As always, we talk about it’s doing our own work so that we can separate that to really tune into the person in front of us, whether it’s our spouse or friend or child, because it really is very similar, the way that we just show up to celebrate people.
Because that judgment is just so damaging for relationships. And so, it’s just, what is the work that I need to do to let that go? Because that is always about me. It’s not at all about the other person or what they’re doing. It’s always about something in me. And so, just taking that time to recognize that just gives us so much more information and just keeps those connections where we want them to be.
Well, this was really fun. So, I’m glad we talked about this topic and I just really appreciate you both being here and I thank all the listeners, too. And I hope that this conversation has been helpful on your unschooling journey and just in life in general, because a lot of times we can look at ourselves and say like, oh yeah, I can quit this thing that I don’t want to be doing anymore.
Have a great week, and we will see you next time.
PAM: Bye everyone!
ANNA: Bye.
EU358: On the Journey with Jahaira Luzzi
Jan 18, 2024
This week, we’re back with another On the Journey episode. Pam and Erika are joined by Living Joyfully Network member Jahaira Luzzi. Jahaira is an unschooling mom of two, ages 6 and 8, and a former early childhood educator.
We talk about Jahaira’s path to unschooling, including her exploration of various types of elementary schools after she left college. We also dive into the spiritual aspects of unschooling, the importance of presence, and more! We hope you enjoy our conversation and that it inspires you, no matter where you are along your journey.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and we are so glad you have joined us for this episode of the Exploring Unschooling Podcast. I’m joined by my co-host, Pam Laricchia, and our guest, Jahaira Luzzi. Welcome to you both.
PAM AND JAHAIRA: Hi!
ERIKA: So, now I’m excited that we have Jahaira here with us today. And Pam, do you want to get us started with our conversation?
PAM: I do! Absolutely. Thank you so much, Jahaira, for being here. I have really enjoyed getting to know you for the last while on the Living Joyfully Network, and I know we all appreciate your contributions to the weekly calls, because they are always so valuable. So, I am very excited for even more people to hear from you.
And, to get us started, I have a two-part question, because I have always loved starting off with, if you could tell us a bit about you and your family and what everyone’s interested in right now, and then I’d love to hear just a quick overview about how you came to unschooling.
JAHAIRA: Okay. Hi, everyone. I just want to say thank you so much, Pam, because when I found out about unschooling and was looking to dig deeper, it was your podcast that made it possible. When I listened to the stories, I realized, oh, okay, this is real. This can happen. And this woman and all of these people have done it before me. So, okay, I can do this. I can do this. Because it’s just such a radical shift from being in school all your life and knowing that as the only way.
So, your podcast showed me all these stories about what’s possible. I remember being brought to tears, realizing the depth of what was possible and how it could even heal me. I just want to say thank you so much to you and Anna and Anne Ohman. Shout out to Anne and now Erika, too. Thank you guys so much for doing this for the world.
PAM: Thank you so much for sharing.
JAHAIRA: So, I’m Jahaira and I just celebrated my 43rd birthday and I’m a full-time stay-at-home mom. I’m with my kids full-time.
My favorite thing to do right now is to work out. I have been part of a workout community called Get Mom Strong. I found her on Instagram and I’ve basically been doing her program for four years now. And it’s weight training, it’s body weight, and it’s also dumbbells and other small equipment that I’ve built up over the years. And it just makes me feel stronger and more capable. And her way of teaching fitness is basically, especially for moms, is instead of trying to get skinny, you want to just appreciate your body for what it can do and what it has done and how beautiful the stretch marks can be when you look at it from the perspective of, this is what my body did to create my babies. So, it just brings this whole new spectrum of appreciating your body instead of trying to change it. And so, that’s why I love that program.
And I also am new to Jiujitsu, thanks to my husband, which is very interesting, because there’s a lot to learn and I feel like you have to practice a lot in order to get better. So, I’m doing that three times a week with my husband.
And I’m also learning a lot about something called non-duality, which is hard to explain, but I basically came across it through, Eckhart Tolle’s teachings. I know a lot of people probably know about The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. And it’s basically a way to think about life in a way, or not even think about it, but noticing how your thoughts are basically what’s making you suffer. And all suffering is basically caused by this thick veil of thoughts, this dense layer of thoughts that’s clouding the reality of what is in this moment. So, I’m into that now.
And then my husband is John and we’ve been married for almost 10 years. He is a software engineer and a business analyst. And he is crazy about Jiujitsu. He wants to go every night of the week now and super passionate about it, watches YouTube videos all day, and is excited that I’m doing it now, too. But he’s super into it. And he likes chess and Jiujitsu is a lot like chess, because when you’re in certain situations, it’s similar to wrestling, but it’s how to move your body in certain situations in order to gain an upper hand. It’s kind of hard to explain, but it’s fun.
And then he also likes to hang out and smoke a cigar and is into cigars and knows how to take care of them and which ones are the good ones now, and is always looking for cigar buddies. And then we also just got a pizza maker, which is fun, because it hooks up to the gas thing outside. It’s powered by the gas, but it’s an actual pizza maker, fire, not wood fire, but fire, pizza maker. And so, he is learning the science of that and it’s really, really great to have delicious homemade pizza.
And then we have Leo, my 8-year-old son, who loves Roblox and VR and is really into Gorilla Tag right now and Rec Room. And he just got the new Oculus Quest headset, which he’s very lucky to have gotten that. So, now I was just watching him and his little sister play together for the first time, because now she’s using the older one. So, that’s really fun to witness them playing VR together.
And then Lianna is six and she loves Bluey which, I know, Pam, your kids are grown up, but you have seen Bluey, right?
PAM: Yeah.
JAHAIRA: Okay. Healing for the soul. I don’t know if everybody’s already seen Bluey. I’m sure everybody here in this community has already seen Bluey, but it is a beautiful production. From the music to just the things that they talk about. And just to see, to witness, how the parents can be so playful with the kids. And it’s just such an amazing example of being able to come back to that childlike state, to be with your kids, and just gentle parenting overall. It’s so amazing. It makes me cry. I am brought to tears watching that show sometimes.
And then, she also loves gymnastics and she’s gotten really good at her cartwheels and she’s working on her handstands now, so that’s fun. Gotta be careful in the living room, because there are flying legs every now and then, but it’s good. So, that’s us.
PAM: I remember when I was a child doing the cartwheels in the living room and smacking my ankle on the furniture. Swollen ankle. That’s my childhood. Indoor gymnastics.
But, anyway, all that aside, thank you so much. That’s what I love about the snapshots of people’s lives. I mean, maybe it’s just the way my mind works, but I can just see your four lives and all those interests weaving together. There are so many overlapping bits. And I love the jiujitsu and chess comparison and can totally see that and how a software person would be very interested in that as well. So much of it weaves together so beautifully. Thank you so much for sharing.
ERIKA: Yeah, we just got a new Oculus Quest. Oliver got the new one here, too. And they’re both very into Gorilla Tag, so that’s very fun. And Bluey is so beautiful. I’m glad that you mentioned it. Maya is 12, but she will watch it and she’s just like, “It makes me cry. You have to see this one. It makes me cry. It’s just so beautiful.”
JAHAIRA: She says that, too?
ERIKA: Mmhmm. She said that, too.
JAHAIRA: Yep. And she’s just 12, too. And I noticed the other day, Leo, he’s eight and he can see what the meaning is. You know what I mean? There’s the one episode where the smallest daughter is in her dream and she sees the sun and he recognized that the parallel is like, oh, mom is the sun. That’s what’s happening there. He could see it and I was just like, oh, yes. That’s so good. With that storytelling, being able to see those archetypes, like you talk about, Pam, through Bluey, it’s just so beautiful.
ERIKA: Yeah. And all the layers. Yeah. Did you want to share about how you found unschooling or when that was?
JAHAIRA: Yes. So, after high school, I had no idea what I wanted to do, of course, because I never got a chance to figure that out. And so, I just went into business administration after high school. So, my first two years of college, I was just studying business administration, just because I didn’t know what to do and just going through the motions and then waitressing and bartending at the same time.
And then at some point I got a job as an assistant in a childcare center. I thought, oh, these kids are lovely. This is wonderful. Like, okay, this is what I want to study. This is what I’ll do.
So, I went to school to study early childhood and, for internships, was placed in different public school settings. And then finally when I graduated, I got a job in a charter school, which I think now, charter schools, of course there are good ones, bad ones, but I think charter schools still have to comply a lot by state standards, so it’s very hard for them to do things that they want to do.
But I got a job in a charter school, in a kindergarten classroom, and basically only lasted six months, because it was heartbreaking every day to see what they were doing with the behavior charts, and then they would get punished. The punishment was supposed to help them to do better, but it just made it worse and it made them feel shame.
And just the standardized tests. We were doing standardized tests in kindergarten. They told them they couldn’t use the bathroom during the standardized tests. And I was like, this is just crazy. And then, all of the staff was just so mean and I was expected to be mean, too. I was expected to do what everybody else was doing, and I just couldn’t do it. And I was just like, this feels wrong. Every day, it was just like, I’m supposed to be doing this thing where I’m supposed to be disciplining them and I’m supposed to be doing what the head teacher’s doing, and I can’t do it. It was just, I couldn’t do it.
And my husband, who was my boyfriend at the time, he witnessed all of this and I think that, since he saw what I was going through, that’s why he signed on to homeschooling, because he realized, too, how it just doesn’t make sense.
So, I ended up quitting that job and I had always had night jobs, waitressing jobs, bartending jobs, jobs in bars, and it was always really good money. So, I always say that that was the reason I was able to walk away so easily from that position, because I knew that I would be okay. I didn’t need that job. I could still take care of myself, because I had this night job.
And then that’s when I went down the rabbit hole of, I don’t remember exactly how I found the podcast. The first podcast I found was Brett Veinotte’s podcast, which is School Sucks. I know that you were on it, Pam, once. It’s called the School Sucks Podcast. I think I searched, why is it so hard? Or something. I don’t remember what I was searching, but I came across the School Sucks Podcast and that’s what led me down. Oh my god. That’s where I learned about John Taylor Gatto and the beginning of public school and why it was created and how, back in the industrial revolution, how they needed trained workers to be able to work the machines and they needed people to just comply.
And wow. I learned so much in that podcast. And I realized, oh, this is why it was so hard. That’s the intent of schools. And so, that’s why it was so hard.
And then that’s how I came across Pam’s podcast. And that’s when I started volunteering in these different schools now, because I was like, okay, I can still be a teacher, maybe I can still find a place for myself, not in the public school setting, but somewhere else maybe. So, I would just volunteer. I’d just go to these schools and be like, listen, can I just help you guys? What can I do to help? I’m a certified teacher, but I don’t have a job right now.
And so, I went to the Brooklyn Free School in New York, where it’s a Democratic free school, just to see how it worked. And I went to Montessori schools and volunteered, and then I ended up in a cooperative where I volunteered. It was a co-op. And that school was the first time that I witnessed the opposite of what I witnessed in my first teaching experience where the teachers were just so mean. In the cooperative, the teachers were so gentle and loving that it just fed my soul. It was just a shocker to see how you can treat them with dignity and they will cooperate. That is a thing.
And so, they ended up hiring me, which is what John Taylor Gatto preached about, because he was a teacher for 30 years and he talked about letting kids volunteer, putting them in the real world in these situations. And so, I was putting myself in those situations and then I ended up getting hired. They hired me after a certain amount of time and then after that, I had my own baby, and then that’s when I stopped working.
But that was also when I learned about Janet Lansbury, who is a woman who preaches about giving dignity to your children even when they’re babies. When I learned about how she preaches about how, when you pick up your baby, say to the baby, “Hi, baby. I’m gonna pick you up now,” instead of like, oh, this is just this chunk of meat that you just do whatever you want with and you don’t even treat it like it’s a human, because they don’t understand you anyway. What a gift that I got from Janet Lansbury. That was the beginning of gentle parenting and everything else, but yep. So, the kids have not ever been to school and they’re six and eight and that’s where we are now.
PAM: Oh my goodness. I love that. I love that you were discovering this whole other world before you even had your own children, that you had found that connection with young kids and you’re like, oh, this is something that feeds my soul, as you were saying. But then, the more typical route, early childhood education and working in public schools and just feeling how that did not fit, because you were in that space. That’s so interesting, to see what the head teachers were trying to accomplish and seeing the impact on the kids. And then seeing that, this is just something I’m not comfortable doing myself, engaging in myself. And then in a space where you could leave that, just reaching out to just try something. “I can volunteer here.” Yeah, I mean, that feeds MY soul.
It’s very different, right? Where we might think, oh, we have to go get a job. We have to stick to that and coming across the School Sucks Podcast is very, very interesting as just a way to open up. It’s like just crank on that idea a little bit. There are all sorts of interesting things under there and Gatto’s idea of just participating in the world and volunteering. That connection you made between your volunteering out there to find what connected with you, alongside that, you’re already living the ethos of the lifestyle before you even had your own kids.
And it’s lovely that your now spouse was your boyfriend then, because he could see you going through that without your own children being in the mix. Because I think sometimes that can be really hard, because of course we all want the best for our kids. And typically, the best is a good education, a good school. That is the typical path. But you guys had encountered and explored that path before you actually had your own kids. So, I can see how that was so super and so wonderful and lucky for them.
ERIKA: Yeah. It sounds like having that open and curious mindset well before Pam ever said open and curious on the podcast to you. You could have gone into that work situation and just held onto the same beliefs that everyone else there did. But since your mind was open and curious even then, it was like, I see this, I hear what they’re telling me. But it’s not okay with me, so let me explore. And that can just lead to a whole life journey. And I just love that.
I was thinking that one of my favorite shifts that happened when I started unschooling was that maybe I had an idea about how my children would end up, or had a vision of what childhood is like, or what education is like, or what my children will be like, and shifting to noticing how unique they are, how different they are from me, seeing them for really who they are.
And I love thinking about every day as a chance to learn something else about this unique person who’s in front of me. And so, the choices that they’re making and all the things that they’re doing are just giving me more information about who they are as humans. And I think it’s just so fun and so interesting. I know you’ve also talked about studying your kids or learning your kids and so, I just wanted you to maybe share about what that looks like for you.
JAHAIRA: So, yeah, the studying my children, I don’t know if Pam remembers saying it, but it was something that I got from Pam. I think it was talking about buying curriculum and it was like, instead of buying a curriculum, your kids are the curriculum. Instead of, here’s these books. That’s gonna tell you what to teach them. It’s like, how about just learn about them and then go from there?
So, for me, I feel like lately it’s hard to really slow down enough, especially maybe because I’m a stay-at-home mom. So, you get busy with doing the dishes and cleaning the house and doing all the things around the house and you see that they’re okay and they’re doing their own thing and they’re learning and they’re having fun.
But sometimes it’s like, nope, you’ve got to remember to come back and just sit down and actually listen to them. Like slow down, slow way down enough, so that when they’re telling you a story, really listen to the words that they’re saying and really focus. Because I feel like my mind as a mom is always like, oh, I gotta do this. There’s things I gotta do. There’s something I have to remember. Don’t forget that you’ve gotta do this. So, it’s hard to set that part aside for a second to really slow down enough to be like, okay, what’s going on guys? And just being present with them. And that’s the first step, I feel like.
I feel like unschooling, it’s hands off in a lot of ways, because obviously you’re just letting them be curious and discover their own interests and everything. But also, and I know you guys talked about this before, it’s also all encompassing, it’s all hands in, because you really have to just be paying attention all the time. And you have to be that facilitator for them. And if you’re not willing to do that, then it’s not better than school in a lot of ways.
But I think that, yeah, slowing down enough. It is like the course that you have, Childhood Redefined. It really is redefining this role that we have in their lives. They’re not just this little thing to be molded, but they are someone who’s growing into their own whatever it may be. I’m not explaining that well, but you guys know what I’m talking about. And so, it’s our role to really be curious and then from there, whatever you see that they’re into, offer different things to them to get them even more excited about life and learning.
PAM: We can help expand their world around the pieces that they’re interested in. And over the years, there will be all sorts of pieces that they will be interested in, but they will also all connect. I’ll get myself all excited about that. But it really does come back. I do love the idea of being a student of our kids. And I love the way you pulled that out, rather than a curriculum, but it’s like, okay, what do I do instead?
I say, I don’t use curriculum, but then what do I do? But shifting it to look at our kids, oh my gosh, we learn so much. I think we learn so much about human beings, because I remember when I first came across homeschooling and then very quickly unschooling, to spend that time with my kids, I realized how capable they are at very young ages. That whole molding thing comes with the idea that, well, they don’t know these things. They don’t know themselves. I’m responsible to teach them how to be a human being. But they are human beings right from the get go and they have personalities and they actually have likes and dislikes and challenges and strengths that all make sense for who they are.
And if we are not a student of them, so much of that seems random. Like, why are they mad about that? Or even, why are they mad about that today when it was fine last week? There are reasons. It is just so fascinating on that human level, I think, to discover who they are. And then from there, then it is so logical, but it just flows so beautifully, the things that they’re interested in or the way they like to learn and just dive into something or sit back and watch for a while. You just discover who they are as a person.
You don’t need to teach them how to be a person. They are just so incredibly capable of taking in what’s going on in the moment and reacting even when they don’t have the words for it or the deeper understanding, but you can see their reaction, how they are trying to communicate in that moment. Even if they’re trying to communicate overwhelm, they’re feeling overwhelmed, and they’re expressing it.
So, when we learn their language, rather than expecting and waiting, like, I’m gonna teach them what emotions are and what the names are for them and I’m waiting till they can communicate that to me and until that point they don’t really understand that, they intuitively as a human being understand so much about themselves. And when we are there with them and understanding on that level, I have to backtrack and say not a perfect understanding, but we are with them as they’re processing and we can help with a little tweak here. Maybe we try something that might help reduce the overwhelm that they’re feeling and maybe it doesn’t really work, but we’ve shown them a tool and we have both learned that, yeah, that doesn’t help me at all in this particular situation. There is no wrong. It’s always learning, right? We learn more about it.
And again, when it comes to relationships, it’s not about like getting it right or fixing it fast. Even if we sidestep, even something goes a little bit off kilter, that repair and them knowing that we are there because of the relationship, not their actions. You know what I mean? They don’t have to act right or do the thing that we told them would solve the problem for them.
And the other thing, and then I’ll be quiet for a moment, but the other thing that I love that being a student of our child helps us do is something that I found to be such a huge a-ha moment, which is seeing things through their eyes. When I’m going into a situation and I care about them and I love them and something’s upsetting them, I try to put myself in their shoes and I’m like, oh, this thing would make me feel so much better. So, I go and do the thing and it does not help them at all.
And I’m like, well, that’s weird. That’s strange. Something’s off. Yet, how different if I can say, oh, I’m gonna see this situation through their eyes, because they’re a different person, they’re a different personality. They have different things that overwhelm them, different strengths, different challenges. They are a different human being.
And if I can try see through their eyes and have that level of understanding, I may choose to try and help or support them in a way that I would never want somebody to do for me, but I know them and through their eyes and this might be more helpful for them. And when I can do that, I do find that I am more successful at connecting with them, more successful at helping them move through it. And when I’m looking through their eyes, I am now all of a sudden taking away that pressure of, I want to solve this fast. I want them to move through this fast. This is really uncomfortable for me.
And when I can go and meet them where they are, all of a sudden their timetable and their processing makes a little bit more sense to me, and I can take that edge off the pressure. Because when we’re all worked up and we come at each other with that energy, that can just make things spiral even more.
ERIKA: Yeah. A couple things came up for me when you were talking. The first is, it’s helpful for me to remember how I felt when I was five or six. I remember being young and I remember that I was me then, too. And so, I know that my kids are themselves now. I don’t need to wait for them to grow in order for their opinions and their choices and all of those different things about them to make sense. They are who they are.
And so, that’s why that curiosity of just learning more about them and getting to that point where I can see things through their eyes, getting to that point where I know if they’ve made a choice, it makes sense for them. So, if it doesn’t make sense to me that they made that choice, I just have more to learn about them. That’s just so fun and interesting. And I think remembering how it was for me, that I have always felt like a human all along, can help me put that into perspective.
And then, Jahaira, I loved how you were talking about being really intentional about spending the time just being there and observing. And I think that’s so important, because when you can put something on your list, like, do this math page with my kids, it’s something that’s easy to check off and it’s a task to do. Or like, cook dinner. That’s a task. But this “be there” doesn’t feel as much like I’m putting that on a to-do list, and so it really can get just pushed aside. I have these other tasks. There’s the work to do, there’s house stuff to do, places to go. And those more time-sensitive appointments and tasks can start to take over the time.
And so, I do think especially in the beginning, or especially if you don’t feel like you have all that knowledge about who your kids are and really wanna get in deeper with that, taking that time and being super intentional about, this is something that I’m going to do today. And what the thing is is just sitting there with them and seeing what they’re doing and what they’re interested in and being there.
We had a podcast guest who mentioned “very important sitting.” That was the phrase she used to increase the importance of that task for herself. So, she felt like it really was a valuable and important thing to do, just sitting in the living room, being there and having the kids exploring the world around her. It makes such a difference for them. They love it. They love having someone accessible like that. And then, for me, just such a huge difference in being able to pick up on the language and what they are talking about, what they’re thinking about and just getting to know them better. I love that.
PAM: I did love that piece, too. When Anna and I started the The Living Joyfully Podcast, where we were focusing more on relationships, the very first episode was talking about priorities, because I think that’s absolutely it. It’s so easy to get caught up in prioritizing the tasks that are more defined. Like, I know what I have to do. I pretty much know what I have to do, and I can get that done and I can knock it off. So yeah, naming it, just understanding that, oh, with our choices and our lifestyle, this is something that’s a priority for me.
And if it helps to frame it as being a student of my child and this is my learning time, it’s learning about ourselves in such a way that we know how to frame things or we learn how to frame things such that we will give it the priority commensurate with the value that we get out of it. Because it is such a valuable thing to do, isn’t it?
JAHAIRA: Yeah. You forget how valuable it is to just sit, like you said, Erika. Oh, well that’s not a thing. It’s like, that’s the most important thing. If I think about what my values are, of course, my children, that connection with my children. That’s connection. That’s what’s gonna nourish them. And if they feel nourished, then everything just is so much easier from there.
PAM: Yeah. Well, I think this last question is going to flow very nicely from this whole conversation, because I have found that, for many of us, when we embrace unschooling, it does become almost like a spiritual practice, right?
There are lots of different facets to it that ebb and flow over time, like we were just talking about, that presence in the moment, being there, challenging so many of our deep-rooted beliefs, which you did a good chunk of before even having children, and breaking the cycle of our own childhood trauma, there could be so much to process there as well.
So, I just thought it would be great to hear some of your experience around this aspect of unschooling or this way of looking at the deschooling and unschooling process and lifestyle.
JAHAIRA: Yeah, I think that in the beginning, it was just about education. It was just about, there’s a different way that they can learn. It doesn’t have to be like that. Let’s find out about these different schools and these different theories about education.
And then, the years go by and you realize it’s a spiritual thing, because with religion and spirituality, it’s like dealing with the unknown. This existence of being alive, what is this? And people turn to religion to try to comfort that feeling of the unknown. Like, okay, I can have faith in this thing, or I can believe in this thing. My husband, he’s been going to church more lately and it’s a Catholic church and I’m open to, what is this existence and what are they teaching there? I don’t know much about the Christians. They have this deep faith and it seems to really be this healing thing. It’s like this beautiful way of just having faith about this lifetime.
So, I think unschooling becomes this spiritual thing, because it’s the same thing. It’s like, okay, I have to trust here, because I don’t know. This unschooling thing, this is a new thing and people don’t even know about it and they think it’s radical.
When I tell people about my kids, let alone home homeschooling is already like, oh wow, you do, but if I try to explain unschooling, it’s like what!? So, for me, I have gained the confidence because of the stories that I’ve heard from so many people who have come before me and shown that it can be done.
But there is still this thing inside where it’s like, whew, I’ve really gotta stay present here and look at these old beliefs and trust that it’s gonna be okay. This nourishment is what’s most important with the children, not this education thing. So yeah, with the trust and mystery and that parallel with spirituality.
PAM: I love that. The trust piece. That wasn’t what came to mind for me at first, but absolutely. I love that you mentioned that, because yeah, when we first come to it and we’re learning about it and we are hearing from people who’ve done it or who have much more experience than we do and it’s making sense to us, you still need to trust, because you don’t know how that is actually gonna work in your family.
JAHAIRA: I feel like I need to know.
PAM: Because I don’t have your kids. And I think one of the big things that I found, I remember thinking at the beginning of the transition, that all of these experienced families, I love the relationships with their kids that they’re talking about. And I am really worried that they just have easy kids.
I remember that so well. It’s like, how is this relationship I have going to look like that relationship sometime in the future? But they say it does and it makes sense to me the way they explain the process. So you know what? I am going to trust and I’m gonna dive in and engage with the process.
I think one of the challenges comes if we choose not to engage. We just say, oh yeah, that’s really cool. And, kind of hands off, we just let them do their thing. That deeper relationship, that strong, connected, trusting relationship would be much harder to develop with our kids in that kind of situation where we’re kind of worried about engaging with them, worried that we shouldn’t be telling them what to do. We don’t do that.
But if you, instead of thinking about the education, because that’s where we’re first coming to it, so many of us. It’s like, well, if they’re not going to school, how else are they gonna learn? How are they gonna become educated? You know? So that’s what we think we’re replacing. And it’s like, oh, well if I’m not focused on that, what do I do? Focus on the relationship. Be a student of your child. Engage with them, be with them there, you can engage it. It’s a new way. It was for me, anyway, to learn how to engage with a person without directing them in the way that I would think this moment should unfold.
And the very important sitting, it all ties together. But watching them in the moment and seeing how they take it, while being with them. If I’m not with them, I can’t see how it’s unfolding. I can’t learn about them. I can’t see them making a different choice and go, oh yeah, that’s not a choice I’d make, but it sure makes sense for them. And it works out. Because maybe I saw it and I’m like, yeah, that’s not gonna work, but I’ll let them discover it for themselves and it does. And you go like, boom, mind blown. Learning my way isn’t the only way. It isn’t the right way. I can say it’s the right way for me, but yeah. It all goes back to that trust and then engaging in the moment.
And that’s how we build that trust, too, because we start to see it unfolding in our own families. And often it looks a little bit different. All unschooling families are different, because we’re all different people in them. But to see that trust piece unfolding right then and there in front of us over those first few months and years, then that becomes so valuable, that becomes our priority.
And then it’s so much easier to lean into that when we realize, oh, if I focus on just my relationship with them, everything else just kind of bubbles up out of that. We’re all doing the things that we’re interested in. We’re all learning, we’re all enjoying those pieces. We’re all having things go wrong. We’re all tweaking and changing and doing all those pieces. Oh yeah, this is life. This is the lifestyle that we’ve chosen, the practice.
I love thinking of unschooling as a practice and spirituality as a practice, because it’s just showing up each day and being present in the moment and bringing that ethos in and the “who I wanna be” into my engagement with my children, but also any human being that I want to be in that close of a relationship with, that I want to be connected with, want to have a trusting relationship. I get to choose who I want to have that depth of a relationship with.
ERIKA: Yeah. I think it is interesting how the unschooling journey leads to the deeper processing, the deeper revelations, and questioning the beliefs, and breaking our cycle of trauma. But it makes sense and I think it starts with that curious mindset that comes towards the beginning of unschooling. Like, what if? Is this possible? That starting place. To me, it felt almost like just opening my mind up to possibilities, rather than just thinking I already know the answers, or I already know what’s going to happen, or I already know who my kids are going to become, I know who I am, all of that kind of stuff. Once I really started being in the moment with these new humans and really seeing, okay, they are different than me. People are different. One curious thought led to another and it really does just become this much deeper process of self-discovery. And so many really valuable things happen, I think, along the journey, if we can keep our minds open and just focus on the relationships, the relationships with ourselves and the relationships with our family, it’s just an incredible journey.
JAHAIRA: Yeah. That whole thing where you said, I know this, and I know that, and I know who I am. It’s like what I talked about, what we look at in non-duality, how it’s this thick layer of like, oh yeah, I know. I know how this is. Oh, we’re so sure of it. We just know. We just know. It’s like, you don’t know anything! We don’t even know what is this. This could be a VR game in itself. You know what I mean? We get so caught up in that and I think it is because of all those years of schooling that we went through that it’s just mind blowing.
Here’s an example of an epiphany I had the other day. So, I thought it’d be a great idea to take the kids to go see The Nutcracker. I did research on it and I thought it was going to be this kid-friendly show with child actors and I just thought it was a great idea. I showed them the video real quick and I said, this looks like it’ll be fun, right? And they’re like, yeah, that looks like fun. This is what ends up happening. I end up insisting to my husband to buy the tickets. He’s a real homebody and I’m the one that’s always like, let’s go try this thing or let’s introduce the kids to this and that and stuff. So, I insist that he buy the tickets. And he did. He wasn’t that happy about it, but he did buy the tickets. We end up going there and it ends up being the ballet. It’s just the ballet. It’s a Nutcracker ballet. It’s just them dancing and the kids, they sat through the first act, I guess, and then the intermission. And then of course the intermission, it’s like, oh, we get to go home now. I’m like, no, no, this is the intermission. So, now, I’m embarrassed to say it, but now I’m insisting that we don’t leave and that we stay for the second act. Because I have this belief now, which now I can see it. Hindsight’s 20/20. I could only see it afterwards that I had this belief in my head. Well, I made my husband buy the tickets. So, now we can’t leave, because I made him buy the tickets. And what if now he’s going to be mad at me if we leave early and he bought the tickets and he spent money on that. And there’s this whole thing, right? I’d really let that get the best of me in that moment. And I wasn’t conscious of it then, but we ended up staying. The kids were so upset and I should have just said, you know what? Let’s just go. But I didn’t. And Leo was crying. Now I feel guilty. So, then we stayed. It was okay. Ended up being okay.
But I realized in that moment that him being there and not wanting to be there, imagine that every single day of your life for fucking eight hours a day. I had a glimpse of like, oh my god. He had to do it for an hour. Imagine you wake up in the morning and then you have to go somewhere you hate and sit through it for eight hours a day for however many hours of your life. What that does to a human being. It makes you lose that touch. That makes you lose this interconnection with whatever spiritual thing is going on. And it was a bad thing that I made him go through that, but it just helped me remember, too, that we had to go through that. And that’s just layers and layers, day upon day, going through this. And it’s just shocking that we do that to people.
PAM: Well, thank you so much for sharing that story. And, oh my gosh, yes. But I don’t know. For me, anyway, I did not even realize. When I was in school, there was just no choice. JAHAIRA: Yeah. You’re just resigned to it. PAM: Right, exactly. You’re just like completely resigned and how am I gonna make the best of this? Because this is my life. And, oh my gosh, there’s so little choice. And, like you said, the spiritual aspect, the understanding of ourselves, it is so hard. I can kind of learn who I am within the constraints of all that, but there is just so much control over your life. You really just have no idea who you would be without that.
It reminds me, I remember Lissy in Girl Guides and they were going off to high school and they were like, “Oh, are you coming to school? Are you gonna come try at high school? Now we’re gonna go to high school. High school’s gonna be awesome. We have so much more time to ourselves. We can get a free period and we can leave for lunch.”
It just felt like their world was opening up and they literally would say like, “What do you do? Your life must be so boring,” because they could not envision what somebody would do if they didn’t have to go to a building and engage with the people who were in that same building with them. They, even as kids, could not imagine what they would do with that time. And so, yes, it really goes deep when you start thinking about it, doesn’t it?
JAHAIRA: Leo was playing video games and he got on with a cousin of his, who’s older. He’s probably 15 or 16. So, they’re playing Fortnite together, because Leo just started playing Fortnite. And so, they’re on the Discord talking and his cousin goes, so, wait, you don’t go to school? And he is like, no. He is like, so what do you do all day? And Leo’s like, I play games. He’s like, you just play games all day? You game all day and that’s it? That’s what you get to do? And Leo’s like, yeah, pretty much. And for this kid, it’s like, what? He can’t conceive of it.
And to hear that as a mom, too, like, oh, he is just playing games all day. But nobody knows what that means. Do you understand that he learned how to read, write, and do math through playing games all day? It’s like, no way!
ERIKA: Yeah. Just the time and space that you have in this kind of lifestyle, it’s such a gift and it’s something that you don’t even realize what it could mean if you don’t have it.
And I was thinking, too, that after we leave that system of schooling, we impose that on ourselves forever more unless we start to question it. And so, that really is such a big part of the unschooling journey is just realizing how much of our mind now is structured by school and starting to question things and starting to change some of the things we believe about ourselves and about the world, and yeah, it’s pretty amazing.
PAM: I know. It is. Because school just leads into college, university, into getting a job, into all those things, like you were talking about earlier, Jahaira. That’s the path and that’s what it’s training us for. And oh my gosh. I know. It’s just so exciting. Remembering back, I was like, I can question those things. I can make different choices and the world won’t blow up. It’s just amazing.
And they reach all aspects of your life. All of a sudden, it’s like, oh, this is up for grabs. And I can actually try and figure out what makes sense to me as a human being. And still, I learned so much about that by watching my kids, that oh, you can just make choices and see how they turn out and then make a different choice and make another choice.
JAHAIRA: And you’re like, I forgot about that. Oh, right. When you slow down enough to just be present with them, then you’re not being controlled by that veil of thoughts. Okay. I’m gonna slow down.
And I’ve talked about that on the calls, too, where if something does come up where I’m starting to feel anxious, I’m like, whoa, I can feel a feeling coming up. Something feels anxious. Hmm. What is that? What’s that about? That space to be curious and to slow down enough to be like, okay, I see, here’s this belief. Okay. I’m believing this. I’m believing that if he doesn’t do it this way, it’s not going to go right. It takes a lot.
Even though I do want to go to church with my husband and I want to see what it’s all about, and I want to learn about the Christians and Jesus Christ, at the end of the day, when I meditate, that quiet space, that is my church. I’m like, this is where the peace is. I don’t need to seek it by some dogma or somebody else telling me how I should be or how I should treat people. This silence here is the source of everything good or something.
We talked about on the call where it’s like, when you can slow down enough to be like, whoa, all these thoughts are going, and all these sensations are going. But hold on a minute. Let me just slow down enough to get back into my senses. What am I hearing? What am I feeling? Okay. It’s just right here, right now. Then from this quiet place, life is going to take me to what needs to be done. Instead of the mind and all the beliefs and all the years of schooling telling me what I should be and what will make me happy, and I’m so sure of it. I’m so sure this is going to make me happy.
It’s like, no, actually none of that shit’s going to make you happy. What’s going to make you happy is slowing down enough to just connect with these people right in front of you. It’s just so beautiful. I’m just so thankful that I came across unschooling and it’s just a blessing. It’s a blessing, right? PAM: So much. Yes.
ERIKA: Yes. Thank you so much for joining us today, Jahaira. We really enjoyed speaking to you. JAHAIRA: Thank you.
ERIKA: And thank you to all of our listeners. We hope that you found it helpful on your unschooling journey, and if you enjoy these conversations, I really think you’d love the Living Joyfully Network.
It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things that we encounter in our unschooling lives. And you can learn more at livingjoyfully.ca/network. And if you’ve been on the fence, you can join with a monthly subscription option so you can check it out for a month, meet the community, explore the archive of themes and resources, and join in the conversations to get a sense for how the Network could fit into your life. And we hope to see you there. Wishing everyone a lovely week! Bye.
PAM: Bye bye. Thank you so much, Jahaira. Lovely to speak with you.
JAHAIRA: Thank you.
EU357: Building Community
Jan 04, 2024
In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika dive deep into building community. As we regularly mention, people are different, and each member of your family will likely have different needs for community, friendship, and social time. We talk about in-person versus online connections, the value of interest-based communities, some of the many different ways we’ve found community during our unschooling years, and more.
It was really fun to discuss this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello everyone! I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and today I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello!
ANNA AND ERIKA: Hello!
PAM: So today, we’re going to talk about building community, and I am very excited to chat about it, because at first, it seems like a pretty simple idea, right? Find and connect with other people. But really, it’s so much more nuanced than that. So, I’m excited to dive into that. Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would. I’m pretty excited about this, because I have so many ideas bubbling around. So, we’ll see where it all goes.
But I think where I want to start, because this is a question that comes up a lot on the Network. It comes up just over the years. You hear a lot of, I need friends for my kids, or, what do we do about finding community? Or, there’s not a lot of unschoolers around me, or all these different pieces.
And so, I think the first, grounding place to be is we’re just going to slow it down and take a deep breath and just say, okay, where are the messages coming from? When I look at my kids, are they happy? Are they asking for more? Are they okay with the relationships that they have? Do I see that they’re wanting a little bit more? Is it me? Is it that I’m wanting more? Is it that I’m not wanting more?
And then I want us to talk about people are different in that way, so that we can recognize that this is going to look unique to each family, it’s going to look unique to each child. And so, just really recognizing that there are some cultural messages of ‘kids need to be with kids their own age.’ And it’s like, hey, let’s just pick that apart a little bit and see where it comes from. So, I want to throw that to you all first, but wanted to start there.
ERIKA: Yeah. I totally have heard that and felt that and all of those things. And right, if we’re looking at our experience, if we did go to school as kids, life as a kid looked absolutely packed full of time with other children. So, it makes sense if our children’s lives are looking quite different from that, that maybe that could be a little jarring or like, is this okay? And those questions can come up. But if we actually look at the personalities in our families, what our kids are asking us, how we are feeling, how they’re feeling. And it’s okay if I’m the one who is wanting more connection. And it’s okay if my kids are asking for more connection, but just tuning into, is it just that everyone else is in school and in all these activities and it’s feeling like maybe we need to be doing that too? Or is it really tuning into who are we? Are we happy with our lives right now?
ANNA: Yeah. I love that.
PAM: I do think it’s so valuable to take that moment and just really consider how much of it is stories and messages that we’ve absorbed growing up and over the years because, I found myself jumping to community as the first answer, as in, oh, you’re interested in this? Let’s join the sports team. Let’s go take a rec class. That community and that type of more conventional learning is the first answer that comes to mind.
And so, just really pulling apart that like, oh, okay. That doesn’t always have to be the answer. What actually is happening here? Is this something that I’m just pulling out? And then, even for our kids too, I think another thing that was always so helpful for me, even when my kids were looking for community or looking for friends, was to realize this really wasn’t about the unschooling at all. It’s really helpful to help them dig into it, too. What is their need that they’re actually looking to fulfill, because often we can, and our kids can too, jump to friends, other people, groups. Those are the answers. But to take that time to just really dig in and ask, well, what am I really trying to accomplish? What do I really want to do? And just to open things up again can be so, so helpful, I think.
ANNA: Yeah. And I think maybe not to romanticize the past, because I did live in a neighborhood where we were out and we were playing and there were kids around, but it had its challenges. I’m an introvert. There were challenges to it. And thinking of school, segregating us by geography and age into a box of a room, it didn’t always work. Those weren’t always the people that I’d connect with.
And I think of my life now where I have friends 15 years younger and 15 years older. And so, I think really we’re so lucky in our life that we can really lean into what works for our children and for ourselves in terms of connection and relationship and learning. Because, like you said, Pam, if we go to, well, we need to do a kids’ class on science, that’s its own thing, versus maybe it’s being mentored by somebody that’s really interested in the field that you’re interested in and they’re an adult and it’s more of a one-on-one. So, yeah, I love that idea of just unpacking all of those pieces.
ERIKA: Right. There’s not one right way for community. So, just like everything else we talk about, there’s not just one right path for, I’m interested in dance. Okay. It has to be this group class. That’s not necessarily the thing. And I love that idea of like. In many cases, socializing with an adult who’s super interested in the things that they’re interested in, that might feel like a way more suitable community in certain moments. So, I really love that.
And I was thinking about some of our experiences with kind of in-person community for my kids. And so, a couple of things that we tried just based on what I was looking for, what the kids were looking for, and again, just playing with all the possibilities. We really liked hosting park days because I found just kind of going to that same location at the same time each week was a way to have time for those kind of connections to develop. Because I have found that if we do these one-off activities like a class or, let’s all go to the museum, there’s not enough free time for the kids to really have a chance to interact.
And so, since my kids are very introverted, slow to warm, we laugh about it with Oliver’s best friend, that it took just months and months of this child following Oliver around and trying to talk to him before they finally really had a strong connection. It just took all that time to warm up and make that connection. And so, having that regular park day was something that helped us develop friendships.
And while most other groups that we saw were doing things like a planned, adult-led activity at the park, I was careful to make mine more just an open playtime so that the kids could find their buddies and make connections that way. And I advertised it in early days as just a parenting group. And then as the kids got older, we turned it into a homeschooling group, because then that way, we were finding the kids who were available during school hours.
ANNA: Yeah, I mean that’s definitely our experience, too. So, we were at the time in a fairly large city on the east coast and so, there were a lot of homeschoolers in the area, but we found that consistency of the park date was exactly that. It was just this known. It felt good. We could do different things.
And the only thing I kind of wanted to add to that is thinking about the different ages. I always found this kind of fascinating, because with the younger kids, it’s a lot more physical in nature. They like to have physical things, the playground equipment, the whatever, and then you get to this teen age where they want to sit. They want to sit and they’re chatting. Or sometimes they need like a side by side kind of thing. None of the people that that came to this were particularly sporty, but we would play kickball and it’s not super sporty. Pretty much anybody can play. But it did allow for a little bit of kind of parallel time for the teens and for those pre-teens to have something that you’re focusing on that’s outside yourself, but also it’s not super involved or competitive. It’s just kind of fun. So, that was something that worked well for us.
But yeah, having that open park day where people could hang out in a place that had different places to sit, places to climb, places to do, really worked well.
I think another piece that was important for kind of our in-person thing is I did a lot of driving. Our city was large and I just was okay with driving to connect with other people and to do. So, it wasn’t the neighborhood kids, it was driving to find people that were available during the day and that we do. So, letting go of some of those tapes of like, oh, you should just be able to swing open the door and there’s a pack of kids. Thankfully we didn’t have that. Actually, I didn’t want that. We didn’t have it. I was glad.
But for some people that’s a stumbling block to realize like, okay, there’s going to be a little bit more facilitation. But I think this may lead into your experience, too, Pam, the interest-driven pieces. We did do the pieces of homeschool groups and homeschool things, but we found a lot of connections were made via interest, and I think that was kind of your experience.
PAM: Yeah. Because we did not have lot of park days yet, 20-odd years ago here in Canada. There were just less numbers of homeschoolers, so there really wasn’t that kind of activity to participate in. Yet, like you said, we really went through interests.
So, the nice thing about connecting with people through an interest is you’ve already got that point of connection, right? You don’t have to find something to come up in conversation with. The other fascinating piece, too, that ties in with what you were saying with the driving piece is like, okay, you’ve got an interest and you’ve decided that actually participating in that interest around other people and with other people is something that they want to try out, or you want to try out, and then it was about finding a place that connected for them.
So it wasn’t, oh, you wanna take dance class? Here’s the closest dance studio. We’ve signed you up. Here we go. No. There were times when I was driving an hour, hour and a half, but to a place that really spoke to them and that really helped them get that experience that they were looking for. So, that was a very helpful thing to kind of unpack for myself that, oh no, why would I go and drive a distance when I’ve got one around the corner?
But when you go back to what the desire is, when you go back to this child or myself, like we’re a unique person and we’re looking for a specific thing. When you can find that and find the environment where that can thrive, it just makes a whole world of difference.
I remember Lissy and Girl Guides. For a number of years, she was looking for some more connection and activities, but not a particular one. She was looking more for that engagement, so that served for her for many years. And then when we wanted that space that you were talking about, Erika, because yeah, that space to just hang out and see how things unfold and to just let conversations and activities grow, when they found someone that they would like to connect more deeply with at the activity, then I would talk to the parents and invite them back to our house.
And that was the thing, too, is being open to being the place where people would hang out. Maybe I needed to drive and pick up the child and bring them to our house for that to happen, because the parents were maybe busy with a sibling or something else. They didn’t have time. And for them, it wasn’t a huge priority to drive their kid to some other kid’s house. Because their kid’s in a class with 30 other kids. They see other kids all the time. They weren’t prioritizing that. But if the other child wanted to come for a visit, I would say, ‘I’ll happily go pick them up and bring them over and drop them home whenever you need. And yes, they can stay over or they can stay for meal, blah, blah, blah.’
But I was open to doing that extra little bit, because it was accomplishing what we were wanting to do. It was meeting a desire. It was something to try out and some lifelong friendships have grown out of that. And it’s just so fascinating to see it in action and to realize that, when we talk about building community, we don’t need to know that there is a community at the end of this path and I just have to quickly walk it as fast as possible.
But when I’m open and curious and I see possibilities and ask what feels good in this moment, what feels like it might help us walk towards this pull that we’re feeling and then seeing how it unfolds is just so much more serendipitous. Things happen, I think, when we’re open to that versus, we must build community right now. Here we go.
ERIKA: I feel like that’s something we talked about in the Network a bit, this kind of playing around with setting up activities for a group and seeing what could come from it. And that was something that, as someone who was organizing events for a number of years, I had to really come to terms with being okay with people not showing up or being okay with things not going according to plan and just trying again.
And so, one thing that I learned was just to choose activities that I would be happy and our family would be happy to just do, even if no one was there. And so, if you are a family with some extroverts or with some people who do like doing activities in groups, it does make a big difference if you’re the one willing to plan things, because people are always looking for things to do and then my advice about that would be to just choose things that you’d be happy to do, even if no one shows up. Because then there’s really no disappointment. You get to do something fun. And if other people come, you’ve chosen an activity and then met someone who enjoys the same thing you do.
ANNA: That is exactly what I was going to say, because we got to a place where we had a pretty good sized group, but there were certainly fits and starts and that was the key. Talking to my kids, okay, is this something you want to do? I’ll put something together. Because you’re so right in that that’s the part people don’t want to do. And partly it’s time and extra kids and all the things. And it’s something that I don’t mind doing.
And so, when I would build it, they really would come, because they were so grateful. And again, we lived in a city with a lot of homeschoolers so we could get homeschool deals. I could make that call and get a super cheap price at the trampoline place or at those things. And people were so happy to participate in that. And it did give us just people to share things with.
But one of the other things I want to talk about, too, in relation to this in-person piece is our own needs as adults and as parents, because I think we’re all introverts here, but we have varying needs of wanting to be around people.
But I guess one of the things I want to say is that sometimes we think we’re going to go to the park day and we’re going to get our needs met to talk to parents. What I found was that that was not true, that I needed to let that part go, because I wanted to be there for the kids. I was really creating that particular environment for the kids to make connections, enjoy themselves and whatever. And often I did need to be even peripherally involved, aware of it. It wasn’t really my time.
So, then it was like, okay, then what do I do for my time? So, then it was finding ways. I had a friend that we did grocery store dates. And I found sometimes parenting conversations were hard for me, because I can get a little worked up about children and all of that. So, I actually found, for me, interest-based was better, too. So, if I was going to something that maybe was a group about rocks or a group about singing bowls or something else, that’s what we were talking about. We weren’t talking about the curriculum they were using or, what are your kids doing about this, or that kind of thing.
And so, I think the big lesson for me, and it’s not going to be a surprise to you two, it’s just open and curious. Don’t get tunneled in on it looking one way or a certain way. Just really start opening it up to, okay, what are the needs? There’s a million different ways to meet it. What can we do?
PAM: I think it is so valuable and helpful to realize that when I think of building community, I want a community, I don’t need a community that meets all my needs. One group doesn’t need to meet all my things. I can have various groups that support me when I want to talk about singing bowls and maybe another group is where I come for parenting stuff.
I remember when I was wanting to build a community and there really wasn’t, I decided to start a conference and I ran a conference for six years. I kind of forget that now. It’s like, oh yeah, that’s right. I did that thing. And that was great for bringing some unschooling families out of the woodwork and gathering them in a spot for a couple of days. So, that was a lovely way to meet some people that were local-ish. Because people would definitely drive to come. But it was nice to just be surrounded for a couple of days with other like-minded parents who at least who were open and curious and wanting to learn.
So, that was actually a nice connection for parents. And then we had kid-focused activities alongside it and what was beautiful was the shared parenting style, where we were totally comfortable with parents coming and going from talks and hanging out with their kids’ activities, kids running in, looking for their parents, et cetera.
So, yeah, when you’re open, like, what could I do? There are all sorts of possibilities, from letting people know that you’re at the trampoline place to running a conference.
ERIKA: That idea that we don’t have to find a whole family that fits our whole family as a friend group. That does give us a little bit of freedom then, so we can really look at the individual members of our family, what are we all looking for? And what I did as far as finding in-person community for myself that ended up working out so well, was doing a book club. Because I wanted to find other people who like diving into ideas. I wanted to find people who are curious and want to learn. And so, a book club is something that draws that type of personality.
And then the books I chose were things like How to Talk So Kids Will Listen and books by Alfie Kohn. And so, it was like, this is what we’re going to be talking about. And then I could start to see, who is that resonating with? Those are the people who kept coming. Then we started reading Pam’s books and it became just a fully unschooling book club. And so, for a few years, that was a really good place for me to connect with people in person who really were having the kinds of conversations that I wanted to be having. And it really filled my cup. So, yeah, I loved that.
PAM: I love that. You can just choose the books and somebody can pass and say, oh yeah, no, that’s not something I’m interested in. They’re moving on. It’s not a judgment at all, but it’s just this kind of call that says, hey, over here we’re chatting about these kinds of things. Are you interested? Yeah, I love that.
ANNA: Yeah, so much. But I think that leads us to that we all live in different types of places, some smaller, some bigger, all across the world, when we’re talking about who’s listening to this podcast and even who’s with us on the Network.
And so, I guess the Network brings to mind just this idea of how important online communities were for me. And I think we all will have our stories to share about that. But I feel like the online communities, I mean this is even way back in the day, were critical. Back then, it was Yahoo Groups, a little bit primitive. And Pam and I have been friends for almost 20 years, probably, meeting on an online group and it’s just incredible.
And so, what I love is that now we have things like the Network, where it’s just so much more rich in the tools and how to connect and how it brings us together and having those conversations. Because it’s very much like you alluded to, Pam, but it’s like when we have maybe a more parenting question or something that’s happening with our kids, I really wanted to take that to people that got it. If I was going to ask a co-sleeping question, I wanted somebody that would go, ‘Okay, the bolster here and the thing there, and this is how I did it,’ versus, ‘Oh, just put them in a crib and you won’t have that problem.’ Because for me, that wasn’t what I was interested in. And so just finding that community of people that are thinking about the ideas that are going through similar pieces, I just felt like that online community was such a rich part of my life and I have traveled, really, the world, meeting them since and that has enriched my life in so many ways.
ERIKA: Well, I was just going to say, online community is real community, which I know sometimes people can kind of poo poo it. It’s like, these aren’t real friendships. But oh my gosh, with my kids and their connections and with me and my connections, we know that this is real. And we have such better tools now for connecting online with Marco Polo and Discord videos and video calling and everything. And so, I feel like online connections can be so deep and rich and just provide access to a whole world of people in order for us to make better and deeper connections.
PAM: Yeah, I remember back when we were first connecting, Anna, online, it was like, those aren’t very meaningful when you’re an online friend. And like, oh my gosh, you’re going to go meet someone that you only know online? That’s scary. Those were the stories at the time.
But yes, I have found them to be such rich and meaningful connections that have lasted for many, many years. But as I was thinking about the value of community, for me personally, I just found that being in community with others who are on that same journey, a similar journey, really just helped me learn more. So, maybe it’s about what that journey may look like from somebody who’s further along. I learned so much about myself, about different things that I might want to ponder, where my blocks are. I find it inspiring to hear how things are going for people who are further along.
Like you said, Anna, that’s a place where I can take questions and get ideas that I would really like to think about versus having to discard the first six or seven, because it’s like, yeah, no, that’s not my path. So often, if I would ask parenting or even learning kinds of questions in my more conventional friend group, et cetera, it would be, send them to school or send them to their room. And fine, I can completely understand why those are your answers. But I found it would be a little bit of a disconnect in that relationship if they, out of the goodness of their heart, were trying to help me with my issue and I was going to completely ignore all their suggestions every time.
So, I wanted to find different communities where I wanted to bring different thoughts, different questions, and I would get different things out of them. So yeah, it wasn’t holding one and it wasn’t that it had to be in person. There was so much value all over the place.
ANNA: And I guess that’s making me think, too, just, we have this vast world. And finding people, Erika, like you were talking about, who like to think about the nuances or the ideas, for all three of us that’s important.
And when Erika and I connected, which was also online, it was just like, ah! Oh my gosh! There’s so many things that we can talk about and do and want to process. And that connection was so deep, so quickly. And I just think, how lucky are we? Because I live in kind of the mid of the United States on the East Coast, and she lives in Miami as far as you can get away and still be on the east coast there. And yet, it’s this relationship that has been so valuable to me and there’s been so much personal growth.
And one of the things I love about the Network is that very piece. There’s so much personal growth for me, because obviously our kids are grown, Pam and mine, yet it’s such a process of understanding ourselves. We still obviously have our kids in our lives, thankfully. And, I just feel like it’s so rich to learn from these other parents that are being so intentional and so interested in talking about the nuances and connecting and just loving up our kids and all of those pieces.
And I love the cultural aspects that that opens up to us from people all over the world and what’s different for them. I just think that cannot be beat. It’s just such a gift of being alive in this time right now. And so, I love that piece. Erika, you go and then I want to say something about kids.
PAM: Yeah, that’s where I was going, too.
ERIKA: Oh yeah. I was just going to say one more thing about the Network. Online communities are so great because they draw the people in according to what that community is. And so, if you can find a community that fits you, it’s just filled with people who you’re going to have fun connecting with.
And so, for me, the learning that I’ve had in the last three years, I feel like it’s been just exponential, because I’m now in this online community that really fits like what I like to think about and talk about and just all these amazing things come up.
So, I think, being able to travel around the world, finding these individual people who are such a good fit would be just this impossible thing if it were not for online groups.
And really, it’s the same in other groups that I’ve been on on Facebook or just different places on the internet about certain things. So, finding people that love to talk about the things that you’re interested in is just super great and you can’t always find that in person where you live. And so, yeah, I just love what we have available.
ANNA: Yeah. And so, where I’m going to go with that, and then Pam, to you, is that it’s the same for kids. Because realistically, again, the geographic location, the age, wherever we happen to live, that can be a very small pool of people. But both of my kids have met people from all over the world, still have relationships a decade late that they connected with over gaming or other interests, in different ways. And so, there are so many tools to help our kids take advantage of this rich, online environment that, like you said, Pam, can sometimes get this kind of scary rap. But there really are ways to navigate that world in a way that is super enriching.
PAM: Yeah. And we’ve talked about it in many episodes before. We can just go back to our navigating technology episode. But it’s like a night and day difference, because we’re cultivating connected relationships with our kids.
And our kids know that when they want to do something, we’re going to help them figure out ways to do it. So, they’re not worried about sharing pieces so much when they’re ready to share them. It’s not an expectation, but when they need your help to try and go meet another family, meet up with a friend, we’re there helping them, trying to figure that out and connecting with the other parents and all those pieces.
But yes, that’s where I was going. That’s the interesting thing, like the same way we’ve found that it’s so fun to connect with other people who want to think about whatever the particular interest is that we want to dive into. And maybe it goes from just following some people on Instagram or on Facebook just to start getting an idea and then maybe digging a bit deeper, maybe finding a group that starts talking about it, and then maybe more of a private group. There are different levels to it, and it depends on how connected we would like that community to become.
So, it’s not that I have to dive into the deep end right away. I can dip my toe in and start having an idea. And it’s the same with our kids. Our kids can have interests that maybe there aren’t a lot of people locally that are interested in that same thing. So, they can find that connection and that conversation that they’re looking for, that enriches their lives, that helps them learn, that helps them feel part of a community. They are part of a community.
I look at Lissy. She connected online around photography. There weren’t a lot of high school aged kids around who were interested and had the time. There were some who were interested in it, but they were just busy with classes and things. So, she found online community at the time, that was through Flickr and that really sustained her for a number of years.
And then she was like, oh, I really want in person. I want to start finding my tribe, face-to-face, which initiated her moving to New York City when she was 18 because that’s what she was looking for. But oh my gosh, we just set that up as kind of a two-month thing. Let’s try it out. Go see what it’s like. And she was very excited with what she found and they wanted to stay there.
So, working that out for her, it’s a journey. We always go back to it’s a journey. You don’t know where it’s going to end up, but it’s like, I’m going to try this next step. This next step looks really interesting. I’m really curious about it. Open and curious. Oh, here’s a way that we can kind of make that happen. And you work together and the thing happens. And then how did that unfold? How did people feel? Did we want to take the next step into the pool or whatever metaphor you want to use. But that’s just an example of how community can grow and how online community can be beautifully enriching at times.
And then at times you’re like, I’m looking for in-person community, and oh my gosh, I need to go to another country. I mean, she had an agent here who told her. I’ll never forget that at our first meeting, I don’t know, she was 15 or whatever. But she said, if you really want to work, it needs to be New York or LA. And that seed was planted. It’s true. That is where the vibrant communities are.
And she spent eight years or so in New York, and then a year in change ago she moved to LA and is finding another vibrant community. And literally the other week she was telling me about the difference between the creative communities in those two cities and LA is vibing for her right now. It’s really fitting who she feels she’s become and she just loves it there. And so, her community has changed yet she’s had New York people fly out and stay with her and hang out with her and LA people. It’s just so fun to watch how our communities can unfold and how we can cultivate them and how we can find new ones.
And it really does, I think, just help, like we talked about the beginning, to take the expectations off it and to understand what our true desires are. What are we really looking for? And then, not like we have to beeline right there. It’s like, okay, so this is kind of what I think I’m looking for. What’s a step I can take now in that direction? And valuing whether that’s online or in person, it really doesn’t matter, because you can get value out of that. And it doesn’t mean that you’re stuck there forever. It’s not a feeling of stuck. It’s like, let me try this out and see what I discover about myself and about the other people. Oh my gosh. I just love the idea.
ERIKA: It’s such a valuable way to look at it, no one right way. It’s just a journey. And it was reminding me of something I heard about the more true to yourself that you are being, the easier it is to connect with community that will actually suit you.
So, if you’re being true about your interests and what you like to do and, and the kind of conversations you like to have and all of that kind of stuff, then you’re more easily able to find the connections that fit. And so, I think the way that our kids’ lives are, is really set up perfectly to be able to follow that, because they can really just be themselves and follow the things that they’re interested in and what they want to do. And we have this whole world of potential community online and in person.
And the fact that my kids have seen me make online friends and then go visit them, they’re like, oh, so that’s possible too. Really the whole world is open for us. And since I’ve visited Virginia and visited Anna, Maya keeps saying, “I’m gonna live in Virginia one day. It’s so beautiful.” And so, I don’t know, it just opens up the world. We’re not just in this one place. And really, as long as we are following what our inner voice is telling us, it’s awesome.
ANNA: Right. And I love that.
And just a funny story from our lives, so Raelin was 13 and the two years prior to that had been on an unschooling gamers group and had made connections. And so, a mom that I had met in person but actually lived in Maine, so we were in North Carolina at the time, the other mom was in Maine, we decided to fly, sight unseen, to meet these boys that they had been gaming with on the west coast in Washington state. It’s a huge flight. It’s a big deal. And people thought we were nuts at the time. What are you doing? You don’t know these people at all.
And these boys’ parents were like, this is a little bit weird. And yet they’re now 10 years, 11 years later, they’re getting married, they’re still in touch. These were these rich friendships. And I think that comes from just, again, opening it up. There’s not one right way. There’s not one avenue to making friends and making connections.
And so, as unschoolers, we have this whole world to choose from and to explore and to be a part of. And like you saw with Maya, it just opens up this idea of, I can be friends anywhere. We can travel anywhere. We can meet people. We can figure things out. And I love that. The energy of that is so much more expansive.
So, I think one of the things I want to end on for me is, if you feel yourself feeling constricted about community, listen to this, breathe this in, because it’s really expansive. It really can be this expansive idea of all the different options, so many different ways to make connections locally, online, in person, with travel, all of these things.
And when we come from that expansive place, that’s when we see the opportunities just start appearing.
ERIKA: I had one other thing pop to mind that I forgot to mention earlier with the kids stuff. Sometimes there are kids who are super extroverted who will play with anyone they meet at any time, and that’s okay too.
I’ve seen parents worry about, but they don’t have friends. But if you’re going to the park and they’re playing with kids and they’re having a great time, if that’s not something that the child is worrying about, it’s the no one right way thing again about that too.
And just really listening to what the individual members of the family are saying and just knowing there’s lots of options.
ANNA: Yes!
PAM: Yes. I love that piece. It is the individual person. What are their needs? And again, like you were saying, if they’re enjoying whatever it is they’re doing, there’s your answer for now, right there.
So, that’s just another piece of the puzzle. That’s who my child is, you know? And that’s how they like to engage with the world right now. We can get ourselves in our head, worried about the other thing, the other way.
Well thank you so much! That was so much fun.
ANNA: Yes. Loved it.
PAM: And thanks everyone listening, for joining us. We hope you, too, have enjoyed our conversation about building community and will find it helpful on your unschooling journey. Wishing you a lovely day. Bye!
ANNA AND ERIKA: Bye!
Harbor Highlights, Issue #1
Dec 28, 2023
Pam shares the first edition of Harbor Highlights, the new monthly audio dispatch she’s creating for her Patreon supporters. In it, she’ll be sharing the behind-the-scenes details of her next grand adventure!
Note that it’s only her Patreon page name that has changed, not the podcast name!
EU356: Unschooling “Rules”: About Food
Dec 07, 2023
We’re back with another episode in our Unschooling “Rules” series. And we use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule!
It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into some common beliefs and misconceptions that people have about unschooling and food. We all bring with us a lot of societal messages and personal experiences with food when we become parents. And for many of us, the unschooling journey offers us a chance to unpack some of those underlying beliefs and expectations and to create a healthier relationship with food for ourselves and for our children.
It was really fun to discuss this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello, everyone. I am Anna Brown with Living Joyfully, and we are so glad you have joined us for this episode of the Exploring Unschooling Podcast. I am joined by my co-hosts Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Welcome to you both!
PAM AND ERIKA: Hi!
ANNA: Before we get started, we wanted to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that they’re no such thing as a rule, not when it comes to unschooling for sure.
It can feel easier to reach for that set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you the space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or the A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent rules that are floating around and cultivate an environment for self discovery, inquiry, agency and growth. And we’re going to change up our format a bit and just have an open discussion about the topic area. And I think it’s going to be a lively, fun conversation because we’re going to be talking about food. Erika, do you want to get us started?
ERIKA: Okay! So, I’m excited. We decided to call this episode Unschooling “Rules”: About Food, because I don’t think there is even one particular food role that comes to mind when we think of unschooling, but there are a lot of beliefs, fears, misconceptions that people have. And it is a topic that people are asking about all the time. And so, I thought we could start out with sharing what some of those beliefs are.
And so, I’ll just list off a couple and then we’ll go from there. So, here’s a few that I’ve heard over the years. The first one goes, if kids can eat whatever they choose, they’ll only eat ice cream. Or fill in the blank, whatever the thing is that feels the scariest. Kids cannot be trusted to know what their bodies need. We, as adults, need to pass along what we’ve learned to them so that they can be healthier than we were when we were kids. Kids should eat how we’ve learned works well for us to eat. And also that unschoolers must just not care much about physical health. If they’re letting their kids eat what they want, what they choose to eat, physical health must not be important.
ANNA: They just don’t care at all. I think we’ve all heard all of those and more when people are just first diving into this.
PAM: Oh, yeah, I think it’s so interesting to think about those and I would love to hear, in the comments below or whatever, what rules come to mind for you. And even though we’re giggling here, that’s because we have spent lots of time processing through this, because this is a huge conventional wisdom piece.
And it comes down to that last one you were talking about that, oh, we must not care about our kids. But no, it’s a different way of thinking about it. And I think we’re going to bring that same analysis that we bring to all our Unschooling “Rules” episodes in that, oh, you know what? People really are so very different. People’s bodies function so very different. And when we can start to look through that lens and just have conversations with each other, we can start to just pick that apart, peel back those layers, because people are different.
It’s not hard to get someone to say yes to that right off the bat, but the depth to that is incredible. It applies to everything from relationships, to food, to sleep, to how we like to engage with the world, to how we react to constraints. Everything is wrapped up in how people are different.
We’re talking about food. So, we can say, “Eating this way feels good to me. My body feels really good.” We can hold that completely. That is our truth. And yet, also, we can hold that I don’t need to tell everybody else, my partner, my best friend, my children, that, “Oh my gosh, I’m feeling so good eating this way. You should do this too.” It’s like when you first get to unschooling, you go, “My gosh! Everybody should unschool! Because it’s working really well. I’m really excited about it.” To be able to hold that, unschooling is really exciting. This way of eating is really exciting and working really well for me. And yet, it may be different for other people. It may be different for other families. To be able to hold those together, that, for me, is the first step.
Because once you get to that point, then you can shift to being open and curious and learning about our kids and food and how it feels to them and supporting them in their choices.
It’s like journeying alongside them, I think. And it’s a funny thing. My kids didn’t have too much weight around food. I didn’t find unschooling until they were a little bit older, but I wasn’t overly judgmental about food, even when they were younger.
But to realize that, oh, I can also discard a lot of the weight that I’ve been carrying around about the messages that I grew up with and that I was getting from society in general. I was like a newbie on this journey alongside them. So, I was exploring food, learning what felt good, all those pieces, and, like we were talking about in the last episode, it changes over time, and I learn more.
It’s not something where I’m looking for the answer, and this is the way I want to eat forever, and then judging myself if I eat in a different way or change something up. It’s more about understanding ourselves and figuring out what’s working for us and exploring and playing and just having all those interesting things.
Ice cream for breakfast is not going to hurt anyone. Ice cream for breakfast for a week, for a month, is not going to hurt, but it’s exploring that and having the conversations. That’s where the learning is, in the conversations. And if there’s judgment, people don’t want to have conversations with you. Like, “Oh, my gosh, you did what? Oh, you must feel horrible!” If somebody said that to me, I wouldn’t want to have a conversation with them about it.
ANNA: And I think that’s the piece that I want to talk about, because you kind of said like, Oh, keep it to yourself. And I don’t think that’s exactly what you meant, but, but that’s not how we did it. I did share my journey with food, because I had some really unhealthy messages given to me as a child. And so, this journey with food has been a long, long one for me to figure out my body, how I want to move, what fuels it, what feels good, all of those pieces. And I am very open with that.
The difference is I don’t think at all that it would necessarily apply to anyone else. But what I think is valuable about the conversations, because in my family, with my kids and my husband, we always talk about food and what feels good to us and how we want to do things, because I think the conversation is interesting. It does give us this mind of like, what does feel good for me? How does this feel? What do I feel about this? We’re able to have conversations, because for me, it was such a valuable piece of my path that I didn’t want to keep it from them, because I think that’s where we can go to the hands off.
We can go to like, just don’t give them any information at all. And I just really am a believer that people want information. And what I saw with my kids is that they eat very differently. One will never eat fruit, still to this day. One loves fruit and this one loves vegetables and this one loves this. And it’s so different how they do it.
There was no judgment about that. It was just like, does this feel good to you? And a lot of it was textures and a lot of it was about energy.
And I loved in a previous episode where, Erika, you were talking about how candy felt different in Maya’s body at different times, like she craved it and wanted it. And I’m thinking, wow, think of how she’s growing and the energy she needed to do things and candy and sugar is a fast energy. So, those kinds of conversations I think are interesting. And so, I think for people, it, it’s not about not sharing information. It’s about keeping that judgment out of it.
PAM: Yeah. When I was talking about journey alongside each other, I meant in conversation and sharing that journey and telling each other, oh, like, “I’m really craving this,” or, “I’m really interested in this and I want to explore this,” and how it felt. Yes, absolutely. That is what I was trying to get to what I talked about journeying alongside each other together.
Because yeah, that is so much of what’s come out of all these Unschooling “Rules” episodes and specifically that Self Regulation one, our last episode that we were talking about. It’s in the conversations. It’s in being together where we all learn pieces, where we can process and bounce ideas off each other and just really dig into it and be curious without the judgment piece.
But information is awesome. With my kids, something that was I found different as they grew up with their peers was that the “people are different” idea was really the lens through which they saw the world and their friends.
There weren’t those judgment pieces. There weren’t the expectations that other people were doing it the right way, the one way, because that’s the way they grew up. How you do things is okay. And that’s working well for you. And that’s really cool. And somebody else is making different choices and that is just as cool. There’s no judgment as to one better than the other. And to be able to even just take that idea with you as you move on into the world and how you relate to friends and all those different pieces, that has been something that has stood out for me over time,
ERIKA: When I’m looking at these beliefs, it’s these cultural messages that have been ingrained for our whole lives.
And so, it makes sense that these are challenging, when we first come to unschooling, especially, and as our kids go through seasons of eating different things if it looks different than what our beliefs are telling us it should look like.
I wanted to go back to the one about if kids can eat whatever they choose, that they’ll only choose ice cream or chips or candy or something like that. And so, I feel like this one is such a popular belief because so many people are going from really extreme controlling of food. And so, if that has been your culture in your family up until this point, and then you decide now, my kids can choose, they’re going to choose the things that they didn’t have access to before. That’s just human nature.
And so, I feel like, in a way, yes, this happens. It happens for a while. It happens until they really do have choice. And then, like with my example of Maya and the candy, there are seasons to it as well. And so, I do think it’s interesting and important to notice, what are you coming from? What are your kids’ internalized beliefs about food? Do they think they really have a choice? How limited have they been in the past? And then really look at that “It seems like they only want to eat ice cream” moment for what it is, which is a human being who wants to choose the thing that they have never been allowed to have before.
PAM: I do like that, because that is such a valuable lens, because especially when restrictions are being released, it’s not so much about the choice that they’re making, it’s the fact that they have the choice. It’s like, oh, now I can choose this thing. Can I still choose this thing an hour from now? Can I still choose this thing tomorrow? They’re going to keep choosing that or don’t be surprised if they choose to keep choosing that until it really feels like a choice that they have that will not be taken away from them. “If I choose it one more time, will you finally decide that we’re going to put restrictions back in place?” And it works with food and it works with tech use. And it just works with anything that is previously restricted, because it’s human nature when something has been restricted. “I can do this now?!”
ANNA: And to test it, because kids want to make sense of things, so they’re going to test that. “Where is the limit? Ice cream for a month? Is that the limit? Is it every meal? Is that the limit?” But something that just keeps popping up to me as we’re talking, I really think the release of judgment is probably the most important piece, because we can think about all different aspects. So, it’s the particular food, it’s the time they eat, the whatever, but I’m also thinking, so I was what was called the picky eater. I had a very limited diet when I was younger. It involved a lot of potatoes in all forms and I think there were times my parents worried about how restricted my diet was, but they really never said anything about it. And what’s interesting now is, as an adult, I understand looking back that it was certain textures. It was certain things that just didn’t work for me.
And now, I have this incredibly varied diet of things that I love. I know different things that I didn’t have access to when I was a kid. And so, I think it’s just not about judging. Because I’ve seen families who are like, “You have to try everything on your plate. I want you to be this well rounded eater,” but back to people are different.
We don’t know how that food is being experienced, spicy versus not spicy, textures, salty versus sweet. We don’t know what that even feels like to another person.
And so, I think that trust and just letting go of that judgment, we just learn so much more. I feel like my parents probably could have done that. I don’t think they shamed me about my eating, but I don’t think they also asked a lot of questions where I probably could have said, “I just think mushrooms are gross. And so, I don’t want to eat that thing that’s smothered in mushrooms.” But we didn’t have those conversations, but I feel like I did with my girls and that we would talk about, “What is it you don’t like about fruit?” “Okay, this is what it is,” and then we could figure out different things. I don’t know. I think letting go of the judgment and having that curiosity leads to so much learning.
ERIKA: Yeah. The letting go of judgment is not easy, because of the culture and just how deeply ingrained it gets. And so, I think that is like a really big part of the journey is just intentionally trying to release that, learning new and different things about food that you didn’t realize before, learning things about child development, and trusting that you cannot know someone else’s internal experience. And so, we really just have to believe people when they say it doesn’t work for them for whatever reason, whether it’s just it makes them feel more comforted to eat foods like that or it’s a texture thing like you’re saying. I mean, there can be so many reasons.
And when kids are young, they won’t even be able to describe, necessarily, how it’s bothering them. Maybe it’s even making them feel sick. They just can’t even describe what that is. And so, for something like food, it’s a shame that there are such strong beliefs about what is right and what is good, because that can distract us from really listening to the only person who knows what this experience is like, which is the person who’s eating the food.
ANNA: Right, and not to be dramatic, but I think that can lead to disordered eating in that we’re not listening to what’s working for us. We’re either being influenced by this outside voice or being shamed about what we’re eating. And so, it just disconnects us from what actually works for ourselves.
PAM: Yeah, and I think for me, when I was starting to feel that worry rise or things, it wasn’t about stuffing that down or saying, “Oh, I’m an unschooler. I shouldn’t worry about that stuff.” But for me, it was more information like, what are other possibilities?
I came across intuitive eating, the idea of that, the concept of that, as I was looking into diets, looking for the best way to eat. When I could get more information, that really helped me see that, oh, yeah, this is the conventional story that I am hearing regularly, but there are other stories and other things are working for other people that open things up.
When I think about all the many, many different pieces of our food journey, they include being vegetarian for many, many years and include Type 1 diabetes and all these different pieces and textures, likes, dislikes, all those things just alongside. For me, what really helped me move through those, looking back, was just coming at it with a lens of abundance versus scarcity. That lens of abundance, if somebody had a texture thing, it’s like, “Oh, that’s really curious,” and thinking about other things maybe with that same texture or without that texture.
So, it was always about bringing more possibilities in if they were feeling that they didn’t like certain things. I didn’t want them to think, “Okay, yeah, sure. I don’t want to make you eat that. I’m not going to make you eat that, but we’ve got a peanut butter sandwich here for you. That’s your other choice.” So, to have that abundance really just helped us play so much more and be so much more relaxed around food.
ANNA: It’s so funny how, like, our brains are so similar in that way, because abundance was exactly what came to mind for me in kind of a different angle. For me, food is medicine. I don’t really participate in Western medicine. And so, the food I eat is important to me and it was important and it was something that we talked about in my family. But it was with that lens of abundance. And that makes all the difference, because there was never anyone feeling like they didn’t have the sweet they wanted, the salt they wanted, the variety they wanted, the everything they wanted. We would just find a way.
So, I think it can be so unique to every family. So again, there’s not one way for this to look. So, I hope everybody’s getting that. There’s not one way. There’s a variety of ways that people are going to eat and it’s going to look. But what I would say is just, how does the energy feel? I feel like that might be a more helpful lens too, than like the specifics of, they’re eating ice cream every day for breakfast. Or they’re never eating ice cream or they’re never having soda or whatever the thing is, how’s the energy? Because what I know from my family and some people find this hard to believe, but you can ask my kids. They’re old. They’ve been there a long time. The energy around food was just, we love food.
Like, let’s find good, amazing food and enjoy it. And so, it just had a feel of, we can have all kinds of amazing food that we love, and there was never a scarcity.
And I think checking that energy. And I would say, that’s not what I felt growing up, because there was some shame around eating and some, you know, Oh, don’t eat. And I mean, bless, my mom just turned 90. She still talks about her weight. So, I grew up with that and that’s what I didn’t want. It wasn’t about the specific foods. I just wanted an energy of, we can eat delicious foods and feel good and love our bodies and know our bodies.
ERIKA: So, as my kids got bigger, it seemed like they narrowed in on, “These are the few things that we want to eat right now.” And it gets a little bit frustrating for me when I know all the abundant foods in the world and they’re just doing this narrowing, but I think it’s probably just a phase of growth too. But one thing that really helped us was food TikTokers. So, to see people quickly making foods. Oliver started showing me, “Doesn’t this look amazing?” And then we could make it, things like that. We got one of those recipe box deliveries, where you pick out the recipes and then they send you the food.
So, we tried that for a little while just to kind of mix things up and both kids liked seeing the photo of the food and it had a name to it. And it was just a little bit different, a little more like, “Oh, we’re at a restaurant,” like, “Oh, this is something that has been designed to be really delicious,” or whatever.
And so, things like that have helped us to expand what’s possible or what they’re interested in. It’s cute to watch them grow up. I’m just having the best time with it. And recently, Oliver just said, “I was so hungry and daddy gave me leftovers and there was a lot of beans and rice and I just ate it all.”
I don’t know if he had ever even tried it before, but in this new growing phase, he’s just like, I need some food. And so, he’s just much more willing to try anything. And so, he was like, “And I think I really like it. I’ve been thinking about beans and rice a lot lately.” Rather than when he was little, if I had said, “This is good for you. I want you to eat beans and rice. You have to try some beans,” if that had been the path, I just feel like the experience would be so different and he wouldn’t have that kind of realization and the ownership and deciding for himself, like, “Okay, this is a food that’s now on my list of foods I like.” And so, yeah, it’s really fun.
PAM: I think, too, even as they’re narrowing in, the huge difference is it’s even with that abundance mindset in that they know it’s a choice. It’s not because these are my only options. It’s not the scarcity mindset of it. It’s the abundance. “Of all the things that I could choose, these are the five that I want for the next six months.” Or however long. But yeah, it’s just a completely different energy, as Anna was talking about. Just consider the energy around food and that, I think, will be a great guide as you’re starting to play with things.
And just with older kids now, that was reminding me, Erika, as your kids were playing with the food meal boxes and all the different things, I see right now to that playful attitude is also transferring and helping with my grown kids now cooking their own food. They have made food along the way. And just over the years, as they have taken that on more and more, that playful, open, abundant kind of attitude has also helped them as they’ve been transitioning to adult lives or whatever, as they’re taking on more of the food prep as well for themselves.
So, it comes with that whole mindset. I think the whole ethos of them growing up where, we can figure things out, we can play with things. There’s no judgment of one thing as better than the other. There’s lots of conversations. They even check in. They’re okay with saying, “Ew. I didn’t like that. Next time when I make it, I’m going to do this,” and we’re okay with asking, “How did you like that?” if we made something and getting feedback from them. It’s not judgmental, or you did something wrong, but it’s for that person, that person’s taste, because people’s taste for salt, people’s taste for spices, all those pieces are really how people are different.
And that just made me think, as we started unschooling that first year or two, where we ended up with food for a very long time, and I would say even still now, was that our meals became more kind of like, we would just put out different things. We wouldn’t mix everything together and, “Here’s your one meal.” We wouldn’t make plates for each other. I would put out a variety of things and be sure that there were other things for the vegetarian, Lissy, to have that weren’t meat-based. And if somebody doesn’t like this, but somebody else really loves this. We’re going to have this, but we’re going to have something else. So, it’s not like I’m making three different meals. It’s like when I’m coming up with a meal, I’ve got like three or four different pieces to it, but I keep them separate, so people can pick and choose what they want. And then they can add more things that they know are around the kitchen, et cetera. But to put it more potluck-ish, so that people still had the choices right then and there as to what they felt like eating out of a few options that were there really helped with not bringing judgment to it, because there were options. It also really helped with the people are different and, “Yeah, your sibling grabbed this thing and you grabbed this thing and, oh geez, everybody went for that. We’ll make more of that next time.” It just really, again, helps the energy be more open and playful around the whole food experience, I think.
ANNA: Yeah. I’ve talked on the Network before about those adaptable meals, where it was like, okay, we can take this sauce off, add onion separately. But again, with no weight about it. It’s just like, yeah, we all like different things and they see me grabbing different things than David grabs and they grab different things. And so, I love that.
And we tended to do that type of adaptable meals for dinner. For lunch, sometimes it was completely different. This one wanted this and I’m making this thing. And then, they want this and they want to heat this up from yesterday. And so, again, I just didn’t want any weight around it. I just wanted it to be like, we eat because we enjoy eating and it fuels our body. And it doesn’t have to have the weight that it can have that, that I’ve had to shed for a long time.
ERIKA: I was just thinking that to be able to have a childhood where it’s okay to say that you don’t like a food, that in itself is such an amazing gift. Because, I mean, I get it, because the adults are the ones who are buying the groceries, trying to figure out what works, preparing the food, and so, it can be hard to hear, “Yeah, this doesn’t taste good to me.” But if we are open and curious, really focusing on learning about the different people in our family, then it’s really good information and they’re learning about themselves and they’re feeling comfortable enough to share with us what they’re learning about themselves. And then, the next time we have a chance to make it even better.
And so, I just think that’s amazing. And I also wanted to mention just the seasons in our own lives. Just like we were talking about with the expectations of this self regulation, there is not an end point you will get to in life where we figure out the diet that works period, because our bodies change over time. Their bodies are growing and changing over time.
And so, just to view it in this long game, this food journey, that we’re all individually on, I feel like it’s much more expansive. It’s much more abundant. It’s much less judgmental. It’s so much more about just right now and how my body is right now, what is working well for me, and not extending that to what is going to work well for anyone else. And it helps me and my family avoid arguments and conflict and everything if we all are really free to be where we are with our eating.
PAM: Okay. I want to grab from what both of you were just talking about, because I love that bigger picture, longer seasons, things change over time, and tying that to you talking, Anna, about, “I just make this lunch and this lunch,” because we did the same thing. Breakfast and lunch were just kind of, what would you like? What would you like?
And so, when you take that lens of the big picture and you put it to your day, time also doesn’t need to control it. So, the reason breakfasts and lunches were just, what would you like? and grabbing you something, was because they weren’t often all hungry at the same time. I wasn’t hungry at the same time that they were hungry. I was hungry when I first got up, so I ate something. And then when they got up, some were hungry immediately, some wanted to eat later.
And then, even though I made that adaptable-meal dinner, there was also not specifically a time component that said, “Okay, now you need to stop what you’re doing and come. Now, I would definitely go around. We’d have conversations, “Oh, I wish I knew that dinner was ready because I like to eat it hot,” or whatever. So, I would always walk around and say, “Hey, food’s ready when you’re hungry. Food’s ready if you can take a break.” And to this day, I still go to my husband, “Food’s ready! I’m going to eat now.” He always comes and joins me, unless it’s the odd time, if there’s something that he’s right in the middle of doing, et cetera.
But so often, they did all come within five, 10 minutes, but it wasn’t an expectation. If the odd time they were busy with something, totally. If they were super busy with something and they said right away, “I can’t come,” it’s like, “Want me to make a plate and bring it to you? Do you want this, this, and this?” My guess, out of what was there, that they might like.
So, yeah, that whole long season, long term, seasonal changes with food. Also, that time component, really within your day, too. Right? That the timing of when people are hungry and what they might be fancying can be very different and we can adapt with that as well. I thought that was really cool to think about.
ERIKA: It can’t really be intuitive eating if we have to eat at a certain time, you know? Yeah, I love that.
ANNA: But I think it’s a good in terms of this “rules” episode to think that some people think that unschoolers never eat together and we actually did. I would say 80% of the time, we had our dinner together at a table, but it was kind of like you’re saying. I would just check in. If they were in busy with something, no big deal. We eat. I bring a plate. Something else. But so often, it was just a time we enjoyed being together and doing it, but it never had that weight.
So again, I feel like so many of these things are, what’s the energy like? Is it creating conflict? Like you were talking about, Erika, you don’t have that conflict because they’re able to say, “I don’t like this. This doesn’t work.” And so, what’s the energy like around those meals? Because a forced family dinner, ugh. That doesn’t feel good. And so, I think it’s just keeping all that in mind, but it’s going to look different in each family.
PAM: Yeah, just to jump off that for a quick, hot minute. The idea of the family dinners, that is another conventional idea that, “Oh, yes, you must bring your family together for a meal and put the devices away,” and all those pieces. And absolutely that comes from a very well-meaning place, because parents are off at work. Kids are off at school. You don’t have time to be together, to engage with each other, to talk, because then you’re doing homework and then you’re doing go to bed routine. It is kind of the one time of the day when everybody can talk to each other.
Yet when you just take a moment to say, ah, but we’re not living that lifestyle. We are at home together. We can choose to talk to each other when something comes up, when we connect, when we go in and check in on them, when they come out to share something interesting. We’re connecting at various points all throughout the day. So, there isn’t that focus on this is the one time when we can talk to each other, so we must sit down and eat together.
So, it’s not about saying that that’s wrong. It’s about saying, oh, that doesn’t fit with the lifestyle that we have. We don’t need that tool to maintain connection and relationship with our kids.
ANNA: And so, then it becomes about the choice, right? And so, then it’s like, maybe sometimes that still works. And so, from the outside, maybe it looks like, oh, they have this conventional dinner, but when in fact, it’s not at all that. It really is just like, we have the choice and this is what’s working for this season or for this time, and so I love just looking at those cultural pieces. Are they serving your family? Are they making things better? Or is it creating this rub or this weight or something that you’re carrying around that’s making you feel bad?
ERIKA: I’m giggling because I’m just thinking about our family dinners, which are don’t usually happen family style, but it’s so funny. So, Oliver is gigantic and eats super fast, so he can get back to what he’s doing. He’s always very busy. And so he, you know, we just all know if he’s he comes to the table, he eats. It takes about 5 seconds and he’s gone. That’s what it feels like Maya takes her time, but she loves to eat alone.
And so, the only real chance for us all to eat together is for us to have some meal that we all like, which that alone is kind of unusual. So, we have this food we all like. We have to not tell Oliver to get to the table until the right moment. We have to plan it just right. Get Maya to the table. Don’t tell Oliver yet. We get there, Josh and I sit down all of our foods ready, so Josh will be like, “Look! We’re all together!” And it’s like this little snapshot of it. But it’s funny and, right, we just have so much time together that there’s no weight on that happening. It’s just this funny little lightning moment of, we were all eating together! And then it’s over again.
ANNA: I love that. Okay. So, this was really fun. I think we’re never going to cover all that needs to be covered about food, because it’s evolving and people bring different things to it. And then that reminds me, join us in the Network, because we’ve had some amazing talks about food. We’ve had snack plate pictures and all the different creative ways people bring food into their life. Parents that are struggling to even make food and talking about that. So, I love that community aspect of people that are blowing the lid off and looking at it differently, being able to share insights and really have just beautiful conversations that don’t have the weight of those cultural expectations.
So, join us in the Living Joyfully Network. That would be a lot of fun. You can find the link in the show notes. I really appreciate you both and just all of this fun conversation about food and the “rules” that may not be serving us.
PAM: Thanks so much!
ANNA: All right. Take care. Bye bye.
PAM AND ERIKA: Bye!
Podcast Update, Nov 2023
Nov 27, 2023
Quick Links
Check out the Black Friday-inspired bundle specials on the newly refreshed Living Joyfully Shop!
Transcript
Hello, everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and I’m popping in to share a couple of bits of news with you.
First is the Black Friday-inspired sale happening in the Living Joyfully Shop right now! It runs until November 30th. In celebration, we’ve added a new course on Validation, and I’ve added all five of my books!
You can use the code BLACKFRIDAY, all caps and no spaces, to get 25% off all our courses and books individually, but we’ve also put together two amazing bundles.
Navigating Unschooling Wobbles is dedicated to walking with you through the challenging seasons, inspiring and re-energizing you to continue on your unschooling journey.
Navigating Family Gatherings is full of mindset shifts and practical strategies for making extended family gatherings a positive experience for you and your family.
Validation is our newest course all about validation, a transformational relationship tool to help our loved ones feel seen and heard.
And Navigating Conflict dives deep into the messiness of conflict, sharing new perspectives and tools to help you navigate conflict with more grace and compassion.
You get all four courses for 50% off! The lessons for each course are delivered weekly by email, but we’ve also created full ebook, PDF, and audiobook editions for each course, which you can download immediately. They’re great for those of you who are excited to quickly immerse yourself in new and interesting information. You might find your sweet spot to be the combo of reading the ebook or listening to the audiobook and then using the weekly emails as guides to dive deeper and focus on the questions provided for each lesson topic.
The other bundle is 50% off my five books. That’s What is Unschooling?, Free to Learn: Five Ideas for a Joyfully Unschooling Life, Free to Live: Create a Thriving Unschooling Home, Life through the Lens of Unschooling: A Living Joyfully Companion, and The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
This bundle has never been available anywhere else, and you’ll be able to download all five ebooks immediately after you purchase, so you’ll be reading all about unschooling in no time.
You’ll find the link to the shop in the show notes, or just go to livingjoyfullyshop.com. And as a side note, I had an incredibly fun time redesigning the home page last week, so I would love for you to check it out.
AND PLEASE SHARE! We’d deeply appreciate it if you shared the Shop and the Black Friday Bundle Specials with your unschooling friends and groups. We’d love our work to reach new people! We’d be honored to help them navigate their unique and beautiful unschooling journeys.
Also, thanks so much for shopping with us directly! Buying from us allows us to keep a bit more of the profit, so you’re supporting our work even more. We really appreciate you and hope you find our work helpful, both on your unschooling journey and as you navigate your most important relationships.
And the other bit of news: in the new year, the Exploring Unschooling podcast turns eight years old. Wow! Last year, we took a bit of a breather, moving to releasing a new episode each month.
And while we took some time to ponder whether we wanted to wind the podcast down, Anna, Erika, and I are feeling refreshed and re-invigorated and have decided to move to a bi-weekly schedule next year. That means we’ll be showing up in your podcast feed every other week with new and interesting conversations that explore unschooling in all its wonderfulness! Woohoo!
We’re excited about that and wanted to share that with you!
And we wanted to make sure you knew about the sale in the Living Joyfully Shop before it ends on Thursday November 30th. Again, the link is livingjoyfullyshop.com and please share it with your unschooling friends and groups!
Wishing you and your family all the best, and we’ll be back in your podcast feed next week.
Thanks so much for your support!!!
Bye.
EU355: Unschooling “Rules”: Freedom Leads to Self-Regulation
Nov 16, 2023
We’re back with another episode in our Unschooling “Rules” series. And we use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule!
It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that freedom leads to self-regulation. We start by exploring the term self-regulation itself. Then we look closer at what freedom actually does give our children and we share some examples from our lives to show how it has all played out for us over the years.
It was really fun to discuss this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Welcome to the Exploring Unschooling Podcast! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Anna Brown. Hi to you both.
PAM AND ANNA: Hello!
ERIKA: We are now, somehow, nearing the end of the calendar year already and for many of us that means a season of holidays and family gatherings and navigating family gatherings can sometimes be challenging. After all, like we always talk about, people are different. And most people have their own expectations and opinions about how the holidays should be. And so, it can sometimes be a recipe for worry and misunderstandings and conflict.
So, I wanted to share about a monthly theme we had a while back on the Living Joyfully Network called Navigating Family Gatherings. You can access all of the theme material in our Monthly Theme Index, along with so many other helpful topics! To join the Network, click the link at the top of the page on livingjoyfully.ca and we’ll put the link in the show notes, as well.
Today on this unschooling rules episode, we’re going to talk about an idea that we hear floating around, especially when families are newer to unschooling, and that is that freedom will lead to self regulation. So, I’m really excited for this one. But before we get started, we want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family.
There are no unschooling police. Nobody’s going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or an A+. Our goal for this series is to explore these apparent rules and cultivate an environment for self discovery, inquiry, agency, and growth.
I’m going to hand it off to you, Pam, to dive into this rule.
PAM: Yay! Thank you very much, Erika. I am very excited to dive into this as well. Because with this episode, what we want to do is explore the possibility that we might be starting off our unschooling journey with a few misplaced expectations.
Because when we’re first learning about unschooling, we can hear the message that when we give our children the freedom to make choices in their days, they will eventually self regulate, meaning understand and manage their choices and behavior. Which, yes, absolutely. Having the space and freedom to make choices helps them learn about themselves, practice with various tools and ways of navigating emotions, and gain lots of experience with making choices and seeing how things unfold and incorporating that knowledge next time. It’s like top-notch learning in action.
But I think the one piece of the puzzle that can be missing for parents, especially early on, is how we define what that self regulation looks like. So, we can be thinking, sure, I’ll give them the freedom to make choices. And eventually they’ll settle into the behavior that I expect. They’ll learn how to self regulate.
The challenge comes when we define what self regulation looks like for another person, because as we say so often, people are so incredibly and beautifully different, aren’t they?
ANNA: Indeed they are. People are just so different. And I think it’s why we talk so much about this being more about the parents than the kids when we’re switching to this unschooling journey.
And I believe it’s our work to understand that we’re all different and how we see and process the world so differently and understanding that the best choice for me in a situation genuinely may not be the best choice for someone else. And I feel like that one can take a minute or many years, but it’s so worth it. And it will help in every relationship that you have.
The beauty of this lifestyle is we have the time, the time to be with one another, to have these conversations, to observe, and to start to really understand how things look through their eyes. Letting go of expectations and leaning into learning about one another is so critical along every stage of the journey.
And I think with this, it’s hard because “self regulation” is kind of this buzzword, like, this is so great and we need this. And unless we start digging beneath the surface level definition, we can really miss the piece of “self” of that and what that actually means. As in what works for the individual.
So, it’s this slippery slope to think that we know what’s best for another and it can cause a lot of disconnection if we’re acting as if we want our kids to understand themselves and make the best decision for their life, but really, what we want is for them to follow this kind of prescribed path where we can feel comfortable.
So, keeping this lens of everyone is different at the forefront and being open and curious helps us not fall into the traps of trying to control another person’s journey.
ERIKA: Yeah. I mean, I love that lens. People are different. It’s such a paradigm shift. And really this self regulation thing is one of my pet peeves, I guess I would say, because when people are talking about self regulation with their kids, so often what they mean is that the child is making choices themselves that the parent would have chosen for them to make. And that to me sounds so much more like obedience than self regulation. It’s that cheerfully compliant to dream child that we may have in our imagination. And so, the words we choose to use can just be so interesting.
And what’s more interesting to me is looking through the people are different lens. So, if you look at any aspect of life, what works for one person will not work for another person. And so, if we can move away from the one right way idea, we open up a world of possibilities. Whether we’re talking about food or sleep, their interests, how much time they spend outside, movement, reading, art, music, really anything, you can find people on such a wide spectrum of choices in the world, and it’s all okay. Only each individual person can tell what is working and what isn’t working for them.
So, maybe it’s more that the freedom that an unschooling life gives a child gives them space and time to more deeply explore what feels good to them and to their unique minds and bodies. And that may lead to a better understanding of themselves. I mean, that sounds really awesome to me, and I do hope that my kids are finding that to be true in their lives. That time and space, though, does not lead to them making the choices that I would make. It really doesn’t make any sense that it would.
I mean, they’re getting to know themselves better, and people are all different. And so, if that’s what anyone is looking for when they’re using that term self regulation, I would just encourage a little curiosity to dig into that idea.
PAM: Yes, that’s what I love to do. I love digging into words. What does it mean to me?
Because we can just quickly latch onto a word and start using that in our conversations. And that’s kind of the lens that we bring to it. But if we don’t take the time to drill down, what really is the energy that I’m bringing to that term or to that idea?
Because one of the things that I think is also missing from this idea of self regulation is that it doesn’t mean alone. That’s that “self” piece. As soon as we start talking, it’s like, oh, they’re going to do this themselves. Right? But with unschooling, our kids’ learning doesn’t happen in a vacuum. We don’t put that expectation on them that they will figure things out on their own and come back to us when they have the answer about all those things you were listing, Erika.
We are a family. We live together. When we choose to not send our kids to school, we’re also choosing to cultivate a welcoming and supportive learning environment for them outside of school. And it’s not just for the school subjects, but for all the other learning that just comes with being a human being. But phrases like “self regulation” or “self directed,” when we just absorb them, they can imply that they should be doing it on their own and that we should be hands off. They’re self regulating. They’re self directing. We shouldn’t be involved.
But for me, that self prefix means that they have agency, that the choice is ultimately theirs. I don’t want to bring judgment into the process, because that can mess up what they’re learning. But that doesn’t mean I need to remove myself from the learning and the choice making process altogether. We’re still together. And depending on the nature of the choice, they may absolutely find it helpful to talk through their options, especially the external processors out there. It can be fun to bounce around ideas and brainstorm possibilities, and they may well be curious to hear my thoughts or previous experiences in similar situations. Same with processing emotions and behaviors, normalizing these things, validating these things. We’re on their team. They do not need to figure it out all on their own.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. That’s such an important point, I think. I really love that distinction of self in these terms as more about agency. I truly believe that all humans want and need agency to feel fulfilled to learn and grow.
But as we talk about so often, our focus is on connection and that’s an active process where we are connected. It’s not hands off. It’s not, go figure it out over there. It is sharing our experiences, helping them process their feelings and their experiences in whatever way works for them. Internal, external, a combination of both. Again, people are different.
My oldest likes to externally process with a lot of discussions. My youngest prefers to pop in and out for connections and thoughts. I enjoy holding space for whatever that process looks like. And to know that through our connection, they do not feel alone. They feel supported in their unique processing and they are able to bounce ideas off of me and to hear my pieces. And sometimes they want to hear it. Sometimes they don’t. Also fine.
It’s much more of a facilitation role, learning about them, being a support as they explore and try different things as they figure out how their body works, how they want to show up in relationships, how they want to spend their time.
And yes, we are all living and growing together. So, they are seeing me figure out things and learn more about my body and food and movement and what type of work feeds me and how I want to be in relationships. And what’s fun is then we can talk about those things, you know, and I can share why I’ve made decisions. They can ask me about it. I can ask them about theirs. It’s this just open communication, with the caveat when I’m talking about my pieces, that I’ve learned it about me, that their experience may be completely different, but it’s still relevant in terms of how humans do things. I feel like that’s the curiosity lens, right? It is interesting to know why you might make a choice differently than I would in a particular situation.
And we can talk about how a particular action would or wouldn’t work for one of us and why. And that’s, again, people are different. Maybe one’s more introverted or extroverted or one feels comfortable walking up to someone and one doesn’t. And so, we can talk about, yeah, that would work for me, but this not so much through through all of that, we start to see how we’re all different and how we can be honored and grow together.
If there isn’t one right path or way to be, then we can really appreciate that we can all do it in a different way. And we may still get to the same point, or we may get to another more amazing point that we didn’t even see from the beginning. And, to me, it’s those differences that makes the world such an interesting place to learn about and explore.
ERIKA: It’s so true. I was thinking that I really do find that the topics that would seem to be about those kinds of self regulation parts of life can be some of the most interesting conversations that I have with my kids, because when they’re noticing that something isn’t feeling good to them, and they want to experiment, try another choice, those conversations can just be so insightful. And I’m always amazed about what they notice about themselves, and really just how different we all are.
And so, in a way, it does feel like they are self directed, because they are the ones having this experience or the discomfort or whatever it is. But I know that my role is so integral to their processing because I can offer observations. I can share my experiences. I can reflect back to them what they’re sharing to help them make more sense of it.
And so, I wanted to give a couple of examples. Recently, my daughter went through a really long phase of pretty intense love of candy. It was a big part of her grocery shopping list. It was just a focus for her. It was an interest and a love. And so, if I was looking at this through my eyes and what feels good in my body, it would just be a terrible thing. I would say she needs to regulate herself. But I remembered when I was young and eating candy felt different for me then, too. So, that helped.
And then recently, she told me she wanted to take a break from it, at least until the holidays. And so, we had this conversation that was just so interesting. She had noticed that it wasn’t quite as exciting or fun anymore as it had been. And she thought that having a break would make the holiday candy feel more exciting and taste better, and so, she just wanted to try that out. And she also said that her body wasn’t craving it like it was before. She would describe, like, I just feel like my body’s craving saltier foods now. And I’m not thinking of candy as much.
And so, this may look like an example where by having that freedom, my child is making what would now be the better choice through the adult’s eyes. But I’m trusting that she is processing each experience and really checking in with how it feels to her. She knows that the candy is still there at the store. It’s an option. And it’s okay to take a break from it too without judgment from me either way. And so, I’ll just give another example that kind of went in the other direction. So, she has also talked to me about her time watching videos on YouTube. And there was this one night where she said that I would be amazed by how many hours she watches YouTube each day. And she opened up the little iPad time tracker. And I was amazed. I actually hadn’t realized how many hours that was.
But then, she told me that having a video going in the background helps her concentrate on all the things she wants to do. So, she said she’s not really watching it all that time. She’s working on a build in Planet Zoo or playing Minecraft or doing a drawing or whatever else she’s engaged in. She just has this video running.
And so, for me, it helps me concentrate to have things really quiet. And so, if I was directing her, I would say, you need to regulate that and make it quiet for yourself so you can draw. But people don’t all agree on this. This is another people are different thing. And so, for her to have noticed this about herself and then to have that space to make the choice that, yeah, having these YouTubers just talking in the background while she’s doing something feels helpful to her brain. I just think that’s amazing. She’s figuring out what works for her. And it’s not about external judgment or trying to do what I think should feel the best, based on my own experience. She’s figuring herself out. And I just love that.
PAM: I do love that story so much. And I feel her so deeply, because that is me as well. I will always have videos on in the background, because if I’m trying to concentrate, what I notice is the silence. That is louder to me. And it’s like, ugh! And so, it is just literally figuring it out for ourselves, because we are so different. And when we don’t bring that judgment piece to it, that it’s all okay to explore and try, to be able to come and just say, I’m changing my mind, I’m trying something different, the freedom to be able to say that without maybe feeling the need to hide it because, oh, I’m not sure they’re going to agree, or I’ll be able to feel their energy, even if they don’t come out and say it.
So yeah, I love that. I didn’t know you could look up your hours watched. That would be very interesting to do. But yeah, I have it on in the background when I’m working, when I’m in the kitchen. There are times, too, when I choose silence and it’s very curious to see the difference. It’s like, oh, why do I want to have everything off right now? This is fascinating. It’s learning about ourselves. I love it so much.
Okay, so what now? I do think it’s worth taking some time to think about what that phrase “self regulation” means to you. So is it an idea you think about? Is it something that you bring into your conversations even with yourself? Do you have an end goal in mind for things? And if so, whose goal is it? All thoughts are okay. All questions are okay. We’re just exploring and having fun and playing with ideas. It’s okay to ask yourself. It’s okay to say, yes, I have an end goal. I really want this. And then you can keep digging into that. Oh, I really want this for this other person. What is the implication of that? It’s fascinating to do.
And thinking back on some of the unschooling rules that we have talked about in this series, are you envisioning your children self regulating around tech use or around sleep schedules or the topics they learn about? Are you waiting for them to announce that they want to learn math? Or that they want to go to bed at 10 o’clock every night? Like you were saying, Erika, sometimes the things that they come up with are more conventional, right? “I don’t want to eat candy for now.” And do I feel a relief with that? Ooh, that’s something curious to dig into as well. “Oh, they want to go to sleep earlier. And look, they’re getting up in the morning before school time or work time,” we can notice, oh, I’ve got these ingrained schedules. Where’s that coming from?
But truly, that is not what self regulation looks like. It does look different for everyone. So, instead of having an end goal in mind for their self regulation journey, just try getting curious about what it looks like for them. It really is so worth exploring our expectations and even how we define success on our family’s unschooling journey.
Especially in those first couple of years, I did a lot of work around what I imagined unschooling would look like and what it actually looked like day to day. So, being able to shift away from judgment and just towards curiosity helped me see that what it actually looked like was leaps and bounds better than what I initially expected, but I needed to open up and just question how I was defining success, how I was imagining my days and to question things. Oh, that’s interesting. Why is that not aligning with what I was seeing?
So, maybe they didn’t go to bed at the same time every night. But what I saw in action was they did consider how tired they were, what they were doing, and what they were in the middle of doing, what the possibilities were for that evening, what the plans were for the next morning, and so many different things. Because with unschooling, self regulation doesn’t look like our kids setting a rule for themselves and following through on it day after day. Oh look, they’re being consistent. They’re self regulating, finally. But it does look like them weaving together what they know about themselves, and about the context of the moment they’re navigating, so they can make the choice that they feel will serve them best. There were definitely times when they considered all the things, and made a choice very different from the one that I would make in that situation. Yet they were definitely understanding and managing their choices and behavior. They were self regulating, and they were doing it pretty brilliantly, I would say. Just seeing them in action, it’s life changing for me.
ANNA: It’s really true. And I have found it so valuable to dig into those cultural ideas. We tend to just accept them at face value, whether it’s about technology or bedtime or what foods to eat. And maybe that’s because of time. It’s a shortcut. We have these standard things that people know and understand. But so, so, so often those ideas do not serve the individual at all. And if you’re listening to this podcast, I feel like something about that conventional path hasn’t been feeling good or hasn’t been serving your child and you’re noticing some rubs or bumps.
And then what we see is that when we step off that kind of tunnel path, that’s being set out for us, there are so many things that could use a second look and just put through that lens of like, oh, is this working for me? Is this idea serving me? And I feel like this is a big one. Understanding that our kids are learning about themselves and what works for them and how to find their own unique path. And they’ll be playing around with all of those hot topics, food, technology, sleep, and learning, and many more, and it’s wonderful that they are, and that they can have the space to do that.
Because when you think about it, as adults, we are often still playing around with those very same topics. So, I’m not sure that it ever ends, but I’ve also seen that mine, who are now in their mid-twenties just have a much better sense of self than I did at their age. They have a clearer sense of what works and doesn’t work for them. And I still see them trying things and pushing out of their comfort zone and experimenting, but it seems to be from a much more grounded place. I felt like it took me decades to really understand my body and what I wanted separate what from what everybody around me wanted for me.
And I really have seen even recently my oldest daughter experimenting with getting up early. We were very much night owls when they were growing up. I have become a bizarrely early, early bird and it’s weird. And so, she and I have talked about it a little bit. We don’t live together. So, I don’t know all of her sleeping habits. And so, recently we had a conversation where she’s like, yeah, I tried for about six months, this getting up earlier and there were things I liked and things I really didn’t. I think I’m just a night owl and I’m like, yes. But there was no energy to it.
There was no judgment that one is better than the other, because she knows I accept both. It’s really just what works for my body at the time. And so, that’s what I love, whereas I feel like I carried judgment with me for longer of like, oh, this is what I’m supposed to do, or this is the path that everybody wants me to do. And so, then I’m having to kind of parse through that. So, I just feel like it’s such a gift we’re giving our kids, a chance to experiment and learn about themselves in an environment where they have our support and they have the time to play around with it.
ERIKA: Yeah, right. I love that about distinguishing between what everyone else wants from us and then what our own mind and body is saying. It’s just so valuable to be able to tune in. And right! This is an adult undertaking for me where my kids are able to do it now. And so, it’s pretty amazing.
I also just wanted to mention something else that came to mind through that people are different idea. And that’s that people have different levels of comfort with routine. So, it is possible that there are kids who will set a rule for themselves and follow through day after day, because for some people that routine feels very secure and safe.
And then for other people, routine feels like they’re being trapped and they need to escape. And so, neither one of these is bad. But I’m just thinking if you’re a parent who feels very comforted by routines, it could feel really dangerous to have a child who does not want to be trapped by a schedule or a certain way of doing things. And so, it might be really hard to see that without just wishing that this child would regulate.
But I just think it feels so nice to just leave space for people to be themselves, just leave enough space for our kids and for us to figure out what really feels good and works for us without all of the judgments and the warnings about this is a better way or this is the right way.
And it’s also okay to have seasons, like you’re talking about, and to change what we want our lives to be like, depending on just the context of the moment or the season. So, tuning into our own mind and body and trusting that our kids are also able to do that for themselves, from my experience, it just brings a lot of peace and a lot of really amazing learning, too.
ANNA: So much. And something that you said really harkened back to something Pam said a bit ago, which was, if you’re really looking at self regulation as a path to a goal, like this stationary point, that that may be the rub too, right? Because what I see in myself, what I see in my adult kids, is that it totally changes in seasons of our lives and how we’re feeling and seasons of the month. And just the days, the different things. And so, I think it’s, that’s a good place to dig in. It’s like, oh, am I picturing this linear path? We come to unschooling. They’re going to have this freedom and then they’re going to taper off to this beautiful, stationary point that feels very comfortable. I just don’t think that’s the way humans work. I feel like we want to try things and things change and our bodies change. And I don’t know. Yeah. I think that’s interesting.
PAM: That was exactly what bubbled up for me, too, while Erika was talking, the importance and the value of being open to things changing. And your story that you were sharing about night owls and early birds. It’s just so valuable to not have the judgment around that so that it doesn’t feel like I’m doing something wrong, like you said, that linear path to a goal and then stationary. I figure myself out. This is the answer. So, I need to keep doing that. I need to keep fitting myself into that, because that’s the answer. That’s who I am.
But to understand that there are seasons. And there are different situations in the moment and that it’s okay to make different choices and to play with them and see. I think that holding things lightly and without expectation just really leaves so much space and energy and acceptance and just curiosity for me anyway about, ooh, I am like feeling a little stuck here right now. What might I want to change up? What might I want to try earlier?
I literally just set an alarm for tomorrow morning earlier than my typical time, because I typically don’t like alarms. But here’s a little season where I want to play with that and I may turn it off as soon as it goes off and like, yep, not trying that anymore, but it’s totally okay. I don’t need to define myself by these pieces that I self regulate to, because I think all choices are me trying to figure out what’s best for me. And to me, that’s the self regulation piece, having the agency that we were talking about earlier to just look at myself and look at what’s going on and look at what maybe I’m trying to accomplish or what direction I’m trying to go and to be able to play with that.
And yeah, our expectations as parents, even as to how we define what self regulation should look like through our lens, because we can find ourselves just making little comments here or there, or making suggestions that always are trying to just nudge them toward what feels self regulated to us, rather than considering who they are as a person and helping them, fully supporting them, not standing back, but fully supporting them to find out or to explore what that looks like for them and what that feels like for them and how that can change over time. I love that stuff.
ERIKA: I love it, too. I’m having a lot of new thoughts that I didn’t know before, right? Like just the importance of context and how amazing it would feel if, when I’m in the mood to stay up late, rather than judging myself, maybe this is just a season of being in night owl mode and that’s okay. And our kids can do that, too. Rather than having this end point expectation of, if I was doing things the right way, or if I was able to regulate, my diet would look like this, my sleep would look like this, and everything in moderation, which is just not the way life is.
And so, a moderate amount of screen time may work really well for somebody. But then someone whose passion is filmmaking and is spending all day editing a video, they’re going to be getting a lot more screen time. And that’s a great life, too. And so, I really think it’s all about dropping the judgment and just tuning in, listening to ourselves and letting our kids listen to themselves, too.
So, this was a very fun unschooling rule to dive into with you both. And for all of our listeners, we would love it if you would join us in the Living Joyfully Network, our online community, where we talk about so many rich topics that impact our unschooling lives. It’s a wonderful place to connect with other families navigating the same challenges and experiencing the same joy of connection. You can learn more at livingjoyfully.ca/network. Thanks again for joining us and we’ll see you next time.
PAM: Bye!
EU354: Unschooling “Rules”: Unschoolers Should Never Divorce
Oct 05, 2023
On this episode of the podcast, we’re sharing another entry in our Unschooling “Rules” series.
We use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschoolers should never divorce. We dig into where this belief might stem from, how unschooling can help our relationships and communication, and we dive into lots of possibilities of what life can look like without black and white thinking.
This topic was so interesting to ponder and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone. I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and this is episode number 354 of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Welcome to you both! ERIKA AND ANNA: Hello! PAM: Before we get started, we do want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can definitely feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new. We feel like we have to start somewhere, but we want to offer you space to look within to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. Because truly, there are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a grade – failing, A+, passing, nothing like that. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent rules and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, inquiry, agency, and growth. And Anna, would you like to get us started? ANNA: I would. Okay. So, a few months back, we asked the Network members to tell us about any of these unschooling rules that they’ve been bumping up against. And the idea that unschooling families should never divorce, that they should stay together at all costs, came up for quite a few. And so, while I actually never really encountered this one out in the wild, I’m super excited to deconstruct it. Something we talk about a lot is that there is never one right way. Life is complex and so are relationships. When we get stuck in rigid thinking that things have to look a certain way, it shuts down our creativity and it can also leave us feeling stuck, and that’s not really a place to learn about ourselves or about the people around us. And I think with this one, there is a lot of outside noise, so there could be cultural, religious, familial ideas at play. And so, it’s important to really deconstruct that for yourself. Are these ideas serving you, your children, your family? And as for why it’s believed to be an unschooling rule, I’m guessing that part of it comes from it being easier to have one parent more available to the kids, that somehow two parents in the same house is best or better. I think having that can make some things easier, but there are so many creative families out there finding ways to make it work. And not just work, but creating environments where everyone thrives, be it with two working partners or single-parent homes. And again, our creativity opens up when we get out of that boxed-in, right-wrong thinking and let go of the outside judgment. And I think it’s important to watch for that internal judgment, too, because we can be really hard on ourselves when things don’t go according to plan. But life is about learning, growing, pivoting, and really it can’t be predicted or planned for as much as we might try. A marriage ending doesn’t need to be seen as any type of failure, but it could be viewed as a recalibration based on who everyone is now and what you’ve learned along the way. PAM: Yeah, that is so true, Anna. I mean, my impression is that at least some of the concern around divorce comes from one parent contesting unschooling in court, insisting their kids go to school. Unschooling can be a source of contention when it comes to divorce. It can be challenging to explain how it works to a judge. The kids may then experience two big life changes out of their control: no longer living with both parents and going to school. Yet, as you said, Anna, divorce doesn’t need to be seen as a failure, but can be seen as a transition. And if we keep our relationships with our kids at the forefront, focusing on connection and validation, we can help them move through it alongside us, that team again. We’ve also spoken on the podcast before about how much of the unschooling ethos is about relationships and how even if the kids go to school, we don’t need to change how we parent. All of a sudden, becoming like teacher proxies at home, insisting on homework completion and insisting on high marks and studying all the time. We don’t need to bring school home. We don’t need to judge our children by their grades, even if they go to school. So, when we can release these fears about the future, we can more clearly see our family and our relationships as they are now, and creatively explore new possibilities around what those might look like moving forward. ERIKA: I think this rule is really interesting and it makes sense that people are looking for a rule and for the one right way, because it can make life feel easier if there’s certainty. But as we’ve talked about with all the unschooling rules, it’s just not true. There just isn’t one right way. And so, context comes into play, individual people who are all different involved in the situation do, too. And I think another part of this belief about never divorcing relates kind of to our Always Be Happy “Rules” episode that we had. The idea that having two parents in the home with children is the best environment for them, and we should somehow be able to control all of the factors. We should be able to make our relationships great if we can just do everything correctly. But it doesn’t take much thinking to see that there isn’t a way to control everything. Two parents in the same home is one possibility, but it’s not always going to be the possibility that works or makes sense in every family. I mean, these are real people we’re talking about, and relationships are complicated. And so, I think the two parent expectation really is just one of those cultural images. It’s more like a fantasy vision of a family rather than reality, which has so many more layers and so much more nuance. It’s like thinking that our real lives should look like someone else’s Instagram highlights version of life. And if we’re comparing our real families to this idealized vision, that’s when all of those fears can come up, like you were saying, Pam. But divorce doesn’t automatically mean that the kids have to go to school. And kids going to school doesn’t automatically mean we can’t have connected relationships with them. There are so many ways for things to work out. And I love applying the no one right way idea to this topic, because like you were saying, Anna, it just gets us to that more open, creative place. If things aren’t feeling good, what are the options? What could our lives look like? Can we make adjustments? What are all of the possibilities? And there really are just endless ways to navigate parenting and partnership. Responding to our unique context and considering the different unique personalities in our family, we can find creative solutions that work for us, and there’s just not a right answer. ANNA: Oh my gosh. It’s such an important reminder to not compare our inside to someone else’s outside. That idealized Instagram family isn’t real. Even for the ones that you know and see, that’s just such a tiny slice. Staying focused on the real relationships in front of you will give you the information that you need. And I think it is a good point, Pam, about parents involving unschooling in custody discussions or court proceedings. And I’ve definitely seen that over the years. And it brings to mind a couple things for me. And one is to focus on validation, really double down. Double down on strong communication so that unschooling doesn’t become a weapon. And, as you said, letting go of the fear around school, because you can still absolutely have strong connected relationships when your kids are in school. And once you’ve released that fear, that set outcome, it again just opens up the creativity. It gives you a better chance at getting to the underlying need of whatever your ex is saying and talking to your kids about what they need. And it leads us to finding solutions that feel good to everyone as best we can. Because when you’re talking to people about it, you just feel the weight released. Because it’s that fear, but what if we can’t unschool? And that’s where you’re stuck, but gosh, just releasing that fear and seeing that what’s important is our connected relationships. What’s important is having communication. That feels so different and it’s much more in your control, too, like the type of relationships that you can have. I think it’s so helpful that the same ideas that we talk about related to our kids and relationships on all the podcasts and in the Network continue to serve us even if our relationships are changing. Understanding ourselves and our differences is key to strong communication and navigating conflicts. Because even if we’re ending our marriage, we are still connected to this person pretty much for life because of the children. So, understanding one another and being able to communicate about the hard stuff is so helpful to everyone’s level of satisfaction and health. And now, that does not mean that there won’t be challenges and upsets and disagreements, but when we use the ideas we talk about, so often, it can truly help us move through even very difficult conversations with a lot more grace and ease. The Foundation series on the Living Joyfully Podcast is a great place to get a refresher on some of those ideas. Things like understanding our differences and being open and curious. You can just start at the beginning of the podcast, or you can find it bundled in our shop, livingjoyfullyshop.com. The conflict series also has a lot of gems that can help in improving communication. Things like assuming positive intent, looking for underlying needs, releasing set outcomes. Those are a few that just come to mind and are helpful ideas when navigating a divorce and figuring out the next steps for your family. I think understanding that with the goal of strong communication, it doesn’t need to mean that the relationship stays the same, can be helpful. Just releasing, again, this expectation or idea. Relationships evolve and some aspects will fall away and others may change, and all of it is okay. And keeping in mind there can be certain relationships that are so toxic that it isn’t safe. I just want to mention that quickly, because that is a different situation. The safety of everyone in the family is always a priority, but more often than not, it’s just differences. Different goals, different needs. Things have changed. Tuning into who you are and what you need will guide you to your decision, shutting out all of that outside noise, because again, there’s no rule, not from unschoolers, not from the church, not from whatever. That can all be tuned out into who you are and how you want to move through the world. You get to create the family that works for you and that can look whatever way feels best to all of you. PAM: Yeah. And thank you very much for mentioning the safety piece, because yes, safety is a priority. And alongside that cultural story, that divorce means you failed miserably, and it’s going to be a long and arduous fight, I feel like there’s just so much fear wrapped up in it all that it’s just hard to imagine another way through it. But even if the idea of divorce has started bubbling up and things are feeling deeply strained, it is worth the energy and the effort to work on our relationship with our spouse, because, as you mentioned Anna, they will most likely continue to be part of our children’s life and by extension ours. So, the better we understand ourselves, each other, and our myriad of differences, the more effectively we can communicate and navigate this challenging season. And with that may also come some softening. That’s what I feel as you release the fear and recognize that yeah, that fear is about the future and it’s me telling like the worst story possible. But when I can release that, that opens me up to understanding myself, to listening to my inner voice a little bit more, to understanding that people are different, and just letting that in, rather than feeling I need to resist and I need to be hard through it. I come to recognize that we are less enemies and we really are more just different people. We have different needs and goals and ways of moving through the world. So, maybe that brings us closer and we move through this season more supportively, better understanding each other’s needs, and maybe we discover that we want to stay together. Or maybe we continue on a path that includes divorce, but with more understanding and empathy. Both paths are better off for our newfound awareness. This work helps no matter how things unfold. ERIKA: Right. Yes. I think when we get stuck in a place of thinking that we are doing something wrong if our relationship isn’t working or that we need to place blame somewhere, then communication shuts down. Even if we’re not on the same page, communication and relationship tools that we talk about in unschooling can help us move towards that mutual understanding. And I think that having that foundation where we have practice communicating and we’ve been working towards these strong, connected relationships, that only helps when things get more difficult. I know, for me, diving into our personality differences has helped me and Josh so much in our relationship. I know you both have talked before about not taking someone’s personality personally, and I think in many ways I used to do that. His brain is just so different from mine, so I would often feel like, why don’t you think like me? Why don’t you get it? But I think seeing how different each of my kids are and really valuing and respecting that has helped me realize that there isn’t a right way to be. And I’ve gotten better at communicating with all of them about my experience without feeling like they should all agree with me or experience things the same way as I do. I’m much more curious about Josh’s way of moving through the world than I used to be. Rather than judging him or trying to get him to see things my way, I get more curious about him and try to understand why he reacts the way he does, or why he makes the choices he does. So, in that way, I think unschooling has really helped us have a more connected relationship with a lot less conflict. And since we really focus on problem solving and win-win solutions, I just have a lot of trust now that no matter what comes up for us, we’ll be able to figure it out. Whether that means we’re staying together or not, it doesn’t feel scary to me, because I know there are always so many possibilities when we’re staying open and curious. ANNA: Right. And I think that energy that we bring to the situation is so important. Letting go of the fear and tuning into the people involved, including yourself. We can rewrite the story of what divorce looks like, and I really think that can be kind of the final shift. We rewrite the whole story of divorce and recognize that it can be about supporting each other on our best paths, just like we do with our children. We can offer that to our ex and to ourselves. Once we get out of that win-lose paradigm and have the tools to communicate, even through the tough conversations, we can move to a place of supporting each other, wanting the best for everyone, and creating a new normal. And again, that doesn’t mean it’ll always be rosy, but it can certainly be better than staying in a relationship that isn’t serving you, where you don’t understand each other, and aren’t able to have any kind of conversations. Our culture really sets up these strange, polarizing ideas that are so extreme. You should stay married forever, or it’s a failure, or you can’t have an amicable divorce. It doesn’t exist. It’s going to be hard. It’s all so extreme, and life is so much more nuanced than that. In my work with couples, I’ve found that helping couples move through the transition of divorce to be really satisfying. They come in and they don’t want it to be horrible, but they really have no model of that, because our culture just paints this picture. It’s in movies and friends and family, all the things. It’s just all around, these ideas. But it is possible and can work really well and it’s, of course, always better for the children when we can find a more amicable path. And it creates a culture of supporting every family member in pursuing their best lives. And in those conversations that I have with these couples, there are hard conversations and there are hurt feelings. And I’ve had couples that are trying to do this where one partner has cheated or been involved in other things. And you would think that’s the scenario where it can never work. But it still can, because we can still have these goals of supporting each other and being there for the kids and figuring out a best path that feels better. But no matter how it’s playing out in your family, trust in your why and in your knowing. There is not one right way. Tune out the outside noise and tune into your body and its knowing. That’s going to lead you to the best possible path for you. PAM: Yeah. I feel like moving out of that win-lose paradigm and into the story of supporting each other on our best paths, as we do with our children, can be a life-changing paradigm shift. I mean, my experience is similar to yours, Erika. It was like coming to recognize the difference in my children and recognizing that they’re so different even though they’re all in the same environment. Before my relationship with Rocco, I didn’t have a lot of deeply connected and trusting relationships to understand another person at that depth. So, it was when I had kids that I really started seeing up close how different people can be. And then through learning that, I could bring that understanding to and widen up the relationship with my partner, with Rocco, and not have so many expectations and, “Why can’t you see things this way?” So yeah, I found that very interesting. And just imagine putting all that energy that’s wrapped up in the idea of winning towards exploring other more supportive paths. I just feel that energy of the resistance and of trying to convince people. When you can release that win-lose paradigm, and it doesn’t mean stuffing down that energy it, it’s moving through it. And now I can take that energy and do something else with it. It is true that culturally we don’t have many models of different ways to navigate the challenges that can come with divorce. But that doesn’t mean, just as you were saying, Anna, that they don’t exist. We get to choose our path. ERIKA: I love that so much. It’s possible to completely disagree and still move forward in a way that can work for everyone involved. Remembering that we’re all different, we’re all doing the best that we can in each moment, and that there are endless possibilities, these are just big paradigm shifts that lower the intensity of the situation and give us some space to be creative and look for solutions. So, yeah, I think it’s just really like so many other topics we’ve explored. When we release judgment of ourselves and of the other person, we release the fears and the cultural messages that we’re holding onto. We’re able to just look at what’s going on and make the next choice that makes sense. And I know some people who get to a place where they feel like their relationship is pulling apart will have this open, curious exploration of all their options and decide to stay together and others will decide to separate. And those choices will make sense for them and their very unique families and experiences. There’s just no one right way and people are all different. ANNA: It’s true! And I’m so glad we talked about this and hopefully put it to rest, because I really hate thinking of anyone out there carrying any additional weight around divorce, because that decision is always gonna be weighty and big and involve a lot. You don’t need any weight from anywhere else just because you’ve heard unschoolers shouldn’t divorce. They do, just like any other population. And I would argue that they’re best equipped to move through it in a way that centers the children and finds the win-win solutions along the way. It will not always be easy, but when you’re remembering your why, keeping lines of communication open, and remaining connected, it doesn’t have to be something to be feared. PAM: Yeah. I love that so much. Thank you both. I really appreciate you, your insights, and your participation in this. I think it is such a big topic. It’s one I have heard for many, many years floating around in the unschooling ethos. So, I really enjoyed diving into it and just picking it apart, because we don’t have to absorb those stories that we hear out there. Thank you very much for listening, and we’ll see you next time!
Redefining Success and Parent-Child Relationships
Sep 21, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a conversation I had recently for the Self Directed Podcast with Jesper and Cecilie Conrad.
It was such an invigorating conversation that I asked if we could share it here as well and they graciously agreed. We dive into the art of fostering strong, respectful, and trusting parent-child relationships, redefining success, and experiential learning—basically, cultivating the space for our children to learn through their interests and experiences, while having conversations about it all with someone who loves them deeply.
I hope you enjoy our conversation!
And if you’d like to bring more thoughtful and engaging conversation about unschooling into your days, I invite you to join me, Anna, and Erika in The Living Joyfully Network.
This month, we’re talking about Finding Our Groove and it’s been really fun and interesting to dive into. In this week’s focus call, I shared three aspects of the idea of finding our groove that I see.
One is exploring my own groove, which means learning about myself as a person: how I’m wired, my fears, my motivations, my sensitivities, my interests, how I like to engage with things, and so on—both embracing them with compassion and sometimes choosing to play with the edges of my comfort zones.
Second is helping my kids and partner find their grooves: people are different and their grooves are going to look different than mine—how they’re wired, their fears, their motivations, their sensitivities, their interests, how they like to engage with things etc.
When we try to see things through their eyes and help them pursue the things they want to do in the ways they want to do them, we help them learn more about themselves and, in turn, we learn more about them.
And the third aspect is weaving all these grooves together into the bigger picture of life as a family: we can find where our grooves connect and resonate. Maybe it’s a shared interest or a shared feeling of excitement around our passions. There’s something energizing about finding our grooves and weaving them together—we resonate at a higher level.
Gaining a deeper understanding about ourselves is a big part of this journey and something we talk a lot about in the Network. It’s a welcoming and encouraging space where you can explore unschooling with other like-minded parents who are also choosing to embrace lifelong learning and cultivate strong and connected relationships with their children.
Check out the Self Directed Podcast with Cecilie and Jesper Conrad.
EU353: Unschooling “Rules”: Unschooling is Child-Led
Sep 07, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a new episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series.
We use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschooling is “child-led.” We dig into some vocabulary to figure out why neither “child-led” nor “parent-led” are really what unschooling is about for us. We also talk about the idea of “unparenting” that can come up sometimes in unschooling conversations. And we explore what living and learning can look like outside of the control and power-over paradigm.
We had a lot of fun diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Welcome! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and this is episode number 353 of the podcast.
I’m joined by my cohosts, Pam Laricchia and Anna Brown. Hi to you both!
PAM AND ANNA: Hello!
ERIKA: We’re back with another Unschooling “Rules” episode.
But before we dive into that, I just wanted to invite you to visit our website, livingjoyfully.ca. There you’ll find a wealth of information in our podcast archives for both this podcast as well as the Living Joyfully Podcast, blog posts and articles, links to Pam’s wonderful books about unschooling, as well as more details about our online community, the Living Joyfully Network.
And now I just want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule.
It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new. But we want to offer you space to look within to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody’s going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, inquiry, agency, and growth. So, Pam, would you like to get us started with our unschooling rule?
PAM: Absolutely. Thanks so much, Erika.
So, with this episode, we want to dive into a phrase that has been used pretty regularly over the years to describe unschooling, and that’s child-led learning. And while I get the idea behind it, if parents take it on as an unschooling rule and just run with it, it can lead to all sorts of misunderstandings.
So, to dig into how that can happen, let’s start with the idea behind it. Why “child-led?” And I think it can be a quick and effective way to describe the important paradigm shift away from learning and life as being adult-led.
Conventionally, kids are expected to follow the adults’ lead, right? Parents, grandparents, teachers, coaches. Adults know best and kids are expected to do what they’re told. The adults lead and the kids follow. With unschooling, we are shifting that power dynamic from being adult-led to being shared amongst the people in our lives, particularly our family.
But for many of us, adult-led is all we’ve ever known. As kids, we grew up enmeshed in that lens and felt pretty powerless until we became adults finally getting the power to control our days.
As we begin our journey, using the phrase “child-led” to describe unschooling reminds us to use this very different lens as we go about our days. And I think the metaphor of a pendulum to describe the journey through big paradigm shifts in general is pretty spot on. In our society, life is almost exclusively adult-led. The adults have the power. So, to break away from that paradigm and explore other possibilities, swinging that pendulum all the way to the other side to child led can be super informative. It encourages us to look at our days through a completely new lens.
What does life look like through the child’s eyes? If I don’t step in immediately to direct them (adult-led), what do they choose to do? Who are they as a whole human being?
And it is in this season that we practically discover a whole new world. I get goosebumps now just remembering that transition going, wow, we see children learning so beautifully without a curriculum. We see them making choices that make a ton of sense when we see them through their eyes. We come to recognize how truly capable they are. Our trust in them as a human being, navigating their world, grows, as does our trust in the process of unschooling. I think it really is quite amazing.
Yet, if people stay at that far opposite swing of the pendulum, adopting the idea of child-led as a rule to be followed forever or they’re not unschooling well, things can definitely get challenging.
ERIKA: Right. I do think that this rule is kind of the result of making that big paradigm shift. We can have so many a-ha moments when we start to step away from the adult-led norm. So, it’s like, wait a minute, kids do know things. And then remembering our experience as children and how we really could have had and wanted to have agency over our own lives. And so, once we start questioning that, it could feel like, yes! I want to free my children from that control. So now, they’re in charge, but it’s that pendulum swing, like you were saying. The term child led is helpful because it makes people think and it feels closer to what we’re doing in unschooling.
In the majority of schools, learning is completely directed by adults, and in unschooling, children are following their own interests, and so maybe it feels like they’re leading the way, but I think it can get confusing if we use that term to mean that we don’t have an influence as parents or that we’re not in the picture at all. The reality of unschooling can be so much richer and it doesn’t need to have the parent or the child as the leader.
ANNA: Right. And I’m so glad we’re talking about this one, because child-led, well, it kind of sounds nice, especially if you’re an advocate for children. But in practice, I think a lot is lost in translation. And like you both were saying, I think it does help people who are just starting out to wrap their heads around children not being told how and what to learn, to think about what it can look like to follow interest and how learning can look so different from the school model.
But yes, with any pendulum swing, it’s helpful to watch for it and to find a more settled spot that allows for nuance and connection. And I’ve heard people say that unschooling is the lazy way out, and I feel like this is kind of somehow related, because the vision of children just doing anything unchecked, the parent need not be involved at all. But, for me, nothing could be further from the reality of unschooling. I think it’s actually the opposite, because I definitely had moments where I was like, gosh, if I could just like plop them down with a worksheet at the table, that would be a whole lot easier. But instead, I needed to be fully engaged, listening, anticipating, connecting.
That intentionality allowed me to understand them and jump off from their interests and introduce new things to their world. And it was that interplay between all of us in the family that created the rich environment. And I think where it gets sticky is when parents get confused about their role and what that looks like, how to facilitate and be engaged without control and instead, they move to a hands-off approach thinking that’s what child-led means.
PAM: Yes, yes.
In my mind, I see a well-meaning parent sitting on top of the bob, the weight at the end of the pendulum, one hand holding the end of the string and the other hand reaching out and holding onto a children’s metal dome climbing structure. You can see tension starting to unfold across their face as it gets harder and harder to hold onto that bright yellow metal bar as gravity begins to pull the weight back down.
And if they’ve adopted the idea of “child-led” as a forever unschooling rule rather than a useful tool for a season, they are going to be hanging on for dear life, because that’s what a good unschooling parent does in their mind. And we all want that “A” still. That’s part of this whole process, as well.
To explore this tension, as Anna mentioned, let’s dive into the role of an unschooling parent. As I mentioned earlier, using the lens of child-led as we begin our unschooling journey can be so enlightening! And if the only way we know at first to interact with our kids is through telling them what to do or leaping into that teachable moment, sitting on our hands for a bit can be helpful both to give them some space to follow their interests unencumbered by our judgment, and so that we get the chance to see them in action. There’s a good chance they haven’t had a lot of space to just follow what they’re interested in in the way that is interesting to them and to be able to just change it up along the way.
But again, as the action of a pendulum so beautifully describes, we don’t want to stay there too long, because unschooling isn’t hands-off when it comes to learning. Our children’s rich learning absolutely includes engaging with us, their parents. In fact, strong relationships with our children are essential for unschooling and learning to thrive.
I think John Holt describes this so eloquently. John Holt was a classroom teacher and school reformer for many years before he eventually concluded that school and learning were never going to be a good fit. At that point, he became a fierce advocate for homeschooling, actually coining the term, “unschooling.”
But in his book, Escape From Childhood: The Needs and Rights of Children, he talks about what children need growing up. He explains that children “need love, stability, consistent and unequivocal care and lasting relationships with people who are profoundly enough interested in them to look after them with warmth, gaiety, and patience.”
That was beautiful. And he packs so many important points about how the lives of parents and children weave together into this one sentence!
If you’re curious to follow that thread a bit more, I wrote a whole talk about the value of relationships for learning, exploring why connected and trusting relationships with our children lie at the heart of their learning. And in it, I dive deeper into that quote. We’ll put a link in the show notes to the episode on the website where you can read the transcript, or in your podcast player, you can listen to it in episode 148.
So, that’s definitely one of the misunderstandings that can happen when parents take on the idea of “child-led” as an ongoing rule of unschooling. By inference, they see their role as being hands-off, expecting the child to discover things on their own and waiting for them to ask for supplies or support. You’re just sitting back waiting, excited. “Oh, I can’t wait to see what they’re just going to do,” when really, unschooling is incredibly hands-on.
ERIKA: Yeah, exactly. And I love that quote from John Holt, too. People learn in relationship to others, they learn with and from others. And so, focusing on the relationships we have with our children is just so valuable.
I think it can be tricky to go from one model that we’re so familiar with of the teacher and the students, controlling parents and adults over the children to this new model. And I feel like it’s like you’ve mentioned so many times over the years, Pam, that sort of vacuum that can be left of like, what are we replacing this model with? If I’m not in charge and directing and assigning and creating these teachable moments for my kids, then what is my role? And I think at first it can seem like maybe my role is just to get out of the way and be totally hands off and just not participate.
But life is so much richer when we can actively participate in life with our kids without control and directing. And as adults, we have access to knowledge and memories and resources that our kids don’t have. And so, we can use our money and our time and our knowledge and our insights to help bring more into their lives. And the difference to me is that I’m participating in their lives without putting expectations on them of what they should be learning or what they should be interested in. So, I can suggest ideas that they would have never known about and bring new activities into their lives. It’s actually one of the most exciting parts about our lives, that they can bring new ideas to me and I can do the same for them. We’re all learning more about ourselves and about each other in our relationships and more about the world, but all in our own unique ways and styles.
ANNA: And I think the richest environment has engaged adults, sharing and connecting. Our kids want to be connected to us. They want to feel heard and seen. And in that, we learn more about each other.
We see the myriad of different ways learning happens for each family member. We learn about different areas and opportunities for being in a family that’s connected and sharing passions from all the angles. One’s interest in photography could spark an interest in costume making for another. A favorite movie could lead to wanting to know more about that location for one, the act of movie making for another.
It’s in the connection and the conversations that we’d learn and start to create our own personal webs of learning.
Sitting back and waiting for a child to lead, I think can be confusing for everyone. There will be some kids who will have a really strong idea of what they want and how they want to get there, but it’s more common for kids to not be sure. To be curious, yeah. But not to maybe have a strictly defined interest. Sometimes we have young multipotentialites who like to dabble and have diverse interests, and how great to have a parent facilitating that, introducing and engaging without agenda. We don’t know what we don’t know. So, finding ways to expand that world is fun for all of us.
And that can be done in ways that suit the actual child or children that you have. That doesn’t need to mean mandatory museum visits and pushing our kids outside of their comfort zone because we think this is good for them. But it may mean noticing an interest in space and sharing what you know, and finding some resources or activities and seeing if they spark an interest. And they may not. And so then it’s on us to not take that personally.
We don’t want to jump on a passing comment and have them signed up for a series of classes, recognizing that so much can happen, learning can happen, just in a conversation, but I needed to be there and listen and be open to having the conversations in the first place.
What you’ll find is the more you know your child, the more trust you build, and the more interesting the conversations you can have are, and the better chance you’ll have of finding new things that you can bring into your lives.
I think another big part of this is being a person that’s curious about the world ourselves. What do I love? How can I bring those things into our space that excite me? How do I engage in the world around these interests that I have? Being an interested and curious person helps everyone in the family as they’re figuring out what lights them up and just shows a pathway to that different style of learning, because like you said, Erika, we can all be kind of stuck in the sitting in the desk with the authority figure upfront telling us what to do. So, it was a learning process for me as well.
PAM: And I think as you had mentioned, I think it was you, Erika, as well, that vacuum that we leave when it’s like, oh, I’m not directing. What do I do with myself? What do I do with my time? And absolutely, as you’re saying, Anna, finding my own interests, diving into them is definitely something that you can do in that space that’s now opened up.
If I’m not looking for teachable moments, if I am having these conversations with them, but not trying to direct them. Not trying to jump in the minute I hear dance or soccer, ah, let’s sign you up. Those conversations help us find the little bit that of soccer that’s interesting to them. Maybe it’s not literally wanting to play. Maybe it’s a location thing, a history thing. Maybe it’s something in a book that they’re reading or a game that they’re playing. And one of the characters was really into soccer and they found that interesting, so they’re just learning a little bit more about it. Doesn’t mean that they want to play yet.
But yeah, so one of the things we can do, and as you said Anna, it’s a great example for just how any human being can get interested in things and jump in and that’s part of that shift that brings both adults and children into the equal footing of unschooling. We’re all following our interests and learning new things and sharing things with each other.
I remember it was just so exciting when our kids come and share something that they’re interested in and it widened my world. So, it’s just widening our world. It doesn’t mean that we need to all of a sudden go do all the things. We don’t need to go hit all the museums and do all these field trips, because opening up the world doesn’t literally mean we need to make it wider. It doesn’t need to be more things. It’s whatever the thing is they’re interested in now. Because we are not following that curriculum that tells us, they’re this age, so we should be talking about this thing. We can talk about it when they’re interested in it.
And now we’re gonna take this a step wider, because unschooling isn’t hands off when it comes to parenting in general, either. So, we’ve been talking a lot about learning, but let’s widen that up. So, again, using the child-led lens as an ongoing rule, can lead us to presume that kids need to figure things out on their own in general, including how to care for themselves, how to be in relationships with others, with both family and friends, and how to navigate their world. There’s just so much stuff that we might be expecting them to figure out on their own if we stay with that child-led lens.
As parents, we want to be in relationship with our kids. We can validate their feelings and help them process their experiences so they can bring that understanding forward with them.
We can explore the context and circumstances of situations with them, so they start to see the bigger picture of things. We can brainstorm ideas with them as they contemplate how they want to move through a challenge, whether it’s learning-related, relationship-related, all the pieces of life. And we can do all that without judgment or expectations, without directing them. That’s the important piece. Without the expectation that, we mention there’s a soccer league, but we don’t expect that they’re going to go, “Yay! Thanks for signing me up!” They may, but like zero expectations.
So, instead, we’re supporting their learning about themselves and the world. Together, we’re navigating everyone’s needs, children and adults alike.
In unschooling circles, that hands-off approach to parenting, I think you’ll see that it’s often dubbed or, or spoken about as unparenting. Because it really does leave the child’s a flounder without help from their parents to recognize and incorporate the perspectives and needs of others, without someone to help them process their experiences and to chat about different approaches and tools they might want to try as they encounter challenges in their day. Not to mention fascinating conversations around the many ways in which people are fundamentally different from one another.
So, going back to our metaphor, I think what we’re aiming for is the pendulum to kind of settle into an equilibrium, without big swings either way, where neither adults nor children hold an ongoing power advantage. Now that said, keeping the pendulum still isn’t the goal either, because life happens and it may sway this way in that, but that’s based on the needs of the individual and the unique family members. So, if one member of the family, child or adult, is going through a challenging time, it’s natural that more of the family’s focus and energy leans in that direction to support them during that season.
The power of the family is gifted to each person as needed. We’re a team that helps each other out regardless of age. It’s not adult-led or child-led, and there is nothing hands-off about it. We are in strong and connected relationships with each other.
ERIKA: Yeah. I love that. And right, there’s so much to learn about the world and the cultural norms and relationships and all these things, and kids can pick up on and figure out so many things on their own, but if they also have an adult there who’s open to helping them learn without judgment, it’s just such an amazing asset.
And it’s so much fun to have those deep conversations with my kids or just to help them talk through misunderstandings with their friends or try to figure out what it is at the bottom, what’s bothering them, what is the need that’s not being met? And if I continue to be a trustworthy source of information and perspective and I validate their experience and their emotions, they keep coming back to share and to work through things with me. And I really value that so much.
I think with the unparenting, more hands-off approach, it’s kind of like the “always say yes” rule that we talked about months ago. Rather than sharing the context of a situation or helping my child think through this thing that they’re wanting to do, I could just offer a blanket yes and no support. And then I really do think it’s setting them up to having misunderstandings with others or some other type of upset later.
And so, if instead I’m supporting them and giving them information about what it is they want to do, then they get the benefit of my experience and perspective, and they know that I’m there for them and we can figure out a path forward that can work for everyone. And so, when I’m thinking about the learning versus the parenting, I guess when I think of learning in my family, I think of it rather than adult-led or child-led, I think of it as excitement-based or interest-based. And then with parenting, rather than thinking of it as, parents are in charge or children are in charge, I think of the four of us as a family team, where all of the people and all of the needs matter. It’s not adults in charge or kids in charge, and it’s just a different paradigm and a different way of looking at the roles and the relationships, and it just feels really good to me.
ANNA: Yes, and that was the thing for me too. Like it just felt better. I liked that feeling. There’s four of us and my family as well, and just how beautiful it was to just hear one another and to figure things out. And it just had such a better feel to me than whenever I got caught in that kind of control paradigm, which did not feel great.
And I am really glad we’re touching on unparenting, because it is something that you can see in unschooling circles at times, and I think it can come from a lot of different places. I think parents can find themselves doing a lot of deep work when they start unschooling. And sometimes that takes them out of the moment and they’re really in their head, thinking about their own childhood and the baggage and the triggers and the things, and it’s all of these pieces, but it’s disconnected from the kids who are then out there doing their thing.
I think others can have an independence agenda. “I want you to figure it out and do it yourself,” and either of those things and others can lead to this more hands-off approach that leaves kids not really knowing how to navigate some environments or how to find what they need.
And I’m just all about information. I think that kids want to understand the broader world and how to fit into it. But, for me, that’s not about conformity, but it’s just about information. Just understanding different pieces. How do our actions impact others? What certain environments, what expectations are there? What’s happening in these different cultures of different ideas about things? With information, they can make an informed decision about how they want to proceed. Is it the right environment for them at this moment? Maybe it isn’t. What can they expect if they do go down that path or attend that event or go to that certain place?
We don’t have all the answers, but our experience is valuable and as long as I’m sharing it with the caveat of, well, this is what I saw, this is what worked for me, and trusting that they will find their own path, then both of us can feel good and stay connected as we move through those pieces.
ERIKA: Going back to the idea of sharing our own interests and passions with them as part of what we can do, I feel like that’s related to what you were just talking about, where it’s like, in the control paradigm, I might hear them say, I’m interested in this. And then I say, oh, well you know what you should do is blah, blah, blah. But in this new paradigm, I can say, oh wow. Well, when I was a kid, I did this, or I saw this video, or I am interested in this. And so, just sharing from what I’m interested in about it and then listening to what they’re interested in about it, it’s just a completely different feeling than taking what their interests are and putting my own kind of expectations and judgements on them.
ANNA: Just one quick thing, because you spoke about this early on, that it’s not just about getting out of their way, but we all know that there is a piece of getting out of their way. And I know you’ve seen it, too. It’s kind of like what you’re just saying. It’s like, yes, sometimes we do need to get out of the way. We just don’t need to leave. We don’t need to leave the building. We want to stay connected, but we want to watch for those things that you’re talking about. Like, are we saying, well if you do it this way, then you’ll get to that place. That’s so different than just like, oh, that does sound interesting.
Here’s something I did similar and what I learned about it. Let’s figure out what it looks like for you.
Because I think that’s what’s hard for people. Like how do I replace it? What’s the next thing you know? What is that gonna look like? But I don’t know. I feel like it’s natural once you start to kind of just let go of those outside paradigms. I was thinking about some things you were saying.
PAM: And we do have a podcast episode. I don’t know the number off the top of my head, but From Control to Connection, because yes, that is talking about that transition, that paradigm shift, that vacuum, that when we stop controlling, well now what do we do now? Now, that’s that move to connection to being together, to being just engaged with one another. And I’m glad you mentioned that, Anna. Some kids have a very clear vision of what they want to do.
And so, it’s really about learning about each other as individuals and what kind of support and energy they’re needing or wanting or might be interested in, not feeling judged if we hand something up and they’re like, yeah, no. Not interested. Or, “What the heck? That doesn’t make any sense to me at all.” Or any of those kinds of reactions. We just learned something more about them. It’s not that they’re wrong. It’s not that we were wrong to share it, but it’s more learning for each of us in how we can connect and support each other.
So, I find that piece so very fascinating. And is really helpful at the beginning of the journey, because I think one of the biggest things in that shift from control to connection, especially if we have been more on the control side in our relationship with them before, is this transition isn’t, you wake up the next day and you say, you know what? I’m not going to control you any more!
There will need to be a shift. And it’s an internal shift for us, because I think it comes across in tone. I think it comes across in body energy. And it will take a while for them to trust when we say, “Oh, that’s really cool. Do you want to try this?” And we’re not saying, “I really think you should do this,” right, Erika? As you were saying. And they’re like, “What the heck? Usually you tell me what I should do and then I argue and then, you know, we move forward from there.”
But that the time that it takes for us to really understand it in our bones so that it’s not coming out as an underlying energy in the things that we say. Yeah, I’m saying this, that doesn’t sound controlling, but you can hear from my tone of voice that I really want you to choose this thing.
Also for them to develop a trust in us that, oh, I can say the thing, I can say, “Oh, it’s really curious about soccer. I just learned this thing,” and you’re not going to jump at me saying, “Let’s sign you up.” Or, “I signed you up. It starts in two weeks.” That trust is something, trust isn’t a one way thing. It’s something we develop together and it’s something that we learn together. And that’s where that connection piece really comes in. And that fully and energetically can replace control in our relationship.
ERIKA: Yes. I think life is just so much more interesting when we’re all bringing our full human selves to our families, like stepping away from the role of the parent, which I think is the block to this type of connection, thinking that we’re all knowing and we’re in charge, but we can still participate and explore and engage in the world together with our children.
So, anyway, it’s been so much fun to dive into this unschooling rule with you and for all of our listeners, we would love it if you would join us in the Living Joyfully Network, our online community where we talk about so many rich topics that impact our unschooling lives. It’s such a great place to connect with other families navigating the same challenges and experiencing that same joy of connection. You can learn more at livingjoyfully.ca/network. Thanks again for joining us and see you next time! Bye.
PAM: Bye!
EU138 Flashback: The Sparkle of Unschooling
Aug 24, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a compilation of experienced unschooling parents answering the question, “Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?”
Another apt title might be Remembering Our Why, which is why we think it’s especially powerful to listen to during this back-to-school season. When we are able to tap into that choice, that reason why we are choosing to live in connected relationships with our children, that reason why we chose unschooling, we can feel so much more confident, even in the midst of all of the mainstream messages.
We hope you enjoy hearing what these experienced unschooling parents had to share!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
EU002, Pam Sorooshian
PAM L: Looking back now, what for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling with your family?
PAM S: The close relationships that we have. Absolutely. No other thing could come close to that. There is nothing that could come close to that. There is nothing more important than relationships. That’s it.
PAM L: That’s it. Yep.
PAM S: So, we didn’t go through awful teen years where we battled. We don’t have that kind-of-thing were the kids are like, “Yeah, I like my family, but I like them 3000 miles away.”
We just don’t have that kind-of relationships. Like I said, my kids they talk to each other constantly. I hear from them every day. I see them frequently. Our lives are still as completely fun and intertwined. The most fun we have is when we are all together. So that kind of relationship is the best part.
EU009, Amy Childs
PAM: Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
AMY: Well, the most valuable thing to me has been the relationship with my kids. They’re all very smart. They all ended up wanting to go to college and they all got ridiculously good grades and honors and awards and scholarships and things like that.
I sometimes don’t even want to say that because I think a lot of unschoolers think that, ‘Oh good, if I unschool my kids then they’ll go to college and get really good grades.’ I just don’t want people to think that that has anything to do with it.
My oldest, I loved it that he got a 4.0 grade average, he was magna cum laude as a mechanical engineer but then after that he threw it all the way and went to go live on the farm and make $8,000 a year. Just because somebody gets a college degree or a fancy job doesn’t mean that they’re going to do that.
But now, I think what they would say about unschooling is that it’s not that they got into college or what they do for money, it’s that they have confidence that they know how to make a good life for themselves. And part of why I know that this is what they feel is because of this last season of working on the podcast interviewing them. It’s been really interesting to hear them talking about their self-confidence. Not that they’re always happy or always confident. They still do things that terrify them and they struggle with anxiety and depression and uncertainty and heartbreak and stuff like that.
But they have such a deep respect for their self—just a deep, inner resource that they know that they can get through anything. They can figure out anything that they have to. Not only do they believe in themselves, but they have their siblings and they have me and they have this wide world that will help them if they know how to ask for help and they know where to ask for help.
That is what’s so reassuring about who they are as young adults, for me. They just don’t feel that there isn’t anything that can’t figure out, or what to do about it or how to have a good life. And that goes back to the very first question in how we discovered unschooling. That was my original hope. If I can make resilient kids and self-aware and self-confident and know how to be happy, what do I care what else they are? What do I care if they know algebra, or if they know all that. Turns out they all know algebra way better than I do!
So, the most valuable outcome for them is their self-reliance. Well, that makes them sound really isolated. Their self reliance but also their understanding of how they fit into the world and their confidence that they fit into the world. They have a community or family or just resources with and around them.
But for me? Selfishly? My outcome is my relationship with my kids. But I got to share their growing years with them and then I get to share their years now as adults. They share questions with me, they think out loud with me, they consider me their ally, and because of that they entertain me. They’re better than TV and I don’t even really like TV.
That’s been my best outcome for me, my relationship with them. They feel very well prepared for life. And they feel sorry for us people around them who they see as not that well prepared for life. I think they sometimes see that as a result of unschooling. I think sometimes they don’t even know how or why they’re self-confident or self-aware. I attribute that to the whole attitude and lifestyle of unschooling and putting my relationship with them and believing in them as the most important part of raising them.
EU014, Joyce Fetteroll
PAM: Looking back now, what for you has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
JOYCE: Well, this is a short answer, it’s definitely the great relationships that we have. I think because I learned so much on my own outside of school I didn’t worry about the academics. I was concerned about interest driven learning being enough as we were going on, but I wasn’t worried that she couldn’t learn.
The best side benefit of unschooling is growing great relationships. She has a great relationship with her dad. They watch, talk, and do sports together. She and I have a great relationship. We talked about writing and drawing and Starbucks. What I learned with her kept the relationship with my husband strong too.
It’s just been one relationship win all around!
EU018, Jennifer McGrail
PAM: Looking back now, what for you has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
JENNIFER: This is the easiest question for me to answer. There’s obviously so many benefits to unschooling: seeing the kids learn, to have freedom and be happy, not going through the angst I see other kids go through.
All of that is great, but far and away the best thing is my own relationship with the kids. I know regular homeschooled kids and public school kids can have good relationships with their parents, but I think unschooling and radical unschooling in particular, relationships come first in the unschooling journey.
I have a wonderful relationship with all my kids from nineteen down to eight and I credit unschooling for that. We live and work together and operate as a family. I couldn’t imagine not having a close relationship with my kids, my teens. The societal mindset of, ‘Wait until they’re teens!’ is terrible! I am enjoying my teens so much. They’re so interesting, all the ages.
I’m finding I enjoy my kids as they get older and are able to talk and do different things. They’re are my best friends, even though society says you are not supposed to do that. They’re amazing and we have such a close relationship.
You go through different seasons, times that are harder, but you work it out as a family. The relationship is always first and I couldn’t ask for a better one with my kids.
That to me has been the most valuable part of unschooling, by far.
PAM: I love that. I found the same thing too. When we first started I had no idea of the relationships that would develop but those are going to last me a lifetime and they have been the most powerful thing that’s ever going to come out of it.
JENNIFER: I see the focus of being the meanest parent and I wonder what those relationships will be like in the future when you’re spending your time in an ‘us versus them’ mentality.
I don’t want to be adversaries with my kids; we’re partners. Like you said, those are relationships we’re going to have the rest of our lives. I look forward to being strong when they’re adults, but I’m also enjoying the ages they are now.
EU022, Lainie Liberti
PAM: Looking back now, what for you has been the most valuable outcomes in choosing unschooling?
LAINIE: It’s the relationship I have with my son and the beautiful relationships that I’ve been able to forge with all the teens that have come into our lives. I don’t think I would have been as open and respectful and approached life on such a partnership with this group of people, including my son, of course, had I not discovered unschooling as a philosophy.
And, I have to add, the permission to be a lifelong learner. It gave me back the permission to learn to go back to the natural learner that we’re all wired to be.
EU037, Carol Black
PAM: Looking back now, what for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
CAROL: People probably say this, but it’s like they always say, people on their death bed don’t say they wish they had spent more time at the office, they say they wish they had spent more time with their kids.
I really feel just the time you have with each other as a family and the time you have to be out in nature and to read books together and think and talk together, it’s just the most precious part of life. To me, that’s the most important thing.
There was a guy who made a good point about how we raise or educate our kids. He was a proponent of the idea that kids pretty much turn out to be who they are and we don’t really have that much control over them, actually. He told that to one of them and she just felt despairing because she was like, “But if it doesn’t make any difference then why does it matter how I treat my kids?” And his answer was, “Well, of course it matters how you treat your kids. You don’t get to pick how your husband turns out, but of course it matters how you treat him.”
I think that that sense that it’s not about molding your child or doing something that is going to make your child into necessarily a different kind of person, but it’s just about treating each other with respect and living together in a way that feels mutually respectful. It’s a work in progress for most of us, obviously.
Unschooling isn’t a panacea and it doesn’t solve every problem in life. The way I kind of look at it is, I think our society is way off course in a lot of ways. Of course, we’re completely unsustainable. I think the way we’re living right now is too socially isolating and fragmented and our communities have really kind of broken down and disintegrated. The levels of mental illness and depression and anxiety are really epidemic. Unschooling doesn’t solve all these problems. I see it as a transitional stage in gradually developing or rebuilding better ways to live on the earth, kind of a step in the right direction.
There’s this Lakota man who does a traditional horsemanship program with at-risk youth. What he was saying, for the Lakota people, who are maybe less far off course than we are, he said it’s taken us seven generations to get this far off course, and we have to expect it may take seven generations to get back. So, I kind of look at it that way and explain it that way to my kids and hope that they will understand whatever failures or things that didn’t work well in their childhood as this kind of transitional process.
My parents were born into a world that was racist, sexist, authoritarian, colonial, with a lot of very negative values. And we’ve tried to change a lot of those values in our lifetime. But it’s a lot of work in progress. My parents tried to raise my brother and me in ways that were more respectful and less violent than the ways they were raised. My husband and I have tried to move that process along by questioning the institutional setting for learning and trying to give our kids the respect to learn what they want to learn when they want to learn it. That’s just sort of the next step. And then this next generation will be able to see ahead. We can’t see what lies ahead but they’ll see what the next step is and then they’ll take.
I think there’s a good chance what we need to do is rebuild our communities to be both more sustainable and healthy and hospitable for children and families, and rebuild ways of living together as communities that are really more workable for both people and other species and the planet.
I look forward to seeing what the next generation is going to come up with!
EU044, Jennifer Andersen
PAM: Looking back now, what for you so far, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
JENNIFER: Well, that is the perfect lead in to this question. There are a lot of things that I love about it, obviously. We were on a trajectory with our family to be that harried, crazy family, who went to school, did sports, played musical instruments, required it all, had expectations and it would have been busy and crazy and miserable. That’s been a great thing to not have in our lives. I’m also so glad that my kids and I aren’t forced to separate everyday and miss each other, so, all those kinds of things.
What we were just talking about, that is ultimately, at this point anyway, what has been the greatest part of being exposed to living this way. Living this way ourselves is that really understanding what unconditional acceptance and unconditional love is. At least understanding it more than I ever had to this point. Really appreciating people for who they are, and my kids especially, because if we had continued down the path that we were on, I wouldn’t even know my kids. How could I have possibly known them if they were told where they were going to be, and what they were going to think about during school hours, and then they were going to be to told what they had to play?
My son doesn’t even like sports but he would have been required to play a sport and probably required to play some instrument instead of learning the part about music that he really likes. So I wouldn’t have even known them because they would have been forced down a path of who other people thought they should be, so that really has been the greatest part of all of this, is really getting to see who my kids are. Just when I think they’re going along one way, they completely change direction and are turning into these different, awesome people who are thinking about and experiencing things so different than I do, or ever did. It’s definitely been the best part.
That of course, applies, as we were just talking about, for me, for all of life because once I could start appreciating my kids for who they are instead of who they were supposed to be, I could start doing that with myself which is not just a gift to me but a gift to my family. You know, that fact that I don’t enjoy small talk. I could finally say, “Ok that’s not a bad thing, it’s just a thing. It’s just who I am.” And a million other things.
And I could start appreciating that with everybody who I meet out in the world. I really get to see people more for who they are than for who I’m forcing us to be in a relationship. I don’t know. That’s not very clear but it’s been huge, HUGE, for me.
EU057, Akilah S. Richards
PAM: I was wondering, looking back now, what for you so far has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
AKILAH: It would go right back to that liberation mindset. That all of these things I believe in as a social justice believer, as an intersectional feminist, all of these things I believe in, unschooling for me has truly been the vehicle that allows me to live that. To live my politics in that sense.
To afford that same right to my children—and not just mine, but I have more of an influence with my children in terms of what they can and can’t do. That’s the most important thing. I now get to practice liberation and I get to extend that space to my daughters.
PAM: It’s amazing, isn’t it? Coming from kids who were in school, at first, I thought if I take them out of school, what am I going to replace school with? In that first six months to a year, I realized the extent of what this was about. I loved your whole liberation mindset. It’s why we talk about unschooling becoming a lifestyle because it just permeates everywhere. It’s just an incredible way to live.
AKILAH: Absolutely.
And you just realize how many constructs were defining your actions. Those constructs are toxic and they don’t even align with who you are. It’s like, I don’t want that. I don’t want to make anybody do anything. That just didn’t dawn on me before. Now I have all of this practice and language. All this compassion, this love/harmony/partnership approach to life and living and that really empowers me. It started about helping my kids to “learn good,” and now it’s about living in harmony with my spirit.
PAM: That’s a good point. It ends up being a lot of our own work, to figure all this out but it’s just such a growth vehicle for us, as people, right? And we learn so much from them. They haven’t been so controlled. They recover so much more quickly because they are still in touch with that open mindset. Just watching them we can learn so much.
AKILAH: Absolutely. I’m sure some folks listen to you out of the space of curiosity, those who aren’t immersed in it but know what’s not working but don’t know yet what to replace it with. I would say unschooling—really, self-directed education—is a philosophy. It becomes an approach to living.
That the box of learning, which comes from the schooled mindset and the pervasiveness. You realize how naturally things can work when you use love and trust, these “woo-woo,” esoteric terms, that sound like yah, I don’t do yoga. We start to understand the practicality of these ways because trust and love are practical things. They really are.
EU066, Pushpa Ramachandran
PAM: Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome so far from choosing unschooling?
PUSHPA: I would have to say hands down the most valuable outcome for choosing unschooling is to rediscover the joy of learning. And how learning is really the most important part of anything that you do. And how learning is constantly happening whether I decide to pin up a board on it and display it and shout out, “Oh we are learning, we are learning!”
Whether I choose to or not, it is still going to happen. I have no control over learning. It will happen no matter what I try to do or not do.
PAM: I love that! That was something that took me a while to see because I had my own expectations on what it should look like, but as soon as I got passed that, it is happening all the time. Whether or not we see it. Whether or not we even know what they are learning in the moment, they are always picking up something. It is so fun to watch, isn’t it?
PUSHPA: The biggest outcome also has been kind of trying to learn—and I am still learning to do this—not to do what you just said about what you think learning should look like and then box your child into that and get upset.
Sometimes they are not learning what you think they should be learning, but then you get surprised and you literally have to eat your own words because you realize that what you thought they were learning, not only have they learned that, they have learned above and beyond that which you have never even considered so.
PAM: I know! One thing I learned that was really valuable is to sit back and not jump in with comments, because I would direct things in places where I thought they would go, because if it was me that is where I would take it. But the places they would take it are so fascinating and different and so interesting to see, but I had to be careful not to jump in there or else I might take over or knock it off their course.
PUSHPA: I also have to say, I am human. I do make all these mistakes that I am so eloquently telling others—I definitely do not want to sound like I am preaching or anything. I can eloquently talk about it, but I do not necessarily know how to do it all the time. I am still learning how to be a facilitator rather than a director.
PAM: Yes, and I don’t want to give the impression, like you said, to anyone that we are “perfect” at doing any of this. It is all about engaging with each other and you get signals and clues and it is like, “Oh, look, I am putting a little bit too much energy into this, I can tell by their reaction it is time to step back.” Or, “I can tell by their reaction they are wanting more.” It is just about the dance of a relationship, I think that is Pam Sorooshian’s phrase.
I think it just works so well because it always is, even with my kids now as adults, you know, it is still that dance. It is still watching out for the clues of whether I should step right, left, backwards, whatever. You know, sometimes we do step on each other’s toes, but that is another clue and we acknowledge it and figure it out. So yes, it is all part of living together.
PUSHPA: If I could say one thing like at the homeschool meetup that we just had, one of the mom’s did a session on Do Nothing. That was the hardest part for most parents, to ‘do nothing’ sometimes.
PAM: Yes. We are very productivity-oriented, is what jumped to my mind. That feeling that we always have to be doing something. It’s so important to just leave that space for things to go where they are going to go or not. Like you said, we are still learning.
PUSHPA: I am still learning how to do nothing sometimes.
EU074, Robyn Coburn
PAM: And, looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome so far from choosing unschooling?
ROBYN: Well, that is a really short answer. I have a very happy daughter with no school damage and a close connection to her parents, to James and me. That is the outcome. That is it.
PAM: The relationship.
ROBYN: A very happy daughter who seems to be completely aware of the world and history and culture and science and, if she wants to find out about something, she knows how do that. She is still determining her career kind of path. The problem is not that she does not know what to do but that she has too many choices. There are so many different interests and ideas about her future that she is not yet sure which path is going to appeal to her most.
PAM: But that is okay because that is the nice thing about not feeling like you need to stick to a particular timetable, right? You were talking earlier about her being confident however things work out, you know, however they turn out.
So, being able to know that, “Oh, gee, I have all these interesting things and to be able to continue pursuing them all to see.” Then eventually, she will see, maybe she will come up with a way to combine them moving forward. Maybe one will start to stand out, but having that space is awesome.
ROBYN: Yes, as time goes on she just has seen more and more to add. (laughs)
EU089, Jan Hunt
PAM: Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling, for you?
JAN: Just to look at Jason and know that he is happy, very secure, that he is amazing. If something goes wrong, he always sees the humour right away. I see the humour six months later; he sees it instantly, so he is always really quick with a cute little joke. He jokes about things but in a very kind way and very helpful, that helps me to see that I was taking something too seriously or that something is not as dire as I had thought. He keeps me in perspective because he has such an incredible perspective on life and in every way. Every interaction that he has with people is just so appropriate and kind.
PAM: I love that point about the perspective, because you know what? When I think of that, it is so true. I always say that I learn from my kids, and it is still true. Mine are age twenty and up now, and still I learn from them in how to approach situations. Their perspective and ability to roll with the situation is just amazingly fun to watch, so when I start getting caught up…
JAN: And it is so important to stay calm in difficult times, because anybody can stay calm in good times. It is how we treat each other and ourselves when things are not going so well. I am still trying to learn that, and I have this wonderful teacher right here.
PAM: Exactly, right? Like you said, I love chatting with them, I love being with them, and hanging out with them; they are fun. They have such a fresh perspective on so many things in the moment and in the world and with information; how they have creatively built their unique picture of the world. Their picture and view of the world is so fascinating, isn’t it? To just hear them talk about something and share the connections and what they see and what they take from things is just so interesting.
JAN: Well, all of that went into this article, and I want to mention is again, ‘Creating a Peaceful World Through Parenting.’ He and I spent several months going over every sentence with a fine-tooth comb; we did not want to hurt anyone’s feelings, we just wanted to be heard, you know, and clear, and this is all of the things. If we had only one article on our website, it would be that one to show people how we can have peace in the world. It all comes down to the early years and the way we treat children.
EU111, Jan Fortune
PAM: Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling for you?
JAN: I think the biggest thing that is, is that if you relate to your children as autonomous creators of their own stories and people you can pool creative with, that relationship goes on throughout life.
So, the most valuable thing for me has been these ongoing relationships of trust and support which are now with a group of young adults who are on all different kinds of journeys. Just the fact that that goes on and on and develops and the excitement that it’s now developing with a first grandchild, it’s absolutely amazing to have that much trust and support with these incredible young people.
It’s also given all of us the mindset that the whole of life is about learning and that’s really helpful, I think, in a world where flexibility is essential. For myself, it’s meant not getting stuck in any role that’s no longer working for me because I know I can change it. It’s always possible. So, the benefits are just ongoing.
At the moment, as you said in the beginning, I’m shifting the balance of my own work from being largely editing with the press that I’ve set up to being more about my own life writing and sharing insights into writing and the writing life and the new blog on Medium.
So, unschooling has taught me that I can make changes in my own life at any age and that I will always have these amazing people in my life to share that with and that the creativity just goes on growing.
PAM: I love that. And what a shift, right, when we first start or choose unschooling we think that it’s about our kids…(laughter)
JAN: Absolutely. It’s about all of us together.
PAM: Yeah, and it’s about learning how to be a human being. Just embracing life—it’s beautiful, isn’t it?
JAN: Absolutely. I mean, I think that is the absolute crux of it. Actually, unschooling is exactly what it says on the can: we don’t need those school models, we need to talk about how we live well and we need to share that with people most important in our lives and when we do that, the magic is extraordinary.
EU130, Ronnie Maier
PAM: Looking back for yourself, what for you has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling all those years ago?
RONNIE: Relationships. Definitely. I wanted to say something more original because I’m sure you’ve had people say relationships quite a bit. Having grown kids who enjoy your company, who call you when they’re feeling sad and want to go shopping with you or have you come visit them in Minneapolis. It’s huge and it continues to be work.
Having grown kids is an interesting challenge. How much do you say? How much do you not say? It’s constantly walking this balancing beam trying not to interfere too much, trying not to give advice when they’re not looking for that. You kind of feel your way. And that’s another one where you just keep shining the light on what you’re trying to do.
Like MJ, the older one, I leave her alone a lot. She’s fiercely independent and of the two of them has more baggage with me because she was that kid who experienced, before peaceful parenting, lot more bag baggage, so I leave her alone but periodically I check in. I send her cute cat photos on Instagram. Things like that. And I check in and say, “I’ve been leaving you alone, is that what you want?” And she’ll say, “Yeah, I appreciate it.” She knows what I’m doing and recognizes that I’m giving her space that she wants.
And then, totally different relationship with Chloe, but still needing to walk that line. She and I talk almost everyday, joined-at-the-hip 1400 miles apart! But then there will be days when she gets quiet and then it’s like, ‘Okay Chloe’s having some mom-free time. I get that!’
Anyway, but the foundation that we have that allows us to do that kind of checking in with each other and trusting each other to listen if we’re getting it wrong, is gold. I could not have imagined how happy a family could be before unschooling. It’s just not something you’re told. It’s not something you lived, the bonds that you have and the fun that you have.
EU131, Maria Randolph
PAM: With your official unschooling years behind you now, looking back what has been the most valuable outcome you think from choosing unschooling?
MARIA: Oh my goodness. I have to pick just one? (laughter)
I would say the most valuable outcome to unschooling is that I was able to take my time and look at our relationship differently.
I think we have always had a fine relationship I really do. You know, I like self-improvement, but I had to do that at a younger age with homeschooling. I feel like because of that we had a stronger bond and a more respectful relationship between two humans than I think we would have had otherwise. Because I began to see her not as the child, but as a person who needed guidance but fully had her own ideas, her own thoughts whether she was verbalizing them or not.
I could give her the information and guide her in whatever it was she wanted to do and I think that has then played its part as she has gotten older. Just kind of has connected us on a level I am not sure we would have connected on before. Because I truly see her as a human fully capable of making all of her own choices and her own decisions.
EU135, Anna Brown
PAM: Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
ANNA: I think it really has to be time because, as I mentioned, we didn’t know how much time we would have with my oldest and really, the truth of matter is, we don’t know how much time we have with anybody.
Some people don’t like to think about that, but it’s the truth. I knew early on because of our experience with her that I wanted to enjoy every moment. I wanted to be able to live with no regrets and if it all ended tomorrow that I could say we had the most awesome time together and I’m so grateful. That’s where I wanted to be and that’s what we did. That’s what we’re still doing. I still do it today all the time because you just never know and that’s what guides my decisions and my spending time with people that I love and my doing the things that I enjoy.
How does that look? I feel like unschooling was such a big part of that. It allowed us to build these relationships and visit amazing places and explore these things that we love and, oh my gosh, the magical people we met along the way. I wouldn’t trade a second of it and I am so grateful for all those things that happened and sometimes it’s hard to be understanding.
I’m even grateful for the things that happened to my oldest because, wow, did it change the trajectory of everything. Had that not happened I wouldn’t be here today. It’s just understanding that those are the choices. I just feel like unschooling—I’m so grateful.
Oh my gosh, it goes by really fast! Bloop-bloop, it’s all over!
Even with that, so now I’m in this age where my friends—their kids are getting older and going off. A lot of them are upset and I don’t feel that at all. We have savored every stage. We continue to be grateful for the time we have together now but I’m so excited for them! I don’t have regrets about not having time or now they’re going and we’re losing time. No! We’ve had so much time and what a gift that time has been. I feel like unschooling was a gift and it helped us step off a treadmill that we were definitely on before all this happened.
It gave us, as a family, so much that I will always be grateful for.
EU352: Unschooling “Rules”: Unschoolers Are Always Happy
Aug 03, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a new episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series.
We use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschoolers should always be happy. We explore why happiness isn’t a good indicator of unschooling success, the importance of validation and presence, and the benefits that unschooling brings to navigating challenging times.
We had a lot of fun diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello! I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and this is episode number 352 of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Welcome!
ERIKA AND PAM: Hi!
ANNA: As always, we want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can feel easier, I think, to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new. But we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you, and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody’s going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade. Also, they’re not going to give you an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent rules and cultivate an environment for self-discovery and inquiry, for agency and growth.
So, with that in mind, Erika, would you like to get us started today?
ERIKA: Yes, I would. I am so excited to have another rule to dive into, and this one is huge.
So, the rule that we’re talking about today is that unschoolers are always happy, or probably more specifically, that unschooling kids are and should always be happy. I think it’s so common to fall into this line of thinking that unschooling life is based on what the kids want to do and what they’re interested in, moving away from coercion and judgment. So then, life should just be great all the time. What do they have to be unhappy about?
And if for whatever reason my kids are unhappy, maybe that must mean that I’m doing something wrong. And it can create a lot of worry and fear if we don’t unpack this belief. And so, the first thought that came up for me as I was thinking about unpacking it was, this is just real life with real people.
And real life comes with all kinds of experiences and all kinds of emotions. It’s not a defect if we have emotions that feel uncomfortable. It’s just part of being alive. If my kids are living their life without school, some of the stresses and challenges that exist for some children might not exist for them or like it did for me when I was in school. But stresses and challenges will still come up. They still have hormones. They still have grumpy moods and triggers and sensitivities just like any human. And navigating relationships can easily bring up all kinds of feelings. The normal constraints of life can be frustrating, like a thunderstorm could mess with our plans to have a pool day. Or living really far away from people we love can feel so hard. Failing to beat a level in a video game over and over and over can feel enraging. And so all of those emotions and experiences are just a part of life, whether or not we’re unschooling.
And I think that being intentional about respecting our children’s wants and needs and not pushing through their consent goes a really long way toward helping them have a life that feels good and works for them, but it doesn’t mean that their lives are perfect or that they’re somehow protected from the harder parts of living, because unschooling is just real life.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. It’s so true. And I think there’s a lot of layers to peel back here, too. And so, I’m very excited that we’re tackling this as one of those kind of unspoken unschooling rules, because I think it creates a lot of bad feelings in parents and all around and even just misunderstandings. I think in part the frustration is compounded, because we are doing our best to be intentional and create a life that allows our children to shine. It’s work. And it’s often very different from what we experienced as kids.
So, when there is upset or big emotions, we can have the thought like, hey, you really don’t know how good you have it! And that’s okay. We may have that thought from time to time, but what I realized is that they don’t know the difference. They only know the life that they have.
And like you said, Erika, life can be messy. It will have ups and downs and challenges and triumphs. I wasn’t unschooling to stop them from living. I wanted them to live their fullest life and to have the space and support to be their full selves. And for humans, that means experiencing a wide range of emotions and experiences. And even when we do all the things, each of our children is on their own journey. And I had to come to terms with this when my oldest was a teen. I couldn’t take away all the pain that she was experiencing, but I could be there and I could make sure that she had space and was loved unconditionally through those darker times. So, for me, it became less about creating an environment where we were all happy all the time, but more about creating an environment where we were all loved and supported for being exactly who we are.
PAM: Oh yes, yes, yes. I do think this is such a rich area to explore. Certainly for me, I was drawn to unschooling because it seemed like such a happier and more relaxed way to live our lives. It was a significant part of our choice to try unschooling. And my goodness, not having school control so much of our days focusing on the things we wanted to do, it just sounded brilliant.
And it was. But pretty soon, I found I needed to tease apart the meaningful difference between happier and always happy. Because, as you both mentioned, life still has stresses and challenges, and on top of that, we each have different personalities and ways of being in the world while still living together. And now, with the kids home from school, we were living together a lot more of each day. So, I feel like this was a pretty important de-schooling shift for me, from this almost utopian vision of always being happy because we were doing the things we wanted to do, to a more grounded and aware perspective that was still happier than before definitely.
But now we were embracing how much choice we truly had in our lives, which was a lot, while also recognizing that things happen pretty regularly that aren’t in our control. What we can choose is how we respond. So, we embrace everyone following their interests and not judging each other’s choices, while recognizing that we are fundamentally different people and our needs and wants are sometimes at cross purposes.
And just as I found my children’s learning faded as a useful barometer or measure of our days and the connection in our relationship became a much more helpful measure, I found that happiness faded as a beneficial indicator of unschooling “success” and joy rose up in its place. See, happiness, while lovely, was more related to circumstances in the moment, “Yay, this thing went well!” while joy felt more fundamental to me. So, looking at our days became less about how things were going and more about how things were feeling. I came to focus more on cultivating the feelings of connectedness and trust and emotional safety, and those lay in the foundation of our days beneath the activities themselves.
And I talk a lot more about this shift in my book, The Unschooling Journey, as part of stage nine, accepting our nature. I find this whole piece really fascinating, and I do think it’s quite familiar to the shift that you described, Anna, from trying to create an environment where we were all happy to creating an environment where we were all loved and supported for being exactly who we are.
ERIKA: Yeah, I love that so much. And that shift from happy to joyful, like it might sound the same, but the concepts are different, and joy really allows space for the ups and downs in a way that being always happy doesn’t.
So, now that we’ve established that unschooling life is just real life with all the emotions that that brings with it. I wanted to talk about releasing expectations and validating ourselves and our children. I think these two areas, which you both talked about on the Living Joyfully Podcast, really tie in so well with this rule.
So, if I notice myself getting uncomfortable when my child is unhappy, that’s a good sign for me to pause and see what’s happening in my thoughts. I very likely have an expectation that they should be happy and maybe some judgment pieces about myself, like maybe I’m not doing a good enough job if they’re unhappy. And there can be a feeling of needing to fix things as fast as I can so they can go back to being happy. And in times where I’m especially overwhelmed, I may even feel angry that they’re unhappy, almost like they’re doing this to me.
And so, all of those feelings and thoughts can come up and I can validate that it’s feeling hard for me. I can remind myself that this is just real life and I can breathe through their intense emotions and my intense emotions and know that it’s safe to feel emotions. I can validate my kids and their experience, not rushing them to move through it, and over time I can practice releasing that expectation that they should be happy or that I should be able to give them a life where they’re always happy.
I do think these triggering moments can get easier to navigate with practice. I can be really hard on myself. So, for me, this practice looks like reassuring self-talk. Like, you’ve got this, you’re safe. Don’t beat yourself up. They’re just humans. Just breathe through it. Let them be humans. And I also think what you were mentioning, Pam, about just remembering that people are all so different helps so much with this too, because some personalities are a little more somber. Some people feel comfortable sitting in darker emotions or are more drawn to experiencing them. And so, while that can feel hard or even trigger me as a parent, it helps to recognize that everyone is different and however we are experiencing our own lives is valid.
ANNA: Right. And I think it can trigger all kinds of things. And just being aware that it’s a trigger, not a threat, can help me take a moment to understand it more. Am I feeling resourced? Am I hungry? What is this bringing up in me? Taking care of myself helps me be present for the big emotions without them needing to stop. And what I found is that we actually move through them faster and feel better when we slow things down and take care with the emotions that are present, and like you said, that’s validating ourselves and our kids. All the feelings are okay, their upset and our frustration. And the sooner we acknowledge and are kind to ourselves about that, the sooner we can truly connect and see that the person in front of us is a human that we love, needing support and understanding. Because again, it’s not about never feeling bad, but trusting that we will be okay, knowing that we can move through it.
Taking the time to identify our triggers, I think is an important aspect of this. That often can’t happen in the moment, but we can recognize them and promise to go back there in a quiet moment. That usually allows me to be more present with the child in front of me. When I start to peel back a trigger, sometimes it’s contextual, I’m exhausted or I’m hungry, or there’s just been a lot going on. Or sometimes it’s from further back. Maybe I wasn’t allowed to express things in the same way that they are now. Maybe I feel they aren’t being grateful, even though I’ve worked so hard to make something happen.
But those things are about me. They’re not about my children, and I don’t want to put that weight on them. I can sort through where those feelings are coming from. And then if further conversations needed, it’s coming from a grounded place in the present, not a triggered place from the past.
So, maybe I did put a lot of effort into something and it just isn’t feeling great, their reaction or what’s going on around me. But once I’ve moved through any triggered energy, I can be honest about any overwhelm I’m experiencing and we can start to solve that together. Maybe I find out they didn’t want me to do all the things that I was doing. They didn’t need that. Maybe they didn’t understand what was involved. They’re kids. They don’t understand all the machinations sometimes. But I wanted to approach these conversations with love and curiosity, not anger that’s stemming from a situation or a time that has nothing to do with this person in front of me.
PAM: Absolutely. I love that reminder so much, Anna, that how I’m experiencing their emotions is about me. Of course it’s about me. And I so remember those thoughts of, what do they have to be unhappy about? And you both shared some great thoughts around peeling back some of the layers around that. And I wanted to pull out something you mentioned, Erika, about sometimes feeling like we’re not doing a good enough job at this unschooling thing because our kids are unhappy.
On one hand is everything that we’ve shared to this point about happiness not being a particularly useful gauge, and also it can be helpful to not ignore our wonderings around whether we’re doing a “good enough” job. Because I know in my experience, if we try to ignore those feelings, there’s a pretty good chance they’ll just keep bubbling up again and again and a bit louder each time until we take some time to process through them.
So, when I was processing through those feelings of not good enough, I found it helpful to reground myself in why we chose unschooling as our family’s lifestyle in the first place, to explore my perspectives on happiness like this, and to tease apart my children’s unhappiness from my actions. Is that something I have control over? To contemplate if I can learn more about my child, about their personality and their needs through better understanding why they’re unhappy. And to brainstorm some creative new ways to lean into supporting them in their endeavors.
So, not using those feelings of “not good enough” as a sign of failure, but as a clue that it just might be time to do a check-in on our engagement and just re-energize and refresh our unschooling enthusiasm.
ERIKA: Yeah. Right. When our feelings and doubts are creeping up, I love that idea of using them as a clue rather than kind of jumping to a conclusion that everything is broken. I think using it as a clue and maybe a little signal to look into things could lead to great new places for the whole family. If we’re using our emotions just as a clue and a little trigger for us to get open and curious rather than shutting ourselves down.
And Anna, I love that part about examining our triggers and one of the recent episodes on the Living Joyfully podcast was about triggers. That was episode 21. So, that might be an interesting concept to dive into just as part of this de-schooling work around happiness.
And I think that the work that we do, all that inner work that we are doing to grow as unschooling parents can really help us navigate life’s challenges. I also think that choosing to focus on relationships can help the whole family when things get difficult, but just because we have the tools and the strong relationships doesn’t mean that hard things don’t happen. Because again, it’s real life.
And so, I thought maybe we could mention some of the ways that unschooling and connected relationships help us to navigate challenges. So, one big one for me is the trust that’s there in our family. So, whether we’re dealing with all getting sick with Covid, which happened recently, or a favorite toy breaking, or a death in the family, or facing a big change, like a new work schedule or moving into a new home, the trust that we’ve built as a family means that my kids know that I’m taking them into consideration, that their feelings are important, and that we’re all doing the best that we can to get through these situations together.
It doesn’t take away the stress of the situation, but it puts us together on the same team to navigate it. I tend to wear my emotions on my face, and so there’s no hiding when something is feeling stressful for me. But I think that having built up lots of experience with facing a challenge and getting through it, with me feeling stressed out and then moving through it, that just creates this sense of trust that the kids have in our capacity to handle difficult things. And they know that we all have hard times and we all have intense emotions sometimes, and that those will pass.
ANNA: I mean, I feel like that trust really helps me stay optimistic and centered when things go sideways. I know we’ll work through it. We just have over and over again. I know we’re going to feel better again, and that just helps me stay present in the moment without kind of projecting out or spiraling back or any of that.
And I know it helped my girls, too, because they knew we would figure it out. They knew we’d just keep at it, even if we had to take a break and come back, or it took a little bit of time, we’d figure it out. And I think all of the time and practice we get with this helps so much in our families.
But it really is important to let go of this idea that things will always be rosy, because life just isn’t that way. It’s amazing and full of growth opportunities, with all kinds of joy and magic. And it has challenges that can help us learn and grow, and it’s just all a part of it. And so, understanding that helps take some of the charge out of the times that did feel harder for me. It was in the resistance, actually, that it felt so terrible.
Accepting or even embracing those times helped the flow feel more manageable and I could cultivate more curiosity, because I feel like in that resisting, “This shouldn’t be happening,” that’s where I would get stuck and very much pulled out of the moment. Then I’m in my head about what I should be doing differently or what’s happening. And so, that just never served me as well as just like, this is life.
Here we are.
And being open and curious has been such a helpful tool for me over the years, because it allows that little bit of space like, huh, what’s this bringing up in me? What’s happening for them? And even just the, I wonder how this is going to play out. That was what I needed to say. Like, I have no idea and I wonder what’s going to happen. Because it again brought me back into the moment and being open to all of the places that it could flow, understanding that I don’t know or control that. Cultivating that mindset keeps me from spiraling down a dark path of, they’re miserable, I’m failing. This whole thing is terrible. Everything is terrible. It grounds me back in the moment and helps me look with fresh eyes, like, okay, what am I seeing? There very well may be things that I want to or end up changing, like you were saying, Pam, like it’s important to think, hey, why is this happening? Are there things that we need to shift? But it’ll be coming from this calm, connected, curious place instead of a place of fear.
And I have found for me, and I really think it’s across the board, we just don’t make good decisions from a place of fear. It very much narrows our vision and we miss a lot of context and a lot of opportunity. Cassie Emmott is one of our Network members who has also been on the podcast and she has a beautiful quote that she said, “Am I being driven by fear or being led by love?” And it’s such a great reminder that really grounds me in the moment and helps me remain open and curious and acting from that place of love and connection. And from that place, we’re learning more about each other, more about the situation. We’re taking in much more information and the energy and the feel of it is just so different.
PAM: So, so different, and I really love that quote. Cassie was on the podcast in episode 346, and it’s a brilliant conversation to go back to, especially if you haven’t heard it yet. I think it’s a great touchstone just to help shift the energy of the situation from like being out of control, from that fear tunnel vision place to the openness, I’m leading. Here we go.
And yes, I too found the strong trust that develops in our relationships with our kids was fundamental to navigating life’s challenges. We were on the same team. So often, when things happen, we don’t know what that path will look like, but we trust each other that we’ll just keep exploring until everyone is comfortable.
And I think another way that our strong and connected relationships with our children can help us navigate challenges is the creativity it encourages, right? They feel safe to not only express their needs and their wants, but also to share any thoughts or ideas that bubble up without fear of being judged or belittled. We may not end up taking on the wildest of ideas, but they can help us start thinking outside the box and come up with ways to move through the challenge that we otherwise wouldn’t have even thought of, let alone considered.
In my experience, I ended up very soon just going to my kids first, because I knew they could break me out of like, I see A, B, and C, and that’s all I see. All of a sudden, they could bring me out and we could get so much more creative. And for them not needing to be vigilant about the people around you, not needing to first filter what you are thinking of sharing based on the reactions that you anticipate from others, that cultivates an emotionally safe place for our children to just sink into the flow of their thoughts and just share whatever bubbles up. I just found it to be so great for brainstorming possibilities around challenges as we were trying to move through them.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. Go ahead, Erika.
ERIKA: While you were both talking, I just had a thought about, if we are stuck in a fear place about them not being happy, that produces an energy where they’re not going to want to come to us if they’re upset about things in, in the same kind of open way that they can, if we’re able to release that wall that we put up against these negative emotions. And so, that open and curious and creativity happens so much better if we can sit with hard emotions with them. Then we can all be in a place where you know, they can share, I’m feeling like this and we can say, what do you think we should do about it? What would you like to do next? And start exploring ways to feel better. It’s a lot easier to do that with a parent who is not resisting the negative emotions or trying to rush a child through the negative emotions. So, I just think it creates this great environment.
ANNA: And who’s not catastrophizing and not maybe overly reacting. And not that we can’t react, we can have our reactions, but again, if it’s that open space, that emotionally safe space that you’re talking about, Pam, that’s where we learn so much more. It just shuts down so much when we get in our head and we’re off thinking, “This is terrible!” And so, yeah, I really love that.
PAM: I think the other piece in that safe space and what I think is just so valuable is, like what you were talking about, Erika, not rushing them through it. We realize it doesn’t need to be solved on our timetable, because we’re uncomfortable with it, but you know, it’s not our space right now. We’re not the one having the hard time right now.
So, giving them the space to work through it on their timetable. Because if they feel us rushing them through, it really sends the message that there’s something wrong with having those emotions. This is bad, this is not good that you’re not happy today. This is something we need to fix as soon as possible.
And so, sharing that message just makes it so much harder for them to get through, and like you said, to come next time and to realize that this is life. Like we’ve been saying. When I look back at my blog, just about every post at the bottom ends with “unschooling is life,” because where we get to. It’s not about some utopian vision. It’s not about everybody always being happy. It’s wonderful and amazing and beautiful relationships, but it’s life. And it’s being together on the same team and helping each other through it. Anyway, yeah. It’s lovely.
ANNA: Oh, I love that. Thank you so much. I really enjoyed this conversation and I hope that everyone found it helpful on their unschooling journey.
And if you enjoy these conversations, I really think you’d love the Living Joyfully Network. It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. You can learn more about it at living joyfully.ca/network.
And if you’ve been on the fence, you can join with the monthly subscription option, so you can check out the community, the rich archives of themes, the wonderful resources, and start to connect with the amazing people. If it’s not a fit, you can easily cancel. But I do hope you’ll check it out, because we have all kinds of amazing discussions. And I just want to bring you all into the discussions that we have like this all the time. But wishing everybody a lovely week, and thank you so much for joining us.
EU351: Bringing It Home: Navigating Technology
Jul 06, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re diving into another Bringing It Home episode. We’re looking deeper at our last Unschooling “Rules” topic, that unschoolers have unlimited screen time, and exploring what it can look like to navigate technology with our unschooling families.
Unsurprisingly, there is no one right approach. It’s so much about seeing through our children’s eyes and understanding the choices that feel good to them. Having conversations that involve the whole family makes navigating technology both safer and more fun!
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone! I am Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully, and this is episode number 351 of the podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello!
ANNA: Hello!
ERIKA: Hi!
PAM: So, in our last Unschooling “Rules” episode, we talked about the idea of unlimited screen time. We talked about how the term screen time is at this point, a pretty loaded yet meaningless phrase, and that unlimited doesn’t mean hands off.
So, in this Bringing It Home episode, let’s continue the conversation and talk about ways we might approach navigating technology, particularly when a child’s tech use isn’t feeling good to the parent. So, Anna, would you like to get us started talking about navigating technology?
ANNA: I would. Okay. So, I feel like in our last episode, we really focused on the higher level understanding of our language, the areas we can dig into and make sure we’re being intentional and focused on the present moment. In this episode, I think we can dig into what we can actually do, how it can look in our homes.
I mentioned this briefly last time, but whenever we find ourselves worried about how much time our kids are spending engaged with technology, instead of clamping down out of fear, we can lean in and learn more. No matter what interest area is being explored by technology, there are ways we can learn more about it and engage with our children around it.
I found it so helpful to learn the terms, especially if we’re talking about video games, levels, bosses, inventory, character names, story arcs. Understanding the specifics helped us have conversations, showed my children that I was interested in what they were diving into, and gave me so much more information about all the complexity of what they were doing.
And sometimes leaning in looks like being a listening ear. I’m sure we’ve all been on the receiving end of the very detailed information about a character or a game, or sometimes a random aspect of history. It isn’t always easy to be fully present for every power and evolution of each and every Pokemon. But those moments are when we can focus on and celebrate this thing that is capturing their interest. We can see the complexities and the thinking that goes into their engagement. Sometimes that alone is enough to calm any fears about what they’re doing and what they’re learning and how they’re engaging with it.
We miss that, I feel, if we just brush it off or oversimplify it. Really listening and taking the time to learn just makes such a difference, because it’s really about how to learn and how to engage with material, not about the material itself. The material is going to change over time, but that quest for knowledge and understanding is a muscle that can be flexed while digging into all kinds of interest areas.
And one of the ways that I would show that I was listening was to then find things outside the game that were somehow related. So, it might be Animal Crossing plushies or Zelda jewelry. “I see you, I want to celebrate and support what you love.” Sometimes, it was traveling to places that they saw on a show or finding ways that their interest came into play in other areas that maybe they weren’t aware of.
So often, we think it’s about getting them to stop the game or move away from it or move away from the show, but really, it can be about just broadening the scope and finding ways that we can all engage with the interest and end up learning so much more.
ERIKA: Right. I really have loved leaning into their interests. I’ve gotten pretty seriously into a lot of the games that my kids play and the shows that they watch. I had a long Minecraft phase and a Sims phase, and I play Roblox every day. And what that engagement does for me is now I speak the same language as them. I get it. And that makes a difference to them. Plus, it’s so much more fun for me.
And I love that too, about bringing in more things to their lives that are related to their interests. And that really only works if we’re leaning in to learn about it. Now I can think, oh, if you really like that game, you might like this. Or, let’s get the toys that go with that show so that we can play with the characters together. It’s just so much fun to help them take that interest deeper, obviously without attachment to the outcome.
PAM: Yes, exactly. Exactly. And I am in the midst of my Minecraft phase right now.
ANNA: Nice.
PAM: But yes, using that lens of learning, it just brings to mind for me the image of a web and the more connections to each node, to each piece of information or skill, the deeper, richer, their understanding of the thing is, the stronger the web is. So, if there’s something they’re interested in, how cool is it if I can find related things that broaden their knowledge in the ways that they enjoy? But I need to be engaged and understand the language and understand the complexity. We think it’s so simple when we’re just watching them, play or surf around, they make them look so easy.
But when we understand it, we see so much more. When we engage with them, we see so much more. We get a richer picture of it, which helps us broaden it, as you said, without the attachments to them just wanting to dig further, but even planting the seed that they know there are more pieces in the world that might be related maybe a couple months from now they’ll be interested in.
I wrote more about this idea in my book Free to Learn. And in there I shared a couple of connection maps that I created at the time when I was exploring this, when I was like really concerned with how much game playing there was. And with my daughter, it was Harry Potter and being really into those books. So, I created these maps looking at the connections between the interests and activities that I noticed them doing as they dove into their passions. Many of which, even back then, involved screen interfaces.
So, if I left it at, “They’re using a screen,” and just put that in the middle, I’d have known so little about all the exploration and learning that they were up to. My maps would have just been a couple of dots. And I would’ve been at a loss as to other things to bring into their lives that they might find interesting. And that’s that distinction, right? Not what I wish they were interested in, but what they might actually be interested in. And the conclusion, where I would naturally go is, I just need to get them off the screens, because this is all they’re doing. This is all they’re doing! Right?
ERIKA: Exactly. And then all those things that they love would just be mysterious and easy for us to dismiss. And I love those maps, too, and looking at all those connections that they’re making.
And I want to talk about just how important connection is in all of this. I know we keep mentioning it, but it really is what makes this approach work, because by focusing on connection, like the connection that we’re feeling in our relationship with our kids, we keep communication open and we more easily see the learning and the joy that they get out of their interests. And we learn so much about our kids and what’s important to them.
And so, of course, connection is such a key in our relationships. But I think connection is also what helps us deal with our worries and fears as well. Because one of the biggest fears that comes up when we talk about screens is online safety, which we talked about in a recent Q&A episode, too. And connection really is the answer there, too, because when I’m connected with my kids, they feel safe coming to me and sharing the things that happen. If instead, I keep focusing on how they shouldn’t be spending so much time online, they’re going to want to hide things more. It doesn’t feel good to be judged.
So, being non-judgmental, showing unconditional love and connection is what helps learning thrive, and it’s what helps keep them safe as well. I think it just helps so much when my kids know that I understand them, I understand their interests, I respect the things that they’re interested in. That just helps them trust that I can help them when they’re facing a challenge.
PAM: Oh, absolutely. Connection really is so valuable when it comes to just navigating our lives together, right? And feeling judged by a parent is kind of like dousing that connection in ice water. I can just literally feel it. Just imagine when somebody judges something you do, how you shrink, right? It doesn’t feel good and it weakens that trust that they have in us.
I think it can also drown out their inner voice. Their self-talk may well become focused on fending off our judgment rather than exploring how things feel to them. So, for example, they might not hear that too muchness message until it’s loud enough to be causing more friction in their lives than it needed to. And without having someone they trust to help them process challenges and brainstorm possibilities, they may feel stuck longer. Right.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. I think the safety point is so important because yes, kids are the safest when they have strong, trusted connections. They know we aren’t judging them. They know we will help them do the things they enjoy, so they feel comfortable telling us if something doesn’t feel good or feels off and they know we’ll listen and help them find a way through. They know that I’m not going to go, “Well then you should never go on that game again!” “I told you it was terrible.” They know that, “I know you love that game. I know these are the things you love about it. This is feeling weird. Let’s solve for that.” And so, that keeps them so much safer.
Because, like you said, Pam, that’s that pushing through that feeling of being uncomfortable or too much. They can do that if they don’t feel like they have the trusted advisor, somebody else to bounce ideas off of, somebody that will support them. So bringing that calm presence to work through a problem is so important. It helps our kids feel safe and secure knowing that we’re there to help without judging them or their interests. And that just creates more connection, more safety, more security, and more learning, because we’re having those conversations.
PAM: Yeah. Those conversations are everything. And we’ve talked about it before and I’m sure we’ll dive into it deeper again, but not all kids are super talkative. Not all adults are super talkative either. You don’t need to literally talk to have conversations, like to have communication. And you don’t need to have, like we were talking about earlier, long sit-down conversations, for us to process.
It could be a few words here, a few words there. It could be paying attention and watching and seeing their reaction. Seeing how they’re engaging, seeing what’s turning them off. There are so many ways to communicate.
Anyway, there was something else that I wanted to mention too, which is how ever things look right now around this, they won’t last forever. That’s our, projecting into the future all the time. One of the big worries we might have. Their interests and passions that are accessed through a screen will likely wax and wane over the years just woven into the fabric of that rich life that we’ve been talking about.
Yes, right now technology is having a season of explosive growth as we continue to innovate and see what we can do with it. The creativity is all around us.
But when we don’t bring a good, bad, judgmental energy to it, when we shine the light on what we’re actually engaging in through that screen interface, we don’t give it that power over us that often comes from fearing something, right? And instead we can just focus on exploring and learning and coming to our days with intention.
Without power and fear in the the mix, we can explore what brings us comfort, right? Because I know sometimes I just want to relax, cocoon, and watch an old show. We can play with tech-free days and weeks for ourselves or consensually together if our kids are curious, too, and just see how it feels. We can share our experiences with our kids without them receiving that big side dish of judgment, because as we were talking about, this is new to us, too.
So, over time, conversations will bubble up around how apps and loot boxes try to keep our attention and entice us to spend money, same as we talk about commercials on TV and direct mail advertising that arrives in our mailbox. We’ll talk about ways to spot scams and how people reengage with online may well not be who they appear to be, not to scare ourselves, not to create fear and run away from it, but just to become more knowledgeable, to become a bit wiser about it, to understand it more deeply. Being hands off and leaving our kids to navigate these things on their own because we have an unlimited screen time rule can make navigating online more challenging, because they have to figure it out all by themselves. We’re just saying, yep, yep. Whatever you want. That’s that disconnection we were talking about.
And having screen time rules that apply only to the kids can also muddy the waters, right? Because we’re sending the message that they aren’t smart enough to figure it out. We think less of them we’ve gotta figured out. So, we can have our phones all the time, but you can’t use the screens till after 4:00 or whatever it is that we feel comfortable with.
Instead, together we can explore what feels good for each of us right now and be open to how that changes over time. Because it will. It really will. And things can change more fluidly if they’re not covered in that goo of judgment, like that heaviness of judgment.
ANNA: Oh, it’s so true. The goo of judgment. It’s a surefire way to harm a relationship. And we’ve all been on the receiving end of it at one time or another, and know that it does not bring us closer to the person who’s doing the judging.
And I love the reminder that what we talk about here is so very different from a hands-off approach. I think it’s the opposite, really, because we’re so involved in tending to our relationships, to understanding and supporting one another, understanding ourselves. It takes time and commitment to be in a deep and meaningful relationship. But who better to invest that time in than our children?
And what we found was that all of the things that you mentioned about the different safety pieces or the things you were learning came up in just normal conversations as we were navigating the world together. What does this mean? What’s this popup? Why are they asking me to do this? Why does this cost Robux and that doesn’t? They just naturally came up. There wasn’t a need for big sit downs or scary talks. We’d all share the things we’d find and things that surprised us, and things that didn’t feel great. And it was all just a part of the fabric of our lives.
And so, I think that can be confusing, because like you said, I think people envision the big sit down, but it’s really, we’re all on our, back in our day, Nintendo DS yelling across the room to the other person about what we’re seeing and why is this happening and we’re having good conversations about it. I think so often, we can fall into the trap of performing as a good parent, that we for forget to engage as humans.
I feel like my kids were well served by having honest, connected relationships with their dad and with me, where we could learn from one another, share our best information, chart our individual courses from there, trusting that while we are on our own unique paths, our journeys intertwined because we want them to, because it feels better. And so, we can look beyond arbitrary rules to find what feels best to each of us, knowing that it can change, knowing that we’ll continue to be there for each other as we navigate new technologies, new relationships, new jobs, all the things that come with life, all the richness that’s thrown with life. It’s the same process of understanding ourselves, understanding each other, engaging, having conversations, just being, exploring this world together.
ERIKA: Yes. It’s so much nicer than staying stuck in just this role of parent, and I really loved what you both mentioned about how a rule, whether it’s the unlimited screen time rule or the no screen time rule, both of those are so much more disconnecting than what we’re talking about. And I just love that and I’m still thinking about that image of the goo of judgment, Pam. I loved that. But it’s true. When we’re stuck in that place of fear and judging, it adds this layer of goo to the situation. It makes it harder for us to see clearly what’s actually happening and to be able to see what all the possibilities are from this place.
So, sharing information that isn’t about fear and judgment feels so much better. It’s fun to talk to the kids about the ways that online games are trying to get their money. We talk about it all the time. We’ve noticed those ads that can make it look like someone’s doing like a really terrible job playing the game to make you get so frustrated that you want to download it yourself. And I’m like, I could play that better than them. And, and I’m like, wait a second. They know that that’s what I’m thinking!
And that endless scroll of TikTok. We talk about that Maya comments on how easy it is to just keep scrolling and scrolling and it’s like, hmm, it’s interesting to notice and talk about.
And sometimes it feels fun to keep scrolling and sometimes it doesn’t. And so, it’s nice to be able to have those conversations and notice those feelings in ourselves. But regardless of what we are navigating in our world, there are going to be so many things to learn about how it feels to us as unique people. And I think it’s, again, so important to remember just how different each individual person is. And so, it helps me trust that we are all figuring out what works for us, and technology is just one aspect of our lives that we can each explore and figure out for ourselves.
PAM: Okay. I just want to bring back that scrolling TikTok example, because that’s a beautiful example, because in one moment, scrolling and continuing to like take that moment. “Yeah, I’m gonna keep scrolling,” is fun and is exactly the right choice in that moment. And then another time I’m scrolling on like, “Oh man, this doesn’t feel good. It’s time to stop.” There is no one right answer, right? Just like “No screen time,” or, “Screen time all the time.” None of it is right, except for the individual, but also the individual in this particular moment.
So, what we’re giving them when we’re giving them this space to explore is the space to have moments along the whole spectrum of when this feels amazing, when this feels horrible, what are my choices in each of those moments? And they’ve got so much more experience with navigating it than they would have if they have a framework or a rule over top of them that tells them, “This framework knows better than you do.”
At some point when they don’t have that framework, they’re going to need to figure out these tools for themselves.
ANNA: Right. We’re taking away that discernment, that critical thinking. And I think it’s hard, because you know why people want to do it. We want to make it perfect and make sure we’re doing the right things. But, for me, I felt like the time that my kids were at home with us and luckily as unschoolers, we do have lots of time together, that’s the time to get in those mucky places, for it to feel bad about scrolling and figuring out and then going, “Yeah, I don’t like that, and why don’t I like that? But now today I love it.” I just felt like that was such a great environment to explore and learn versus me making rules when they’re young. And then they’re out on their own and I guess what it’s bringing to mind is when I first went to college just like, woo! People went nuts!
I didn’t have a lot of rules as a child. I don’t know. I was the baby and my siblings were older. So, my parents, we had a more conversational kind of environment, so I just was way more mature, but all those people that have been controlled all that time, whoa! Because they didn’t have that time to explore that with their parents as partners. It’s just so different.
ERIKA: It’s becoming clearer to me as we’re talking about it how limiting in either direction, in either direction is and how much more you can learn without that kind of structure. Oh, I love that.
PAM: And one last thing that bubbled up for me as you were talking there, and I will catch that bubble in my mind before this ends. One of the things, too, I feel, because at least I remember processing through it a lot, is that in my role as parent, I felt like I was failing if my kid was like upset about something or didn’t feel good. If my child was doing something that in the end they came to me and said, I did not enjoy doing that, scrolling longer or whatever, I would feel like that was a failure of mine. It’s like, oh my gosh, my role as a parent is to make this wonderful childhood for my child where they’re having fun all the time.
And so, yeah, it was the work of understanding the importance and the depth of allowing them or giving them the space, especially while they’re with me, to explore the wide range of experiences that life can offer or the wide range of experiences that they are interested in exploring. Because we can also go, oh, I want my kid to experience all the things, and I’m trying to take them here, do this, this, and this.
No, what’s important is what they’re wanting to explore in the moment, because that’s where they’re going to learn the most about themselves and about the thing, because they’re gaining that wide range of experiences of, how do I want to engage with this thing? And like you said, Anna, that experience with the process is what they’re learning and how they like to engage with the process. And in having a harder time or ending up feeling bad about something, they’ve learned how they start to feel bad, and then sometimes they can start to catch that even earlier. It’s like, ooh, I’m starting to feel a little bit off. I know from experience that if I keep this up for another hour, I’ll feel even worse. And then at least then they’re making a more cognizant or intentional choice. In that moment, it’s like, no, I really want where I am right now. None of that is wrong. None of that means I’m a failure as a parent, but I’m around to chat and help them process, and I can notice.
And maybe I mention, “You look like you’re starting to feel a little squirrely. Do you want to do X, Y, or Z?” And if they say, “No, that’s okay,” It’s not like, “Darn, they didn’t listen to me.” All of a sudden, the role as a parent that we can often feel and struggle with can be really impactful in this situation, too.
ANNA: Right, because that’s that piece of like, we’re not really looking at the human engagement part of it. And one last piece that bubbled up for me when you said that is that piece of how we think we have to expose them to everything during this time that they’re with us, but really life is this long game if we’re lucky. And it may be that like they realize, okay, I spent a bunch of years cocooning and doing this. All this learning was happening. Learning about who they are, what they want, different internal aspects, things we can’t even see. And then they may make different choices later, but it doesn’t all have to happen.
And I think that’s our piece of that role of parent thinking. We need to control and mold and make sure everything’s perfect and going to turn out in this one way. And it’s like, oh, if we can just engage as humans traveling along, learning from each other, figuring things out, it just has such a different feel to it.
PAM: Oh, it really does. Okay. Thank you. Thank you so much. This was so much fun. And we hope everyone else enjoyed listening in on our conversation and you found it maybe a little bit helpful on your unschooling journey. Thanks so much and wishing everyone a lovely week.
ERIKA: Bye!
ANNA: Bye!
EU350: On the Journey with Sarah McMackin
Jun 08, 2023
This week, we’re back with another On the Journey episode. Pam, Anna, and Erika are joined by Living Joyfully Network member Sarah McMackin. Sarah is an unschooling mom to Eamon, who just turned seven. She also runs a restaurant in Austin, TX with her husband, Ray.
We talk about Sarah’s experience unschooling an only child, we explore how unschooling and running a business mesh together, and we dive very deep into the power of play! It was so amazing having Sarah share her story on the podcast and we hope you find our conversation inspiring on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hello everyone! I am Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and this is episode number 350 of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis, as well as our special guest this week, Sarah McMackin. Welcome to you all.
PAM: Hi!
ERIKA: Hi!
SARAH: Hi!
ANNA: Today, we’re sharing another episode in our On the Journey series where we speak to our guests about their experiences, their a-ha moments, their challenges, and what they’ve learned on their unschooling journeys. Sarah is a member of the Living Joyfully Network, and I have so enjoyed meeting her and getting to know her and her family. Sarah brings so much joy to everything she does. Her insights and excitement about being a parent and finding ways to focus on connection while running two successful restaurants in Austin, Texas is so inspiring. I am very excited for her to be here and share some of her story on this On the Journey episode.
So now, I’m going to turn it over to Erika to get us started.
ERIKA: Hi! Hi, Sarah.
SARAH: Hi.
ERIKA: I’m so excited to have Sarah joining us and I thought we could start maybe with you sharing a little bit about you and your family and what everyone is interested in these days.
SARAH: Sure. Thanks so much for having me on. Yeah, in my inner household it’s myself and then my husband Ray, and our son Eamon. We live in Austin, Texas. And Eamon just turned seven yesterday, but old soul. Old soul.
Yeah, so Eamon’s overarching, major passion is play and then that permeates everything. Everything that he does. Pretend play, and then it’s really manifested into video gaming and how he even engages with video games. So, basically, I mean, right now he is really into simulation games and first-person, really immersive, playing with them, making up storylines and stuff like this.
When he was five or so, I think I showed him Laurel and Hardy and that right there like sparked this thing in him with this like dynamic duo kind of mentality of like getting into mishaps and just having a sort of dynamic in which they’re engaged like with the world. He has literally taken that up and just used that in most of our play. Because him being an only child, it’s really been him and me in a big way. And so, coming from a playful parent, like my mom, it comes very naturally for me. So, that’s a lot of the day is him oscillating between his screen and video gaming and YouTubeing and watching all the stuff, the walkthroughs, other gamers doing their thing, and then rolling that in.
So typically, he likes me to be sitting with him and like engaging with the game itself. So, it’s not just the video game. Because the games that he plays are not typically like ones that have a goal. They’re just kind of these open world simulation and then let’s make up scenarios and let’s make up kind of character development and stuff like that and bring it in.
So, he’s really into that. He’s just gotten close to, over the last few weeks, gaming with one of the Network folks’ son in Denmark. So, we’re in Texas and they’re in Denmark. So, it’s a seven-hour difference. So, they’re gaming together typically two times a day, morning time here when it’s their evening, but not really morning, more like 1:00 PM, because Eamon is a night owl, just like his dad. So, he is going to sleep around 3:00 AM lately, which is also how he’s learning time. He keeps jumping into bed and saying, “The small hand was on the two,” or, “The small hand was on the three.” So, he’s sort of playing with that.
And then he wakes up around 1:00 and it’s right on with Theodor. So, the two of them are playing Fortnite right now, and they’re playing this game called Wobbly Life, which is really fun to hear him. He was always, being an old soul and being I think an only child and then unschooling, part of the reason why we unschool is because I think he was kind of overwhelmed socially with other kids, really, when he was small and he really loved just our play and the way that we work together.
So, just to watch him now at almost seven or now seven be very comfortable and open and ready for some real social engagement. I mean, now it’s like he’s just hamming it up. I mean, he doesn’t stop talking. Theodor doesn’t stop talking. And the two of them are just like at it. So, there’s this whole little friendship thing happening now socially for him, which is really interesting.
And he loves filmmaking, like making stop motions. And he’s not a big movie watcher, but it’s amazing how much he’s gleaned just from the few movies that he’s seen. And then I think YouTube, which at first, YouTube was very scary to me as a medium of like, wow, is this what we’re going to be watching? It felt like reality tv, all the time, which was just sort of foreign to my upbringing because it was like just shows and these like beautiful plots and very controlled characters and stuff. And now it’s like, oh god, what is he watching now? But he has gotten so much out of it, and I’ve sat with him and watched a lot with him, and now I’ve felt the freedom to kind of like, I could be cleaning and he’s doing that.
But the social and the comedic and the everything he picks up, he is like finding what really turns him on, and then he’s able to utilize that in his gaming, in his filmmaking, anything like that. So, shorts and stuff are now coming in to play, which again, the YouTube shorts, you’re like, oh my god, what is this doing to a brain? Are we okay? This is a scroll. We haven’t gotten into TikTok yet, but he’s doing it and the guys that he’s watching or the girls he is watching, it’s like they’re so Eamon. They’re so him. And when they’re not, he just kind of flips it, or it is, and now it’s a new aspect of him. And so, that right there, it’s just wonderful. It’s all weaving into life.
But the real passion that he has for the filmmaking part, at least what he’s said at this point, is the editing. So, he loves the filming and then he could sit for hours and he will edit till the cows come home. Music, he loves picking out like the perfect soundtrack to like any moment. Right? And even in our play, he’s got these Spotify playlists that are kind of vaudeville. They’re very jazzy and, but like with a jauntiness. Or he’s got some real intense savior kind of music, like rescue music or something. And it’s like, that’s when things go into slow-mo and we’ve got stuffies and gnomes. But it makes the play so much easier to do because you’ve got this music.
So, I just feel like the music, the video gaming, the video editing, all of it, him being able to control the scene, it’s really about that. He almost thinks in vignettes in a way, which is so interesting, like how we’re going to make this up and then the song will change and it changes the whole mood. So, he’s just playing. He’s playing with everything. And so, that would be him right now. It’s a lot of video. It’s a lot of YouTube. It’s a lot of the gaming and then the pretend play with me.
And then I guess just what we are into. So, Ray and I, yeah, we opened up a plant-based gastropub here in Austin, the same year we had Eamon, which people think is crazy. But then I’m like, well, I don’t know when else we would’ve done it. So, actually it’s really good timing that we did that, because we wouldn’t have had any time otherwise.
And so, for the first six years I’d say, we had a GM and we just had the team. And so, Ray and I divided and conquered attachment parenting with Amon, so I’ve been with him a hundred percent. We still co-sleep. We still nurse. We still do it all. And my focus was really on like playing with him in a very immersive way and that’s just it. And so, we’ve just continued that on, and Ray taking on over at The Beer Plant more.
And then recently, we sort of had a little shake up. So, COVID, in restaurants, you can imagine. So, just some things have gone just a little funky. And so, I’ve decided just in the last six weeks, “Hey, we’ve been trying to weather this. Why don’t I get a little bit more involved? I think it’s just a lot to handle for one person and maybe I think I need to get more in tune with this thing because it’s a lot of parts and it’s a lot of people.”
And anyway, so my new thing basically is like kind of getting in there in general managing from the morning and the sleep cycle has worked out so well in terms of Eamon staying up so late and sleeping in, so I can get up, get over there, come back, and be with him for a bit and then get over there again if I need to.
So, that’s kind of a new thing right now. We’re playing with sleep. We’re playing with me working more, but really having all these wonderful conversations about how life is changing a little bit. But that The Beer Plant needs my attention right now, but he does too. So, he and I like make sure that we really create like a great schedule for that. Because before this, I mean really it’s been The Beer Plant, Eamon. and unschooling, and that’s where I’m at anyway. Those are my interests and what takes up most of my time.
And we’ve got some new neighbors, which I haven’t had much social stuff. So, again, as Eamon is kind of blooming with Theodore, I feel like we’re in tandem where we’ve got these new neighbors that now are coming over once a week that we’ve like met. And I just love them. And it takes a lot to just like really love, I don’t know, like really commune with people at this age, so that’s been really fun to kind of open and develop my social aspect a little, like that social self a little bit.
And then Ray is my nighttime researcher. He’s nocturnal, so he’s at The Beer Plant every evening, just helping be a gofer and stuff like that. And then, he’s home and he just researches whether it’s health topics or state of the world or whatever. Yeah, that’s where we’re at right now. So, anyway. Yeah, I went a lot of places.
ERIKA: Wow! That was so amazing. I think that what you were sharing about Eamon, what came up for me is like, he’s seven. And what an amazing, rich, deep life he gets to have. How even a young child like that can have these really strong interests and really explore the depths of things, human emotion and human relationships and storytelling and like all these things. And I think mainstream culture will tell us that children that young, they just have to wait. You have to wait till you get older, till you can actually explore these things. But hearing all the things he gets to do at seven just gives me goosebumps. What an amazing life. You know?
SARAH: Yep. Well, when you’re in it, too, you don’t have that perspective. To me, that’s just Eamon. And Eamon is ageless. He just really is, because he’s always been this old soul, verbal, thinking about a million things. And so, it doesn’t even strike me as it would be different, but yeah, when you step back and you just say, wow. You’re allowed to just really go to town on anything you want and all that you get back from that, it’s unbelievable.
PAM: I love it. I do, and what struck me too was the openness of your lives in that, this friendship has bubbled up now for Eamon, and you’re noticing a friendship bubbling up for you alongside, and you’re weaving in getting more involved at the restaurant. So, for me, that’s the seasonality of life and the ability to flow as things come up, because, I mean, that is stressful that things went funky absolutely during COVID and the recovery season from that and figuring things out.
So, even when life gets funky, we have the space to let things bubble up. And as you say, we’re trying this. You’re working with Eamon to see, does this still feel like we’re connected? Are you still feeling comfortable with this? And even if it’s not big conversations. He’s very verbal, so probably you guys are literally chatting about it. But also, you can see through reactions, through emotions, through all these pieces.
They’re still communicating how things are feeling for them, and even when we choose something to try, and then we need to morph it a little bit more, it’s not wrong. Each little step is like, ooh, we’re going to try this and we’re going to learn a little bit more about how it feels, and then we’ll keep tweaking it until we hit something that feels good. And then I always add for now, right? Because these grow and change over time, don’t they?
ANNA: So much.
PAM: Okay. I have the next question and, absolutely, you mentioned your restaurant business and we just wanted to hear a little bit more about how you see running your business and unschooling fitting together into your life. If you could dive into that a little bit more, that would be so cool.
SARAH: Oh yeah, of course. Yeah. I mean, gosh, the two things, they seem like they’re so similar, on this similar track. They’re like boundless. They’re never stopping. I don’t know. It’s like choose your adventure at all times, basically. And it’s about listening and growing. I mean, you open a restaurant and you don’t quite realize, but it’s like this living, breathing thing, right?
And from the backside, it’s like you’ve got so many parts. You’ve got to listen to the guests. You’ve got to listen to your team. There’s a lot of support that it needs. There’s a lot of creativity. It’s like the same thing as this unschooling, where you wake up every day and there’s no difference between Monday and Sunday, really. Except for us, it’s like volume on Friday night and Saturday night, but that’s about the only rhythm that changes. So, there’s no nine to five.
And so, for me and for Ray, I think even in the beginning, it’s funny, I sort of had this like realization about like balance and trying to strike balance. I was sort of like, you know what? The hell with balance for a little while and the restaurant’s going to take everything. It’s going to be a hundred percent for us and Eamon is going to be a hundred percent. We live in a fixer upper. It’s just perpetually a fixer upper.
You know why? Because we don’t have the time right now. Eventually we will have the time. So, I can put that aside and I can prioritize that the restaurant really needs this, or Eamon really needs this, or whatever it is. But it’s amazing when you’re present in something and also you’re in the driver’s seat, and Eamon is in the driver’s seat, too. So, I don’t mean that Ray and I are driving Eamon at all. It’s like the three of us get to kind of drive these lives and we’re driving the restaurant, but at the same time, so is everybody else that’s involved in it.
And so, it takes this like team effort and so many beautiful things come out of it and with unschooling, because everybody’s involved, everyone’s chatting. We run the restaurant the same way with Eamon. For better and for worse, we’re very relaxed people. Except for a little anxiety about stuff, but that’s behind and then very approachable, communicative. Let’s work together. It’s kind of soft and really nice. We’ve heard about cutthroat restaurants and the way that restaurants typically function, it’s like, it’s the numbers, it’s the bottom line. It’s, we’ve got managers in place and everyone knows exactly what they’re doing at all times. And this is what we do on Mondays. This is what we do on Tuesdays. We are not like that, which some people can hang with that and some people can’t. And a lot of people would be like, ah! I can’t do this! Like, you can’t run a restaurant like that.
Or, with Eamon, Eamon does what Eamon wants. We do it together. It works out so beautifully. He goes to bed when he wants, when his body’s tired. He eats when he wants, what he wants. A lot of my adult friends, it’s like, oh my gosh! I could never do it! They have school vacation and they’re like, oh my gosh! What are we going to do this week? You know? I’m going out of my mind! Where I’m like, oh my gosh. It’s the best. So, I guess the two things are. It’s not counterintuitive, but I guess so from a cultural standpoint. We’re doing both of these things in very different ways, but they’re the ways that are authentic to us, and they work out nearly, almost all the time.
Except for that footing, which again, I do think that Covid, yeah. That definitely shook stuff up. And in life you get those little missteps, too, where you’re just like, oh, things got funky, like you said, and we’re gonna get all in and just approach it just like we do every day and then figure it out. So, I guess the two, they really work so well together, the fact that I can get up and I can prioritize my day, and I don’t have to be anywhere at any time unless I’ve made a meeting time or something like that. But everything’s flexible, too.
And the flexibility piece is just so, I mean, in some ways I feel not like spoiled, but I feel so lucky, I guess would be the word, the positive word. It’s just very, very fortunate that we all, the three of us in this house, can do whatever we need to do and want to do, when we want to do it, and how we need to. And it’s going to take more of our brain power oftentimes because we’re the ones that are behind everything. We don’t have a principal or a teacher or I don’t have a boss that’s telling me, oh, Sarah, actually don’t you see that your food costs are this? I have to do that. So, it’s hyper-vigilant and you still have to sleep, which we get plenty of it, because we get to sleep when we want. So, that’s just it.
PAM: I find that interesting, too, to think about, because yes, when we feel so empowered and lucky that we have control over our time like that, but it does take energy to make the choices. We are empowered and we need to make the choices of what we’re going to do. Or even that we need a rest day or we need a rest hour, or whatever it is.
But I think that can be something too with kids with unschooling. At some point, sometimes it can feel a bit overwhelming to be making all the choices. And then it’s like, oh, just tell me what to do, etc. So, I think that is just a fascinating piece that we learn about ourselves and to be okay with, oh geez, if I just knew what to do. I don’t quite have the energy for making all these choices. Yet, I know in my case anyway, even when I kind of felt that way, I never chose that way. Because the value of having the choice in my life always, always won out. Because then I knew, oh, that’s kind of a clue that I’m feeling a little low energy. Maybe I’m starting to burn out just a touch, that this is starting to feel a little overwhelming. So, I might need a little bit more self-care. Just bring that up rather than thinking, oh no, this was all wrong and I would rather just have outside control over my schedule. I don’t know. That might have been a weird way, but that’s what bubbled up for me, because that freedom is awesome. But just acknowledging that it also takes energy, doesn’t it?
ANNA: What I loved and want to really point out, so we’re talking about unschooling a lot here, which education’s pretty conventional in our society, and we’re taking an unconventional look, a creative look. We can change things up.
And what I love is that the restaurant business, I mean, there are people that very much think there’s a conventional way to run a restaurant and that it has to look a certain way. And to me, it’s just this reminder of, you know what? All bets are off. We can change anything. And, Pam, we’ve talked about it a lot before. Once you start down that unschooling path, you really just start to question all the things. And so, really, do I have to be doing it the way that they’re saying that I need to do it?
And so, I love that you have these two things that you’re making fit authentically with you, that you’re looking at it with this new creative eye, and that you’re not getting bogged down in the, “Well, for to run a restaurant successfully, you have to do X, Y, and Z,” because it’s just not true. There’s so many ways to do things, and so, I don’t know. I love that aspect of like just bringing the lens to everything.
ERIKA: Yeah, as I was hearing you talk, Sarah, it was all these paradigm shifts jumping out at me.
You know, like the paradigm shift of, we’re not doing power-over. It’s going to be collaborative. And there is no such thing as a “have to.” We’re going to just make choices of what we want to do and these are huge paradigm shifts to make if you’re coming from a conventional place.
But I just love how all the things that we talk about with unschooling just weave right into all the other things we do. When you’re interacting with the people that you work with at the restaurant, the same principles of communication and collaboration, those same things can apply so well and really, I think could surprise people with how well it can work to come from that angle.
ANNA: Yeah, and how much better it can feel, too, because the restaurant business can have a lot of darkness to it for people. And I think part of that is the convention that’s put on it. And so, I love that you’re just rethinking all of that and it just sounds like it fits and feels so much better for everyone involved.
So, I have question number three, which kind of hearkens back to something you were talking about earlier, but on the Network, you’ve talked a lot about Eamon and his play and I loved hearing those nuances of all the things he’s into and how you’re involved with that. But I think just talking a little bit more about how that evolved and it sounds like it came pretty naturally to you. What have you learned in that process? Or has it been like you thought it was going to be, or just a little bit more about that, because I’m so fascinated by the beauty of the play that you all have.
SARAH: Oh yeah. Because it’s so big in our lives, most of the day, like I’ve said, the characters just kind of come out. And they’re in every moment. And we just know we’ve got the stuffies, a lot of it’s characters, right? And that means also that the play comes with us wherever we go.
So, I guess, the bond, and again, Eamon is an only child, so I take that stock right now. If he had siblings, he’d probably be playing with them all the time right now. And a lot of learning would be coming from that. So, families that do have more than one child would be like, that’s where that’s going. But as a mom of an only child, I could see very early on it was like our play dynamic just worked from the get-go.
So, when he was very small, of course you’re playing with two-year-olds, you’re playing with three-year-olds, you’re playing with stuff, but mainly you’re just playing together. And at the park, it was me and him. And it’s not just chase, it’s more this character thing. I could just see this within him. And not that he’s not him. He likes to even be him. But then maybe I’m a YouTuber that he loves and he lights up. He literally feels like that YouTuber is right there. So, this is where just a little bit of like, I was in drama in high school and college, not even college, I only went to high school, because it just wasn’t a thing. But I’m like, this is where you use that. This is where that improv comes in. Just have fun with it.
The closeness and bond and the being able to have it in my pocket at all times, from when he was small to even now at seven, if we’re out somewhere and I can see that he’s a little bored or maybe something is upsetting him a little bit, the playfulness that we can just tap into in a moment changes everything.
And so, there’s this constant playful energy that we’ve cultivated through having been just down on the floor with him. It’s funny, yesterday was his birthday, so for a few minutes, we all looked at some old videos. Thanks to the technology that we have. So, we’re on his iPad and we just looked at a few things when he was like three, four, or five. And there he is, he’s this little guy and we’re playing and he was already such a character and already gleaning so much stuff and he’s just there on the screen and I thought, man, we’ve been doing this for forever, like since he came out basically.
And it just has created this solid foundation for the two of us that, like right now, it’s a really busy time for me. Which I didn’t want it to be this record rip where all of a sudden it’s like, because then when I come home, I still have some stuff going on. I don’t want to lose that thing. And we’re not. We’re not losing it. Even if it’s less time that maybe we have, we don’t have all day to play. We have it in every pocket.
So, I’ll come home and I’ll come in and I’ll be Pythor from Ninjago. That’s a really good example of where he goes. He has watched just the season one of Ninjago. This was when he was about five. He watched that and the Lloyd and Pythor dynamic. I don’t know if you’re familiar at all, but if you are, their dynamic. He just took it and he ran. Okay.
So, these guys then can be mischievous but also kind and they’re good. And then he sort of brought in this whole other storyline of Kai trying to make Lloyd be the green ninja. This is a huge part of our play. That’ll just come up and we know that that’s where we’re at. So, then I’m Pythor, he’s Lloyd, and either we’re going to do jobs wrong or something, or we’re going to do whatever. There’s no start or finish. It kind of is just always there for us to tap into and then it fills his cup and then it’s like we’re off to the next thing.
And so, the play is just weaving in and out of the day. The minute he gets up, it could be we start or whatever. And I just know we can read each other so well because of it. Because when you’ve played with somebody, I think you develop together a chemistry and like a language and this whole other world template, a place that you guys go and a bond that just feels like so good, so tight.
I feel like I know him so well even though he constantly surprises me and I think vice versa. So, play, at first, I think when I just thought about like, you play with your kid. You play with your kid. It’s great. And then life goes on and whatever. You just have these like moments of play and oftentimes parents are exhausted by playing and that’s just it.
But when, when it’s not this like, “We play an hour a day,” and it’s this isolated time, when you’ve developed these like things together, it can just be in and out of the day, again. So, there’s not this scheduled time or that we have to fit it in. It’s like it fits into every single like space that the day allows, which is also just beautiful.
So. play is just incredible. If you can do even a little. Whatever it is. I mean, some people are better at a board game or something like that and not maybe the pretend, but whatever way that you can, if you can inject that into the day, I just feel like it, again, it’s like a bond that happens between you and your kid that like it, it helps with everything. Again, those moments and defusing and stuff like that. So, yeah, I love it.
And then just one last thing, I guess like video gaming, too, to me. Beforehand, before Eamon really got into it, it would’ve been like, oh, they video game. You just think of it as like, they’re playing Mario Brothers and they’re smashing each other and you’re trying to get over the obstacles. It’s like, it’s so much more than that. When you actually sit and then you’re doing it with them, they are getting a ton out of that. And we’ve bonded over that. So, again, this is a connection piece. I guess the play part is so big for a little kid. They’re tuned for it.
ANNA: Oh, I love it! And I would say I was not as great with the pretend play and so, had to work at it, but what was interesting to me is kind of what you saw. When you do commit and kind of get in there, you see all the connections, all the learning, all these things that are going on. Because I think when we’re standing back over here, oh, they’re playing with some figurines.
They’re playing over there and my daughters, they had each other, so they’re playing with their sibling. But when you’re in it, you see how the wheels are turning, where they’re connecting something from maybe something that’s happened in the family, with something they saw on a show, with something that happened out here. And that was always so fascinating for me. That’s how I could get into something that I felt like was a little bit hard for me, because I’m not as playful as that in real life.
But it was those making those connections and seeing that that got me excited about it, about being involved.
And same with video games, right? Because that surface level of video games is, oh, they’re doing Mario Kart, but when you’re playing it, you realize, one, how hard it is. Two, all the things you need to be thinking about in order to do it. And so, it does become this connection point and this common language and something you can reach to because I am all about, we can shift energy so quickly when we bring that kind of playful mindset to it, when we set that stage. So, having those things to pull from is so valuable, and I’ve just seen that so much with you and things that you’ve talked about.
ERIKA: Yeah. I have goosebumps again from that section, Sarah. That was just so incredible. It just feels like you are speaking the language of childhood with Eamon. You know what I mean? You can’t get that level of connection without being able to go there. But I think it’s hard for a lot of adults, because it takes a lot of vulnerability to be able to be someone else and pretend something and really go there with being silly. It’s kind of like you have to really step out of the role of who you are being in your real life and just give into it.
But I think it’s that being vulnerable, like that vulnerability is what then allows the children to connect with you, because it’s like, oh, she is actually going there with us and it’s just so fun. And you’re right about just like then the shared language of those characters and just knowing all of those details with each other is like, it creates such a bond. And it’s super inspiring to hear you talk about play.
SARAH: I was just thinking like, yeah, just a couple of things that have helped me to stay in the play zone. So, we have a lot of stuffies obviously, but like we’ve got some puppets, right? And so, a puppet coyote who’s like just the best big and fluffy, and that’s Kai the coyote. So, Kai will often come on, walks with us, or someone. We’ll take somebody with us on a walk, like just trying to get out in nature and stuff.
Eamon loves his walks. I love walks, too, but he’s not just going to walk and he might want to talk about everything he’s seeing. And he might be someone who’s like, oh, look at this. But if he has a character to do it in, it’s even more fun. Or he can be him, but he’s got Kai to talk to him.
So, then it’s Kai. And Kai doesn’t know anything. So, it’s sort of like, well, what’s that thing over there? And he’s like, That’s a mailbox. Well, what’s the mail? What do you mean a mailbox? What’s a mail? And he loves this. He lives to try to break down everything and just teach. This’ll be the mile walk that we do around our loop and he points out everything to Kai.
And I remember being a kid or seeing kids with grown-up teachers that come in or even like Mr. Rogers or like the old things. They have somebody, typically, or they are someone and they’re engaged and they’re real animated and they’re just talking to the kids.
Most of our play, when I think about it, I’d say half the time, it’s just talking, but we’re just doing it with this playful piece to it. So, maybe it’s not me he’s talking to, even though he loves to chat with me, but that’s like when we’re driving and we’re together. He loves having that third, that element of whether it’s Kai or it’s a little gnome we take with us. And then they can talk about anything and you can bring it on your walk.
We’ll pretend again, like the Ninjago characters, when we’re on our walk. If we see any cracks, that means that Jay’s after us, right? Because we’re Python and Lloyd, so we’re the bad guys, kind of, but they love us. So, it’s like, avoid all cracks. Come on Lloyd, let’s go! We’ve got to go! And then we just jump the cracks and sometimes he gets done and that’s the whole walk. So, it’s not the most relaxing walk. It is so fun, though. And then I’m jumping and running and I’m actually getting my exercise. So, it’s like, again, that interweaving, and voices definitely helps.
So, I wouldn’t do them here, because I’m not good at voices. But to Eamon, it’s like I am Pythor for a minute, you know what I mean? And it keeps me in character. Because if it’s just me, I get. Hi. If I was a little guy and I was just me and I’m playing, I’m going to get bored in like five minutes, literally. You know what I mean? Like, hi, Eamon. Here we go.
But if I’m using a voice and I’m this character, you can like stay in that character and then it’s fun for you and you kind of ham it up if you, if you are into that thing, which I think a lot of us have that if we just kind of allowed for it. It’s almost like you get a little tipsy or something, do you know what I mean? But you’re not, you’re just tipsy on play, where it’s like, oh my god, I’m being so silly. Is anyone hearing this? And it just develops. Just to see like what you find fun in play. If you can tap into what is fun for you as a grownup and maybe even what was fun for you as a kid.
And I don’t think I’ve had to go back that far, but some people might, just to kind of reconjure, if you can. And it might be tricky and you’ll find another bond with your kiddo, obviously. So it could be like that they’re really into science or something, and you’re really into it, and you guys just totally groove on that and that’s fine. It’s just more, if you have that playful little piece of you that wants to come out, it’s remarkable how it’s like this tool, just this thing that you have with you guys, you know?
PAM: Okay, so number one, you took it exactly where I wanted to go. It was such a paradigm shift for me, so that’s what bubbled up when you were talking, that play can just weave into our days and the things we do. It’s not, this is playtime. And now this is when I go make dinner, and this is when I go have my walk around the neighborhood for my exercise or whatever. But that play can be part of those things.
Sometimes it would be, can we continue this in the kitchen area because everybody’s getting hungry and I’m going to get us a snack? But it’s not a stopping point. Or can my character or somebody take my turn for a couple of rounds while I go grab a snack and bring it back? It doesn’t have to be one or the other. For me, that was a huge shift once my kids came home and were there all the time and we started actually hanging out together and doing things together and playing together.
So, my mind was just like, okay, I do this and then I do this, and then I do this. And it was fascinating to get more to the flow state. So, it wasn’t like start, stop, start, stop, start, stop. It was like, things could flow and we can bring pieces here and bring pieces here and it just brought such a different energy to the day.
And I just want to highlight one thing you just brought up there, too, which is brilliant, which is finding for ourselves. The idea of getting bored with play. But yeah, finding for ourselves that little thing that helps it be a little bit more engaging for us. Absolutely, just that little piece of, I’m going to filter this through a character and bring it out. I have to think about that now. I have to keep engaged and occupied, so that I can do that. So, that was just really fascinating for me.
And again, if what we’re wanting is to connect with our kids, it’s going to be through the things they love to play with. So, like you have so beautifully connected with Eamon through play, like how you saw from when he was just the youngest, youngest child, that this is what makes his eyes light up and his heart sing.
And I get goosebumps just thinking about you two just hanging out and playing together. It can be different for somebody who is more into science experiments or board games. I love the video game idea, too, because as Anna was saying, there’s just so many different pieces to it, right?
But when you engage with them, you see the pieces that make it shine. Like, like with Joseph, it was stories and characters. And I love you talking about how he’s just in an open world for the most part, and you’re bringing the story to that.
And with Joseph growing up, it was more like RPGs. He didn’t play the open world games. He wanted games with a deep story and lots of characters, so that he could sink into that and play through those different viewpoints, perspectives and see how that felt. So, yeah, it’s all about getting to know our kids, isn’t it?
SARAH: It really is. Yeah. It’s those details. When you really, really listen, pay attention. Whenever you tune in. Doesn’t have to be when they’re very, very small. You can tune in anytime, right? And just be like, wow. When you just really sit, which life goes by very quickly. And the older we get, it seems like a day goes by so fast, but just taking that little time, paying attention. It’s like, wow, those are such little gems that then just can like weave in. It’s the weaving, it’s the flow, I guess.
ERIKA: I had a couple other thoughts when you were both talking, first just about the idea of, I don’t have time to play right now, actually doesn’t make any sense. Because in any moment, I could just be playful about it or be a different character. You know what I mean? Like I could still get my things done in a playful way. And so, I like the challenge of just dropping that idea of there needs to be time to play and shifting to just being playful.
And then the other thing I was going to mention is, so my kids are 13 and almost 12, and so I think, for me, when I was growing up, that was kind of past the point of this kind of pretend play stuff. But for my kids, it is not past it and I just love that. I feel like it could be a little bit cultural too, because I see on Roblox all these role-playing games that are there and you know, teenagers are playing those still with their friends. And it’s like, do you want to do a role play? I hear them do it with their friends all the time.
And we are getting ready to go on a trip right now. And I overheard them. My heart was just bursting because I overheard them in the living room with their plushies, talking about the trip from the point of view of the plushies, working through some of the things that they’re thinking about. But just like, now this character’s asking, so where are we going to go again? And where are we going to stay? And what is it going to be like? What are we going to get to see? And then they’re just talking through all these things. It really is, I think, just the natural way that humans learn to process their lives is through play. And so, I just love like that our lives have enough space that at this age, they still are feeling free to play like that.
SARAH: I love that. That gives me hope. Because I’m like, okay, we’re at seven. And I’m going, how much longer do we have? It’s like, nope. Probably a long time.
ANNA: A long time! And I think it’s kind of like Erika was saying, too. It’s just this choice to just take a playful attitude. And I think somehow that feels easier, too, for me than like, okay, I’m going to sit down and play. But it’s like, no, we can just be playful and we can bring in characters and we can be silly and we can just keep that energy alive.
And I mean, I definitely saw that kind of pretend play for so long with my girls who are now in their mid-twenties. And there’s still a very playful energy, especially with their dad who tends to be more playful than I am. And it’s just fun to see how, I think it is kind of a natural human thing that maybe gets tamped down. I’m just thinking of like me and my Enneagram eight, just tamp down the playfulness, but it’s just so fun to see.
And the story about the kids working out the trip, like how valuable is that to be able to have that conversation in a way that maybe feels safer than saying, I’m worried about the trip, or, I’m not sure about this aspect of the trip, and so that is such a beautiful gift.
PAM: It really is. And I’ve got to say, even like you were saying, Anna, with adult kids. Yeah. I mean, Lissy will still dress up. They attract and they connect with friends in life, too, who have that energy and ways that they connect. And she had people together for the weekend for her birthday recently, and a big part of that was playing games. They still play hide and seek with the flashlight where they turn off the light. When they come home and visit, they will still have friends over and do that at night. When I get up in the morning and I see all the microwave light, all the lights are taped over.
So, it is not something that they have to lose over time. When it’s something that’s respected and valued by the people in their lives, they’re comfortable bringing it with them and they attract and find the people in their lives as friends who will also engage in that with them. So, yeah, that’s really fun to think about.
SARAH: I love that. And also, too, I know we don’t want to ever look at things that kids are doing now and be like, oh, and when you grow up, this will serve you well. But you do, you see these things in a positive way and you just say, man, like some of the more successful, happy people that I know video game. I’ll be like you video game, too! Oh yeah, I know all those games. It’s like, in your work, in your life, if you keep that playful spirit, again, you don’t have to have it to be successful, but if you’ve got it and it’s honored, just like you said, Pam, like it’s like encouraged, it serves everything when you get older as well. In your workplace people, are looking for this, a brain that thinks in a way that’s sort of like, ah, there’s a lot of possibilities. How do we want to play with this? So, it’s such a great, human trait to foster and see where that can go for you. So, again, just from an unschooling perspective.
ANNA: Yes, because again, it’s not about it looking a particular way. We’re all going to bring different things to it. But it’s that playful, creative energy and we talk about that all the time. To bring to problems, to bring to relationships, to just have that open curiosity is part of that playfulness of figuring out different pieces.
And so, I do think it’s this incredibly useful human trait that we can all cultivate and, as always, our kids lead the way if we just leave ourselves open to that. And I think that’s just so, so beautiful.
So, thank you so much for joining us today, Sarah. That was amazing and so much fun. I hope everyone enjoyed this conversation and will be bubbling about all the things about it.
And we definitely hope that you’ll join us next time on the Exploring Unschooling Podcast. And come join us on the Network, where we can keep talking and playing. All right, everyone. Take care. Thank you so much for being here.
PAM: Thanks, Sarah!
ERIKA: Bye!
SARAH: Thank you. Thanks, guys!
EU349: Unschooling “Rules”: Unlimited Screen Time
May 25, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a new episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series!
We use the word “rules” in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschoolers have unlimited “screen time.” We explore what that term even means, examine the fears and underlying beliefs that we carry, and share about the kinds of conversations that families have when they’re navigating technology use.
We had a lot of fun diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
THINGS WE MENTION IN THIS EPISODE
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Welcome! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and this is episode 349 of the podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Anna Brown. Hi to you both.
ANNA: Hello!
PAM: Hello!
ERIKA: We have a fun Unschooling “Rules” episode for you today. And before we dive into that, I wanted to share a Living Joyfully update. If you’ve stopped by livingjoyfully.ca in the past few weeks, you will have seen our brand new website. The design has a new look and we added new areas of content as well.
Pam, Anna and I have been brainstorming all about the vision of Living Joyfully, and we realized that everything we talk about is really about relationships. Over the years, we’ve seen just how powerful the shift can be in our families when we change these paradigms and learn tools to help us in our relationships, and we want to bring that focus on relationships front and center in all that we do.
To that end, we have the Living Joyfully Network, our online community, where we dive deep and learn together. If you’re curious and would like to learn more, please visit livingjoyfully.ca/network. We can’t wait to meet you.
Okay, so in this episode we’re going to talk about the unschooling “rule” that unschoolers have unlimited screen time. And first, we want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes, to draw attention to the fact that there’s no such thing as an unschooling rule. It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you, and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody’s going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, inquiry, agency, and growth. So, Pam, let’s dive into screen time.
PAM: Yes, yes, yes. Let’s. Okay. Okay. You probably know by now from me that the first aspect I would like to talk about is language. And what is meant by the term “screen time.” So, at this point in our culture, that is a very general term, right? Because a screen can be, it can be a TV, it can be a laptop, it can be a desktop monitor, a phone, a tablet. It can be found in your house, in your car, in your pocket, maybe even in your fridge. So many of our day-to-day activities now involve screens in some ways such that the idea of “screen time” really doesn’t add much value to the conversation.
Screens are pretty ubiquitous in our lives. So, saying someone is in front of a screen is pretty meaningless. It tells us practically nothing about what they’re doing. Screens are just an interface, a way for a person to interact with technology, with a piece of hardware.
It’s what they’re using the screen to do that is interesting. What’s behind the screen? And that is an incredibly rich set of possibilities. It’s pretty much anything and everything. It can be an activity we really enjoy, like playing a video game or watching a movie. It can be a way to connect with others who also enjoy something that we love. It can be tips and tricks for improving our skills. It can be learning the history around an interest or an activity that we’re curious about, so, deepening our understanding of that it can be a way to find community, both online and off.
So, for me, instead of using the lens of screen to examine our days and whether or not my child is using one to engage with something, I am much more curious and have found it much more meaningful to know what that something is. What are they interested in? What are they exploring? What are they learning about? How are they learning about it? What tools are they using to help them move through their day? What entertains them? That’s the level at which I can actually connect with them, be in relationship with them, where I can better understand them and their interests and in turn, better support their learning, all the pieces. I learn so much more about who they are as a human being when I move beyond the screen interface and focus on what they’re using that screen to engage with.
ANNA: Oh my goodness. Okay, so you know that I love language, too. Really the three of us, this is something we enjoy, toying around with the words and thinking about being intentional about it.
So, I’m really glad this is where we’re starting, because I think that the words we choose set the energy for our actions and absolutely impact the stories we tell about our lives.
And so, think of the differences in these statements. My daughter was on screens all afternoon. My daughter watched four hours of cooking shows. Okay. That’s without me putting any tone to it, which I could have. And you can see how much more we learn and convey with just that tiny shift. If one is watching cooking shows for four hours, there’s something to that interest. There’s something there. And when we engage at that level, like you were talking about, Pam, being interested in what they’re enjoying, we learn even more about what they’re getting out of it and where it’s taking them.
We can think about screens as the interface to technology and then the next question, what is the technology bringing into our lives? Because like you said, it can be so many things. It could be about having time with friends and chatting and strategizing and solving complex problems and working as a team. It can be about exploring music or art, the storytelling, a way to dive into any particular interest. YouTube is this gateway to pretty much anything to study and just way too many to even name. I feel like it’s such an amazing time in the world where we can dive into any question or interest and go as deeply as we want or just scratch that surface for a quick answer all at the tip of our fingers.
And as someone who loves to learn all the things, I am grateful every day for technology and the myriad of screens that I have to interact with. And I really think being intentional with our language is such a great place to start, because it helps us to remain open and curious about what’s happening around us and connected to the people involved.
ERIKA: Right. Yes. I love this shift so much, because when we say our kids are just on their screens, I feel the distance that that creates. Now I’m way over here looking at them, really barely even looking at them. Maybe I’m just looking at the back of the screen they’re looking at. I’m seeing such a small sliver of what’s actually happening, and it can cause this reaction in me.
If all I see is a kid with a screen, I can think, they’re not doing anything. They’re not using their brain. They’re not being creative. But I actually have no idea what’s happening if I’m keeping myself at that distance and not letting myself see what they’re actually doing. So, challenging myself to be more specific with my language brings me that one step closer to who they are and what they love.
It puts me closer to being in connection with them. Well, it turns out my daughter was drawing on Procreate, creating a new character, or my son was playing Roblox with his friends. Or at another moment, maybe he was figuring out who that background actor was on Agents of Shield, and she was watching an exotic animal vet show.
So, that’s why it makes sense to take a pause if you’re tempted to use the word “screen time” and challenge yourself to go deeper. Really, all I have to do is think about my own life with my phone, my iPad, my computer, how many different things I use those devices for. It feels ridiculous to describe all of that time as “screen time,” and it’s the same for my kids. It’s always so much more real and more connecting to look closer and see what they’re actually interested in.
ANNA: Right. It really is. And it’s such an easy thing to do and it can really light up our kids when they see that we see them, that we’re genuinely interested and that we’re actually just naming what they’re doing and noticing what they’re doing. It’s so important.
So, a couple of the pieces that I want to touch on require a bit of introspection. So often, we find ourselves judging how our children or really anyone is spending their time. When we find ourselves doing that, I think it’s so much more about us than about them.
And one of the things that can be at play is fear. So, releasing our fear is really critical here, because when we’re projecting out into the future with fears, we’re pulling ourselves out of this moment and we are most likely harming the connection with the people in our life. It’s pretty safe to say that fear clouds our judgment, puts us into kind of this reptilian brain where we’re not using our critical thinking skills, we’re not engaging. Like you said, we’re on the other side of the room, looking over here, casting this fearful glance.
I feel like fear can be such a helpful red flag. There’s a purpose for it, but I personally just never want to act from that place instantly, unless it’s a tiger coming at me. You know? I want to use it as a clue to dig deeper, understand, where is it coming from? Time and time again, when I would dig into my fear, I would find some old wound or some outside noise from people or systems that didn’t know anything about my kids, and they definitely didn’t know anything about our life.
Processing my bits and setting aside those outside voices allowed me to tune back into my children and see what they were exploring and all that it was bringing to them and our family. And so, it is that clue of like, when I’m not noticing what they’re exploring, I’m probably in my head with some fear pieces. And so, there’s one more piece I want to talk about, but just I feel like you probably have a couple things to say about fear, too. So, I’m going to throw it back to you, Erika.
ERIKA: I know. I do. But I think it’s connected to what I was talking about before with the feeling of the distance that can happen. It has that feeling of disconnection. Because fear is something that’s happening because of my thoughts, and we talked about this recently in the network Marco Polo group, how there are the actual things that are happening. And then the next step is the thoughts that I have about those things and then the emotions like fear come after I’ve had my thoughts. And so, a situation that feels totally safe and comfortable for one person can feel scary to another person. And so, that’s why to me it’s so valuable to unpack my thoughts and beliefs.
Is my fear about screens really a fear about what other people would think if they saw my kids on screens? Is it one of those future projections, like you were mentioning, Anna? So digging into our fears and questioning them can be so powerful in so many areas, but I think it really is so common when we’re talking about the “screen time” worries, and then it’s all about getting out of our heads and all those thoughts and back into the moment of what’s actually happening in real life. And chances are good that the fears are really just coming from my own thoughts and beliefs that I can release.
PAM: Absolutely. So many kinds of fear can bubble up in this situation. And I found that people often mention the fear that they’re doing their kids a disservice by not insisting they do other things, that screens are addictive and their kids need protection.
But again, like you were saying, Erika, those are my thoughts and I can work through them. So, for me, processing those fears encouraged me to lean into engaging with my kids around their tech use and my own as well. Noticing how over time, more and more everyday things can now be done virtually through a screen interface.
So, for example, most often I don’t need to run to the bank anymore. I can do my banking through my browser or an app. We don’t need to go to the game store anymore to get a new game. We can download it through the console or the computer, again, either way, a screen. And sometimes we can’t choose to go to the store to browse for fun. So, yes, I definitely interface with screens more than I did a decade ago, but it’s often both more effective and efficient.
I remember moments and still have these moments where I’m sitting my computer. It’s like, okay, I’m going to do something else now. And I think of, what’s the next thing I want to do? And then it’s like, oh. I’m doing that on my computer too! I’m not even moving. So, leaning in with my kids helps me see the variety of things they’re doing and helps me engage with them around both what they’re doing and how they’re feeling about it. A wealth of fascinating conversations bubble up over the months and years as we just explore and learn about tech use alongside each other, because it’s something we’re all kind of experiencing for the first time as it grows in our lifetimes.
ANNA: Right. And that piece is so important, just our own experience of it and being maybe more honest about that than letting the fear take hold and cause that to clamp down. It’s always a great idea, I think, to just take that second look when we’re feeling that little bit of grip with fear, or like you said Erika, maybe the sign is just that you’re kind of pulled apart from your kids a little bit. That that means maybe fear is involved, you know?
Okay. So, another place to dig in and peel back is the fantasy that we create around our children and family. It makes sense. And I would say that most of us have done it at some point, thought about the children we would have and the family we would create. I remember having lists of names for future children when I was in middle school. And after our children actually arrive, we can still buy into some of these fantasies, ranging from future sports star to Ivy League academic or children dressed in woolen clothes frolicking joyfully in the woods.
We create ideas around what type of activities have value based on how they fit those visions. So, if you’re holding onto the academic vision, sports are a waste of time. In the sports vision, hanging out with friends is taking away focus from the sport. You can see how those visions really tunnel us in. And that’s one thing if it’s about us pursuing a passion for ourselves, it’s quite different and way out of our lane when we’re boxing in another person based on our vision for them.
The key for me was truly understanding that my children were unique humans on their own personal journeys. And this quote from Khalil Gibran has always spoken to me and grounded me in this understanding and idea. And I think I’ve actually read it on the podcast before, but I’m going to read it again.
“Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of life’s longing for itself.
They come through you, but not from you.
And though they are with you, they belong not to you.
You may give them your love, but not your thoughts, for they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies, but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.”
And there’s so many things about that poem, but I’m just going to take the “house of tomorrow” piece, because I think it’s related to this conversation. Because with each generation, innovation takes us to new places that the generation before doesn’t understand and often vilifies.
So, when I was a kid, many, many years ago, having a telephone in your room was the thing that was literally going to bring doom and rot our brains, like that’s what we were told. Talking for hours on the phone was pretty new when I was in high school, because I remember actually as a little kid, we had what was called a party line. So, we shared a house phone line with 10 of our neighbors. So, you’d actually pick up the phone and see if somebody was talking. And so, you never lingered on a call because so many people were using it. So, this makes me sound like a hundred years old. I am not. Just 54. And that’s how fast things change.
By high school, I had a corded phone in my room and spent many nights talking to friends until the wee hours only to have to get up at the crack of dawn for school, which I’m sure concerned my parents. They were pretty chill about things, but you could tell. Because this was the buzz that was going around the culture is that these phones are bad for these kids and they shouldn’t be on them. And the thing that’s so funny looking back is that it wasn’t even just phones. People would complain about book reading. I’d hear this. “You’re spending too much time with your nose in a book.” Like what does that even mean, when we think about it now?
So, whenever we find ourselves needing to judge how another person spends their time, we can pause and remember that it’s probably saying a lot more about us and also maybe highlighting a lack of connection or really understanding the child or the person in front of us and what it is they’re engaging with. We maybe haven’t taken that extra time. Instead, we can focus on leaning in, finding ways to connect, learning more about their interests. Why are they enjoying this new thing so much? Learning the terms to be able to have a conversation to really see them and what they love.
I focus on connection because I feel like that’s where we learn more about ourselves, more about the person we love. And oversimplifying and trying to control another person’s interest is not a means to connect, be it sports, books, or technology. Behind those simplified descriptors is a world of nuance and learning. So, understanding the richness of any area of interest is such a simple step to take for the people that we love.
ERIKA: Oh I love this part. It’s so natural to have a vision of childhood and a vision of what our family would be like, and it could be based on what we remember from our own childhoods or just things we see on social media or read about. And it can feel like there is a right way to be a child or a right way to be a parent. But when we open up to the idea that I love so much that everyone is different and that we have so many ways to find our interests and to learn, it just takes a lot of pressure off. There really is not a perfect way to be a human.
I think a lot of people are really drawn to the latest technology, because it’s the cutting edge of human creativity and there’s so much potential there, but not everyone is drawn to it. And different people have different goals and interests and ways that they want their lives to look, and that’s pretty exciting.
And it can also be challenging as a parent when our children are choosing interests that we don’t understand, or that didn’t even exist in our childhoods. And that’s, I think, where that open and curious mindset comes in so handy. And maybe putting up a print out of that poem you shared too, Anna. That was really beautiful.
PAM: Well, you know what I loved, Erika, what you said there not being a perfect way to be human. That takes me right to the people are different and my way is okay. And even different people with different ways are all okay, too. And even while that can feel overwhelming at first, it’s like, oh my gosh, like everybody’s different. Oh no! I found it more approachable when I thought about it in terms of exploring the possibilities with an eye to discovering what I’m curious about and what works for me in terms of engaging with those interests as well as with people that I love. And it changes over time as we learn and grow and change ourselves.
So, for me, it becomes the ongoing mystery of life. I know that kind of sounds cliche and all, but truly isn’t it true? Just think about it for a minute. I’m a mystery to myself and that’s why I keep connecting and engaging. My kids are grown now and it is still so fun to connect with them and hear what they’re up to.
So anyway, this leads me to all of that connecting and engaging and, especially when they were younger, it was discovering what makes their eyes light up. And not judging whether or not the act of accessing those things involves a screen. That was just a piece of the process. It wasn’t the thing. It wasn’t, they love screens. That said so little about them. Right?
ERIKA: And so, when we’re in that connected place and actually seeing what we’re, what they’re doing, and we’re not in that fear place or that fantasy place, we’re now using language that’s connecting instead of just calling it “screen time,” now I think we’re ready to have conversations with them. And I think it can be pretty automatic at times to want to just make a rule or a proclamation, like, “No screens before 4:00,” or, “No screens until the weekend,” or, “One hour of Roblox per day, period.”
We hear about those types of rules and it can feel like they might be a good solution to our fears and concerns. But without communication and conversations, top-down rules and orders are so disconnecting. There’s such a big difference between a parent proclaiming that all screens must be turned off, and the whole family deciding together that they like how it feels when they have dinner and no one brings their devices to the table.
When we talk about not having limits on the time that our kids are engaging with their iPads or their computers, it doesn’t mean that we’re hands off. We’re staying connected. We’re having conversations when something is feeling bad, we’re talking about it and problem solving together. And when we can build trust in our relationships with our kids, they can come to us with their feelings and concerns, too.
So, like Maya has definitely told me that she wants to stop watching videos or to stop playing computer games for a while. And she knows that she can share that with me and I won’t villainize the games and the videos, and I can help her if she wants to go outside for a walk or play a board game with me instead. I can help her brainstorm things to do that are not screen-based when she wants, and I’ll help her troubleshoot when things get tricky in her games and apps too. She’s free to share all of her interests with me without judgment.
And by focusing on connection, the whole family can work together to have a rich life, rather than just me or just Josh and me as the parents like making decisions without having conversations and handing down those decisions that are really just based on my image of what our lives should look like. And so, I think it’s just a much better fit when we’re all involved in creating our family life together.
PAM: Yeah, I think that’s the crux of it for me, really. I think a rule, even one in the guise of not being a rule, like unlimited screen time encourages disengagement.
There’s the rule out there for everyone to see, so we know what’s up and we don’t need to talk about it, right? It leaves the impression that there aren’t any nuances to be had. But as you mentioned, nuances are found when real, different people are involved. When we’re engaged and supportive of each other, when we’re on a team together, we help each other navigate tricky or uncomfortable things without the judgment.
When someone’s feeling they’d like to do more things that don’t involve screens, we help them find ways to do that that feel fun and enjoyable. We don’t leap to, “Oh my goodness, we need a no screens for a week rule,” so that we can help them do this thing they want. It is okay to have a feeling of too muchness around something. I made up that phrase, but it felt so right. Those are great clues for us as we explore who we are and the things we like to do and how we like to do them.
Wanting to change things up doesn’t mean that where we are now is wrong. So there’s a quote from Sebene Selassie that has stayed with me for a while now. She wrote,
“We don’t need to make ourselves a problem to aspire to transformation.”
And that absolutely applies to our kids as well, especially as they explore how they engage with their interests and their days from food to screens to sleep, like all the things.
ANNA: And I love that too muchness because, just like you just said, it’s food, it’s screens, it’s sleep, it’s running, it’s exercise, it’s whatever. We can get into that kind of too muchness stage and then we can just start talking about how’s that feeling and what we want to do. And I think ultimately for me, and you kind of mentioned it before, this whole realm that we’re talking about at the screens, it’s about just having it be one little part of everything.
We’re having the same kind of conversations, it’s the same process, versus this boogeyman, and it’s something so big and we’re setting it aside and making separate rules about it. And I think for me, again, just that always boils down to connection and conversations for me. And that doesn’t mean big sit-down conversations with heavy energy, but light energy of checking in, sharing what’s going on with me, what I’m feeling too muchness about, listening to what going on for others in the family. Just having that be common dialogue that we talk about how we’re engaging with the world and the things around us.
I have seen families work through this and come out with some guidelines about when they do what, and I think the key for that to work is everyone being involved and also, so key, being open to things evolving, because, again, it’s not one thing that’s being restricted when we make rules around screens. Do we really want to restrict research, connecting with friends, checking the weather, looking up history of a word that you just heard that came up in a conversation? Those are just a few of the things I do daily on my phone or tab, and it would seem so strange to say those things can only happen in this pre-assigned window that we thought of last month.
And so, I think just being open to what we’re using things for, how things are evolving and just tuning into how everyone wants to spend their time. What else is happening around us? What can we bring in to enrich our lives? Those are the things that we can be exploring together so that the focus is on creating a life of using all kinds of tools and exploration.
Removing the hyperfocus on one aspect, the screen aspect, can actually remove defensiveness, misunderstanding, and open up creativity. Focusing on connection, learning about one another, building a trust that we’re all working together to create our best lives just relieved a lot of pressure around individual bits for me, because I knew we would figure things out together. I didn’t have to carry that weight and fear alone.
ERIKA: Yes. Well, I love this conversation. It was so much fun. I really enjoyed diving into the unschooling “rules” particularly and unlimited screen time. I hope you found our conversation helpful as you navigate technology with your family. And if you’d like to join in on lots of conversations just like this one, come join us in the Living Joyfully Network. You can find out more about it at livingjoyfully.ca/network. Wishing everyone a wonderful day! Bye.
PAM: Bye!
ANNA: Bye!
EU348: Q&A Deep Dive
May 11, 2023
In this week’s Exploring Unschooling podcast episode, we’re diving deep into a listener question submitted by Michelle in Texas. She writes,
I listened to the episode with Xander regarding gaming, and it really helped change my perspective, especially during this unschooling phase. The question that keeps coming for us is definitely fear-based, but for good reason, and that’s online safety. Our son loves online gaming. Fortnite is the game of choice. But we struggle with the proper level of “parental controls” and his freedom to do what he loves, which is socializing and making new friends online. He’s easily influenced by a lot of the kids he plays with, and it has become a concern with behavior/attitude/mature content/cussing, etc. I’m so curious how unschooling parents protect their kids online without having strict parental controls. Unfortunately, I can’t listen all day, but I do try to pay attention and we have lots of conversations. I just don’t feel like he hears me, or maybe I’m approaching the topic too fearfully and strong. He wants to be accepted by his peers and will do almost anything to get it, which concerns me. Long-winded, but that’s what I’m dealing with and I’m sure other parents are, too.
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling and cultivating strong and connected relationships.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Hello, everyone! I’m Pam Laricchia from Living Joyfully and this is episode number 348 of the podcast. I am joined by my co-hosts, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Welcome!
ERIKA: Hi!
ANNA: Hello.
PAM: So, in this episode we’re doing a Q&A Deep Dive exploring a listener submitted question. And of course, we want to remind everyone that our Q&A conversations are not focused on giving anyone the quote right answer, because there isn’t a universal right answer for any situation that will work for everyone. So, basically, we’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
And if you’d like to have these kinds of conversations more often, check out the Living Joyfully Network online community. You will find all three of us there. We have regular live calls where members share their questions and concerns, their a-ha moments on the journey, as well as everyday snapshots of their unschooling lives. The community is incredibly rich with the twists and turns of real life with wonderful families from around the world, all through the lens of unschooling. It is so inspiring, and as I said that, I got goosebumps. It’s for real. So, you can learn more about and join the community at livingjoyfully.ca/network, or you can follow the link in the show notes. We’ll be sure to put it there. So, Anna, would you like to read the question for us?
ANNA: Yes! Okay, so our question comes from Michelle in Texas and she has an almost nine year old.
“I listened to the episode with Xander regarding gaming, and it really helped change my perspective, especially during this unschooling phase. The question that keeps coming for us is definitely fear-based, but for good reason, and that’s online safety.
Our son loves online gaming. Fortnite is the game of choice. But we struggle with the proper level of “parental controls” and his freedom to do what he loves, which is socializing and making new friends online. He’s easily influenced by a lot of the kids he plays with, and it has become a concern with behavior/attitude/mature content/cussing, et cetera. I’m so curious how unschooling parents protect their kids online without having strict parental controls. Unfortunately, I can’t listen all day, but I do try to pay attention and we have lots of conversations. I just don’t feel like he hears me, or maybe I’m approaching the topic too fearfully and strong. He wants to be accepted by his peers and will do almost anything to get it, which concerns me. Long-winded, but that’s what I’m dealing with and I’m sure other parents are, too.”
Okay, so thanks for your question, Michelle. And it is a topic that comes up a lot for good reason, and I think it’s really important to tease apart and think about. I always want to take some extra steps when I see I’m being driven by fear, you know, because fear tends to pull me out of the moment, but also away from my child. And so, taking the pause and naming the fear for me can be helpful.
And then, I want to dive back into the moment with my child to understand things from their perspective to see what I might be missing. I came to understand that what kept my children safest was our strong connection. I wanted them to feel completely comfortable coming to me when things felt off or if they had questions. And I could only foster that environment by being really open and not judging what they were doing.
If they felt like I didn’t like an activity, they were much less likely to come to me if something was going on with it. It kind of pushed them into this place where they would maybe take more than they wanted to for fear that it would play into my concerns. And if they felt comfortable with me and knew that I supported what they loved about the game or the activity, then when something was off, they knew that I’d help them process, but with this eye to getting them back to what they loved.
And it sounds like you’re already having a lot of conversations and that’s really what helped us. But definitely it was important to check in about any kind of tone or agenda I might have, because I know they can sneak in, especially if we’re carrying around any fear. So, I would share my experiences and the why behind any decision I was making. If I felt uncomfortable, I’d share it, but again, with an eye to still move towards the thing we were interested in, but in a way that felt better to us both.
I think talking about the online environment and how it’s unique is so helpful. People sometimes use that space to push boundaries and try things on, and sometimes that doesn’t feel good. So, empowering our kids to say something when it doesn’t feel good or doesn’t work.
And another thought that I had was if your son is, if feeling a scarcity of connections, maybe why you’re feeling like he’ll, “do anything to be accepted,” then I might focus on broadening that community, finding more online friends to add to the mix, because scarcity, like fear, can influence our behaviors and contribute to making choices that might not be the best for us. But that’s something you can start solving for and working towards together, more abundance in the online or even in real life friend department. There is an unschooling gamers Facebook group and families on our Living Joyfully Network connect through gaming as well.
It really is just so much about the relationship and it sounds like you have a great foundation there and looking at your own fears and, are we giving information or kind of passing along and handing some weight of our fears to our kids that just might not make sense to them at all? So, I found that just keeping connection as the driver can allow us all to feel comfortable as we navigate these tricky topics.
ERIKA: Yeah. I liked this question, too. I think you’re absolutely right that so many parents are facing these same concerns about online safety and navigating that with their children, whether or not they’re unschooling. And with so many different people and different parents and different children, there are just endless ways in which those concerns are addressed.
And I really love that you’re recognizing the underlying fears that you have and that possibility that the way you’re approaching it with him might be too strong or fear-based, because I do think it’s so easy to go there. We’re definitely surrounded by stories that can ramp up our fear and our imaginations can spiral a bit out of control just thinking of all the scary possibilities and that just feels so terrible and I’ve been there.
So, I guess first, I would just say to ground yourself back into the present moment and really honestly look at the things that are actually happening rather than what might happen. He’s probably heard a lot of your concerns and fears at this point, and so, those messages are already in there. Giving some space for a while might help you see what’s actually happening. And when I say giving some space, I don’t mean just leaving him alone, but just not like jumping in with the warnings and jumping in with a bunch of questions.
There have been phases where I’ve been worried about what my kids are watching or the way they’re interacting with their friends online. Maybe things don’t feel very kind in the interactions sometimes, things like that. And there have been times where I’ll jump in, like, “What is that you’re watching?” Or, “Is everybody okay?!” in this super fear-based, loaded, emotional way. The questions by themselves are not terrible questions, but when I bring them with that loaded energy of, I believe everyone’s in danger or something bad is going on, the kids react to that energy and it creates that disconnection.
And then, they want more privacy, because they believe that I’m not understanding them and what’s going on, and so the disconnection grows. And so, the repair that works for me in that case is giving them more space and more trust. When they don’t feel like I’m jumping on every little thing, then there’s room for them to actually come to me with their tricky situations, to ask me about safety, and to ask for my help with their conflicts.
And so over the years, I’ve given them information like, we don’t know who the people are who are playing online with you. They could be anyone. They could live anywhere. And so, we’ve had some fun imagining who these people might be. And so, it’s safe. I tell them, it’s safe to play online together, but it’s also important to remember we don’t know these other players well enough to trust them with our personal information.
And it actually reminds me of when Anna started playing Adopt Me with me on Roblox, and she wanted to believe and trust everything that everyone was saying in the chat. And I had to tell her, a lot of people are scamming and a lot of people are lying. And it’s still so much fun to play, but it just helps to be aware of that. And I think it takes some practice to get really savvy online, but that practice is what the kids are getting when they have the chance to explore.
And so, our family’s use of parental controls has evolved over the years, and it’s always the result of conversations with the kids and what they’re feeling comfortable with. Most of the controls that are just kind of automatically created are too limiting, we’ve found, and so they haven’t been super helpful. The kids know how to block people on their games. They know that they can always leave if something is feeling uncomfortable, find a new server, if someone is being obnoxious.
And I think watching gaming YouTubers has actually helped them learn a lot about some of the things that people do, the scamming and the pranking and the trolling, just so that they have a better idea of what to watch out for. And, like Anna was saying, the more I focus on keeping our connections strong than the safer they feel to come to me to talk about anything that doesn’t feel right.
PAM: Okay. I love so much what you both have shared, and thanks again, Michelle, for the question. I, too, really had a lot of fun thinking about it. And in fact, our theme in the Network this month as we’re recording this happens to be connection. And a big part of deschooling is the parenting journey from using tools of control to connection in our relationships with our kids. So, that’s on my mind and I think it’s an interesting angle to explore with this question.
So, let’s just play for a bit. Let’s take a moment to pull out to the bigger picture and think about the purpose of parental controls. They’re basically rules to control an environment, whether they’re built into a technology that’s involved, or they’re rules that the parents set and expect the child to follow.
So, let’s just say you found the “perfect” set of parental controls that you envision and you turn them on. So, now what? How do you feel? What do you do next? Maybe you let out a sigh of relief, maybe your shoulders drop a little bit. Ah, you’ve controlled the environment and things just feel safer now. You know your child will no longer be able to find their way into situations online that you find uncomfortable or worrisome. Now you can relax and leave them to play and have fun, and you can go off and enjoy doing your things. I mean, that sounds pretty cool, right? That’s the goal.
But I know I will forever remember the story that Teresa Graham Brett shared on the podcast way back in episode 27, because it just so clearly showed the contrast between control and connection when it comes to our relationships with our children. And I’m pretty sure the story is in her book too, Parenting for Social Change.
But just to summarize, when her eldest was young, she decided she’d let him watch PBS Kids, because it was educational and non-violent. That meant he could have free access at any time to PBS Kids and online, he could go to the PBS Kids website. So, in that parentally controlled and safe environment, he would watch this PBS show Caillou, and there would be a point in almost every episode where he would say, “Shut it off.” So, she’d shut it off and he’d move on to something else. And she never thought much about it at the time until she began questioning her parenting choices more directly.
She started watching TV with him and quickly recognized the difference there. When she was in the mode of everything on PBS Kids is fine, because it’s not my version of violence, she was actually uninvolved. Because she had deemed everything he had access to be safe, she wouldn’t watch with him. There was no partnership. And as she described it, she had abdicated her responsibility to him because she had controlled the environment in which he had access.
When she started hanging out with him, watching with him, paying attention to who he actually is as a person, she said, oh my gosh. She learned so much. For example, she came to see that in the show, Caillou was always getting in trouble at some point in the episode, and a parent or teacher would step into chide and correct him. It was consistently at that point that he wanted the show shut off. It became obvious that he was uncomfortable with that kind of emotional violence being imparted on a child, and that was such a huge a-ha moment for her. Wow. Their definitions of violence were so different.
What she thought was safe and what was aligned with the conventional narrative of media safety differed from what he needed, which was for children to be emotionally safe. The violence that he saw was not the violence that she saw. She said that if she could point to one thing that greatly expanded her view of media access, that was the moment. And I just wanted to share how she describes that shift.
So, she said, “Being responsible for the care of a child doesn’t require control. It requires being in connection and being a partner and being a facilitator.” Now, I wanted to share that because it’s just such a clear example of the shift from control to connection on our parenting journey. Instead of controlling their environment so that we’re comfortable stepping away, with the impression that it’s all good, they can’t encounter anything that we are uncomfortable with, we can be their partner. We can connect and engage with them. We can see the person they are and help them as they navigate and process the environments that they are keen to explore.
So, bringing that back and coming to your particular situation, Michelle, you mentioned that you’re having lots of conversations with your son about what you’re seeing with his online play. You also mentioned that you don’t think what you’re saying is connecting with him, because it feels like he’s not hearing you. And I love Anna’s point about paying attention to the energy that you’re bringing to the conversations. And I just wanted to add another thought to the mix and actually it’s just an extension of what Erika was talking about, because I am sure he’s heard what you’ve been saying.
So, repeating it over and over moving forward just won’t add much value to the conversation. So, what if for the next while, your conversations with him are more focused on listening to him, letting him lead any actual conversation. What is he seeing in the interactions that he has online? How is he feeling about them?
You can hang out with him quietly just absorbing his enjoyment and trying to see what things look like through his eyes. Leaving a relaxed space, like Erika talked about, for him to just share his thoughts or not. It doesn’t have to be actual conversations, because lots of communication happens that doesn’t need conversation. I think that’s such an interesting piece.
So, maybe you’ll glean some interesting insights just as Teresa did, but I do think you’ll definitely experience a deepening of your connection as you learn more about him and he feels seen and loved for who he is right now, Fortnite and all. He will just feel so seen and heard. And instead of you directing the conversations, there’s space for him to just mention what’s bubbling up, or even just noticing his reactions to things that are bubbling up that might spark conversations later. Because sometimes conversations happening in the charged moment of something going on there, there’s not space and time for reflection and conversations about that either. Anyway, so such a great question.
ANNA: It really is. And I may have just lost it, but it is that point of, it’s the walking in the shoes and the looking through the eyes thing, because what feels scary or inappropriate to us, unless we’re connected to understand what that feels like to them, we really do miss the boat. And so, I think that was really important for me.
And also, I think there’s a piece about, again, this experimental piece of being online that you do see your kids kind of push some boundaries and try things on and language or different things, but I think because it feels safe to them, and so, then understanding that and kind of having that and then being there for it, you know? And then, yeah, we can’t sit there every single minute they’re online, but we can make some intentional choices about just exploring and listening, not coming in just with our two cents, but really hearing about it. And, I don’t know, I just think about some things that I’ve seen with Erika’s kids, things I saw with my kids. It’s such an interesting environment that they have the ability to experiment with at this age.
ERIKA: Yeah, that’s what came up for me, too, when you were talking Pam, was just that like, me putting my, “what I would do if I were them” lens on it doesn’t make any sense, because what they’re doing is figuring out who they are, figuring out how the internet works, figuring out what these different cultures of video gaming are like. There’s a lot of things that I think happen in Fortnite that to me feel like, oh, well that’s terrible. But to them in it, it’s like that’s the culture. That’s how people are having fun and that’s the way that they’re interacting. And so, sometimes I’ll say like, does that, is that fun for you? Is this game fun for you? And they’ll be like, yeah. And people seem like they’re being mean to each other. And I’m like, oh, to me that doesn’t feel fun. But to them, they know, that’s just this game. This is a roleplaying game or this, you know, we’re in these characters and this is the way we’re interacting.
And I think it’s kind of amazing, because it’s such a rich environment for being able to explore different ways of being, different ways of treating people. And like mistakes, if they were to say they made a mistake in the way they’re interacting, that’s okay, too, because they’re just learning and it’s just that rich environment for being able to learn more about themselves and how to interact with people, too.
PAM: Yeah. I think I learned so much using that lens of role playing, too. That is so fascinating and there are absolutely environments where that is the focus and you take on a personality, any kind of personality and history and whatever and play through that lens or just communicate through that lens. And it’s just such an interesting way to explore and everybody participating in it knows what’s going on or quickly learns. That’s the experience. It’s like, oh! Holy bananas. This is really crazy.
But, oh yeah! So this is what we’re doing in this culture. So many different cultures. Different environments. And that’s the great thing. They can go in and experiment and experience and say, that’s not for me. Or say, oh, I could really lean in. No, this is really fun, mom.
So, the connection and the experience is just where, in my mind, they just learn so much more about the world, about themselves, about who they might want to be, about how they can be different in different situations and different environments, and that this is okay. I feel like it’s a rich, rich environment.
So, even just figuring out, sitting there, listening, figuring out what he’s enjoying. For him to be able to start having conversations. Looking through his eyes, when you’re there, half his mind may be like, oh, is this something mom’s not going to like? Is this something she’s going to say something about?
He’s not getting the opportunity to dig deeper and say, oh my gosh, this is fun. This is fun, because … Because his mind’s already busy worried about what might happen because of what he’s doing. So, opening up that space to really just absorb and process what he’s experiencing, I think just can go a long way for him.
ANNA: Just one quick thing. Even just listening to the two of you and I’m thinking people listening to the podcast will feel it, too, like just this lighter energy of curiosity. And we’re not just saying, ignore and throw out. We’re saying like, bring that lighter energy. Because in that space, we do hear more from them.
Because, like you said, Pam, I really do think when we bring a heavy weight of an energy to something, I think they are thinking, okay, what do I do? This weight doesn’t feel good. This energy doesn’t feel good. And so, then there may be censoring pieces and they’re not being honest, because they don’t really know that energy. So, I don’t know, just listening to the two of you with this light, playful, curious energy, still is so engaged, and yet a very different environment being created.
PAM: Right.
ERIKA: Yeah. I was just thinking as Pam was talking, like my experience as a child of a mom with a lot of worry and fear, it is a constant. That’s what I’m hearing in my mind as I’m making my choices is like I’m looking at everything kind of through her lens. I think it’s hard not to do that. It’s hard not to pass some of our fears down. But I do think it’s distracting, like it distracts from who I am, what choices I make. And so, I just want to try my best and be careful and mindful of what I’m passing on to my kids in that way, because there’s just so many different ways to be, and the things that I’m afraid of are the same things that other people love doing. And so, just remembering that and keeping it light.
ANNA: But don’t you think even just saying that, just saying like, this doesn’t feel great to me, but I can see you’re enjoying it. That takes that edge off of where maybe your mom or other moms might be more like, this feels terrible, this is bad. This is worrying me. And it has that weighty feel to it, versus this like, wow, this is my experience of it. Tell me about yours.
Because I think it’s unrealistic to think that we’re never going to be worried, that we’re not going to have things that are concerning us, that we’re not going to be passing some of that down, like you’re saying. But I think the more we own it for ourselves and the more honest we are about how we are moving through the world and that we’re curious about how you’re moving through the world, I just think that really changes that dynamic a lot.
PAM: I think so. I think so. It comes back to that team. It’s like, people are different. Even if we’re related by blood, we’re different. Our ages are different, but we still all have needs and things that we enjoy doing. And when we can bring that curiosity, when I can walk in and say, that feels uncomfortable and they can reply with, no, it’s lots of fun. Rather than making a mental note that, okay, next time I hear mom coming up the stairs, I need to move to a different game or just need to move to a different room or end this conversation or whatever. And again, they’re doing that out of love, too, because they don’t want you to be upset with them.
But that means that they do feel like they need to hide things and then we can’t have conversations. And then when things go a little awry for them, they will hesitate to come and try and process that with you because they’ll feel that “I told you so” energy, et cetera. Because this will be something new to us because they’ve been hiding it on us.
So, it’s that curious energy and just being curious about our child and what they love and why they love it. I think it just brings a whole different energy to the family, doesn’t it?
ANNA: It really does.
PAM: Okay. Thank you again so much for your question, Michelle. As you can tell, we really enjoyed diving into it. And if you want to continue the conversation, we would love to explore the questions that you are pondering right now on your unschooling journey in the Living Joyfully Network. You can join at livingjoyfully.ca/network Bye, everyone!
ERIKA: Bye!
EU347: Bringing It Home: Staying Up Late
Apr 27, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re diving into another Bringing It Home episode. We’re looking deeper at our last Unschooling “Rules” topic, that unschoolers don’t have bedtimes, and exploring what it can look like to navigate staying up late with our unschooling families.
Unsurprisingly, there is no one right approach. It’s so much about seeing through our children’s eyes and making choices that feel good to them. A world of possibilities exists when we are open and curious!
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ANNA: Hi, everyone! I’m Anna Brown from Living Joyfully, and this is episode 347 of the Exploring Unschooling Podcast. And I’m joined today by my co-hosts, Pam Laricchia and Erika Ellis. Welcome!
ERIKA: Hi!
PAM: Hello!
ANNA: On our last Unschooling Rules episode, we talked about the idea that unschoolers have no bedtimes, what that actually looks like and how in practice, it’s a lot different than that blanket statement might indicate. In this Bringing It home episode, we will continue the conversation talking about how it looks when kids stay up late and how we can navigate it in a way that works for all members of the family.
Erika, do you wanna get us started talking about late nights and how we can navigate them?
ERIKA: I would love to. And I actually think it’s kind of perfect that I get to start us off on this episode entitled Staying Up Late because late bedtimes are very much a part of life and a part of our family discussions these days. We’re right in the middle of a season of sleep exploration.
I think one of the fun things about this topic is that there are just so many ways that bedtime plays out in different families, but I do think it’s so common to have certain phases of life or certain children who have that strong interest in staying up late. And what’s late to one person just feels like a great time to get some things done for someone else, or a great time to hang out with some friends. So, this is of course, so individual. Everyone is so different. And so for this episode, I thought it might be helpful to go through some of the big sticking points and issues that can come up when kids are wanting to stay up late, starting with, “But nighttime is time for grownups to finally relax and be together.”
And so, this was me at one point in what now feels like the distant past. The kids had been falling asleep much earlier than Josh and I for a long time. And then that natural bedtime and their sleepy cues gradually became later and later until it no longer made sense for Josh to try to stay up later than them if he had work in the morning.
And, for me, the biggest part of navigating that new reality was just realizing that these are all seasons. We had a season where he went to bed without me, and then a season where we both went to bed before the kids, but I knew that I couldn’t expect them to go to bed early forever. And so, just releasing that thought was so helpful. In particular, I think the teenage brain seems geared to late nights and late mornings.
And so, instead of fighting with what was happening or clinging to that vision of an early bedtime, I shifted my focus to figuring out a new way, new ways and new times of connecting with Josh instead. And it also helped to start doing my nighttime routine and my self-care earlier in the evening, which was a definite shift from waiting to take care of myself until the kids were asleep. That just wasn’t working anymore. And I really don’t like that feeling of getting so tired that I can’t even drag myself to the bathroom. And so, I guess it was really just being aware of the stories that I was telling about the situation and being open to shifting my routine as it became clear that they were needing something different from me and from their schedule.
ANNA: I think it is one of the biggest sticking points. We get this idea, this picture in our mind, of how nights are supposed to look, and we can spend a lot of energy and try to move everyone into that vision. Ultimately, it was realizing that part of the stress of the evenings was my own creation by trying to force or even ever so gently nudge people towards participating in my vision of the night.
But when we opened things up and let go of any preconceived notions of the solution and started turning to the needs, that’s when things started to feel easier. At that point, we could be creative. You know, both David and I were finding time in the evenings, and thinking about how the evenings were playing out in general. Thinking about food and teeth brushing, wind downs, who needed to get up early the next day? Where were we all going to sleep?
Keeping an abundance mindset about time and solutions helped us find creative ways for David and I to have time together, even when the kids were staying up later than we were. Opening everything up, I feel, allowed us to flow with the needs and find solutions that worked for everyone, and it was always evolving. The seasons that you talked about, always evolving.
PAM: Always evolving. And that opening up to possibilities beyond how I was envisioning them going to sleep was definitely key for me, too. I remember noticing that if I went into conversations about going to bed with even just the energy of getting them to commit to a plan just for that night, they were resistant. Even when they did say something like, “I just wanna finish this game or this level, or this book, or whatever, and then I’ll go to bed,” there was a good chance it wouldn’t actually happen that way anyway, because they were in their flow.
I came to see that I was actually trying to get them to predict their future flow, and that’s when it started to seem a little ridiculous. So, with that, I was able to shift to supporting them in their actual flow. So, I could share plans that were on tap for the next day without the energy of, so therefore you should go to bed soon. And they could just add that info to the mix as their evening played out.
And we’d also chat about how they’d like to be woken up if need be, or what other things that they wanted to have happen in anticipation of the plans for the next day. And eventually, I remember getting to that point where I enjoyed waking up in the morning while the kids were still all asleep.
And I’d just walk through the house to see evidence of the fun they’d gotten up to the night before, after I’d gone to bed, after Rocco and I had both gone to bed. So, sometimes it was like some dishes in the kitchen or an old game console pulled out and plugged into the TV, or blankets piled up on the couch.
I just came to see those little vignettes as lovely reminders that we are all individuals living our unique, both together and apart. It’s so interesting to get to that stage where your kids are awake and living and doing things while you’re sleeping. It’s beautiful how they weave together, right?
ERIKA: Mm-hmm. And I love seeing that evidence of fun, like you described it, too, especially like elaborate scenes with all the characters and the plushies. I just have so many good memories of that. And I love what you both emphasized about not getting stuck on the vision or that set outcome that we always talk about, like releasing that there’s this one right way. And getting creative and curious about the possibilities just helps me so much, especially in these kind of charged areas like sleep.
So, I thought maybe next we could dive into what happens when a child wants to be up late, but also doesn’t want to be alone. And this is one of those challenges that I find leads to all kinds of interesting conversations and problem-solving opportunities.
And so, as far as my experience goes, it felt like the kids and I gradually shifted later and later together as they were more interested in playing with friends online and had just more going on in their social lives. We had many nights where I would say, “I’m getting tired,” and one of them, or both of them would say, “Just a little bit longer, we’re still playing.” And so, because they weren’t comfortable with being up alone at night, I did my best to support them while still trying to be honest about my own capacity. And so, I ended up having a season of really late nights with them, which worked out pretty well. We had a lot of fun together, and I was there to hear all the things that they were exploring and talking about with their friends, and we just had late nights and late mornings together.
Well, one night, I had reached my personal point of exhaustion and I let them know that I needed to go to bed, and this time, they were really right in the middle of something super exciting. And so, rather than join me and go to bed, they agreed together that they would stay up longer than me. And so that was the beginning of a new phase of our lives. The experience that they’ve gained from listening to their bodies and figuring out about what time they need or want to wake up for the next day’s activities, what their bodies feel like when they’re tired, regular tired, or overtired. All of that I think is just so valuable and we all get to do what feels best to us as individuals, which really suits our family since we’re all so different.
ANNA: It was a lot like that for us, too. I feel like it was this gradual moving back of when they were tired and I’m a big proponent of listening to our bodies, eat when we’re hungry, sleep when we’re tired, and so, it really tested my commitment to that as we each figured out when we really wanted to sleep and even how much sleep we needed, which was different for all of us. And all of those kind of related bits that then became late mornings, early mornings, late nights, middle of the night.
But part of the conversation for me was to be honest about my capacity and narrating to show my process in the evenings. So, how my brain was feeling, and if I was getting frustrated or just too tired to play or move or think. I could talk about what was going on for me without putting anything on them, because it was different, but it was still giving them information and some language. And when they were still at an age of not wanting to be alone, that’s where we’d start the creativity again and find ways for them to maybe play quietly in the family bed or in the room if I was really needing to go to sleep. I’d put on a sleep mask and some earplugs sometimes.
I was thinking about this and it’s just so funny what a small blip of time it feels like now, but I remember how long those moments felt on those nights where it was being pushed and pushed and I was figuring out, where is my capacity? There were times early on that we had to think about David needing to get up early, so we would strategize about quieter play, being in another part of the house, doing that prep work before bed earlier so there was less commotion in that bathroom when we needed to go to bed.
And so, I was a night owl way back then. And so, staying up with them was really not hard for me. We would just all sleep in the next day. I’d get up a little bit earlier and so then I had to adjust having my quiet time, a little bit of quiet time for me, in the morning instead of late at night, which would’ve been probably my preference back then. But like you said, it is a season. And so, I just did my best to embrace that and just figure out, where is this going to take us next? What are we learning? And I love the things that you mentioned, like we’re learning so many things.
We never had the super, super late nights for anyone until my youngest was a teen and started gaming with night owls on the west coast. So, midnight for them was 3:00 AM for us. But by the time this was happening, she was in her own room and on headphones and every once in a while, we’d hear the shrieks from something happening in the game. But for the most part it really wasn’t that disruptive. And I’d just make a point to check in with her before I was going to bed and we’d have a chat and does she need any food? What does she need for her night? We also had conversations about what was happening the next day and if she felt like she would get enough sleep, or was fine pushing through and going to bed earlier the next night?
It was just this ongoing dialogue about what was going on and a process of her learning how her body worked and how it functioned best. I remember she would not agree to sleepovers with friends unless there was a cushion day afterwards, because she knew what a toll those all-nighters with the big sleepovers took for her body to catch up.
PAM: I just want to emphasize that point too, because them making choices, like pushing through tiredness, that’s all good. That’s not a bad choice. That’s not a wrong choice. That’s like, ooh, I can play around. I know I can stay up extra late. I can do it for two, maybe three nights in a row, but then yes, I need some catch up time, some extra rest time. So, things that might look like wrong decisions that our kids make, no, they’re just choices. And to let them explore. I remember how many times I was surprised in those first couple of years when they would stay up late anyway and we would go to the thing. And they’d be great. They’d have fun and they would just enjoy themselves and then they’d come and maybe crash earlier that night or whatever. It doesn’t have to be like clockwork how things unfold.
Anyway, I did want to mention that I remember being sent to my bed in my room all by myself. And it was uncomfortable for me over different seasons growing up. So, when my kids were young, there were seasons where I’d go from bedroom to bedroom, hanging out with each as they wound down and fell asleep, reading books, chatting, whatever we were into at the time.
And then there were other seasons when we’d all hang out in our bedroom watching TV and chatting, them eventually falling asleep and Rocco and I carrying them to their rooms. If they got up during the night, maybe they’d come join us or I’d go join them. Or they found me sleeping in like their brother or sister’s bedroom, and then they’d just wake me up and I’d move to their bedroom. It might be two or three different bedrooms during the night. And that worked fine for me, because I can sleep just about anywhere now.
Once we began unschooling though, and moved beyond the bedtimes, there were times when someone wanted me to stay up with them and we would just chat about it as you were both mentioning. Mostly it was that they wanted me in the same room and I’d hang out as they were doing their thing, and maybe I’d be napping here and there. They’d wake me up if they needed something or they wanted to share something exciting that had happened. Or I’d wake up when I heard the loud little noise and say, “Hey, what happened?”
And alongside that, there were times that we all found ourselves up later than usual for something fun. And as you were mentioning narrating, Anna, I’d just share how I was feeling along the way. So when I’m getting tired, I get giggly and laugh longer and at sillier things. And that was known for years as the Sleepy Giggles as we talked about it, and they thought it was pretty hilarious. They could definitely tell my behavior changed as I got tired. If I continued to stay up, I started feeling nauseated and needed to lie down.
Their bodies absolutely were different, but they understood mine pretty easily. It was unfolding right in front of them, and I was telling them what was going on. So, if things were still popping and they wanted me to be around, or I didn’t want to miss the fun of what was going on, I would just lie on the couch quietly. I started to feel better. Maybe I might fall asleep, but I was definitely still around to catch the highlights. And then as they got older, I’d say goodnight, check in, see if they needed anything and off to bed I went. Different seasons. And over time, it really was just all about the conversations, how we were feeling, what we needed, what was going on, and goodnight, have a great night!
ERIKA: I love that so much. We have experienced so much of that late night giggly time, too. Maya and I have had so much fun making each other laugh late at night. We even coined a term belirious to describe that feeling, and Oliver doesn’t quite get it. He prefers to go to sleep before he gets silly, which totally fits with his personality. And because everyone is so different, there are just so many ways that this can work in practice, the possibilities are really endless.
And so, I think it could be fun to mention some of those logistical pieces of late nights. Things like noise, light, different people having different schedules, and what can those sleeping arrangements look like? And for this, I just think the key is staying open and curious and including everyone in that problem solving process. I know sometimes as the parent, I come to my kids with the solution I think is going to work because I’m the parent, but the kids have really great ideas and thoughts about these situations, too, and so I lose out on a lot if I think my one answer is the right answer.
And there are so many things we’ve talked about in the Network that can help with creating a sleeping atmosphere for some people in the family while other people are still awake. So, things like closing doors, using blackout curtains, using earplugs or white noise machines, putting rugs under furniture and noisy chairs if the kids are scooting around in the night, using headphones for gaming, moving that activity, the gaming activity or whatever it is, to a room that’s farther away from the sleeping room, or moving the sleeping room to another room that you might not have even considered for sleeping, but it’s a little more out of the way , so now that seems perfect. And that’s just to name a few ideas.
ANNA: It just really is so amazing what bubbles up when we remain open and curious and involve all the parties. There are so many options and they’re just there if we start looking and just recognizing any resistance we might have and noticing, is that helping us find solutions or is it kind of shutting down the conversations, like you said, maybe narrowing in on one solution? Then we just have this tunnel vision. I wanted to actively set aside any resistance just to feel how it felt to be open, because my resistance comes from a place that I’m tired or I want it to be a certain way. It’s not a bad thing necessarily, but it’s just kind of checking in to understand, hey, if I set that aside, what actually opens up? And what I found was a lot.
And just remembering it’s not about one person acting in a vacuum. We talk about everyone’s needs and trust that we will keep at it until we find something that feels good. And we just get there a lot faster if we bring that open, curious mindset and everyone’s participating. From that place, I felt like we could get at the needs. So, that might be light or a need of quiet or food or the need of company. Whatever was bubbling up for the people involved, when we understand that need, that’s when the options opened up. It’s really this creative process to think about how to address noise or too much light. We miss those if we’re focused on the answer being that everyone just needs to be in bed asleep by X time.
We had friends that put up acoustic tile in their gamer’s room and it made a huge difference. I don’t mind earplugs, so that helped me, because I’m a very light sleeper. I’ve found that when kids know that we’re open to finding solutions and not trying to stop them from doing what they’re wanting to do, and they’re not trying to stop me from sleeping, we know that we’re all working in this together, then we can find these solutions that feel good.
And I know if families are newer to this, everyone may not be participating yet. They’re still a little unsure of what this process looks like, and can we trust it? But as the trust builds and all the ideas are considered and valued, that is going to change. And sometimes in the beginning, just making it fun and starting with some off-the-wall, silly ideas can just make people laugh and get them excited and they start throwing out ideas and it just sets the stage of, there’s no bad idea. We’re just here talking and trying to figure things out.
And you’re right. There have been so many great sleep conversations and breakthroughs on the Network. It is so unique to each family. And it’s definitely not a rule that all unschoolers stay up late, but hopefully, it’s about each person in the family really tuning into their body and finding rhythms that work with the life that each family is creating.
PAM: Oh, I know. I love that. And it really does just go such a long way to validate someone’s wish to stay up later. When they just feel seen and heard and trust that you’re going keep going to figure out ways to make it work for everyone, they often feel less defensive and resistant, feel like we’re on the same team. But as you mentioned, Anna, that process takes time, too, right? It takes time for that trust to build. So, maybe if sleep is your first one that you’re going into this kind of conversation with, because I knew where I wanted to get and with that understanding that, I can’t say, “Hey, you can fully trust me now. I changed my mind! We’re just gonna figure this out together.”
That is hard to trust. I can know that in my head and know that I want to get there, but I can also take my time and I can be extra giving upfront so that they can see through experience that they can really trust me. So, I think that is such an important point to help people get there if this is their first experience, that it can take some time. But it is so worth it and that’s where the relationships and the trust and the connection grow deeper and deeper over time.
And, as you both mentioned, kids really can come up with some great ideas. So, my being extra open to things, I got to start to hear, when they realize that they can share ideas, even silly ones, and I’ll be like, “Oh, that’s cool! That would be so funny.” Rather than, “Oh my gosh, that would never work,” the energy changes and then over time they feel more and more open to share things without fear that they’re going to be shut down or told that was a silly idea, or, “I don’t agree with you.” We come to see how capable kids really are and they really are open to considering the needs of others when they feel like their needs are respected too. It gets us to that team level where all our needs, all the things, our constraints, our quirks of personality, all those pieces are going to be respected and heard and woven into the mix of the ways we move forward.
And it’s not about like, let’s brainstorm and come up with one solution. It’s like, Ooh, what about this? Let’s go try this. Oh, what about this? Let’s go try this. Oh, that kind of worked, and just working through it, through the conversations. And it really became so much fun over the years to brainstorm unconventional possibilities, using the rooms in unconventional ways, setting up different environments and different spaces. For us, it was just so fun. We’re still moving our house around.
ERIKA: I just think like not getting stuck thinking we need to solve everything in some perfect way that’s just going to stay the perfect way forever. Especially with something like sleep, that’s just not going to happen. Things are going to change and we could just try different things. Even just for one night, we could try something and just see how it goes. And so, just being playful with it makes things feel so much lighter.
ANNA: So much lighter. But actually something bubbled up for me that’s not as light from Pam’s, but I do want to mention it, because it’s this idea we’ve seen in the Network and a lot of places over the years, it’s an older child that maybe wants to stay up later and maybe there’s younger siblings around.
And so, the focus is on what we’ve been talking about solving for these pieces. But really again, it’s about getting to that underlying need and maybe that older child is needing some quiet. It’s a bit more chaotic environment during the day with younger siblings. And then sometimes, as parents, we can get defensive about that, that wait a minute, but you know, this environment, whatever. But it’s like, so even things like that, just checking in. Like, hey, okay, is it that? What do they love about the late nights? Is it friends that are available? Is it quiet to think and it’s a creative time for them? And okay, how can we create that in other ways, maybe, during the day? Or how can we just honor it in the night?
But that’s that piece of just understanding each other, really being open, really looking for that underlying need. So, something you said, Pam just made me think of that piece.
ERIKA: Okay, so that brought something up for me too, which is I’ve heard the kids say things like, “I just want independence,” like, “I’m in charge of what happens right now. I’m gonna be getting food for myself and deciding what to do for myself.” So, sometimes it’s that, like a great opportunity to just do their own thing.
PAM: Yeah. And sometimes what those conversations are so useful, because the staying up late can be the solution that they’ve come to. And like you were saying, getting to that need underneath helps. It helps them recognize it. It helps us understand them better and also helps us maybe come up with like three or four different ways. So, if for a time or a week or whatever staying up late doesn’t work, maybe we can get them some quiet time on their own if that is the issue or whatever that underlying need is. Staying up late can definitely be one way, but maybe we can come up with an abundant three or four ways to meet that need, and staying up late is a choice on the platter rather than the one solution, as you were talking about, Erika.
ANNA: But we miss it if we’re just kind of tunneled in, even on this specific situation. It’s so much about just getting to know each other, having those conversations. What do you love about it? What’s fun about it? Because I think we can get so focused on even finding the solution, even when we’re doing it in this way, like being creative and we’re gonna find a solution. We’re kind of focused on that versus the learning, the learning that can happen when we’re finding out these nuances of each other and living in the family together.
PAM: Yeah. And it’s a season, right?
ANNA: I hate to say that, because I think people are like, gosh, Anna, we’ve heard it before, but it’s like, when you’re telling the things Pam, and I’m just thinking, oh, it was so long ago! It’s so quiet here now! And so, I know that sounds terrible because I really do remember how long those nights felt like. I remember just thinking, this is never going to end. I’m never going to sleep again. But you really do. It really changes so, so fast.
Oh my goodness. It has been so much fun to dive into this rich late night topic with you both, and we’d love it if you would join us on the Living Joyfully Network where we talk about this topic and many more that impact our unschooling lives. It’s such a great space to connect with other families navigating the same challenges, to feel support around that and experience all the joy of the connection as well. So, you can learn more about that at living joyfully.ca/network. So, thanks again for joining us here, and we hope to see you next time.
PAM AND ERIKA: Bye!
EU346: On the Journey with Cassie Emmott
Apr 13, 2023
This week, we’re back with another On the Journey episode. Pam, Anna, and Erika are joined by Living Joyfully Network member Cassie Emmott. Cassie is an unschooling mom with four children with diverse needs. She shares her path to unschooling and some insightful reflections about parenting and deschooling.
We talk about navigating challenging seasons and large families, the depth of inner work that unschooling encourages, and the choices we make to stay present and see the joy. Cassie also shares her beautiful poem about what processing feels like on the inside versus what it looks like on the outside. It’s so wonderful having her on the podcast and we hope you find our conversation inspiring on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Hello, everyone! I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully and this is episode number 346 of the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I’m joined by my co-hosts Pam Laricchia and Anna Brown, as well as our guest this week, Cassie Emmott. Welcome to you all!
CASSIE: Hi!
ANNA: Hi!
PAM: Hello!
ERIKA: Today we’re sharing another episode in our On the Journey series where we speak to our guests about their experiences, their a-ha moments, their challenges, and what they’ve learned on their unschooling journeys. Cassie is a member of the Living Joyfully Network and I have so enjoyed meeting her and getting to know her and her family. She’s a very inspiring thinker and I just always get so much out of the ideas she shares with everyone on the Network. And so, I’m so excited to have her here for this On the Journey episode.
And before we get started, I just wanted to share. One of my absolute favorite network features is one I was hesitant about initially, and that is the live weekly Zoom calls that we call our live conversations. So, I’m introverted. I get nervous when I’m speaking in front of people, and at first, I really wasn’t sure if it would feel too strange to listen to and talk to people I don’t really know or if I would be too nervous to share my thoughts, especially in front of Pam and Anna, who I’d been listening to on the podcast and the summit for years. And so, it’s fun to realize that now that call is one of my absolute favorite parts of my whole week.
We have different types of calls throughout the month. Sometimes we have breakout rooms to chat in small group. And most of the calls are just an open discussion and we end up talking and hearing about so many interesting things. And what I’ve really noticed is that the energy of being together is just so amazing. There’s this great feeling of support and connection.
And one of the ways that the calls have helped me grow in my own journey is that I just have this confidence now that I can handle big emotions and big problems, my own and other people’s. I can move through things that feel hard at first and sit with feelings that are challenging. And since I now have so much more experience hearing challenges and hearing all different ideas and perspectives about those challenges, it’s really helped me ground into the fact that there are always so many ways to approach a situation and that we can figure things out. And so, I just really value all of the collective insight and the experience that the community has to offer and love all the connections I’ve made.
And so, if you’re curious about what the Living Joyfully Network has to offer you, I really encourage you to give it a try. You can check out LivingJoyfully.ca/network to learn more.
And now I’d like to turn it over to Pam to start us off on this On the Journey episode. Pam?
PAM: Yay! Thank you. Hi, Cassie!
CASSIE: Hi!
PAM: And I just want to echo Erika, that I, too, feel so lucky to have met you through the network and I’m really happy that you are here to share some of your thoughts and ideas. So first, to get us started, can you give us just a bit of an introduction to you and your family?
CASSIE: Yeah, sure. Thank you for having me. I’ve loved this podcast for some time, so it’s been really great and it’s been really lovely to meet all of you as well, so it’s been good.
So yeah, in our family we have me, Cassie, and Pete, and we are the grownups, arguably. And then we’ve also got Grace who is 11. Our birthdays all changed from sort of December through to March, so we’ve just had all the shift around. So, yeah, Grace is 11, Isaac’s 10, very much just, Olivia is eight, and Micah is three. And so, yeah, so that’s us lot.
And yeah, we’ve pretty much unschooled since the beginning. I had a friend who was considering pulling her kid out of school when he was quite a lot smaller and she looked at home education here in the UK and so she said, “Oh, would you consider doing it?” And my answer was, “No. I don’t like teaching children.” And that’s not true because I like teaching. I’m quite didactic, but I was like, hmm, I don’t really want to be in a classroom trying to make small people mind. It just doesn’t work. And so, I like my own and like kids I care about. And then it just went from there.
She was looking into some stuff and I ended up finding John Holt as most people seem to and it just opened a total paradigm shift. So, we went sort of that route and Pete has been with me since the beginning. I tend to do the reading and then I disseminate to him and it’s fun. We’ve gotten more kind of open as time’s gone on. I think they were so small. Grace was two when we first really considered this, so it’s still infancy really anyway. But it’s watching them grow and flourish and marking their own time and so that’s been really interesting.
So, Grace is currently, if that’s cool, I’ll share a bit about what they’re into.
ANNA: Yes, please!
CASSIE: So, Grace is into everything. She reminds me a lot of me at her age, books, the hind leg off a donkey, but also loves performing, loves making scripts, loves messing around for comic effect. She’s got cracking comic timing, always has had, and has always got some massive project on the go.
At the moment, she’s currently making about four films and several series, and she’s just decided she’s going to start a club, ironically, a school club, which is hilarious about krakens and things. And so, she’s been doing loads of editing and stop motion and she keeps diving into going a new script.
And literally this week, she’s suddenly got into baking, which she’s never been interested beyond the cakes. And so, she’s like, “I’m going to write a recipe book.” And so, she’s been doing that and she’s very sweet, very kind, incredibly good, big sister, really lovely and fun and really fabulous company. Very empathetic.
And then Isaac. So, Isaac is 10, but I should probably mention my middle two are both autistic. And that does make a big difference in our family, because Isaac is largely nonverbal. Doesn’t really talk. He sings though, and boy can that kid sing. He’s got a beautiful voice and an amazing ability to hear music and pick up melody like that.
And so, he’s also still in nappies, as is Olivia. So, it’s a very different setup to having a ten- and an eight-year-old who may be on a usual path. And so, he’s recently got into Sonic the Hedgehog and running games on his tablet, which is really fun. And it’s so funny hearing him kind of play stuff and when he crashes, he then just turns the whole thing off and flings it across the room.
And he’s very affectionate and cuddly. Loves music, loves bouncing and smushing his face to us, which is always lovely. And singing and if you sing something he’ll pick up really fast and sing it back to you for weeks. So, I used to set Psalms for church and I’d be making up a new tune and he’d just be singing it for the next two weeks, the bit that I wrote. He’s amazing like that. It’s so cool.
And he’s got loads of energy and used to escape a lot. Doesn’t so much now, but runs. See, he’s got a lot of energy, so he’s definitely kept us on our toes.
And then Olivia, who is eight now, she’s so sweet, too. She is loving dolls. Over Christmas, we got loads of dolls and she’s just been exploring looking after babies and she has a tablet most of the time and is always listening to a movie or something in the background. Currently, as of the last couple of days, she’s discovered recording herself, so she’s been doing microphone stuff, and recording herself, and all the tablets get nicked.
So, they’ve all got one and she keeps nicking them in order to use the extra storage. And so, she’s singing and recording herself. And she’s really artistic, creative. Grace is really artistic as well, likes drawing, but like she keeps tearing little characters or draws around the house, which is both not ideal but beautiful and is very affectionate and cuddly and again, also autistic. And that comes out for her more in the need to have all the lights off or all the lights on and certain things and just timings needed to be clear for her. But ever since she was a teeny tiny baby, she’s just really sweet and that’s lovely.
And then Micah. Micah is three and very loud. I call him Captain Shouty-Pants, because he loves to shout and at the moment he’s into numbers. There’s a program on BBC called Numberblocks and he’s been counting like crazy. So much fun and so funny. He’s also very dramatic, he gets it from his mum, and likes to sort of recite stories and he waits till he has your attention and then performs it for you. And he does this weird gesticulating thing, like he’s doing some kind of hammy Shakespeare. It’s so funny. And yeah, he’s very boisterous, loves to climb, fling himself across the room, build stuff. He’s really into building with Magna-Tiles at the moment, so he’s lots of fun.
And then Pete and I, what to say? Lots of things. He’s my best friend. I’m really blessed to have him. He’s an amazing dad and husband, so I’m very glad to have him in my life and the kids. He’s got back into Dungeons and Dragons more recently. He works as a chaplain at a school, so sort of a Christian school. And he’s a Christian chaplain, but he’s not like a minister or anything. He’s amazingly empathetic and carries this unschooling energy into his schoolwork and the office, and holds space for people and also gets excited about sharing faith, but it’s also the combination of that and the pastoral care. And he’s very playful and silly and we like riffing with words. So, that’s fun.
And then I’m kind of into everything all the time and oh, just all sorts. So, I’m an actor by trade and training, although for the last decade or so, I’ve very much been full-time mothering and home educating or not, and so I love performing and singing and writing songs and writing poems and just all sorts. I love anything that’s to do with people and how people tick and connecting and communicating and getting people to kind of get unstuck and all of that.
I love to bake, so the creativity comes out in loads of ways. And lately I have been deep diving into Minecraft, and I’ve currently spent a lot of the last few hours building a city out of a mountain, which has been great fun. So, I’m figuring out how to do that and it kind of plays with my design love. So, that’s a lot, but that’s kind of us. It’s a lot of us in the house, so, yeah. Hope that’s not too much.
ANNA: Oh my goodness. No, I love it so much and I think it just paints such a lovely picture and I just love it. And it kind of fits into what I want to talk about and I’m going to give just a quick background.
So, on the Network, we have a Marco Polo group, which is a video messaging app. And it’s so fun to get that glimpse into people’s homes and lives and just have that connection.
And gosh, I mean, what stood out for me from the beginning, Cassie, is just how you delight in your children, and it’s just this love and care and joy that just is so evident, and that is even in the midst of all the challenges that life throws because life throws challenges as we know. But there is just this deep connection and love and joy, and I feel like you’ve created an environment where all of your children with very diverse needs can thrive. And I just think it’d be really fun if you could tell us just a bit about some strategies or your journey as it came with that and what’s kind of helped you do that. And I know part of it is just who you are and what you bring to it, but I know you’ve had lots of learning along the way as we all have to create that environment that just feels so good.
CASSIE: Yeah. So, I’ve been thinking about it and so that I don’t give you like an epic thesis worthy of a giant document, I will do my best to nutshell it, because I have lots of words.
It’s funny. I was really thinking about this and it kind of hinges on like creativity, connection, and communication, which are starting to become my buzzwords in everything else that I’m doing as well. And it’s not deliberate. I’m not like marketing, but it’s like surrendering to who you actually have.
And I was chatting to Pete about it and just said, “Is there anything you want to add to that?” when I was sharing some of my thoughts, and he said, “Surrender.” And I think that is such a big word in so many aspects, in our faith journey, like surrendering to trusting that God’s got us, but also surrendering to who you actually have in front of you, who you’re dealing, with who they actually are, who you are at this precise moment in time, which changes, and then getting creative with how you work with that. So, I mean, there’s so many facets to this family, because, like the big diverse needs. I didn’t expect, for example, to have three kids in nappies when my youngest is three and the others are that much older. It’s fine. Do I wish at some point that they’d be in a position where they’re no longer in them? Of course. I’d love them to be free. But at the same time, to serve them in that way by loving them and just helping them is actually a different kind of joy and it’s slowed me down.
I think I was never a major stress head when it came to the kids. I think part of my actor training part of a lot of things, of just being where you are and learning how to really see where you are actually at and unpick that and ask the questions. That’s been really important. So, I came to motherhood I think with a bunch of that already, but not trying to propel us on this journey. And so, changing things up.
Sorry, this is going to go around and around because this is how my brain works. So, I hope you’re still following. Shout if it’s unclear. So, I think Pete and I joke that we get some things in place and we feel like we’ve got a rhythm and everything’s working and everyone’s needs are being met and then it’s usually about six weeks and it has to change all over again. And we just think we’ve got a pattern down or we know what we are doing.
And so, the surrender to change, which isn’t always easy, is really hard. And yet when we do and we lean into it, rather than fighting this uphill battle against what isn’t going to work anyway, it’s like, well, let’s just try this a different way and just see, and then it’ll probably change in another six weeks’ time.
I mean, it’s not as neat as that. That would be lovely.
Leaning into the dull and the mundane has meant that, where I dream of big and dramatic and life changing and world changing, has helped me to really see and helped us to really see the incredible beauty that is right in front of me. And it’s a bit like the macrocosm/microcosm thing. You know, you can walk out into a woods or a forest and go, “Wow, the whole thing!” and that is one part of it. Or you can then hone in right on the small things and and learn to delight in the beauty that is right in front of you in the teeny tiny.
And I think, whereas my heart dreams of massive stuff at the same time, it’s been a real journey for me, especially with the ongoing needs of the family, to keep looking at what’s there in the small. So, for example, Olivia started drawing on the walls. Now that I live in a rental property with landlords who aren’t wildly amenable to redecorating every 10 minutes, if at all. So, it’s that natural, very real fear of going, I don’t have loads of money. I don’t want to be repainting 95 times. This is tricky.
But then I looked at what she was drawing, and to be fair, I’ve been looking at what she was drawing anyway, so I got there quicker than that. But this was a few years ago, she was drawing these beautiful little Tinkerbell fairies and the quality of artwork was just so stunning.
And she’s not like a child-prodigy-stunning, but when you looked at the drawing, it’s just beautiful and really clear and she’s got a real style and a flare. And seeing that has meant that I could go, “Oh wow, but look at what she’s drawing.” It will probably wash off the walls eventually, and if not, we’ll have to paint before we leave. But it’s like, in doing that, I could have yelled and I have my human moments when I’m much more shouty pants myself. But instead going, she really needed to draw. And evidently the canvases I was offering her of a small piece of paper were not sufficient. She needed a big space, and so therefore, giving her that option to do that, has, I guess, taken the pressure of her needing to be a particular way.
And the same for Isaac. Just constantly being creative, finding space where they can all have little chill out spaces. Figuring out that we were all sleeping in the same room except for Isaac anyway, that maybe we needed to just move rooms and put loads of beds together, which we did just before Christmas. And so, we’re all in there because Grace at 10 and now 11, still needed us. And so, she needed to thrive and feel safe by knowing she was safe at night. And did I, again, dream that I would be sharing a family bed with a whole room like a giant dormitory? No.
I guess it’s just been this whole creative thing and respecting them as individual people and who they are and enjoying them for who they are and surrendering to the tablet stuff of giving them all a tablet and, you know, paying it off when we can. Or Olivia wanting to go to the shops and buy a doll and she got a load of Christmas money, so we took her to the shop every time and she just wanted to get all the things. And rather than going, “No, you must have one,” it’s like, okay, well we have this fund at the minute, let’s just use it for that. And her delight has been so rich and gorgeous and she’s playing with them and then she moves to something else.
And it is tricky sometimes trying to navigate lots of people in her family anyway, but lots of people with different needs. I just think keep being open to trying and trying something else and forgiving one another and apologizing when you screw up and then just being playful with it. And bedtimes went out the window a while ago, but we have a rhythm. Again, it’s just not rigid.
And I think the other big thing that I’ve been constantly working through in this whole aspect of parenting and with our kids is the need for permission. It’s a really real thing for that sense of outside permission that you’re not going to have someone turn around and tell you, “You’re doing it wrong.” And there’s so much cultural messaging around how to parent and what is the right way and what your kids should be learning. And when you don’t go to the school route, I have my wobbles and I’m going, are they going to learn anything? And then suddenly, Grace decides she’s baking, or she’s making these amazing short films and doing loads of editing and then showing them to anybody she just meets. And it’s just like, wow. And so, realizing that I don’t necessarily need permission from outside if I’m confident in the choice itself. And the same for Pete.
Just building a nest and building what we need. And at the moment, we’ve been in a long season of colds, but also of being very much in our house because it’s trickier to get out. We’ve now got some help and that that helps. But it’s still wet and horrible and everyone’s still under the weather and we are very much hibernating and surrendering the whole idea we should be going out and doing stuff is not where we’re at right now. And that’s okay, too. And maybe the reason I don’t go out and get out in the woods all the time, even though that’s what I imagined I’d be doing if I home educated my kids, I swear I was going to have a woodland life. It’s not been that at all, but it’s been a cuddle on the sofa, surrounded by toys, children bundling on you and squashing you, and then trying to Minecraft and not knock all your blocks off at the same time. And it’s been great. It’s been really fun.
And in the harder times, it’s, keep leaning back into that who they are and the delight that they give us because they’re flipping amazing. They’re really fun as well, and they’re funny and playful and silly and then I can be my playful silly self, which sometimes involves some daft dancing or weird wordplay. It’s not meant to be alliterative, but anyway. And it’s really fun. And I think that answers, but, you know,
ANNA: Right! I mean, I think what I love about that is, I do think you hit those big pieces, because surrender. I mean, that’s a beautiful word. And I think what I see is that element that’s in in you, that light in you, is really in that moment. And I think that surrender helps you be in that moment. And in that moment you are seeing the joy and the beauty, because you’re right when we’re in our head thinking about what other people are wanting for us or these other things, they’re not with these beautiful children. They’re not there.
And I think all of those things that you talked about are what get you into that moment where you can just be amazed and in awe of how wonderful they are. So yeah, I loved that so much. Thank you.
ERIKA: I was just going to pull out that six weeks at a time little thing that she had mentioned. I thought that was so great. Because it’s like, I mean, that is another type of surrender I think to just like realize, even when we feel like we’ve got it, it’s going to change again. They’re going to grow, something’s going to change, the next thing’s going to happen.
And so, just to kind of keep yourself from attaching too strongly to something that’s working, I think, has been a really fun thing to hear about.
PAM: Yeah. What bubbled up for me, and again, back to the surrender piece, and as you mentioned, Cassie, this is not what I imagined my life was going to look like back then. But that surrender piece and what you made so evident is that yes, it’s very different and it’s so amazing. Right? It’s not like I gave that up for something different, for a nebulous reason for myself. But this is also, in my experience, many times, was actually so much better and richer and just more fun than that steady path that I thought I was going to go on. So, the surrender piece, such a huge part.
But what kept me surrendering day after day was learning so many times, wow, this was even better than what I could have come up with on my own.
CASSIE: Yeah. And I think there’s dreams. Like, I still have big dreams. So, my heart still is very much in acting, but it was realizing that you can’t have two priorities. One has to always be slightly prior and it’s been the family, and I’ve said this so many times, but I’ve never regretted. I miss acting and performing and doing that whole thing like I’d miss a limb. But I’ve never missed it more than I have valued being able to be fully present with my family. And it’s like the two things can be held in tension. The desire for both the big dreams that I still have as a person on my own right and the passion that just will not die in this whole area and yet, maybe that’ll come in the future, but meanwhile I’m not giving up for something that’s just drudgery. I’m actually giving it up for something that’s so life giving and it might not be forever either.
PAM: That’s beautiful.
ERIKA: I love that. And I was thinking, too, that step forward path that Pam was talking about. It’s so freeing to be able to think of life as more of a journey metaphor, which does not look like a predictable line, but has all of these kind of unexpected twists and turns.
So, I had a thought that I wanted to talk about, because you shared a poem that you wrote about doing deep inner work that’s so much a part of deschooling and unschooling and I was wondering if you would share it with us and maybe some of your thoughts about that aspect of your life.
CASSIE: Sure. Okay. I’ll bring it up on my phone, because I didn’t print it out yet.
That deep work that brings us out into the light,
enabling us to really see,
To know ourselves –
This work of unpicking and unpacking our story,
Of tentatively claiming kinship
With those orphaned experiences,
those parts of our childlike character we were trained to reject –
This is the work that goes unseen.
Looking as though nothing is happening,
With no obvious shoot or bloom –
But, the seeming opposite,
That of a shrinking,
Diminishing,
A reducing of capacity and strength,
Becoming more pathetic –
Is less attractive,
Even offensive,
To those on the outside.
Yet the excavation underway below the surface –
Unearthing great caverns of beauty,
Geodes of pain,
Hidden rivers of strength –
This is where the refining and reforming
is at its most ambitious.
Here, the understanding
and redefinition of beauty,
is both infant and infinite.
Re-tuning to that holy note,
Becoming more crystalline,
We begin to resonate,
Growing in clarity,
Anchored in rock.
No errand for those whose hunger for hope is quenched,
This downward, uphill struggle will break you open,
Cutting to the quick,
Where every nerve vibrates,
Raw,
And grief threatens to drown.
Yet here is where peace is found.
In the turmoil of stillness,
At the edge of the abyss,
We die.
And wake to new life,
More tender,
And more whole.
This deep work –
Which none can know,
But the one on the inside who bears witness,
And tends the wounds with love –
This work is love made flesh,
And freedom follows.
There you go. That’s the end. You can talk again.
ANNA: Beautiful!
PAM: I know. So beautiful.
CASSIE: Thank you. Yeah. What was the question again? It’s funny, so yeah, just thinking about I think many of us are really afraid to truly see ourselves. I think we’re afraid of shame or rejection. We’re afraid of actually realizing our stories are full of shame, because maybe they are. Maybe we’re ashamed of things we’ve done or things we’ve been, or how we’ve been. Maybe we don’t know how to unpack that and we can often feel powerless to change.
And I think a lot of us are content to sleepwalk and we just won’t look too closely. It’s safer this way, and yet it really isn’t safer, because you don’t know what you’re going to bump into.
I think I had someone describe it once as a bit like walking into a room filled with cluttered furniture, but with the lights off and then you’re like, but it’s safer. I can’t see what’s there. But you crash into everything. You turn the lights on, you see everything that’s there.
(Cassie shared that the reference to the cluttered room came from Aundi Kolber’s book Try Softer and her IG handle is @aundikolber.)
I think saying you turn the lights on and then you’re like, “Oh my gosh, there’s so much there,” But you’re less likely to crash in and stab yourself in the eye from something you’ve stored. And I think the nature of all work that connects us with our sense of story, whatever that is, because everyone’s had pain, everyone’s had trauma, whether it’s big or small. I’ve had some pretty big ones, like one I’ll share briefly.
We lost a baby in a late term miscarriage and so that was a pretty big one, but then there’s others like looking at my family background and stuff that was beautiful and then going, oh, but some things that didn’t quite work for me and starting to realize that now. And that’s scary, because then you go, but I had a happy childhood and in many ways I really did. But looking slightly deeper is scary, because then you have to go, but what about the bits that maybe weren’t so great? And I didn’t have a terrible childhood at all. I had loving parents and a very supportive family in so many ways.
But it’s that nature of looking deeply can be really scary. And I think when I was writing this poem, I’d been writing it because I’d been processing a whole bunch of things about so many bits and pieces, but in the process of doing that, it’s exhausting. And physically, I’ve had five babies, but four babies, and then we had a lockdown and all the things, and so, physically I’m pretty drained and exhausted and yet also all this processing takes physical energy and that isn’t visible and it’s not visible because I still haven’t unpacked half of it. And so, it’s still messy on the inside. And so, that’s still taking energy. And then it looks like, whereas I used to be the super capable person, I mean I think I just ran too fast anyway. I’d be doing millions of classes and dancing and performing and used to be able to run on all of that.
And now it’s like if I’ve had one outing in a week, I’m done for the week. And it’s really crazy how much, I think from the outside, to people who knew me more at that point, it probably looks like I’m a bit useless now, or I just want to hole up in my comfort zone. And yet the nature of really asking the questions about, well, what was that like? How do I feel about that now? Is that still who I want to be? Does bring up pain? And allowing yourself to really feel that pain is sometimes almost as scary as the fact that there might be some.
But like with grief, which has been a theme that’s run a lot through my life, you can’t circumvent it. You can hide it, you can squash it, you can suppress it, but you can’t move through it if you don’t allow it to take the space it’s going to take.
And I don’t know, with unschooling, we’ve gone off a beaten path, or at least a beaten path I’ve known growing up with my kids and what I was parented like, and in lots of ways there was a certain amount of freedom too. And they were supportive from being an actor without telling me I had to get a trade behind me. I mean, that’s a big deal for a lot of people. And yet, things like expecting certain levels of respect or putting boundaries in place that mean, well, it’s the parent’s time now and it’s the kid’s bedtime and going, well, why? Is that really an important boundary? And sometimes those boundaries really are. Maybe Pete and I haven’t spoken to each other properly all week, and so actually we need that time. So, finding someone to create that to work for us. It’s not that the thing itself isn’t necessarily a good thing, but just the nature of unschooling as I’ve dived into it more as we’ve dived into it more as our kids have grown, I have wobbles every so often that what if they’re not reading in time? What if I’m not doing it right? And yet asking those questions, taking the space, allowing myself to feel what I’m feeling, and then also just connecting.
My interest in people, especially as a performer, as an actor, like I love the story. I love getting into the head and the heart of somebody, and it’s an incredible privilege when I’ve got to do that work to stand in effectively stand in somebody else’s body and walk out their journey. And that sounds a bit weird, but it’s like you are. You are offering your body to be a conduit to tell that story, to connect with the people in the audience, whether on screen or in person. And so, you are sharing that. And you have to allow them to be them, whoever that character is. And so, you have to know where you stop or start in order to be able to tell someone else’s story without just making it all about you.
And so that was good grounding. But with parenting and unschooling, it’s been a lot of, keep asking questions. And sometimes when we are tired or we snappish or you just want to do something or, “Well, they should really eat this.” I love to cook and it really annoys me when my kids won’t eat my food. And I’m like, “But I made it particularly. Why don’t you want it?” And yet, actually, hang on a minute. Does she need to? Is it really a value judgment on my worth and my cooking skills if she doesn’t? Is it really the end of the world if they eat nothing but bread and I have a family of ducks forever? Maybe I can cook something nice. I swear at one point we did have a family of ducks. We’d just get through bread. They’d just eat bread. I’m like, “Oh, the Emmett Quackers.” It was hilarious.
I just think we do not in our culture, and I think as people we are a bit scared of story being messy. And we’d like to wrap it in a nice bow. There’s nothing wrong with a lovely bow, but there’s no point in wrapping bow around something that’s really not actually at a point there’s some wholeness.
And yet, asking those questions, allowing yourself to sit with the you you’re not so sure you like until you come out the other side. Not necessarily going, “And I’m fixed!” at all, but going, do you know what? I like her. I don’t always like what I can do or can’t do. I get very frustrated or disappointed with my lack of energy or the fact that I feel that, what if I’m not getting my kids out enough? Or what if they’re only going to be on their tablets now forever? Of course they’re not. And then I see that they don’t but it, but I like who I’m becoming. I like the person.
It’s really funny. So, as a performer, voice is important, and that command of your voice and being able to do that. I mean, I once told someone off the stealing in my bike because I shouted at them and told them off. It was brilliant. I still have that. So, I went, “Ah, excuse me. Do you mind not stealing my bike, please!?” I just sort of yelled at him and all the adrenaline was pumping. It was hilarious.
And so, commanding voice and knowing that you can set a boundary by saying to your child, “No,” it’s very powerful. Except it gets in the way of connection and it gets in the way of that being a person. And so, when people say, well, if you just say no, I’m like, seriously? I can say no really authoritatively, till the cows come home. Believe me. I do old-school mom fantastically. I’ve played Russian matriarchs. I’m good at that. I’m not even that old, but I’ve played old ladies. It’s funny. But there’s that, do I want to do that? Or I insist on something and I watch my kid’s face fall or I watch the light go out their eyes or I get too teachery, because I like to get excited and tell you all about it and try and get you to get it with me. And then I watch Grace just switch off and glaze over and be like, “Mommy. I just want to play with the letters my way. I just want to make up words that are gibberish and then get you to say them. I don’t care what they spell.”
And it’s been challenging, but it’s been a real, again, journey of surrender, I guess, a journey of grace. And I think the idea that giving grace to yourself is a really good phrase, but it can be hard to know what that means and how to do that. And I think sometimes that means when you’re tired yet again, not feeling like you are less than for not, well get up and have a walk and it’ll make a difference. Because sometimes it will, but sometimes it isn’t what you need and it’s maybe you just need to sit and Minecraft for three hours and that’s self-care.
And it sounds really weird, but it’s something that brings you joy. And again, trusting that when you see yourself, you actually become more tender. Or you can choose to get hard and get bitter, but I think it brings you to the end of yourself. And for me, that means coming to God and going, I need, I need your love. And that encourages me to actually be kinder, because God’s way kinder with me than I ever am, and actually becoming more tenderhearted, more vulnerable, more open, which means you get hurt. But I’m so much more receptive for that. And I think that means I’m more receptive to my kids and to their pain and to their joys, and I think that. I don’t know if that answers your question.
ERIKA: I think that I love the part that you brought up about there being a physical toll from doing the mental inner work, because I have found that to be the case and it’s something where looking at me, you wouldn’t know why I have this face on right now. What’s going on? But it’s because of the internal work. And how common it is for unschooling to be a path into doing that work. And you don’t have to get there through unschooling. I think, as far as what I’ve seen, it’s pretty common for people in their forties to start looking at things on the inside and figuring out things. But I think unschooling, it almost boosts you forward on that internal journey, because you’re questioning everything. It has started the path of questioning everything. And so, I don’t know. I liked thinking about how big of a deal it is to do that and really giving yourself some credit, giving yourself some space and kindness and compassion for that work that you’re doing.
ANNA: Yeah. And I think, too, how that work, how we’ve seen it kind of interplay with unschooling families and other people is, like you said, it’s a deepening, because you understand yourself more as you look at those dark corners and the hard things, and not just gloss over it. I think it expands our heart. I think we’re able to open to other people. We’re able to see that they have their own unique journey, because we’re not just cramming our journey into some kind of a box or some kind of a stereotype. So, I just think all of that interplay of the unschooling and being in such close relationship with people every day, all the things. It creates this environment where we can really learn so much about ourselves and the people around us. I really love that so much.
PAM: I really love the word tender. It really does speak to that feeling. And as Erika mentioned, I think one of the things that we really don’t give a lot of credence to when we’re doing that deep work, that tender work, that vulnerable work, we don’t give credit or recognize how much of a physical toll it takes, like how much physical energy it takes to think like our body needs to feed our brain to do all this processing, to ask these questions, to just see how they feel in our bones, see how they feel inside.
I just loved the imagery of your poem, because it just brought to mind how so much of that processing can feel from, from little healing rivers to deep chasms, to all those pieces and coming through the other side more tender.
And I loved your point, too, about really, it’s worth it and it’s valuable to see what grace and compassion for ourselves looks like and feels like, because the words are valuable and helpful and everything, but what does that look like? Does it look like three hours of Minecraft is self-care? And literally knowing that, not just telling yourself that, but feeling it in your bones, knowing through experience that this feels good. This deserves to be on my list of things that can help me maybe recover some of that energy from processing.
You talked before about in and out, I forget the word you used, but maybe when it’s a transition time, like I have looked at this deep stuff up close in the forest. I’ve looked at this leaf for a long time. To me, the clue was kind of, I feel like I’m circling now. I’m not really making progress as I stare at this leaf. I’m not getting any more out of it. But yeah, to transition to, you know what? I’m going to look up now doesn’t mean I’m never going to look back at the leaf. That leaf is going to be carried with me now as I look up right and see different perspectives and start putting the puzzle together in a different way.
We don’t lose that, but for me, those are the pieces where grace and compassion for myself come in. It’s not judgment of myself. Maybe that’s part of it, like understanding that all these pieces are okay. Even if, I feel like I told somebody what I was doing, I haven’t been out for a week, that they may bring judgment with that, because we do hear those stories outside of us so much. But to really lean into what it means to be us and how we tick and giving ourselves that grace and compassion instead of judgment. Imagine if we supported ourselves like we support our children. Often, it’s easier to get to through supporting our children, but oh my gosh, it is so helpful to be able to give that to ourselves, too, as part of our journey. Anyway, thank you so much for the poem. It brought up so much for me!
CASSIE: Pleasure. Do you mind if I just add one thing? I was just thinking when you’re saying about the, just telling yourself, but not necessarily believing, I think that’s also a process from outside to in often and sometimes it comes inside out. And I think we can move inside out or outside in with a lot of realizations and understanding.
But I think sometimes, I would rather work inside out when I’m trying to figure out a journey or a character, because it’s like, what’s here and then what feels more honest as I go forward. But sometimes you just get stuck and so you say, move here, say this, do this, say it in this way. And then the feeling life catches up. And I just think it’s also okay for us to remember that when we know something is true, like there’s a truth about it, but maybe it hasn’t resonated or landed with us, like the whole, “It’s okay to say this is self-care,” when you’re secretly going, “But I feel like a fraud.”
It’s like, hearing that and going, “It’s okay that I have spoken this as a truth. I know this is true. My emotions, my feeling life will catch up. They’re just not there yet.” And trusting that by doing it and by giving yourself the space to do it more, whatever it is, gradually your feeling life or your sense of the reality of it and the validity of it will catch up and then you’ll be able to fully inhabit that.
But we can’t always do that straight away. So, if we’re waiting till we really believe it before we do it, we’ll never do it. But sometimes it’s like, I know this is good for me and I’m enjoying it. It is honestly good self-care. It’s not me just being lazy.
And so, then you start to believe it more as time catches up, that’s just something I’ve found really helpful to remember as well.
ERIKA: That’s really interesting. I feel like when Pam was talking, too, and with that most recent bit too, I like the kind of being playful about the inner work, too, like keeping that kind of sense of curiosity and play about it as well. Because then, right, it can be easy to get kind of trapped in judgment or the external judgment and internal judgment, but if we’re more playful about it, then it can just be, “Well, I can play Minecraft if I want, and then we’ll just see. We’ll see how I feel after,” and so then there’s less judgment I think helps us along that internal work path.
CASSIE: Yeah, and YouTube rabbit holes do the same for me, as well. Watching other actors talking about stuff, and watching a whole bunch of round tables, I just physically feel myself coming back to myself. I’m like, YouTube rabbit holes are actually a good thing sometimes.
ANNA: Yes, yes.
ERIKA: They definitely can be. Thank you so much, Cassie, for spending time with us today. It was great to be able to share some of your journey with everyone, and thanks so much to everyone for listening, and we wish you a wonderful day. Bye!
ANNA: Thank you!
CASSIE: Bye.
PAM: Bye.
EU345: Unschooling “Rules”: No Bedtimes
Mar 30, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a new episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series!
We use the word “rules,” in quotes, to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschoolers don’t have bedtimes. And although it’s true that most unschoolers move away from arbitrary bedtimes set by the clock, we still all sleep! And because people are so different, what a family’s bedtime routine looks like can be unique—for different families and also in different seasons of life. We talk about some of the worries and fears that come up when thinking about sleep, as well as what sleep has looked for us over the years.
We had a lot of fun diving into this topic and we hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from LivingJoyfully.ca and today I’m here with Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello!
ERIKA AND ANNA: Hi.
PAM: So, before we get started, we want to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or even an A+. Our goal with the series is to explore these apparent rules and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, inquiry, agency, and growth.
So, with that, in this episode, we’re diving into the rule that unschoolers have no bedtimes. That can seem a little out there when you’re newer to unschooling and first come across it, but I will say, it’s a pretty distinguishing feature for many unschooling families. And that said, it doesn’t really mean what it sounds like at first.
Through the lens of conventional parenting, it sounds like chaos and tossing bedtimes out the window in a family used to relying on rules and needing the kids to be up early for school would most likely end up that way, absolutely. Yet, through the lens of unschooling, most unschooling families truly don’t have fixed bedtimes, yet their lives aren’t forever sleep-deprived and chaotic. So, what gives?
Well, it’s about the lifestyle the parents choose to embrace with their children. It’s less about control, about adult power over children, and more about connection, living and working together as a team. As we gain experience with unschooling, we come to question hard and fast rules like bedtimes dictated by the clock. We tend to prefer to consider the context of the moment, like, is there an activity we want to do tomorrow that necessitates getting up early? And the needs of the person, are they actually tired right now?
Yet not having a rule to pull out doesn’t mean we’re all of a sudden not involved in helping our children navigate the situation. We don’t leave them to run wild until they drop. Instead, there’s a helpful perspective shift that we can make from rules to routines. So, what does that look like with bedtimes? Well, people do get tired. What if you thought of bedtime as more of a routine to help your child get to sleep when they’re tired rather than a fixed rule based on the time on the clock? Does it seem reasonable to help them listen to their bodies and follow their cues rather than try to control their bodies based on outside factors? There is so much rich learning in there and a deeper sense of self-awareness.
Another helpful aspect of thinking in terms of routines rather than rules is that, for many kids and adults, there’s comfort in routines, in knowing what to expect. And routines help with transitions. A relaxing routine to get ready to go to bed when they’re tired or a routine to get out the door so things aren’t forgotten and people aren’t rushed and miserable. Having a rule like a bedtime actually encourages us to not learn the nuances of the people we love. We just pull out the rule and insist they follow it no matter how they’re feeling or what’s going on in their lives. There’s no critical thinking, just obedience.
Not having a specific bedtime rule is about getting to know and understand our children and ourselves. When do we feel tired? How do we like to ease into sleep? We can figure that out alongside our children, which we talked about in the last episode, as well. We don’t have to know the answers. We can figure this out. We’re finally getting the chance to question these things. We probably grew up with a bedtime. We’ve certainly heard the messages that “children need bedtimes” that surround us. So, it’s really fascinating to just take a rule like bedtimes and then just start questioning it. Like, what if we didn’t have it? It could be just something fun you play with in your mind at first when you think, what the heck? That seems a little unnerving to me. What are your thoughts, Erika?
ERIKA: Oh my gosh. This rule is a really fun one to dig into, I think, because it is one that seems just so wild at first. It’s one of those that’s like, well, I would never do that. But then now, the idea of enforcing a certain time for sleep just seems so strange to me.
And I remember having a really hard time falling asleep as a child myself, and I do think I could have benefited from this kind of approach of learning some of the calming tools that we talk about now, having some sort of a relaxation routine to help me and learning how to listen to my body instead of just looking at the clock.
So, I found that the transition from when my kids were babies to now has been this gradual process of learning and growing. I observed them, saw what they needed, saw when they were tired, and how they like to fall asleep, and so on, and just used their cues as the guide. And over the years, the timing of their sleep, the location of their sleep, what helps them fall asleep, all of that has changed and fluctuated.
So, what I find so valuable about this approach and looking at sleep as this physical need rather than a prescribed schedule, is that we all learn so much more about our bodies. We get to really feel how our bodies tell us what we need. We talk about what makes sleep feel easier or harder, which is actually different for different people.
And I’ll give you a couple of examples just to think about. So, some people actually have a really hard time sleeping when it’s pitch black, while other people want to have complete darkness. I have friends who feel the safest and most comfortable falling asleep in the daytime when the sun is coming through the window. So, light is one aspect that can be different for different people.
And then there’s sound, some people fall asleep best in silence, but for many, having a sound machine or a fan going can help us fall asleep more easily. I love to have a heavy blanket over me, because it makes me feel safe and cozy, and it’s not even cold where I live, so my husband gets so hot that a heavy blanket is a terrible idea for him. So, I have my little blanket zone that’s just for me. And there are more aspects like what activities you do before you sleep or what you eat or you drink before bed, how many hours of sleep feels really good for your body, and so on.
And I just wanted to share some of these differences just to emphasize that, like with everything else we ever talk about, there is no one right way to sleep. And by opening up the possibilities and getting creative, we really can figure out what works well for us as individuals and also as a family. And so, I think that in some unschooling families, it will look from the outside like they’re enforcing a bedtime, because everyone’s falling asleep at the same time each night. But it’s just because that’s what’s working well for them at the moment.
And so, to me it’s not a matter of just like, who cares? Stay up to whatever time you want. I’m not going to help you get any sleep. It’s about thinking about the context, like what you were saying about what do we have to do in the morning, what do we need to do with our time? What do we want to do with our time? Noticing how we like to sleep and what makes us feel good. And then my role is trying to support my kids and my whole family to meet all of our different needs. And when we aren’t meeting all of the needs, then we can have conversations and try to problem-solve together. Just try something different and play with it. So, it’s always a work in progress and it’s constantly shifting as the kids are growing and as our needs change. Anna?
ANNA: Oh my gosh. Yes. And I love the reminder about how we’re all so different, you know? Because as you were going through the differences, I was thinking about my own preferences. I prefer pitch black. I also have a sound machine. I like a blanket, but I have this thing called Bed Jet that cools our heats depending on the time of the year. So, I’m a little bit of a princess. But I’ve seen these people that can just sleep anywhere. Right? But that is not me and it wasn’t my kids either.
When I think about it, part of my journey as an adult was learning to listen to and love my body, because I feel like I had a lot of messages when I was younger that really dissociated me from those cues. And I knew that I wanted my children to not lose touch with the wisdom of their bodies. In babies, we see this clear communication of being hungry or tired, and yet somewhere along the way, conventional wisdom tells us that we need to apply this strict, somewhat arbitrary schedule really, to these growing humans. So, I guess in fairness, some people do that with babies, but developmental psychologists and medical professionals agree it is really important to listen to a baby’s cues. And if you’ve been around a baby, you see they know how to communicate those cues.
And so, what it looked like for us was, we were eating when we were hungry, we were sleeping when we were tired. And as you’ve both touched on, though, that was in the context of our family of four, what made sense for the life that we were creating together.
And in the early years, David was working outside the home and needed to get up early. So, that was always a part of the consideration. Noise levels, energy, time of the night. We had this gigantic, huge, family bed, and thankfully he was a deep sleeper, but we still needed to find ways to be creative to meet the needs of everyone involved. And we did often like to go to bed together. I just have really fond memories of that time in the dark, thinking about our day, sharing the ups and downs, reading a book. That was just really precious time that I think about often, but it also meant that I wasn’t getting alone time in the evening. So, as an introvert, that was a little tricky for me. So, I would make adjustments like getting up earlier than they did, or taking time when they were playing with David. Also, just looking for ways to fill my cup throughout the day.
It just never really felt good to me to think about sending someone off to bed who wasn’t tired, just because I needed to have some alone time. I wanted it to work for all of us, and I found that, as we worked together and really caring for and honoring each other’s needs, allowed us to be creative and come up with the solutions that felt good for us all. And, like you said, Erika, it changes. There are bumps and changes along the way. But we can just kind of keep that attitude of, we’re going to figure this out.
And just kind of an aside about this, because it always comes up in these kinds of discussions, is the idea if they don’t have a strict bedtime that and get up in the morning, they won’t be able to have a job. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard that from people and it does always make me chuckle, but it comes up. I get it. We have these cultural messages. My girls, and really, all four of us back in the day, tended to be night owls. So, if something was coming up that required an early start, we would talk through what we wanted that to look like. And I found over and over, they were able to show up for the things that were important to them. Sometimes it was going to bed earlier the night before. Really more often it was leaving extra room on the back end to maybe go to sleep early that night or sleep in the next day.
And my youngest, she’s 23 now, and she has worked at a lot of different jobs over the years, some that go very late into the night. Currently, she has one that has her starting at 6:00 AM most mornings, and she has no trouble adjusting. And says she has actually been enjoying the early shifts because it frees up her afternoon and evening to be with friends.
And so, I guess my point is when we listen to our bodies and learn about the nuances of how we handle things, we make adjustments that we need to do the things that we want to do. So, I think walking through any fears anyone has about that can help you pinpoint the underlying issues. Is it fear of the future? Is it not getting a alone time, not getting couple time? Whatever it is, walking through that will give you more information. And then once you’ve identified that root issue, you can find creative solutions that feel good to everyone as opposed to just, we’re going to put down this arbitrary bedtime instead of digging deeper to what’s really going on here. So, I think that kind of introspection can be really helpful.
PAM: Yeah, I just want to go back to that question of, how will they be able to get up for a job? Because you don’t have to train for years to be able to wake up. And that’s the other piece, too. They’re choosing this job or whatever the reason is to get up by a particular time, whatever it is, it’s something they’re choosing. So, it really is, I guess, surprising when you first introduce the idea, but not at all surprising soon after. They’ll figure it out.
ANNA: Right. Once you start thinking about it. And then I think the other thing I want to throw in is they’re young, so Raelin will work these really late nights and then have an early shift the next day, and I’m just thinking, I would die. She’s totally fine. So, when they’re doing things they want to do and they’re young and not our age, they have this ability to adjust and move through things when they’re tired and those pieces, but they’re learning so much about what works.
And she would say sometimes when she was younger, sleepovers, she knew they weren’t going to get sleep at the sleepover and so she didn’t want to plan anything for two days afterwards because she wanted to rest. But I love that she had that insight. She still wanted to do the sleepover, because it was fun being with her friends, but she was learning things all the time, versus if I was imposing something, she’s not learning anything except what bedtime I think is a good idea.
ERIKA: It’s kind of reminding me of the don’t borrow trouble idea, too, because you can really get caught in kind of a tunnel vision mode when it comes to things like this, especially if it is triggering the like, I never get to have time with my husband alone, or are they going be able to wake up for the things 20 years down the road, all those future fears or the fears of like, it’s going to be like this forever. And so, if we feel like those kind of fears are popping up, I think that’s a good time to step back and remember that there are seasons. Everything’s always changing.
Every time I felt so trapped in whatever the sleep situation was that was going on, it would change the next day. Like as soon as I voiced my concern of, it’s never going to change! it changed the next day. And so, remember that things do change and there are difficult seasons of sleep, but yeah, it’s all a process and a journey.
PAM: Yeah, I think that is a really cool piece, too, because we’re all learning. As you were saying, Anna, they learn, and again I’ve experienced with my kids as well that they learn what their body needs and what they like. I know I can have an extra late night and an early morning once, maybe twice in a row, and then I will need to accommodate at some point with an earlier night or a sleep in or something like that.
But they’re learning how their body ticks and how it works with sleep and what feels good and they’re gaining experience with how that changes over time, because I feel for myself anyway, I remember when I was younger, when you mentioned that, Erika, it would be bedtime. I’d go to bed and I would lie there looking at the clock. And I’d be just like, okay, I don’t want to look at the clock. I need to be asleep by a certain time. And then I’d look and that time had come and then I’d be like, oh my god. Oh my god, no, I’m going to have a horrible night.
We absorb that and we set ourselves up for feeling bad about it. I could have woken up in the morning. And been perfectly fine, but I was thinking I did not get much sleep last night. I’m going to be cranky all day. And I kind of set myself up for that. So, that was a long season when I remember looking for it to 10 o’clock. Oh my gosh. Or hearing my parents go to bed, because you went to your room and you just laid there till you go to sleep. Or I’d put my radio on for like the hour sleep timer and if it would go off, I’d be like, oh no! And you’re dealing with that all by yourself.
So that’s when we’re talking about supporting our kids and helping them, and maybe they do want to go lie down and they get to learn that rest is okay. You don’t literally need to be asleep all the time for recovery. Sometimes just some quiet time is reinvigorating. So, all these different pieces of learning about themselves and listening to the cues that their body is giving them and how it doesn’t mean that we need to be like perfect is the first word coming to mind. Like, oh, I’m tired, therefore I’m asleep, or anything like that. We can try all sorts of, I am tired and I really want to do this thing and I’m going to get more experience learning about, how do I deal with that?
So often, we discover when it’s something we really want to do and we’re excited about it, we do not feel tired while we’re doing the thing. We may be extra tired after we have our two days of recovery, after a super big event is over, things like that. So, it is just so fascinating.
And just in the interest of sharing, because you guys shared how you like to sleep, I do like some light on. So, I have some colored lights around the window in the bedroom here. I do like sound. I have some sleep headphones that I wear and I listen to an audio book. I like to have talking in the background.
ANNA: Interesting!
PAM: It’s just so fascinating and actually, here’s a case where it’s sometimes easier to do for us, but for kids, we need them to do it like the right way. Dark, quiet, this is the way you should sleep. I need all these extra accommodations. But no, no. We are all individual, unique, fun people and whatever helps us do the things that we’re wanting to do, like get some rest, get some sleep. Absolutely. Okay. So much fun to play around with.
ERIKA: I love that so much. And I love that the focus is so much more on what do our bodies feel like rather than, I mean, that’s exactly my experience as a kid too, Pam, of just looking at the clock and being like, I’m doing this wrong. I can’t turn off my brain or whatever. But having no tools to help me through the spinning thoughts. No thought about what would make this room more comfortable for me. None of that was a consideration. And so, just thinking of it more as what is my body feeling like? It’s just such a nice place to start.
PAM: Yeah. It’s so considerate. All right, thank you so much. I really enjoyed diving into another one of these unschooling rules with both of you. And I hope our listeners find our conversations helpful as they navigate sleep with their family. Wishing everyone a lovely day. Bye.
ERIKA: Bye.
EU344: Q&A Deep Dive
Mar 16, 2023
In this week’s Exploring Unschooling podcast episode, we’re diving deep into a listener question submitted by Julie in Ontario. She writes,
How would you encourage parents to best unschool themselves? I’d really like to be a better example of someone who follows their passions. My husband would love to do a job more suited to his passions, but feels stuck. I feel hypocritical with my kids, because we encourage them to do what they love and talk about one day how it could lead to a career. But we aren’t living this out fully ourselves. Help! Thanks for this podcast. I love it.
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling and cultivating strong and connected relationships.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
ERIKA: Welcome! I’m Erika Ellis from livingjoyfully.ca and I’m here with Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia. Hi to you both!
PAM: Hello!
ANNA: Hello!
ERIKA: So, in this episode, we’re exploring a listener question. And before we get started, we just want to remind everyone that our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right answer,” because there isn’t a universal right answer for any situation that will work for everyone. So, basically we’re just sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling. Anna, do you want to get us started?
ANNA: I do. So, this question is from Julie in Ontario, Canada. Julie has five children, ages 10 and under, and she writes, “How would you encourage parents to best unschool themselves? I’d really like to be a better example of someone who follows their passions. My husband would love to do a job more suited to his passions, but feels stuck. I feel hypocritical with my kids, because we encourage them to do what they love and talk about one day how it could lead to a career. But we aren’t living this out fully ourselves. Help! Thanks for this podcast. I love it.”
Okay, so, thanks, Julie! We really appreciate you writing in. And this is such an interesting question.
And I would say what first came to mind for me is, “There’s plenty of time!” And I say it all the time. But most of us have a lot of deschooling to do and we can get there, I feel like, faster for our children than we actually do for ourselves. We’re really focused on that piece of it. But I found that the longer we lived this life, the easier it became to bring that this life to me, to my husband, to all of us, to really understand how it can fit in our family.
So, I am a scanner. Some people call it a multipotentialite. Basically, I want to do all the things, so I pretty quickly fell into this lifestyle alongside my children. And I will say that when my kids were young, one of my main passions was actually parenting and unschooling. So, that was a big focus area for me in terms of my personal learning and how I wanted to spend any extra time I had. I didn’t really want to do things that pulled me too far away from that or from my children. So, I would look at our environment and see what could easily fit into our life that would kind of spark my interest. I did a lot of gardening. I kept chickens and bees. Those were things that I would end up sharing with our community down the road. They were just easy things I could do alongside my kids.
We also did a lot of art and nature projects that I could easily scale to be of interest to everyone involved. New art things were interesting to me. And I learned to just play, play games, video games, board games, otherwise. What I realized is that I don’t think I ever really allowed myself to play games when I was younger in this way. I was too busy checking other people’s boxes.
And my husband, on the other hand, naturally fell into this lifestyle. Sometimes I think it was really him who led the way, so when he had a chance to leave corporate America, he did and has never looked back. He loves adventure and he really wanted to be around for our girls when they were young.
So, I think it’d be interesting to check in with your husband about what’s feeling hard for him about changing directions, because that would give you a clue if there are things that you could do as a family that would help. What’s making him feel nervous? Or again, what’s feeling hard? I like to ask that question, because that gives us a really good sense of, are there things we can change? Are there some system pieces we can do differently? Is there a different way to approach this problem?
And I like to look at things like that as a puzzle. How can we move towards this thing that we want that feels slightly out of reach? What next step can we take, which kind of reminds me of the Baby Steps episode we did on the Living Joyfully Podcast. But what step can we take towards this?
We don’t have to jump and leap there. We can just start to align our family with moving towards this place. But I also want to say that kids will still thrive in this environment, even if we’re still figuring it out for ourselves. There will be opportunities along the way to discuss everyone’s needs and work together to find ways to make this happen.
That, in and of itself, has so much value. Them seeing us learn and process and figure out new ways, that has so much value. But again, there is plenty of time. It’s not a race. There’s no perfect path, and what I’ve found is that the learning just continues all these decades later. Erika?
ERIKA: Hi, Julie! Thank you so much for listening and for your question. I did find it really interesting, too. And I love Anna’s point about there’s plenty of time, because that is so true. And I also love that you’re noticing something. You’re noticing that something doesn’t feel good and you’re open to exploring the possibilities and really figuring it out.
So, a couple things bubbled up for me when I was thinking about your question. The first was just maybe a lens shift. So, I think sometimes when we realize that things are not feeling as good as we’d like them to, we can get in this long-term view. And from there, it feels like what’s needed are these huge changes and that they need to happen now. It feels more daunting and less doable. It feels like this big, important, scary thing. Like, we just need everything to be different. Or even worse, like we need to somehow be different people in order for things to be better. And of course that feels so challenging, maybe even impossible, like where do we even go from there?
But what if the lens was just this smaller lens of, what fun thing could I do today? What fun thing does my husband like to do with me or with the kids? It could literally just be an intention to do something fun. It’s about lightening the mood and adding some playful energy. Kids are naturally mostly in that zone anyway, but adults could forget to go there.
And maybe that one fun activity could lead to another idea of something else we might like to do, and that could lead on and on to so much learning.
It could be fun, too, to just notice, like Pam was mentioning in her Helping Kids Find Their Passion episode that was on recently, to just catch yourself when you feel that little bit of curiosity about something and just comment on it. Like, “I think I’m going to go look that up.” Or, “I’d like to know more about that.” Just those little tiny examples, narrating what it feels like to follow tiny threads of curiosity. Our kids can see us doing that and see some of the ways that we can learn about the world.
I do think it could be valuable to dig into your husband’s feelings about his work. Are there ways to make his life feel better without changing jobs? Are there other ideas he has about how to use his time? There are just so many aspects of working and time management and money and all of that to dig into in order to figure out what feels the best. But there are always, I’ve found, more choices available to us than we’re usually aware of at first. And so, being really curious about what’s possible can lead to new opportunities.
And that’s not to say that it’s not challenging. It certainly can be. But I’ve found that having an abundance mindset and really trying to keep myself open to possibilities has helped us find ways to make our lives fit us better over time.
And I guess I would also just add that if trying to focus on fun or getting open and curious all feels really difficult for anyone who’s listening, if that feels very difficult, you’re not alone. There are definitely situations in life and phases in life that are just really challenging. Having a lot of young kids is challenging. Health issues can cause stress. Work stress that seems difficult to address, can be just so hard to deal with. And so, for times like those, focusing on stress management or maybe working in some somatic tools to reduce stress and anxiety, things like that, that’s where I would really want my effort to be.
And like Anna said, kids will still thrive even if we’re still figuring things out. And so, when things feel stressful and hard for me, I can allow the kids the space to do their thing while focusing my energy on caring for myself or caring for my husband when he’s stressed out, trying to reduce the impact of those stressors in our lives. Knowing that there are challenging seasons of our lives that we will move through can help put it into perspective as well.
But in any case, I think it’s always valuable to show ourselves compassion and kindness, and then doing that can help us find that next baby step that feels good.
And can I just say that I love how you used the phrase unschool ourselves? I think that’s just so beautiful, because it reminds me to include myself in the fun and the exploration of unschooling and to accept myself and my husband just as we are, the same way that I’m trying to do for my kids. So, I really loved that. Pam?
PAM: Yes. Hi, Julie! Thanks so much for submitting your question.
It has been really fun to think about. And I would like to just start at the end. You wrote, “I feel hypocritical with my kids, because we encourage them to do what they love and talk about how one day it could lead to a career, but we aren’t living this out fully ourselves.”
First, I want to encourage you to be kind and compassionate with yourself and your partner. It’s completely understandable that you don’t yet feel like you’re fully living this lifestyle, because it’s not an on/off switch. It’s a journey. It’s deschooling, as Anna was talking about. Neither one of you had an unschooling childhood, I suspect, which would’ve been filled with years of exploring things you find interesting, gaining experience with how interests ebb and flow over months and years, learning how you prefer to learn new things, finding ways to embrace your strengths and navigate your weaknesses, learning the value of not judging yourself harshly when things go sideways or even just more slowly than you were hoping.
So, that’s why we talk so often about the unschooling journey for parents. For unschooling kids, it’s really just their childhood, right? They’re just figuring this stuff out along the way. But when we come to unschooling as adults, as parents, we are just starting to explore all these things now. We do need a lot of time to work through so much of the conventional wisdom that we’ve absorbed as truth growing up, which is why, as Erika just mentioned, it’s so cool that you framed your question as ways to encourage parents to unschool themselves. Because that’s the heart of it, isn’t it?
And for me, encouraging parents to unschool themselves is about encouraging them to question what they think they know about life and learning, which is definitely no small task, which is why it can feel overwhelming. There really are so many things to question. Where do we start?
Now, I think we can get a sense of what questions to explore next by just noticing what’s starting to rub. What’s not feeling great right now? What questions are taking up a lot of real estate in my head and making it harder for me to be in the moment connecting with my kids?
Now, pretty often, when we first come to unschooling, it’s questions like, how do I know they’re learning? What about math and reading? I encourage parents to embrace beginner’s mind, because when it comes to unschooling, we are beginners. It’s really helpful to release what we think we know and instead bring that open and curious mindset as we explore the questions that come up through the lens of unschooling.
And for you and your husband, Julie, the question that’s rubbing right now is around the idea of following our passion. You wrote, “I’d really like to be a better example of somebody who follows their passions. And my husband would love to do a job more suited to his passions, but feels stuck.” So for yourself, I imagine you’re trying to get a sense of what it looks like when somebody is following their passions and first, I would encourage you to use the word interests rather than passions. Not because there’s anything wrong with the idea of passions per se, but that the energy of the word can sometimes trip us up. Passion seems to be like a super interest, giving the impression that we need to find the one or two things that make our soul sing, and that is a lot of pressure to be putting on ourselves.
So instead, let’s just take it down a notch and think in terms of interests, because interests are cool. We learned so much about the world and ourselves through exploring them. And maybe eventually, we might become passionate about some of those interests, but maybe not. And either way, we’re learning a lot and having fun along the way.
And as Erika mentioned, share what you’re doing and learning along the way with your family. For me, that was a big one because I think that’s something you’re seeing right now, Julie, that your kids are doing this thing and you guys as parents don’t feel like you are. And as Anna was saying, you’re gonna be learning it alongside. There’s plenty of time to do that.
So, it’s really interesting to see when we can share a little bit. And maybe it’s just that, “Oh, I think I’m going to go learn a little bit more about that,” just embracing those little moments when you’re starting to see a little something. “Oh look, I am curious about something. That’s interesting.” And just sharing that with your family. It helps also the kids to see that this isn’t just for kids. It’s the process. It’s not about the destination, “I have a passion.”
And what that can do also, because you talked about being a better example, Julie, what that feels like when you’re living your lives alongside each other and when everyone’s diving into their own interests and sharing their excitement with each other along the way, that’s when we can realize that we don’t have to share the same interests, but we can definitely connect with each other around that shared excitement and joy of doing something that we really like to do.
And I love what Anna shared about how her interests changed over the years to align with her family’s needs. That’s another thing. If we’re really trying to find a passion, something that makes our soul sing, that doesn’t take into account the context of our family. We can find things that are interesting for us and they can change over the years. So, when her kids were younger, your kids were younger, Anna, and needed you to be close by, you dove into things that didn’t take you away physically, things that the kids could enjoy doing with you if they were interested. Because again, there is plenty of time. This is what life looks like. It’s not like our life is on hold while we figure out what our passion is. This is life. Exploring interests and finding passions, and seeing how it all weaves through our days.
And then I just wanted to mention, as for your husband, I think it’s really the same idea. It doesn’t need to start with anything drastic. I loved the way you put that there, Erika. When you’re looking to the future, all of a sudden, I need to make big changes now to make some really drastic future change happen. So, quitting his job is not something that he needs to decide right now, but you can help him lean into exploring what he finds interesting. As his curiosity and his creativity begins to just open up more, maybe he finds some interesting aspects of his work now that he can lean into.
Maybe he comes to see work as just something he does for money to support the family when everybody, including him, pursuing their interests. Maybe he finds other ways to supplement his income that are more interesting to him, growing that and winding down his current job. There are just so many times over the years that I’ve experienced new opportunities serendipitously appearing once I have something top of mind. Once I’m now thinking, “Oh, what would I like to do? What would be fun? What am I curious about? What am I interested in?” When those questions are bubbling around in your head, you start to notice so many things around you that you really didn’t notice before.
So, the point is, if he’s feeling stuck at work right now, you can focus on making the rest of his life more fun and interesting. Let his interests weave through the family, too. Celebrate it alongside everyone else’s. Lighten and loosen things up. And then just kind of see what happens, because that’s the thing. Instead of looking to the future and trying to make a path, really, you create a wonderful path by focusing on the moment that’s in front of you. Just look for what is striking your curiosity. What are you interested in? What is your husband interested in? And do those things. Play with those things. Bring your kids along. Invite them to join you in those things.
But even if you’re doing these side by side, everybody’s doing what they enjoy and it becomes a lifestyle that we all live together, versus this is what the kids do and this is what the parents do.
ERIKA: Yeah. I feel like as you’re talking about it being a journey and so much maybe more difficult or more work for parents to unschool and deschool themselves than it ever is for the children, I was just thinking about that we have all these societal messages maybe to deal with and some beliefs that we have kind of created over the years, or been given over the years. So, maybe there are things like, am I even allowed to do something that’s enjoyable for me? Can I make these choices? Because we could end up with feelings of, but there’s these things I should be doing or I have to do. A job has to look like this and my time should be spent doing these things.
The role of the mother is that I’m supposed to be doing these things, so can I really dive into something that’s just fun for me? So yeah, starting to question all those things.
ANNA: And I think what that leads to mind for me is something that you mentioned also, Erika, which is the abundance mindset. So, I think instead of trying to solve the specific problems of how he does this or how I do a passion, it’s bringing that abundance mindset into the every day. Because you can hear this kind of deficit focus of, he doesn’t like this, we’re not sure about this, we’re not doing this. Like this not, not, not, which is the cultural message, right? That’s the message is always look at the deficits. Here are the things we needs to fix.
But it is, let’s add things. Let’s find what sparks. Let’s just enjoy these moments together. Let’s just delight in everyone else’s excitement about what they’re doing, bringing that energy of abundance and connection to each of those moments. I think that’s what opens the doors. That’s what then, like you said, the serendipitous opportunity appears and then suddenly we’re open to it.
But I think when we’re kind of tunneled in on what’s not working, we miss the magic, you know? So, I think that’s really something tangible that can happen right now is just bringing that abundance mindset to every moment for everyone in the family.
PAM: I love that. I love that. Because yeah, just as you were talking there, it was the tunnel vision. It was like, oh yeah. When there’s something we need to fix, even if it’s something with ourselves. We do. We get so focused on it. How can I fix this? How can I improve this? How can I make it better? And we definitely just get tunneled in on, I need to fix this and I need to fix this fast.
I don’t want to sit in, “Something’s wrong,” because that’s bad. All those societal judgments that end up on our plate and focusing us in, and then yes. Oh, we miss so much and we miss so many opportunities. I can just have fun watching a movie with my family. Or we can go and draw some pictures or grab the paint. And it’s just getting more and more fascinating to me how that just that shift of opening things up makes things feel lighter and looser as we were talking about a bit earlier.
And for your husband there, who’s maybe not enjoying his work, when you’re so focused on that, even outside of work, that that’s what you’re thinking about, oh my gosh. If you’re instead having fun and doing other things, that becomes a smaller portion of his day. The stuff that he’s not enjoying is a smaller portion, so it doesn’t feel as heavy. It’s a little bit lighter. He can start to pick out little things like, oh, you know, I don’t really mind this. Rather than saying, I hate my job. It just lightens things up so that we can look at things a little more closely with a little less judgment, with a little less fear. There’s probably the word.
ANNA: I just got one quick thing that came from that thing. I’s the examining our why. Just like we talk about with the kids. So, instead of this like, okay, I hate my job. It’s terrible. There’s a reason that he’s choosing to stay in it. And it may be because it’s providing the money that he needs. It may be that it’s close to the house so he doesn’t have a long commute. There’s something about it.
But if we can revisit that, it’s like, okay, I am actively choosing to do this job. I may not do it forever. It may not be meeting some of my needs, but let me think. Let me revisit why I’m doing it, because that has such a different energy and then that translates into this energy we’re talking about in the home that’s more abundant and more focused on what we can do. And again, that’s where I’ve seen just over and over again, opportunities open up from that more expansive place.
PAM: Now that you hit that why, when you’re thinking about your why and you’re opening up thinking about work, what occurred to me as you were talking about that is, you realize that work doesn’t have to satisfy so many things.
ANNA: All the things.
PAM: It doesn’t have to accomplish everything. All my life doesn’t need to be fed or validated from this work. I can open it up and get all sorts of needs met in different ways. That doesn’t have to satisfy all my needs.
ERIKA: Yeah, that, that made me think, I mean, both of you, that made me think of it’s the story we tell about it as well. So, if the story we tell about my husband’s work is it’s providing us with this and he can do this. He can’t do this. But he could do that at home, just find a way to reframe it that feels lighter and that makes everyone feel better moving forward. So, anyway, thanks again for your question, Julie. We obviously had a lot of fun diving into it. Have a wonderful day, everyone!
PAM: Bye!
ANNA: Bye!
EU343: Bringing It Home: Navigating Lessons
Mar 02, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re diving into another Bringing It Home episode. We’re looking deeper at our last Unschooling “Rules” topic, that unschoolers don’t use curriculum, and exploring what it can look like to navigate lessons and adult-led activities with our unschooling families.
Unsurprisingly, there is no one right approach. It’s so much about seeing through our children’s eyes and making choices that feel good to them. A world of possibilities exists when we are open and curious!
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from LivingJoyfully.ca, and today I’m here with Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hi to you both!
ANNA: Hello!
ERIKA: Hi!
PAM: In our last Unschooling “Rules” episode, episode 341, we talked about the idea that unschoolers don’t use curriculum. And yes, it can definitely be very helpful when you’re starting out unschooling to steer away from curriculum and organized adult-led activities, because when we first come to unschooling, our vision of how learning works is so often tightly wrapped up in what it looks like in school. So, staying away from that environment for a while encourages us to explore the many other ways that learning so beautifully happens.
And eventually, we realize that we don’t need a curriculum or a more structured, adult-led environment to inspire learning, because learning is always happening, at which point the need to actively look for learning begins to fade. And instead we concentrate on cultivating what we’ve discovered lies underneath, connected and trusting relationships, and supporting them in following their interests, however they want to explore them. That’s the solid foundation of unschooling.
So, if you haven’t yet listened to that episode, it’s a great lead in to this one. So, I encourage you to listen to it and then come back here.
Okay, so with this follow up Bringing it Home conversation, we want to talk about an aspect that comes up pretty regularly in unschoolers lives and that’s navigating lessons or more broadly, adult-led activities as an unschooling family. So, maybe it’s music lessons or dance or karate or so many, many, many other possibilities. It’s one thing to get comfortable with unschooling in your own home, but it can be another whole kettle of fish to bring that learning mindset with you out into the world.
And this is a topic I’m pretty passionate about, so I have three aspects I want to mention, but then I’ll turn it over, I promise. Before we dive into that, just a quick reminder, something we talked about in the “Rules” episode, which is that lessons or organized activities aren’t the only way to pursue an interest. And they aren’t objectively better than the other ways. They’re just a different way. But depending on the child, they might be a great way for them to explore their interests.
Okay, so the first aspect I want to touch on is finding a good match between the activity and the interested child. The more conventional response when a child asks to join an activity or take lessons, assuming the parents agree, is for a parent to find the closest location and sign them up. End of story.
From there, the child is expected to do the work to fit into the environment. Now, for unschooling parents, our foremost focus is on supporting our children’s learning. So, instead of expecting our children to adapt, we are willing to do the work to search out an environment that meshes well with how our children like to learn. Understanding that the atmosphere surrounding many activities is dictated by the individual adults who run them, we look for a good fit between the group’s atmosphere and the child’s personality and goals.
So, let’s just take karate as a quick example. Some dojos focus on attendance and progress their students through the belts based on the time invested. Some focus on skill development and progress their students based on proficiency displayed. Some dojos insist their students compete in certain tournaments. Some avoid tournaments altogether and so on. The big question is, what are your child’s goals? That is a great conversation to have with them as you’re approaching an activity.
And then on top of the activity itself, there’s also the teaching methods and personalities of the teachers or coaches. Do they demand obedience and cultivate a strict hierarchical environment? Do they encourage questions and cultivate a supportive atmosphere? Are they somewhere in between there? The knowledge and skills of the instructors being relatively equal, there is still a wide range of possible learning environments. Some your child may fit into like a glove, while others may turn them off the activity itself for years to come.
So, if your goal is to help them explore their interest, your best bet is to help them find the studio, dojo, group, league, or teacher that is a good match for their personality. Instead of choosing a location by geography and expecting your child to conform, take the time to explore the options, including those that may be a bit further afield, and try to find one that is a great fit for your particular child.
Okay, so the second aspect is getting ready to leave for the activity. Participating in an activity likely means a fixed time for lessons or practice or games. And this can be challenging, especially for younger children who may have a harder time transitioning to leave if they get caught up in doing something at home. And on top of that, it can also be challenging for newer unschooling parents, because they may feel like they are coercing their child to leave. What do they do if their child says they don’t want to go this week?
So, if going to an activity is becoming a struggle, take a moment to look at how you’re setting it up. If you find yourself saying something like, “It’s Wednesday. Your karate class is today. Are you going to go this week?” Just take a moment to rethink that. By asking your child each week whether they want to go to class, you’re basically asking them to revisit their decision each time. And that is a lot of work, especially for younger children.
So, in my experience, it’s easier to assume your child wants to go, because they wanted to sign up in the first place, and to do your best to help them get there. Make it as painless as possible for them.
“Hey, your karate class is today. I have your gi clean and I put your bo by the front door. We’ll get changed and leave right after dinner.” By bringing it up during the day, you have time for conversations without the added pressure of trying to get out the door. And by making sure all the supporting things are in place so that your child can just go to the activity, clean outfits or uniforms, working and available equipment, transportation and timing, all those supporting things, then they can focus on the activity itself.
Are they enjoying it? Because that’s the real question, which then leads to the third aspect I want to mention, and that is choosing to quit. When our children express an interest in an activity, it can be easy for us parents to get all caught up in the idea that, ooh, maybe they’ll grow up to do this for a living. We want to encourage them to continue.
Sometimes we’re afraid that if they quit, they’ll get behind and the opportunity to develop their interest into a career will be lost and they’re eight years old. There are a couple of things to consider here. First, if it’s not catching their interest so much that they are excitedly dedicating many hours to it on their own, then the chances of a professional career are pretty slim. Certainly, the chances of enjoying a professional career are slim. And second, quitting is not a forever decision.
When you’re doing things for enjoyment, there is no “behind.” There is just where you are. At the dojo, there are white belts of all ages. There are adult beginner ballet classes. There are adult recreational hockey leagues. And there are public swimming times where people of all ages and abilities can enjoy the water.
Or maybe we’re worried that our children wanting to quit means they will always give up when things get challenging. First off, challenges that aren’t motivating and inspiring for your child are probably not the right kinds of challenges for them, and that is great to know. But also, the choices they make today don’t define all the choices they will make in the future. The choices they make today are helping them gain experience with making choices. Over the years, they will gain lots of experience with wanting to try something, with choosing ways to try it out, and with seeing how well those paths meet their goals.
They will discover things they enjoy, things they don’t, and get a better feel for the clues that help them decide when they want to step up their game and when they want to quit. And even after they choose to quit something, for now at least, they’re still learning. How does that choice feel? Do they miss the activity? How much do they miss it? What do they miss about it? What are they doing with the time that quitting freed up? Are they enjoying that more than the activity? Less? So, so much learning.
Okay. Okay. I know I went on for a bit, but I just love how we can bring our unschooling approach to conventional lessons and activities in ways that continue to actively support our children’s learning without needing to revert to control over the way they choose to participate.
So, Anna, any thoughts?
ANNA: Oh my goodness. I love all of your insights and I think taking that time to find the best environment for your particular child really is so critical. And it can be challenging, because most classes or instructors are geared towards school children, and they tend to kind of cater to the parents versus the children.
And I remember when my youngest wanted to take piano lessons, it was so interesting to explain to the teacher that this was her experience. She wanted to be there and she was the customer. I wasn’t going to be forcing practicing, and I didn’t need him to be doing things for my benefit. And that was a very new experience for him. And it took a bit of adjustment, but we got there and she had this great experience. So, it was worth that kind of time and investment and that conversation at the beginning.
And we also ran into classes or activities that just didn’t dig deep enough and I think it’s one of the big reasons we ended up avoiding so many of these type of things. Both my girls enjoyed nature and animals and our life had a lot of experience with both, and I remember attending this nature event with a park ranger. We thought it was going to be so amazing, talking about snakes. And Afton had to correct half of what he said and it ended up just being this lecture where Afton’s correcting him and he’s saying things and I was just like, ah! Because we were getting far more hands-on and deep diving just in our backyard.
So, that really led me to realize that things that are geared towards adults but that allowed children was actually a better fit for us. So, for example, my youngest was having a deep dive into rocks and a recreation class geared at children would have been really boring for her and way below her interest level, because she was really deep diving in pursuing this. But attending the Gem and Mineral Club downtown, which is a club for adults, was perfect.
First of all, they loved having her there. And they were talking at a level that gave her new information, which she was really excited about, and they were so happy to answer her questions and share their love of the subject. And in this case, gave her a lot of new rock specimens that she just was over the moon about.
And I think it’s just so wild to see how most things designed for children just really dumb it down. Sometimes it feels like they’re trying to make it as boring and painful as possible, which I hope is not the intent, but I did watch for it, because I really wanted to facilitate their curiosity, and not have it squashed by arbitrary waiting and crowd control.
And as we mentioned last time, I always wanted to look at my motivation. Were we pursuing an outside adult-led class to facilitate their journey or because it looked better to the grandparents or checked an arbitrary box for me? And so, really honing in on what we wanted out of the experience and what things offered us the best path for that exploration and my child’s goals, like you were talking about, Pam, was so helpful in deciding what things we wanted to try.
And so, I don’t know. I learned so much about this whole world of classes from a whole different lens, because I went to school straight through and just did all those things. But what I love about what you said, Pam, is again, it’s just, take that time to really find something that works for your child and maybe scratch beneath the surface of what might normally pop up if you Google horseback riding lessons or whatever the thing might be.
So, anyway, lots to think about. But Erika, how about you?
ERIKA: Oh my gosh. I was laughing about that. I’ve had that same thought, like, are they trying to make this as boring and painful as possible? And I’m sure that’s not the case, but it is true that most people are approaching activities for children from a much different perspective than I would be. And in my area, most extracurricular activities are really marketed with language about school readiness, regardless of what the activity is. It could be ballet or karate or whatever, they will market it with what types of school skills are going to be included in these lessons.
And I’ve watched two- and three-year-olds at soccer classes at the park where it’s mostly about waiting your turn. And I totally get that. Practicing waiting your turn could be helpful if you’re going to use that skill in school. But it’s really boring for these little tiny kids. And I think now, there’s the risk of them thinking that that’s what soccer is, that soccer is boring, you know?
And so, what I love about approaching adult-led activities from an unschooling perspective is that we know there’s not just one way or one path to learn about an interest. There’s no right way to approach it. And there’s no requirement of how deep they dive or how much they achieve. It can all be so individually tailored, and that means we can also tailor our choices to each child’s individual personality.
And I know some children and some adults experience a lot of anxiety if they feel they’re being controlled or expected to do something in a certain way. And so, overly-directed activities just might not feel good to them. And that’s a big part of why my kids have not been interested in signing up for adult-led classes generally. They don’t like to be directed in that way.
But even given that, we have so many options available to us. We could do open gym sessions at the play gym instead of classes. We can do YouTube tutorials instead of taking a class with a teacher, learning by doing, learning from friends, observing an adult doing a class from a distance and just watching what it’s like for the kids in the class. We’ve done all of these things and they’re all valid options and we can learn in so many different ways. It just feels like we have this whole world of possibilities at our disposal if we’re not narrowing it down to, there’s one way.
And if we can’t find a good fit, we could even create what we’re looking for ourselves. Homeschoolers and unschoolers in my community are always putting together lower-pressure alternatives to the typical lessons and getting small groups together to participate. And so, if you can’t find what works for your child, it’s worth seeing if there’s a way to think outside the box to create something new. Just communicating what you’re looking for, what you’re wanting and needing to the dojo, to the instructor, or to the studio, that might give them the opportunity to really meet those wants and needs.
You know, saying, “We don’t want to require our kids to practice. We don’t want them to be taking home homework,” or, “We don’t need for you to be trying to impress us.” And some people in the community get so excited to be able to do it in a different way that’s not so school-skills-focused and we really just have to ask for what we want.
I also had a thought that this episode is reminding me a little bit of the Not Bringing School Home idea that was shared on the Living Joyfully Podcast recently. Like you were mentioning with that piano teacher, Anna, we don’t have to enforce practicing or homework or add any pressure to the activity just because that’s what other people are doing. We don’t have to add that urgency of progressing at a certain speed or meeting a certain bar.
Our children can determine for themselves the goals that they would like to meet. And with some activities and for some children, that will be this full-immersion, quick progress, working at it like it’s their full-time job. And for others it’s just a fun interest and they take their time and do what feels good. So, there’s not a right and a wrong about exploring our interests. And if we notice we’re looking towards a set outcome or feeling this external pressure or feeling like we’re on a certain timeline, that could just be a clue to step back a bit.
And finally, I just wanted to say, as an adult who is a scanner and I’m interested in doing all the different things, it’s been important for me to be careful not to commit myself to activities that the kids might enjoy, but also they might not enjoy. And it’s definitely happened to us in the past where now, I have people expecting me to help lead a class or run a group, and my kids were just done with it or not interested in it, and it’s really just not a good feeling. And in those cases, we worked through by just trying our best to meet all of our needs.
But there have definitely been times where I’ve regretted committing to something for myself because I would’ve been better served by being more available for what my kids wanted to do instead. But that’s just one of those things, I think, where you live and you learn. But I just wanted to mention that, as well.
PAM: Yes, live and learn. It’s fascinating. We talk a lot about how much we learn about our kids, just giving them the space and the opportunity to just make choices, but also think about how much they’re learning about themselves, the things that they love, that they enjoy, but how they like to enjoy things, how they like to pursue things, all the different possibilities. You touched on a number of them Erika, there and it is amazing. There are so many possibilities, so many different directions we can take when we’re curious about something.
I mean, the famous ballet example. I remember when Lissy was younger. “Do you really want lessons? Is lessons the thing you want to do or are you super happy to pick up a pair of ballet shoes?” You know what? You can go to a dance wear store and pick up tutus and shoes and tights and all that kind of stuff, and dance around in the living room, maybe watch YouTube videos. There’s so many ways you can play with something that is just as valid as showing up to the class.
And I think it was you that mentioned, Anna, is that class more about, okay, now I can tell people that she’s taking classes now? That is a feeling that can come up for us, certainly, in the beginning.
ANNA: We may not even recognize that. And the point that you made too, Pam, about, but are they going to push through challenges? I think that’s important to revisit, because what that’s a clue of is that I’m projecting out into the future really nothing that has to do with the class in front of me or the child in front of me.
And so, recognizing that, yes, when something matters to humans, we find a way. And so, if they’re not pushing through what you’re seeing as maybe a challenge with the class or something else, that’s really a good clue. And like you said, so much of what I wanted from these experiences for my girls was learning about themselves. How they wanted to take in information, what things sparked the interest, and I wanted them to be able to move on if it wasn’t. Because I’m also a scanner and I felt like I lost so many years being in school, doing what everyone else was telling me, that I was kind of excited they were going to have this time to really dive into these different things. So, always watching for those tapes in my head that might be projecting out and writing some story about the future that really has nothing to do with the child in front of me.
PAM: Yeah. And just one last thing to bring up again. You mentioned, Anna, the looking at activities geared for adults that might go to the depth, also the level of interest of the child. Because adults are choosing to go there. I mean, there’s oftentimes, too, where you go to rec activities and the kids are there because their parents signed them up. “I want you to take these lessons. You can have three activities a term and these are the best ones. School skills. These are going to get you the school skills that the teacher says you’re lacking.”
So, often the kids can be in activities that are geared to kids, they’ve got that lens on, that kids aren’t that capable, so we’re going to kind of dumb down the material to what grade level are they at? What words do they understand, etc. And then also the way they speak to them, the whole deal. And so, just opening up our view that it doesn’t have to be, “Okay, my child is 10. What is out there for 10 year olds?” No, what is out there for a person who loves these things a lot.
ANNA: Right. But I think, Erika, your point, you’ve said this before and so it stuck with me, this piece of, they are trying to teach these school skills. That’s why they’re doing it. Because, to me, I was just baffled by it. I’m like, why is this happening? Why are they making this so hard? Why are they making it not fun? Sit here. Don’t move. Line up here. Do this. But they’re selling it to parents as these school skills. And I’m like, oh, okay. These are not skills that I’m interested in.
ERIKA: Right. And that’s why it doesn’t make any sense, but it’s making me think of what a spectrum there is as far as how parents are approaching activities with children. Because I’ve heard plenty of parents say, “I want my kid to develop this. I’m going to put them into this activity.” And so, really, when you are doing those activities designed for children, there are plenty of children who have been just placed into that against their will, because of what the parents hope they’re going to be able to develop. And so, of course, in that atmosphere, you might feel that energy of, I don’t know, people don’t really seem to like this. It feels like they’re having to force the children to do these activities.
And so, I don’t know. I love, I guess, it’s like a lightness or a free feeling that we don’t have to buy into it. There’s not the one way, and so, we don’t have to just accept, well, I guess this is what soccer lessons are like. That’s just what it is. There are so many possibilities if we get open and curious about like, who could come help us? Who could do this in the way that would feel really fun for these kids?
ANNA: And so, right. And your point about just asking, because what I found with several people that had a specific interest that my girls were interested in, they loved not having to worry about those school things. They wanted to talk about the guitar or the art thing, or the whatever it was, from their passion perspective, so that that was a big piece of it.
But that piece that you were talking about with the kids there that didn’t want to be there. So, that, for my oldest, was a huge trigger, because she was there because she was super interested in the topic.
And so, this chattering over here, or this not focused because they didn’t want to be there, oh my gosh. She would get so upset about it, but I had to just tell her, I’m like, “Afton, they don’t want to be here. They’re just not interested in it as you are.” And so, then we would keep searching. But that’s the thing.
Bring some lightness to it. Know that there’s lots of options. Yeah. I just love that.
ERIKA: That’s where the adult groups would be a much better fit, in that case. Because all the adults are choosing to be there.
ANNA: Right, exactly. And super interested.
PAM: I love that. All right. Okay. This was so, so much fun. There are so many interesting aspects to consider when we’re approaching these kinds of activities from an unschooling perspective.
Thank you so much for the conversation and wishing everybody a lovely day. Bye.
ANNA: Yes! Take care.
ERIKA: Bye!
EU342: Helping Kids Find Their Passion
Feb 16, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing a talk that Pam gave at the 2022 Canadian Online Homeschool Conference, Helping Kids Find Their Passion. Following our children’s interests and passions is one of the joys of unschooling. And truly, humans are born curious. As parents, we can give our children the gift of encouraging that curiosity, which in a conventional setting can definitely be snuffed out. And there are as many interests, and as many ways of pursuing interests, as there are children! Keeping an open and curious mindset as we support them can really help us all enjoy the adventure.
We hope you find the talk helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
Hi everyone! I’m really excited to be part of the 2022 Canadian Online Homeschool Conference. And I’m happy to welcome you to my session, Helping Kids Find Their Passion. I’m excited to dive in.
Introduction
But first, a quick intro. My name is Pam Laricchia. My three kids left school back in 2002. I soon discovered unschooling and we never looked back. They are all in their twenties now.
Over the years I’ve written and published five books about unschooling—soon to be six.
In 2016, I started the Exploring Unschooling podcast. I continue to create new episodes every week, with more than 300 episodes now in the archive. It’s a treasure trove of conversations with unschooling parents from around the world about their experiences, as well as conversations with grown unschoolers.
And in early 2020 I started The Living Joyfully Network, a private, online community for parents where we have candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling.
If it isn’t yet clear, I love talking about unschooling!
Enough about me, let’s quickly go over what we’re going to talk about today.
First, we’re going to dive into the value of helping our kids follow their curiosity and dive into whatever catches their interest, to whatever depths they want to go, and how that helps them find their passion.
Then we’re going to talk about quitting and why it’s okay to let our kids quit things. In fact, it’s even better than okay.
Next, we’ll talk about scanners. Have you heard of scanners? If not, that’s going to be extra fun! This will bring a bit of a twist to our premise, but in a good way. It’s about how our kids are wired and helping them lean into that. Do we all really have one true calling?
Then we’ll dive into the importance of finding and following your interests. Unschooling isn’t just for the kids! We’ll talk about all the wonderful reasons for being open and curious, and for learning alongside your kids. It’s hard to encourage our kids to be lifelong learners if we, as adults, aren’t happily learning too.
And finally, we’ll connect the dots, weaving together a lovely picture of ways to help our kids find their passion, or passions, that hopefully makes sense and inspires you to live and learn with enthusiasm alongside your kids.
Unschooling in action!
So, let’s dive in.
Follow Their Curiosity
With unschooling, we choose not to direct our children’s learning through using curriculum. Instead, we follow their curiosity.
Not only is following their curiosity definitely more fun, it also deeply nurtures their learning. Curiosity and learning are intimately connected.
I love Eleanor Roosevelt’s quote: “I think, at a child’s birth, if a mother could ask a fairy godmother to endow it with the most useful gift, that gift would be curiosity.”
Following a child’s interests truly does create a uniquely-tailored web of learning connections and knowledge that fits them so beautifully.
And truly, humans are born curious. I think the real gift we can give as parents is to not continually discourage their curiosity because it can definitely be snuffed out.
How might that happen?
Young children are insatiably curious about their world yet, as they become more mobile, we begin to dissuade them because their curiosity makes our life messy: cupboards emptied, food squished, puddles splashed, toys dumped.
They are drawn to participating in whatever the adults around them are doing because they are curious about their world. But as their excitement and exploration bumps up against their parents’ exhaustion and wish for some peace, their days gradually become peppered with noes.
“No! That’s not a toy.”
“No! Don’t make a mess.”
“No! Don’t touch that.”
Children continue to be deeply curious about their world, yet now we seem determined to stop them. And when we do this, the message we’re really giving our children is to stop being curious.
And it doesn’t get any better as our children get older. The mess becomes a bit more focused—less whirling dervish—yet we continue to shut down their curiosity and exploration.
“No, you can’t watch another episode, it’s bedtime.”
“No, I’m too busy, I can’t drive you to insert fun activity.”
“No, your friends can’t hang out here, they’ll eat all our food.”
The pull of curiosity weakens each time they aren’t given the opportunity to ask a question, to follow a thought, and to end up somewhere new. Most children ultimately get the message: their questions, their interests, their explorations, aren’t important. And eventually they stop asking. Sooner or later, they even stop asking themselves.
That’s how it can happen.
Let’s take a moment to explore what following their curiosity might look like if we don’t actively discourage it. If we choose, instead, to be open to the possibilities.
Let’s follow a few of my daughter’s interests and see how things unfold. Back in 2004, she was passionate about all things Harry Potter.
She’d listen to the Harry Potter audiobooks over and over and over, doing arts and crafts while she listened. Repairing PJs. Making pillows. Knitting. Creating vignettes of scenes from the books.
Then she picked up reading and branched out to Harry Potter fan fiction. So much reading!
There was a fan fiction author she enjoyed who began each chapter with song lyrics, which sparked an interest in music. She wanted to hear these songs.
This is probably around the time she also began getting interested in photography and taking pictures.
Her interest in music continued to grow and she wanted to see her favourite alternative bands live at shows. She was around age 12. We went to lots of shows over the years.
Alongside the shows, her interest in photography, specifically fine art photography, grew. When she was 18, she got an O-1 visa and moved to New York City to work as a photographer. She continued to go to small, alternative shows and meet musicians.
Over the next few years, she discovered she really enjoyed working with musicians as clients and her photography work began to lean in that direction.
And over the last couple of years her style has developed to mix various arts and crafts mediums into her images, like watercolour painting, stickers, and cutting out image elements to recombine them.
It’s no wonder we describe unschooling learning as a web, right?
There were many points along the way I could have discouraged her interests. So much fabric and yarn supplies for her creations. Going to shows in bars at age 12? Going to lots of shows? Travelling to see bands she liked? Moving to New York City on her own at age 18?
Yet now, looking back, we can see how those threads of interests have woven together in her current passion and joy photographing musicians for publicity shots, covers for song and album releases, and more.
But I had no idea where her interests might go at the time.
That reminds me of something Steve Jobs said in his commencement address to Stanford students in 2005 about connecting the dots. He shared a few bits and pieces from his life and how they connected, then observing:
“You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backward. So, you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.”
Steve Jobs
Part of helping our kids find their passion is developing this trust that dots will connect in the future. This trust that encourages us to be open and supportive and patient as our kids create their unique collection of dots over the years.
The dots—their interests—often aren’t their passion. Maybe they’re fleeting curiosities, or month-long deep dives, or interests with longer staying power. Maybe they’re part of a winding path to their passion. And even then, as with my daughter, none are an end point, it’s part of their ever-evolving story.
And we can’t lay it out the path for them, or even guess what it might look like. If we try, those guesses can quickly become expectations that get in the way of their exploration. Of learning about themselves.
What we can see looking back is the connections they’ve made over time. Over years. How their interests and passions have woven together to where they happen to be right now. For now.
It might be for you take a few minutes this week to think about your child’s interests over the last six to twelve months.
What threads do you see connecting them?
Is there a common denominator that sits in the foundation of their various interests over that time?
What interests have fallen by the wayside?
And this seems like a great time to talk about the idea of quitting. Remember how I mentioned that those dots may be fleeting curiosities, month-long deep dives, or interests with longer staying power? It doesn’t matter which, they’re all good. They all have value. And it’s totally okay when they realize that an interest has waned.
Choosing to quit an activity is as much a learning experience as starting it.
That may be a pretty unconventional perspective, but let’s dive in and explore it.
Conventionally, quitting is akin to failure.
I love what Anna Brown shared on my podcast in episode 262 around this idea. She explained:
“We have this idea of, “But you’re on the team! You’re gonna let your team down!”
But I just want to remind everybody that we have all been on teams and in groups where members did not want to be there. And it was kind of the worst, you know? I find it’s way more of a disservice to people who actually want to be there, who are actually passionate about that team or that activity or that idea, to hang out when we aren’t happy and don’t want to be there. Because I don’t know if it’s possible to give your all to something where you really don’t want to be.
So, this idea that you’re serving the team by toughing it out is just really not the whole story.”
Anna Brown
Another one is, if you quit something before the official “end,” you have failed to finish it. Parents have been known to explain to their kids, “I paid for ten lessons, so just finish them and then you don’t have to sign up again.” It seems like a reasonable compromise. At least on the surface.
Well, consider our human tendency to fall prey to the sunk cost fallacy, which is the tendency to follow through on an endeavor if we have already invested time, effort, or money into it, whether or not the current costs outweigh the benefits. The money is already spent, so we can take it out of the current conversation altogether. Right now, is it worth the cost of your child’s growing dislike?
It’s definitely worth taking a moment to revisit your goal. If each week the lesson is an actively unhappy time for your child, is your insistence that they attend worth it? Is your goal to turn them off ballet or swimming for the indefinite future? If you’ve paid $200 for a series of ballet lessons and they’re only half finished, might you consider that last $100 as an investment in preserving their enjoyment of dance?
One of the wonderful things about unschooling is that the children have time to explore the world, including a variety of activities. But if we continue to insist that they “finish what they start,” they will more likely learn to NOT try out an activity unless they are very sure they will enjoy it: the fear of being stuck there will outweigh their curiosity to explore something new. Less exploration.
Less dots.
Or maybe we’re worried that our children wanting to quit means they will always give up, rather than rise to a challenge. Again, that’s fear talking—the choices they make today don’t define all the choices they will make in the future. The choices they make today are helping them gain experience with making choices. Not to mention, challenges that aren’t motivating and inspiring for your child are probably not the right kinds of challenges for them. That’s a great thing to learn!
Over the years unschooling children will gain lots of experience with wanting to try something, choosing ways to try it out, and seeing how well those paths met their goals. They will discover things they enjoy, things they don’t, and get a better feel for the clues that help them decide when to step up their game and when to quit and move on.
And each time they choose to quit, they’re still learning. How does that choice feel? Do they miss the activity? How much? What do they miss about it? What are they doing with the time that quitting freed up? Are they enjoying that more than the activity? Less? So much learning! And quitting is not a forever decision. Now that they better understand the environment, they may choose to go back at some point in the future.
Children who have the freedom to explore a variety of things and discard those that don’t catch their prolonged interest do not feel like failures when they choose to drop something.
More dots.
And not only that, these experiences help them better understand what they like and what they don’t like—whether it’s the activities themselves, the environments like big groups or small, highly organized or more free-flowing, and so on. All of which helps them figure out things that will be a good fit for them.
More dots help them home in on their passion.
And speaking of environments, moving on from an organized activity needn’t mean an end to learning about it. It doesn’t have to mean no more dots.
What if they just really don’t like swimming lessons? If your wish is for them to enjoy swimming and be safe in the water, instead of lessons, find the ways they do enjoy the water and explore those for now. The adventure of water parks? Playing at the beach? Jumping off the dock into the lake? A wading pool in the backyard? Lots of baths? Open your mind to the many ways there are to enjoy water beyond swimming lessons.
Joining and quitting activities is more about helping our children explore their world—the activities and environments that spark their curiosity and bring them joy. That’s where the learning is.
If they discover a passionate interest, they will doggedly pursue it, even through many challenging moments. You don’t need to teach this kind of unwavering commitment by requiring it in everything they do. Instead, help them find things that they enjoy so much that their dedication and learning flows naturally.
See how that works? Quitting is actually another way we can help our kids find their passion.
And not only that, what a great skill to bring into adulthood! How many adults do you know who feel stuck in in situations or jobs they don’t enjoy, not willing to leave because that would feel like a failure? I’ve seen it lots of times.
It’s empowering to know they have agency over their lives, at every age.
Having More than One Passion: Multipotentialites or Scanners
Alright. Now that we’ve talked about the immense value of helping our kids follow their curiosity wherever it takes them and quit things when their interest wanes in support of helping them find their passion, let’s step back and question our premise.
I know you want to help your child find their passion, but is there just one singular passion for everyone?
Is everyone meant to be a specialist?
What if they have multiple interests? Multiple passions?
What if they don’t want to choose just one thing?
In her book, Refuse to Choose: A Revolutionary Program for Doing Everything that You Love, Barbara Sher identifies a person she calls The Scanner?someone who frequently has a multiplicity of interests, but finds it hard to create a life they love because their passions and abilities are taking them in so many different directions.
Contrary to popular wisdom, Sher tells Scanners that theirs is a unique ability, not a liability. And that they can do everything they love, they don’t have to zero in on one pursuit at the expense of all others.
She makes a great point in her talk that “the notion of the narrowly focused life is highly romanticized in our culture. It’s this idea of destiny or the one true calling, the idea that we each have one great thing we are meant to do during our time on this earth, and you need to figure out what that thing is and devote your life to it.”
While Barbara uses the term “scanners” and others use “polymath” or “Renaissance person,” Emilie prefers “multipotentialite.”
She has been writing and speaking with people about this idea for a while and has landed on three multipotentialite superpowers that I want to share with you.
The first is “idea synthesis,” which she describes as combining two or more fields and creating something new at the intersection. That aligns so well with our unschooling process of connecting the dots, doesn’t it?
The second is “rapid learning.” In her experience, when multipotentialites become interested in something, they dive in fast and deep.
Interestingly, I think that’s something we see often with unschooling kids because they get to choose whatever they dive into. I think the “slow learning” that she’s seeing in comparison probably has more to do with the school environment. It’s hard and slow to learn something you’re not interested in, but kids—people—who are free to choose what and how they want to learn about something learn pretty quickly!
And the third multipotentialite superpower is “adaptability,” the ability to morph into whatever they need to be in a given situation. Having had many different interests over the years, they have lots of experience with trying new things and stepping out of their comfort zones. And they bring what they’ve learned across various topics with them every time, so they’re rarely starting from scratch.
She goes on to explain:
“It is rarely a waste of time to pursue something you’re drawn to, even if you end up quitting. You might apply that knowledge in a different field entirely, in a way that you couldn’t have anticipated.”
Emilie Wapnick
More dots!
And see, through a completely different lens, quitting is still okay. In fact, it’s more than okay! Just because they quit something doesn’t mean they forget what they’ve already learned about it. Maybe that amount was just right. Maybe it’ll connect beautifully with something else they dive into in the future.
That’s the incredible mystery of life we embrace with unschooling.
Circling back for a moment, as Steve Jobs reminds us, we can’t connect the dots looking forward.
Looking forward is about trust.
However your child is wired, help them embrace it. Whether they choose to explore their world in pursuit of a singular passion or they prefer to embrace multiple interests—all at once or in quick succession—what’s important is helping them figure out how they tick and supporting them as they explore their interests and passions.
And what’s fascinating is that no matter their wiring, how we as parents support them on their journey is the same: help them follow their curiosity and let them quit when they’re ready to move on.
It’s that simple. Of course, that doesn’t mean it’s always easy.
Definitely, sometimes it will be easy, like when we share our child’s interest, or when the learning that’s happening is obvious to us. But sometimes we’ll be dancing at the edge of our comfort zones, trying to move beyond feelings of judgment and exploring ways to grow.
If you find yourself stuck here, I think you may find Roya Dedeaux’s book really helpful. It’s called, Connect with Courage: Practical Ways to Release Fear and Find Joy in the Places Your Children Take You. Roya is a Marriage and Family Therapist and an unschooling mom with three kids.
I spoke with her on the podcast about the book in episode 286, if you’d like to check that out.
Find Your Interests
And last, but not least, it’s important for you to find your interests.
Often, we start down the unschooling path for our kids, but soon enough we discover that unschooling is really a lifestyle for the whole family.
How will our children absorb the value of lifelong learning if the adults around them aren’t also learning?
So, let’s be a shining example of being curious and continuing to learn whatever our age.
Are you exploring your interests? Asking questions and seeking answers?
If you find yourself mostly indifferent to the world around you, it’s time to find and fan that spark of curiosity. You needn’t start with an earth-shattering question, nor a big, passionate interest—that’s way too much pressure.
Just quiet things down for a while and listen. Underneath the noise, you’ll start to hear the whisperings of your inner voice.
As you go about your days, notice what catches your attention. And, rather than dismissing it, roll it around in your mind for a moment. Get curious. Is it connected to something you already know? Is it something new to you? Why do you think it caught your attention? Might you enjoy knowing more?
What questions come to mind?
When something catches our attention, instead of judging ourselves negatively, let’s lean in.
Here’s a story. When my kids were much younger, sometimes they’d watch Food TV with me. I still clearly remember one night when we were laying in my bed and watching a special on reverse engineering popular foods and they showed how to make Reese’s peanut butter cups at home. Joseph was the only child still awake by the end (I just looked at my printout of the recipe and it was the year 2000, so he was 8!) and I said, “What do you think, should we try that tomorrow?”
His answer was a happy “Yes!”
They were awesome and to this day I still make them—they are now a family classic.
That is what’s so exciting about being curious and following your interests—you never know what you might discover. With an open and curious mindset, you will see so many more opportunities for fun and connection bubbling up around you than you will by walking around judging and worrying, mostly closed off from exploring life.
I understand that, especially when our kids are younger, we don’t often have large swathes of time to dedicate to solitary deep dives, but we can find a few minutes here and there.
Maybe we read about our interest, sitting nearby our kids as they play.
Maybe we enjoy painting, or arts and crafts, and we keep a basket with our current project nearby to bring out to do alongside our kids. Maybe we also have some supplies at hand for them in case they want to join us.
As my kids have gotten older, it’s been so interesting to see how our interests and joy intertwine, sometimes even in the most unlikely ways.
Like rediscovering my interest in alternative music through Lissy’s music interest, or better understanding Michael’s passionate interest in karate through my own passionate experience with ballet growing up, or re-igniting my love of stories through Joseph’s passionate pursuit of them through all facets of storytelling.
If you’d like your kids to live an engaged and curious life, then live an engaged and curious life yourself alongside them.
Unschooling is a gift for us too.
Which means that, as we explore our interests, we can share our excitement and enthusiasm with them without any expectations that they’ll want to join us and learn the same things.
In fact, learning new things reminds us what real, engaged learning feels like, which can help us connect more closely with our children around the process.
Learning new things reminds us that learning can sometimes be challenging, which may give us space for more empathy for our child next time they get frustrated trying to figure something out.
Learning new things also reminds of how fun it is and we may be more apt to celebrate our accomplishments along the way, and those of our kids.
Even if we don’t love one of our child’s particular interests, we can still meet them in the feelings of wonder, frustration, and joy—the common threads that weave through pursuing our interests.
Giving ourselves the space to follow our interests can also be a great lens through which to explore cultural messages like, “you need to be productive,” “don’t waste your time,” and “it’s only valuable if you’re going to monetize it.”
Are these the only reasons to pursue something? No!
In his book Curious: The Desire to Know and Why Your Future Depends On It, Ian Leslie describes the essence of curiosity this way:
“The most fundamental reason to choose curiosity isn’t so that we can do better at school or at work. The true beauty of learning stuff, including apparently useless stuff, is that it takes us out of ourselves, reminds us that we are part of a far greater project, one that has been underway for at least as long as human beings have been talking to each other.”
Ian Leslie
Think about that for a moment. Being curious is a deeply human thing and so many of us have lost it.
Let’s recapture that sense of wonder we see on our children’s faces.
Let’s approach our days being open and curious.
Open to new possibilities over stale patterns we follow without thinking just because that’s the way we’ve always done things.
Maybe that’s efficient, but does efficiency always need to be the goal?
What about being creative? Curiosity often leads to creativity. How else might we do this?
And it’s so fun to contemplate!
When we cultivate a welcoming, non-judgmental space that’s free from deadlines and expectations, we give possibilities time to percolate and unfold.
As Ian says, that’s the true beauty of learning stuff.
Connecting the Dots
Okay, let’s try to connect the dots we’ve scattered around today.
You’re curious about how to help your child find their passion.
One valuable aspect of that is helping them follow their curiosity.
That means rather than judging or discouraging their interest in something—in anything—try to say yes more.
We can only connect the dots of their interests looking back, so, looking forward from today, we need to trust that the dots will connect somehow.
An important aspect of following their curiosity is letting them quit when they realize an interest has waned.
Quitting isn’t failure, it’s more learning. It’s homing in on their passion.
Maybe it’s just that particular environment they’re not enjoying, don’t be too quick to toss the interest. Instead find another way to explore it.
If you make them stick it out, what they’re really learning is not to try something new they’re curious about unless they’re super sure they’ll enjoy it. Less dots.
If they discover a passionate interest, they will doggedly pursue it, even through many challenging moments. You don’t need to teach this kind of unwavering commitment by requiring it in everything they do. Instead, help them find things that they enjoy so much that their dedication and learning flows naturally.
And then we talked about whether everyone is meant to have one singular passion. To be a specialist.
Maybe your child is a scanner, or multipotentialite. That’s cool too!
The idea of one true calling is highly romanticized in our culture, but not everyone is wired this way.
In her TEDx talk, Emilie shared three multipotentialite superpowers: idea synthesis, rapid learning, and adaptability.
She shared that it’s rarely a waste of time to pursue something you’re drawn to, even if you end up quitting. More dots in your child’s web of interests and learning.
And lastly, we talked about the immense value of pursuing your own interests—of living and learning alongside your kids. Unschooling is not just for the kids, it’s a family lifestyle that celebrates lifelong learning.
Fan the spark of your own curiosity and share your enthusiasm with those around you—without expectations.
No matter how a person is wired—whether a specialist, a scanner, or some beautiful mix—how we help them find their passions is the same: help them follow their curiosity wherever it leads and let them quit when they’re ready to move on.
Look at all these dots of info for you to connect in the ways that make sense to you! All because you’re interested in unschooling and supporting your kids. It’s your web of learning in action.
And as we wrap up our time together, I want to pull up into the bigger picture.
Let’s go back to the quote from Ian’s book, Curious:
“The most fundamental reason to choose curiosity isn’t so that we can do better at school or at work. The true beauty of learning stuff, including apparently useless stuff, is that it takes us out of ourselves, reminds us that we are part of a far greater project, one that has been underway for at least as long as human beings have been talking to each other.”
Ian Leslie
This isn’t just about helping our kids find their passions. There’s no endpoint.
This is about the true beauty of learning stuff.
About being human, in a world of humans.
It’s life.
Thanks for joining me today to talk about helping kids find their passion!
EU341: Unschooling “Rules”: Don’t Use Curriculum
Feb 02, 2023
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing our second episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series!
We use the word “rules,” in quotes, to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that unschoolers should never use curriculum. It can be really helpful when you’re starting out unschooling to steer away from curriculum and adult-led activities, because, when we first come to unschooling, our vision of how learning works is so often tightly wrapped up in what it looks like in school. But eventually, our focus on what they’re learning shifts to focusing on cultivating connected and trusting relationships with them and the choices they make about what activities they want to do and how they want to follow their interests just flow naturally from that connected place.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca, and today I’m joined by Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hi to you both.
ANNA AND ERIKA: Hello.
PAM: Now, before we get started proper, we want to remind everyone that, with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can sometimes feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new. But we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or even an A+. So, our goal with this series is to explore these apparent rules and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
So, in this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” that says unschoolers don’t use curriculum. And I think this is going to be so interesting to explore.
Now, when I started thinking about it, it is very similar to the first rule we explored, “Always Say Yes,” in that it makes sense as a guide for people new to unschooling. It can be really helpful when you’re starting out to steer away from not only curriculum, but also more formal adult-led programs for a while, like local rec classes or online classes, things like that. And that’s because, when we first come to unschooling, our vision of how learning works is so often tightly wrapped up in what it looks like in school. There’s an adult teacher who knows the subject and the order in which it’s best to learn it, and students who soak up the knowledge as directed.
Sure we have likely chosen unschooling because something in that process didn’t make sense to us. So, maybe our child didn’t mesh with the classroom environment of sit quietly and listen. Or maybe the high student-teacher ratio makes us uncomfortable. Or maybe we buck at the amount of seemingly arbitrary rules needed to manage a classroom of 30-odd kids. Yet, and this was definitely the case for me, I didn’t know what I didn’t yet know about how learning happens. I thought I knew how learning happens. I’ve been learning for so many years in my life.
So, the encouragement to steer clear of curriculum when we were starting out was helpful for me. Without that curriculum-based structure to fall back on, I had a little choice but to ask myself, “Well, how would my kids learn instead? So, I ended up more intentionally watching them in action, playing with them, chatting with them, hanging out together. And over time, I came to see how much they were learning as they went about their day following their interests.
Because, with unschooling, instead of following curriculum, our kids are following their interests. And if we don’t first take curriculum off the table, there’s a pretty good chance we’ll just naturally jump to that style of learning whenever our kid expresses an interest in something. “Dance? Okay. I’ll sign you up for ballet lessons.” “Soccer? Oh yeah. Let’s join the local soccer league and get you on a team. It’ll be so fun.” “Science? The Science Center has a six-week summer program. I just signed you up. Yay!” And that’s because we still think these more formal adult-led settings are the best way to learn.
But really, they are just another way to engage with an interest, not objectively better than dancing around the family room or kicking the ball around the yard or making slime at home. And the more we sink into that, peeling back those layers, the more we discover about how human beings are wired to learn, how they will naturally play around with things to figure out how they work, how human beings are just so curious.
And eventually, our focus on what they’re learning shifts to focusing on cultivating connected and trusting relationships with them. Because we know in our bones now that learning happens all the time and in the bigger picture, we can better support their efforts when our relationship is strong. And it is here that this role can start to rub. It can start to feel a bit restrictive.
If we continue to stick with the story that people like us, unschoolers, don’t use curriculum, we are apt to take interesting possibilities off the table, just because they’re curriculum-based. Instead, now that we no longer feel that learning directed by an adult or teacher is any better than learning that they pursue themselves, we can now add those bits to the big smorgasbord of learning possibilities to choose from. None is better than another except to the individual who’s interested in learning about something.
How do they like to learn? What are they looking to learn? Where might they find that kind of information? Where might they find other people who are as interested in the topic as they are? Maybe they’ve loved dancing around the house and now they want to try a class with others who also love to dance. Maybe an online class that dives into a book series they love looks interesting to them, or joining a sports team to up their game, or chemistry class, or whatever strikes their fancy.
At this point, the fundamental difference is that they are choosing the more formal environment or curriculum because they’re interested in the information that they’ll find there. It’s not about the grades. It’s about what they want to learn. And if they find the environment isn’t a good fit after all, they know they’re free to leave and try another way to dive into their interest, without any judgment. And at this point, we know and we feel how this applies to our whole family. We are a family of people who pursue our interests and aspirations in whatever ways we’re curious to explore, no matter our age. Now, we’re really unschooling! So, Anna, what are your thoughts around this?
ANNA: Oh my goodness. First, I really do love this series, because I feel like picking apart this idea that there are these hard and fast rules is so valuable, because it gets us to our “why” and all this thinking that I like to do and pick apart and see the nuances, because it really is just so unique to each family. And if we keep connection at the forefront, it makes it so much easier to navigate all these things as they come along.
So, in our family, my girls never went to school, but I did. So, I had certainly soaked up what learning was supposed to look like in a school setting. I am also a scanner though, and so I just love learning new things, and so I had that going for me. I knew that I could learn whatever I wanted to and dig to whatever depths I wanted to, so I had that experience that I think helped me along the way.
In some of the very early days, I was really attracted to the nature-based curricula and new school supplies were super fun for me at school. That was probably my favorite part. And I definitely enjoyed getting the art cabinet fully-stocked and having all these tools at our disposal.
But what I learned pretty quickly was, I was drawn to the nature based curriculum because it was what I liked. And interestingly, my girls also enjoyed nature when they were very young, but they didn’t like a book telling them what they were going to do each day. So, we had a really cool backyard with the creek and all kinds of nature and flora and fauna, and they just really preferred that exploration, being led by what was in front of us and what was happening in their lives and where their interest was drawn throughout the yard.
And then I think about the flip side, we also learned so much about bugs and fish through Animal Crossing, which is a video game that we all enjoyed as a family. We each had our own. And I found cool ideas from all kinds of different sources over the years. When I used them in a way that flowed with our days and our organic interests, everyone enjoyed it.
So, for me, it’s never been that that curriculum doesn’t have a place. It’s more about who’s driving it and how it’s used. I want to look carefully at why I felt it would be helpful. And oftentimes, when I dug in there, it was because of maybe how it would look or I can say, we’re using this. Or it would take some of the responsibility off of me, because then I’m not having to plan activities or think or follow their interests as much. We can just sit down and do the thing.
But, in the end, I found, even when I tried to find curriculum-type resources, they felt so short of what my children actually wanted to learn. It was very surface level. And what I found with mine is that they like to dive deep and learn all the things about whatever their interest was in that moment.
And so, in the end, it just really didn’t add much for us. But I do think every family is unique and every child unique, and so, it is worth exploring.
I guess I do want to add, too, this is just a personal aside, that I don’t believe that kids need worksheets to learn. I think humans like to know how information is used and how it fits in the world, and I think worksheets tend to dissociate from that. So, that was actually something we didn’t have around. We had tons of books and games and watched shows and found resources that enhanced the things that we were interested in. Our halls were lined with posters from snakes to a giant timeline of the presidents. They liked logic games and different computer games, and Raelin went through a geography phase and we found all sorts of resources for that.
There are just so many amazing resources out there, and I think probably even more now than there was when our kids were growing up. For me, it’s just really about staying connected and in tune with what might help them along their chosen path. And I think that’s the important piece for me is, they’re really seeing that path and I’m right there with them facilitating and learning alongside of them, but I’m not carving the path for them. Erika, what are you thinking about?
ERIKA: So, I thought this was a really interesting one, too, and like with that “Always Say Yes” rule, I’ve definitely seen this idea cause issues in both directions. So, on one side of the pendulum swing, parents might actively reject anything that reminds them of anything that anyone has ever done in school, which potentially limits what their children have access to. And then, on the other side, parents might value curriculum or learning that looks more schoolish and subconsciously, or even purposefully, encourage their children to make those kinds of choices.
And really, in either case, it’s not as much about what the kids are drawn to or what feels the best to them, and more about judgments of the parents and what the parents want their life to look like from the outside. So, I think for this rules episode, it’s fun to just consider where you are on that pendulum swing and what kinds of reactions you have to the types of interests that your children have.
I remember at the beginning of my unschooling journey, I was drawn to the idea of curriculum, because it seems fun to have a plan and to have activities to do, and it’s appealing to me to check off boxes. I also love school supplies, and I do think curriculum is also appealing in that same way that Anna was describing, that handing off responsibility piece, because if we’re following a plan that someone else has created, we are less responsible for the outcomes. And if we’re on that prescribed path, there can be a feeling of security that’s tied to that.
And, depending on our children’s personalities, there will be more or less push-back about doing adult-led activities. And in the case of my kids, there was just no way to direct them to do activities of my choosing. They are very focused on the things they’re interested in. And so, I recognized that very early on and focused on supporting their explorations rather than trying to direct them.
And every once in a while, we would try out a nature program or a story time or an art activity at the park. And really my experience with my kids, with all adult-directed activities is that they don’t like the feeling of being directed. And I know my kids are not the only ones that feel like that.
But some kids do like their Outschool classes or their co-op classes and their reading practice books. And some kids, we hear, oh, they love doing math worksheets. And so, I guess in those cases, I would just want to dig into a couple of questions for myself. Am I giving my kids any indication that choosing those adult-led activities is better than something else they might be interested in doing? Or am I suggesting classes and curriculum ideas, like Pam was saying, as the first thing that pops into my head when they express a new interest? And if that’s the case, maybe it would be worthwhile to expand the possibilities, give things a little more space to blossom, and get curious about what that particular child really would want to do if they were free to make a choice.
There’s definitely not a right way when it comes to learning, and so, I’m just grateful for space and the chance to give things time and for my kids to truly be able to choose what makes sense as the right next step for them as they’re following their interests.
ANNA: I think that’s such a core piece though, right? Is when it happens that, okay, they like this. They like that. Great. We’re supporting that. We’re supporting their interest in the class or the worksheet or the whatever. But I think those questions are important, because we’ve seen it. I mean, I feel like we’ve just seen it recently with some friends, too, that are just so excited about the classes that are starting up! And kids sense that, right? They see that, okay, this is really valued. And we’ve been hearing, oh, we’re just sitting around all day and oh, we’re just doing this. And so, what is that energy, and what is our body language, and what are our words conveying about learning? I think it’s just interesting to kind of explore.
ERIKA: And if it’s a certain kind of kid, the kid will see that excitement and want to do it. And then if it’s my kind of kid, they’ll see that excitement and never want to do it. And in either case, they’re not really listening to themselves.
ANNA: Right. To themselves.
PAM: Yeah. And I think it that is so interesting for us to dig into, too, because I feel there may be occasions when we get super excited about how a class or something sounds. It can be, why? Let’s dig into that. Is it because it’s something that’s interesting to us. That’s cool. And maybe we could take the class, then. But also, most of us have grown up going to school and we have that school experience and when that’s still what we reach for as learning, but now it’s in like maybe a more open environment, it’s less restrictive than the experience we had. So, that’s another piece that can be exciting for us, because it feels more open to us. It’s more open. It’s something they’re interested in. This is awesome! Yay!
But we won’t notice until we kind of dig in, because it’s just something we haven’t had much experience with until we give ourselves the ability and the choice and the space to just think, ooh, what am interested in? It could be really interesting just to think, what is something that I’d like to learn about? What am I curious about? And then, whatever pops to mind, how would I like to learn about that? And it would just be so curious to write down 10 ways that you might learn about the thing that you’re curious about learning and just look at them. It could give you a really cool snapshot of where your mind is and how we learn things, how human beings learn things.
And maybe you’ll go, you know what? I’m going to try out number seven on the list, because that might be a little bit outside of my comfort zone, but that could be cool to experience. Because that’s the thing is, when we don’t have judgment, when we’re not worried about grades, when it’s really just about us and our learning and the way we want to learn things and the things that we’re interested in learning, we can try it out. We can try it out for a couple of weeks. It’s like, oh, this doesn’t feel good, but when we have these experiences about ways to learn, we can bring that to our conversations with our kids. It helps us release some of the judgment. It helps us see the value in, “Oh, they’re ‘just’ playing.” That was in quotes, right? It is fascinating when we can start playing with it for ourselves, because now we have more experiences and we can see new things in our kids that we might not have when we had a little bit more of a tunnel vision around how human beings learn.
ANNA: Right. And I feel like we don’t even know that we have that though. So, I think the exercise you’re talking about is really important, because when you just realize, oh, I need a class, I need an expert to tell me how to do that. Oh, I need to go do it this way. It’s just so ingrained in us. It’s just so hard to even begin to question that.
But I think when we turn our eyes to our children, actually, we see all the learning that takes place in a given day as they’re physically moving objects, as they’re asking questions, as they’re exploring the world.
And so, I feel like, for me, that’s what really opened that up was just seeing how much they were learning just organically living their day. When I was trained and taught that that’s how you learn is to sit there and listen to the expert telling you. And while there were pieces of me that bucked against that, I didn’t know that we really could do it another way. And so, I think it is more ingrained in us than we think. And it’s really fun to let it go, I’ll just say, now, 20 years down the road. Oh my gosh. The power that we have to just learn anything that we want in so many different ways is such a unique time in history I think as well. So, it’s really fun.
ERIKA: Yeah. It’s exactly that. I feel like when we have the tunnel vision about the one way to learn and we’re directing them into this kind of chute of, here’s the next step, then we’re missing what we talk about so much, which is like what they actually like about the thing, too. And so, the more they get sucked into, this is the way everyone learns about this thing that you’re interested in, the less chance there is for them to take the offshoots of what they actually really are curious about.
And so, I think it’s such a special environment for a person to be able to actually be following the little threads of their own interest. I think there’s a better chance for finding new things or finding something that just so perfectly matches with who they are. That’s really exciting to think about, actually.
ANNA: I love that, because I think, like you’re talking about, it’s these different webs and there’s backtracks. So, I’m interested in dance. But I like the music. Oh, but I’m going to come back here. And, oh, I like the costumes. And, oh, I’m going to come back here. But it’s like the ballet class for the five-year-old is just going to be the ballet class for the five-year-old. You’re going to be learning these few feet positions and put a tutu on, but we have the ability to provide a richer environment where all those aspects can be explored to the depths that maybe just a quick shallow or a very deep dive that’s so unique and so much more, I think, how humans learn.
PAM: Yeah. I love that so much. That’s such an interesting thing to think about, because you’re right. When we get a topic and we want to be helpful and supportive, it’s like, okay, let’s go! Let’s sign up for the lessons, let’s do this. But when you start doing that, you’re guiding them, because in that environment, they’re told what the important part of the thing is, right. So, it’s like, oh, okay. So, I don’t get to wear a costume until maybe the end of the year when we have our performance, right?
So, they just absorb the message that, oh, that’s not really an important part of it, even though, for me, when I watched some ballet or I see a ballet, that was what I loved. And I love ballet! And, “Okay, let’s go to class.” And that gets lost and it gets pushed down. Not even anyone saying anything, but those messages come through.
So, giving the space for a little while, just to like dance with them, to see what they’re drawn to. Put ballet dance videos and all those things on and see what they do with it. See where they take it. That can give us so much more information than quickly setting them in an environment that is presupposing what their love of the thing is all about.
ANNA: Right, and I’m going to take it back to the topic, just really quick to even wrap it up. Once we’ve cultivated this environment where we’re able to explore and go and come back and do and create the web, then a curriculum doesn’t have any power. It may have use. So, then you bring in that more conventional tool that maybe is an expert or maybe is a written curriculum or is maybe some type of class and they know it’s just one option among many. They don’t weigh it any more. They get what they want to from it. They don’t feel bad about themselves if it doesn’t fit them or it doesn’t feel good.
And so, I think that’s the beauty of creating this environment. It’s not about no curriculum, no classes. It’s about the whole environment. Is everything valued and is our own unique learning path valued?
PAM: Oh yeah. I love that. I love that. When you get to that point, then everything’s an option.
Life is just so much bigger and beautiful. Oh, thank you so much to both of you for joining me. That’s a really fun discussion and I am really, really loving this series.
ERIKA: Me too!
PAM: Yay! I hope everyone else listening is as well. And remember, you can come and comment on the episode on the website where we’re sharing it on the YouTube video, on Instagram, all the different places. We would love to hear your thoughts as well. Have a great day, everyone. Bye!
ERIKA: Bye!
ANNA: Bye.
EU340: On the Journey with Nora McDonald
Jan 19, 2023
This week, we’re back with another On the Journey episode. Pam, Anna, and Erika are joined by Living Joyfully Network member Nora McDonald. Nora is an unschooling mom of two living in Costa Rica. She shares her journey to unschooling as well as two major a-ha moments she has had in the last year.
We talk about getting to know our children better by dropping expectations and really listening to them as well as how valuable it is to drop our sense of urgency when it comes to getting through difficult moments. Nora writes so eloquently on the Network about her big realizations, her thought processes, and her challenges, and it was so fun to bring some of her insights to the podcast.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from LivingJoyfully.ca and today, Anna, Erika, and I are excited to speak with Living Joyfully member Nora McDonald. Welcome, Nora!
ANNA: Hello.
ERIKA: Hi!
PAM: So, to get us started, can you give us a bit of an introduction to you and your family?
NORA: Yeah, sure. Okay. I’m Nora. I’m British, as you may hear. And I am married to a Costa Rican man called Luis. And we have two kids, Ruben who is eight, and Liam who is five. And me and Luis met in Costa Rica and we’ve sort of gone back and forth quite a lot, but we’ve spent more of our relationship in Cambridge, in the UK, but actually at the moment, we are in Costa Rica as of seven months ago. This is my third time living in Costa Rica, Ruben’s second, and Liam’s first. So, it’s a bit complicated.
So, I was going to say about how we got into unschooling, because I always like hearing about that. So yeah, I was sort of thinking about, it feels like a gradual journey towards it. I discovered gentle parenting and that kind of thing when Ruben was a baby. So, that made me feel like I was doing something slightly alternative. But that was kind of it.
And then, when I was going to have Liam, we went back to the UK from Costa Rica at that point. And so, we actually had the same doula that we’d had with Ruben. We had the same one with Liam and she is a home educator, I think still. And so, we ended up having much more conversation with her about home education than we did about babies. And so, we looked into it after that and ended up home educating and I didn’t really have a philosophy for a while. I was kind of exploring things.
Ruben has always been very anti-being taught things, so we were pretty relatively laid back. But the big dive into unschooling happened about March 2021 when Ruben was really kicking back on the very, very strict rules that we had about tablets and TV and stuff.
And so, I was kind of aware of unschooling and I was like, that always seems to make sense. So maybe I should go and see why lots of unschoolers don’t have these really strict limits. And I distinctly remember being like, “I’m never going to go that far, but at least maybe I could go and see what the thinking is.” And luckily, I had an unschooling friend, Lorna, who sent me loads of links and told me about the podcast and she was in the Network on here. So, I think I listened to two episodes of the podcast and then I was like, “Yep, this is for me,” and joined the Network.
So, yeah, I can’t believe it’s only been like a year and a half since that happened, because it’s been quite a journey and I’ve just been sinking deeper and deeper into it. And it’s completely changed my life, as I like to tell people, because it’s been so many great skills about being in relationship with other people, communicating, identifying where my beliefs come from, challenging everything, saying, is this working for me? All of this kind of stuff that we talk about has been amazing.
But yes, so, to fast forward to now, the kids are super into tablets and video games and YouTube and it’s a huge interest for both of them. Lots of Minecraft, lots of Roblox happening. And it’s actually really nice, because Liam, I think quite recently, has got up to Ruben’s level with Minecraft and Roblox, so they’re playing together loads. It’s really cool. And Ruben’s also been playing with a kid from a Network family in South Africa, so that’s been really nice.
And they also like swimming, bowling, any kind of physical fighty play, wrestling or acting, Minecraft, or any of that kind of thing. It was funny, because I was thinking about this and I was thinking about what they enjoy doing and they have a lot in common, but they’re such different personalities. So, Ruben is very sweet and caring and likes the same things and the same people. But once he likes something, he really likes it. So, he’s completely delighted if one of his favorite people would join him in one of his favorite games. He’s really into his interests.
Whereas Liam is the comedian. He has this amazing comic timing. And also, he really knows how to enjoy himself. I just so often look over at him and think he’s just the embodiment of the phrase, living your best life, because he’s great at just like chilling out and he just seems to know how to have a good time, I think.
And then I am a stay at home parent, thinking about maybe trying to do some work, but I don’t know what to do with my life. So, we’ll see. Since the kids both really like being at home, I have got quite into podcasts, which has been really fun. So, obviously the two Living Joyfully podcasts, but also anything about psychology, human relationships, history. I used to really love history and I’ve really been diving back into that, which has been super fun. And I like reading and cooking and eating. I’m quite excited about that one, because my cooking mojo totally disappeared during lockdown and it’s finally coming back. So, I’m getting back into baking stuff, which is cool.
And Luis is super into maths and science and engineering, that kind of stuff. And he just loves building things and taking things apart. And also swimming and water polo is big. He’s going back to his water polo team here, which I think he’s really happy about. And he just says he likes learning stuff when I asked him. Which is really great, because it means he’s really good at listening to me telling him all the stuff that I’ve learnt, whether it’s unschooling or any other podcast. He’s a very patient listener to the summaries that I give him. So, that’s us.
PAM: That’s the best! It’s so fun. I love that that he is a good listener, too, because that is a part of our process sometimes, is synthesizing it for ourselves so that we can share it with others. So, that’s a fun piece as well.
And I loved hearing just a bit about that technology journey. It is a pretty common one. Absolutely. Because it’s so unconventional. Even though, we’re starting to hear more stories about tech not being as vilified conventionally. I love that, because I remember when I first started reading about homeschooling and the kids first came home. I was just hearing those bits about unschooling, it’s like, okay, that sounds really curious. I mean, “I’m not going to go all the way,” but when you start learning more about it and it starts making more sense, that’s it. You don’t have to make the decision right at the beginning, right?
You don’t have to decide, “Okay, I’m doing full on unschooling. Let’s start. I’m going to go learn about it.” No, it can be, “You know what? I’m curious about this. I’m going to learn some more and learn some more.” And it’s like, baby step by baby step, I can just say, “Oh, this feels good. This is looking good.
What else you got to offer?” And then I take another step, right? Did it feel like that for you, Nora?
NORA: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Well, with the technology thing, it was kind of interesting, because I also did a webinar with a British psychologist called Naomi Fisher. And so, my unschooling friend Lorna was like, “Don’t do anything really suddenly,” but after I’d watched this webinar I was like, “No, I can’t. I can’t do it anymore. I can’t enforce it.” So that did happen quite quickly. But it was because I was so convinced. But there’s definitely been lots of baby steps to get to where I am now and lots to come, I think, as well.
PAM: Forever.
NORA: Yeah.
ERIKA: I love that so much. It reminds me, too, of the beginning of my journey, too, where some things were just like, “This is it. Jump right in.” And other things were like, “Well, I’ll never get there.” Then you realize it’s just this journey and it just naturally happens.
So, I have really enjoyed a lot of the a-ha moments that you share on the Network. I feel like you’re so great about sharing the process as you’re realizing things and taking us through the realizations and then how things used to feel and how they feel now. And I just think that’s so valuable for everyone. There was a story that you shared around shedding the sense of urgency that you had about like pushing through things, getting through a car ride, and other examples like that, and just how transformational it was to drop that sense of urgency. And so, I was hoping that you could tell us about that here.
NORA: Yeah, sure. Okay. Basically, we had this big change, because in Cambridge, in the UK, we didn’t have a car. I don’t drive. So, we had this wonderful cargo bike that I really miss or buses or walking. But we are in San Jose in Costa Rica, which is not the most walkable city, and there’s not much public transport that takes us where we want to go.
So, we’ve had to do cars a lot more. And the kids were even less happy about this than I was. They really hated it. We’re sort of getting there now, but especially at the beginning, they really just did not want to be in the car. And so, my first instinct was just, we have to do this. We’ve got no choice.
We’re just going to have to push through. They’re just going to have to hate it. All we can do is go as fast as we can and hope that there’s something nice at the other end. And that was how I was expecting things to go.
But luckily, because I’m in the Living Joyfully Network and there’s so many conversations about being creative, about different people’s needs, and respecting their needs and everybody’s needs being important, and probably loads of other kind of useful mindset shifts, “There’s plenty of time,” luckily, I was able to just stop and go, “What on Earth am I thinking? I can easily make this better for them.” And it just took 30 seconds for me to think, do you know what? We’ll just stop whenever they say they need to stop. So we just stopped worrying about being late for things, which in Costa Rica is fine anyway, which helps. But also I’d rather we arrive happy and slightly late and just prioritizing us being okay.
We just decided we were going to stop and we also always get an ice cream now whenever we go anywhere. So, it’s just these really simple, basic things. We’ve done stops that are like a five-minute stop at a park that we happen to be going past. And we’ve done a stop that was like an hour in a little town getting an ice cream and having a wander around. Ice creams are often involved, but it seems so simple, but it was amazing to me that I just was on this autopilot of, “We just have to push through. We just have to do it. Bad things happen and all you can do is push through them,” both for me and my kids, I think. And it was just amazing how revolutionary it felt to me to just stop and go, “Okay, no, we can think creatively about this.” We can improve the situation as much as we can. And obviously there’s a limit. But it makes such a difference, I think, as well, just the kids knowing that we are trying everything that we can to help them feel better.
And, yeah, I feel like I probably still am working on making this automatic, but I’m definitely trying to make it a habit.
So, the other example of this that I thought of was trying to get the kids comfortable going to the dentist and we found this very lovely dentist. But what I’m hoping that we’re going to be able to do is, rather than just say, okay, we’re going to go, we’re going to do everything we can to get their mouths open so she can see, I’m going to contact her and be like, “Can we just pay your fee for an appointment and then just hang out? We’ll teach you to play Minecraft. They’ll get used to the room. They’ll get used to you.” We don’t have to just push through everything.
It feels so simple now, but it’s been like this huge life mindset change for me.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. It makes such a difference though, right? Because we can just really tunnel in on, okay, this is what we’re supposed to do, have to do, how it has to look, and let’s get it over with, this bad stuff. But we can change all of that immediately, like you said, and it really just takes a few seconds to think about, okay, we can now start brainstorming and think about the different ways.
And I do love the Network for that, because I do think we’re kind of steeping in that creativity. We’re steeping in all these different ways that people have done it. And so, it really is. I think it’s easier when we have that community around us.
PAM: It really is. It’s so surprising, like you talked about the moment where you were like, “Hey, I don’t have to do that.” There are so many things where we feel like, okay, you know, life isn’t perfect. There’s going to be some things we dislike. Let’s just get through it as fast as we can.
That is just such a normal way to see something, first approach to something, and that little switch that says, “Oh, but hey, what if we didn’t?” It’s like that’s a little thought experiment that I love to play with myself. When I’m feeling stuck with something, no matter what it is, it’s like, what if it was the opposite? What if I wasn’t stuck? What if I thought that this was great. What if we could have the most fun ever on car rides? What if we love this dentist? How would I be acting then? That’s what opens it up for me. We’d be stopping when we saw something fun or we felt like an ice cream. We’d be bringing fun things to do in the car. We’d be laughing, chatting, or headphones on, whatever it is for us as individuals.
But that thought experiment is that quick shift for me that just helps me realize, oh, there’s another way to look at this. There are so many more possibilities that we can play with. I love it.
ERIKA: Yeah, I was thinking how it is kind of that mainstream paradigm thing of, there are just things we have to do. There are things we have to do and the kids better get used to that there are just things we have to do and you have to just push through. And for that to be like a lesson to teach a child, this lesson of push through. But right. I feel this kind of lightness in my head if I can just kind of open it to, but wait a second. Like you were saying like, wait a second. It doesn’t have to be this way. In any situation, there are so many different places that you could be looking for a different way to do things, something to switch up.
And so, I think being in that adult position of, but I should just be able to say the thing and they have to just push through and maybe it will somehow be more convenient for me as an adult if I could get the kids to just push through, but then if I actually look at reality, pushing through is so hard. It’s so hard to do with kids. It actually makes my life a lot harder if I don’t try to address the different needs that they have and the places that they’re uncomfortable. So, I just loved that.
ANNA: Yeah. It’s so fun. Okay, so another huge shift that you shared on the Network was around how, with the best of intentions, your priorities, the direction, leading your kids towards ideas, fun ideas and what you thought would be great, was really stopping you from knowing them and how they wanted to spend their time. And so, we just thought it’d be cool to have a discussion around that, because there’s a lot there with that piece.
NORA: Yeah, no, this felt like a really huge, multi-level a-ha moment for me. Because, as I said, I started off when Ruben was a baby, getting into gentle parenting and positive parenting and conscious parenting, whatever. There’s lots of versions.
And so, I remember getting into unschooling and reading about it and feeling like respecting and honoring your kids’ interests and doing what they want and saying yes to them and all of that, it all just seemed fine. Like I was like, yes, yes, I’m on top of that. That’s easy. That’s fine. That’s done. I know them. I know everything they were going to want to do. I was at home with them the whole time, so I was like, I know these kids.
Yeah, it took me a long time to start realizing that actually, my head was so full of these ideas of what we should be doing as a family, what children should be like, what parents should be like, what childhood should be like, what activities are better than other activities. I was totally signed up to, we should be reading, we should be outside, we should be going to groups, we should be going to museums, which is all great if that’s what your kids want to do, but really, my kids didn’t want to do any of that.
So, this sort of big realization, I think of it as a two-stage process. So, the first little a-ha moment was back in Cambridge. So, Cambridge has quite a few nice museums, so every so often I would drag the kids to a museum, because this was educational and good, but still fun. But they were never very interested in them. And so, it always felt like a bit of a flop as an activity.
So, then one day, I guess I’d been kind of reading about unschooling and processing it all, and one day it just suddenly occurred to me that there is a museum in Cambridge called the Fitzwilliam Museum, which has a room full of weapons, like swords, crossbow, armor, lots of sharp, pointy metal things. And I just suddenly was like, that’s where Ruben would like to go. That’s what Ruben’s interested in, because he really loves all kinds of fighty computer games. He likes cutting out weapons of increasing complexity by eye with scissors and with paper and just playing with them. I was like, he likes weapons. Why am I not taking him to the weapons bit?
And we actually never ended up going, but he did express interest, but it just felt like this real moment where I was like, oh, I’m starting to see these, these options more from his point of view, thinking about what genuinely interests him, not what I think kids should know about.
And then, the second a-ha moment was in Costa Rica. A few months ago, I actually walked past this bowling alley. And I was like, oh, I should suggest bowling to the kids, with zero expectations, because I did not think they would be interested. And they were both like, “Yes, we really want to go!” And I was really surprised. I thought, “Okay, fine. We’ll give it a try.” Worst thing that can happen is they don’t like it. And they loved it. And this was in a place, really loud music, loads of people. You have to wear weird shoes, it’s competitive, but it’s so competitive that you can see who’s winning. There’s a big screen telling you who’s winning. And I just never in a million years would’ve thought that they would like that. And we’ve kept going. They still like going. We’ve sort of tweaked the competitive element, so we kind of mess about with who goes when and everything, but still they keep wanting to go.
And that felt like an a-ha moment, because that was not something I would’ve thought that they would want to do. That was not something I would’ve thought they would enjoy once we got there. So, it just made me realize that I was getting so much information from that about who they were, about what they wanted to do, because I had stepped out of the way. And I’m probably still working on it, but I had mostly dropped my expectations, my ideas of what should be happening, what we should be doing. So, I got this information that they wanted to do bowling.
So, it just made me realize how much all of this noise in my head had been stopping me from truly both seeing my kids based on what I know about them, but also just giving them the chance to lead and teach me about more about themselves and give me more information. I still don’t really know why they like the bowling, but also just the difference between seeing them going and doing something that they actually wanted to do, how much easier it was to get them out of the house as well. There’s so much information that I just would not have had if I had still been like, “Okay, Monday we do this, Tuesday we do that.” It just was so useful and so now, if they surprise me, I’m delighted, because it means that I have stepped out of the way. I have given them the chance to show me something that I wasn’t expecting. And then that gives me more information to then be able to say, “I think you might like this other thing.”
And so, still doing the weapons room-type stuff. So, still saying, “Okay, I think you might like this.” And still being able to look at it from their point of view based on the information I have. But it’s like a virtuous circle where, if I’m stepping out of the way, I’m way more able to offer them stuff that they’re genuinely going to want to do. So, yeah, that’s been really fun.
ANNA: Oh my gosh. Go ahead, Pam.
PAM: Yeah, there’s so much in there, Nora. So, I’m going to start with, I love the nuance that you’re talking about of dropping expectations. So often when it’s like, yeah, you know what? It’s not helpful to have expectations that we as a family or they as a child should enjoy this, or we feel like this would be good for them, all those expectations. But there’s the piece, too, where when we can drop those expectations and stand aside and have a harder time for a while not sharing other possibilities. You know what I mean? Like, I don’t want to put anything on them. I don’t want to have these expectations, so I’m just going to let them lead and I just kind of stand back.
Yet, passing the bowling alley and going, huh, that’s really off, but it’s here by us. We could go there. And mentioning it. It’s that nuance of not having any expectations when we share something. So yeah, absolutely, knowing them, we can think of the things we think they might be interested in, and then also sharing random possibilities that are actually around in our lives as well. Not as in, oh, I need to share something every day, and they need to like say yes, no, whatever, but to bubble our lives with these other possibilities that give them the opportunity to surprise us, to choose. “Right now, I do want to try something totally new.”
It’s so different when we are more with them. And we can share things without the expectation, like not letting not having expectations have us stand back a little bit. Does that make sense? But we can lean in more without those expectations and just bubble away and discover so much more about each other.
ANNA: Right. I mean, for me what stuck out was just that attachment that we can have to, it should look this way in childhood and all of these pieces. And, like you’re saying, there’s so many nuances within this piece, but I think it does come back to the expectations and attachments.
And I love the piece about the bowling, because I think we can also fall that direction into kind of boxing our kids in a little bit. Like, oh, they’ve never liked big crowds or loud things, so I’m going to steer clear of that. And that’s, again, with love and great intention, because we’ve seen that. But I just think kids change and grow and when it’s something that sparks their interest, who knows? Maybe they saw a YouTube about bowling or one of their favorite characters was bowling. So, they’re just like, I want to see what that’s all about. And even if they hated it, they still got that information.
So, I think it is just that stepping back, but yet staying engaged, that seeing through their eyes like we talk about, because it’s just all these nuances. But I think we can easily see, for any of us, how we can kind of get on this path, and then we’ve lost sight of the children that we’re there hoping to facilitate.
ERIKA: Right. It feels like you’re just giving this space to them to be able to just be who they are and that they get to decide who they are. Because my kids surprise me all the time, exactly like how you were describing. And sometimes I’m like, what? It really can throw me.
But that’s part of the fun of our lives, being able to give enough space for them to change their mind and do something different and surprise me. And I really got so much out of when you were describing the feeling of, we all want to do this activity. That reminded me of those moments. And they can be few and far between sometimes, because the kids are so different from each other. But where we all are like, “A hundred percent we want to do this thing together,” how easy and fun those types of activities are. So, to look for those. I loved that story, too.
ANNA: And that reminds me of something, I think you said it in the Network, too, Nora, but it’s just kind of expounding on what you said, but how different it felt. You had told a story about, well, it’s hard to get them going anywhere because they like to stay in the house. So, it’s this process of getting them to go and making it fun and doing all this.
But then when you saw this delta of, when they’re leading the way, it wasn’t hard at all or it was so much easier. So, I thought that was really interesting, a thing that we can kind of watch for, you know, those energy shifts.
PAM: Yeah, I do think that is a huge shift. It was for me. The realization, when we talk about commitments and things, it’s less about figuring out a fun way to kind of cajole everybody to the place where we think they should be, for whatever reason. And then that ties in with letting them quit things when it’s not interesting to them, because what we’re really looking for is those things that they’re super excited about, where it is so much easier to do, because it’s theirs. It’s something that they want to do. It’s like night and day. Yet, we can get so attached to the things that we love or that we think that they should be doing.
NORA: Yeah, no. I was just going to say, yeah, I wrote a whole thing in the Network, a post in the Network about, “It’s so hard to get my kids out of the house. What can I do?” And I had this whole story that it was this really stressful process and I’d just spiraled into like, “This stresses me out. So, I’m stressed. So, I’m making it stressful,” on and on and on. And yeah, it turned out that mostly my kids like being at home and also, Ruben especially likes being at home, but he will dash to the car if it’s something that he genuinely wants to do. But because I’d never given them that chance to tell me what it was they would dash to the car for, then I didn’t know that it was possible. So yeah, it’s been a fun journey.
ANNA: Yeah. That’s amazing. I love it.
PAM: Yeah. I want to say thank you so much for taking the time to join us today, Nora. We really appreciate it. It’s so fun hearing little snippets of the journey that, when people think through them and can see and can communicate what their process was, I think that’s so helpful for people to hear. So, thank you so much, Nora.
NORA: Thank you for having me. It’s been super fun.
PAM: Yay! Us too! Have a wonderful day.
NORA: Bye!
ERIKA: Thank you.
ANNA: Take care.
EU339: Q&A Deep Dive
Jan 05, 2023
In this week’s Exploring Unschooling podcast episode, we’re diving deep into a listener question submitted by Jessie in Colorado. She wants to explore a quote from Free to Learn that took her off guard, which is:
One proviso, though. Unschooling won’t work well if you actively avoid having your family interact with the world, with life. Shutting out the world rather than embracing it will limit your children’s opportunities to learn, maybe to the point where school is more connected to the world than home is. Inhibiting their exploration of the world around them is not helpful or supportive of learning.
Free to Learn by Pam Laricchia
Jessie wonders if being introverted or neurodivergent makes unschooling a poor fit, since social interactions can be draining. She worries that she doesn’t have the ability to provide enough interaction for her daughter and is curious about the meaning of the quote.
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling and cultivating strong and connected relationships.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and Anna Brown and Erika Ellis are joining me today to explore a listener question. Hi to you both.
ERIKA: Hello.
ANNA: Hello.
PAM: Now, before we get started, I just want to remind everyone that our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the quote “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal right answer for any situation that works for everyone. So, basically, we’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling. And, Erika, do you want to get us started?
ERIKA: I do. So, this question is from Jessie in Colorado and she writes,
“My little is still a toddler, but I recently learned about unschooling and I haven’t been able to stop reading more and more. I’m currently delving into Pam’s book, Free to Learn. There is one caution in the book that took me off guard and has me worried about whether I can unschool. Pam writes,
‘One proviso, though. Unschooling won’t work well if you actively avoid having your family interact with the world, with life. Shutting out the world rather than embracing it will limit your children’s opportunities to learn, maybe to the point where school is more connected to the world than home is. Inhibiting their exploration of the world around them is not helpful or supportive of learning.’
I’m wondering if you could delve into what this means a little more, and if unschooling is likely to be a poor fit for folks who are introverted or neurodivergent in a way that makes socializing hard. We certainly go on lots of adventures, hikes, parks, library, etc., and going out can be fun, but interacting with new people is exhausting.
We have a small friend group and I struggle to find the energy to engage with people and organizations that I don’t know well, in a way I’d want to model. The idea of reaching out and making a lot of new connections is overwhelming to the point that I do now wonder if my daughter would do better in school. I know that the socialization that happens in school isn’t ideal, but I would like her to get to interact with lots of kids and adults, and I worry about my ability to provide that. I have considered sending her to tuition-free preschool just for the experience of interacting with others without me (Sudbury schools and other paid groups are not accessible to our family, both in terms of location and money), but unschooling sounds so much better.”
So, hi, Jessie, and thank you so much for your question. I’m really excited to hear Pam and Anna’s responses, too. We’re all introverts, so I know we all have a lot of experience navigating this topic.
A lot of thoughts came up for me when I read your question. First is that personality difference that you mentioned. There are just so many ways to be a human, and for someone who is introverted or who is sensitive to sound or who is overwhelmed in busy places, being out all the time in active places surrounded by people is not going to feel good. But living in alignment with that is not the same thing as shutting out the world at all. My family is introverted, but we figure out what feels good for us, the frequency of outings, the number of friends, the places that we like to go. And the key for me is listening to my kids to determine if their needs are being met.
I have a friend who is also introverted like me, but she has an extremely extroverted child. And so, that can be more challenging in moments, but there is so much learning there. They’re learning about each other’s personality differences. She can push herself out of her comfort zone at times in order to meet his social needs. And she can communicate with him about her needs, as well. And there are just so many possibilities for meeting his needs that can still feel good to her. School could be one of those possibilities. But there are also co-op classes and homeschool groups and park days, play dates at friends’ houses, online gaming, spending time with extended family, having other people take him out to do activities, and so on.
So, rather than getting caught up in a kind of nebulous future fear of, what if it’s not good enough? That’s that borrowing trouble, like Anna says, instead we can ground ourselves in trusting that we will figure it out as the needs arise. In my experience, unschooling doesn’t take away possibilities. It just gives us space and time to figure out what would feel good. And there are just endless possibilities if we stay open and curious.
And your question kind of reminds me of a recent Q&A, too, where I was talking about staying in the present moment and focusing on the current needs of your child where they are right now, rather than getting pulled into worrying about the future. Over time, I’ve found that future worry is really unnecessary, because the most pressing needs are clear. They’re the ones that are right in front of me. And my kids will let me know when things aren’t enough or they’re bored, or they’re needing something different.
For example, Oliver will say, “When’s the next time we’re going over to my friend’s house?” Or Maya will say, “I feel like we’re not going to enough places.” Or I will ask, “Would you be interested in going to the homeschool park day this week?” We just check in about what their social needs are and figure out the best way to meet those.
And I bet it could be hard to imagine what it could look like while your child is still a toddler. But online gaming with friends has been such a powerful way to meet a lot of our social needs, mine included, because the kids are free to jump in more often when they need more interaction and then to pull back when they need more quiet time or solitary time. And it has just been so helpful. I mean, we’ve had some months-long phases of, I don’t need to be around friends at all. And then when they want it, they can jump back into that world and it’s just worked so well for us.
And it can also be helpful to remember that you yourself don’t have to be the one who solves all of the problems and meets all of the needs by yourself. Solutions can come from all kinds of places, like play dates and day trips with other family members and friends. Maybe your child will become very interested in a certain activity like drama or martial arts that has kind of a built-in social circle for interaction. So, there’s plenty of time to see how it plays out and what her needs and interests will be.
And I guess I would also add that socializing with a lot of people and being out exploring the world are two separate things and people will have differing needs and desires for each of those things. I think the bottom line for me is, if I’m listening to my kids’ needs and bringing that yes energy, figuring out ways to meet those needs, then we’re good. And their lives are not going to be nearly as full of people and activities as mine was when I was their age, but what we are doing is more aligned with their personalities and how they want to spend their time. I didn’t have that option when I was growing up to find environments that fit with my personality. And so, I think we’re lucky in that way. Pam?
PAM: Oh, I love that so much, Erika. Thank you. And yes, I do appreciate your question so much, Jessie. I love the opportunity to dive into this more, because first, when I talk about interacting with the world, when I was writing that, for me, it means so much more than physical, in-person engagement.
In my mind, inhibiting their exploration of the world might look like filtering or blocking their access to information or not actively helping them as they seek out information or experiences they’re curious about.
Just like Erika was saying, there are so many possibilities to do that, but when we’re not open to that, open and curious and helping them do that, that’s more what I was talking about for not interacting with the world. It was a more esoteric definition of world, rather than physical, face-to-face exploration, because none of that is literally dependent on leaving the house, right?
For me, keeping their world small is definitely a separate thing from exploring and supporting all the ways and the frequency in which each person in the family wants to be out in public and interacting with other people, socializing. And that’s the other piece that you’ll find, as Erika was mentioning, as well. Everybody’s needs are taken into account. The family example Erika shared where the mom’s more of an introvert and child’s more of an extrovert, we can work with that. We can figure things out. We aren’t the sole responsible person for this. There are so many ways that we can pull things in. So, it’s really fun to get creative at that point.
And yes, my family includes both strong introverts and all sorts of neurodivergence, and it was so worth giving everyone the space to explore what that looks like for them and also, how the experience of that can change over time. You know, like you were saying, Erika, for months, it’s like, this is all I need, you know? And then it’s like, okay, I’m ready for a little bit more or a little bit more of this, or less of this, etc.
And, again, how we can stretch for exciting things. Sometimes we are happy to jump out of our comfort zone for bit or push on the edges of it. Because I found it was much easier for me to stretch when it was in service of something that one of my kids was super interested in doing. And that was because I could focus on their joy. I didn’t need to be seeing all the other things that might be overwhelming. I could focus on that piece. And then, we could also build in the recovery time and the relaxed time afterwards. And again, it was different depending on the child. It was different depending on the activity, where they were in the seasons of things. But that level of self-awareness is just so valuable for everyone, adults and kids alike.
When we had that or were able to pick up some of it along the way, we could bring that to the table as we figured out plans, figured out ways to move through things that worked for everyone. So, in that way, I feel like unschooling is an absolutely wonderful lifestyle for introverted and neurodivergent families, because each person is celebrated for who they are, rather than trying to change them to fit into this more conventional box.
So, I did want to mention there are a few podcast episodes where we dive into unschooling and neurodivergence that I think you’ll enjoy checking out. Episodes 120, 221 and 246. And we’ll put the links in the show notes. Anna?
ANNA: Okay. So, obviously you guys hit a lot of the points that that brought up to me, as soon as I was reading it, and I definitely identify with the question in terms of being an introvert. And it’s not really easy for me to reach out to strangers. I don’t love big, loud, crowded environments. But what I found was it was so much easier to do those things in small doses when I was facilitating my children, like you said, Pam. When you’re seeing your child light up about something, it’s the best. So, it really just makes it so much easier.
And there’s a connection that we have with our children, and that connection helps us find the ways to meet each other’s needs, even when it involves stretching our comfort zones a bit. I think the understanding that we had of each other just helped it flow, because we knew we’d figure it out. So, we could have this, okay, hmm, how are we going to do this? This part feels hard, this doesn’t. We want to do this. They just had a trust in me and I had a trust that they would also hear me and my concerns and how I was feeling about it.
And the piece, I think maybe you both mentioned it, but remembering that I don’t have to meet all the needs, as well, that helped me ground into, okay, there’s other resources available to help meet these needs. And even if it wasn’t something that David could do, maybe it’s a grandparent or a friend or someone else. And so, just being open, I found that those opportunities arose for them to be involved in all kinds of ways that I could not have predicted ahead of time.
And in terms of the school kindergarten, preschool thing that you were talking about, I really don’t believe that toddlers need to be with other toddlers, especially in a classroom environment, because there’s really not enough facilitation and it really isn’t an interest for the toddler. Toddlers aren’t interested in that. Their interest is to explore. And at that age, you’ll see a lot of parallel play and also a lot of upset, because toddlers are not so sure.
I think children want to be with their parents and learning about the world around them. And it sounds like you’re already doing that, Jessie. You all are already exploring the world. And I love Pam’s point about that quote was not about necessarily physically exploring the world. I think it was just shining a light on, we can limit our children in a lot of ways, and that limiting often happens at at home, not because of home, but because of not sharing certain resources or devaluing certain ways they want to explore things. And so, yeah, just open up that idea of what we’re talking about when we say exploring the world, because you’ll find that you just learn and grow together.
And I definitely wouldn’t be borrowing trouble about years down the road, because I truly believe and have seen, if we focus on the connection and the relationships, we’re in the best place to solve all the problems that life throws at us. And so, I just would look at your child. Are they happy? Are they enjoying life? Are they asking for something else? Are you both enjoying this time together? Things change really quickly and at each point you can pivot, make adjustments. That connection will be what helps you kind of tune in to who they are and what would help them do the things that they’re interested in.
PAM: Yeah.
ERIKA: That reminded me, too, about how it’s not a forever decision. Any decision isn’t a forever decision. So, there’s no reason right now to decide whether unschooling will work forever or not. It’s not even important to think of that.
PAM: That’s a really good point, too. We don’t need to decide now for forever. And I really liked your point, Anna, when you’re mentioning like how things will bubble up, possibilities will bubble up and that happens more when we are in that open and curious space, rather than in that smaller space where we’re not scanning, not noticing the things. And it’s not that we need to be in that space all the time, but if our child is curious about something and we’re not quite sure how we might meet that, we find so many possibilities when we just pay attention and not literally have to leave the house to be paying attention to it.
But I remember there were seasons where, when the local paper showed up, I was reading that, or I was going online just to see some things that were around us. Or if they had an interest in something, I would do some research on my own and I could find maybe a video that I could show them or a show or we’d go to the library and get some books. There are just so many possibilities.
And just being with them. I love the point of being with them and being in the moment right now, because this is what we can help with. And when you’re in the moment with them and noticing times when they’re, I don’t know, the word “bored” comes to mind, but there’s a whole conversation around that. What it does is, we can help them in those moments. We can work together. It’s not even so much us helping them as in, we have to come up with a solution. “Okay, you’re bored. Here you go, do this thing.” It’s conversations. It’s sitting with that. How are they feeling? Did they want to try something new? At those times, maybe what they want is comfort things. A show that they are very familiar with, when they’re feeling at odds and not sure what they want to do next.
There are just so many different ways to go, but when we can be with them in the moment, we can learn so much about them. We can help them move through that moment. And when you’re doing that, there’s so much less chance that you’re going to be blindsided by something coming up. “Oh my gosh! Not going to school was just a horrible choice, because their whole world was too small!” It is much more of a mindset, much more of a way of engaging with your child and just helping them pursue and enjoy the things that they’re interested in.
ANNA: Right. What that really brought to mind for me was, when we get into this thought process of way down the road, we’re so out of the moment that we really are missing the cues. We really are missing what’s happening. And so, once you get a little bit more time under your belt with your child, you’ll see that, as you stay connected, it’s this gradual growth. You’re gradually growing together, you’re learning more about each other and how you work well together and what works for how long and those type of things.
And so, then it just naturally unfolds and grows. But it’s like, if you jump way ahead, you’re just thinking, I can’t do this. But it really pulls you out of where the actual learning is about each other, which is in that moment, because that’s all that we have. And so, just watch for that. Like, “Hey, I’m getting way ahead of myself. I’m really sitting in my head and disconnecting from my child.”
Because, as we always say, we’ve said on the podcast so many times, when you start feeling that, just lean back in, lean back into the child in front of you, and then you see like, oh yeah, we’re doing great. We’re having a great time. Look at all that they’ve learned in the short two years that they’ve been on the earth.
ERIKA: Right. And when you’re thinking so far ahead, I feel like the only way to really do that is to be thinking of this kind of generic person who’s going to require these different things. Like a teenager is going to have this many friends and will have learned these things and gone to these places, or whatever it is. And so, that really is not about the child at all and the individual. And so, focusing more on the excitement of learning who this person is and how cool that is.
Everyone is so different, and so, school doesn’t make us think that everyone is so different. And I think that’s kind of a mindset shift to really realize how different every person is. And so, when you have this very young child in front of you who’s kind of just starting life, how fun and exciting is it to look at them and think, each thing that we do, I’m going to learn, Oh, they like that! They don’t like that. Ooh, this is really exciting for them! Who knew that they were going to be interested in that? And then that’s where life just gets more and more fun.
PAM: So much more fun! There was one little thing also that bubbled up for me, as you were mentioning leaning into your child, Anna, there will be seasons moving forward where the question does come up. Am I doing enough? This is what this feels like now as we dive into the question. And so, not to be afraid of that question, not to take that question as judgment. It’s like, oh, I’m failing. I’m failing unschooling. I’m failing parenting. Am I doing enough for them? But to use that as a reminder. For me, that was often a reminder that, oh, I’ve kind of drifted away. I’ve kind of disconnected a little bit, because I don’t have this hands-on experience and connection that is always telling me I’m doing enough when I’m helping them do the things that they are interested in doing. That’s just such a valuable question, because people can use that as, as such a judgment and beat themselves up over time, “I’m so worried about this,” but when you can use it as a cue, oh, you know what? Am I? Let’s go see! Let’s go talk to the kids!
ANNA: Let’s go see! Right. Let’s go see! And I love your point too, Erika, about learning about this child, because I think we do often hold this generic child in our mind, and it’s from our own experience or from how we are or from what we’ve seen on TV or whatever the thing might be.
But when you really lean in, I mean, these kids are so unique. I guarantee this child at two has strong preferences and things that really light them up and things that they just want to keep following, whether it’s trains or dogs or whatever the thing might be. And so, just really being open about that and just getting excited about it, I think just really leads the way.
And, like you said, Pam, then when those questions come up, you have, first of all, a background of connection and then you can go, okay, you know what? I do want to just lean in and see where are we now and what are they interested in now and how can I facilitate that now? And so, I love just all of that thinking, because the questions are going to come up. They just do.
PAM: They do. They really just do. And when we can not take those on as weight, but to take them on with curiosity, it leads us in so many super cool places.
Thank you so much to both of you for joining me today. I super appreciate it. I very much appreciate your question, Jessie. That was lots of fun to dig into.
If anyone hasn’t read Free to Learn yet, there will be links in the show notes or just go to books2read.com/freetolearn and you can pick it from your favorite online stores. And thank you so much, everyone. We’ll talk to you soon. Bye.
ERIKA: Bye.
ANNA: Bye bye.
EU338: A Conversation with Lore Blancke
Dec 08, 2022
This week, we’re sharing a conversation Anna Brown and I had recently with Lore Blancke on her podcast, Intimate Breath. Lore came across unschooling and the Exploring Unschooling podcast and was intrigued by the similarities she found with her work as she listened. And while she’s not a parent herself, her enthusiasm was apparent when she reached out to ask about having a conversation with her on her podcast.
It was such a delightful conversation that I asked if I could share it here as well!
We dive into what unschooling is, questioning rules and social conditioning to live how we want to live, the power of feeling free to make choices, moving from power and control-based relationships to consensual and intimate ones, what it can look like to prioritize relationships, and creating a culture where it feels safe to make mistakes and to quit if something doesn’t feel good.
Lore’s website, Intimate Breath
RESOURCES
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU337: Bringing It Home: Yes Energy
Nov 24, 2022
This week on the podcast, we’re sharing our first Bringing It Home episode. In this series, we’re going to dive even deeper into the topics that we explore in the Unschooling “Rules” series, with an eye to showing how these concepts come up in our real lives and the many possibilities for how to approach them.
Today, we are sharing more thoughts about the idea that unschoolers should “always say yes” to our children, and looking at the value of having “yes energy” instead.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca, and today, I’m joined by Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hello to your both!
ERIKA: Hi.
ANNA: Hello.
PAM: So, in our last Unschooling “Rules” episode, which was 335, we talked about why people may find themselves trying to always say yes as part of the paradigm shift to unschooling. We discussed how always saying yes may lead to frustration, disconnection, and resentment, and I shared one of my guiding questions, which was, “Why not yes?” That helped me lean into the yes, but also consider the whole context of the situation. We also dove into a few examples of how conversations and focusing on working together to meet everyone’s needs, can cultivate valuable learning for the whole family, for everyone who’s involved.
So, with this follow up Bringing it Home conversation, we want to talk about an aspect of leaning into saying yes that we’ve seen trip people up in various ways over the years. So, what if we can’t make it happen? There are definitely times when our kids have a request that we can’t meet immediately or on the timeline that they’re looking for.
Previously, we talked about the value of having conversations about the reasons behind it, but we wanted to dive into what might those conversations actually look like, because even in those moments when we’re not able to say yes right away, we can still bring yes energy to the conversation.
So, maybe they’re asking for something that’s overwhelming or not possible in a practical sense. “Mommy, I want to fly to the moon!” Or they want to build a rollercoaster or dig to the center of the earth. They are imaginative. Or maybe it’s a resource or a time constraint that makes the request just not doable for now.
When that happens, we can feel the urge to shut the conversation down because it seems nonsensical or because we are feeling a little bit bad that we can’t make it happen for them right now and don’t want to dwell on that. We want to move on. But instead of shutting things down by saying no or changing the subject, we can join them in their excitement and wonder with the energy of yes. We can meet them where they are and see their requests through their eyes. We can get curious. What about this idea or this thing is lighting them up so much?
Maybe we say, “That sounds amazing. What would you like to do on the moon?” Or, “That toy looks so cool. What do you like most about it?” We can have wonderfully engaged conversations with them about the thing, fully validating their interest in it or in doing it, and sometimes that is totally enough for them. Sometimes that helps them move on. Sometimes it’s less about actually doing or getting the thing and more about feeling seen as a person who would be excited about it. “Ah. They get me. They get me. They see me.”
I think we can fear that joining them in their excitement about the thing will be interpreted as, “Yes! Let’s do it. Let’s buy the thing right now.” I know that was what I was reticent about early on, but it’s not been my experience. That yes energy can lead to printing a picture of the thing that they’re wanting and making concrete plans to save for it. It can be brainstorming various ways to experience some of what they’re curious about. Say we watch some documentaries about space travel, or we check in on astronauts that are living on the International Space Station right now. Or maybe we go to the science center and see and feel a moon rock. When the answer feels like no at first, if we can get curious and bring that yes energy into the moment, we learn so much more and have a lot of fun getting creative about the possibilities for now and for the future.
It just takes that mindset shift to not feel like, oh man, I need to shut this down. Or, I feel bad about it. I need to change it. We can really dive into it and there’s so much fun in there. Anna, what do you think? What are your thoughts about that?
ANNA: Right. So, I would say our experiences were very similar. And that yes energy for me is really about connecting in the moment, not getting in my head about what we couldn’t do or why it won’t work, or what kind of an idea is this? But lean in and ask the questions and get excited. That was such a key point for us. And we would do this a lot at the store, if we saw something that they were interested in, but it wasn’t really an option for that trip, for whatever reason, I would just ask questions like, what do you love about it? What’s your favorite part? And then I would get excited. “I love this one! Look at this. And I love how cool the colors are and that’s the cutest face on that little dog that’s a part of that set.” And they loved me seeing what they were seeing with that excited energy and those excited eyes.
And, for us, oddly enough, and I know it’s not this way with every child, but a lot of times that conversation was enough to then move on to the next one. And it was actually sometimes I felt like a bid for connection, even, because we’re in the store and we can kind of be in our heads and it’s a little bit busy, but it’s like, we would connect over these different toys and talk about them, so that was enough to move on.
But if it wasn’t, we would do, like you were saying, put it on the list and let’s check different places as soon as we get home, because sometimes we can get a better price than we can at the grocery store or at Target. And if birthdays or holidays were coming soon, then that might be an option. And if not, then we talk about, okay, how can we bring some extra money in? What are other options that we have? Sometimes we’d realize that we did, right now, we needed it, like this was something we needed and that we could make adjustments elsewhere. But those were conversations that were again, just kind of open and curious, how can we get through this?
And it was another reminder for me that I didn’t have to have all the answers, that things come into their life from a lot of different sources and we’re good at finding used items or big sales or someone that’s getting rid of something that they’re interested in. The key piece was that they trusted that I heard them and that I knew how important it was, and that we would find a way. There was never a doubt about that with them. They knew that if this was something they wanted, we would keep cracking at it until we could figure it out, even if we couldn’t get to it that first time.
And I feel like that’s really how we cultivated that yes energy. It just boiled down to that trusting that all of our needs and desires were valid and we would put them into the context of our life in that moment and we would figure it out together.
But this leads me to some thoughts that bubbled up since the last podcast about this, and it’s related to context and understanding our own needs, and I think it’s an important piece of this puzzle. So, I do want to dive off to the side just a little bit here.
I’ve found that children naturally know how to advocate for their needs. The infant who cries when they’re hungry and needs a diaper change, the toddler who wants the blue cup, they just know. But if a child is systemically overridden and told their needs or desires are wrong or not important, they disconnect from those cues. It becomes about pleasing the people around them, especially when the people hold the keys to survival.
So, this can play out a couple of ways as adults. Because their needs have been repressed, they can lose touch with what their needs are. They can feel the distress and know something doesn’t feel right and it can even cause them to be snappy or grumpy, but they don’t really know why. They feel put upon, but they don’t know how to access what their actual need is or how to articulate it.
And so, this may continue along the path of people pleasing, not understanding their needs. And so, they’re never even brought into the equation of these conversations at the store or these other pieces. Or they may stumble upon that boundary language that we’ve talked about before and it just feels really appealing. Like, I just want this feeling of uncomfortable to stop. And I’m going to throw up a hard boundary. But the thing is, setting a hard boundary isn’t actually being in tune with our feelings. You don’t dig into the why of it. Why is it rubbing? What is the underlying need here?
And it’s hard, because if we’ve been told that our needs aren’t valid our whole lives, how do we start to tune into them? And that’s why we talk so much about self-awareness. Being able to identify and articulate our needs and feelings is so important. And I think if you come into unschooling without a handle on your own needs, and you’re faced with a child who is quite clear, the pendulum can swing to the side of not getting your needs met and it only being about the child, and you’re following this, just say yes idea without any context or putting your own needs into the equation.
And honestly, it’s just a disservice to you both and to the whole process. Children want to understand the world and they want to be given information. So, as you develop self-awareness, you can articulate your needs and you can deepen the conversations about the context. Conversation and collaboration just becomes kind of the MO, like I was talking about before. That’s just the trust. We trust that we are capable of stating our needs and working towards a solution. Children are capable of understanding more context than we give them credit for. But it comes from that environment where we’re all doing that, that’s where that trust develops that, okay, if mom’s saying this doesn’t work right now, I know she’s going to hear me and I can hear her.
And cultivating a yes environment that actually feels good to everyone is contingent upon understanding and being able to articulate our needs. And we don’t have to do that perfectly. There’s always going to be growth and fine tuning, but for it to be sustainable, all parties need to be heard. So, I feel like some of these factors come into play when people are grappling with the Just Say Yes idea. And when we get the feedback that it’s not working, or these conversations aren’t working, and something’s not happening that way for them at the store or in these other pieces. So, I think digging into that a bit can open up some areas that possibly need healing or development. And we can learn those things alongside our children, because as so often, they do lead the way when it comes to this. And so, I just wanted to put that in there as people are grappling with this idea of just say yes and how it’s working in their families.
So, Erika, what did you think?
ERIKA: I am so excited to dive more deeply into this idea. My mind has been coming back to it again and again as things are coming up for me at home and as I’m hearing stories from people on the network.
And first, that yes energy that you were describing, Pam, has worked so well for me and my kids. They really just want someone to be excited with them and to understand what they’re interested in, to imagine all of the possibilities with them.
Oliver used to like watching YouTube videos of Lego sets and minifigures that he didn’t have and that met a need for him. We did print out pictures of minifigures he loved and he has a binder full of them. But, for me, understanding his excitement and bringing yes energy meant not just saying no to that expensive, discontinued minifigure, but getting excited with him and putting the most important items on his wish list and looking up all the details and finding pictures. And it’s just so much more fun to connect from that place rather than the place of, that’s too expensive. Forget it.
I don’t want to shut down my kids’ creativity, and their excitement, and their ideas, their interests with no energy. And sometimes it happens. I mean, the context of the moment sometimes includes me being overwhelmed or maybe having an intense hormonal time. But I can try to remind myself of that good feeling that comes from just connecting with them about what excites them and letting my eyes light up when they tell me about what they want rather than trying to shut it down. It just makes such a big difference.
And then, Anna, what you were mentioning about being clear about our needs as adults and those valuable conversations that can happen, I just think that’s so, so important. It’s exactly that pendulum swing to, I’m meeting all of the kids’ needs with no thought of my own needs, and that can get us into so much trouble. I see this happen more with my husband, Josh, with my kids, because he’ll definitely push through his feelings at times, because the kids are so clear about what they want. And he just doesn’t want to have an argument. So, I try to notice when he really is pushing through his own tiredness or if he’s not in a good mood or whatever it is, and I see him pushing through, trying to meet all of their needs regardless. And I try to help, have a conversation between the kids and him to help him communicate his needs.
And I try to keep that idea that we’re all on the same team at the forefront of that, because we may have conflicting needs at times, but we can figure out what to do. We don’t need to be adversaries in order to meet our different needs. It’s like the abundance mindset. There’s plenty of time, there’s plenty of resources. Even when things are hard, there’s plenty of possibilities and we can problem-solve together.
But I had one other aspect of this that I wanted to bring up, just because I couldn’t believe how perfect it was. So, in the Network this month, we’re talking about kindness and compassion, and in our book club, we’re reading the book, Radical Compassion by Tara Brach. And in one of the first chapters, Tara talks about saying yes to our feelings and to our current situation as a way to show compassion to ourselves and to move through difficult moments. And I just thought it was an amazing connection to what we’re talking about here.
Bringing the energy of yes to myself and my feelings and my experiences means that I’m not judging myself when I’m having a hard time, which I can tend to do. If I have that yes energy, I’m not shutting down in the face of difficulties. I’m encouraging myself to stay present, to stay open and curious, to accept things as they are as the way of moving towards what would feel better. And when I’ve practiced saying yes, since reading these chapters, I’ve noticed the physical feeling of that. The tension around my heart feels like it relaxes. My body feels less contracted. My mind feels clearer and more spacious. I feel more loving towards myself when I’m not saying no to my feelings and trying to shut my feelings down. And so, for me, this, yes, energy is like, even more helpful than I had even realized. It’s so helpful in so many areas.
I can give yes energy to my interactions with my loved ones, even difficult interactions when they’re having a hard time. I can give that kind of same energy to myself when I’m having a hard time. Even just thinking the word yes in a hard moment can bring some lightness into that moment.
ANNA: Ooh. I love that!
PAM: Bringing the yes energy into feelings and emotions. It’s not all about, I want to buy the thing or I want to do that thing, right. It’s also, I’m feeling this thing. Yes, you are feeling this thing, or yes, I’m feeling this thing, and just acknowledging that. Oh yes, the lightness that comes with it, even if we don’t know the next place we want to go with that. Just like, oh, I don’t have to fight it. I don’t have to resist it. This is how I’m feeling in this moment. And when we’re not resisting it, we’re not telling ourselves no, which is the, shut it down, I don’t want to have this conversation, I don’t want to have this feeling, when we shut that down, we don’t learn more about ourselves. Like that open and curious that you were talking about, it’s like, oh, there are possibilities to move through this. This isn’t an end point.
And I think sometimes with feelings, for me anyway, that resistance is there, because I cannot see a possibility where I would go next with it. So, I’m stopping it here. So, when I can say, yes, you’re feeling this, or, yes, this is hard, that encourages me to take the next step to be kind and compassionate to myself. And it’s like, okay, what do things look like from here? It’s okay.
ANNA: Right. And that’s cultivating that trust and yes energy for all of it, for the whole situation, for the whole family, that we can have these feelings and we’re going to look at the context when things come up. And that, if you’re having a big feeling about this, that’s okay. We’re going to figure out space for that. And again, it may be about, figuring out how to get to the moon or do the thing or whatever, but it is just creating this environment of like, it’s okay. We’re all in this together and we’re going to figure it out. So, that’s the yes piece to me, that team piece, that, we’re in this together, piece.
PAM: I really loved your point too, Anna. I know for me it was so much of learning about myself alongside processing this with my kids. I definitely did that swing, like, it makes so much sense to say yes because they’re learning and all these things and I don’t want to negatively, control, et cetera. And I didn’t have words to bring my discomfort into the conversation. So, it was just like, okay, yes! Which, I mean, it felt good. But it builds up over time. That’s the whole pendulum swing. You can get to burnout or just to overwhelm from saying lots of yeses that really are just about the yes, not about the context of the conversation. So, it’s not to shame anyone who is in that spot, because so many times we have been in that spot.
But it is a great clue or a great reason, motivation, to start understanding ourselves. It’s like, oh, now why is this rubbing? Why am I feeling more involved in this moment? And it’s also watching and seeing how all those yeses unfold, because sometimes it is completely and utterly amazing and sometimes things go sideways. I’m gaining more experience with things that I’d never had experience with before, because I had not said yes this often. And it wasn’t even that I was taking my needs into account per se. It was like, ugh, I’m too tired. No. Or that’d be too messy. No. Not digging into like, how tired am I? Is tired a factor in this moment?
ANNA: But that’s the boundary piece, right? You’re like, it’s too messy. No. But you’re not digging into what’s the underlying need there? Okay. So, is it too messy? Maybe it is in this room, but maybe it’s not over here. You’re stopping the conversation with those, I’m too tired, it’s too messy. No.
PAM: Yeah. Because at that point I couldn’t bring anything else. I didn’t think to dig deeper to find those underlying needs so that I could then bring those and be creative. It’s like, oh, I don’t want a mess in the kitchen, because I’m just about to start dinner. But if I had dug deep enough, it’s like, oh, can we do that in the basement? Can we do that outside? All those other pieces. We can be so much more creative when we really understand ourselves. That self awareness piece is so valuable to bring all these yes conversations.
Anything else anybody wants to add? We can go on with this forever. And everybody, you can bring your pieces of the conversation, too. Comment on Instagram or on YouTube or on the website. We are very happy to continue this conversation, because having had time to think about it for a couple more reasons, I like having this second follow up episode. We’re going to be able to bring so many more pieces that bubble up to us over time. So, I am really enjoying this.
ANNA: Yes, I think it’s great. And like Erika said, it just seems like since our last talk, it keeps bubbling up in all these places and we hear it on the Network and we hear it in these other realms. So, I was so glad she brought those pieces in.
PAM: Yeah, no, that was perfect. And being able to say yes to ourselves, even to feelings before we get to the doing and the things, et cetera, like being able to meet ourselves there. That’s brilliant, too. All right. Thank you so much for joining me today, both of you. I really appreciate it. Have a wonderful day.
ANNA: Take care.
ERIKA: My internet was acting up when we recorded this call, so I just wanted to take a moment to add something else that bubbled up for me about this Yes Energy. What came to mind is the idea of both/and. I think if I’m stuck in a spot of either always saying yes or in the opposite place, seeing myself as a gatekeeper and doling out yeses and nos, lots of no’s, then I’m missing the nuance. I’m in a place of either/or, instead of both/and.
And so, I think Yes Energy can also be about accepting and acknowledging the complexity of situations and people and feelings. Maybe it’s a child who wants to go to the park but also seems to not want to go to the park. Or maybe part of me is excited about the possibility of my child’s activity of choice and another part of me has a lot of fears and concerns. In a more mainstream paradigm, I may be putting pressure on myself and my kids to have the one answer, to make the one right decision. But in real life with real emotions and real context, it can be both/and. There is more space to feel all of the different feelings that come up and to brainstorm with that open and curious mindset all of the possibilities of our next steps.
So, I just think that focus on Yes Energy can help us not rush into decisions and not try to shove everything into this yes/no, right/wrong, do it this way/don’t do it at all kind of place. We can say yes to all of our feelings as well as our children’s and create this environment of openness, curiosity, and problem solving as a team.
This topic has been so much fun to dive into for me personally and I just can’t wait for the next one. Take care, everyone!
EU336: On the Journey with Josh Ellis
Nov 10, 2022
This week, we are excited to share our first episode in our new On the Journey series!
Anna, Erika, and I are excited to bring guests on the podcast to share their experiences. We’ll be talking about paradigm shifts, a-ha moments, challenges they’ve faced, and realizations they’ve made on their unschooling journey.
In this episode, Erika’s husband Josh Ellis is joining us to talk about his path to unschooling, which he realized started when he was in school himself. He also shares how he’s been able to weave unschooling principles into his work as a college professor in the field of film production. We dive into many common themes, including “kids are capable,” deschooling, and connection. Josh’s enthusiasm for his work and his family life shine through in this fun conversation!
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from livingjoyfully.ca and today, Anna, Erika, and I are excited to speak with Josh Ellis. Welcome, Josh!
JOSH: Hello.
ANNA: Hello.
PAM: So, to get us started, I was hoping you can give us just a bit of introduction to you and your family.
JOSH: Okay. So yes, my name’s Josh. I’m married to Erika.
ERIKA: Hi.
JOSH: We met in film school, in graduate film school, in Tallahassee, Florida. I’m actually from Seattle, so I originally started off in that corner. And then in graduate school, we met, but we weren’t together until we moved out to Los Angeles, and then we became a couple in LA. And then, several years later had started to have children. So, a couple years after our oldest Oliver was born, we started to just think about what his future was going to look like in school and that kind of thing. And of course, we had gone to tons of school, all the way through grad school. Erika even did extra. She was going to get extra education, training, all this stuff.
And so, school was a part of our decades of life at that point. But then, just started to think about, listening to him, and watching him and being observant and thinking, I don’t know if school makes sense for the way that he is, which was, I think, kind of a leap for us anyways. Looking back, kudos to us for even acknowledging that, but it kind of hit us pretty simultaneously. And then Erika, as she usually does, did an incredible deep dive into just looking up everything and anything, articles and blogs and books and the whole thing. And then I would kind of get like the cream off the top and be like, Okay, read these five things and then talk about it.
And that kind of transitioned to maybe homeschooling to maybe project-based learning to unschooling, what does that mean? And kind of getting to that point. And obviously now we’re fully into that type of mentality, not just in kids, but just in life in general. And it feels excellent. It feels perfect.
But in terms of where we’re at right now, I mean the kids are so into many things, kind of like us. We’re into a million things, too. I know that I’ve always been into movies and video games pretty much since I can remember. And so, probably just upon demonstrating that some of that probably just wore off on the kids to some degree anyway, so they’re being exposed to it constantly.
So, Oliver really likes Legos and he really likes video games and he likes Lego video games and just starting today, we’re start getting into holiday movies again. We all really like holiday movies. We’ll watch Home Alone on repeat for the next couple months. But all four of us love that. And so, that’s something that we’ve always bonded with. Some movies are part of our lives as well and it’s a big part of my life, because that’s what I do professionally. And he plays lots of Roblox with his friends and that kind of stuff, too. Swimming is a big thing for Oliver, too, as well as Maya. Maya really likes swimming a lot, as much as possible. It’s so hot now. It’s kind of like, I almost don’t want to go outside, because it’s so hot. But this is probably the perfect time to go swimming, so we probably should get out there again very soon.
Maya likes anime. There’s a lot of anime shows that she’s really into, and I’ve never really been into that, but now I’m like, I will do anything with you, because I want to watch things with you. I want to listen to things. And so, now I’m kind of getting into that stuff, too. It’s kind of fun. Like Demon Slayer, and My Hero Academia, a bunch of these different anime shows are really interesting. And then she’s really into animals, always been a big part of her life. She has a couple video games where you design zoos, which she calls animal sanctuaries, but that’s kind of a big thing for her.
We’ve recently got a dog, a long-term dog as part of our family now. And so, taking him for a walk is a big part of her daily routine, and that’s a big thing that she’s always wanted to do. So, I try to do that with her as much as possible. I don’t know. That’s kind of a snapshot of what we’re doing day-to-day now, I guess.
PAM: You know, one thing that really jumped up for me that I love, Josh, is that shift from engaging with our kids and their interests because we want to hang out with our kids and learn more about our kids and see it through their eyes, rather than, “Oh, I don’t like those kind of shows, so you go watch that. I’ll go do my thing over here until we find the thing that we like together.” As you said, like holiday movies, like there are things that we enjoy together as a family, but we’re also unique individuals, too. And there are things that we like as a person.
Then when we can set that aside and choose to join them because we’re interested in them, so it’s not so much about the show, it’s more about them. It’s more about connecting with them. It’s more about having shared language like that we can understand when they’re sharing the next cool plot twists that happens two weeks from now or whatever. But we learn so much more about them, which makes our life just feel, for me anyway, just so much richer, because there are so many things bubbling up in it. Individual things and shared things as well, right?
JOSH: Absolutely. And I kind of have a standing rule for myself that if a kid wants to watch anything, I’m going to watch it with them. I think that I just kind of announced that to the world. And it kind of goes together with I’ve heard on the podcast a few times about trying to say yes as much as possible and trying to listen as much as possible. I think it kind of falls into that category and I kind of buy into that a lot.
But I also just want to expose myself to other content, too, so why not expose myself to things that they’re really interested in.
PAM: I have learned about so many things that I have ended up being interested in.
JOSH: Oh, totally. Yeah, absolutely.
PAM: So much of the world. We say it all the time, that our lives feel so much richer. Things I wouldn’t have gone to or looked at without them being interested in them first. But like, yeah, there’s still music that I listen to from when my kids were interested in it.
JOSH: So many kinds of music. Absolutely.
PAM: Even now, I’m diving into video games much more just because that interest has been bubbling through our days for so long. But anyway, yes, it’s beautiful.
ERIKA: I was just thinking, it’s so interesting, because I think that was one of the things I hadn’t really realized going into parenting, like how different they were going to end up being from the two of us even. It was like, but we’re going into this with so many interests, between the two of us, and so much excitement about life, and we do so many things. And yet, here they are with even more things and different things and just a completely different way of being in the world. And so, yeah, if you’re open to that, I feel like I learn so much from them.
ANNA: I was going to say, too, that I think, being our scanner personality that likes to learn all the things, that was how it was for us, too. It was just like, ah, they’re bringing in all these things I hadn’t even thought of. And I want to learn all about it. I love that.
PAM: Yeah, and because we want to lean into connection with our kids, it gives us so many more pieces, so many more threads that we can connect through. Like, holiday movies really only become a thing for a couple of months a year. There are seasons for interests, too, which reminds me, so when we see an interest, an interest of our child’s might have a season. It might come in, peak, and it might be two months, six months, two weeks, whatever. But when we, as you said, Josh, choose to engage with them around it, choose to watch the new thing that they’re watching, and we learn that little piece.
And then like six months, a year down the road when something else comes up, we can see the threads and the connections looking back, which just helps us better understand how unschooling works, how human beings learn. That wasn’t like a start and stop, and I’m never going to think about that again. It may have waned, but it bubbles up in different ways moving forward.
So, it really helps us understand the richness and the form of how human beings like to learn, Doesn’t it?
JOSH: Right. Because you never know what information you need at any given time. There’s no way to pre-plan that. You just have to stumble into it. And then if it gets lodged into your brain somewhere and becomes significant later, then great. You can file it back and you’re like, Whoa, that really is now really important information that I have, and I can build on that or save it for later.
PAM: And it helps us choose new things to bring into their lives that, that they might find interesting, too, just because we have a little bit more experience, a little bit more perspective of what’s out there.
If we have two or three dots along the way and we say, ooh, that looks like it might be leading in this direction, without expectation, we can bring in some new things that they may find super, super interesting too.
ANNA: This might be a tiny tangent, but it reminds me of Oliver’s piece with LEGOs, like how that has changed, from him wanting you to make them to now he’s into this piece, and so I love how you all have kind of fostered that environment for him to explore in a way that works for him at the different stages of it.
ERIKA: Yeah. At the beginning, he wanted me to do all the building and was only interested in building minifigures. And then, lately he has come to me and said, “You know what I love about LEGO sets is building them all by myself.” And I was like, really? This is new!
JOSH: Alone in a room. Don’t talk to me. I’m doing this LEGO set. Right.
ERIKA: And then just feeling so proud about it. But he had not been interested before, so it’s his own path through even something like that, that seems like, well, isn’t this just how you do LEGOs? Not necessarily.
JOSH: If you really go back, too, it started with just LEGO heads.
ERIKA: The helmets.
JOSH: And helmets. It was so specific. And then it slowly transitioned into minifigures and then Star Wars characters, and then obviously full sets now. It’s really amazing.
ERIKA: It’s fun.
PAM: What I love about that story is how meaningful that is to Oliver and how, as part of the shift to unschooling, how we can think, okay, this is the LEGO set we’re giving to them, and LEGOs are all about building. We can get stuck on encouraging them to build it themselves and like, oh my gosh, why do you even like LEGO if you don’t want to build it? We can tell ourselves so many stories in our head about it and feel like we should be pushing and encouraging our kid to do the thing. But if we can give it that space to unfold in the way it makes sense to them, oh my gosh. It can be very different than typical, but it is so beautiful and it so beautifully, uniquely speaks to who they are as a person too, doesn’t it?
ERIKA: Yeah. I’m thinking about how hard it is sometimes to buy the $120 LEGO set when he only wants this guy in it, you know. And so, yeah, the building is a fun new component to this .
PAM: Oh, I love that. Okay. You mentioned a little bit, Josh, about how you guys first were like, oh, I don’t know if school’s going to work for Oliver. How that question started just started to bubble up. So, I was hoping you can share a little bit more about your early journey of how you got to unschooling and what the deschooling or getting used to it or understanding how it works more, what that looked like for you.
JOSH: Right. So, again, it just started with the question of what would be best? Does this make sense for us? And obviously, part of the equation too, LA is always interesting, because people start freaking out really early, like at preschool, kindergarten of like, you have to get in a list like four years in advance. So, what school do you want them to go in five years from now? And it’s like, I don’t know who he’s going to be like in five years. Like, how do I even think about that? And so, that started us down this path of thinking about how he’s going to grow as a person and what does he do? And then that means you have to listen to them and observe them more and those kinds of things.
And it started to all kind of gel into, school is not what makes sense right now for that person and that brain.
And so, then as we started to think about these other topics, when we eventually did come to unschooling and once I started to know what that definition was and what that was about, then you start to compare it to your history, like my history, especially since we had so much school. And then, one thing that really was kind of shocking to me is that I was rethinking my experience in middle school. That is when you started to get lots and lots of homework, like you’d start getting piled up more and more. So, it’s like six, seven hours at school and then like a couple more hours at home. Yeah. So, it’s like 10 hours a day of like school. It’s like crazy.
And I just had this epiphany in middle school and I was like, you know what? No more homework. I have made the decision that I will do homework at school during other classes. I will just figure out a way to get it done, maybe even lunch, whatever. When I go home, that’s my time. I get to do whatever it is, it’s reading, it’s playing with friends, it’s playing video games, whatever it was.
I made that decision early and I did it all the way through high school. I never did any homework and I still did good enough in school that like people left me alone. I wasn’t getting terrible grades. I figured out enough to play within the system that I could still do what I wanted, which for me meant kind of ignoring counselors saying, oh, you have to take these college prep classes. And I’d be like, you know what? I want to take two gym classes, or I’m going to take the extra Home Ec class. And they’re like, you don’t need that! And I was like, well, that’s what I want to take. And luckily, I got support of my parents saying, if that’s what you want to take, then you should take that. And so, it was great.
So, somehow, I stumbled into college and I had good enough grades out of high school to get into a college. But then, in college it’s also like, this is the curriculum for this degree. You have to take these classes and half the classes, I’m like, I don’t want to take those classes. And then again, I was lucky enough in college that I was at a college that allows you to make your own degree. And so, I would pick and choose, like, these are the classes that I’m interested in. And Erika always teases me, you kind of minored in sports, because I liked taking those classes. I took volleyball and I’d take advanced photography. Those are the classes that I wanted to take. And so, I kind of invented a degree.
So, all along this time, I’m like, you know what? I was kind of in charge of my own learning from the beginning, because I just kind of did it. And is there a way we can give our children and at that time, my son, an opportunity to do those things, too, without having to like fight against the machine that is school and all the stuff that’s part of that? And unschooling was like, well there it is. I mean, that’s clearly what that is.
And so, it wasn’t until I chose to go to graduate film school where I was like, okay, everything they’re saying is what I need to hear right now, so I’m going all in on it. And it was totally different than me having to take a bunch of gen ed classes for things that I had no interest in, a bunch of math and history classes that maybe at some point in my life I’d be fascinated by, but at that time I’m like, I can’t even hear what you’re saying right now. I’m thinking about this other thing that I want to do.
But film school fit for me. And so, now, I want to give the students that I’m with on a day-to-day basis the opportunity that I had by discovering that passion and that love to do that in my day-to-day job now. But again, it came from this like lightning strike of like, I’ve been living my life like this anyways, I just didn’t know how to describe it. And so, it really made a lot of sense when we started to explain to each other what that meant to us.
PAM: Wow. I love that story. That’s a little bit rare. And, as you said, you know, your parents said, oh, if that’s what you want to take, that’s what you take.
JOSH: Yeah, they were very supportive. That was great.
PAM: Yeah. That’s awesome. That’s awesome.
ANNA: I think what I love about that story that I want to highlight for everybody is that, so in middle school, you’re what, 12? 11-ish?
JOSH: Yeah. About that.
ANNA: Yeah, and look at the agency and autonomy that he wanted. That is what all our children want. All our children have that ability to know what they want and to have agency and want to do things that interest them. And yet, they’re shoved into this machine that doesn’t allow that. And so, I just love that reminder. So, now we have this adult that’s reflecting back like, yeah, I knew what I wanted to do. And it wasn’t that.
PAM: We talk so much about how children are capable at young ages of knowing and doing and understanding so much more than we often give them credit for conventionally. So, that is a shiny example of that.
JOSH: And one thing that comes up a lot is, people will, especially during deschooling and stuff like that, is think kids will veg out and watch videos or movies or TV or whatever it is, you know, that they see it as something that’s maybe a negative. But then I could think about my experiences and I used to watch movies on repeat for just days, like staying up all night and I didn’t know why I was. I mean, when you’re doing it, you don’t know why, and then 10 years later I was like, I was studying those movies. I was trying to figure out how this movie was made. I didn’t know, as I watched Terminator 2 for the 45th time why, but I was tearing it apart in my head and I was studying it.
And so, at some point, when people are watching content, especially on repeat, there’s something in there that they’re trying to get out of it, and they probably can’t even put it into words, especially when you’re younger. You’re just drawn to it like a magnet. And so, if you need it, then they should do that. That’s great.
PAM: Yeah. I love that. That is such a great point, too. Even for ourselves, sometimes as we’re starting to do something or we’re pulled, we want to do something, it is hard to explain exactly why. I want to.
JOSH: Right!
PAM: And it feels like we need to justify it as adults, but then kids need to justify it to their parents. You’ve watched this like 10 times. Let’s put something else on, or whatever. Because those messages of being productive and being able to show your work right now are so strong, aren’t they? Oh, I love that.
ANNA: Or that things have to be such a linear path. And it’s like, even while in some ways your path was linear, because now you’re so into film, it was specific aspects of it. And so, for another child, it might be the music or the art or the way they’re putting the comedy together or the way all those pieces, and it’s like, it’s not this linear path. It’s like we always talk about it, it’s the web, it’s the threads that then lead us down the road to have this information that we need for this next thing we want to do.
JOSH: Right. But just, you need the time and the opportunity to explore it. You just, you’ve got to have it.
PAM: That’s what I was thinking. Goosebumps. That is one of the things I love most about unschooling is the space and the support, like your parents, Josh, not stopping you from making these choices, to follow our interests as in what we’re drawn to. We don’t need to name it. They don’t need to be to name it. We don’t have to explain it to other people. None of those things. But the space for our kids and eventually ourselves, too, to just follow where we’re being pulled, is so valuable.
It’s so rich, because, like you were saying earlier, Josh, we don’t know where it may go, and Anna, we don’t know what piece yet might connect with something. But like you said, like something sticks and that thing may bubble up in another context like, like a film degree later on, but without the expectation, which is why, again, back to what we were talking about right at the very beginning of connecting with our kids and seeing the things that they’re interested in in the different seasons, in various moments, just so we understand them better. It doesn’t mean we can explain. It doesn’t mean we have an answer to anything. But we see another one of the seeds and then another one of the seeds. And then how they begin to thread together over time.
I remember there were fun times when my kids were interested in something and I said, oh, hey, you remember like a year ago when you were doing this thing? How similar is that? And we would just have big smiles and fun conversation about it, but just to see it’s like, ooh, this is me. It helps them feel seen and heard. When we can put those pieces together. It gives a little bit more meaning to those pieces when they aren’t disparate little things. When we start to see the patterns, it’s like, oh yeah. I’m moving in a direction that’s really about me, even if I can’t define it.
JOSH: And especially when everyone’s happy, you know it’s working. You’re not fighting against something at this point, just because you’re getting the time and the space to be who you are. And especially when you’re younger, you’re still figuring that out. I mean, we’re still figuring that out, but I mean, especially when you’re younger, you have no idea and you couldn’t put into words if someone asked you of course. And so, you just need the time.
And so, again, you still have to have to fight instincts and so, like, I’m going to bed and it’s late and I’ll mention to the kids maybe like, oh, it’s getting late or whatever. But she’ll be in the zone playing a video game of doing her zoo thing and it’s like, I’m not going to mess with that. Because she has no interest in stopping. Why fight that? Like, get out of the way. Do you need anything? Do you need some water? Whatever. And just let her stay in that space that she needs, because maybe she’s going to have this big moment that’s going to have an impact, or not. I don’t know. But I shouldn’t get in the way.
PAM: I love that. Not getting in the way of it. That’s a big thing, too, because we can bring so much of our adult framework on top of it. Like you said, she’s in it right now. It doesn’t really matter what the time on the clock is, especially now. They can sleep as long as they want and whenever they want or need to. There are so many things that seem like, oh, we have to do this, we have to do this, we have to do this, but if we take a moment and just think about it, it’s like, Oh, well, nope, maybe they don’t have to. Maybe they can just continue doing.
JOSH: There’s infinite ways to tackle any issue. And so, yeah, it’s part of just also just learning to be a problem solver in general. Never too soon to start practicing that.
PAM: So, you alluded to this a little bit earlier and I’d like to dig into it. As a professor, how do you find unschooling principles weaving into your work nowadays?
JOSH: Yeah. So, it was kind of at the same time where I started teaching that we were also learning about all this. And so, that was kind of interesting. So, when I started teaching for the first time, you first start with what you know, which is, this is what I’ve experienced. You kind of regurgitate in another way, or this is how someone else says to do it. Great. I just need to do something.
And so, a lot of that was the formula you think of, like quizzing and testing and the kind of stuff you think about when you think of school.
So, as soon as I started to think about reevaluating it, I was like, well, that’s gone. Like, that’s not about the individual. That’s about the test, not the person. But what can I replace it with that’s going to be helpful to the students? And this is still ongoing, this is still me trying to figure out a way to do the best possible. But I think recently, and I was just talking to Erika about this, it was about creating as many opportunities to have one-on-one conversations with students when it’s a good time to talk to them.
So, for instance, I do film production, so it’s a lot of on-set production. They’re on set, talking to actors, working with equipment, doing that thing. So, it’s observing them to know when to stay out of the way, because you’re like, I should not jump in right now. I’m going to ruin something. They’re figuring it out themselves or they’re helping each other. That’s awesome. Like just watch or maybe even don’t even be there, because sometimes my just being there messes it up, because they’re looking over their shoulder to be like, is this right? That kind of thing.
So, it’s trying to find that cadence of when do they need me? And then being available when they need to have a conversation, to get them out of a bind, or they’re lost, or they just need to hear encouragement or whatever it is, which is listening, which is exhausting, honestly. And it’s kind of the opposite of, again, traditional school, which is like, sit down, shut up, and here’s some stuff, and then in a week we’re going to quiz you on it.
But now it’s like, I have to listen to them, their needs, their wants, what they’re trying to achieve with their projects. And then see if there’s any way that I can be helpful and if not, get out of there, but always being available, which again, it’s just, it’s a lot of energy.
And so, then coming home and trying to do the same for your kids, too, is also hard, because I don’t want to shut it off. When they come in and they’re like, I want to tell you about this new show! I can’t be like, I can’t listen to it right now. It’s like, okay, give it to me, tell me more stuff. But it’s just trying to be okay with that and like, that’s what I needed. That’s what they need. That’s what my students need. And so, trying to give everyone that space, but then obviously knowing that I need to make time for myself, my own brain to reset as well.
But you find those opportunities and as you get older you figure out a way for you to make your own systems to do that. And for me, it’s been getting up really early or going outside or whatever it is, and kind of reset. And you figure that out. But I think, in school in particular, it’s figuring out ways to talk to them in smaller groups as much as possible and giving them opportunities to teach each other as much as possible. And knowing when to just stop talking. And that’s hard, because as a teacher, you’re taught that that’s your primary role. But now I see my primary role is to watch and know when it’s time to talk. And sometimes there is, or sometimes it’ll be like, okay. You guys need this info. Here it is. I’m going to try to make it as efficient and as clean and as fun as possible and get out of the way again.
And that’s been a big part from learning about unschooled principles.
PAM: Wow. That really, just imagining a room full of students and the energy. Yeah, no joke. The energy that that takes to be just feeling it out, feeling your way through it, being in the moment to get a sense of where they are and when it would be helpful to step in, pull back, how much to share. That takes a lot. But I can imagine what a huge difference it makes to the students themselves in that course. They must just feel so engaged and have such agency, even within the confines of a class or a course, right?
ERIKA: One thing I’ve noticed a lot is, he’ll tell stories of when the students first come. So, a lot of them are fresh out of high school. They get into these college classes, and so, they have that attitude of, what do I need to know? What do I need to know for the test? What do I need to do in order to pass this? And really, really focused on that. And then, he just will turn it around and be like, what do you want to do? What do you want to learn? What’s important to you? And they’re just like, mind blown, like a little confused.
But yeah, each person, even in the same program, has different goals and different interests and you know, like in a film program there’s so many different areas that you could be interested in. And so, it’s like Josh’s job to figure out, what does this person want to get out of this program and it’s a lot of individual tailoring.
ANNA: Right. So, two things came to mind for me. One, just because I have some inside knowledge, like how well loved he is, as everyone can imagine. His students think he’s amazing and the endowed chair and all the things that he’s done. And so, I had to do it, Josh! He’s bringing his passion to this position and it’s working, for him, for the students, for the school. And so, I think it’s just a really good reminder of like, we don’t have to box ourselves in, in the way that it’s always been done. We can succeed and have this life that we love by really finding our core principles and by living those core principles.
But then the other piece that popped out, we talk about it from a parents’ point of view, or I talk about it specifically, like I didn’t want to have the conflicts. So, for me, it was worth doing the work of, collaborating and whatever, because it just feels better. But I feel like it’s probably the same for you too, Josh, like yeah, you could give them tests and do, and maybe there would be some things that would be easier about just handing them and they regurgitate it. But it’s like, for you, I think it’s got to be so much more energizing and fun to have this collaborative relationship. And so, I love that piece of it, too.
JOSH: Yeah, absolutely. Because I think one of the things I kind of miss from working in film production like professionally and not teaching, is that it’s purely collaborative. It’s high energy. It’s all these leaders together creating new works. School is kind of not for that, but I can create that environment in my classes and so, I can still be in that every day. So, I kind of get to do my first and second loves simultaneously. It’s perfect. And so, I’m very lucky in that regard.
PAM: I think that’s such a great point, too, that we can bring our full selves, as you were saying, Anna, we don’t have to say, oh, this is the school framework, this is the way it goes. I need to kind of shut down those other pieces of me to just do this thing the way it’s expected to be done. Yet, when we can bring our full selves, yes, it takes a lot of energy, but it’s in service of something that I love and enjoy and I get to feel fulfilled. Is that the way you feel? I’m sure exhausted and all those pieces, but it also seems like it would be fulfilling, like you said, to cultivate that environment that you enjoy, so that they can experience an environment that is more similar to when they go out in the world to do that work.
JOSH: Yeah. And I think, demonstrating the joy of what you do is important, too. Because especially, what I’m training them for and what they’re doing at school, this career is crazy, right? It’s very entrepreneurial. You’re very independent contractor-y. You’re on your own in a way. And when you finally get on a show, you’re working like 80, 90-hour weeks. It’s crazy.
And if you don’t absolutely love it, you’re going to be miserable. So, I’m trying to show, the enthusiasm I have right now, we need to be at that. And so, I’m not going to tell them that, but I’m going to demonstrate it, because if you’re not at that level, you’re going to burn out in like a couple years. You’re never going to make it. It’s just too intense.
PAM: Yes. I’m just thinking about Michael and yes, the film sets are just intense, long hours and unexpected. Show up tomorrow, 6:00 AM, let’s go. It’s fascinating. It’s a world unto itself, and yet to be able to just demonstrate, show them with your enthusiasm, that that’s kind of the level of love, like if you don’t love it this much, then you have to try something else. If this just feels like, ugh.
Because that’s it, especially if they’re fresh out of high school, it may not be, but what you’re giving them is an experience that helps them see if this really is a good match for them.
JOSH: Right. And for some people, like I’m teaching them how to make movies, like that’s what we’re there to learn about. But then after taking a semester or two, they might realize, you know what? I just wanted to get better at making webcam videos. And that’s fine. But they discovered that by being around things. And so, if I can help that, that’s fantastic. I’ve had lots of those conversations of like, actually I’m thinking about this other thing, but it’s still related to media in some way, which is why I was drawn to this as a word, because some counselor said the word film and I ended up in your class. And we do also have people that become directors and cinematographers and that thing, too. We have all of those, but again, it just becomes listening to them and trying to help them as much as I can if they need it.
PAM: That’s so beautiful. So beautiful. Thank you so much for taking the time to join us, Josh. I really appreciate you sharing your thoughts and your experience. It was so interesting to hear.
JOSH: Yeah, it was great. I listen to these all the time, so it’s funny to be on the other side.
ANNA: We’re glad to have you.
PAM: Thanks so much, Josh. We very much appreciate it. Have a wonderful day.
ERIKA: You, too.
JOSH: Thank you. Bye.
EU335: Unschooling “Rules”: Always Say Yes
Oct 27, 2022
This week, I’m excited to share our first episode in the Unschooling “Rules” series!
We use the word “rules,” in quotes, to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing as an unschooling rule! It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new, but we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade—or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
In this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” to say yes to your kids. We explore why people may find themselves trying to always say yes as part of the paradigm shift to unschooling. And we also talk about how always saying yes can lead to frustration, disconnection, and resentment. I share one of my guiding questions, “Why not yes?” and we dive into a few examples of how conversations about context and a focus on working together to meet everyone’s needs can create such valuable learning for the whole family.
We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
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Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from living joyfully.ca and today, I’m joined by Anna Brown and Erika Ellis. Hi to you both.
ANNA AND ERIKA: Hello.
PAM: Now, before we get started, we wanted to remind everyone that with this Unschooling “Rules” series, we use the word rules in quotes to draw attention to the fact that there is no such thing. It can feel easier to reach for a set of rules to follow, especially when we’re learning something new. But we want to offer you space to look within, to find what makes sense to you and what makes sense to the individual members of your family. There are no unschooling police. Nobody is going to drop by your house and give you a failing grade or an A+. Our goal with this series is to explore these apparent “rules” and cultivate an environment for self-discovery, for inquiry, for agency, and for growth.
So, in this episode, we’re diving into the “rule” to say yes to your kids. Now, conventionally parents are so used to saying no to their kids’ requests for any number of reasons. They don’t want to spoil them. They want to avoid a big mess to clean up. They’re busy and they don’t have time to play and so on. It’s not that this is done with any particular malice. It’s more about the power dynamic that’s inherent in conventional adult/child relationships, right? The parents’ needs take precedence over the child’s needs.
So, when we begin learning about unschooling, we’re encouraged to question the that script. Since our children are going to be learning through living rather than through following a curriculum, it makes sense for them to engage in lots of experiences, to follow their curiosity and see where it leads. That’s often when they’re in a flow state learning almost through osmosis.
But to get there, we are actively encouraged to stop saying no to our children’s requests and start saying, yes, absolutely. The challenge comes when we, striving to be a perfect unschooling parent, take this idea on as a rule, seeing yes is good and no is bad. Full stop.
Now, always saying yes to a child’s requests can be as thoughtless as always saying no. And that’s because context matters. Human beings, individuals matter. A little thought and conversation goes a long way to discovering if the request makes sense in the moment. So, even if it’s a small request with a pretty easy yes, narrating our thoughts as we walk over to the cupboard to grab the paint can help our child see the kinds of things that we can consider.
So, we might say, “Oh, the table’s already clean and the plastic tablecloth is right here for us to toss on top. Let’s go grab the paints and paper from the cupboard.” It also gives them the opportunity to pipe up with their thoughts, too, to be part of the process if they notice something. And that way, from their perspective, we are not just a gatekeeper of random yeses and nos. Instead, we’re their partner in accomplishing the things they want to do. That is what we’re looking at with unschooling.
And when situations get more complex with more needs and more constraints at play, they have some experience now to draw on as we dive into conversations around ways to get to the yes that work for everyone involved.
So, what helped me in this transition time was to tweak that rule into a question that I could ask myself. So, instead of feeling the admonition to say yes always, I would ask myself, “Why not yes?” What that did was put me in a mindset of leaning to the yes — yes was right there in the question — while still reminding me to take a moment to think about the context, because that’s where the meat of it is. That’s where we’re learning so much about ourselves, learning so much about our kids, learning so much about where everybody is in that moment. Learning about the environment, just learning how to make choices and decisions. That’s the richness of unschooling, not an offhand yes or no. The richness is in the moment.
Okay, so Erika, what are your thoughts?
ERIKA: I’m so excited to dive into these unschooling “rules,” quote unquote, because as someone who grew up being a very good student and a huge fan of those A+’s, I know there is a certain appeal to rules and to just being told what to do. I’ve experienced that draw towards wanting to do things the right way and to have all the right answers. So, I absolutely get the reason why people latch onto a so-called rule, like always say yes, and treat it as a rule from on high to be followed no matter what in order to be a good unschooler.
But what’s so interesting about the unschooling journey is that it’s exactly those rules that tend to be what create challenges and sticking points along the way. They’re the places where parents will say, “I’m trying to do this.” Like, “I’m trying to always say yes, and it’s not feeling good. I feel like unschooling doesn’t work for our family.” If I say yes when I’m feeling really uncomfortable, or if I’m pushing through my fears and the messages I’m getting from my body, pushing through my emotions, pushing through my capacity over and over again, I can reach a breaking point, and this is when I feel like a martyr.
I may think things like, “I do everything for them. When will my needs matter?” Or, “I feel like I never get a break. Don’t they see how much I do for them? It’s never enough. I just can’t keep doing this. I feel like no one cares about my feelings.” And thoughts like that are warning signs. I am being martyrly. I’m not communicating my feelings and needs, and I’m thinking that I have to do things in a certain way, even if it’s not working.
And I also get why it’s common unschooling advice to say yes more, because our culture’s treatment of children includes excessive use of the word no. Kids do not have the same rights as adults. Adults are encouraged to use their power over their children to get them to comply, and good parenting is really equated to having complete control over your children, maybe in a loving way, but the power dynamic is there and it’s adults who have the power. Saying no to children as an automatic response is considered acceptable and perhaps even good for children, because of this idea that children should know they can’t just get what they want. And saying no puts them in their place in that power dynamic, which is at the bottom.
And so, questioning that makes sense and it’s revolutionary to begin with. Turning those automatic nos into yeses could be a way to approach changing that structure. But the version of unschooling that I love isn’t saying that children now have the power in this same power dynamic and that the adults have no power. It’s changing that relationship completely to try to eliminate power-over as a dynamic. Everyone in the family’s needs are valid and important regardless of their age, and everyone has autonomy, has a voice, regardless of their age.
So, I also wanted to add that adults can use their culturally-given power over children out in the world in order to make sure that the children’s voices are heard and that their consent is respected when we’re not in our unschooling homes. Anna?
ANNA: For me, whenever I notice that, “I should be,” or anything similar, I know that it’s time for me to dig into what, what’s that about? The idea that there’s one way to be in the world is a very helpful idea to toss aside.
So, there’s so many ways to be in the world, and there’s not one way to parent or unschool or, I would argue, to do anything. But when we’re changing a paradigm, that pendulum swing happens so naturally. We want to distance ourselves from the action that now feels out of step or even wrong. But swinging to that far side can be just as problematic, like Pam mentioned. And as it relates to, “say yes,” if you’re saying yes to something that doesn’t feel good, your energy is not aligning with your actions, and kids really pick up on that. But they don’t exactly know what to do with it. So, then sometimes it ends up with behavior pieces or just a disconnect between you.
And you’re also missing the opportunity for you and your kids to learn how to consider other opinions, how to look at the context, how to see what someone else needs, how to solve a problem, and find a solution that feels good to both parties. And that is such a helpful skill to carry with us through our lives. So, we don’t want to overstep those opportunities or miss them somehow.
And I love, Pam, your, “Why not yes?” Because it creates such a great space, a space where we’re questioning that snap no. We’re absolutely questioning that. And we’re looking at the whole context. And in that context, we can see the limitations of our own capacity, what the environment can support, while keeping an eye to finding a way to meet the need.
So, instead of the power struggle, it becomes a chance, again, for collaboration, to be on the same team, for learning more about one another. And I think what I found and I’ve heard it echoed in other families, is when you build that foundation of trust that needs will be taken seriously and are something that we’re all going to work towards, it becomes so much easier and faster to communicate about our capacity at any given moment. There’s a trust that we’re going to figure it out. So, even if I’m needing to say no right now, because I don’t have the capacity to do it, there’s a trust that that’s not a closed door. That’s just a, we need to pause a minute and start having some discussions about it.
PAM: Yeah. I think that speaks of the relationship that we’re building over time. And sometimes, it can take a lot of yeses, depending on how much experience our kids have with us saying no. It’s not like, oh, all of a sudden, I’m going to change to asking myself why not yes? and saying yes more. And then, it’s like a light switch. Now everybody knows and now we can all talk about this and yeah, they’re not going to come at me with all these requests that they want.
Because I found over time that the requests faded a little bit. Not that they disappeared at all, but that they had more agency to do things and they also had so much trust that we would figure out a way, even if it wasn’t now for capacity issues, environmental issues, timing, all those pieces. They didn’t have to come with the big energy to convince me that this was really important to them.
They could just tell me with words. And they trusted at this point, through experience, not just because I said, “You can trust me now, I will listen to you.” That’s great to say, but you have to earn it. Trust is something that comes with experience. It’s not a switch that we can turn on.
ANNA: But I think, too, that it’s not just, okay, so you have to say this automatic yes for five months. It’s more that you’re not saying the automatic no, but it’s the transparency, I guess is what I’m trying to. You’re explaining the context along the way as you are making the decision.
Because I think it’s that arbitrary yes or no that’s very confusing to kids. And so, just a very quick example from our house that from the outside would look like, oh, you have this rule where you’re saying no. The girls grew up in Charlotte, which is in the south part of the United States. And bugs are no joke. Like no joke. And so, we would eat in the kitchen. That’s just what we did. And we did that, because if we were eating around the house, we would have bugs all over the house. So, it’s not a, I’m saying no to you eating out of that. It’s, we’re all talking about they don’t like bugs. I don’t like bugs. Here’s a solution.
So, it feels so different. It might be a common rule in someone else’s house, but with no discussion, that can feel arbitrary, versus giving that context. So, I think that kind of thing is so important.
ERIKA: Yeah, we’ve had that exact situation too, also living in the south. And we also just eat in the dining room, but it’s because the kids don’t like bugs. And so, that’s a good solution. But I’ve seen the automatic yes with that exact situation, as well. And it’s like, oh well, I guess we’ll just deal or whatever.
But I really liked, Pam, when you were talking about even when you are easily able to do something, to mention the things that are coming into your mind. Because I was thinking of an example of a kid who’s just fully in the moment. Kids are always right in the moment. “It’s midnight, but I just watched a video about making slime. I want to make slime right now.” It makes so much sense in their brain, which is right in the moment that, “I want to do that right now.” And what’s not popping in their head is what time it is, what materials we have, the cleanup. None of that is going to occur to the excited child. And so, as an adult with that bigger perspective, just to share those things, every time they come up in your mind gives so much information.
PAM: And there’s not a right yes or no answer to that question. You may be feeling excited and you happen to have the stuff and, let’s dive into it! That’s awesome. And then sometimes it doesn’t work out that way. Maybe you don’t have one in the ingredients and, “Oh, we’ll go out in the morning and get that thing,” so you can bring that yes energy with you.
But I think that piece of narrating and sharing, that is where the richness is. That is everything. That’s what takes the arbitrary out of it. We may be thinking all those things, so we know it’s not an arbitrary yes or no, but unless we mention it, they have no way of knowing. They came up with this great idea and then they get a yes or a no, and then we can get the backlash when there’s no’s, etc.
And we talk about the time it takes to move through a tantrum or upset. Do I want to spend that time or do I want to spend the time upfront sharing, having the conversation, letting them know the pieces that just aren’t lining up in this particular moment to do the thing that they’re wanting to do. And we’re going to talk a bit about the future and look, it looks like we can do this tomorrow. We can do this next week. Or we can grab this thing. The conversation — that’s where the connection is. That’s where the feeling of teamwork is. It really comes down to that relationship and connection, doesn’t it?
ANNA: Right. And something else I wanted to say about it, too, that I would see in some friends’ houses was because, like Erika was saying, we had the friends that said the automatic yes to things that where I was going, “Eek!” But what I noticed was they would say that automatic yes for a period of time, until it got to be too much for them. And then they would scream. And it was, “This is a terrible mess!” And I’m like, oh my gosh. And the kids were like deer in headlights, because it was fine 10 minutes ago, but now it’s not. But if we’re honest and we’re talking through that context and what’s happening for us, again, even if we’re moving towards the yes or no, it’s not even about that. If we’re being honest about, oh, I’m feeling worried about the cleanup for this, and if we have time to get to there for that, then it’s not the surprise. And I feel like you’re not creating this pressure cooker in yourself, because you’re being honest about your capacity and what you can do and what your concerns are. Because they are kids living in the moment. They’re not going to think 20 steps ahead when they’re super excited about something. And while we don’t have to bog them down with that, we can still provide some context that’s super helpful and helps us feel better. It’s just a calmer environment overall.
ERIKA: Yeah, I have an example from real life. I would like to tell a story.
So, my daughter Maya loves animals so much, and I do, too, but I’ve never really felt compelled to own pets in this intense way that she does. I love observing animals and connecting with friends’ pets. I have a lot of friends that are dogs who I love so much, but Maya is the next level. She wants to have an animal sanctuary. She wants to have 12 dogs of her own. So, she’s asked about getting a dog for most of the time that she’s been alive.
And I know that for me, owning a dog is outside of my comfort zone, and I have a lot of reasons why it feels like it’s too much for me. We have an apartment without a yard and, for many years, we didn’t even own the apartment, so a pet felt like that would be a liability. We love to travel. The whole family does, and so that seems like that would add a challenge. Pets can create unexpected expenses in addition to the expected ones, and we are a one income family. I get overwhelmed by household tasks and adding a pet adds a lot more household tasks.
And so, over the years we talked about it a lot and I validated and empathized with her. And together, over time, we figured out things we could do in the meantime, like visiting our friends that had dogs, offering to pet sit, and so on.
And so, an opportunity came up where Maya and I could pet-sit my sister’s giant menagerie of pets for a month, and I felt really nervous, but I also felt like this was something big that I could do — it was just outside my comfort zone — in order to fill her need for a while and it would still be manageable for me. So, we did that. It ended up being so much fun for both of us, and I let my sister know that if she ever needed help again, we would be so happy to do it again.
And as we thought more about it and talked more about it, and I talked to my sister more about the experience, my sister offered the suggestion that we could borrow her smallest dog to stay with us at our house for an extended period of time. So, that would be a chance for Maya to have a dog at home. And for me, it felt doable because I already know Marty and I love him, and he’s not a puppy. He’s really easy going and he’s small. And it felt like that situation of knowing the dog and being familiar with him, that removed a lot of my concerns. And my sister can take him back if I ever need her to, which solves most of the rest of my issues.
And so, it really became a situation that I felt like I could handle. And so, then my next step was to check in with my son and my husband about it, because I knew Maya would be on board, but I needed to make sure they were also okay with this plan. So, we talked it through and there were more potential issues like, would Marty be chewing up Oliver’s toys? Or would he be getting in the way when Oliver wants to use the computer?
And so, we came up with plans like putting a baby gate on that room that Oliver is in most of the day, so that he doesn’t have to worry about the dog. And so, we all agreed that we could do this, try it out in order to help Maya meet her strong need to have a dog with a solution that could work for everyone.
And the fun part now is that there are still so many possibilities. We can still decide at any moment if it feels good to keep him longer than the original plan or to bring him back to my sister sooner. We could talk about all the things we’ve learned about having a dog. Maya has learned so much about the annoying parts of owning a dog, and what are the fantastic parts, and what would we imagine doing if we had a dog of our own and then wanted to travel.
So, we have a better sense of what that could look like. Does having to take him out for walks since we don’t have a yard work well with the way that we want to live our lives? And so, we’re just learning so much and I am trusting completely that we’ll just keep communicating about all of our feelings and our needs and our concerns and what our visions are for what we want our lives to be like. And we can figure out ways together to make it happen in a way that feels good for everyone. And it’s just been a really.
And Maya knows, too, that her goals are really important to the whole family, and that we’re always going to be trying to figure out a way to help her follow her path, too.
ANNA: Yeah. And what I love about that story is, it’s a perfect example of why it’s not a yes or a no. It’s never that cut and dry. And when you share the context of it, everybody’s learning. Maya’s learning, you’re learning, everybody’s learning. And that’s the beauty of this.
PAM: Yes, exactly. There’s no yes/no and there’s no pass/fail.
ANNA: Right!
PAM: Go back to those grades. Nobody’s coming to grade you and we don’t need to grade ourselves or our kids. That does not need to be part of the conversation. And I think when we think about things in yes/no, pass/fail frameworks, that gets in the way of that the teamwork energy, of everybody trusting and feeling able to share their thoughts without being judged.
Because if you’re passing everything that everyone says through the yes/no filter, does it pass? Yes? No? That can get in the way of coming up with a plan. Instead, those are all seeds. Erika’s story is just a beautiful example of so many seeds being planted along the way until they bubbled up to this particular moment. But this isn’t the end of the story at all. There are just so many possibilities.
Things aren’t yes/no, now or never. None of those dynamics really help these conversations around the things that our kids are wanting to do, are interested in, all those pieces. It’s more, why not yes? How can we make this work? What are the other pieces to consider? Who else is involved? There’s so much in those conversations that we can bring with us forward over time. It doesn’t need to be a yes/no, now, never, or forever, all those pieces.
ERIKA: Yeah. And I really think Oliver, who is not a huge part of this story, I think it’s super valuable for him, too, because I keep checking in with him. What are the things that aren’t working for you about this situation? Or what are the worries that you would have about bringing Marty to our house? But I think him seeing me supporting this, even though I’ve talked about all the challenges of it, I feel like he’s learned a lot from it, too, and also feels seen and heard, that his needs regarding Maya’s needs are also important.
PAM: And they bring that knowledge with them. They see how hard you are working and also considering for something that she’s super interested in. He knows that he will get that same trust and energy from us if something ever bubbles up for him. So, for him, seeing how that is playing out is just a beautiful example of how things may play out for some need that he has in the future. And I bet it feels good to him even knowing that you guys are considering everybody else’s needs, not just hers.
ANNA: The other cool thing about it, too, that just came to mind that I think is important when we’re talking about saying yes and finding these ways through, is that it isn’t just about you, Erika. You were solving problems using a large community beyond even your immediate family to go see dogs before you could do this, then go have the pet sitting experience. So, I think it helps our kids realize that we’re not the gatekeeper of yes and no and granting. That was not a role I wanted to be in. I wanted to be in this team behind going, how are we going to make this work? I don’t even know, but let’s start looking at our resources. Let’s start bringing in help. Let’s start figuring things out. And so, that really changes that, I’m asking and you’re granting kind of thing that can happen in a lot of families.
PAM: Yeah. And also the the energy that we have to solve it, that we have to be the one that fulfills-
ANNA: All the things.
PAM: Yes, exactly. Yeah. That’s so beautiful. All right. Thank you so much for chatting with me today. It was really fun, really fun to dive into. I’m excited for more episodes in this series.
ERIKA: Me, too.
PAM: Thanks so much, and we will talk to everyone soon.
ANNA: Bye.
ERIKA: Bye.
EU334: Q&A Deep Dive
Oct 13, 2022
In the intro, I share my new vision for the podcast: helping people figure out how to apply bigger picture unschooling ideas in their everyday lives. I want to help listeners explore how these big unschooling ideas work on a more practical level. In real life, with the real people that make up our family.
Here’s how the Exploring Unschooling podcast is changing in support of this shift in focus:
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis will be joining me on most episodes to bring more perspectives, experiences, and stories as we tease apart what unschooling ideas might look like in real life
they’ll be shorter episodes that deep dive into more focused topics
we’re moving to a biweekly release schedule
and you might also notice the new logo
Also, Anna and I are starting a new podcast!
What sparked the idea was recognizing how much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Network isn’t actually about unschooling, it’s about life. So, in The Living Joyfully Podcast, we’re going to talk about life, relationships, and parenting without mentioning “unschooling.” We want to reach people who are curious about prioritizing the relationships in their lives, but aren’t sure what that looks like or how to go about it. AND we want to make it much easier for you to share this kind of information with your family and friends without having to get into the whole “unschooling” thing.
And in this week’s Exploring Unschooling podcast episode, we’re diving deep into a listener question submitted by Joanna.
How can I convince my spouse that unschooling is right or good while I myself feel I am conducting a big experiment? When will I feel confident that this experiment will work out for the best?
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
PAM: Welcome! I’m Pam Laricchia from living joyfully.ca, and today, Anna Brown and Erika Ellis are joining me to explore a listener question. Hi, to you both.
ERIKA AND ANNA: Hello!
PAM: Now, before we get started, I just want to remind everyone that our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the quote “right answer” because there isn’t a universal right answer for any situation that works for everyone. So, basically what we’re doing is sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
So, Anna, would you like to get us started?
ANNA: I would. Okay. So, I’m going to read the question.
“Hello. Thank you for your show. We have been homeschooling our kids since the beginning, but that was through a public school that offered enrichment classes two days a week. When those classes stopped because of COVID fear, I started unschooling. It had been dawning on me that, no matter how fun I tried to make school, I was always trying to get them to do something they’d rather not do, for the most part. They’d be much happier playing all day if I let them, so I finally did.
I love unschooling philosophy, but in practice it’s hard for me to relax into, even though I’m reading and listening and thinking about this for much of my time. So, I’m wondering how you convinced your spouse that this is right or good, while I myself am conducting a big experiment. When will I feel confident that this experiment will work out for the best? Self-doubt is always on the edge of my confidence, and so, it’s very hard for me to be persuasive with this. Any ideas? Resources? Thank you.”
Well, thank you for the question, first of all. I will say I am pretty clear with myself that I don’t want to convince anyone of anything, so I want to trust that they’re on their own path.
But I loved reading that you’re reading and listening and going to all the podcasts and all the things, and taking in all this information, because I think so much of the mechanics of it will start to sink in. And then next comes the practice, like you’re finding, the day to day where you feel it in your bones. And that comes from remaining connected.
So, during the times where I was wondering about our path, I would realize that I had drifted out of connection and I would just lean back in, go to them, see what they were up to, listen to the stories, play the games, watch the show, just be with them. And then the learning and the joy was so evident and that always brought me back to the present and kind of out of my head.
And so, while I think it’s really important to learn and to take it all in and to explore all those pieces of it, it’s just as important to get out of our heads and connect with our kids in front of us. And because I can tend to be that person that reads a lot and researches a lot, that was something that I had to relearn over the years. Because I would do that, I’d dive deep into learning about something, but realize I’d drifted away from the day-to-day connection with my kids.
And as for the spouse piece of the question, I really think that’s about tending to the relationship. Are you feeling connected to them? Are you sharing all the fun stuff that’s happening, all the amazing learning that’s happening every day? Because what I found is, as I was sharing that, it was sinking in for me, too. And if they have specific concerns, hear them, just take them in, validate. Let’s talk about that. And really validate, validate, and look for that to not get defensive.
Life is an experiment. Handing kids over to complete strangers to follow a process laid out by the powers of the moment, also an experiment, and one that often fails the individual. So, I don’t worry so much about that. I focus on connected relationships, knowing that, as we tend to the moment in front of us, we’re creating the future that we all want together.
So, Erika, what did you think?
ERIKA: Thanks so much for your question. I found it really interesting to think about, particularly I grabbed onto that word “experiment.” I love that you used that term, because I think it may be a great clue or a great place to start with a mindset shift.
I think we hear things like this a lot, something along the lines of, unschooling is this unsure, experimental, off-the-beaten-track, out-there option. Or maybe even that choosing school and a more mainstream, controlling parenting style will somehow be easier or more of a sure thing. And so, maybe that would be something to dive into and question a little bit. Is unschooling really experimental? Or is school more of an experiment? Because school is certainly a more recent invention. So, that’s just something to ponder.
And is there something guaranteed about the outcomes of schooling or mainstream parenting? I would say that there isn’t and so, it might help to recognize that there isn’t one way that will yield this desired outcome and another way that is more experimental. Either way, we’re dealing with people who are all different and we don’t really know where their lives will lead.
And so, really, what we’re looking at is just choices that have no right or wrong answer and no guarantee one way or another about how things will turn out. And so, for me, the most valuable places to look for guidance on making those choices were my own inner voice and my kids. My intuition inside would tell me when things weren’t feeling right, or when it felt like I was putting an external expectation on the children that didn’t seem to fit them or make sense if I really started thinking about he situation.
And then, if I looked to my kids, if I was willing to listen to what they’re saying, they would make it clear what was working for them and what wasn’t. And I think most people push against the kind of control that happens in school, and so, if I’m listening to my kids about that, they would say that they don’t want to be in that environment. And so, my intuition would tell me not to push past that message.
I really loved your observations about your experience of trying to do those schoolish activities at home. And it felt like you were pushing them to do things that they would rather not do. And so, I think those are the signs from our kids can prompt us to look at what’s really going on. What could life look like without those activities? Do kids learn without us deciding what they should learn or pushing a certain way or a certain time to learn?
And I do think it becomes more challenging when you have a partner who is not on board with the idea of unschooling yet. And I feel like we’ve talked about this a lot. It’s a really common issue. I know we’ve talked so much about communicating with partners on the Living Joyfully Network, but I’m pretty sure it’s been part of some podcast episodes as well. And I guess what I’d say to that aspect of the question is, like what Anna was saying, it would probably help to stop viewing it as trying to convince someone or trying to be persuasive.
For me, conversations tend to go more smoothly and our communication feels better and more effective if I’m starting from a place of being on the same team with my husband. We both love the kids. We want to create a situation for them where they have the life they want, to do our best to be supportive, providing what they need. I think most parents want that. And so, if you’re starting from that common ground, it can help us have conversations and help us make choices that are feeling good to everyone.
With my partner, we really both enjoyed reading some Alfie Kohn and some John Taylor Gatto at the beginning, to start questioning the school path. And then I shared Pam’s work and we talked about the visions that we used to have for our family and about our childhood and thinking about our experience in school and stuff like that. Those were a lot of the conversations we had early on. And meanwhile, our kids were just living their lives, growing, amazing us with all of the learning that they were just naturally doing.
I had one other thought about a possible mindset shift that could be helpful and that would be to bring yourself into the present moment, rather than getting stuck in thinking about this big-picture, long-term view. So, I would say, at this point in my journey, I very rarely am thinking about ideas like, will this all work out? when it comes to my kids. Because it’s like, there’s no way to control for that outcome, one. And two, it’s pulling me away from what is happening right now.
I think probably at the beginning of my deschooling, I did think more about that, like will this all work? But it’s been more valuable now to treat each day and each moment as it is. I’ve seen enough times that my kids will surprise me with the ways they grow, learn, and develop. So, I can’t predict the challenges. I can’t control things in such a way that I eliminate challenges, either.
But I can meet their needs and I can keep open communication and that really has been a path that’s felt so great for us.
PAM: Yeah, I think that is such an important piece, that mindset set shift to say, well, is there a path that has a guaranteed answer? Is that something I can even seek out? Is that a question that I can answer? So, that’s a great thing just ponder for a bit, to realize that there is so much uncertainty in life, no matter which path you choose. But being in the moment allows this moment to work out as well as we can, and then the next moment works out as well. And you’re in the best place that you can get when you focus on the moments, because they build over time.
Anyway, of course I am going to visit that word “convince” and, with three different ways of saying it, we’ll see what connects for anyone. But, for me, it was really helpful and I absolutely remember the feeling when I was learning so much about it and I thought this sounded so cool and I felt like I needed to convince my spouse that this was a great idea so that we could do it. I totally remember starting there, but for me, the shift was, oh, instead of sharing my answer, which is unschooling, I could share the thoughts that I was having and the observations of my kids that I was making that were leading me in that direction and see what they think. How do those things come together for them?
There’s some trust in there and some uncertainty in there. Maybe they’ll see something different, but maybe it’s something that I’ve missed. So, it’s more information. It’s more heads. It’s working together on a team, like you were talking about before. So, you can share the things that you’re seeing in your kids as they relax into playing all day, as you mentioned. You can share the interesting things you’re learning as you listen and read about unschooling.
The energy of working together and sharing, instead of, I’ve presupposed this answer for our family, and I want to convince you that this is where we need to go. That can build resistance in another person. No matter what you’re trying to convince them of, it’s like, “You have an answer that you want. You’ve made a decision for me that I haven’t really had any input in.” There’s just resistance there. Like, “I’ve decided we’re going camping next weekend,” whatever it is. You have to get through that initial resistance to explain, why do you wanna camping? Where do you wanna go camping? What are the plans that you made?
And I love what Erika mentioned, the way to get to that “We’re a team together” can easily be like, these are our kids. We want the best for our kids. We both love our kids. The choice of school, homeschool, unschooling is about the kids. They can be involved. It’s observing them and chatting with them. It’s not that they’re not doing their curriculum, if it’s homeschooling, not doing school, whatever it is, they’re doing other things instead.
So, it’s about noticing those things, noticing them over time, seeing what they’re learning, seeing what they’re choosing, seeing the joy in their faces. As Anna said, get into the moment with them, because that’s where you’re gonna see all this stuff in action.
One thing that bubbled up for me, too, is when you’re feeling that need to show confidence and be persuasive to someone, that can be a clue that you’re feeling a sense of urgency around making this choice, making this decision to start unschooling in earnest. And that can add attention to the process that doesn’t need to be there, too.
Maybe you and your spouse can just decide to give it a try for six months and even better, a year. You can always go back to the homeschooling curricula, the school, whatever, because it’s not a forever decision. You’re not making a lifetime decision in this moment. You’re like, this seems really curious. It seems like it will be a really great fit. Let’s try it out and see. That’s where that experiment word comes in. It’s perfect. Like, let’s learn more about it. Let’s see what this actually looks like in our family, because I’m really curious. It sounds like it could be super, super interesting.
One thing I wanted to talk about too is that six months to a year kind of thing, it is really important, because giving it that time to understand how unschooling works and to see it in action, that practice piece that Anna was talking about, long enough to gain real experience with it, that helps build trust, that helps you understand the process and what learning looks like. And it looks different than a curriculum. The curriculum there, whether or not your kids actually learn it, follow it, et cetera. You can see, it’s very nicely laid out in little chunks. I always think of it as a ladder, bit by bit, the rungs are the same space apart. Each time you’re learning this bit. The timeline looks very consistent.
Yet real learning, when you see it in action, is really beautiful and can look very different. It could be like boom, boom, and then we can stay here for a while, not really noticing much learning happening. Then all of a sudden, it’s like this, off the charts. And then a few more steady steps, and then we get stuck again for a while, et cetera. So, you need a nice expanse of time to really see it in action, to be able to look back and say, “Oh look! A few months ago they were doing this and then this, and then, oh, they jumped over here.” And, oh look, when I look back, I can see how related that is. I can see the beauty of the learning in action, but it’s not something that I can predict.
So, to really get a feel for unschooling and how it works, it really helps to dive in for a nice chunk of time. And in that time, you’re also learning more about unschooling and you’re seeing it in action and you’re with them in practice with the whole process and sharing these observations with your spouse.
I just think that’s an important piece. It’s not like, we’re gonna unschool for two months and then we’re gonna decide forever whether or not this is the path we’re gonna take. That’s just setting yourself up for failure. So I just wanted to, to mention that piece.
ANNA: Some things bubbled up for me that I want to talk about, and it’s actually jumping back behind what you just were saying, which is so important, I think, to give it some space to breathe and to figure out.
But what you were talking about earlier really spoke to something we talk about a lot, which is having no set outcome. So, if you’re coming into that discussion with unschooling is the answer, it really shuts down all the options and even the critical thinking. Because this does come up a lot, some things that come to mind for me is, when we can honestly say, “I don’t know, Let’s talk about it. Let’s figure out,” then we can look really critically at all of the different pieces. Because I think asking yourself, “Is it really true that this path is predictable,” and like Erika said, “will have this set outcome of, everyone’s successful and everyone’s happy?” I mean, no. We know that’s not true, because we live in a society where most people are going to school, but also to really ask, is it really better or is it just that we aren’t responsible?
And I think that’s a piece that really is an internal piece to sit with. Because if I hand them off to school or whatever that institution is, then I’ve done what I’m supposed to do and that feels more comfortable. So, even if it is an experiment that fails that way, we don’t have to be responsible for it.
So, for me, that was a lot of work I had to do to be like, you know what? I’m okay with this responsibility, because I’m living with these children every day. I see how they would not do well in a school environment. I see how they’re thriving here. And so, I can take that responsibility.
But we have to do some of that work, to peel back those layers to understand, what is the appeal of the other? Is it that we think it’s certain? Is it that we are not responsible?
ERIKA: Yeah. That’s super interesting. I was thinking also about that first part, Pam, that you were saying about giving more of the observations and the information. That’s so huge, because if you’re coming straight to someone with the set outcome in mind of, I have the plan, I know the answer, I’m gonna convince you of the thing, just the energy that you have coming into that conversation is going to make someone want to put up a wall of defense, because it feels like a lot.
But if you’re giving the information that he doesn’t already have, the things like, “You know what, when I was doing these activities with the kids, they were so resistant to them. I could see. These are the things they’re doing in school and I’m watching the kids do them and they’re not enjoying it at all. They’re resisting this and then, I look over here and they’re playing this and they’re figuring out how to read these words,” or whatever it is, the real life observations of what you’re actually seeing that is showing you why you’re wanting to choose unschooling. But starting at that place, I just think that’s such a great idea. I love that.
PAM: And that’s where the urgency piece really comes in. It’s not urgent. We’re living our days with our kids. It’s not urgent, the timeline that we get there, to choose unschooling and then it’s not urgent to like, “Okay, let’s implement this and do this forever.” I mean, that’s something that we as human beings can be drawn to. It’s hard to sit in the nebulous of not quite knowing. We all love a path. And I shouldn’t even say, “we all.”E
ANNA: There are those of us who just like to jump off that path, Pam.
ERIKA: Many, many people love the path.
ANNA: Many people. The other thing I wanted to say that speaks to what Pam said earlier, too, because this came up on the Network not long ago, and it was funny how the discussion was about the two parents and how they were deciding about what was gonna happen. And I was like, hey, what’s the kid wanna do? What’s that little one thinking? And so, this is a family decision that impacts everyone and so, if you end up trying a school thing, it’s that checking in. Is that working for them? As opposed to this top-down, “You’re now set on this path, young children, and you’re going to stay there.” No, we can all be talking about it. What feels good? What doesn’t? What would we like about it? What would we want it to be?
And so, I think sometimes that pressure we put on ourselves to make the decision as parents actually can be really helped by this process of unschooling and the way that we’re talking about collaborating,
because you’re getting input from the people that are most impacted by the decision, and they’re telling you what they want to do and what works for them. And so, I like that piece of it, too, to not lose sight of it.
ERIKA: That’s one of my absolute favorite things about unschooling, actually. What it feels like is we don’t have to worry about this nebulous, mysterious future. It’s just like, what is everyone needing and wanting and feeling now? And then the things that are the issues present themselves, and then together we deal with that thing. I mean, Maya loves talking about future plans, so we do a lot of that too. But in this present moment, what are her future plans? What are the things that are getting in the way of what she wants to do?
All of all of the issues that are important to address become super obvious. And I don’t need to make up what the problem is gonna be in the future. And so, making choices become so much easier because I’m seeing the reality of what’s happening right now rather than these future worries.
PAM: Yeah. I love that piece. I love that piece of involving the kids. Because that can also take a bit of the edge off the two parents feeling they need to make the decision and pass it on. It’s like, we have more people we can get input from. Here are my observations and my thoughts and what are they thinking? What are they doing? What are they enjoying? That expands the team.
And that’s gonna be part of the deschooling. You’ll be reminded a lot to expand the team to include your kids. It’s like everybody working together, noticing what’s up in the moment.
And I love your point, Erika, about how being in the present moment doesn’t mean never thinking about the future. It’s more about not predicting the future, not trying to predict the future. We can absolutely have all sorts of thoughts about the future and what we’d like to do or how we might like to get there, all those different pieces. And those are amazing conversations to have in the moment. And then you have them a month from now and six months from now, and you see how things have changed. Maybe the context of the moment has changed. Maybe what they’re aiming for or wanting to walk towards has changed.
Understanding that human beings change is a wonderful piece of self-awareness for adults and children to have with them, right? Because then, every moment that you’re in, I can make this choice now. It’s not, oh, last week or last month or last year, I chose this goal for myself and I have to stay there even when maybe I’m not feeling so good about it now, but it’s a failure if I don’t.
But if we can really just embrace and chat about how things change over time, I think that’s another amazing piece that, that you can bring forward with you.
So, I did wanna mention, I have a blog post I wrote. I always have a blog post. It’s called, What to Do Instead of School, and it was big enough I put it into two parts and I know we’ll put links to it in the show notes, but I think that you and your spouse might find it super helpful, too.
For me, it’s part of sharing interesting things, it’s those mindset shifts that Erika was talking about. Just what do you do instead of these more formal things? Even if it’s like curriculum and you’re only hitting the school a couple days a week or whatever life looks like right now. It can be hard to envision how we might shift from one to another way of being, an unschooling lifestyle. So, there’s some interesting stuff about in there about the transition and thinking about a season of Saturdays and getting to know your kids and learning more about unschooling.
But also, that whole self-awareness piece too, the conversations and collaboration that Anna was talking about, all those pieces, they’re just laid out there just to give you an idea of what you can do instead of just kind of sitting back. Because so often, it’s like, Oh, I’m not supposed to do these things. We’re not doing this, we’re not doing this. The person can feel like, Oh, we’re not doing a bunch of things all of a sudden, but what are we doing instead? So, I thought that would be a great thing to share, as well.
All right. Thank you so much to both of you for joining me today. I really appreciate it. It was so much fun as always.
ERIKA: It was.
ANNA: Yes. Thank you.
PAM: Bye, everyone.
ERIKA: Bye.
EU213 Flashback: Unschooling and Math with Marcella O’Brien
Oct 06, 2022
This week, I’m sharing a popular episode from early 2020 with unschooling mom Marcella O’Brien. Marcella’s grown sons, Jack and Sean, have also joined me in Growing Up Unschooling episode 181.
Marcella’s experience as a public school teacher and math tutor gives her a unique perspective, which led to an interesting conversation about math in school versus unschooling. Because she’s participated in both worlds, Marcella was able to share some amazing insights about math, a common sticking point for many new unschoolers.
I hope you find her thoughts helpful on your journey!
Questions for Marcella
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You’re also a math tutor, so I’d love to dive into that topic with you! First, let’s talk about the conventional way math is taught in schools. You have a unique perspective as a tutor to see how that teaching process plays out for students trying to understand math concepts. What have you seen?
Now let’s dive into exploring math through unschooling. In unschooling circles, we talk about how kids can learn math concepts through everyday living. I’d love to know how you’ve seen that play out. Has that been your experience as well?
Your two older sons, Jack and Sean were on the podcast last year and I really enjoyed hearing about their experiences growing up unschooling, especially through the teen years and college. I’d love to hear your perspective on those years! What strikes you as you look back on them now?
You’re still unschooling with your youngest. What’s your favorite thing about the flow of your days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU239 Flashback: Unschooling Dads with Roop Bhadury
Sep 29, 2022
This week, I’m sharing a fun conversation I had with unschooling dad Roop Bhadury. I connected with Roop through his wife Susan, who is a member of the Living Joyfully Network. She has also joined me on the podcast in episode 220. Roop and Susan live with their now three young children in Australia. It was so much fun to get to hear about their family from Roop’s perspective. He shared his thoughts about the philosophies of unschooling and entrepreneurship, about life, curiosity, learning, and relationships.
It was an expansive conversation with so many profound insights!
Questions for Roop
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
When we connected, you shared some topics you’d be interested in touching on and I was struck by the language you used, so I want to stay with your lovely wording! I’d love to hear your thoughts on your first point about curiosity and guardrails. Do they complement or compete?
Next you mentioned positive and negative empathy. Can you describe what you mean and share how you see them playing out?
You used the phrase “creative chaos in play.” I love the image that conveys! How have you seen that unfold in your lives?
And the last point you mentioned: “Knowledge is free, pedagogy isn’t, and its ongoing relevance.” What are your thoughts around that?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are just starting out on this journey?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU119 Flashback: Gaming and Growing Up Unschooling with Xander MacSwan
Sep 22, 2022
I get so many questions about “screen time” and video games and how they fit into an unschooling life, so I thought it might be helpful and fun to reshare a conversation I had with Xander MacSwan in 2018. Xander left school in the 5th grade when his parents—both professors in the University of Maryland’s College of Education—decided the best thing they could do was to start unschooling.
We dove deep into Xander’s passion for video games, including the difference between gaming as part of deschooling and choosing gaming as a passion, the joys of gaming, and things he learned or experienced through gaming that continue to be relevant in his life.
Xander’s perspective looking back as a grown unschooler is reassuring and enlightening!
Questions for Xander
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and what your family’s move to unschooling looked like?
One of the common worries for newer unschooling parents is around whether or not to limit the time their children spend playing video games. And there’s definitely a difference between deschooling and choosing gaming as a passion, though at first it might be hard to distinguish between them. Can you talk about the difference?
How did your passion for gaming develop? Can you share a bit about how that unfolded for you?
In my experience, I think diving into any passion, including a passion for video games, can be a wonderful way to learn so much about ourselves. And that understanding applies everywhere in our lives. Was that your experience?
Can you share some examples of things you learned or experienced through gaming growing up that continue to be relevant in your life now? What threads do you see looking back?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU111 Flashback: Ten Questions with Jan Fortune
Sep 15, 2022
This week, I’m sharing a conversation I had with Jan Fortune back in 2018. Jan home educated her four children in the UK and wrote many articles and five books on unschooling and parenting. Her book Winning Parent, Winning Child, focuses on living with children in ways that respect their autonomy.
In our conversation, Jan shares some of her thoughts about autonomous learning and the important role of trust in unschooling. She describes how consent-based parenting is not about martyrdom, but problem solving and time spent communicating.
I enjoyed revisiting this wonderful conversation, which is full of inspiring gems!
Questions for Jan
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. One of the first paradigm shifts that happens as we move to unschooling is from the conventional idea that childhood is a preparation for life in the adult world to the idea that a child’s present life is intrinsically valuable. And yet, almost paradoxically, focusing on living well in the present moment and solving today’s problems ends up being a great way to prepare for life as an adult, doesn’t it?
4. In an article you wrote for Life Learning Magazine, you dive into the building blocks of an autonomous, or unschooling, learning environment. I love the point you made about how this lifestyle transcends boundaries. And not just academic subjects, but getting to the place where there are essentially no boundaries between learning and living. Can you share some of the boundaries that melted away for you? It’s a deeper level of trust we reach, isn’t it?
5. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling?
6. In your book, Winning Parent, Winning Child, you make a great point about how consent-based parenting is not a call for parental self-surrender and martyrdom. Rather, it’s a call for engagement with our children. You talk about how there may be times when a mutual solution escapes us and we choose to put our children first, but that’s not ideal. Even though sacrifice is often held up as a virtue in society, why is simply giving in not a good long-term solution?
7. I’d like to dig into this transition to consent-based parenting a bit more. In the book, you wrote, “Consent works best when everyone in the family, adults and children alike, see themselves as free, respected people who can live the life they prefer within the family group. When this happening, adults and children can all be open to changing their wishes without ever fearing that it will mean doing something they really don’t want to do. This releases an enormous flood of innovative thinking for solving problems.”
I think that’s something that can be hard to believe until you see it in action. Can you share some tips about this transition and how it cracks opens creative problem-solving?
8. Another aspect of the transition to consent-based parenting I’d like to touch on is moving beyond the conventional idea that children will tend toward bad choices if they aren’t controlled. As we move to unschooling, we discover that what our children really lack is just experience. Especially if we’ve been parenting with rules and control for years, our children have had little experience with understanding themselves and making reasoned choices, so at first, they may behave in ways that may seem, to us at least, irrational. Yet that’s still not a sufficient justification for falling back on control and compulsion, is it? How else can we look at those situations?
9. In another article you wrote for Life Learning Magazine, titled, ‘As If…On Not Turning Our Children Into Byproducts of Our Philosophy,’ you talk about something I think is really important. I want to read a short quote from it:
“There is a temptation to want to prove that our home-educated children, and especially those who have real control over their own learning are more successful, more polite, let’s face it, just more… than their school-going, coerced counterparts. There is a real danger of advertising our learning style, and the alternative life style that is often a byproduct of it, by pointing to the product. Children, however, are not products; they are real, autonomous, human people, making their own mistakes on their own learning adventures; living out their learning for their own sakes, and not to provide examples for their mother’s most recent workshop talk.”
Even for parents who don’t chose to share more publicly about their family’s unschooling adventures, it’s still so valuable to shift away from the conventional mindset that our children are products turned out at the “end of our job” as parents. I think breaking this invisible tether between us and our children as builder and product, is a crucial step in our ability to see them as separate and whole human beings. Has that been your experience as well?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU207 Flashback: Advice from Grown Unschoolers
Sep 08, 2022
It’s compilation episode time again! This week, I’m sharing one of our listener favorites from 2019, a collection of conversations with grown unschoolers in which they offer their thoughts for newer unschooling parents.
I’ve woven together answers from eleven episodes featuring twelve grown unschoolers. I think you’ll find their answers helpful and enlightening wherever you are on your unschooling journey!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
This week, we’re revisiting a popular compilation episode from last year. Many people have asked me whether any former or current teachers have been interviewed on the podcast. And the answer to that question is a big YES! We have had more than 20 podcast episodes featuring guests who were or are teachers or university professors, who study education, or even who teach education courses.
Does it seem like a strange leap to make from being a teacher to being an unschooler? To me, choosing teaching indicates an interest in children and in learning, so to dive into that even more deeply with their own children through unschooling seems like a rather natural next step to take.
This episode contains snippets from six teachers turned unschoolers sharing about their journey. It’s inspiring to hear from them, especially during this frenzied, “back to school” season. And if you’re interested in hearing more from all of our episodes featuring teachers turned unschoolers, I have a reference page here for you to check out.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me again this week to dive into listener questions! We talk about the fears and doubts that come up at the start of the unschooling journey, the idea of wanting to measure success, and what to do when a child is interested in a topic that seems too grown up for them (in this case, an interest in war).
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Question summaries
We had a quick first question from Sabrina who was looking for interviews with single parents who are unschooling. Pam put together a reference page with episodes to check out.
Our second question is from Erin in New Jersey. She wonders how to get past some of the doubts she has about unschooling and the judgmental opinions of family and friends in order to trust herself. She also mentions feeling a need to measure success when it comes to unschooling and isn’t sure if that’s okay.
Our third question is from Joy in Ireland. Her eight-year-old son has a strong interest in war, weapons, fighting games, and history. Some of what he wants to watch and play is rated PG-13, which feels like it might be unsafe for him. She sees him learning so much from his interest, but worries that he might be desensitized to violence and that the more mature content could be harmful.
Our final question is from McKinzie. She is a third-generation teacher and is finding deschooling and trusting unschooling to be difficult, despite wholeheartedly agreeing with the concept. She specifically feels like teaching math and reading could be important, because she doesn’t want to “leave it to chance.”
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU332: An Unschooling Journey with Jae Williams, Part 3
Aug 18, 2022
This week, I’m sharing the second part of my recent conversation with Jae Williams (you can listen to the first half here). Jae is a former teacher and new unschooling dad of two young children. We first spoke about a year ago, right at the start of his deschooling journey. It was great to catch up with him and to hear his reflections about what he’s discovered in the last year.
Jae talks about the moments when he wonders if he’s doing enough as an unschooling dad to support his children’s learning. We dive into some ways to support an interest in math and what that can look like outside of the school environment. Jae shares what has surprised him most about unschooling, including the value of slowing down.
Jae’s observations are insightful and his curiosity about life and learning is inspiring!
QUESTIONS FOR JAE
When we connected to set up this call, you mentioned you’d like to talk about the question, “Am I doing enough as an unschooler?” It’s a good question, one that I think can be valuable to ponder at various points on the journey. What’s your experience with it?
What has surprised you most about your unschooling journey this last year?
What is your favorite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU331: An Unschooling Journey with Jae Williams, Part 2
Aug 11, 2022
Jae Williams is a former teacher and new unschooling dad of two young children. I first spoke to Jae when he was about two months into his unschooling journey, in episode 290.
It’s been a year now and we had so much to catch up on! Jae and I talked about the inner work of deschooling, the joy of an unschooling, routines versus structure, and the way unschooling expands into all areas of life.
Our conversation was so rich that we ended up talking for almost two hours! And so as not to overwhelm you, I’ve broken up our discussion into two episodes, with the second half coming out next week.
I hope you enjoy learning more about Jae’s journey!
QUESTIONS FOR JAE
Can you give us a bit of an update about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
When we spoke last July, you’d been unschooling for a couple of months. It’s been a year now, and I imagine there have been ups and downs. What have you found to be the most challenging aspect of your unschooling journey so far?
What has been your most valuable a-ha moment so far? And what sparked it?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU330 Bonus Episode: A Peek Inside the Living Joyfully Network
Aug 08, 2022
I’ve mentioned the Living Joyfully Network online community here and there on the podcast over the last couple of years, sometimes sharing the theme we’re exploring that month or testimonials from members.
But I feel like that doesn’t actually say much about what we get up to in this rich and vibrant community. So, for those who are even just a bit curious, I want to share a peek inside the Network!
Anna Brown, Network co-host and community advocate, and Erika Ellis, community moderator and resource-gatherer, join me up front to talk a bit about the Network: the platform, the flow, who it’s for, what makes it different, and why we love being members!
Then we share one of our weekly focus calls, where Anna Brown and I discuss an aspect of the theme of the month as it relates to our unschooling lives. For this call, the theme is Navigating Conflict and we’re diving into the idea of No Set Outcomes. I think you’ll find our conversation really interesting and helpful.
And, if it seems like a good fit for you on your unschooling journey, I hope to see you inside the Network!
THINGS WE MENTION IN THIS EPISODE
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU023 Flashback: Learning to Read in Their Own Time with Anne Ohman
Aug 04, 2022
Anne Ohman is a long-time unschooling mom of two grown children. Back in 2016, Anne and I had a lovely conversation about reading that I have referenced countless times over the years. When we spoke, she was working as a library director, giving her powerful insights and amazing stories to share about children learning to read.
Anne shares her perspective on why children at school are expected to learn to read early, why unschooling children who aren’t yet reading aren’t lacking anything, how they play with the puzzle of reading every day, and so much more. It was so valuable to dive deep into one of the most asked-about topics in the unschooling world!
Questions for Anne
Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family and how you came to unschooling?
School, and by extension society, is laser-focused on children learning to read as early as possible. As a library director and unschooling parent, I’d love to hear your perspective on how you’ve seen these reading expectations play out.
I’ve really enjoyed the stories you’ve shared on Facebook about schooled children at the library and how their outlook on reading has changed since you started there. Can you share some of those stories?
Our society is so caught up in reading by a certain age that if a child isn’t reading by then, most adults in their lives seem to focus on that missing piece. Why do you think that is?
Let’s talk about how our kids have learned without reading!
Something that has struck me over the years is how unschooling children are more apt to call themselves readers once they are comfortably reading adult-level books. Have you seen this too?
Have you had anyone judge your kids for not being able to read?
How do you feel now about Sam’s journey to reading as you look back on it today?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Remember Your Why and we’re looking through the lenses of connection and joy.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU154 Flashback: Unschooling Dads and Documentaries with Jeremy Stuart
Jul 28, 2022
This week, I’m sharing a conversation I had a few years ago with unschooling dad and filmmaker Jeremy Stuart. Jeremy directed and co-produced the documentary film, Class Dismissed, which was released in 2015. Since then, it has been screened in more than 60 countries and translated into five languages. His second documentary, Self-Taught, which explores the lives of grown unschoolers, came out in 2019. Jeremy’s curiosity about life and learning have led him to make some profound observations. We talk about expectations, trust, and lifelong learning, as well as diving into his experience filming the documentaries. It was an inspiring conversation!
Questions for Jeremy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
In 2015, you released the wonderful documentary film, Class Dismissed. It’s the fascinating story of a family’s choice to pull their two children from school and the journey that follows as they take their children’s education into their own hands. What inspired you to tell this story?
I got goosebumps when, nearer the end of the film, the mom shared, “I think I’m starting to kind of let go and relax a little bit. I’m amazed at how much I’m learning now. It’s not that I have more opportunities to learn now, but I’m taking more opportunities to be part of learning and to engage with life in a more rich and fulfilling way.” It’s the return of curiosity for the parent, isn’t it? It’s like a re-awakening to the joy of learning and truly embracing that learning is not just for the kids—it’s a lifelong thing. Which, almost paradoxically, helps us better understand why this lifestyle is such great way for our kids to learn. That’s such a valuable step on the journey, isn’t it?
What is your favorite part of the film?
You’ve been working on a new documentary for a couple of years now, Self-Taught. Can you share what it’s about and the inspiration behind it?
You’re in the production home stretch right now and running a Kickstarter campaign to fund the final stages. Can you share a bit of information about the campaign and where people can check it out?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Pursuing Interests and we’re looking through the lenses of patience and trust.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
This week, I want to share one of my conference talks, Time to Think.
So many of the questions and concerns we hear from unschooling parents boil down to the fears that bubble up when we project our current situation into the future. So, it’s not surprising that the value of bringing ourselves back into the present moment comes up pretty regularly on the podcast!
In this talk, I dig into the ideas of being present in the moment, of being patient with our children, and of giving them time to process their experiences and connect the dots in the ways that make the most sense to them. I also talk about mindfulness, choice, trust, and more. It’s fascinating how time weaves its way so significantly through thinking, learning, and being—in other words, through unschooling.
I hope you find diving into these ideas helpful, wherever you are on your unschooling journey!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU090 Flashback: Growing Up Unschooling with Phoebe Wahl
Jul 14, 2022
This week on the podcast, I’m sharing a conversation I had with grown unschooler Phoebe Wahl a few years ago. Phoebe is an artist whose beautiful work focuses on the themes of comfort, nostalgia, and intimacy. After first grade, Phoebe left school and dove into unschooling. She graduated from Rhode Island School of Design in 2013 with a BFA in Illustration and is currently working as an artist in Washington State. We talked about her passion for drawing, the idea of “knowledge gaps,” what she found valuable in her college experience, how unschooling has influenced her art, and Phoebe’s advice for unschooling parents.
It was so nice to revisit Phoebe’s journey!
Questions for Phoebe
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
How did your passion for drawing develop? Can you share a bit about how that journey unfolded for you?
One of the pretty common worries when people first contemplate unschooling is that their children will have gaps in their knowledge. The question itself speaks to how they’re still using traditional curricula as a standard of what a person “should” know because we all have gaps, don’t we? Can you share your perspective on how unschooling as a lifestyle addresses that concern?
You chose to take some classes in high school and then went to college, attending the Rhode Island School of Design. What did you find most valuable about your college experience?
How do you see your unschooling childhood influencing your art?
Your work has been described as “body positive” and in an online interview you were asked how you defined “body positivity.” You answered: “I think it is holding onto the core value that my worth does not lie in my physical features. It is being gentle and patient with myself, because truly loving, sustainable relationships are a “two steps forward, one step back” process. It is HARD work maintaining an appreciative and honest relationship with yourself. Above all it’s about trusting myself. Sometimes I breach my own trust and have to rebuild. But then again, sometimes my own strength and beauty will impress me beyond what I thought possible.” I love your answer and I think the process applies well to just about every societal expectation we may find ourselves grappling with. I was hoping you could expand a bit about how the process plays out for you.
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Pursuing Interests and we’re looking through the lenses of patience and trust.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU329: Unschooling Stories with Jennifer McGrail
Jul 07, 2022
Jennifer McGrail, long-time unschooling mom of four, joins me on the podcast this week. I last spoke with Jennifer on the podcast in episode 18 and her kids have grown a lot since then! Jennifer shares a family update and we dive deep into how parenting and unschooling change as teenagers transition into young adults. Our roles and interactions change, but the connection is still strong thanks to the relationships that we focused on developing during our unschooling journeys.
It’s always amazing to see how different each unschooler’s path can be and how perfectly it suits them as an individual. It was so great to have a chance to talk more about this phase of our children’s lives and to catch up with Jennifer!
QUESTIONS FOR JENNIFER
Can you share a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
As I mentioned, we last spoke on the podcast back in 2016. What has unschooling looked like for you and your family these last few years?
Let’s dive into unschoolers transitioning into adulthood. There are so many possibilities! Maybe going to college, maybe moving out, maybe full-time work, or maybe none of those things. I’d love to hear your experience and perspective!
What is your favorite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU007 Flashback: Diving into Parenting with Anna Brown
Jun 30, 2022
This week, we’re going alllll the way back to episode 7 to revisit a wonderful conversation I had with Anna Brown about parenting. I had been inspired by one of Anna’s conference talks and was so excited to dive deeper into these concepts with her. We talked about uncovering underlying needs during conflict, validation and empathy, assuming positive intent, letting go of set outcomes, noticing our triggers, the 90-second rule, and finding trust in our children and in unschooling.
These are powerful tools and strategies no matter where you are on your unschooling journey and no matter the age of your kids. In fact, these ideas can help create a strong foundation for any relationship!
Questions for Anna
The first question I’d like to ask from your talk is about finding the underlying needs when a conflict arises. We’ve probably all experienced times when just asking hasn’t worked—often even adults aren’t good at verbalizing what real needs they are trying to meet by engaging in a conflict. How do you go about discovering the underlying needs at play in a conflict?
When your child’s upset about something, it’s not very hard to feel sympathetic, to acknowledge their feelings. But often we jump from there to trying to fix things, and then we wonder why they stay stuck in the upset. As part of my book research, I’ve been reading more about empathy. Empathy is about feeling with a person—acknowledging their emotion, and then connecting with the person on that level, helping them feel heard and understood where they are. It reminds me of how in unschooling circles we talk about validation, that step of acknowledging a child’s feelings as real and valid, connecting with the child where they are, and then moving forward when they are ready. How do you see the process of validation playing out?
What is the 90 second rule?
Another thing you mentioned in your talk really stood out for me because I also found it to be such a helpful way to approach things. It was to recognize that everyone is doing their best in this moment. Can you talk about that?
When you and your child are at odds, it can be tempting to try to maneuver things to get to the outcome we think is best. Even if we don’t come right out and say it, kids can often sense our agenda, can’t they? Yet that can get in the way of their learning and undermine the trust in your relationship. So how else can we approach those moments?
One of the most empowering ideas on my unschooling journey has been the realization that everything is a choice. Really, everything. Was that a big one for you as well?
An important part of deschooling is developing trust: in the process of unschooling, in our children, in ourselves. Why is that so valuable?
Sometimes we are reminded that we’re doing something very unconventional and find ourselves feeling anxious and unsure. What helps you move through those moments?
We all have hot buttons, things we react to almost unconsciously before we even realize what’s happening. Yet on our unschooling journey, as we gain more self-awareness, it’s pretty common to begin to see those automatic reactions as over-reactions to the actual situation at hand. And we don’t want to do that to our family. How can we change things up?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU027 Flashback: Ten Questions with Teresa Graham Brett
Jun 23, 2022
This week on the podcast, we’re revisiting a conversation I had with Teresa Graham Brett back in 2016. Teresa is currently the associate dean of diversity and inclusion at the University of Arizona’s College of Veterinary Medicine. She’s an unschooling mom of two and author of the book Parenting for Social Change.
Teresa’s background as a social justice educator gives her a unique perspective on parenting and unschooling. We talked about adultism, the conventional controlling parenting paradigm, screen time, and ways to move towards a more respectful, supportive parent/child relationship. Teresa shared so many stories from her unschooling journey and many profound realizations and a-ha moments. Her focus on creating social change is inspiring and just as timely and valuable today as it was when we recorded this interview. I hope you enjoy our conversation!
Ten Questions for Teresa
Can you share with us a bit about your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear more about your unschooling kids. What are they interested in right now? How are they pursuing it? How did that interest come about?
You have written on your blog about the concept of adultism. Can you explain how you define it and give us a couple of examples?
One of the consequences of adultism and looking at life through an adult-centric filter is that we often see children as “adults-in-training.” You have a great section about that in your book. Can you share what you see as the implications of that perspective? And how can we move away from it?
In the book, you also make a great distinction between power and control. And you emphasize that, “letting go of control doesn’t mean we abdicate our responsibility to care for the children in our lives.” How do those ideas all weave together?
As people come to unschooling, they usually have a lot of questions surrounding “screen time,” or, I like your phrase, media access. I think that’s because the dominant cultural story is all about how dangerous it is: addictive, violent, mind-numbing, creativity-sucking. Can you share your story?
You identify a number of tools that parents can use as they shift from controlling parenting to supportive parenting. There are three I’d love if you could touch on for us: accepting our feelings; mindfulness; and awareness. Can you describe what they are and how they can help us shift away from the impulse to control?
You book is titled, Parenting for Social Change. Here’s a short quote I love from the book: “By the simple, but often challenging, act of redefining our relationships with children, we can begin the process of creating profound social change.” Can you talk about the social change aspect?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects for you on your unschooling journey so far?
Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
This week, I’m re-sharing one of my conference talks, Curious and Engaged, with you!
Here’s the description: Our conventional society honours learning deeply, yet its definition has steadily narrowed over the years to checking off curriculum expectations and awarding graduation certificates. Does this restrictive view do learning justice? What if real learning is bigger than that? Join Pam as she widens the view on learning, moving beyond curriculum to curiosity, beyond graduation to lifelong learning.
So, in this talk, I focus on three valuable characteristics of real learning—engagement, motivation, and time to think—exploring what they look like through the lenses of both the conventional education system and unschooling. And from there, I talk about some of the day-to-day ways we can live this learning lifestyle with our children.
I’ve found that it can be so valuable to revisit these fundamental concepts as we enter new phases of our unschooling journeys with our children. I hope you enjoy this deep dive into how learning unfolds!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU116 Flashback: Growing Up Unschooling with Summer Jean
Jun 09, 2022
Back in 2018, I spoke to Summer Jean about her experience growing up unschooling. We talked about how her mom came to unschooling, how they dealt with disapproval from extended family members, how her interest in glass art came about, and some of the common questions she gets when people learn she didn’t go to school.
It’s always so interesting to hear stories from the perspective of grown unschoolers and to see just how unique each person’s journey is!
Questions for Summer
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What inspired you to learn more about unschooling and did it change the way you saw your childhood?
I understand that you guys experienced quite a bit of pressure and disapproval from extended family growing up. How did you deal with that? Any tips you’d like to share?
How did you discover your passion for glass art and how did that unfold?
When people find out you that you grew up unschooled, I imagine they are full of questions. What are some of the most common questions you get?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me again this week to dive into listener questions! We talk about navigating sibling and friend relationships, the idea of self-regulation when it comes to technology, and the journey of finding community and connection for ourselves and our children.
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Question summaries
Our first question is from Alison. There are shifts going on with her daughters’ relationship with each other and with their mutual friends. She wants to stand up for her younger daughter when she is being excluded and wants to help them without being pushy.
Our second question is from Belinda in Canada. Her six-year-old son wants to use the iPad more than she feels comfortable with. She believes he can’t self-regulate and wants to protect him from spending too much time on the iPad, while also wishing she didn’t feel that way.
Our final question is from Amelia in Utah. Her five-year-old daughter’s friends are all starting school and so, she’s looking for ideas about finding support and connections with other unschooling families.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU084 Flashback: Enjoy Parenting with Scott Noelle
May 26, 2022
This week on the podcast, I’m sharing a conversation I had with Scott Noelle, unschooling dad of two, back in 2017. Scott is an author and a life coach dedicated to supporting parents who want to move away from control-based parenting methods. He founded The Daily Groove, an email newsletter and website where he shared practical parenting insights for many years. We talked about his parenting framework, PATH, the value of nonverbal communication, ways we can hold presence with negative feelings, and how fear can slip into control.
Whether you’re revisiting our conversation or it’s your first time listening, I’m sure you’ll make some new connections that deepen your understanding of unschooling!
Questions for Scott
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You have a wonderful website, dailygroove.com, where people can sign up to receive daily emails from you. I signed up when I was early on in my unschooling journey, and I really appreciated your nuggets of parenting insight as I was in the midst of challenging so much of the conventional parenting wisdom I’d absorbed. You call it PATH Parenting, and I love that not only is it an acronym, it’s also a reminder that the journey—the path—is the destination. Can you share an overview of what PATH parenting is?
We talk quite a bit in unschooling circles about communicating openly with our children and how it facilitates connection and trust in our relationships, but some children aren’t big verbal communicators. It’s not that they aren’t giving us messages, just that not a lot of them are verbal. If we find ourselves in that situation, what are some other ways we can communicate and connect with our child?
You have a great article on your website about holding presence with negative feelings, such as frustration or fear. Can you share what you mean and how we can develop that skill?
As our children get older, we can sometimes find ourselves uncomfortable with some of their choices. We start feeling fearful and protective, and that can so easily slip into control because that’s the go to response in our culture: forbid the activity and explain the consequences we’ll impose on them if they disobey. That approach can really damage the relationship though, can’t it? What might we do instead?
You’re also a founding member of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education, which advocates both unschooling and alternative schools that support self-directed education. I love that the ADSE is trying to normalize self-directed education as a whole. Could you give us an update on the work that the Alliance is doing?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Richness of Communication and we’re exploring it through the lenses of trust and compassion.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU125 Flashback: Challenges on the Unschooling Journey
May 19, 2022
This week, we are revisiting the first compilation episode I ever created for the podcast! I gathered clips from fourteen different episodes where I asked some version of this question: “What has been one of the more challenging aspects for you on your unschooling journey?”
It is so interesting to hear a wide variety of different responses to the same question. Considering our challenges and peeling back all of those layers can be so valuable. I hope you find this compilation inspiring as you reflect on your own experiences.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Richness of Communication and we’re exploring it through the lenses of trust and compassion.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU238 Flashback: Deschooling with Jessica Kane
May 12, 2022
This week, I’m sharing a lovely conversation I had with Jessica Kane in 2020. Jessica and her husband live in Ireland and have three children. Her oldest attended school through high school, her middle son left school in grade 4, and her youngest son has never been to school. This gives her such a unique perspective to share!
We talked about deschooling and some of the challenges she faced, what she has learned about relationships and communication with her husband, and what has surprised her about her family’s unschooling life. I really enjoyed the details that Jessica shared about her journey and her personal growth and I think her story is such a beautiful example of the value of deschooling!
Questions for Jessica
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling so far? And can you share a bit about your journey through it?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
There are pretty big age gaps between your three children, which puts you in distinctly different seasons with each of them, all at the same time. I’d love to hear more about that!
What is your favorite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
Things mentioned in the episode
Check out the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit! It’s an online workshop that focuses on the deep, personal work needed to peel away the layers of conventional ideas about learning and parenting that can get in the way of cultivating a thriving unschooling spirit in your family. In other words, our own deschooling journey!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Richness of Communication and we’re exploring it through the lenses of trust and compassion.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to spend time creating episodes each week, and to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU037 Flashback: Ten Questions with Carol Black
May 05, 2022
In 2016, I asked Carol Black ten questions about her unschooling journey. Her two daughters were then 22 and 26. We talked about her documentary, Schooling the World, as well as her popular essay, A Thousand Rivers. Carol approaches unschooling and parenting from a cultural lens, through which she’s made many valuable connections and insights. She shared some of the major differences between traditional cultural views of children and the modern, school-centric view, as well as her thoughts about the future and what we can learn from other cultures.
It was such an enlightening conversation!
Ten Questions for Carol
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
2. What are your children up to right now? Looking back, can you see a thread of interests and activities that has brought them to this point?
3. I love the bigger picture lens through which you see and talk about unschooling—through the essays on your website and through your film, Schooling the World. What brought you to explore how children learn across different cultures and incorporate that into your view of unschooling?
4. I’ve seen your wonderful essay, A Thousand Rivers: What the modern world has forgotten about children and learning, being shared in unschooling circles for years. In it you make the point that people today don’t know what children are actually like—they only know what children are like in schools. Your classic quote is, “Collecting data on human learning based on children’s behavior in school is like collecting data on killer whales based on their behavior at Sea World.”
Controlling a child’s learning—content, pace, and style—has such a profound effect on how they see themselves, as both learners and people, doesn’t it?
5. Another great observation you share about unschooling children is that they want their learning to be their own. Can you talk about some of the ways we can interfere with that?
6. You published a new essay on your website earlier this year, On the Wildness of Children: The revolution will not take place in a classroom. In it, you note that compulsory schooling is basically a social experiment originally conceived in the late 1800s to adapt children to the new industrial age—to train them in the skills needed for this new era of manufacturing. Yet in only about seven generations, school has become an integral part of childhood, this background forgotten.
With unschooling, we choose to leave this experiment behind and look at how children are naturally wired to learn. We soon come to see that learning isn’t really a special activity at all, but a natural by-product of being alive in the world, and spending much of their days in, what researcher Suzanne Gaskins calls, a state of “open attention.” Can you describe what that looks like?
7. Now I’d like to shift and talk about your documentary, Schooling the World. Here’s something you wrote by way of introduction: “The film Schooling the World asks us to re-examine some of our deepest assumptions about knowledge, learning, ignorance, poverty, success, and wealth. The purpose of the film is not to provide all the answers, but to ask a question, to open a conversation. Our hope is that you will be able to use the film with your friends, colleagues, students, or organization to begin conversations that will be deep, challenging, and inspiring.” I love that your goal was to spark conversations. So, let’s do that.
First, let’s talk about the culture of schooling. What are some of the differences between the culture of schooling, which basically defines modern childhood, and the culture of childhood in a traditional society?
8. In conversations about traditional cultures, it is regularly suggested that those who appreciate their ways are romanticizing traditional cultures, downplaying problems like infant mortality and infectious diseases. What the film brings out so clearly is that maybe we are romanticizing our own culture and our version of education when we export it overseas. We’ve seen through experience that the school structure also brings with it consequences like lasting damage to children’s creativity, and branding so many children as failures. We also often fail to consider the depth, breadth and complexity of the knowledge systems that we are displacing.
I love the point Wade Davis makes at the end of the film: “These peoples, these cultures, are not failed attempts at being us—they are unique answers to the fundamental question, ‘What does it mean to be human and alive?’ Their answers have allowed them to live sustainably on the planet for generations.”
How might we move beyond romanticizing either side of this cultural confrontation and have deeper conversations about how we connect and engage with other cultures around the world?
9. Can you share a bit about what the filming experience was like? Your daughters came along, yes?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Richness of Communication and we’re exploring it through the lenses of trust and compassion.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU327: Exploring Unschooling Q&A
Apr 28, 2022
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me again this week to dive into listener questions! We talk about navigating a dyslexia/dysgraphia diagnosis, sharing unschooling information and parenting ideas with grandparent caregivers, and the mental overwhelm that can occur at the beginning of the deschooling journey.
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Question Summaries
Our first question is a quick one. The listener is wondering how to report to the state as an unschooler.
Our second question is concerning a dyslexia and dysgraphia diagnosis. The listener wonders how to approach the recommended tutoring plan if the child doesn’t have any interest.
Our third question comes from the parents of a one-year-old who is regularly cared for by both sets of grandparents. They wonder how they should approach sharing what they’ve learned about unschooling with the grandparents and what to do when their parenting approaches clash.
Our final question is from Brittany, who is brand-new to unschooling. She is feeling ungrounded with all of her swirling thoughts and wanting some “me time.”
Podcast Update
I mention this in my intro, but want to share it here too. I’m going to be changing up the podcast, at least for the next while.
I have some projects that I want to free up some time to work on. Things like producing and releasing audiobook editions of my books, and actually publishing the book I shared on the podcast a few months ago to celebrate reaching episode 300.
So, for now, the podcast is going on a bit of an hiatus. That doesn’t mean it’s ending though! There is such a rich library of incredible content that so many newer listeners haven’t yet had the chance to hear. And the podcast audience continues to grow. Over the last month there have been 7,689 unique listeners from 60 different countries. That’s wonderful!
So, I’m still going release an episode every week, but many will be curated from the archive. That said, sometimes there will be new episodes. Surprise! For example, you’ll still be able to submit questions for Q&A episodes and as we get new questions, Anna, Erika and I will record and release new Q&A episodes. Those are definitely listener favorites. I’ll probably put together and release some compilation episodes, inspired by questions I’m receiving. Maybe more unschooling in context episodes. And I do have some interviews scheduled over the next month that will also come out. But, for now, I’ll be creating and releasing them when they bubble up in the flow, versus having a strict ‘new episode every week’ schedule.
And I’m excited to be reviewing and curating amazing episodes from the library to share with you! As I’ve mentioned before, even if you heard the episode when it first came out, it can be so valuable to listen again. You’ve grown and changed since then, and with your now more experienced lens, I’m almost certain you’ll make new connections, deepening your understanding of unschooling and of yourself. And if you haven’t yet heard the episode, you’re in for a treat.
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU326: Walking Together: Seeing the World through Your Child’s Eyes
Apr 21, 2022
This week on the podcast I share a talk I wrote in 2015, Walking Together: Seeing the World through Your Child’s Eyes.
In this talk, I dive into some of things I’ve learned on my unschooling journey about the value of walking together through our days with our children.
I touch on:
ways to shift and see situations through your child’s eyes;
some of the challenges we’re likely to encounter as we move to this new perspective; and
why it’s integral to creating a solid unschooling environment.
Then I talk about some tools to help us along the way!
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU325: Unschooling through Menopause with Sara Yasner
Apr 14, 2022
Sara Yasner joins me on the podcast this week. Sara is an unschooling mom of three and we talk about unschooling alongside her experience going through menopause. Sara’s two sons are older now, but her daughter, Pamela, is nine.
We talk about her family’s flow and how the addition of Pamela shifted things for everyone in very positive ways. Sara shares a lot of what she’s observed about the effects of peri-menopause and menopause and tools that she’s found helpful in taking care of herself. Our conversation through this new lens was so interesting and I think Sara’s insights are so valuable—especially for those at a similar place on their journey!
Sara would love to connect with other parents who are experiencing menopause while unschooling younger children. I encourage you to share your thoughts and experience in the comments on the episode show notes on my website to continue the conversation with Sara!
QUESTIONS FOR SARA
Can you share a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When we first connected, you mentioned you’re curious about other women’s experiences with parenting and unschooling young-ish children during menopause. Can you share some of your experience? And we welcome listeners to share their experiences in the comments for this episode.
You also mentioned that there are plenty of challenging moments to work through as part of the journey. Can you share one or two you experienced and how you moved through them?
You have a background in mindfulness and meditation. I’d love to hear how you find they weave together with unschooling.
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
We invite you to join us in the Living Joyfully Network, a warm and welcoming online community of like-hearted parents. It’s a non-judgmental space where you can steep in these unconventional ideas around parenting, relationships, and learning, and explore what they might look like day-to-day in your uniquely wonderful family. We offer a free month trial so you can see if it’s a good fit for you. Click here to join us.
Sign up to our mailing list on Substack to receive our email newsletters as well as new articles about learning, parenting, and so much more!
Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about exploring unschooling and navigating relationships.
EU292 – Embracing Cocoons and Bubbles with Anna Brown – Sara’s thoughts: Embracing cocoons and bubbles is a great way to look at menopause or any life transition. It’s important to allow what is, with gentleness and kindness, and remember that nothing lasts forever. Seasons of unschooling are the same as seasons of life. Giving myself permission to be where I am and feel how I feel, and loving and trusting my family enough to allow myself to be authentically ‘a mess’ or different than I used to be.
EU035 – Redefining Success with Jo Isaac – Sara’s thoughts: Not Cocoon but just a time in life. It is valuable as is and not just as a path to get somewhere else. Redefining success during this time (of menopause or any life transition/challenge) as well. ‘Success’ as an unschooling parent (or parent in general), in career, as a partner, as a friend, as a human being, etc.
EU281 – Going Deep with Unschooling with Talia Bartoe – Sara’s thoughts: Great comments on the inner work and exploration and self compassion that is central to the unschooling journey. It’s relevant as a new unschooling parent, an unschooling parent well on the path, and for those of us in later years and dealing with menopause and other life transitions.
EU176 – Coming Home with Tara Soto-Regester – Sara’s thoughts: Every experience builds upon the last for continual life evolving and growth. Great episode to hear about the benefit of being present and engaging with what is, how kids and parents are right now, and allowing that exploration and expansion of self.
EU263 – Unschooling Paradigm Shifts with Susan Walker – Sara’s thoughts: Going through a transitional time, moving out of interest/passion in one focus but not yet excited about something new. “It’s okay to be who you are” and, “In order to honor and accept my children, I have to honor and accept myself.”
EU162 – Ten Questions with Alex Peace – Sara’s thoughts: Specifically helpful listening to both Alex and Pam talk about their new passion career taking off when their youngest were teens. This is so topical for women living through menopause as well. Time to now focus on passion/career but also still needed at home and all of it a new time of life.
EU044 – Ten Questions with Jennifer Andersen – Sara’s thoughts: About us as parents also living with and spending time on our passions and interests. Pam said, “We want our kids to live this unschooling life, but I think it’s important to realize that we want to live that lifestyle alongside them. We want to be that shiny example of the person living and learning and doing the things they are interested in, right alongside them so that they see it in action.”
EU007 – Diving into Parenting with Anna Brown – Sara’s thoughts: This episode was so lovely to listen to. I appreciated learning about the “90 second rule” as a specific amount of time that allows the hormones to dissipate enough to be able to think clearly and more easily choose a response (vs. react). Also, it’s always a wonderful reminder to stop and appreciate the moment, especially when feeling overwhelmed, down, or frustrated.
Menopause Resources from Sara
Menopause Taylor YouTube channel – Barbara Taylor, M.D. is a gynecologist who has adopted the name “Menopause Taylor” and taken the professional and fashionable reputation of Barbie to a whole new level. In a completely unbiased manner, she guides you in tailoring all the management options to your own particular needs and desires in five categories: (1) Diet & Lifestyle, (2) Vitamin & Mineral, (3) Herbal & Botanical, (4) Hormonal Medication, and (5) Non-hormonal Medication.
The Biology of Peri-Menopause and Menopause – Learn about what menopause is and what symptoms to expect, how to manage them, and what natural treatments you can employ.
Mental Health During Menopause – The second session of our “Menopause: Body, Mind, and Spirit” series. A panel of mental health specialists discuss particular stressors common during this time, how to anticipate them, and how to manage them.
Spiritual Health during Menopausal Years – The third session of our “Menopause: Body, Mind, and Spirit” virtual series. How to care for your emotional and relational needs and how they may change during this period.
EU324: Open and Queerious with Ellie Winicour
Apr 07, 2022
Ellie Winicour joins me on the podcast this week! Ellie, her wife Jodi, and 8-year-old Celia have always unschooled, following Celia’s interests and flow. Ellie shares some of her experience embracing pretend play and the deep connection that comes from stepping away from the mainstream adult-child power dynamic. She also shares how she has intentionally created an inclusive environment for Celia and some ideas to help other families do the same. We talk about finding community that supports us and our families and how that can change from season to season.
Ellie’s connection with Celia and the joy of their unschooling lives is inspirational!
Questions for Ellie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
I have found the concept of flow to be such a good description of how unschooling feels to me day to day. And when I hear your stories about your days with Celia, that word seems to fit so well. How would you describe the flow of your days?
You’ve shared a bit on the Network about your journey around play and I thought it was really inspiring. Pretend play can be challenging for many parents, and I was hoping you could share a little bit of your process and what you’ve discovered.
You’ve been very intentional about cultivating an inclusive and supportive environment for Celia. What has that looked like through the years?
Finding community can be so valuable on our unschooling journeys, both for our children and ourselves. The Living Joyfully Network has been a great place for us to connect and I’m so grateful that you and another member have come together and started a new group there called Open and Queerious, for LGBTQ+ families. Can you share a bit about how you find community for you and for Celia?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Embracing Beginner’s Mind and we’re exploring it through the lenses of release and explore.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU323: Spinning a Web: The Art of Learning
Mar 31, 2022
This week on the podcast I share a talk I wrote in 2014, Spinning a Web: The Art of Learning.
With unschooling, learning often looks very different than what we’ve been taught to expect, so it can take a while to recognize it in action. And then it takes time to figure out how, as unschooling parents, we can actively support it.
First, we’ll take a look at the conventional approach to learning so we can compare it to unschooling and better understand the differences. Then we’ll talk about three ways we can support and encourage our children’s learning through unschooling, namely by:
being open
being patient, and
being brave.
And then we weave it all together into a wonderful a-ha moment, after which unschooling really starts to shine!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Treasure of Time and we’re exploring it through the lenses of expectations and flow.
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me again this week to dive into listener questions! We talk about cocooning and connecting with young teens, the mainstream concept of productivity and how we get curious about external messages of judgment, and the idea of an “ideal unschooler.”
As always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Our first question comes from the comments on our last Q&A YouTube video. The viewer is feeling disconnected from their young teen and worrying about the time he’s spending gaming.
Our second question from Maya is concerning the concept of productivity. She wonders why it feels difficult to release her judgments about productivity and laziness.
Our final question relates to curiosity. The listener wonders if people who are more naturally curious about a wide variety of topics make better unschoolers and whether there is something they can do to help their younger two children who seem uninterested in following those curiosity trails.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Treasure of Time and we’re exploring it through the lenses of expectations and flow.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU321: A Passion for Creative Writing
Mar 17, 2022
This week on the podcast, I am joined by two teenage writers, Isabella Watkins and Caitlin Wharton, and their mentor, Milva McDonald. The three of them share their experience creating and participating in a homeschool creative writing group. This past year, they published an anthology of short stories and poetry and they describe some of the process of working on a big, collaborative project. They also share some of the important factors that make their group a safe space to explore writing together.
Their excitement about writing and their support of each other is so beautiful to see!
Questions for Isabella, Caitlin and Milva
Can you introduce yourself and share what you’re interested in right now? What’s making your eyes light up?
How did your writing group come together? Basically, what’s the origin story? And what does it look like now?
I’ve been reading and enjoying your book, Unlocked: An Anthology of Short Stories and Poetry. I’d love to hear the story behind choosing to create the book. And how did that process unfold?
This question is for Isabella and Caitlin. Since you don’t go to school, you have much more freedom in what you choose to do with your time day to day. I’m curious to hear how your passion for creative writing weaves through your days.
Can you share a couple of tips for anyone who’s interested in starting a writing group?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Treasure of Time and we’re exploring it through the lenses of expectations and flow.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU320: Amy’s Unschooling Journey with Amy Hughes
Mar 10, 2022
Amy Hughes, unschooling mom of eight children, joins me on the podcast this week. Over the years, Amy’s family moved from school to homeschooling to Charlotte Mason and finally to unschooling. She shares the big a-ha that led her to unschooling as well as how unschooling works in her large family. We talk about Amy’s advice to other large families and what has helped her most to avoid overwhelm. She also shares her daughter’s experience with attending college after unschooling.
Amy’s joyful excitement shines through in this inspiring conversation!
Questions for Amy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
What did your family’s move from regular homeschooling to unschooling look like?
With eight kids ranging from toddlers to teens, I feel like you’re experiencing different seasons of unschooling all at the same time! How does unschooling look different between toddlers, kids, and teens?
What’s your favorite piece of advice or experience to share about unschooling in large families?
One of the more common questions that comes up as people explore unschooling is, what about college? I’d love to hear about your experience with unschoolers choosing to go to college.
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Treasure of Time and we’re exploring it through the lenses of expectations and flow.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU319: Unschooling Stories with Missy Willis
Mar 03, 2022
Missy Willis, a longtime unschooling mom of two, joins me again on the podcast this week to share more about her unschooling journey. We talk about the way that unschooling leads us to question everything, from conventional parenting and education to productivity and success. And we dive deep into a few common misconceptions about peaceful parenting. Missy also shares several mantras that she has found valuable and grounding as a parent.
It was so much fun to catch up with Missy and to dig into some of the foundational concepts of unschooling and parenting!
Questions for Missy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
When we connected for this call, you mentioned that one of the things you like about unschooling is how it not only leads people to question the education system, but eventually other systems as well. I’d love to hear about your experience with this.
As we dive into deeper deschooling, we come to question the conventional wisdom that surrounds parenting. I think there are a couple of misconceptions about this more peaceful approach to parenting that can get in our way at first. One is that peaceful parenting means our “goal” is to eliminate conflict. Another is that peaceful is akin to passive. But neither of those is true, is it?
I saw your recent post about mantras on Instagram and I was hoping you could share a few of your favorites and why you find them helpful.
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Treasure of Time and we’re exploring it through the lenses of expectations and flow.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU318: Exploring Unschooling Q&A
Feb 24, 2022
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me again this week to dive into listener questions! We explore the idea of unschooling philosophy and strong beliefs, how gaming and unschooling might go together, and the idea of “self-directed” learning.
And, as always, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer, because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone. Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Our first question comes from California. The listener wonders about how unschoolers view high academic achievement and whether unschoolers pursue advanced degrees, such as medical degrees or MBAs. [starts at 3:56]
Our second question from Jenn is concerning the idea of learning basic academic skills. Her children spend most of their time gaming and are not interested in reading and writing. She wonders if gaming can be a valuable part of an unschooling lifestyle. [starts at 21:38]
Our final question is another unschooling philosophy question, this time about physical activity and movement. The listener wonders if we are doing more sedentary children a disservice by not insisting on movement activities. [starts at 34:39]
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Four Pillars of Unschooling, loosely based on my book, Free to Learn. We’re focusing on one pillar each week: redefining learning, following their interests, making choices, and “Why not yes?”
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU317: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Feb 17, 2022
Anna Brown joins me for another Unschooling in Context episode! This time, we explore unschooling in the context of boundaries, comfort zones, and capacity. This topic came up as we were diving into cultivating self-awareness in the Living Joyfully Network last month and we wanted to talk about it here too!
Setting boundaries is a popular topic in parenting and self-development circles, but the energy of that term can feel confrontational or rigid when we think about our relationships with our children. We talk about how the term “comfort zone” has a different feel and how capacity may be a good lens to look through when facing challenging times. This conversation is a deep dive into how our word choices and the stories we tell ourselves impact our relationships. It’s so much fun to explore!
Discussion Points
Boundaries are popular in conventional self-care circles but setting boundaries can lead to disconnection in our relationships with our children.
Shifting from boundaries to comfort zones, advocating for our needs without drawing a line in the sand.
We can choose to stretch our comfort zones or to operate outside our comfort zones.
When we are faced with limitations, capacity can be a helpful description. Capacity changes depending on the context and doesn’t feel as rigid as a boundary, while still being communicative.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Four Pillars of Unschooling, loosely based on my book, Free to Learn. We’re focusing on one pillar each week: redefining learning, following their interests, making choices, and “Why not yes?”
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU316: Teens and Passions with Robyn Robertson
Feb 10, 2022
Robyn Robertson, unschooling mom of two, joins me again on the podcast this week. Since our last conversation in 2018, Robyn’s kids have grown! We talk about how unschooling changes when our children become teenagers. Robyn shares how supporting their interests and passions looks different now, but that the connection and relationships are still strong.
We dive into the idea of teenage rebellion and expectations that might pop up as our children grow. It’s amazing to see how the foundation of trust that Robyn has built with her children over their years of unschooling has created this rich atmosphere for growth and learning as they move towards adulthood!
Questions for Robyn
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
Since we last spoke, your kids have entered their teen years. Do you feel like your unschooling days have changed from when they were younger?
The idea of teen rebellion is pretty ubiquitous in the parenting world, yet many unschooling parents really enjoy life with their teens. I’d love to hear about your experience!
Supporting our children’s passions continues to be important and that can take on a whole new meaning as our kids get older, can’t it?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Four Pillars of Unschooling, loosely based on my book, Free to Learn. We’re focusing on one pillar each week: redefining learning, following their interests, making choices, and “Why not yes?”
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU315: Nurturing Our Children and Ourselves with Teresa Hess
Feb 03, 2022
Teresa Hess, unschooling mom of three, joins me again on the podcast this week to explore how her unschooling journey has helped her not only nurture her children but re-parent herself. We talk about Teresa’s spiritual view of unschooling and the upward spiral of connection and love that happens when we see children as whole beings. Teresa also shares her issues with the commonly-used term “boundaries” and how she has created a respectful alternative in her family.
She has found the process of parenthood and unschooling to be deeply impactful and healing and it was so interesting to hear her insights!
Questions for Teresa
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
When we were organizing this call, you mentioned the idea of self-parenting and how it’s been a part of your journey. I’d love to hear more about that!
For many parents, embracing unschooling comes to unearth a spiritual aspect, which you’ve described as “honoring the light and essence of the individual child.” Can you share how that perspective has unfolded for you?
For me, seeing my children’s inherent wholeness blossom with unschooling awoke in me the seed of understanding that I too am whole and worthy just as I am. Which in turn allowed me to nurture and hold space for my kids even more deeply, round and round, cultivating a positive spiral that is so much more valuable than, “What did you learn today?” I’d love to hear your experience!
You wrote a wonderful blog post, titled “True Boundaries,” that so clearly demonstrates the value of understanding and nurturing ourselves alongside our children on this unschooling journey. So much of this work helps us move beyond parenting in unconscious reaction to our own childhood wounds, doesn’t it?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Four Pillars of Unschooling, loosely based on my book, Free to Learn. We’ll be focusing on one pillar each week: redefining learning, following their interests, making choices, and “Why not yes?”
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU314: Exploring Unschooling Q&A
Jan 27, 2022
Anna Brown and Erika Ellis join me this week to dive into listener questions! We explore technology and “screen time,” deschooling, connection, and validation. And as I mention at the beginning of our conversation, our Q&A conversations aren’t focused on giving anyone the “right” answer. That’s because there isn’t a universal “right” answer for any given situation that will work for everyone.
Instead, our focus is on exploring different aspects of the situation and playing with the kinds of questions we might ask ourselves to better understand what’s up. We’re sharing food for thought through the lens of unschooling.
Our first question is from Ella, a new unschooling mom with three young children. As the family is deschooling, she’s noticing that the children are choosing to watch TV for a lot of the day. Her partner is uncomfortable with the situation and she wants to know about setting boundaries around TV time or how to find a balance of how her children are spending their free time. [starts at 3:51]
Our second question from Tara is concerning avid video-gaming kids who used to spend more time playing outside. Tara feels stuck in a rut and like her children no longer want to do the things that they used to do. Often, when they do go outside, they love their time there, but it’s hard to get them out the door. [starts at 20:20]
Our final question is from Nadia, who is trying to figure out how to support her children as they attend school at her ex-husband’s insistence. She’s wondering what her options are as she believes unschooling would be a better path for them, though it feels like she doesn’t have a choice given the circumstances. [starts at 43:21]
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Cultivating Self Awareness and we’re exploring it through the lenses of curiosity and acceptance.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU313: Advice for New Unschooling Dads
Jan 20, 2022
This week, I’ve put together a compilation episode with answers to a question I ask many of the unschooling dads who are on the podcast: As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
And I love the range of answers! Trusting our kids and letting more of the world in. Getting involved with our kids and sharing our passions. Empowering yourself by learning how unschooling works. Balancing protectiveness with trust. Understanding that humans are naturally curious. And giving yourself permission to question your gut.
They share so many wonderful insights and I think everyone, wherever they are on their journey, will find them inspiring!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Cultivating Self Awareness and we’re exploring it through the lenses of curiosity and acceptance.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU312: The Breadth of Unschooling with Sara Davidson
Jan 13, 2022
Sara Davidson, unschooling mom of two, joins me on the podcast this week to explore the breadth of unschooling.
Sara shares her journey from controlling, conventional parenting to the connected relationships she has with her children now. We talk about many of the paradigm shifts she made along the way and how her entire view of parenting and learning has changed. Sara also shares so many insightful observations about how unschooling has not only affected her relationships with her children, but also with her husband and herself.
Our conversation was so much fun!
Questions for Sara
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When we connected, you mentioned how moving to unschooling has impacted every aspect of your life and I’d love to dive deeper into that with you. Let’s start with learning. How has your idea of learning grown since you began unschooling?
Now, let’s talk relationships. For many parents embracing unschooling, there’s a big shift in how we relate to our kids as we move away from control and focus on connection. I’d love to hear about your experience with that.
How has this shift to unschooling impacted other relationships, beyond with your children?
And finally, how has embracing unschooling changed your relationship with yourself and how you engage with your days?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Cultivating Self Awareness and we’re exploring it through the lenses of curiosity and acceptance.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU311: Ten Questions with Erika Ellis
Jan 06, 2022
Erika Ellis joins me again on the podcast this week! On previous episodes, Erika and I have talked about unschooling book clubs and self care, but she’s back to share more about her unschooling journey.
We talk about the paradigm shifts that she made during deschooling and how her and her husband’s teaching work influenced their path. Erika also shares her experiences moving through the fears and discomfort that pop up as her kids grow older. We talk about the exciting energy of the new year and how her self-care practices have changed over time.
Through the whole conversation, the joy of her family’s unschooling life shines through!
Questions for Erika
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When you were in the thick of deschooling, what were some of the most challenging paradigm shifts you made?
Even after we move through the bulk of deschooling, challenges and fears continue to bubble up here and there because that’s life. And we’ve come to realize that they really are all about us, aren’t they?
What has your husband’s journey to unschooling looked like? Was this a new idea to him?
Has there been a time when one of your kids’ interests really stretched your comfort zone? How did you move through that?
What, so far, has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
We had a conversation on the podcast a couple of years ago, episode 201, diving into self-care, which I encourage everyone to check out! I’d love to hear how your experience with self-care may have evolved since then. And with this episode coming out in the new year, can you share some thoughts on embracing that energy?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
From your perspective right now, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling so far?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is Cultivating Self Awareness and we’re exploring it through the lenses of curiosity and acceptance.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU310: Unschooling Through the Teen Years
Dec 30, 2021
We may have been unschooling pretty comfortably for years, connecting with our kids, having fun, actively supporting them as they pursue their interests, but then our eldest approaches the teen years and all of a sudden we start to feel a bit uncomfortable. We begin to worry. Is unschooling going to work through the teen years?
It’s a pretty common scenario and I’m excited to dive into it with you!
In this talk I gave in February 2021 at the Canadian Online Homeschool Conference, first we’re going to explore those voices in our head that start to bubble up when our child hits their teens. It’s not surprising because, until now, we’ve had no real reason to do the work and peel back the layers of goo that infuse the conventional wisdom surrounding teens. We’ll look at some of those messages we’ve likely absorbed about both the earlier and later teen years.
Then we’re going to talk about ways we can actively support our kids through the teen years. Unschooling with teens is often less hands-on day to day, but it’s not less time and effort on our part. It just looks different. And again, we’ll explore what our support and engagement might look like in both the earlier and later teen years.
Check out the Canadian Online Homeschool Conference to sign up for information related to the 2022 online conference, being held February 7-12. I’ll be speaking and my talk is called, Helping Kids Find Their Passion.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Joys of Unschooling and we’re exploring it through the lenses of presence and kindness.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU309: Deschooling with Christina Kauffman
Dec 23, 2021
Christina Kauffman is an unschooling mom of three young kids, and she joins me this week to talk about her deschooling journey. We explore both what she’s found challenging and what she’s found surprising so far. She also shares her experience with navigating sibling dynamics.
We have a lovely conversation!
Questions for Christina
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you? Can you share a bit about your journey through it?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
One of the benefits of choosing unschooling is how much time the family spends together. Yet, sibling dynamics can sometimes be challenging to navigate. I’d love to hear about your experience with that.
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Joys of Unschooling and we’re exploring it through the lenses of presence and kindness.
EU308: Unschooling Dads with Philip Mott
Dec 16, 2021
Philip Mott, a former teacher and unschooling dad to three young children, joins me this week. Philip shares how his unschooling journey began and how his experience as a teacher and what he learned about educational philosophy shaped his path. We talk about the challenges of deschooling and how ingrained our cultural beliefs really are.
For Philip, the opposite of unschooling is authoritarianism, and deschooling is all about questioning authoritarian practices and replacing that model with a focus on relationships. He also invites dads on this journey to question their own gut instincts, wondering how much of what we think is our gut is really societal messages.
Philip is passionate about sharing the philosophy of unschooling and we have a wonderful conversation!
Questions for Philip
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
I understand that you were a teacher before diving into unschooling. I’m curious how you discovered unschooling and how your teaching experience wove into your family’s choice to move to unschooling. What did that look like?
Having been a teacher, I imagine the need for deschooling made sense pretty quickly. What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you? Can you share a bit about how you worked through it?
Deschooling often quickly grows beyond school to exploring the kind of person we want to be. When we connected, you mentioned that lately you’ve been redefining your role as a father. I’d love to hear your thoughts around that process.
What is your favorite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Joys of Unschooling and we’re exploring it through the lenses of presence and kindness.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU307: How Unschooling Grows with Fran Liberatore
Dec 09, 2021
Fran Liberatore, unschooling mom of two and the creator behind the Instagram account Big Mothering, joins me this week to talk about her unschooling journey so far. Fran, currently working on her master’s degree in early years education, shares some of her reflections about educational philosophy and practice and how she hopes to see schools change for future children.
We talk about adultism and other societal messages we absorb about children, which then affect the way we treat children. Fran also shares her experience doing the deep inner work of unschooling and some of the ways she has grown and learned from her children.
Fran has thought deeply about parenting and education and her philosophical reflections are inspiring!
Questions for Fran
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When we began unschooling, one of the first things I really began to unpack was just how thoroughly we judge and control children, treating them as adults-in-training. Many years later, I’m still peeling back layers around this. You’ve written about this as the adult gaze. What does that mean to you?
With unschooling we’ve definitely chosen to question the education system and soon after that, the adult-child power dynamic. It doesn’t take long before many of us find ourselves questioning the multitude of systems that weave through our lives, does it?
When we connected, you mentioned you’re doing a masters in early years education. I’d love to hear the story behind that!
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Joys of Unschooling and we’re exploring it through the lenses of presence and kindness.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU306: Unschooling Seasons with Iris Chen
Dec 02, 2021
Iris Chen, author of Untigering and mother of two, returns to the podcast this week to share what their unschooling lives look like right now and talk about her book. Iris talks about her family’s experience with a self-directed learning center and the path her sons took to make the choice to attend one.
We dive into the connection between parenting and unschooling and how her book is about the inner work needed to be a peaceful parent—and in turn, an unschooling parent. Iris also shares how her earlier unschooling days helped shape the relationships that now thrive even in this new season, with new activities and schedules.
Questions for Iris
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
When we connected, you mentioned the idea of “seasons of unschooling.” I thought that was a beautiful description of how unschooling flows over time. Can you share what it means to you?
How do you see unschooling principles continue to weave through your days now that they include time your boys spend at a learning center?
Do you think bringing the learning center into your lives may have been a different experience if it had happened earlier in your unschooling journey?
I definitely want to mention your book, Untigering: Peaceful Parenting for the Deconstructing Tiger Parent. I really enjoyed it! It’s focused on parenting rather than unschooling per se, but those parenting shifts really are integral to unschooling, aren’t they?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling, with its different seasons, has unfolded for your family so far?
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
This month, our theme is The Joys of Unschooling and we’re exploring it through the lenses of presence and kindness.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons. Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU305: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 7
Nov 25, 2021
This week, we’re finishing up my miniseries, In Celebration of Unschooling, sharing the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting.
In chapter 8, Childhood is Bigger Than School, I explore how we can choose to embrace the unschooling mindset even if school happens to be part of your lives right now.
I talk about a number of small, but powerful, paradigm shifts that can help you move beyond the school mindset. The classroom is definitely one way to learn, but you don’t need to relinquish control over your family’s lives to the education system as if it’s the only way to learn or give it the final say on what your children are learning. The world is bigger than school.
How looking beyond test marks and grades doesn’t mean we need to belittle the classroom environment in which our children find themselves. Using school as a tool means taking all the great parts and letting the parts that don’t work for our children flow on by. We can continue to follow and support our children’s intrinsic motivation within the school environment.
There is so much life outside of school hours. Even when school is in the picture, you can spend the many hours outside the classroom focused on helping your children explore themselves and their world through making choices and following their interests, rather than insisting on certain activities chosen strategically for future school success.
Even if school is in part of your lives, you don’t need to value school learning over any other kind of learning.
And then, in the final chapter, The Art of Parenting, we take a moment to gather ourselves. We’ve reached the summit of our parenting expedition. What does the view look like from here?
It’s not a pristine view, with picture-perfect trees, and a babbling brook of ice-cold, clear water streaming out of a crevice and meandering down the slope. It’s messier. A bent tree searching out the light. A fallen log decomposing. A broken branch over the brook, redirecting its flow. But it’s more alive. Raw beauty.
Now it’s time to weave together our beautiful unschooling tapestry! We pull together the threads of questioning the eighteen-year window of childhood and how we define success. The intimately connected threads of curiosity, learning, and creativity. And the many threads of character growth and the connected and trusting family relationships we continue to cultivate. Again, raw beauty.
Sure, the knowledge and skills our unschooling kids gather over the years won’t reflect the school’s curriculum exactly, and maybe not even closely, but it will reflect each child’s unique view of the world. And it is the threads of those personal interests and passions that will weave into their adult lives. The roots of their days—pursuing their goals and aspirations—don’t change from childhood to adulthood, even as the content of their days may change drastically. Their curiosity, lifelong perspective on learning, and creative approach to challenges come together in ways that will serve them well over their lifetime.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU304: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 6
Nov 18, 2021
I’m continuing my miniseries, In Celebration of Unschooling, sharing the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting.
This week, we’re diving into Chapter 7: Family Relationships.
In this chapter, I explore moving beyond power struggles, the idea of fairness and how it doesn’t mean equal, ways to cultivate strong and trusting relationships with our kids, and the value of fostering joy.
These ideas around family relationships can seem unconventional, how focusing on supporting and connecting with each family member individually actually cultivates stronger family relationships. Yet, as so many unschooling families have discovered, when individuality is cherished and nurtured, the family flourishes.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU303: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 5
Nov 11, 2021
I’m continuing my miniseries, In Celebration of Unschooling, sharing the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting.
This week, we’re diving into Chapter 6: Exploring Character.
In this chapter, I dive into some of the character traits being explored and discussed by psychologists and researchers. Building on the character discussion we began in chapter 2 where we looked at the why, now we’ll tackle the how. And we’re going to concentrate on the traits that I’ve seen have a significant impact on our children’s ability to navigate and engage with the world.
The list is similar to what researchers have cited as markers of “success,” though we’ve already redefined that measure for ourselves. Though the lives of unschooling teens and young adults can definitely look successful through a conventional lens, we’re now starting to see that they are coming to it from a decidedly unconventional perspective.
We’ll explore self-awareness, empathy, trust in themselves, adaptability, grit, and how everything we’ve talked about so far weaves together into our expanding picture of unschooling in action.
At unschooling gatherings, one of the first things most new people point out is the children’s enthusiasm. And not just the younger children, the older ones too. The teens and young adults are just as busy doing interesting things: having fascinating conversations, playing games, helping out younger kids, engaging in their passions and sharing with anyone who’s interested, curiously investigating what others are up to. They haven’t become cynical. They still have interests. They still do things with enthusiasm. It’s infectious!
It’s the curiosity that pops them out of bed in the morning. The intrinsic joy of learning new and interesting things. The self-awareness and trust in themselves to make choices and try things out. The adaptability to creatively adjust their course in response to shifting circumstances. The grit to keep moving toward their long-term goals even as the path weaves momentarily out of sight. It’s a zest for life that is almost palpable.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU302: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 4
Nov 04, 2021
I’m continuing my miniseries, In Celebration of Unschooling, sharing the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting.
This week, we’re diving into Chapter 5: Cultivating Creativity.
In this chapter, I dive into the widely accepted Geneplore model of creativity, a combination of “generate” and “explore.” The generative stage is the brainstorming of ideas, and the exploratory stage is the evaluation and implementation of those ideas.
Those terms—generate and explore—align well with the ways we describe unschooling, don’t they? I share my thoughts around how unschooling beautifully nurtures both stages. I also talk about the benefits of free time and the cost of judgment and shame—and what they both have to do with creativity.
And as we wrap up these three chapters on curiosity, learning, and creativity, I am again reminded how intimately they all weave together! Nurturing our children’s curiosity is how they experience the deep satisfaction and joy inherent in learning. It’s how they discover that learning often combines both engaging with the topic and contemplating the experience, leading to a deeper understanding of the connections that weave between things. And that wealth of knowledge, experiences, and connections in turn directly feed creativity.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU301: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 3
Oct 28, 2021
I’m continuing my miniseries, In Celebration of Unschooling, sharing the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting.
This week, we’re diving into Chapter 4: The Joy of Learning.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU300: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 2
Oct 21, 2021
To mark the occasion of hitting 300 episodes, I decided to share the draft of an as yet unpublished book I wrote a few years ago. The book looks at unschooling through the lens of parenting and with an audience in mind who are curious, but maybe haven’t yet made the leap. And I was trying to bring in ideas that I’d come across out in the world that, likely unbeknownst to the authors, resonated well with unschooling.
Last week, I shared the book’s Introduction, Chapter 1: What is Unschooling?, and Chapter 2: Our Parenting Mindset.
This week, we’re diving into Chapter 3: Nurturing Curiosity.
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU299: In Celebration of Unschooling, Part 1
Oct 14, 2021
Episode 299! Wow.
For the last few weeks, I’ve been pondering what I’d like to do to mark the milestone of 300 episodes. Maybe a compilation episode, maybe a solo episode. Hmm. I’ve been doing those regularly for the last while (which I’m loving), so I planted that seed and let it bubble around in the back of my mind as I went about my days. I had a title I loved, though, In Celebration of Unschooling.
And then (at pretty much the last possible moment, of course) … CLICK!
But first, I need to share a bit of backstory.
Earlier this year I came across a draft of a book I wrote back in 2015 and 2016, completely re-organizing it three times before putting it on the back burner to simmer and shifting my focus to writing The Unschooling Journey, which I published in 2018.
I wrote this book through the lens of parenting and with an audience in mind who’s curious about unschooling, but maybe haven’t yet made the leap. And I was trying to bring in ideas about children and learning that I’d come across out in the world that, likely unbeknownst to the authors, resonated well with unschooling. So, trying to meet new-to-the-idea-of-unschooling parents where they are.
I wasn’t sure how well I did that, which is why I put it in the metaphorical drawer of first drafts to marinate. Fast forward to now and I’m spending most of my time producing the podcast and supporting the Living Joyfully Network community, so I don’t know when, or even if, I’ll dive back into the book. And yet, there are ideas and connections in there that I’d like to share.
And, in case you haven’t yet guessed the punchline, this podcast milestone seems like a fitting opportunity in which to do that!
This book has also changed titles quite a few times—from Free to Think, to The Art of Unschooling, to The Art of Parenting, to The Art of Being a Parent—but, you know what, In Celebration of Unschooling feels just fine right now.
So, over the next seven weeks I’m going to be sharing the book with you! The hook, the build, the twist, the payoff. And even if you’re not smack in the middle of the intended audience, as you’ve heard me say many times before, I think that no matter where you are on your unschooling journey, you can still get a lot out of revisiting ideas you’ve encountered before.
It might help remind you and reground you in why you’ve chosen unschooling for your family. And that often helps us stay more fully in the moment with our children. Maybe it’ll spark some new connections, helping you understand and appreciate the beauty of unschooling more deeply. Which in turn may bring new possibilities to your family’s days.
Let’s find out. I hope you enjoy accompanying me on the ride!
The Network is a wonderful online community for parents to engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. Our shared goals are to embrace lifelong learning, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. If you’re curious to learn more, click here!
Become a podcast patron
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU298: Unschooling Stories with Megan Valnes
Oct 07, 2021
Megan Valnes, an unschooling mom of six, joins me this week to talk about her unschooling journey. Megan was on the podcast once before, way back in 2018, and it was so fun to catch up and see how her life has unfolded since then.
She shares some of the challenges of having a large family, as well as many of the mindset shifts and creative solutions that have helped her meet so many varied needs. We talk a lot about the inner work of deschooling and how it is an ongoing part of her life, even after all of these years of unschooling. Megan reflects on how she has seen trust weave through her journey: trust in her children, their trust in her, as well as her trust in the lifestyle itself. She also shares an example of the healing and relationship repairs that are possible when she focuses on connection instead of control.
It was a beautiful conversation with so many valuable insights!
Questions for Megan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
In our earlier conversation back in March 2018, we spoke about how you found unschooling and focused on deschooling. Looking back now, how important was that more focused deschooling phase as part of your journey?
I’d love to hear your experience with navigating the different needs and personalities of six kids. How do you find your unschooling days flow?
I remember reading a book about attachment and the author mentioned that even sensitive caregivers get it right only about 50 percent of the time. What stands out is that they actively acknowledge and repair the disconnecting moments. What has repairing relationships looked like for you?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
What is your favorite thing about your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU297: Cultivating Trust with Anna Brown
Sep 30, 2021
Anna Brown joins me this week to talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Cultivating Trust. This has been such a valuable theme to explore because trust really is foundational to unschooling—I can’t imagine unschooling thriving without trust!
We begin by looking at how we can develop trust with our children, which goes both ways: our trust in them and their trust in us. We also explore how we can similarly cultivate trust with our partner, which in turn helps to create a strong team spirit in our family.
From there, we consider the inner work that turns out to be such a powerful and important aspect of our unschooling journey: cultivating trust in ourselves. And finally, as our trusting and connected relationships continue to weave more strongly together with our growing understanding of and trust in ourselves, our trust and confidence in unschooling grows.
It was so interesting to dive into all of these overlapping layers of cultivating trust!
Things we discuss
Cultivating trust with our children.
Cultivating trust with our partner.
Cultivating trust in ourselves.
Cultivating trust in unschooling as our family’s chosen lifestyle.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU296: Deschooling Discoveries
Sep 23, 2021
This week, I’ve put together a compilation episode exploring deschooling discoveries. One of the many things I love about the unschooling journey is how unexpected it can be. As we dive deeper and deeper into deschooling, we begin to question so many things! Things we thought were pretty much facts—about children, about learning, about relationships, about how the world works.
Many podcast guests have shared how surprised they were that the unschooling journey entailed a lot of personal growth and transformation. That so much of it is OUR work to do, not the kids—their living and learning soon flows beautifully as we release our need to try to control it.
So, in this episode, I’ve gathered some clips in which guests share their, often surprising, deschooling discoveries and insights. It’s so interesting to hear them side by side! I suspect new connections and insights may bubble up for you too as you listen in.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU295: Unschooling Dads with Jesper Conrad
Sep 16, 2021
Jesper Conrad joins me this week to talk about his experience as an unschooling dad. Jesper shares his perspective of their family’s decision to unschool, which began when their now 15-year-old son tried kindergarten. We talk about Jesper’s move from an office job to working from home and some of the paradigm shifts that he’s experienced over the years as a result of questioning the mainstream path. He also reflects on the benefits of being a traveling family and what he enjoys the most about their unschooling life now.
After speaking with his wife, Cecilie, last week on the podcast, it was so interesting to hear about the family’s journey through Jesper’s lens!
Questions for Jesper
Can you share a bit about you and what you’re interested in right now?
What inspired you to embrace unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like from your perspective?
What has been your biggest paradigm shift or a-ha moment so far? How did it come about?
What do you love about combining unschooling with your more nomadic lifestyle?
What is your favorite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU294: Worldschooling Nomads with Cecilie Conrad
Sep 09, 2021
Cecilie Conrad joins me from Istanbul this week to talk about her unschooling, worldschooling life with her family. Cecilie shares about her path to unschooling, which started when her second child began attending school. We talk about how her family’s love of travel has enriched their lives and how the unschooling lifestyle fits so well with their choice to explore. Cecilie also reflects on the amazing relationships that she has been able to cultivate with her four children as a result of diving deep into their loves and interests together.
Questions for Cecilie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your kids? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did your family discover unschooling and what did your move to unschooling look like?
You have a wonderful essay on your website titled, ‘I used to be a feminist.’ Can you share a bit about that journey?
What do you love about combining unschooling with your more nomadic lifestyle?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU293: Raising Free People with Akilah S. Richards
Sep 02, 2021
Akilah S. Richards joins me again to talk about her most recent book, Raising Free People: Unschooling as Liberation and Healing Work. We talk about her definitions of unschooling and deschooling and dive deep into the far-reaching impacts of choosing an unschooling lifestyle. We also dive into some of the profound realizations she’s had about schoolishness, adultism, and the way our culture treats children, as well as how questioning all of that has allowed her to create deeper relationships with her own children.
Akilah also shares how the pandemic has given many families the opportunity to pause and see their children in a new way, and the changes that ripple out from there are transformative.
Our conversation was powerful and inspiring!
Questions for Akilah
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and what everybody’s interested in right now?
You wrote, “Unschooling is a way of life that is based on freedom, respect, and autonomy. Listening and witnessing help parents to facilitate learning by offering resources for their child to pursue their interests and to follow their curiosity, without the restrictions of time limitations or judgment by way of testing.” You mentioned the key elements there in your description, following their curiosity, pursuing their interests, no time limitations. Let’s start there. How have you seen that playing out in your family?
You wrote about viewing your relationships with your children through the lens of post-colonial parenting and how that helped you move beyond that adult-centric perspective on those relationships and what it means to be a parent. That is just a bigger lens on adultism. I was hoping you could share a little bit more about how that’s looked for you.
Let’s dive into the importance of developing “mad question-asking” skills! For years, my mantra has been “open and curious.” Not assuming our way is the “best” way and instead asking questions really opens us up to learning so much about our kids, doesn’t it?
What is your favorite thing about your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU292: Embracing Cocoons and Bubbles with Anna Brown
Aug 26, 2021
Anna Brown joins me this week to talk about our monthly theme in the Living Joyfully Network, Embracing Cocoons and Bubbles. It is part of the human experience to have periods of introspection, of pulling inward, processing, and integrating. Our children may lose interest in their usual activities while not yet knowing what’s next for them, or they may choose to stay home more, spending time in a comforting nest.
We look at some common seasons in which our children may choose to cocoon and ways to approach those times with curiosity, connection, and joy. We also dive into the idea of our unschooling bubble and ways to build that protective, confident mindset that helps us move out into the world as our authentic selves.
Things we discuss
A cocoon is a season in which a child is choosing to pull inward.
Some common cocooning seasons and ways to approach them.
A bubble is like a protective aura we bring with us out into the world.
Over time, our bubble strengthens and shines, attracting other like-minded families.
My Living Joyfully with Unschooling Box Set is half price right now to celebrate NOT back-to-school season. Click here to buy it at your favorite online retailer. Three ebooks to help you learn more about unschooling and what your family will be doing INSTEAD of school.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU291: What to Do Instead of School
Aug 19, 2021
This week, I have a solo episode for you!
As the back-to-school energy hits its peak this month, I thought it might be helpful to re-commit to our choice to NOT go back to school.
It’s completely understandable to feel a bit off-kilter as the “back to school” messages ramp up around us—be kind to yourself. We can use it as a nudge to remember why we chose this path in the first place. So, with all the schooly messages around us, let’s focus on what we’re doing instead of school.
I hope you find it helpful, especially if this is your first time experiencing it!
I also want to mention that to celebrate this NOT back to school season, I’ve put my Living Joyfully with Unschooling Box Set on sale for half price for the next couple of weeks! The box set includes my first three books, Free to Learn, Free to Live, and Life through the Lens of Unschooling.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU290: An Unschooling Journey with Jae Williams, Part 1
Aug 12, 2021
Jae Williams recently decided to leave his teaching job and stay home to dive into unschooling with his two young children. Leading up to this choice, he spent the last year immersed in podcasts and books, exploring natural learning and questioning many mainstream paradigms about children, schooling, and success. We talk about his experience as a sixth-grade teacher and the frustrations he felt within the school system. He describes his excitement and the big aha moments that have come from exploring unschooling, and how it has impacted his parenting and relationships with his children.
Jae also shares his thoughts about the accessibility of unschooling and his vision for a better school system, as well as the challenge he’s feeling right now around finding a balance between pursuing his interests and being present with his children.
Jae’s excitement and passion about learning and life made for such a fun and engaging conversation! It will be fascinating to see where his journey leads as he approaches unschooling with an open and curious mindset.
Questions for Jae
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
You recently decided to quit teaching and move to unschooling. I’d love to hear that story! What inspired you to make this change?
What has been your biggest a-ha moment so far?
What unschooling-related question is most on your mind right now? How are you playing with it?
When we connected, you mentioned you’d love to talk about whether unschooling is a viable option for single parent families and/or poor working-class families. What are your thoughts?
You also mentioned society’s shifting views on schooling and careers as a path to happiness and whether that may be reaching a tipping point. I’d love to hear your perspective! Are you seeing these conversations bubbling up more often?
As you settle into unschooling, what has surprised you most so far?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU289: Unschooling Dads with Izaak Sibley
Aug 05, 2021
Izaak Sibley joins me this week to share his experience as an unschooling dad. He shares about his own school education, how he saw his love of learning disappear over time, and how unschooling with Q has reignited it. We talk about trusting human curiosity and how he has seen Q’s learning naturally lead in such interesting directions. Izaak and his partner Holly have been creative with their living and working situations in order to meet the needs of everyone in the family, and he shares some insights into how they’ve made things work.
Izaak’s excitement about learning and unschooling shines through in our conversation!
Questions for Izaak
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did your family discover unschooling and what did your move to unschooling look like?
What has been your biggest paradigm shift or a-ha moment so far? How did it come about?
I’d love to hear about how you and Holly have set up your lives around your choices to embrace unschooling, spend lots of time together, and do things you all find interesting and fun.
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU288: Sitting with Fear and Discomfort with Anna Brown
Jul 29, 2021
Anna Brown joins me this week to talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Sitting with Fear and Discomfort. This is something that comes up on our unschooling journey pretty regularly because, not only are we challenging lots of cultural norms around learning and parenting, we’re also giving our children space to make meaningful choices in their days, from what they want to do to how they want to explore the world. Sometimes their exploration has us bumping against our comfort zones!
Anna and I walk through the process of noticing our fear or discomfort, validating the emotions we’re feeling, asking questions about our internal experience as well as what’s happening in front of us, and coming to a greater understanding of the situation. And then, from this place of deeper clarity, we can have more meaningful conversations with those involved and make choices moving forward that both make sense and feel good. Fear and discomfort will bubble up again and again, that’s just part of life. But having tools to tease apart the various aspects at play—like cultural messages we’ve absorbed, baggage we carry from past experiences, and thoughts we’re projecting into the future—helps us process the overwhelm, improves our communication, and strengthens our relationships with our kids.
Discussion areas
Why sit with discomfort and fear?
Why it’s important to first be kind to ourselves.
The transition from external “fixing” to internal processing.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU287: Why Joy?
Jul 22, 2021
This week, I have a solo episode for you! The idea to share why I focus on joy and the unschooling journey bubbled up a couple of weeks ago and it’s been fun to put this together. And for listeners who may be newer to the podcast, I share a bit about me before diving into exploring the idea of joy and how it became a very helpful compass for me as I navigate, not just unschooling, but life.
I hope you find it interesting!
Discussion areas
Joy is a beacon for learning.
Joy is a beacon for building strong relationships.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU286: Connect with Courage with Roya Dedeaux
Jul 15, 2021
Roya Dedeaux joins me on the podcast this week to talk about her new book Connect with Courage. Roya is a grown unschooler, a marriage and family therapist, and an unschooling mom of three, so she has lots of experience to draw from as she considers how children learn and thrive.
In her book, Roya describes the many benefits of supporting our children’s interests and the strong connections between parent and child that those positive interactions cultivate. She also details nineteen different barriers that can arise and walks readers through ways to find solutions. In our conversation, we talk about two of these barriers and how so much of it is our inner, emotional work to do to move past our fears and to a place of connection with our kids. Our conversation was energizing and I’m really excited for more parents to read Connect with Courage. These are powerful, life-changing ideas!
Questions for Roya
As a quick refresher, can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
I’m thrilled to have recently published your book, Connect with Courage: Practical Ways to Release Fear and Find Joy in the Places Your Children Take You. I really love the book, and I think it may well be life-changing for many parents. Let’s start off with this: why is the connection between parent and child so important?
When it comes to connecting with our kids through supporting their interests and passions, lots of things can get in our way! And that’s where our work as parents comes in, which is why the many exercises you’ve included to walk parents through these challenges are so helpful. In the book you work through nineteen common barriers, and I thought we could touch on a couple of them here. First, let’s dive into “I don’t understand why they enjoy it.” How can a parent work through that challenge?
Another barrier I hear parents complaining about pretty regularly, especially with younger kids, is that the thing their child likes to do is messy. There are a couple of aspects to that, aren’t there?
What do you love most about your unschooling lives right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU285: Unschooling Stories with Erin Rosemond
Jul 08, 2021
Erin Rosemond, an unschooling mom of four, joins me this week to talk about her unschooling journey. Erin shares her earliest reflections on her own schooling experience and how they prepared her for embracing the idea of home educating her children. We dive deep into the ideas of interdependence, collaboration, and kindness, and how unschooling has created family relationships that really incorporate those values.
Erin also shares her thoughts on the accessibility and affordability of unschooling to the wider community and her belief that all families should have community support to make educational choices that work for them. And we talk about how she and her husband have navigated their work schedules while still unschooling. Erin has years of unschooling experience and has so many great insights to share!
Questions for Erin
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
As I embraced unschooling, I found that so much of my work was internal, focused on connecting, supporting, and engaging with my kids rather than teaching them. But, certainly at first, it can be hard to understand what that actually looks like in action. What has that looked like for you? How do you approach your unschooling days?
Over the years, you’ve woven together unschooling and paid work. Can you share what that looked like and how you navigated it?
I’ve really enjoyed reading around your blog, Ever Learning. So much goodness! One post that really spoke to me was, ‘Shining Our Light: Kindness as Mindset.’ It’s not about grand gestures, but small moments of everyday kindness that can make a big difference, right?
When we connected, you mentioned that you’re often thinking through ways for unschooling to be accessible and affordable to more people. I’d love to hear your thoughts!
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
Lane Clark joins me this week to talk about her unschooling journey and to dive into what she’s learned through deschooling. Lane’s journey began when her family was living abroad and felt their best option was homeschooling. When their carefully chosen curriculum didn’t feel like a good fit, she discovered unschooling and has been questioning all of the boxes we’re put in by mainstream society ever since.
We talked about how deschooling felt like opening Pandora’s box, how Lane has found that her unschooling community helps her navigate her tendency to overthink things, and how her new ways of thinking inspire her to plant seeds of change in her community. It’s such a rich conversation!
Questions for Lane
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When I think about deschooling in the context of learning, I see two distinct phases. First, we widen our definition of learning beyond “academics” to recognize all the learning that’s happening as our kids pursue their interests. And then, we find that our need to look for the learning and to ponder where it might lead starts to fade away. We see that we can just focus on the living, on the moment in front of us. It’s a fascinating journey, isn’t it?
Another conventional idea that we often need to untangle is the idea that if children get to choose what they do, they’ll never do hard things, or even just things that they don’t find particularly enjoyable. On the surface, that seems to make sense, but as we deschool and dig deeper, the story is very different. Can you share your experience with untangling this idea?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you? Can you share a bit about how you worked through it?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU283: The Value of Play with Anna Brown
Jun 24, 2021
This week, Anna Brown and I talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Play! We dive into how integral play is for learning both about the world and about ourselves. We can carry a lot of preconceived notions about play, its value, its place in our lives, even the definition of what it actually is. Broadening our definitions and seeing the many ways play contributes to our growth and the growth of our children is profound.
It was so much fun to explore and reflect upon this important aspect to our unschooling lives!
Discussion areas
How play and learning weave together.
Ways to support—and engage with—our children’s play.
Play is a wonderful way to develop self-awareness and process emotions.
How do you define play—is it bigger than toys and games?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU282: Teachers Turned Unschoolers
Jun 17, 2021
This week, I want to dive into another question that I get pretty regularly, and that’s whether I have podcast episodes with unschooling parents that used to be teachers.
It’s fun to ponder the why behind the question. Does it seem like a strange leap to make? To me, choosing teaching indicates an interest in children and in learning, so to dive into that even more deeply with their own children through unschooling does seem like a rather natural next step to take.
But whatever the reason behind this pretty common question, the answer is a resounding yes! On the podcast to this point, there have been 22 guests who were, or are, teachers or university professors, who study education at the post-secondary level, or even teach education courses.
In this episode, I’ve gathered a few snippets from teachers turned unschoolers sharing about their experience and how that journey came about for them. It’s so interesting!
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU281: Going Deep with Unschooling with Talia Bartoe
Jun 10, 2021
Talia Bartoe joins me again on the podcast to update us about her family’s unschooling journey. We didn’t know it going in, but it quickly became obvious that the theme of our conversation was “going deep”! Talia generously shares so much about her inner work and the shifts she’s made as part of deschooling and living an unschooling lifestyle with her family.
We talk about the layers of messages around parenting, food, learning, and self-care that we internalized growing up, and how Talia has intentionally changed her thinking and chosen to do things differently. She also shares her experience with having four young children and the ways she meets their various needs, as well as her own.
It’s such a rich and inspiring conversation and I’m excited to share it with you!
Questions for Talia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
Last time we talked, almost two years ago now, we focused on the deschooling aspect of the journey. And while deschooling isn’t ever “done,” do you feel like you’re actively unschooling now?
So much of deschooling is our personal work to do: excavating our curiosity and creativity, exploring the roots of our fears, growing our ability to sit with discomfort etc. Do you feel like you’ve grown and changed as a person since you chose to begin unschooling? In what ways?
I know that food is a big interest that weaves through your family’s days, and sometimes relaxing around food can be a big paradigm shift for people. I’d love to hear a story or two about your experience!
With four active children between the ages of two and ten, I imagine many of your days are action-packed! I recall those days as being an interesting, and often tiring, dance of choosing to say yes to their fun and exploration while also trying to stay cognizant of my own energy and self-care needs. Sound familiar? What does that look like for you right now?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded for your family so far?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU280: Growing Up Unschooling with Samantha Donndelinger
Jun 03, 2021
This week, I am joined by 20-year-old Samantha Donndelinger, who has always been unschooled. Samantha shares some of her childhood stories and reflections on growing up unschooling. We talk about how her family’s lifestyle gave each child the space to make choices and figure out their own path, and how making choices and exploring her interests has given her confidence in moving out into the world.
Samantha also reflects on her journey of self-discovery, including diving into her art and choosing to enroll in a college program that combines all of her passions. And she offers some sage advice to unschooling parents who are just starting out: trust yourself, listen to your kids, expand your idea of what learning looks like, and find a community to support you.
It was so fun and inspiring to hear about Samantha’s experiences and insights!
Questions for Samantha
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
I understand travel has been an interest of yours. How did that develop, and can you share some stories about your experience traveling?
The question of college is an interesting one, and it’s really about choice, isn’t it? When we connected, you mentioned gap years and alternatives to college. I’d love to hear more about your experience!
At this point, what do you appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU279: Validation with Anna Brown
May 27, 2021
This week, Anna Brown and I talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Validation. Diving deep into validation flows beautifully from last month’s theme of Stories because practicing validation with the people in our lives is about hearing, understanding, and accepting their stories as their truth in the moment. Our connections with our children grow stronger when they feel seen and heard and loved for who they are. Full stop. No ifs, ands, or buts.
And while validation helps our children move through their strong emotions and difficult moments, ALL kinds of moments are great opportunities to show our children that we understand and care about them. Validation is a key ingredient in the connected, respectful, and trusting relationships we see in unschooling families!
Discussion areas
How sympathy, empathy, and validation weave together in our relationships.
What validation looks like and the language we might use.
When big emotions are involved, non-verbal validation can be so helpful.
Ultimately, the goal of validation is connection.
All moments with our kids are opportunities for validation!
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU278: Unschooling in Large Families
May 20, 2021
This week, I’ve put together a compilation episode to dive into a question that I get pretty regularly: What does unschooling look like in larger families?
As we learn more about unschooling, we’re encouraged to spend time with our kids, to say yes more, to connect with them more, to explore ways to meet everyone’s needs. Add in multiple children, and soon we start to wonder how we’re going to build all these strong, connected, and trusting relationships. It can seem daunting!
I have three children, but I’ve had guests on the podcast with four, five, six, seven kids, so I’ve brought together some of their wonderful stories, tips, and insights to help parents with larger families envision what unschooling might look like for them.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU277: Unschooling Q&A with Sue Patterson, Part 2
May 13, 2021
Sue Patterson joins me again this week for the second part of our conversation, diving into three more listener questions. Check out part one here!
Question Summaries
I feel like I should be finding more friends for my kids to play with, but I’m introverted and it’s hard for me to reach out.
My 12yo daughter is attending middle school and I think it’s so damaging for her, but she wants to continue going. How can I convince her to try unschooling?
I have three kids ages 9, 5, and 2. I feel completely overwhelmed trying to meet all of their different needs as well as my own, while taking care of the house without any help.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU276: Unschooling Q&A with Sue Patterson, Part 1
May 06, 2021
Sue Patterson joins me this week to dive into listener questions! And I’m sure it’ll surprise nobody that our conversation went long, so I’ve split it into two episodes—three questions each.
A quick reminder, these Q&A conversations aren’t about giving anyone a “right” answer. We can’t know that because we don’t intimately know the real people involved. And there probably isn’t just one “right”? answer anyway—we can get where we’d like to go through many different paths. Rather, our conversations are about contemplating the situation from the different perspectives of those involved, through the lens of our unschooling experience. It’s kinda like tilling the soil around the question with an eye to helping not only the questioner, but anyone listening find a connection to their lives, or help them better understand how unschooling works.?
So, whether the situation applies to you directly or not, I encourage you to listen with an open and curious mind. Let it all bubble away for a while—the questions asked, our thoughts, your thoughts—and see what connections and insights might spark for you.
Question Summaries
Since we live in a location that requires reporting, how can I keep track of academic requirements without it affecting our unschooling?
I’m uncomfortable with my children having unlimited screen time. What should I do if I’m not comfortable with the idea of being a “radical” unschooler?
I have a lot of fear about online safety and tend to want to control my kids to protect them. How can I create a more positive, supportive environment for them to explore while I work on my fears?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU275: Stories with Anna Brown
Apr 29, 2021
Anna Brown joins me this week to talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Stories. Diving into this theme has been fascinating because there are so many ways in which we tell stories as humans, with really far-reaching impacts. We talk about the stories we tell ourselves and our families in our daily lives, the stories we share about our family with others, and the stories we create in our minds about what other people are thinking and feeling.
It is so empowering to realize that we can choose the stories we tell. Being intentional about the way we think and talk about our lives is a form of self care, and it can help our children grow up without the weight of past stories, like those that have been handed to us.
Discussion areas
I love this quote from The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human by Jonathan Gottschall: “Story is for a human as water is for a fish—all-encompassing and not quite palpable.” Humans are storytelling animals, it’s how we make sense of our world, and realizing that everything is a story can be a life-changing paradigm shift.
Looking at the stories we tell ourselves, they become our self-talk, our inner voice.
Looking at the stories we tell others, it can get complicated because as we get further along on our unschooling journey, familiar words have a new richness to them.
Looking at the stories we assign to other people, often we tend to assume the worst.
Looking at the stories we tell ourselves about our family, take care with expectations and roles.
We get to choose the stories we tell, so let’s choose those that make sense and feel better to us.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU274: Rules versus Principles
Apr 22, 2021
This week, I’ve put together a solo episode. This episode is geared to parents who are newer to unschooling, navigating the paradigm shifts that come with questioning so much of the conventional wisdom around learning and parenting that we absorbed growing up.
Spoiler alert: there are no unschooling “rules.”
But I think more experienced unschooling parents may also appreciate the reminder. As I dug into writing this episode, peeling back more layers for myself, I was surprised to discover how the idea of “rules versus principles” can be applied to so many of the shifts we make on the unschooling journey!
I also talk about some things we can do to explore and expand our comfort zones. Because as we let go of our need for rules and control, it can sometimes feel very uncomfortable.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU272: Our Unschooling Journey with the Beck Family, Part 2
Apr 08, 2021
The Beck family of five—Angie, Darren, Josh, Rylie, and Ellie—are back to continue our conversation about their unschooling journey. We had so much fun chatting and sharing stories that our conversation flowed for about two hours, so I split it across two episodes. Check out part one here!
This week, we talk about each of the children’s unique paths through childhood to their current interests and activities. As Ellie mentions, their interests and personalities are so different, and it’s fun to see how the family was able to meet their needs and support each child’s path by working together as a team. We also discuss some of the challenges they all faced over the years and some of the surprises they encountered along the way. Their reflections are so fascinating and inspiring!
Questions for the Beck family
Each of the kids has chosen a very different path after they got their free love tarot reading online. I’d love to hear more about how that has unfolded, from everyone’s perspective!
Can you share a story or two about challenges you guys have worked through over the years? It’s such a different process when everyone’s working together, isn’t it?
Looking back now, what has surprised you most about having embraced unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU271: Our Unschooling Journey with the Beck Family, Part 1
Apr 01, 2021
The Beck family of five—Angie, Darren, Josh, Rylie, and Ellie—joins me this week for a wonderful conversation about their unschooling journey. As you can imagine, the six of us had so much fun chatting and sharing stories that our conversation flowed for about two hours, so I’ve split it across two episodes.
In part 1 this week, we dive into how Angie discovered unschooling, their experience with an amazing local homeschooling group, and the fun they had connecting with mentors in their community to dive deep into the kids’ interests. And Josh, Rylie, and Ellie share what they value most about their unschooling lives, including the freedom to really focus on their passions and the self-awareness that comes from being able to make important choices from a young age.
It is so fun to hear from the whole family, each with their own unique experiences and perspectives!
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU270: Supporting Our Partners with Anna Brown
Mar 25, 2021
This week Anna Brown and I talk about our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, Supporting Our Partners. We chose the word “partners” to represent any important adults in our family’s lives who have active relationships with our children—spouses, co-parents, significant others, grandparents, and so on. Our partners are an important part of our unschooling lives and taking the time to focus on and nurture those relationships benefits the whole family.
It was fun to see that so many of the tools and ideas we talk about are the same ones we have used to strengthen our relationships with our children. We can connect with our partner through their interests, intentionally seeing who they are as a person outside of their family “role.” We talk about developing trust in them and nurturing their trust in us, which in turn helps them build strong relationships with the kids and feel like a valuable part of the family. The ripples that emerge from supporting our partners bring even more joy to our family’s days!
Discussion areas
The first step in supporting our partner is strengthening our connection with them. We want them to feel truly seen and heard by us. Let’s talk about some tools for doing that.
Ways we approach challenging moments or conversations that keep our connection at the forefront.
As our connection with our partner strengthens, we can take the next step: extending trust.
Ways we can support our partner as they develop their own relationships with the kids.
Ways we can support our partner as they learn more about unschooling.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU269: Unschooling Doesn’t Spoil Children
Mar 18, 2021
This week, we’re diving into a question that comes up pretty regularly, not just from people new to unschooling but also from extended family and friends when they see our parenting choices in action: Won’t unschooling spoil a child?
We look at four examples of parenting behaviours or actions, the typical conventional and unschooling motivations behind them, and what the child is likely learning along the way:
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU268: The Joy of Unschooling with Karen Matthews
Mar 11, 2021
Karen Matthews joins me this week! Karen and her grown son, Tyler, own a furniture and wood craft business together. We talk about how their unschooling journey began and how following Tyler’s interests has not only been a rewarding path for him, but also for her. Karen shares some of the big a-ha moments she had and paradigm shifts she made through the years. We also talk about questioning our cultural views around productivity and expectations. Karen’s focus on following her son’s joy and cultivating his passions has led them to the connected relationship and wonderful life they enjoy now. It’s so inspiring!
Questions for Karen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
One of the pieces of advice you received early on was to deeply value your child’s interests—no matter what. Can you share how that played out for you?
One of my most valuable unschooling paradigm shifts was around the importance of down time. Conventional society is apt to call this laziness, but it really isn’t, is it?
Tyler unschooled through the high school years. I’d love to hear more about what that looked like for you guys!
Looking back, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU267: Growing Up Unschooling with Laura and Allen Ellis
Mar 04, 2021
Siblings Laura and Allen Ellis join me this week to talk about growing up unschooling. They share how their childhood interests and experiences connect to the work that they currently do and some of the realizations they made along the way. We talk about the role their mother played in supporting their interests and providing opportunities that fit their goals without controlling or adding weighty expectations. Laura and Allen also describe the benefits they see in retrospect of living an unschooling life as they were growing up. It’s wonderful to hear their perspective and to see how their two different journeys have unfolded so far!
Questions for Laura and Allen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What were some of your interests and passions growing up and how did you pursue them?
Let’s shift to your young adult years. What choices did you make and how did they unfold for you?
At this point, you’ve each ended up starting your own multi-passionate companies. What does that look like and how do you see your unschooling background continuing to weave into your lives?
What do you each appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU266: Finding Our Guides with Anna Brown
Feb 25, 2021
Anna Brown joins me again this week! This month in the Living Joyfully Network, our theme is ‘Finding Our Guides.’ As I wrote about in The Unschooling Journey, our children can serve as our most valuable guides, helping us move through our fears towards joy and connection. Anna and I talk about how handing our children the weight of our worries and fears impacts them and erodes trust, how connecting with our children helps us navigate our fears, and how being part of a community of like-minded parents inspires us and enriches our unschooling lives. It was such a fun conversation and a great reminder of the value of being truly present in the moment with our families.
Discussion areas
What makes children such good guides?
Connecting with our children helps us move through our unschooling-related worries and fears.
Connecting with our children as guides also helps us build trust: our trust in our kids, their trust in us, and our trust in unschooling as a lifestyle.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU265: Unschooling Passions
Feb 18, 2021
Pam shares her essay, Unschooling Passions.
Unschooling is about learning through living. As unschooling parents, we want to open up the world for our children to explore. But what if your child is passionately interested in just one thing? Doesn’t that close off his access to the world and limit his learning? I have two children who have discovered passionate interests. Instead of spending my time trying to convince them to try new things, I decided to explore their interests with them. I was amazed at how much of the world came to life when they were free, and encouraged, to immerse themselves in their deep, passionate interests.
EU264: Unschooling Stories with Julia Triman
Feb 11, 2021
Julia Triman joins me to share her family’s unschooling journey. As a mom of two young children, Julia reflects on how her understanding of parenting and learning has changed through observation and being present with them. We talk about the incredible depth of her children’s play and how powerful it is that they can choose what they spend their time doing. Julia also shares about her ongoing process of deschooling and what led her to start posting photos of her children’s snack plates on Instagram! It was such a fun conversation!
Questions for Julia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
With younger kids, I’d love to hear more about how you’re seeing learning unfolding. Coming to unschooling, it can be a big paradigm shift to see and value all the learning that’s happening when we’ve grown up seeing it through the lens of curriculum and needing to be taught.
What have you found to be one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling? Can you share a bit about your journey through it?
You finished your PhD a year or so ago. I’d love to hear about that journey and how it wove together with your unschooling lives.
You post on Instagram as @snackplatemama. Can you share the story behind that?
What’s something fun you guys have done recently that you don’t think you’d have done before finding unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU263: Unschooling Paradigm Shifts with Susan Walker
Feb 04, 2021
Susan Walker, who lives in the Patagonia region of Argentina, joins me this week to talk about her family’s unschooling journey and the major paradigm shifts she made along the way. We talk about her discoveries about being highly sensitive and introverted, how diving into unschooling resulted in so much personal growth, and how her understanding of radical unschooling and radical self-love connected to help create the joyful family life and strong relationships she has now. Susan has thought deeply about these paradigm shifts and her perspective is inspiring!
Questions for Susan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
When we connected about our call, you shared that there were four big paradigm shifts that were instrumental for you on your unschooling journey. I’d love to dive into them! Let’s start with learning. What big paradigm shift around learning happened as you explored unschooling?
Another big paradigm shift you experienced was around the idea that it’s OK to be who you are. Can you share what that shift looked like for you?
A third paradigm shift you mentioned centered on the idea that everything changes. People change, circumstances change. How did that shift unfold and how has it helped?
The last big paradigm shift you mentioned was to seeing radical love as the foundation of your unschooling lives. I’d love to hear how that shift came about and the difference it has made.
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU262: Nurturing Our Children’s Learning with Anna Brown
Jan 28, 2021
Anna Brown joins me again this week! This month in the Living Joyfully Network our theme is Nurturing Our Children’s Learning. We are getting back to the basics of unschooling by observing how children learn through following their interests. Exploring learning through the lenses of curiosity and creativity, we talk about what to do when doubts creep in about whether we’re doing enough, when our children want to quit an activity they started, and when it seems like our child is “doing nothing.”
I love diving into this rich topic, which is so relevant no matter where you are on your unschooling journey!
Discussion areas
With unschooling, we replace curriculum with curiosity. Exploring the world by following their interests and passions creates a personally tailored web of learning connections and knowledge.
As we navigate the shift from curriculum-based to interest-led learning, it can be challenging to shift to this new and very different way of supporting our kids’ learning. Sometimes we find ourselves asking, “Am I doing enough?”
Another challenge that can bubble up as our children follow their curiosity is around the idea of quitting activities.
Curiosity and creativity weave together so naturally in support of our children’s learning. An important paradigm shift is moving away from the idea of right and wrong.
Another aspect of creativity is having the space and time to just be. It may look like they’re “doing nothing,” but it’s how seemingly disparate bits of information and understanding have a chance to connect in new and creative ways.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU261: Deschooling with Joss Goulden
Jan 21, 2021
Joss Goulden, who lives in Western Australia and is mom to two kids, joins me to talk about her family’s unschooling journey. We talk about how she was inspired by her son’s brief time in kindergarten to make the choice to try unschooling, what her deschooling process looked like, and how she sees learning happening naturally as her children pursue what interests them. Joss shares how unschooling has created strong family relationships and how trust plays such a big role in their lives: both learning to trust herself and to trust her children to make their own choices and follow the path that is right for them.
Questions for Joss
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When people first hear about unschooling, they often find it hard to imagine how learning happens without teaching and a curriculum. But it really does! How have you seen learning naturally unfold with your children?
Another thing that trips people up is the idea of children choosing what they do. They worry kids won’t do hard things if they don’t “have to.” That’s just not what unschooling parents see in action. Intrinsic motivation is so powerful, isn’t it?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you? Can you share a bit about your journey through it?
What has surprised you most so far about your unschooling journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU260: Unschooling Stories with Betsey Tufano
Jan 14, 2021
Betsey Tufano, an unschooling mother of two living in Barcelona, Spain, joins me this week! Betsey shares many details about her unschooling journey and about the importance of the internal work that she did along the way. We also discuss how her relationship with her partner has changed and deepened through their choice to unschool, the role of technology in their unschooling lives, some of the challenges they’ve faced, and lots more!
Questions for Betsey
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of your unschooling journey so far? Can you share a bit about how you moved through it?
When we were prepping for this call you mentioned that you love how technology weaves through your family’s learning. Technology is a topic that many people find a challenge to navigate. I’d love to hear about your experience!
As we move deeper into unschooling, we find our relationships with our children becoming steeped in connection and trust, but it can sometimes be challenging to extend that to our partners. Can you share how unschooling has deepened your relationship with your spouse? What has that journey looked like?
What’s something fun you guys have done recently that you don’t think you’d have done before finding unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU259: Nuggets of Wisdom from Five Years of the Exploring Unschooling Podcast
Jan 07, 2021
This week marks the five year anniversary of the Exploring Unschooling podcast!
To celebrate, I decided to dig into the podcast’s rich treasure trove of unschooling stories and highlight a handful of the many beautiful nuggets of wisdom that guests have shared over these five years.
It’s been such a treat to revisit episodes as I gathered and organized this lovely collection, and I ended up with four distinct sections:
Parenting
Seeing Learning in Action
Making Our World Bigger, and
The Question of College
I imagine it surprises no one at this point that the flow of these sections aligns pretty closely with our unschooling journey. Because that’s my jam.
I’ve really enjoyed spending these five years engaging in conversations with so many wonderful unschooling parents and grown unschoolers. I’m so grateful to them for sharing their stories, their experiences, and their sparkling nuggets of wisdom about unschooling!
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU258: Seeing the Magic with Anna Brown
Dec 31, 2020
Anna Brown joins me again this week! This month in the Living Joyfully Network our theme is Seeing the Magic. As we move into the re-invigorating energy of new year, we are turning our attention to connecting with our children and finding the joy in our everyday lives with them. Anna and I talk about ways to connect with our kids, what finding joy looks like in practice, and how joy relates to our self-care practices.
Our conversations in the Network have been beautiful this month, as members share the magic they’re noticing in their lives and support each other through the more challenging moments.
Discussion areas
Focusing on our connections with our kids helps us see the magic in our days.
Instead of inviting our kids to join us, we can go to them.
Let’s talk about joy.
Connection, joy, and self-care weave together so beautifully as part of the magic of our days.
Join us starting in the new year as we walk through the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit online workshop alongside participants.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU257: Unschooling Instincts with Ali Walker
Dec 24, 2020
This week, I’m joined by Ali Walker, an unschooling mom and primatologist living in New Zealand. I have gotten to know Ali on the Living Joyfully Network, where she has shared some incredible insights about parenting and unschooling through her lens as a primate researcher focusing on the mother/infant bond. Ali details some of the realizations she has made during her own journey as a mother, including the need to be present and available for Very Important Sitting, the importance of interdependence and connection, and how self care fits into her unschooling life. Her perspective is fascinating!
Questions for Ali
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You worked as a primatologist before having kids. I’d love to hear some of the ways that experience has influenced your experiences with your children.
A few months ago in the Network you shared a really valuable idea, which you described as ‘Very Important Sitting.’ Can you share what that is?
With two young kids, some days can feel long and exhausting. I’d love to hear your thoughts around self-care and what that looks like for you right now.
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU256: Deschooling with Marta Venturini
Dec 17, 2020
Marta Venturini joins me this week! Marta lives with her husband and daughter in Portugal. We dive deep into her unschooling journey, which began when her daughter was an infant, and discuss her deschooling process and how it continued to evolve as she grew as a parent. Marta also shares how much she values the online unschooling community and the wealth of resources she was able to learn from along the way.
Questions for Marta
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Deschooling is a wonderful window to exploring ourselves and the person and parent we want to be. It quickly expands beyond “replacing school” and becomes a story of personal growth, doesn’t it?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you? Can you share a bit about your journey through it?
And then it goes even deeper. The unschooling journey, if you embrace it, becomes an exploration of being human. We see it unfolding so beautifully in our children, through their interests and passions and on their own timetable. Our urge to judge others slowly fades as we come to see them more clearly as being on their own journey. Has that been your experience? What has struck you about how unschooling grows from a style of learning to the story of being human?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU255: Choices and Unschooling with Holly Clark
Dec 10, 2020
Holly Clark joins me this week, mom to two always unschooled children living on the Sunshine Coast in Australia. Holly shared so many amazing snippets of their lives which all tied into the idea of choice—the choices we make as parents, the choices our children make, and our choice to support their choices! We also talked about fear about technology, when children want to quit an activity, and much more!
Questions for Holly
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When we were arranging our call, I asked if there was an unschooling topic you were particularly passionate about and you answered: choices. I love that! It’s a seemingly simple answer, but so incredibly far-reaching. Everything really is a choice, isn’t it?
When it comes to unschooling, one important aspect is choosing to actively support our kids as they explore their interests and learn about the world. That’s not so hard to do when we feel like their interests have “value.” But eventually they choose something we’re not so comfortable with and that’s when our real work starts. Can you share what that process has looked like for you?
Another aspect of choice that comes into play is around parenting. We are surrounded by so much conventional parenting advice that it can be hard to wade through it all to discover the person and parent we want to be for our kids. Sometimes it feels scary to embrace that choice, but it’s also so freeing, isn’t it?
What has surprised you most so far about your unschooling journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU254: Finding Unschooling with Daniela Bramwell
Dec 03, 2020
Daniela Bramwell joins me this week, an unschooling mom living in Ecuador. Daniela’s journey is fascinating! As a child, she was a student at an alternative free school, but, as an adult, found herself wondering if there was a better way to approach learning. She dove deep into learning about educational philosophies, including pursuing her PhD in the field. And then, as a mother, she found unschooling. We talked about her varied experiences in education, what she’s figured out along the way, and the joy she’s finding now, living and learning with her family.
Questions for Daniela
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
Your journey to finding unschooling is really interesting and I’d love to walk through some of the pieces with you. To start, you went to an alternative Montessori free school growing up. Can you share a bit about your experience?
Then you went to university and became very interested in studying education, completing your Masters, teaching courses, and now working on your PhD. What have been your big takeaways so far from that experience?
How did all that—your alternative ed experience growing up and your post grad education studies—weave together into you finding and choosing unschooling for your family? What pieces did unschooling bring that you felt were missing?
You mentioned to me earlier that your deschooling journey around “screens” was a big one because you grew up with so many negative messages around them. Can you share what that process looked like for you?
What’s something fun you guys have done recently that you don’t think you’d have done before finding unschooling?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU253: Navigating Family Gatherings with Anna Brown
Nov 26, 2020
Anna Brown joins me this week to talk about navigating family gatherings, the theme this month on the Living Joyfully Network. With the holiday season ramping up, it’s a great time to explore how we choose to engage in larger family celebrations, but the ideas are definitely be applicable throughout the year, from birthday parties to weddings to family reunions.
Anna and I talk about making choices about how our gatherings will look over time, the fun work of preparing for events, and the joyful presence with which we can show up. We also discuss how these extended family gatherings can bring up difficult conversations and strong emotions, and offer some tools and ideas to navigate those. I hope you find our conversation helpful!
Discussion areas
Attending family gatherings is truly a choice.
It’s fun to play with traditions!
Ideas to help set the stage for an enjoyable gathering.
The value of showing up with a joyful, fun, and grounded presence.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the podcast archive growing and freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out Exploring Unschooling on Patreon.
EU252: Unschooling Stories with Eva Witsel
Nov 19, 2020
Eva Witsel joins me this week, an unschooling mom and homeschooling activist in the Netherlands. Eva’s journey to unschooling is such an interesting one, as is her varied experience supporting the Dutch homeschooling community and affecting legislation there. We talked a lot about technology, following our passionate interests, supporting children as they become teenagers, and lots more!
Questions for Eva
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Your children are young teens now. Do you find that your unschooling days look different now that they’re older?
You mentioned that you and your husband are involved in tech. I’d love to hear how different aspects of technology weave their way through your lives!
You live in the Netherlands, and you have been involved with government discussions around homeschooling legislation. Can you share a bit about your experience and what unschooling looks like in the Netherlands?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU251: Unschooling as a Lifestyle with Lucia Silva
Nov 12, 2020
Lucia Silva joins me this week to talk about unschooling as a lifestyle and her journey so far! We talked about how her understanding of unschooling has grown over the past few years and how what she’s learned has benefited all of her relationships. We also dove into the idea of expectations and how conversations with our families become so much more fun and interesting when we drop the agenda. Lucia shared some amazing a-ha moments she experienced while having conversations with her children, as well as her realization that every unschooling family’s life will be completely unique!
Questions for Lucia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s initial move to unschooling look like?
For many families, the first big milestone on their unschooling journey is choosing to not send their kids to school. It’s an educational choice and the focus is on how their kids are going to learn instead. But so often, it doesn’t stop there. Unschooling grows beyond academics into a lifestyle. Can you share what that process has looked like for you?
As we come to more fully understand the foundations of unschooling and get more comfortable with how they weave into our days, there is another paradigm shift that happens. And that’s a shift away from feeling like there are unschooling “rules” we should follow and toward exploring the right choices for our unique family. Which is why unschooling can look so different in different families, can’t it?
As we embrace unschooling as a lifestyle ever more deeply and our self-awareness grows, many of us discover how often we go into conversations with our kids with an agenda—a plan in our mind of how we want things to go. Even if we don’t state it out loud, it comes across in our energy. When we can shift away from that to showing up with an open and curious mindset, it makes a world of difference, doesn’t it?
What has surprised you most so far about your unschooling journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU250: Embracing Unschooling with Donna Anderson
Nov 05, 2020
Donna Anderson joins me this week to talk about her family’s unschooling journey. We dive deep into her family’s interests, some of which are individual and many of which they share as a family. We also explore the idea of an unschooling nest, talk about some of the challenges of deschooling, and how maintaining strong family relationships really makes such a difference when times are hard.
Questions for Donna:
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What did you find to be one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling? And how did you work through it?
An idea that comes up pretty regularly in unschooling circles is building an unschooling nest. It seems simple on the surface, but there are so many aspects to it, aren’t there?
You’ve been unschooling for a few years now and life has its ups and downs. What has been your experience with unschooling through big changes and challenges?
At this point on your journey, what is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU249: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Oct 29, 2020
Anna Brown joins me for another Unschooling in Context episode! This time, we explore unschooling in the context of consent. I think consent lies at the heart of unschooling and I’m excited to share my conversation with Anna about what that means and how it informs the ways our families move through the world. It has also been our theme in the Living Joyfully Network this month, so we have been steeping in these ideas!
Discussion Points
First, let’s get everyone situated. Let’s talk about what we mean by consent and why is it so important.
There’s a valuable paradigm shift that takes us a step deeper into unschooling and that’s the shift away from talking about something and toward living it. We don’t need to talk about the theory of “consent” or “unschooling” with our kids, instead, we live it.
Let’s talk about what it means to push through another person’s consent.
Another aspect of consent that I find fascinating and so valuable is the idea of consensual conversations. Let’s start by explaining what we mean by that.
Coming to conversations with our kids with even an unspoken agenda can get in the way of consent. I think it’s so valuable to take a moment to check in with ourselves before a starting a conversation with our kids to see if we’re feeling resistant to a “no” answer and peel that back a bit.
Everyday unschooling, by which I mean connecting with our kids through engaging with and supporting them in their chosen activities, is a brilliant way to help our kids better understand consent! Let’s dive into that.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU248: Favorite Things about Unschooling
Oct 22, 2020
This week, I’ve put together a compilation episode! This time, it’s a collection of responses to the question, “What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days?”
If you’re newer to unschooling, these can be a great reminder of where you’re heading. And if you’re more experienced, they can be a great reminder of why you chose unschooling for your family. Either way, I suspect you’ll find them super inspiring, helping you take a deep breath and release whatever is preoccupying you so you can get back into the moment and connect with your kids. Truly, life is a collection of these small, everyday moments of connection. And that’s where our trust and respect for each other grows.
EU247: From Teaching to Unschooling with Kelsi Stembel
Oct 15, 2020
Kelsi Stembel joins me this week! Kelsi has two teen daughters and is a former teacher turned farmer and entrepreneur. It was a joy to hear about how both her girls have developed and learned at their own pace, honoring their unique styles, and how unschooling has been such an amazing gift for their family. Kelsi’s journey from teaching middle school to becoming a full time farmer and unschooling parent is a beautiful story!
Questions for Kelsi
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
You were a teacher in the public school system. I’d love to hear the story of how you got from there to unschooling!
I think a valuable part of the deschooling process is the realization that unschooling isn’t just for the kids. That it’s important for us as parents to be living and breathing examples of lifelong learning. Has that been your experience?
Another valuable paradigm shift happens when we come to recognize that school’s focus on “fixing” kids is often more damaging than helpful. Instead of focusing on their challenges, we can embrace their strengths. That shift makes a world of difference, doesn’t it?
It can be challenging for an unschooling parent to not get pulled back into the conventional learning mindset of tick boxes and grades when a child chooses an activity or a learning process that looks more “schooly.” But an unschooling child approaches it so differently, don’t they?
What has surprised you most about your unschooling journey so far?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU246: Unschooling and Neurodiversity with Michelle Morcate
Oct 08, 2020
Michelle Morcate joins me this week to talk about their unschooling journey and how unschooling is such a natural fit when considering neurodiversity because it’s all about facilitating our children as individuals, how they learn, and how they want to move through the world. Michelle’s excitement as an ally and advocate is contagious and we have a wonderful, flowing conversation about it all.
Questions for Michelle
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
One of the core concepts of unschooling is that it asks us to respect each child for who they are and to meet them where they are. Full stop. Which I think explains why this lifestyle works so beautifully for every child—including neurodivergent children. It’s all about them, not us. That’s such a powerful paradigm shift, isn’t it?
Helping our kids explore the world and figure out how they like to learn things is just one aspect of unschooling. It’s also about helping them understand themselves and how they tick so they gain confidence and trust in themselves. In the bigger picture of life, I think that’s even more valuable. How are you seeing that play out?
Are there other ways in which you’re seeing unschooling support neurodiversity?
What is it about unschooling that makes it a great fit for your family?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU245: Unschooling Stories with Cate & Jenna Phillips
Oct 01, 2020
Cate and Jenna Phillips join me to share some of their wonderful unschooling stories! With six children, it was inspiring to hear about how their journey has unfolded as they prioritize relationships, follow their passions, and work together to support each other.
Questions for Cate and Jenna
Can you share a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what your move to unschooling look like?
Connecting more deeply with their kids and supporting their interests can feel a bit foreign for parents as they transition to unschooling. It’s a new kind of way to be in relationship with our children! I’d love to hear what your kids are into right now and some of the ways you’re helping them explore.
Can you share some tips on navigating your unschooling days with six children? What does that look like for your family?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU244: Not Back to School with Anna Brown
Sep 24, 2020
Anna Brown joins me again this week! This month in the Living Joyfully Network our theme is Not Back to School. It has been a rich month of checking in with ourselves, quieting the outside noise, and focusing on our kids and the joy around us. Anna and I talk about the “back to school” messages that pepper this time of the year. How they can sometimes knock us off-kilter and have us questioning our choice to not send our kids to school, and how we can use that discomfort as a jumping off point to remember WHY we chose unschooling in the first place, to re-engage with our kids and see it in action, and to re-commit wholeheartedly to that choice. Because unschooling is a choice.
Discussion areas
remembering our why
the value of turning our gaze to our children and our days
not judging our inside by someone else’s outside
the value of finding community
the choice to activity engage with our children
stretching our comfort zones to facilitate and partner
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU243: Parenting Shifts with Sarah Peshek
Sep 17, 2020
Sarah Peshek joins me this week! Sarah is an unschooling mom of three and she shares the details of her journey and her parenting shifts from control to connection. Her insights and experiences are so helpful in really pulling out why this lifestyle is so amazing! How unschooling encourages us to recenter around the person and parent we want to be, with deep, meaningful connections with our children and a deeper understanding of ourselves.
Questions for Sarah
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and decide to follow that path?
Your daughters were 7 and 4 when you began to shift away from more conventional, controlling parenting to the supportive, partnership style of unschooling. What did that transition look like? How did you start?
Parents who’ve discovered unschooling and supportive parenting when their kids are a bit older can sometimes feel frustrated with themselves and regret not having discovered this sooner. Did you experience those feelings? How did you work through them?
Your youngest child was born after your shift in parenting style, so you’ve cultivated a connected, partnering relationship with him from the beginning. I’d love to hear how that experience has been! What differences have you seen?
What has surprised you most about your unschooling journey so far?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU242: Deschooling with Nadia Joshua
Sep 10, 2020
Nadia Joshua joins me this week to talk about her family’s move to unschooling and her personal deschooling journey. It was delightful to learn more about her family and how they navigated moving to one income, explored the need to go and do, learned to honour both her daughters and their individual personalities, and lots more!
Questions for Nadia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
When we connected, you mentioned that when school wasn’t working well for your eldest, you left your job and you and your husband changed your lifestyle so you could afford to live off one income. Can you share a bit more of that story?
From there, how did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I love seeing different learning styles and personalities play out in online unschooling groups. Some people come in asking lots of questions, others prefer to quietly read, read, read—and, of course, there are all points in between. You’re a question-asker, right? I’d love to hear about your experience!
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling so far? And can you share a bit about your journey through it?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU241: Exploring Race, Racism, and Diversity in Unschooling with Erika Davis-Pitre
Sep 03, 2020
Erika Davis-Pitre joins me again this week! I rebroadcast her episode, Unschooling and Diversity, earlier this year and she graciously offered to return and answer listener questions that arose from that episode. The result is this amazing episode with so many actionable steps and layers to peel back for all of us on this unschooling journey as we explore the roles we can play to address systemic racism and biases.
Questions for Erika
QUESTION 1. Hi Erika! Thank you so much for what you shared in this podcast episode and thank you so much for agreeing to come back and share more! I appreciate how you said that the default of our culture is racist. If you don’t do anything, it’s not neutral. You default to the racist biased structure… So how do we “teach” antiracism to our kids without teaching? Since we don’t teach our kids as unschoolers. My thoughts are to start with educating myself about White Supremacy, systemic racism and antiracism work by reading books, listening to podcasts and watching movies and then invite our kids to join us if they want to? Protest and march and invite our kids? Have discussions about antiracism with my husband and invite our kids to ask questions? What else can I do?
QUESTION 2. I think of how I have read in some Unschooling circles about not wanting to bring in scary news stories because that will stress us or our kids. That we should build a safe Unschooling nest. I get upset and then it makes it hard to stay positive and joyful and connect with my kids. But the truth about our racist society isn’t peaceful or joyful. It doesn’t feel right to hide behind white privilege and stay safe and comfortable. How do I balance prioritizing staying connected and joyful and following my kids’ passions with actively working to dismantle white supremacy? Things feel particularly urgent right now. There’s important momentum happening with the Black Liberation movement and I want to actively support it, but I don’t want to check out and leave my kids behind.
QUESTION 3. I feel like we could or maybe even should question the belief that our children are too young or innocent to talk about racism and the death of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and others. What are your thoughts on this?
QUESTION 4. I do see a risk that I’m talking about injustice towards Black people so much lately that my kids are starting to feel sorry for Black people. What’s a good way to counteract that? One of my closest friends is Black and my kids have played frequently with her two sons since they were babies. I remind my kids of our friends when we’re talking about Black people. But overall, our community is very white.
QUESTION 5. I think the question that comes up most often for me is, I’m white and I grew up with the idea that you should treat everyone the same, that treating someone better because of how they look is almost as bad as treating someone worse because of how they look. So, I guess my question is, is it “okay” to purposely seek out diverse playmates for our kids and friends for ourselves? Is it “okay” to be extra nice to the Black family at homeschool group, both because we want them to feel welcome, and because we want to nurture a diverse group where our kids can play together? I think I’m afraid of “using” diverse families to raise anti-racist kids, if that makes sense, I know it’s a twisted-up idea.
QUESTION 6. I’m about nine months into unschooling and am observing, processing, digging/reading, and WORRYING about how this new way of life works. There’s one issue that’s especially concerning right now. I have three beautifully brown-skinned children with “othered” names to match, living in a 75% white community. I worry about my children not having a diploma, especially with these “disadvantages.” In Nevada, from what I understand, I can issue a diploma, but am not sure how it will be received when they begin to apply for work. My husband has expressed his strong concern about them not graduating from school, as he did not, because he feels it was difficult getting a “good” job without a diploma. What can you share that will help me feel better about them not getting a school-issued diploma with the above considerations in mind? I feel strongly that unschooling is the way to live, but I struggle pulling it all together.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support helps pay for the hosting and transcription, as well as my time spent creating new episodes each week. It’s instrumental in keeping the growing podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU240: Kids Are Capable with Anna Brown
Aug 27, 2020
Anna Brown joins me this week to dive into the topic, Kids Are Capable. It’s a foundational principle of unschooling, and seems simple enough, but it’s about so much more than meets the eye!
Questions for Anna
Choice is a great lens through which to start looking at the idea that ‘kids are capable.’ Paying attention to the choices our children are making helps us become more aware of who our children are—the things they like and dislike, their strengths and challenges, their personality style, their learning style, and so on. And from there, we better see the many things they are capable of doing, don’t we?
We also want to be careful not to fall into the “independence agenda” trap. I know that’s something near and dear to your heart, so can you explain what you mean by that?
So often we see things as black and white: yes or no, they do ‘the thing’ or we do ‘the thing.’ But there’s a whole world to explore between those two ends of the spectrum, isn’t there? You called it the “meaty middle” and I love that!
We soon discover that the idea of ‘kids are capable’ is not only about “doing” things, is it? It’s also so much about their self-awareness, that they are capable of knowing what they want and what doesn’t feel good.
Peeling back another layer, holding space for our children to make choices on their timetable and in the directions they are drawn to, while also being involved and engaged so we can help and support them, is the fertile soil in which trust grows, isn’t it?
And now we’re getting to the REAL magic of unschooling. When our children feel seen and heard for who they are, when they see that we trust them to make choices and follow their joy, their trust in themselves grows—they feel empowered and capable. How great is that?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to spend time creating episodes each week, and to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU239: Unschooling Dads with Roop Bhadury
Aug 20, 2020
This week I’m joined by unschooling dad, Roop Bhadury. Roop’s wife Susan joined me earlier this year in episode 220. It was such a treat to get to hear about their family from Roop’s perspective but more than that we had an amazing conversation about the philosophies of unschooling and entrepreneurship, life, relationships, we covered it all.
Questions for Roop
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
When we connected, you shared some topics you’d be interested in touching on and I was struck by the language you used, so I want to stay with your lovely wording! I’d love to hear your thoughts on your first point about curiosity and guardrails. Do they complement or compete?
Next you mentioned positive and negative empathy. Can you describe what you mean and share how you see them playing out?
You used the phrase “creative chaos in play.” I love the image that conveys! How have you seen that unfold in your lives?
And the last point you mentioned: “Knowledge is free, pedagogy isn’t, and its ongoing relevance.” What are your thoughts around that?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are just starting out on this journey?
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to spend time creating episodes each week, and to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU238: Deschooling with Jessica Kane
Aug 13, 2020
This week, I have a lovely conversation with Jessica Kane. Jessica and her husband live in Ireland, and have three children. Her oldest attended school through high school, her middle son left school in grade 4, and her youngest son has never been to school. This gives her such a unique perspective to share! We also dive into her deschooling journey and challenges, what has surprised her most so far, and lots more.
Questions for Jessica
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling so far? And can you share a bit about your journey through it?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
There are pretty big age gaps between your three children, which puts you in distinctly different seasons with each of them, all at the same time. I’d love to hear more about that!
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
Things mentioned in the episode
Check out the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit! It’s an online workshop that focuses on the deep, personal work needed to peel away the layers of conventional ideas about learning and parenting that can get in the way of cultivating a thriving unschooling spirit in your family.
I deeply appreciate all my patrons! Your generous support allows me to spend time creating episodes each week, and to keep the podcast archive freely available to anyone who’s curious and wants to explore the fascinating world of unschooling. If you’d like to join my community of patrons and scoop up some great rewards along the way, check out the Exploring Unschooling page on Patreon.
EU237: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part Six
Aug 06, 2020
This week I’m sharing part six of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Last week, we covered stages ten, eleven, and twelve, ultimately reaching the holy grail of our quest: unschooling with confidence and grace.
Let’s do a quick review to set the stage for the final leg of our journey.
In Stage Ten, Accepting Others Where They Are, we ask ourselves, who still holds power over us? Why do we continue to engage with them on the see-saw of resisting their control and seeking their approval? What grows out of this deep, personal exploration around our need for approval is a feeling of freedom to show up openly as ourselves, mistakes and all, doing our best. As we continue to embrace this new level of self-awareness, we no longer feel the need to hide or apologize for our choices, nor are we drawn to flaunt them—we just live them.
In Stage Eleven, Cultivating Kindness and Compassion, we reach the apotheosis of our journey, which, for me, was all about finding the magic in the mess. As we contemplate what we’ve learned about judgement, temptation, and power over the last three stages of our journey, our understanding continues to grow, and in this stage, we glimpse the true nature of life. As we continue to heal from our past, old fears and hurts fall away, and their influence on our choices fades. As that weight lifts, we feel lighter and more open, able to find more creative and fun ways to navigate our days. As our self-awareness grows, we bring more of our true selves into our days. And as we learn more about our children, our connection with them deepens, and our trust grows.These revelations feed off each other, bringing an increasing lightness and depth to our days and in time we realize we are approaching the summit of our journey. We find ourselves able to reach for kindness and compassion more often. And, in my experience, so often when we choose to reach for kindness and compassion in the moment, we discover magic. The moment turns, and we find ourselves going places more interesting, more fun, and more meaningful than we could have predicted or even imagined.
In Stage Twelve, Unschooling with Confidence and Grace, we obtain the holy grail of our quest: we are truly and deeply unschooling. In myths and stories, the reward at the end of the journey is often represented by an object: fire, magical trinkets, priceless treasure, or elixirs of health or immortality. But after the trials and tribulations of our journey, the real reward isn’t material. We have journeyed to attain the grace of the gods and goddesses. Not to steal it from them, nor to trick them into giving it to us—it’s not a fixed commodity. But to come to understand, and therefore share, their perspective and their spirit. Their grace. The real prize we’ve gained is the knowledge of our indestructibility in life. It’s that understanding, deep in our bones, that enables us to move through whatever challenges life throws at us. Grace is the kindness and compassion that comes from knowing that we will endure. That there is a light at the end of the tunnel, even if we can’t quite see it yet. And remember, having grace doesn’t mean we are perfect. There will be challenges that seem insurmountable. There will be temptations. In fact, understanding that we aren’t perfect is an integral part of our journey. We learn, ever more deeply, that unschooling—that life—is a practice. Each day, each moment, we can choose to reach for love, kindness, and compassion. To live gracefully with others.
And that’s where we left off last week! At the summit of our journey. And in this final episode, we enter the last phase of our journey: living unschooling. The unknown world we set out to discover now feels like home. And with our quest accomplished, we’re enjoying the fruits of our labour. Maybe for a while we think we’re done, but there is so much more to explore and learn! And at some point, we’ll choose to begin our journey back to the ordinary world.
And as we wrap up, I want to make special mention of the incredible illustrations included in the book, by the amazing Hema Bharadwaj. I love them so much, and Hema, an unschooling mom herself, joined me on the podcast when the book first came out to talk about the inspiration behind the images and share some delightful stories about her own unschooling journey. Our conversation ended up being almost two hours so I broke it into two episodes, 114 (Part 1) and 115 (Part 2). I encourage you to listen to them! And if you’d like to see the illustrations we’re talking about, I included them in the episode transcripts, 114 (Part 1) and 115 (Part 2).
I hope you’ve enjoyed this podcast side quest, diving into the unschooling journey through the lens of the hero’s journey.
***
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, ‘The Unschooling Journey’ is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. I share this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema Bharadwaj’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
And for listeners who prefer interview-style episodes, for this last week I’ve selected episode 27, Ten Questions with Teresa Graham Brett, first released in July of 2016. Teresa is an unschooling mom with two kids, and she’s the author of a wonderful book, Parenting for Social Change. Teresa’s background as a social justice educator brings a unique and interesting slant to her journey to unschooling. In this episode, she shares some great stories and the fascinating insights she has gleaned along the way. Of course, the journey never ends, we’re always learning. And in that vein, we talk about adultism, the conventional obsession with control over children, ways to move to more supportive parenting, and much more.
Such a wonderful conversation!
This is the thing about control: when I controlled his access to everything—food, media, whatever it was—I was uninvolved because I had deemed everything he had access to, to be safe. So there was no partnership.
Teresa Graham Brett
EU236: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part Five
Jul 30, 2020
This week I’m sharing part five of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Last week, we covered stages eight and nine. And while our deschooling story to that point was working through much of the nuts and bolts of unschooling, in stages eight and nine we begin the personal growth and transformation aspects of our journey in earnest.
In Stage Eight, Accepting the Value of All Experiences, we come to recognize the connections between the ups and downs of life and truly understand that we gain valuable insights from both kinds of moments. Judging them as “good” or “bad” adds no value. In fact, it can get in the way of valuable learning. And it hits us: life isn’t about trying to avoid “bad” moments so we can finally live our “good” lives. We’ve been living our full lives all along.
In Stage Nine, Accepting Our Nature, we do battle with idea of temptation. We learn to accept, rather than fight, our nature. To accept all facets of ourselves—confident, fearful, tempted—and no longer judged them as “good” and “bad,” but to see and accept them all as part of our nature.We move beyond judging ourselves so that we can mindfully move through these moments of temptation, learn what we can, release what isn’t working, and continue on our journey.
And this week, we’re covering stages ten, eleven, and twelve to reach the holy grail of our quest: unschooling with confidence and grace!
***
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, ‘The Unschooling Journey’ is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. I share this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema Bharadwaj’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
And for listeners who prefer interview-style episodes, this week I’ve selected episode 37, Ten Questions with Carol Black, first released in September of 2016. Carol Black unschooled her two daughters, after dropping out of a teacher education program, sparked by reading John Holt’s How Children Fail. She has written some wonderfully insightful essays about unschooling, which you can read on her website, carolblack.org, and she directed the fascinating documentary film, Schooling the World.
I really enjoyed our conversation!
The goal of life is not to be better than other people. It’s really important to remember that and make sure that our kids understand that as best as possible because this society is so competitive.
Carol Black
EU235: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part Four
Jul 23, 2020
This week I’m sharing part four of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Last week, we entered the deschooling phase of our journey and found ourselves on the aptly named road of trials: a series of tests and challenges that the hero faces as they begin this personal transformation in earnest. On our unschooling journey, this is when we find ourselves challenging so many of our existing beliefs around learning and parenting. And these areas are distinct and meaty enough that I created a separate stage for each.
In Stage Six, Challenging Our Beliefs About Learning, we confront some fundamental truths about learning. Depending on where you are on your journey, some of them may seem a bit “out there,” but just begin where you are, with the openness of beginner’s mind, and start asking yourself questions.
In Stage Seven, Shifting From Control to Connection, we explore some truths about parenting. The parenting truths that are so valuable for unschooling to thrive are those that see the child as a unique and whole person. It’s about moving away from control tactics and toward the rich soil of connection that nourishes a trusting relationship between parent and child. Between two human beings.
Be sure to give yourself time to ponder these truths. To see what they look like through the lens of your lives. If you try to race through these stages, you’ll miss so much of the value of the journey.
This week, we’re diving into stages eight and nine. You can think of your deschooling story to this point as working through much of the nuts and bolts of unschooling, the hands-on details of living unschooling day-to-day.
And now things are going to get really interesting!
***
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, ‘The Unschooling Journey’ is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. I share this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema Bharadwaj’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
And for listeners who prefer interview-style episodes, this week I’ve selected episode 154, Unschooling Dads and Documentaries with Jeremy Stuart, first released in December 2018. Jeremy is an unschooling dad and video editor who also directed and co-produced the documentary films, Class Dismissed and Self-Taught, which looks at the question, “What happens when they become adults?”
I really enjoyed our conversation, which included this gem from Jeremy:
“I think as we go through this journey of life, things tend to get narrower and narrower—or they can. We are forced into these little funnels. To me, the challenge is to break that funnel down and actually get bigger and bigger and bigger and bigger and let more and more of the world in. Let more of the world in, not less. The more of the world you let in, the richer your life becomes.”
EU234: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part Three
Jul 16, 2020
This week I’m sharing part 3 of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
One thing I love about looking at our unschooling lives through this lens is how intimately it connects us to the human journey, which can help us feel less alone. Recognizing that yes, other people really do go through these stages and struggles and they come out the other side. We will too, even if we don’t yet know how our particular path may unfold. It’s fascinating how universally human the journey is. How, through the journey, we find our connection to humanity. But that’s getting a bit ahead of ourselves.
So, last week, we dove into stages three, four, and five. Here’s a brief recap to remind us where we are:
As we enter Stage Three, Finding Our Guides, we’ve chosen to accept the call and embarked on our unschooling adventure. And, as with many tales, when we begin our journey in earnest, a guide appears. Mythologically speaking, guides tend to be elderly—think Dumbledore and Obi-Wan Kenobi. But in a fun unschooling twist, I discovered the most important guides on my unschooling journey were my children. I came to see that, for me, fear often began to take root in my thoughts when I had become a disconnected from my child. I would get stuck in my head, leading to more disconnection and more misunderstanding, which then fertilized my growing worry and a downward spiral ensued. Eventually, I’d remember to look at my kids again. My guides. I’d see them playing with such determination. As we engaged more, I’d see their joy and enthusiasm. I’d notice the new things they’d learned since I got pulled into my head and away from them. They brought me back to what I already knew: unschooling rocks!
In Stage Four, Crossing the Threshold to Unschooling, we find ourselves matching wits with the threshold guardians. I noticed I felt challenged in three different areas, which so interestingly aligns with the three heads of Cerberus, the three-headed dog of Greek mythology who stood guard at the entrance to the Underworld. Head #1 tests our our resolve to leave the ordinary world. Often it’s family and/or friends questioning our choice to not send our kids to school. Head #2 tests our worthiness to enter the new world. As we engage with more experienced unschoolers—online or in person—chances are we are going to feel challenged by new ideas. We can feel like we’re being rejected by the new community we so excitedly want to join. And head #3 is more recognizable: securing permission to homeschool. It can be tempting to approach these gatekeepers adversarially, but they serve a useful purpose: to ensure we understand the applicable education laws/policies and legal implications of our choice to homeschool.
Stage Five, Embracing Beginner’s Mind, is all about transitioning to a learning mindset. As we begin this stage, for all our excitement about entering this new world, we’re also still fearful of letting go of the old one. We want the two worlds to mesh. We seek out compromises. We sign our kids up for classes, just not in school subjects. We encourage our kids to engage in skills that schools prize (say, writing), but in non-schooly ways (“Why don’t you write in your journal today?”). What we need is to find the courage to left up that second foot and leave the ordinary world behind once and for all. This is our metaphorical point of no return. This the last stage of the departure phase of our journey symbolizes this transition: it describes the hero’s figurative death in the ordinary world and their rebirth in the new one.
This week, we enter the Deschooling phase of our journey and find ourselves on the aptly named Road of Trials. In stages six and seven, we are asked to confront some fundamental truths about learning and parenting—and they look very different than they did in the ordinary world.
Remember to bring the fresh eyes and child-like curiosity of beginner’s mind with you!
***
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, ‘The Unschooling Journey’ is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. I share this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
And for listeners who prefer interview-style episodes, this week I’ve selected episode 96, Ordinary Unschooling with Anna Brown and Pat Robinson, first released in November 2017. Anna and Pat have both always unschooled their children—we talk about the idea of “unschooling success stories,” the impact of the conventional “independence agenda” which starts very young in our culture, the incredible value of ordinary unschooling days, and lots more.
I think it’s so valuable to consider what extra-ordinary goals we might be contemplating for our children and why. There is much kindness, grace, and contentment to be found in the ordinary.
EU233: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part Two
Jul 09, 2020
This week, I’m sharing part two of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, The Unschooling Journey is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from my journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. I share this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
Last week, we dove into the introduction and the first two stages, answering the call to unschooling and refusing the call.
In the intro, we set the stage. Choosing to accept this quest to create a thriving unschooling learning environment for your children is to embark on your own hero’s journey to appreciate, understand, and, in the end, integrate, these unschooling truths—that learning is everywhere and that humans are wired to learn—into your lives. I also touch on why I chose to call this a field guide and the value of having a general sense of where we are on the journey, being careful not to see the stages as tick boxes to race through, and the difference between understanding a stage intellectually and experiencing it enough times to believe its truth.
In Stage One, The Call to Unschooling, we begin in our ordinary world. Often, we’re reasonably comfortable with how things are. We know the general rules and expectations and, for the most part, are happy to go with the flow. Then, something happens. Something that gives us a glimpse of a new and previously unsuspected world: the world of unschooling. This is our call to unschooling. Often, this call is delivered by a herald, whether it be a person or an event. The fascinating thing is, when the hero is ready, the herald appears. That’s because the change that sparks the call happens within us.
And in Stage Two, Refusing the Call, the realization hits us that choosing to answer the call to unschooling isn’t a simple question of yes or no and moving on. Those first weeks—even months—can feel like a see-saw. One day we’re gleeful and thrilled by the possibilities. The next, fear looms large and we waver in our resolve. This is such a common aspect of the journey that it has its own stage. Contemplating refusing the call shows that we are starting to understand the commitment involved in choosing to undertake the journey. If you want to develop a thriving unschooling environment for your family, be sure to take the journey. Don’t look for a shortcut. Engage with your questions as they arise, rather than pushing them away because they don’t fit a preconceived idea you have about unschooling. This doesn’t mean you need to understand everything about unschooling before getting started. It does mean that choosing unschooling with your family is the beginning of the journey, not the end.
And here we are.
This week, we’re diving into stages three, four, and five—finishing up the departure phase of our journey, which I’ve called the ‘Choosing Unschooling’ phase. We’re going to find our guides, match wits with threshold guardians, and spend some introspective and valuable time in the belly of the whale.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
Akilah is an unschooling mom with two lovely daughters. She’s also an author, a podcast host, and is on the organizing team of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. She answers my ten questions about her unschooling experience with candor and enthusiasm, and I hope you enjoy our conversation as much as I did!
EU232: The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, Part One
Jul 02, 2020
This week, I’m sharing part one of the audiobook edition of my book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide.
Published in 2018, here’s a bit of the description:
Inspired by Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey framework, The Unschooling Journey is a weave of myths, contemporary stories, and tales from Pam’s journey. It’s not a “how to” book—no two paths through the world of unschooling have the same twists and turns—yet having a general sense of where you are on your journey can bring valuable insight as you navigate the challenges that will inevitably appear. She shares this book as a field guide to the stages and characters you are likely to encounter in some form on your unschooling journey.
Characters such as the heralds and guides who call us forward and help us choose our next step. The tricksters and monsters who are determined to confuse and scare us at every turn. And the gods and goddesses who shake us to the core and inspire our inner journey until, at last, we capture the holy grail of our quest: unschooling with confidence and grace.
I am so excited to share these ideas with you!
And I think it could be fun to discuss the book as we work our way through it, so please feel welcome to share your thoughts and experiences in the comments.
The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide also includes ten beautiful illustrations by Hema Bharadwaj—an unschooling parent herself—created specifically to visually reflect the inner journey we are taking as we embrace unschooling.
And the print edition is also a journal! In the print edition, you’ll also find plenty of room to document your journey along the way. Hema’s illustrations are printed full page for you to colour as you contemplate your journey, there are journal pages for writing down your experiences and clarifying your thoughts, and even blank pages for doodling and sketching.
For listeners who prefer interview-style episodes, I don’t want to leave you feeling neglected! So I’ve curated a wonderful collection of amazing back list episodes for you to listen to.
Phoebe is an artist whose beautiful work focuses on the themes of comfort, nostalgia, and intimacy. She left school entirely after first grade and dove into unschooling. Eventually she chose to go to college, graduating from Rhode Island School of Design in 2013 with a BFA in Illustration. We have a lot of fun talking about her passion for drawing, the idea of “knowledge gaps,” what she found valuable in her college experience, how unschooling has influenced her art, and lots more!
EU231: Growing up Unschooling with Michael Laricchia
Jun 25, 2020
My son Michael joins me this week to talk about his experience growing up unschooling! We had a lot of fun diving into his varied interests, the threads that weave through them, and how they have helped shape the person he is today. We also talk about his experience with type 1 diabetes and our unschooling approach, he shares what he appreciates about growing up unschooling, and lots more!
Questions for Michael
Can you share with us a bit of an introduction?
As you were growing up unschooling, what were some of your interests, and how did you pursue them?
What was it that caught your interest with karate, and how did that interest grow and change over the years?
I think diving into any passion can be a wonderful way to learn so much about ourselves. And that understanding applies everywhere in our lives. Can you share your experience with that?
When you were 11, you developed type 1 diabetes. When it comes to our kids health, it can be super tempting for parents to control things even more closely. I chose to continue with our unschooling approach to food, and to actively support you making choices around your care, like medical devices. It did make for some interesting appointments at the diabetes clinic though, didn’t it? Though they were always supportive, even when they didn’t understand our crazy ways. What are your thoughts about how those different approaches (top-down control vs bottom-up support) tend to play out?
You have quite a few interests: martial arts, parkour, music, programming, philosophy, spirituality. Have I missed any big ones? Is there a thread or two you see that connects them?
At this point, what do you appreciate about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU097 RECAST: Unschooling and Diversity with Erika Davis-Pitre
Jun 18, 2020
This episode was first shared in November of 2017, and I want to share it again now as the Black Lives Matter movement gains important momentum to bring Erika’s valuable experience and insights about diversity and racism through the lens of unschooling back into our conversations.
Erika and her husband, Michael have four adult children—they unschooled for many years and loved it. She has spoken at many unschooling conferences over the years and in our conversation we talk about the value of digging into our fears around race and privilege, ways to bring more diversity into our unschooling lives, having challenging conversations with extended family members, and so much more. Erika also shares her favourite anti-racist story: a supermarket encounter she had with a curious 3 year-old boy and his mom.
As Erika mentions, these are uncomfortable conversations. Yet, as we’ve discovered on our unschooling journey, we learn so many incredibly valuable things—especially about ourselves—when we take the time to sit with our discomfort, rather than pushing it away. I encourage you to sit with your discomfort and explore what bubbles up for you.
And when I asked Erika’s permission to re-broadcast this episode, not only did she say yes, she offered to come on the podcast again to continue the conversation. If, after listening to this episode, you have questions for Erika, please share them in the comments and we’ll do our best to address them in our upcoming conversation.
Questions for Erika
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I heard you speak at an unschooling conference earlier this year about unschooling and diversity and really enjoyed it. You shared some very enlightening stories about the subtle impact of privilege in our society. Can you share one with us?
As we move to unschooling, we learn the value of digging into our own fears and questioning conventional wisdom in many areas of our lives. For example, our fears around learning—that our children won’t learn if we don’t tell them what they need to know, or if we don’t insist that they follow a certain timetable. We eventually discover that we truly can trust them to learn—that they are born to learn—and our world opens up. Can we can apply this same process to our fears surrounding race and diversity?
Can you share some ways in which we can be more welcoming to families from the wide variety of backgrounds that exist in the unschooling community?
Do you have some tips on approaching these kinds of challenging conversations around diversity with extended family members?
EU230: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Jun 11, 2020
The idea with the unschooling in context episodes is to deepen our understanding of unschooling by exploring it in the context of other, related things. In this episode, we dive into unschooling in the context of parenting and examine some of the paradigm shifts around parenting and parent/child relationships that are integral to helping unschooling thrive in our families.
I had to think about it a bit to choose how I wanted to represent the relationship between parenting and unschooling in the diagram. I chose a big circle to represent parenting, and then a smaller, fully enclosed circle to represent unschooling. Because, of course, there is parenting that exists outside of unschooling, yet, once we commit to unschooling and discover what a pivotal role our relationships play in learning, unschooling and parenting become one and the same.
Topics we cover
Parenting doesn’t need to be adults vs children: from control to connection
Connected and trusting relationships are key
Children are capable of making choices
Exploring boundaries and comfort zones
Things mentioned in the episode
The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us About the Relationship Between Parents and Children by Alison Gopnik
Attachment across the Lifecourse by David Howe
Escape From Childhood: The Needs and Rights of Children by John Holt
This week, I’ve put together a compilation episode! This time, the lens is on parenting and the shift away from control and toward connection and engagement with our kids. I think you’ll get a lot out of this deep dive.
EU002 RECAST: Ten Questions with Pam Sorooshian
May 28, 2020
Pam Sorooshian is a veteran unschooling mom of three now adult daughters. Originally broadcast as the second episode of the podcast, I wanted to bring this gem back into the light!
In our conversation, Pam shares so many incredible insights from her experience. She talks about the early years of unschooling, tips on navigating sibling conflicts and reluctant spouses, how she worked through her bias against TV by exploring her husband’s love for it, and we also dive into her well-known essay, ‘Economics of Restricting TV Watching of Children,’ about the law of diminishing marginal utility.
In prepping to re-share this episode, I found some notes I made a while ago when I was reading the book Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much about how it wove together so clearly with Pam’s essay. Here’s a quote from the book, written by Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir:
“Scarcity is not just a physical constraint. It is also a mindset. When scarcity captures our attention, it changes how we think—whether it is at the level of milliseconds, hours, or days and weeks. By staying top of mind, it affects what we notice, how we weigh our choices, how we deliberate, and ultimately what we decide and how we behave. When we function under scarcity, we represent, manage, and deal with problems differently.”
It’s really fascinating stuff! The scarcity mindset can effect everyone—not just children, and not just around TV watching. But it is a great example, and one that often comes up in unschooling circles.
Even if you’ve listened to this episode in the past, I strongly encourage you to listen in again. I suspect you’ll find yourself making all sorts of cool connections and maybe even gaining some new insights and ideas.
Enjoy!!
Ten Questions for Pam
1. Jumping back a few years, how did you first hear about unschooling and what spurred you to begin exploring unschooling with your family?
2. Let’s talk a bit about what learning looks like with unschooling. When one of your children was actively pursuing an interest, what are some of the things you did to support their exploration? And how did you weave together pursuing the interests of all three children?
3. One of the wonderful things about unschooling is the time we spend together. We get to know each other very well, strengthening our family’s connections and relationships, and part of that process, especially with siblings, is figuring out ways to move through moments when they are frustrated and angry with each other. When your children were younger, how did you help them move through conflicts?
4. I understand that your husband was a bit wary of unschooling for a few years, as was mine. How did you approach that?
5. One of the topics that regularly trips up newcomers to unschooling is TV watching. I’ve always loved your clear explanation of how restricting TV actually causes children to become more strongly attracted to it, the opposite of what the parent is trying to accomplish. Can you take us through that?
6. As an economics and statistics professor, you are pretty comfortable with math, but it’s an area that can be challenging for some people to figure out as they explore unschooling, especially since school has mostly boiled math down to worksheets. I have two questions for you about math. The first is, can you talk about how you see learning math through unschooling?
7. The second question is, can you suggest, especially for parents who are feeling a bit math phobic, some activities can they do with their children?
8. You’ve been actively involved with Homeschool Association of California’s annual conference for many years. What are some the benefits of going to a conference that you’ve seen for newer unschooling families?
9. All three of your daughters chose to go to college, and you see lots of schooled kids in your college classes. Have you seen any advantages in college from growing up unschooling?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
This week, I’m sharing the third and final part of the audiobook recording of my book, Free to Learn: Five Ideas for a Joyful Unschooling Life. This episode dives into the fourth and fifth ideas: instead of ‘no’ and living together.
If you haven’t read it yet, this is an opportunity to learn more about the paradigm-changing ideas that I found to be truly fundamental on my unschooling journey.
And if you have read it, I think it’ll still be wonderful to revisit. You’re in a different place on your unschooling journey now. You’ve peeled back some layers and have fresh eyes and new experiences to bring to it. New things will likely jump out and connect for you; things that passed by unnoticed before.
Free to Learn Description
Humans are born to learn. So why are we so determined to get in our children’s way?
Leaving the traditional education system behind is definitely unconventional and sometimes scary, but it enables us to preserve our children’s curiosity, creativity, and enthusiasm for learning. And that means more learning, not less.
With more than a dozen years of unschooling experience, Pam Laricchia explains the five paradigm-shifting ideas about learning and living that freed her family from the school system’s compulsory schedule and typical teaching methods. Her practical examples and stories may make all the difference in your life and the life of your child. If you are a fan of online gaming, there has never been a better time to look at all the online casino gaming options available to you.
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In Free to Learn, you’ll discover:
Why you want to look for learning, not teaching
How to see the learning that is happening everywhere, all the time
How judgement and shame short circuit learning, and what to do instead
How saying yes more encourages our children’s learning and cultivates their confidence
How to give your children a voice in your family, and much, much more!
Through its concise, easy-to-understand language, Free to Learn explores the depth and potential of unschooling and how it can strengthen your family’s learning and relationships.
This week, I’m sharing part two of the audiobook recording of my book, Free to Learn: Five Ideas for a Joyful Unschooling Life. This episode dives into the second and third ideas: that learning is everywhere and that choices are key to learning.
If you haven’t read it yet, this is an opportunity to learn more about the paradigm-changing ideas that I found to be truly fundamental on my unschooling journey.
And if you have read it, I think it’ll still be wonderful to revisit. You’re in a different place on your unschooling journey now. You’ve peeled back some layers and have fresh eyes and new experiences to bring to it. New things will likely jump out and connect for you; things that passed by unnoticed before.
In the section ‘Embracing Passions,’ I mention the connection maps I drew back in 2006 that showed me that even seemingly narrow passions can be a window to the world. They’re on my website if you’d like to check them out: Joseph’s passion for video games and Lissy’s passion for Harry Potter.
And have you had a peek at the cover? It’s a photo of my son Michael, taken by my daughter Lissy. Once I had decided on the book title and it was time to think about the cover, I went looking through our pictures for an image that I felt represented the ideas of “free” and “joyful” and this one jumped out immediately. I’m so grateful they both agreed to let me use it!
Free to Learn Description
Humans are born to learn. So why are we so determined to get in our children’s way?
Leaving the traditional education system behind is definitely unconventional and sometimes scary, but it enables us to preserve our children’s curiosity, creativity, and enthusiasm for learning. And that means more learning, not less.
With more than a dozen years of unschooling experience, Pam Laricchia explains the five paradigm-shifting ideas about learning and living that freed her family from the school system’s compulsory schedule and typical teaching methods. Her practical examples and stories may make all the difference in your life and the life of your child.
In Free to Learn, you’ll discover:
Why you want to look for learning, not teaching
How to see the learning that is happening everywhere, all the time
How judgement and shame short circuit learning, and what to do instead
How saying yes more encourages our children’s learning and cultivates their confidence
How to give your children a voice in your family, and much, much more!
Through its concise, easy-to-understand language, Free to Learn explores the depth and potential of unschooling and how it can strengthen your family’s learning and relationships.
For the next while, I’m doing something a little different on the podcast.
With many people sheltering in place worldwide due to the coronavirus pandemic, it’s become increasingly challenging to arrange interviews. At first that seemed curious because people are connecting online even more so during these uncertain times. But as I thought more about the things I was seeing, it made so much sense.
Personal circumstances are changing so quickly right now that guests have been needing to reschedule calls, sometimes multiple times. And with the increased Internet traffic on our rural bandwidth, sometimes I’ve needed to reschedule calls to off hours. All that is added stress that I don’t want to put on people’s plates right now.
So, a couple of weeks ago I started contemplating what else I could do with the podcast during this time. I can rebroadcast some older episodes that many newer listeners likely haven’t yet discovered—there are some real gems in the backlist! And I can put together some more compilation episodes. It can be helpful to do a deep dive on a topic, hearing how different guests have answered similar questions. Another idea that bubbled up was my long-standing wish to record audiobook editions of my published books.
You might wonder why I’d share them for free on my podcast when the books—and eventually the audiobooks—are for sale as part of my livelihood, but I quickly realized that I truly don’t see it as either-or. I want to share my thoughts and ideas about how unschooling works. I want to share my experience with the personal journey we each take as parents as we strive to cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families. Having the ideas out there for curious and interested parents to discover, through all sorts of channels, feels good to me.
And that’s what I’ve chosen to start with. This week, I’ve recorded and am sharing part one of the audiobook edition of my first book, Free to Learn: Five Ideas for a Joyful Unschooling Life.
First published in 2012, since then Free to Learn has been translated into four languages: French, Spanish, Portuguese, and Hungarian.
If you haven’t read it yet, this is an opportunity to learn more about the paradigm-changing ideas that I found to be truly fundamental on my unschooling journey.
And if you have read it, I think it’ll be a wonderful refresher. Because you are in a different place on your journey today. You’ve peeled back some layers and have fresh eyes and new experiences to bring to the table. New things will likely jump out and connect for you; things that passed by unnoticed before.
I’m excited to share!
Free to Learn Description
Humans are born to learn. So why are we so determined to get in our children’s way?
Leaving the traditional education system behind is definitely unconventional and sometimes scary, but it enables us to preserve our children’s curiosity, creativity, and enthusiasm for learning. And that means more learning, not less.
With more than a dozen years of unschooling experience, Pam Laricchia explains the five paradigm-shifting ideas about learning and living that freed her family from the school system’s compulsory schedule and typical teaching methods. Her practical examples and stories may make all the difference in your life and the life of your child.
In Free to Learn, you’ll discover:
Why you want to look for learning, not teaching
How to see the learning that is happening everywhere, all the time
How judgement and shame short circuit learning, and what to do instead
How saying yes more encourages our children’s learning and cultivates their confidence
How to give your children a voice in your family, and much, much more!
Through its concise, easy-to-understand language, Free to Learn explores the depth and potential of unschooling and how it can strengthen your family’s learning and relationships.
EU225: Unschooling Stories with Liz Brady
Apr 30, 2020
Liz Brady joins me this week to share some of her family’s unschooling stories. Liz and her husband live with their four boys in Western Australia. We dive into how she discovered unschooling, her parenting journey, and the gift of sharing her life with so many unique and dynamic personalities. The love and joy shines through in every story!
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Questions for Liz
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What stands out for you about your journey from traditional parenting to cultivating more consensual and respectful relationships with your children?
With four children ages ten and under, can you share your experience with navigating everyone’s needs and wishes as you move through your days? How do you approach things when they are at odds?
I’d love to talk about the idea of “productivity.” It’s so pervasive, yet it’s definitely a valuable concept to explore as we’re deschooling, isn’t it?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
Things mentioned in the episode
Join us in The Living Joyfully Network to connect with like-minded parents and explore candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling
Fiona Munday joins me this week. Fiona and her husband live with their 4.5-year-old son in New Zealand and she dove into researching unschooling when her son was a baby. We have fun exploring her journey and she shares some of the wonderful insights and a-ha moments she’s already experienced—including applying the same principles to the adults in the family!
Questions for Fiona
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling?
Your son isn’t quite yet school age, but you’ve been diving deep into learning about unschooling. What benefits have you seen from starting your unschooling journey early?
What have you found to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling so far? And what’s been your experience as you work through it?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your days right now?
Things mentioned in the episode
The Axel Show – one of Ollie’s favorites and one that helped Fiona too!
EU223: Unschooling with Young Kids with Eva Whipple
Apr 16, 2020
Eva Whipple joins me this week! With children ages four and two, she and her husband have always known that they wouldn’t send their kids to school. We have a wonderful conversation diving into their journey, how she discovered unschooling, what their days look like, how capable and emotionally intelligent their children are, and how they are thriving in their loving environment.
Questions for Eva
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling?
It can be hard to make unconventional life choices that many people don’t understand. I’d love to hear how you’ve worked through that discomfort to become confident with your choices.
Looking through the lens of parenting and your relationships with your kids, what has deschooling looked like for you so far?
What has your deschooling journey looked like around learning?
What is your favourite thing about the flow of your days right now?
EU222: Living Joyfully Network and Q&A with Anna Brown
Apr 09, 2020
This week’s episode is a special one for me. For a few months now, I’ve been percolating lots of thoughts and possibilities around building an engaging and supportive online unschooling community. Finally, it’s HERE! And Anna Brown is an integral part of it all, taking on the role of Community Advocate. We are well into our “soft opening,” things have been going swimmingly, and we are so excited to open it up to anyone who is interested! Anna joins me this week to talk about how the Living Joyfully Network community works, and then we dive into a couple of listener questions.
Living Joyfully Network Overview
Purpose
We bring together unschooling parents to support and learn from each other as we question and explore many of the conventional beliefs around learning and parenting so that we can more gracefully navigate our personal unschooling journeys, develop strong and connected relationships with our children, and cultivate a thriving unschooling lifestyle in our families.
How are we going to do this?
Monthly theme
To help unschooling parents navigate their journey, we have an unschooling-related theme each month.
For April, the theme is our parenting toolbox—we thought this would be especially helpful right now as many of us around the world have been asked to stay home as much as possible.
Weekly focus
Each week we’ll explore the monthly theme through a different lens, or focus.
On Mondays, Anna and I share and expand upon the weekly focus through a short video conversation, including a couple of ideas or questions to contemplate over the week.
You are welcome to post your questions, your thoughts, your insights etc. in the Network as they come up.
Weekly live Q&A call
At the end of the week, we meet up online to answer more questions and chat about what we’ve observed and learned.
Soon we’ll start to vary the times for the call because we have members from around the world, giving most the opportunity to join us live, but the calls are recorded so members can listen whenever it’s convenient for them and their family’s flow.
Topics
Conversation isn’t limited to the weekly focus!
We have a number of topics to start with, like A-ha Moments, Challenges We’re Facing, Questions We’re Pondering, as well as a Hanging Out space for more random fun and connection.
Everyone is encouraged to start conversations and participate however works for them.
And Anna and I are working on even more ways to help members to learn about each other and connect.
Q&A Questions
QUESTION 1: I am mom to 4 bright, inquisitive, and energetic boys. My oldest, 8, is brilliant at science and would do experiments all day long. He knows more about space than most adults, and he loves to be around people. My second is 6 and is a very creative builder, loves spending his time designing monster jam stadiums for his monster trucks, blows my mind with his creative problem-solving skills, and is definitely a leader. He also likes to make people laugh. My third, 3, is a tank. Super physical, adrenaline junkie, and fearless. He is also really sensitive, caring, and sweet and is the most easygoing of the four. My fourth is 1 and his personality is still coming out, but he is adventurous, happy, and a snuggle bug!
My point in telling you that I guess is that I want to recognize that they really do shine – my problem is that I often can’t seem to see it. We have been unschooling for about a year, and I actually found letting go of the academic stuff to be quite easy. But I feel defeated. The atmosphere in my home is still awful. My kids are fighting with each other constantly and it often gets physical. My oldest son and my husband argue constantly. My oldest son is very much struggling right now to compromise on anything at all. He yells at me, his dad, or his brothers frequently for not doing things to his liking. My 6-year-old is also extremely demanding in his tone. They have no respect for me or my personal things and are often destructive. I try to say no only when it’s truly necessary and always try to validate and discuss solutions, alternatives, or even just different times that we can do things, but this is ALWAYS met with instant whining rather than a willingness to discuss. I feel like I can never find the right words to have conversations like you so often discuss in the podcast, which gets me feeling down on myself. I often end up yelling or resorting to punishments like timeout, which I know don’t work but they’re also the only way I feel that they’re not being allowed to treat myself or each other that way. Then I feel so guilty and like I’m doing everything wrong. My husband claims to be on board with what I’m trying to do, but he always has rules and demands that I think are ridiculous (like getting mad at our oldest because he thinks he’s carrying too many toys). He won’t do enough of his own research to really understand it. I’m sure he and I being at odds in our parenting isn’t helping. I want the relationships so badly. I just feel like I’m failing with communicating and controlling my own temper when they are so rude and disrespectful to me, and failing at parenting in general because my kids act this way. What do I do? I’m ready to throw in the towel and send my two oldest to school just so there can be some peace in my house.
I’m just really hoping for some insight, even if it’s just showing me HOW I can develop the ability to have effective conversations or how to handle such behaviors in a respectful manner, or…honestly I don’t even know what I’m looking for. I just feel discouraged and need help.
QUESTION 2: I live with my husband, our 2 year old daughter, and nearly 5 year old son. We have decided to unschool… it’s been quite the journey to reach that decision!
I have a question. My children are so young, I’m happy to let them play and just be. When they are older I know they will be able to ask for what they want and it will be easier for me to support their learning. For now, I just want to make sure I have the right things around for them. Do you have any ‘must have’ items or activities to do with kids in this age group? Reading, craft, outdoor play, blocks…. I suppose I’m just chasing reassurance that they have everything they need.
EU221: Unschooling and Neurodiversity with Tara McGovern Dutcher
Apr 02, 2020
Tara McGovern Dutcher joins me to talk about neurodiversity, how we are all unique in our experience of the world, and how unschooling creates an amazing environment from which our individual gifts can shine.
Questions for Tara
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I’d love to hear more about your journey around neurodiversity. How do you define it and what does it mean to you?
I pretty regularly see questions like, “Will unschooling work for my autistic child?” How do you answer that question? What are some of the benefits of unschooling for autistic or neurodiverse children?
Unschooling is about cultivating a supportive environment that celebrates each child as a unique individual—helping them as they explore who they are, their interests and passions, how they like to engage with others etc. And how that changes over time. We sometimes talk about this as being a student of our child. It also means that our unschooling days can look very different from other families, doesn’t it?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
EU220: Pursuing Our Curiosity with Susan Bhadury
Mar 26, 2020
Susan Bhadury, an unschooling mom with two children, joins me this week. She shares some wonderful stories and insights as we dive into deschooling challenges, the joys of technology, helping our children follow their inner compass, how curiosity weaves its way through their lives, and lots more!
Questions for Susan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What have you found to be one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling? And can you share a bit about your journey through it?
When we first connected, you mentioned that technology has been an awesome tool for your family. I’d love to hear more about that!
You recently wrote online that unschooling is about helping our children find who they truly are as people by listening and following their own inner compass without everyone around them overriding that intuition. That change in our focus, from our expectations to their inner compass, is so important, isn’t it?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
EU219: Home with the Kids with Pam and Anna
Mar 19, 2020
For any parents who find themselves at home with the kids during these uncertain times, Anna Brown and I dive into the value of using this time to embrace and strengthen our relationships with our children, tips for navigating sibling conflicts, and some ideas to get your brainstorming juices flowing for fun things to do at home!
Discussion topics
Acknowledging the challenge and stress of these uncertain times
Kim & Jason Kotecki (who were recently on the podcast in episode 217), founders of Escape Adulthood, are encouraging people to stay calm and be optimistic. They are offering a free download of their book, thanks the update of their website with the support of the professionals from bestwebsitehosting.ca, A Chance of Awesome, hosting virtual coffee dates every weekday during this time, and continually updating their post, The Good Fight with all the links.
Roya Dedeaux (who was on the podcast in episode 24) is active in MOB Nation (Mom-Owned Businesses) and, in an effort to help support small businesses during all of this social isolation, all March Meetups have been moved to virtual meetups. You can check them out here, and she’s given us a password for $5 off a ticket for any meetup event: forevercurious5
EU218: Growing Up Unschooling with Jayn Coburn
Mar 12, 2020
Jayn Coburn joins me this week to talk about her experience growing up unschooling. Her mom, Robyn, joined me back in 2017 so it was great to connect with Jayn! She openly shares her unschooling experience and insights. We talk about video games, learning, food controls, and touch many of the big topics that come up for families new to unschooling. It’s wonderful to hear her perspective and see how unschooling has influenced her life.
Questions for Jayn
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
It can be hard for parents to let go of our inclination to judge our children’s interests, thinking of things that more easily fit into the “academic box” as better. Yet fandoms and participating in pop culture can be great learning tools for unschoolers, can’t they?
On a related note, I’d love to hear your take on the ways that school and homeschoolers are represented in popular media.
Another common deschooling challenge for parents surrounds food choices and limitations. What has your experience been with that?
What do you appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
EU217: Change the Way You See Things with Jason and Kim Kotecki
Mar 05, 2020
Jason and Kim Kotecki are back! We had a great time catching up and hearing about what’s going in their unschooling lives. I love Jason’s new book, ‘A Chance of Awesome: How Changing the Way You See Changes Everything’ and found so many parallels to our unschooling lives. The lens of unschooling changes how we see things and that changes everything!
Questions for Jason and Kim
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
You shared your journey to unschooling in our earlier episode (EU151). So, I’d love to know what’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
You guys published a new book late last year titled, A Chance of Awesome: How Changing the Way You See Changes Everything. It’s filled with Jason’s wonderful art and great stories that illustrate the many ways we can change up the way we look at things and why we’d want to! Can you share the story behind the book?
I really love the book, and with just about every section, I thought, ‘I want to talk to them about this on the podcast!’ Obviously, that won’t work, so I’d love to hear from each of you what your favourite story is in the book.
There’s a great quote from Kim in the book: “Never let making a mess get in the way of making a memory.” It’s so short and sweet—and eye-opening! It struck me because when we find ourselves going through our days on autopilot, we often jump to seeing the mess and miss seeing the memory-making potential of the moment. I think that’s extra relevant in our unschooling lives, yes?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Nikki Zavitz joins me this week to talk about her deschooling journey. She talks about how her life as a teacher influenced her decision to unschool, and how it also created challenges in her deschooling journey. She shares stories from what she calls the “messy middle,” and the beautiful moments that come alive everyday, and the deep connections she has with her girls and her husband as they move through this life together.
Questions for Nikki
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What have you found to be one of the more challenging aspect of deschooling? And can you share a bit about your journey through it?
When we connected before the call, you mentioned being a recovering perfectionist and how that has guided you on your unschooling journey. I’d love to hear more about that.
The dance of unschooling relationships often includes sharing pieces of our personal journey with our children as it connects to, and bubbles up in, our conversations. How has that been unfolding for you?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
EU215: Unschooling Stories with Dola Dasgupta
Feb 20, 2020
Dola Dasgupta is a long-time unschooling mom with two older children and we have a fascinating conversation! She shares some wonderful stories as we dive into her journey to unschooling, deschooling challenges along the way, the value of free time, her experience unschooling in India, and lots more.
Questions for Dola
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody interested in right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I think one of the challenges of deschooling can be navigating not having set goals or expectations for our children while still staying aware and engaged and supporting them on their journey as it unfolds. It’s an interesting dance, isn’t it?
A topic of concern that comes up pretty often in unschooling circles is “screen time.” I’m curious what your experiences and thoughts are on the topic.
For me, one of the biggest surprises, and joys, of unschooling turned out to be having large swaths of free time at our disposal. When we started, I didn’t realize how much open-ended time would be so well-spent by slowing down and being with my kids at their pace, whether it was around exploring their interests or feeling their feelings. Has that been your experience as well?
When we connected before the call, you mentioned the value of being aware of indoctrination while parenting our children. I’d love to hear your thoughts around that.
I’d love to learn more about unschooling in India. You were involved in creating the first homeschooling conference in India, yes? How have things grown since then?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling lives right now?
EU214: Unschooling Dads with Bob Mahan
Feb 13, 2020
Bob Mahan joins me to talk about his experience as an unschooling dad. An accountant for 24 years, he had all the bells and whistles of that career, but he didn’t enjoy it. In our conversation, he shares his journey from there to unschooling and living a life of freedom, fun, and connection. Nowadays, Bob, his wife, and their three sons live in an RV—they traveled around the US for a few years and are currently living in Orlando.
Questions for Bob
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everybody into right now?
You planned to homeschool before you had children. I’d love to know how that choice originally came about, and how it evolved into unschooling.
Can you share your experience with moving through the doubts and fears that arise as we learn to trust ourselves to navigate this new path?
On your Facebook page, you recently wrote: “People are often amazed by what we are able to do. And ask how we do it. We are proactive in designing our lives. It’s really that simple.” I love that description! What does that look like in action?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
EU213: Unschooling and Math with Marcella O’Brien
Feb 06, 2020
Marcella O’Brien joins me this week. Marcella is an unschooling mom of three boys. Her grown sons, Jack and Sean, joined me to share their experiences back in episode 181, so it was such a treat to hear Marcella’s journey. She was also a public school teacher and still tutors math which led to a fascinating conversation about her observations around math in school verses unschooling. With toes in both worlds, her unique perspective really lends some amazing insights to a subject that comes up a lot for new unschoolers. Her journey as a mom working together with her husband and boys to find the best path for their family is inspiring!
Questions for Marcella
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What is everyone into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You’re also a math tutor, so I’d love to dive into that topic with you! First, let’s talk about the conventional way math is taught in schools. You have a unique perspective as a tutor to see how that teaching process plays out for students trying to understand math concepts. What have you seen?
Now let’s dive into exploring math through unschooling. In unschooling circles, we talk about how kids can learn math concepts through everyday living. I’d love to know how you’ve seen that play out. Has that been your experience as well?
Your two older sons, Jack and Sean were on the podcast last year and I really enjoyed hearing about their experiences growing up unschooling, especially through the teen years and college. I’d love to hear your perspective on those years! What strikes you as you look back on them now?
You’re still unschooling with your youngest. What’s your favourite thing about the flow of your days right now?
EU212: Ten Questions with Nisa & Jewel Deeves
Jan 30, 2020
Nisa Deeves and her daughter Jewel join me this week to answer ten questions about their unschooling lives. This was a lovely chat that felt like sharing a cup of tea with old friends. I love the rich tapestry of lives created by all of the unschoolers who so generously share their time with me.
Questions for Nisa and Jewel
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling and how did you work through it?
In unschooling circles we talk about the importance of actively supporting our children as they pursue their interests. What has that looked like over the years for you? Were there certain aspects of support that you found most helpful?
Jewel, can you share what you’ve been up to lately?
What was your favourite thing about unschooling during the teen years?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Have you found that your definition of “success” has changed since you began your unschooling journey?
I love hearing about how unschooling parents whose children are now young adults are approaching this next phase of their family’s journey. There are so many possibilities! What are you excited about and how are your lives weaving together?
Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
When we first decide our children aren’t going to go to school, it can be daunting to envision how they’re going to learn instead. The great thing is, we don’t need to re-create the ethos of school in our homes to help our children’s learning thrive in the real world.
In this talk I gave in 2018, I dig into the conventional wisdom that surrounds learning by exploring three characteristics of real and effective learning: engagement, motivation, and time to think. By the end, you’ll be well on your way to recognizing and encouraging your children’s real learning—even when it doesn’t look like school at all.
It’s a great talk for people who are starting out on their unschooling journey, but I think it’ll also be interesting for those who have been unschooling for a few years. You’ll bring a more experienced lens with you as you listen, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you make even deeper connections because you’ll have seen these ideas play out in your lives already.
EU210: Unschooling Stories with Michelle Conaway
Jan 16, 2020
Michelle Conaway joins me this week. Michelle is an unschooling mother of three and grandmother to one! She also runs the Texas Unschoolers group, coordinates their annual conference, and was gracious enough to share her journey and some wonderful stories and insights from their unschooling lives.
Questions for Michelle
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What’s everybody into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I think one of the big misconceptions people have when they first hear about unschooling is that it’s “all about letting your kids do whatever they want.” I mean, on one hand, it’s true, we help our kids do the things they’re interested in doing. But it’s so much more, isn’t it? They aren’t doing these things in isolation; their actions are woven into their world.
I think one of the most valuable paradigm shifts of deschooling comes when we’re able to distinguish between who we think our child should be and who they actually are. Truly seeing our kids and the gifts they have to bring to the world is life changing. But it can take a lot of personal work to get there, can’t it?
You run the Texas Unschoolers Conference, which is happening in April this year. I know a lot of work goes into organizing these kinds of events and I’d love to know, what is your favourite thing about the conference?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
EU209: The Lovely Chaos of Unschooling with Shan Burton
Jan 09, 2020
Shan Burton is a writer, an unschooling mom and a recent widow. She kindly joins me this week to talk about her unschooling life, how the idea of Lovely Chaos (her website name) came about and how embracing unschooling healed her relationships and helped her family through the loss of their beloved husband and father. It was a lively, fun conversation and I’m so grateful that she agreed to join me and share so much of herself and their life.
Questions for Shan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What’s everybody into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I love that your online presence is woven around the idea of “lovely chaos!” Can you share how that came about and what it means to you?
I was so sorry to hear of your husband’s passing last year. I can only imagine how much that shook your family’s world—and continues to weave through your days. You mentioned before our call that you found unschooling principles to be helpful in times of trauma. I’d love to hear more about your experience with that.
I saw a comment you made recently on your blog about Miah turning 18 and how one of your goals is to stop saying “the kids” to reference your adult children. That struck me because, with my kids in their twenties, I’ve been feeling a bit uncomfortable using that phrase as well. I’d love to hear your thoughts around that.
At this point, what do you love most about having chosen to embrace unschooling?
EU208: Don’t Aim for Perfect with Sue Patterson
Jan 02, 2020
Sue Patterson joins me to talk about how the idea of “perfect” can get in the way of living our best unschooling life. We touch on comparisons, tough times, the personal work involved, the gifts that these choices bring, and lots more!
Discussion Points
Let’s start with the genuine excitement that bubbles up when we first discover and start exploring unschooling. No school schedules and homework battles? Connected and respectful relationships with our kids? Having fun? Sounds amazing! It can seem almost Utopian, can’t it?
As we continue to learn about unschooling and shift our relationship dynamics, we also need to take a deeper dive into what we think unschooling looks like. That Utopian lens begins to fall away. We’re real people, with different personalities and interests. Life has real ups and downs and challenges. As we read about or listen to unschooling parents sharing their experiences, we begin to more clearly recognize the personal and parenting work that weaves through their stories. Life isn’t “perfect.” It’s time to stop using that ideal as a goal, isn’t it?
There’s something else that may come up as we dive into the personal work and self- awareness that deschooling asks of us. For some, delving into those depths can bring up challenges and even trauma stemming from our experiences growing up. That can be a surprise, can’t it? Sometimes it can feel like deschooling is easier for everyone else.
We’ve talked a lot about how life isn’t “perfect” and how striving for that ideal can get in our way. But there are definitely advantages to the unschooling lifestyle when it comes to moving through challenging times. I thought it’d be great to wrap up our conversation talking about some of the advantages we’ve seen.
It’s compilation episode time again! In many of my conversations with grown unschoolers, I ask what advice they’d like to share with newer unschooling parents who are starting out on this journey. In this episode, I’ve woven together answers from eleven episodes and twelve grown unschoolers.
It’s so interesting to hear the things that they feel were valuable for them as they grew up unschooling. I think you’ll find their answers fascinating! And great fodder for you as you contemplate your family’s unschooling journey.
Anna Brown joins Pam to talk about navigating the holiday season through the lens of unschooling.
As we move into the holiday season, things can get challenging. Maybe you’re deep into deschooling and questioning everything—including holiday traditions—to see how well they really fit your family. Maybe you’re the lone unschooling family and anticipating uncomfortable visits with extended family as the holidays gear up. And then there’s the general stress that seems to build, both in the people around us and sometimes in ourselves, as we feel the growing weight of the expectations of the season—no matter how you celebrate.
Let’s talk about ways to bring more JOY to the season!
Discussion Points
First, I want to dive into the idea of holiday traditions. I remember that a-ha moment when I realized that I didn’t have to try to twist my family into all the holiday traditions that I—and my husband—grew up with. That everything was a choice—even around holiday traditions. It was another layer of deschooling for me and it felt so freeing! How has that perspective unfolded for you, Anna?
So, maybe there’s a holiday tradition in our extended family that doesn’t mesh well with us, yet they are expecting us to participate. Let’s chat about ways to navigate those kinds of situations.
Now, let’s say we have plans to visit with extended family. How can we set things up so it’s a fun experience?
Now we’re there—at our parent’s home, or our in-laws, or even a cousin’s place. Let’s talk about how can we support our children and their relationships with their relatives.
And finally, let’s brainstorm things we might do if, in the midst of our visit, someone decides to challenge us about our unschooling lifestyle.
EU206: Deschooling with Kinsey Norris
Dec 12, 2019
Kinsey Norris is an unschooling mom with two kids and we had a wonderful chat about her journey! She has a background in Early Childhood Education and it was fascinating to see how many seeds were planted along the way that ultimately grew into the amazing unschooling life they are living as a family today.
Questions for Kinsey
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What are you each into right now?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What have you found to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling so far? And what’s been your experience as you work through it?
I think one of the biggest paradigm shifts for me as we moved deeper into unschooling and I focused on building connected, respectful relationships with the kids, was how I approached moments when things got challenging—like when the kids wanted to do different things, or when I was uncomfortable about something one of them wanted to do. It was such a paradox for me! How on earth would being open and creative help me narrow in on the “best” solution? They practically seemed like opposites. But it’s often in moving through those moments when creativity really shines, isn’t it?
With the holidays on the horizon, we can find ourselves spending time with extended family members who don’t really understand our lifestyle. Do you have some ideas or tips that have been helping you guys move through those moments?
What’s your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
EU205: Unschooling Dads with Lucas Land
Dec 05, 2019
Lucas Land is an unschooling dad with three kids, and we have a wonderful conversation about deschooling, living in another country, trusting our kids, and lots more! He also recently started a podcast, We Don’t Talk About That with Lucas Land.
Questions for Lucas
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s transition to unschooling look like?
Was there a shift in parenting for them in that area, from control to connection?
What, so far, has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
Were the kids excited to move to Bolivia? Is it a family decision, how you guys decide where you’re going to be going when you’re travelling?
What is your favourite thing about your days right now?
You recently started a podcast. I’d love to hear the story behind that!
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
Anna Brown joins me this week to dive into listener questions.
Question Summaries
The first question is about deschooling and moving to unschooling. She has two boys and they have always homeschooled. They’ve been looking at moving to unschooling. She’s been reading and researching and she’s feeling a little bit overwhelmed. The main focus of her question was around Deschooling. Do they need it? What does it look like? How does unschooling begin?
Our second question is about parent’s intuition. She’s listened to most of podcasts episodes and a number of Q&As and understands the perspective most the guests come from, but has left some of those talks feeling uncomfortable. She says that so many times she’s heard moms speak on the podcast that it was their intuition that guided them to attachment parenting or a different way of living with their children and how their intuition led them to unschooling. Yet, when they speak of their concerns around things like technology use or food choices, it feels in the podcast that their intuition is now being dismissed. She feels that there seems to be little respect for moms having a gut instinct about how their particular child is responding to video games, etc. And there seems to be a dismissal of the parent’s intuition, but it was praised when the parent trusted it way back when.
Question three was sent in by someone with a four-year-old who’s currently in a Waldorf pre-school, and she wants to know if it’s possible to unschool when both parents are working outside of the home.
Question four asks, “Do I have to choose between my aspirations and the needs of my children? Because I think I will be a better mom and role model if I can still pursue my calling in the arts at least part time while giving my kids what they need to thrive.” There is also another aspect about anxiety and not knowing whether it was school-related.
EU203: School’s out. Now what? Part 2
Nov 21, 2019
School’s out. Now what? Choosing to step off the conventional education path and leave school behind is often the culmination of a long, and sometimes emotional, process. But, in the bigger picture, it’s really just the first step on your new path.
School’s Out is a curated collection of some of my published articles, in an order that I think aligns well with the unschooling journey. I also had a lot of fun putting them together, magazine-style, in the PDF edition, as well as creating more streamlined ebook editions.
And now, with more and more people enjoying audio content, I thought it was high time I created an audio version as well! However, with ten articles, I split it into two parts for the podcast. You can listen to Part 1 here.
EU202: Unschooling and Connected Relationships with Liza Swale
Nov 14, 2019
Liza Swale joins me to talk about her unschooling journey and the value of connected relationships. She shares some amazing stories of trusting, being open, and following the flow. We also dive into what she’s learned about staying connected with her two children, who have very different needs and personalities, and how they prioritize connecting as a family.
Questions for Liza
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of deschooling for you and how have you worked through it?
Strong, connected relationships with our kids are valuable for unschooling to flow. Can you share some ways you nurture those connections?
Another key aspect of unschooling is supporting our kids as they pursue their interests. In fact, that also helps builds trust and connection with them, doesn’t it? Have you seen that in action with your kids?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
EU201: Unschooling and Self Care with Erika Ellis
Nov 07, 2019
Erika Ellis joins me this week to talk about the very important topic of self care. Of course, we look at the topic through the lens of unschooling, dispelling some myths and letting go of some “shoulds” about how to take care of ourselves. Erika shares so many practical, easy to use tips to help bring calm and peace to each moment. I’d love to hear your favorite tips in the comments!
Questions for Erika
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
Now, let’s dive right into the topic of self care. It comes up regularly in unschooling discussions and, through that lens, it can be different from the conventional advice we often hear. I’m excited to dive into that, but first, how do you define self care and why is it important to consider?
Mindset is also an essential aspect of self care, isn’t it? Was there a mindset shift you found valuable as you wove unschooling and self care together?
Can you share some self care activities or tools that we might find helpful for releasing stress and re-energizing?
It can be a bit of a challenge, certainly at first, to figure out ways to fit self care activities into our unschooling days. How has that been working for you?
Do you see your kids absorbing these ideas around self care?
Things mentioned in the episode
Erika was on the podcast, along with Tracy, back in episode 158 about unschooling book clubs.
EU200: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Oct 31, 2019
It’s the 200th episode!!! What a wonderful journey it’s been! This week Anna Brown joins me for another Unschooling In Context episode. We explore the idea of deschooling and how it fits in the larger context of unschooling. We talk about language, our values, ideas that we can let go and so much more. Anna and I really enjoy these Unschooling in Context chats—we hope you do as well!
Discussion Points
The concept of beginner’s mind is a valuable place to start for deschooling.
Deschooling our understanding of learning: eventually you’ll be seeing it everywhere.
Deschooling our language: there are words that will likely fade out of your vocabulary as you move from deschooling to unschooling.
Deschooling our relationships with our kids: they are so much more capable than society gives them credit for.
Deschooling our values: what do we hold dear?
In unschooling groups, we often see some version of this question posted: ‘What is the correct unschooling answer to this situation?’
EU199: Unschooling Stories with Holly Johnson
Oct 24, 2019
Holly Johnson is an unschooling mom with two children, and her family is currently traveling the world together! How they got to that place is an amazing story. We dive into the choice to remove a child from school, helping an anxious child, hacking their lives to suit themselves, and how unconditional acceptance and love is always the answer.
Questions for Holly
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
Your family’s journey started with your son in school, as did ours. What were some of the challenges he experienced there?
How did the choice to begin homeschooling come about? And how did that evolve into unschooling?
Can you share a bit about your experience helping children navigate challenges like fear and anxiety?
I’d love to hear the story behind the children’s picture book you’re close to publishing, and where it’s taken you!
At this point on your journey, what do you love most about having chosen to embrace unschooling?
Things mentioned in the episode
Learn more about Holly’s book, The Happiness Seed, at her website.
EU198: School’s out. Now what? Part 1
Oct 17, 2019
School’s out. Now what? Choosing to step off the conventional education path and leave school behind is often the culmination of a long, and sometimes emotional, process. But, in the bigger picture, it’s really just the first step on your new path. Welcome!
School’s Out is a curated collection of some of my published articles, in an order that I think aligns well with the unschooling journey. I also had a lot of fun putting them together, magazine-style, in the PDF edition, as well as creating more streamlined ebook editions.
And now, with more and more people enjoying audio content, I thought it was high time I created an audio version as well! However, with ten articles, I’ve split it into two parts for the podcast. Part 2 will come out next month.
And if you’re ready to dive even deeper into the personal work that embracing unschooling invites us to do, consider joining Anne Ohman, Anna Brown, and me for the Childhood Redefined Online Unschooling Summit. Enrollment is now OPEN until October 20, 2019.
EU197: Choosing School, Part 2 with Alex Polikowsky
Oct 10, 2019
Alex Polikowsky joins me to share an update about how her family weaves school and unschooling together. Recently, a listener posted a comment on Alex’s first podcast appearance (almost three years ago) about how much she enjoyed the episode and that she’d love to hear an update. I thought it was a great idea and luckily, Alex was up for it too!
Questions for Alex
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
In the last episode, you talked about Gigi’s school experience—she chose to go for a few months when she was nine and in grade four. She really enjoyed it at first, but she satisfied her curiosity and eventually found that she didn’t have enough time outside of school to pursue her interests as much as she wanted. What were some of the interests and things she dove into over the next couple of years?
Gigi chose to attend school part time last year, and then this school year she started full time in grade eight. Can you share the motivation behind her choice this time and how you felt about it?
Last time we spoke, you talked about how you continued to weave unschooling principles into your days. It really is a different experience when they’re choosing to go, isn’t it? And when we continue to choose connection rather than control in our parenting. Have you been able to continue that this time around?
I’d love to hear what Daniel’s been up to the last three years. When we spoke, he was interested in traveling to Japan, maybe as part of an exchange program. Can you share an update with that and what he’s up to now?
It’s only been a few weeks, but how do you find your days flowing as you weave together unschooling Daniel and full-time school for Gigi? Is it challenging to not let school take over your lives?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives so far?
EU196: Growing up Unschooling with Katie Patterson
Oct 03, 2019
Katie Patterson left school after kindergarten and grew up unschooling. She is an actress, a writer, and an all-around lover of horror. We have a wonderful conversation about her childhood, how her path has unfolded, what she loved about unschooling, and what she’s up to now.
Questions for Katie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
We talk pretty regularly on the podcast about giving kids room to fully explore their passions, though sometimes that can stretch our comfort zones. I’d love to hear your perspective!
Looking back, what do you appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
Lots of people worry when kids choose career paths that don’t typically provide stable, reliable income. Have people asked you about creating a Plan B? How do you answer them?
What are you working on right now?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU195: Unschooling Stories with Renee Cabatic
Sep 26, 2019
Renee Cabatic, the mother of two unschooled teens, joins me this week to share some wonderful stories from their lives. We dive into passions and comfort zones, college and quitting, agency and self-efficacy, and lots more.
Questions for Renee
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Many long-time unschooling parents have a story around learning the value of stretching their comfort zones. The spark is usually one of our kids becoming interested in something that makes us feel uncomfortable, or even fearful. Do you have one of those stories?
I regularly get questions from newer unschooling parents about concerns around technology. I’d love to hear how technology like TV, video games, and YouTube, wove through your unschooling days. What was your experience?
One of the valuable paradigm shifts that often happens on the unschooling journey is around the idea of quitting. Conventionally, it’s often seen as a failure or lack of commitment. But there’s another way to look at it, one that’s much more positive. Do you have a quitting story you could share?
Another common concern is that choosing unschooling closes the door to college. I’d love to hear a college story or two!
Looking back, what do you feel has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling all those years ago?
Compilation episode time! This time, let’s explore the idea of stretching our comfort zones.
This can come up in various ways along our unschooling journey. Often, we first encounter it when we’re actively deschooling and questioning so much of the conventional wisdom around learning and parenting that we’ve absorbed growing up. We can also find ourselves playing at the edges of our comfort zones if our child becomes interested in something that we’re not fond of, or we’re unfamiliar with. Or maybe our child’s learning journey wanders further off the beaten path than we were first expecting.
So, in this episode, I’ve brought together snippets from eight different podcast conversations that I hope you might find helpful and inspiring the next time you bump up against the edges of your comfort zones.
EU193: Unschooling Younger Kids with Martha Delmore
Sep 12, 2019
Martha Delmore joins me this week to talk about unschooling with younger children. Unschooling wasn’t on her radar before she had kids—she’s a former high school teacher—but her desire to maintain and enhance her relationships with them led her down this unexpected path. We dive into attachment parenting, when family members question our choices, the transition to unschooling, and lots more!
Questions for Martha
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I’d love to hear how you discovered your passion for treating children as whole people so early in your parenting journey.
What aspects of attachment parenting have you found to be most valuable for your relationships with your children and how do they play out in your days?
It can be challenging when our parents or extended family aren’t familiar with our style of parenting. Can you share some ways you’ve handled those comments or questions?
I’d love to talk about the transition from attachment parenting to unschooling. How did you discover unschooling? Did your days change as your son reached school age?
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
EU192: Unschooling to College with Amy Milstein
Sep 05, 2019
Amy Milstein’s two children have grown up unschooling. Last year, her eldest decided she wanted to go to college. We dive into how they handled the legalities of unschooling in New York, her daughter’s journey to college, and the lovely flow of their unschooling days along the way. I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did!
Questions for Amy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Your family lives in New York state, which has a standardized testing requirement for homeschoolers. I saw you mention on your blog that the process was mostly easy and laid back. For those who may be in similar circumstances, can you share how you went about it?
I know your daughter, Maya, chose to go to college last year. I’d love to know how that choice come about and how you helped her along the way.
She’s finished her first year now. What was the experience like for her? Has she chosen to return?
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Anna Brown joins me this week to dive into listener questions!
Question Summaries
Mom hears many parents on the podcast talking about hanging out with their kids so much more now that they’re unschooling. But since she stopped limiting screen time back in January, her boys, 15, 13, and 10, play online games. Her question: “Will they ever stop playing computer games so we can hang out together?!!! Nothing is as enticing as disappearing off into a fantasy land with their mates online ALL day. I feel fed up and I see much less of them than when they were at school last June.”
Dad is wondering if it’s safe/wise/possible for parents who are themselves very laid back and relaxed to unschool their kids. What if the parents lack that motivation/drive, and ‘leave it to the kids to find their own way’?
Mom is considering unschooling her 14-year-old. He hates school and has trouble with critical thinking and reading comprehension, but she wonders if it’s too late to get started.
Mom is a type A personality and avid “rule follower” who started homeschooling last year. She’d love to dive fully into unschooling but is struggling with falling back on her old beliefs and fears.
EU190: Unpacking Unschooling Memes with Sue Patterson
Aug 22, 2019
Sue Patterson joins me this week to dive into five popular unschooling memes. Memes can be quick, inspirational pick-me-ups, but we don’t need to stop there—we can use them as a springboard to learn more about both ourselves and unschooling. It’s so worth doing the work.
The five popular memes we discuss
1. “You cannot raise your children as your parents raised you, because your parents raised you for a world that no longer exists.”
2. “Not every place you fit in is where you belong.”
3. “I don’t have a 9-5 job. I have a “when I open my eyes to when I close my eyes” job.”
4. “The reason that kids need to learn to read so early in school is because in school kids read about doing stuff instead of doing stuff. When kids live life outside of school they actually get to do stuff, so it’s not as important to read about it in order to learn.”
5. “In the end, I am the only one who can give my kids a happy mother who loves life.”
EU189: Ten Questions with Amy Martinez
Aug 15, 2019
Amy Martinez joins me this week to talk about her family’s move to unschooling. Amy is a mother of five, who range in age from 15-29. They had time in public school, homeschooling, and ultimately moved to unschooling. Her insights on those transitions, on living in a big family, and on the connections and amazing relationships that have developed with unschooling are inspiring!
Ten Questions for Amy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
With parents who are discovering unschooling with older kids, it’s pretty common to hear concerns like, “If I let my kids decide what to do, what to eat, or when to sleep, they’ll play video games all night long while eating only junk food!” The three youngest of your five kids were older when you moved from a school at home approach to unschooling. What was your experience?
The transition from a more conventional lifestyle with rules, expectations, and curfews to an unschooling lifestyle focused on trust, respect, discussions, and grace can be a bumpy one. We’re learning a whole new way of engaging with our children. What was that transition like for you guys?
I regularly get questions from parents with larger families about the challenge of trying to meet the many needs of everybody in the household with mutual consideration and respect. With five children, how would you answer that?
Speaking of five kids, sibling relationships in unschooling families can look really different too, can’t they?
When we connected earlier, you mentioned that you’ve learned some things from your kids about handling arbitrary societal norms and the pressure to conform. I’d love to hear more about that!
What has surprised you most about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Another topic you mentioned earlier that caught my eye was how we can help our kids really feel at home, rather than like perpetual guests in our house. I’ve not heard it put that way before, but it’s definitely something I’ve thought about, especially as my kids have gotten older. Can you share more about that?
Looking back, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU188: Our Unschooling Work with Jen Keefe
Aug 08, 2019
Jen Keefe joins me this week! Jen was on the podcast almost three years ago and I really enjoyed learning a bit about how their unschooling lives have grown and changed since then. We dive into what she found challenging as they moved to unschooling, how it’s been life-changing for her as well as the kids, video games, unschooling resources, the podcast she’s started, Real Women’s Work, her favourite thing about their unschooling days right now and lots more!
Questions for Jen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What was something you found challenging as your family moved to unschooling and how did you work through it?
With years of unschooling under your belt, what does the phrase “kids are learning all the time” mean to you now?
Unschooling can be life-changing not only for the kids, but for us as well. Has that been your experience?
Since we last spoke, you’ve started a podcast called ‘Real Women’s Work.’ I’d love to hear the story behind how that came about.
What is your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
EU187: Time and the Wild Landscape of Unschooling
Aug 01, 2019
I originally wrote this essay for Rosemary Magazine, for their winter issue, which had the theme, “wildschool.” I loved playing with that idea!
There’s the outer wildness of living outside the structure of compulsory school. In the world, rather than in the classroom. Kids in the grocery store in the middle of the day. Running around the local park in the middle of the week. In most places, that’s decidedly outside the box.
And then there’s the inner wildness. Learning on their own timetable. Following their curiosity and interests rather than a curriculum. Cultivating their creativity rather than encouraging conformity. The time to daydream. To ask themselves questions and contemplate possibilities. To choose what to do. To explore the edges of their comfort zones. To discover how they tick.
This way of living—of welcoming children into our lives with warmth and grace—flies counter to much of the current conventional wisdom around parent-child relationships which urges us to control their wildness so they fit neatly and quietly into our adult-centred culture. Into the box. Tamed. And many of us deeply absorbed those cultural messages growing up. They feel like truth. So, when we lift the lid and peek out, the wild world of unschooling seems almost unfathomable.
And the wildest, most subversive thing of all? Giving our children an abundance of free time.
In this essay, Time and the Wild Landscape of Unschooling, I dive into some of the beautiful ways that free time weaves through our unschooling lives and helps our children stay in touch with their wildness.
EU186: Sparkle and Zest and Unschooling with Teresa Hess
Jul 25, 2019
Teresa Hess is an unschooling mom with three kids and the family—Teresa, her husband, and the kids—live in a cool co-housing community on an island in Washington state. Teresa and I had a wonderful conversation about their unschooling lives, diving into the shift to peaceful parenting, the ever-deepening spiral of mothering and self-awareness, the concept of “joy,” and lots more!
Questions for Teresa
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
A couple months ago you posted a wonderful manifesto on your blog, explaining that you are a radical unschooling family and listing some of things you believe that led you to that choice. I urge everyone to go read it! In it, you also talk about how you came to this way of parenting, and I think that’s a big shift for many people as they come to unschooling. Can you share what that process looked like for you?
You have a beautiful blog post titled, ‘The Storm and the Ocean Mother,’ and I want to share this quote from the end of the post: “This is how I learn to be more fully myself: by mothering my children. And this is how I learn to mother my children: by being more fully myself.” I love how clearly you described that ever-spiraling cycle and it’s been my experience as well. Can you share your thoughts about that?
You also wrote recently about learning to follow our intuitive sense of our own Joy. That’s something else that we learn in ever-deepening cycles, isn’t it? It sounds pretty simple, “follow the joy,” yet I named my website Living Joyfully more than a decade ago and I’m still discovering the depths of that phrase. Can you share some tips for people who’d like to explore the concept of joy and how it weaves so elegantly into our unschooling lives?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
Talia Bartoe is an unschooling mom with four young children who have never been to school. We have a wonderful conversation about her deschooling journey—as someone who excelled in school, she had no idea this would be in her future. Her excitement and gratitude for finding this path and for the beautiful connections that have blossomed with her family is contagious!
Questions for Talia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What did your family’s move to unschooling look like? What have you found to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling so far? For me, one of the biggest surprises of moving to unschooling was how much I learned about myself along the way. And how valuable that learning has been for our family as a whole! Did you find that as well? Can you share some tips on navigating your unschooling days with four young children? In a recent interview you mentioned that your joy is multiplied ten-fold when you see the adventure through your children’s eyes. It’s almost like reawakening, isn’t it? Can you share a bit about this aspect of your deschooling journey? What’s your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
EU184: Sprinkle in More Love with Shannon Loucks
Jul 11, 2019
Shannon Loucks joins me to talk about unschooling, parenting, and her new book, Love More: 50+ ways to build joy into childhood. Shannon’s an unschooling mom with two boys and she believes in the power of play and partnership as a way to bring more joy and love into our children’s lives. We dive into the story behind the book, the value of patience in our relationships, the deschooling shift to seeing the child rather than the behaviour, what she loves most about their unschooling lives right now, and lots more!
Questions for Shannon
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how long you’ve been unschooling?
My imprint, Forever Curious Press, recently published your book, Love More: 50+ ways to build joy into childhood. I love the book, and I’d love to hear the story behind your choice to write it. How did that come about?
I thought we’d dive into a couple of the ideas in the book. It’s divided into two sections, so let’s do one from each. The first section is Love in Action, and I thought we could talk about your suggestion to ‘Smell the Roses.’ Can you share your thoughts around it?
The second section is, Love in Presence. To me, the distinction between the two sections feels like ‘things to do’ and ‘ways to be.’ From this section, I’d love to talk about the idea to ‘See the Child, Not the Behavior.’ As you mention, this is so much easier said than done. But it’s such a valuable shift, isn’t it?
Your book is full of inspiration and ideas about how to bring more fun, more love, and more joy into your days. Why does that aspect of parenting feel important to you? So important that you chose to write a book about it to share with the world.
What do you love most about your unschooling lives right now?
EU183: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Jul 04, 2019
Anna Brown joins me this week for another Unschooling in Context episode!
This time we’re diving into unschooling in the context of life. And what I mean by that is, we’re exploring how unschooling eventually weaves so tightly into our lives. Which is beautiful! Unschooling IS living our lives. Yet, as challenges arise, it can also be valuable to ask ourselves, “Is it the unschooling?”
Consider this:
The mind, once stretched by a new idea, never returns to its original dimensions.
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Many of our thoughts, while prompted by our journey to unschooling, have grown beyond unschooling. So, with this episode, Anna and I tackle some of the common questions we see in unschooling circles that, in the bigger picture, maybe aren’t really about the unschooling.
Discussion Points
When we begin unschooling, we soon find ourselves deep in deschooling territory. We question so much of the prevailing wisdom around learning and parenting and, eventually, life in general. Through our journey to unschooling we come to see life differently, don’t we?
A big part of deschooling is changing how we see and engage with our children, with lots of questions around building trusting and respectful relationships. Yet, when all is said and done, is that really about the unschooling? Even if our kids went to school next week, I suspect we’d still want to cultivate trusting and respectful relationships with them.
What about sibling relationships?
Let’s talk about issues around housework, like cleaning, chores, tidying up messes etc, whether our own stress or conflicts with our spouse or partner. I think these challenges most often stem from choosing being with our children over cleaning the house. That’s a fundamental shift in parenting priorities that we often embrace more deeply as we move to unschooling, so it’s pretty easy to conflate the two. The question is, would they go away if we were no longer unschooling?
What about bigger events, like medical emergencies or moving? Chances are, we’ve made some unschooling-inspired changes in how we approach them.
It’s time for another compilation episode! This time, let’s dive into video games. Video games are a common topic of conversation in unschooling circles because, when it comes to questioning conventional advice, this topic is a hot bed of widely varying perspectives. For me, when I find myself in that conundrum, I look to my reality. What does it look like for me, for my kids, for my family?
And with this episode, I’m widening that a bit to ask, what does it look like for other unschooling families? I’ve brought together snippets of podcast conversations with both unschooling parents and with grown unschoolers.
I hope you find it both interesting and helpful as you explore unschooling!
EU181: Growing Up Unschooling with Jack & Sean O’Brien
Jun 20, 2019
Jack and Sean O’Brien both grew up unschooling. Sean chose to continue unschooling during his teen years and Jack chose to go to high school. Now they’re both in college and we have a wonderful conversation about the ways that unschooling has woven its way through their current college experiences.
Questions for Jack & Sean
Can you guys share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your bigger interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
Jack, you chose to go to high school, and Sean, you chose to continue unschooling during those years. How did those choices come about?
You’re both now in college and university. Can you share what you’re studying and how you’re finding the experience?
How do you guys see your experiences growing up unschooling informing your current, more formal, education experiences?
As grown unschoolers, what piece of advice would you each like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU180: Growing Up Unschooling with Nick Bergson-Shilcock
Jun 13, 2019
Nick Bergson-Shilcock joins me this week! In a nutshell, Nick grew up unschooling and now runs the Recurse Center in New York. It’s a wonderful space for both new and experience programmers to take a sabbatical and vastly improve their programming skills. It was fascinating to hear the story of how the Recurse Center came to be and how it really has its roots unschooling.
Questions for Nick
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your bigger interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
I’d love to hear the origin story behind the Recurse Center. Why did you want to start a company to help people learn more about programming?
Understanding that most people come from a background of traditional schooling and work environments, I would be really interested to hear how you guys give participants that space for the floundering but also help them get used to and participate in and get something of value out of this new kind of environment for them.
The Recurse Center has continued to grow since its first batch of participants in 2011, and you moved into a bigger space last fall. It definitely seems like it’s often a successful experience for everyone involved. What do participants say about their time there?
Looking back now, what do you appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
EU179: Unschooling Stories with Joan Concilio
Jun 06, 2019
Joan Concilio joins me to share some of her family’s wonderful unschooling stories. We dive into her journey to unschooling, the learning that happened along the way, the profound changes it brought to their lives and the deep connections that it forged. She also talks about what it’s like to live in a highly regulated state and how unschooling can still fit right in. So many nuggets for people at any stage of their journey!
Questions for Joan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I’d love to talk about unschooling with kids who have learning differences. That can trip us up for a while, especially at the beginning when we’re thinking of our role as replacing school learning. What are some of the advantages you see with unschooling for kids whose learning styles are more unconventional?
One of the most common questions newer unschooling parents have surrounds video games. Much of the conventional parenting advice out there characterizes playing video games as mindless fun, often addictive, unproductive, and ultimately a waste of time. Yet, as parents dive deeper into exploring unschooling, they start to hear stories about gaming that contradict that perspective. Can you share your experience around the value of video games?
You live in Pennsylvania, which is known as a highly regulated state for homeschooling. Can you share some tips about on how people might document their unschooling days to meet homeschooling requirements?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling unfolded in your lives?
Anna Brown joins me this week to answer listener questions. We talk about finding ways to live together when we have different styles and needs, considering diplomas and next steps, allowances and family money, and how learning looks different in unschooling families.
Question 1 [00:00:20]
How do I make a minimalist, quiet home dynamic enough for a lively and curious sociable 10 year old?
Question 2 [00:10:49]
How to support a child who is considering school, with concerns from family and concerns about bullying?
Question 3 [00:20:01]
Can unschooling fit under an “eclectic homeschooling” approach?
Question 4 [00:33:47]
Mum would like some ideas about how to manage an unschooling household when one of the parents is highly sensitive.
Question 5 [00:39:17]
Do unschooled kids learn reading, writing, and maths. And how does it compare to traditional school and what they’re learning in that regard? If they only want to play video games all day are they permitted to do so? And if they are allowed to follow their bliss and their bliss is to sit and be lazy. Then what?
Question 6 [00:48:06]
How do unschoolers get a high school diploma? Or do they? And if not how does college fit in?
Question 7 [00:53:36]
Looking for ideas around allowances, paying for chores or not and managing requests.
EU177: Growing Up Unschooling with Alyssa Patterson
May 23, 2019
Alyssa Patterson joins me this week to chat about growing up unschooling! Alyssa and I dive into her interests growing up, her choice to go to high school for a year and a half, how she came to open her own business a few months ago, what she appreciates most about growing up unschooling, and lots more!
Questions for Alyssa
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
You chose to go to high school for a year and a half. I’d love to hear how that chapter of your story unfolded. How did that decision come about and what was the experience like for you? Why did you decide to leave?
You recently opened your own hair salon, Blissfully Blonde. Congrats! I’d love to hear how your interest in hair styling developed.
Looking back now, what do you appreciate most about growing up unschooling?
What are your plans for the next year or two?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU176: Coming Home with Tara Soto-Regester
May 16, 2019
Tara Soto-Regester, an unschooling mom with two children, joins me for a wonderful conversation about her family’s journey from school to unschooling. We dive into how she discovered unschooling, her son’s transition from school to coming home, what’s surprised her along the way, her new podcast, and lots more!
Questions for Tara
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and decide that was where you’d like to go?
When your son left school and came home, what did his transition to unschooling look like?
What has surprised you most about your unschooling journey so far?
You recently started a podcast, A Mother’s Intuition. The tagline is, “openly exploring the intuitive connection of children.” I’d love to hear the story behind it!
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
Leah Rose joins me this week to share her unschooling experience. Turns out, our conversation had such a lovely, organic flow that we soon left the questions behind!
Show Notes
In our conversation,we wove our way through these ideas:
intrinsic motivation
the pitfalls of comparison
transitioning to unschooling
breaking down deschooling
conversations taking the place of “no”
the dance of relationships
letting go of outcomes
healing sibling relationships
choosing curiosity over fear
Links to things mentioned in the show
Leah first found John Holt and he opened the floodgates
EU174: Unschooling Teens at Camp with Laura Bowman
May 02, 2019
Laura Bowman is the founder of the East Tennessee Unschooled Summer Camp for teens and previous guests have said wonderful things about their camp experience. We dive into Laura’s unschooling journey, how the camp came to life in 2010, what a day at camp looks like, the idea behind the Mentor Groups, reluctant campers, and lots more.
Questions for Laura
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You host the East Tennessee Unschooled Summer Camp for teens. In the last few months, Alec and Max have been on the podcast and both talked about how much they’ve enjoyed the experience. I’d love to hear the story behind how the camp came to be.
Daily meetings with their Mentor Group are one of the few things required of campers during the week—I imagine that’s because you’ve found them to be a valuable part of the camp experience. Can you share more about them? How do they help?
What does a day at camp look like?
What would your advice be for parents who may wish this kind of experience for their teen but find they seem to be reluctant?
What are you most looking forward to at camp this year?
Learn more about the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit. Enrollment is closed right now, but you can sign up to be notified when it opens again in the fall.
EU173: Unschooling in Context with Anna Brown
Apr 25, 2019
Anna Brown joins me this week for a conversation with a twist: we’re not talking about the ins and outs of unschooling itself but about how it fits in the bigger picture. Hence the title of the episode, Unschooling in Context.
It’s a topic I’ve been wanting to do for a while, but I really needed to let a bunch of things percolate, like: the kinds of questions I get from people, how they relate to each other, the missing bits of information or connections behind the questions, the conversations I come across online about what unschooling is and how it fits in with other alternative education options etc. I needed time to for all that to bounce around in the back of my mind, making interesting connections, and eventually starting to come together into my version of the puzzle of defining unschooling.
Granted, after percolating for a few months, I needed to remind myself not to wait for “perfect!” My puzzle isn’t done. In fact, I’m sure I will continue to add to it for many years, as my understanding continues to grow. But, I think I got far enough along to participate in the conversation.
Discussion Points
1. One of the most fundamental and helpful shift for all parents to make is the realization that our children’s education is our CHOICE. Whether we make that paradigm shift before we have our own children or after they’ve started public school, when we understand that it’s our choice, our whole outlook changes, doesn’t it?
2. Let’s dive into some terminology, because often it’s helpful to choose different words to describe what we do depending on whether we’re inside or outside alternative education circles. For example, in social conversations with say, a neighbour or at the grocery store, when the school question came up, I very rarely used the word, “unschooling.” Did you?
3. Lately, the term “self-directed education” has been growing in use, as part of The Alliance for Self-Directed Education’s work. I’ve had some questions around this recently, and I put together a little Venn diagram visual, which I used on the episode image. One circle represents homeschooling and the other circle represents self-directed education. Where they overlap is unschooling. Unschooling is a style of homeschooling, in that it is home or family-based, rather than school-based. And it’s also a style of self-directed education, in that the child is free to choose what they want to do and learn, rather than having to follow a curriculum. Does that make sense?
4. In the last few years, the term “radical unschooling” has become more prevalent in conversations. What’s the difference between unschooling and radical unschooling?
5. “Child-led learning” is another term that sometimes gets used interchangeably with unschooling, but that can also lead to misunderstandings about how unschooling works, can’t it?
6. Over the years, I’ve often heard democratic schools, like those based on the Sudbury model, referred to as “unschooling schools.” There is commonality in that they both fit in the self-directed education circle, but they aren’t synonymous. They are two distinct learning environments and I think it’s helpful to understand the differences. What differences do you see?
EU172: Unschooling Travels with Heather Clark
Apr 18, 2019
Heather Clark joins me this week! I first met Heather a few years ago at an unschooling conference and I love the way she and her family have slowly but surely woven an interest in travel into their lives. We dive into her journey to unschooling, the story behind embracing travel, the value of embracing curiosity, the joy and power of embracing interests, and lots more.
Questions for Heather
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You guys travel about half the year and are at your home base for the other half. I’d love to hear the story behind the choice to embrace travel! What do your unschooling days look like when you’re in a new place? Can you share a story from your recent travels?
Even if long-distance travels aren’t on a family’s horizon, I think bringing that exploration mindset into our every day lives can be really valuable. It’s about embracing our curiosity, isn’t it?
With unschooling, we talk about how beautifully learning flows from following our children’s interests, rather than trying to direct it through curricula. It makes sense intellectually, but in practice, parents can sometimes find themselves worrying that their child’s world seems to be getting smaller, especially if they have a passion or two that they love to focus on. Yet, in my experience, when we trust and embrace their interests, they can be a window to the whole wide world. Has that been your experience with Jamie?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
EU171: The Magic of Learning to Read Naturally
Apr 11, 2019
It’s time for another compilation episode! This time I went with a topic rather than a particular question: the topic of learning to read naturally. Listen to ten different guests share their experiences around unschooling and learning to read. Hearing their stories in this new context—side by side—may well spark helpful new connections and insights for you.
EU170: Unschooling in Action with Kelli & Rhanna Lincoln
Apr 04, 2019
Kelli and Rhanna Lincoln, unschooling mom and daughter, join me this week on the podcast. I had so much fun chatting with them and hearing about their unschooling lives—from both their perspectives. We talk about their journey to unschooling, living and learning with four kids (or three siblings!), their family’s RV travels, their latest business adventure and lots more!
Questions for Kelli & Rhanna
Can you guys introduce yourselves and share a bit about you and your family?
Kelli, how did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Rhanna, at some point you realized other kids were going to school and that your family was doing things differently. The conventional messages about needing school to learn are so pervasive. Was there a time when you were worried about that? How did you work through that?
With four children—or three siblings!—it can sometimes take time to figure out and weave everyone’s needs into our days. I’d love to hear what that process has generally looked like, from each of your perspectives.
I’ve heard you guys have had some RV adventures! How did that come about and do you have a story or two to share?
I’d love to hear some stories about how learning has unfolded in your unschooling lives. It looks different than school-based learning, doesn’t it? Though it doesn’t make it any less valuable.
I’d love to hear the story behind Miss Teaberry’s Baked Goods. I saw you just celebrated your first anniversary, congratulations! How has that evolved, and how does your working relationship flow?
Links to things mentioned in the show
Join Anne Ohman, Anna Brown, and I in the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit! With more than 40 years of unschooling experience combined, we have poured our souls into this project. Last day to enroll for the spring 2019 expedition is April 14th.
EU169: Deschooling with Alicia Gonzales-Lopez
Mar 28, 2019
Alicia Gonzales-Lopez joins me this week to talk about her deschooling journey. We dive into how she discovered unschooling, the emotional healing that’s happened for her, what she’s found challenging along the way, connecting with our kids, what has surprised her most, and lots more.
Questions for Alicia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
For many parents, deschooling and shifting away from conventional parenting can bring up a lot of emotions as we revisit memories of our own childhood. It can be really hard but that emotional processing and healing is so important, isn’t it?
What was the most challenging area of deschooling for you? How did you work through it?
In unschooling circles, we often talk about connecting with our kids. What does that look like for you guys?
As I was deschooling, I discovered that my vision of being a parent and the kind of parent my kids actually needed me to be were different in many ways. In fact, what my kids needed from me as a parent was sometimes even different for each child. Has that been your experience as well? How do you figure out what they need from you?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
EU168: Embracing Unschooling with Joan Karp
Mar 21, 2019
Joan Karp, unschooling mom with three kids, joins me this week! We talk about her fascinating journey to unschooling, what she found challenging about deschooling, we dive deep into the teen years, what she most appreciates about having embraced unschooling, how her passion for sports weaves into their days, the new business they’ve recently started and tons more!
Questions for Joan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What was the most challenging area of deschooling for you? How did you work through it?
I’d love to talk about the teen years. It’s an amazing time, isn’t it? What’s been your favourite thing about your relationships with your teens? And how did you foster that?
It’s also really fun to support teens as they pursue their interests and passions. To witness their determination and to walk with them through the challenging times. What did that look like for you guys? And how did you approach those challenging times?
What do you most appreciate about having embraced unschooling?
I know you are very passionate about sports and I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about how you found that weaving in to your unschooling days?
I know you’ve started a new business recently. I’d love to hear what everyone’s up to and how your days and lives weave together at the moment.
EU167: Unschooling Dads with Ben Lovejoy
Mar 14, 2019
Ben Lovejoy, a long-time unschooling dad, joins me this week. I met Ben and his family at the first unschooling conference we ever attended. His boys are grown now and we have a lovely chat reflecting on his family’s journey, including the influence of his military background, the idea of rules versus principles, the value of parents having passions, the benefits of unschooling conferences for dads and lots more.
Questions for Ben
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What’s everybody up to?
How did you guys discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
How about your own journey to understanding the unschooling lifestyle? Coming from a military background, I imagine it was a big shift!
The dichotomy between rules and principles is something that is near and dear to your heart and I’d love to dive into that. How do rules get in the way of learning? And how does the shift to principles help open things up?
After spending a lot of time helping my kids pursue their passions, it eventually dawned on me that it was good for me to have interests and passions as well. It’s not just for kids. Has that been your experience as well?
What surprised you most about how unschooling unfolded in your lives?
Your wife, Kelly, hosted the wonderful Live and Learn unschooling conference for a number of years. I imagine you were involved behind the scenes, but you were also involved in supporting the dads. What were some of the benefits of attending an unschooling conference that you saw for dads over the years?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
EU166: Unschooling and the Teen Years with Sue Patterson: Part 2
Mar 07, 2019
This week is Part 2 of my wonderful conversation with Sue Patterson about unschooling and the teen years. In this episode we talk about the later teen years, transitioning into adulthood, is there preparation needed, should we be defining success for someone else, connection and how relationships evolve and change. So many wonderful moments talking about this dynamic stage of our unschooling journey!
Questions for Sue
Let’s dive into the later teen years and the transition into young adulthood. The societal expectations can be daunting—for both us and them. Let’s start with that practically ubiquitous question: What about college? And let’s ask it of ourselves first. Some parents who’ve chosen unschooling for their kids growing up do expect them to go to college. Though that can sometimes cause friction, can’t it? And is college the necessity it’s made out to be? How can we find our way through this question?
What if they decide they’d like to go to college? How can we help them with that? Can you share your experience?
Now let’s jump to the bigger picture and another common—and wonderful—question asked by unschooling parents of teens: how can we help and support them as they grow up and into the world? We dove into the college question, but there are so many other possibilities, like getting a job, travelling, transitioning to paid work in their passion field, and so on. And not only around choosing what to do, but exploring who they are as a person and young adult. Can you share how you supported your kids as they moved through these choices and transitions?
Is there anything you’d like to add to our conversation around unschooling and the teen years? Something we didn’t touch on?
EU165: Unschooling and the Teen Years with Sue Patterson: Part 1
Feb 28, 2019
Sue Patterson returns to talk about unschooling and the teen years. We are both rather passionate about the topic and our conversation ended up lasting almost two hours! I decided to split it into two, and it actually worked out quite well, with Part 1 covering the transition into the teen years, and Part 2 diving into the later teen years. So, this week we dive into the conventional messages that surround the early teen years, supporting our kids through the transition, leaving school for unschooling in the teen years, and approaching additional challenges.
Questions for Sue
To start, I think there are typically two periods during the teen years that unschooling parents can find challenging—even if we’ve been unschooling reasonably comfortably for years. The first one is the transition into the teen years. And I want to talk about this transition from both the parent’s and teen’s perspective, but let’s start with the parent’s perspective. This is our personal work to do. What are some of the conventional messages we can find bubbling up and how might we shift to see them through the lens of unschooling?
What if we find our child seems to be struggling some with the transition into the teen years? What might this time look like through their eyes? And how might we support them through that?
There are also some teens who choose to leave school and transition to unschooling—how might we help them?
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This week Anna Brown joins me to answer some questions from listeners. We talk about finding friends, letting go of worry and fear of the future, the teen years, and more. I think you’ll find some helpful nuggets no matter where you are on your unschooling journey.
Question 1 We are an Italian family. Here in Italy unschooling is almost unknown and very few families practice it. Last year my older son (now 11) did his first unschooling year. It was successful. He found out his passion for wood handcrafts and enjoyed free time. Last September our second child (6) was ready for 1st grade. We were going to unschooling both of them and I (the father) was the one taking the daily responsibility of this family choice. I felt overwhelmed to have to handle not one but twp children of different ages at the same time. Having to work, and when they asked for children to play with, we decided to move and live where there was a solution for them. The older one, is now attending two days per week a private educational project founded and managed by some parents (me included).
My question: how can you handle two or more children unschooling? So much is required!
Question 2
I’d love to hear more about unschooling teenagers. My daughter is 13 and has ASD with PDA (pathological demand avoidance), so unschooling works best for her. I love the unschooling philosophy but often have wobbles because I wonder if she is learning enough or rather, deeply enough!
I’m impressed by how much she does learn by herself but wonder if she will get enough depth on certain subjects she’s not so keen on. For example, she learns a bit of basic maths through things like baking and shopping, but how will she learn at a more advanced level? Or does it even matter?
Question 3
We are 1 month into deschooling our 15yr old son. And, I feel I’m being chased by an emotional roller coaster ~ demanding I get on board. Our once physically active son is delving deep into fortnite gaming—and into the wee hours of the night. My husband and I cannot differentiate between this as an addiction or a new passion and we are unraveling.
Our son, has always been a MONO-focused fella regarding his interests but, in the past, those were all outdoor activities that my husband and I admired. Now, today, I recognize we are deeply lacking faith and trust and that we have projected this emotion more than I’d like to admit. We’ve been living a middle of the road semi alternative lifestyle between early elementary where my son first felt and said: I’m not smart. From that point we dove into 3rd and 4th grade homeschooling and then at our son’s request, entered back into four years of public school until now.
It’s hard to have faith when your child’s uninterested in what we view as worthy. The fact that he ONLY wants to game right now—and stays up till 4am if we let him—makes us want to jump off a cliff. We are certainly in need of finding some like minds in this journey and only wish there were people in our own community to lean on. Any resources you can turn us on to would be deeply appreciated.
Truly, we want to have faith and patience in the journey toward committing to unschooling but find that we are impatient and feel we accept the journey intellectually but feel spiritually challenged by it.We can’t help but want to manage his gaming, bedtime and eating habits but feel that every time we open our mouths with desire to direct him we are defeating the purpose of allowing the momentum toward him finding his own motivation and self care.
Question 4
There are two aspects that are starting to worry me a bit nevertheless and I appreciate this opportunity to ask specific questions.
I have two children, my son is 5 and my daughter 3 years old. My son is very shy and quiet around new people and larger groups. He loves being with friends and family and is very social amongst them, and also needs a lot of time at home to read, draw or play with Lego. There are no other kids his age in our neighborhood and friends don’t live nearby, we only manage to see them about once a week. So far, he seems to be happy the way things are but I do notice that after meeting friends he is even more content and balanced.
So, I have started wondering whether school might be an opportunity for him to make friends because he might benefit to be around the same people every day and thus building trust and getting to know them. He is not the type of person to chat up other kids at the playground and he is not interested in attending any sports club or other structured/weekly activities. Also, our friends with kids around that age are getting busier now that their kids are all starting in school (which is “compulsory” from 6 years on).
We have been attending meet ups at a park with our local unschooling community, but he does not enjoy these meetings very much and has not made friends there, either. I am wondering how he will be able to develop friendships without this continuous contact with the same group of people. (Basically, all of this applies to my daughter, too. I see that her personality is a little different, though, and her getting a bit older I can imagine her attending clubs/courses and finding friends there.)
This leads me into my second question: Apart from the “friends topic” I am so confident that unschooling is the right choice for us! I am loving to observe the kids explore their interests and games their own way. It is so fascinating. I would love to continue like that.
However, we live in Europe, Austria and the legal situation here does not completely allow for unschooling. Children who do not attend school need to take exams once a year from the age of six, based on the Austrian curriculum. In these exams they will have to prove that their base of knowledge is equal to that of schooled children. So, even if my children will be able to determine what to do and learn themselves for the most part of the year, come spring, I will have to make sure that the curriculum is covered. If they don’t pass the exam they will have to attend school the following school year, according to law.
Do you have any suggestions on how to keep the unschooling spirit alive in the face of this legal requirement? I am worried I will be feeling stressed and adding pressure on them and lose the great relationship we have now. It is such a joy seeing them develop their interests and exploring their questions together without having to follow any curriculum.
I am looking very much forward to hearing your ideas and opinions on these two areas. Thank you so much.
Question 5
My son is 16 and my daughter is 14, and we have been living the unschooling life since they were born (and even before that, now that I think about it). Can’t even imagine living any other way. : )
The teen years have thrown me for a bit of a loop. The emotional / developmental stuff I can handle (most days). But my faith in our unschooling life regarding ‘schooly’ things got a bit wobbly. Both kids have dyslexia in varying degrees, which affects their writing, spelling, and math skills (reading is fine). They tend to avoid anything to do with these skills, and I find myself panicking about it and doing crazy things like insisting that they go to a math tutor a couple of years ago. Yikes! Eight months of torture for all.
In spite of all of the challenges, my daughter feels that she must get her high school diploma, which she’ll start working on through our home learning program starting next fall. She loves to sew and wants to design formal wear, and for some reason feels that her “real life” can’t start until she gets that diploma.
My son is not remotely interested in schooly things; he has a lot of anxiety around academics (even before the math tutor fiasco) and basically becoming an adult. He spends his time gaming, researching gaming, reading sci-fi, watching movies, and thinking about a fantastic story that he would like to turn into a film one day. Getting his high school diploma doesn’t appeal to him at all.
So, one has anxiety about getting that piece of paper, the other about not getting it. How did this happen?! I wasn’t pushing high school, just worrying about basic skills. And I guess that they’ve picked up on that worry and may be feeling that I don’t have faith in them, which was not my intention at all.
They are both such creative and wonderful people, and I know in my heart that they can create the lives that they want for themselves, even with all of the challenges that they have. They have our love and support and lots of time to figure things out. I do miss the days when I was able to enjoy the day to day wonderfullness of living and creating our lives together without worries about their future and ‘what ifs’ keeping me up at night. I’ve had my ups and downs with feeling this way, and I’m doing my work around this. For the most part, I’m back to following my children’s leads and remaining curious and excited about this incredible journey that we’re on as a family and as individuals.
EU163: Growing Up Unschooling with Adrian Peace-Williams
Feb 14, 2019
Adrian Peace-Williams joins me this week! A companion conversation to last week’s episode with her mom, Adrian and I have a wonderful conversation, diving into her childhood unschooling, her choice to go to high school, her years of traveling the world after high school, where she is now in her journey, and lots more. Her understanding of who she is and what she needs is inspirational!
Questions for Adrian
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What were some of your interests growing up and how did you pursue them?
Over the years, was there a time you found your unschooling lifestyle challenging? How did you move through that?
I know that you enjoy travelling. What is it that you love about it and can you tell us some of the trips you’ve been on?
You’re in college (university?) now and home for the holidays. What are you studying and how did you find the transition to school?
What do you appreciate most about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
What are your plans for the next year or two?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
Alex Peace has been one of my unschooling inspirations for many years! She has three adult children and I’m so excited that she agreed to come on the podcast to talk about her family’s unschooling experiences. We dive into what she found to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling, building trust, stretching comfort zones, how her relationships with her kids have changed now that they’re adults, and lots more.
Ten Questions for Alex
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family? What are your kids up to nowadays?
2. How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling?
4. What was your husband’s journey to unschooling look like? Was this a new idea to him?
5. When it comes to unschooling, trust plays a really big role. How did you develop that deep level of trust with your children?
6. Was there a time one of your kids’ interests really stretched your comfort zone? How did you move through that?
7. What surprised you most about how unschooling unfolded in your lives?
8. As your children got older and needed less of your hands-on involvement every day, you began developing a career as an editor. In fact, you’ve edited all my books and it’s been a wonderful experience! How did that interest develop and how did you weave that work into your unschooling days?
9. Now that your children are all young adults, in what ways are your relationships the same and in what ways are they different?
10. Looking back, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
This week, please enjoy the audiobook edition of my intro book, What is Unschooling? Written and read by me, Pam Laricchia.
Here’s the description:
Life in the real world is much bigger and more exciting than a school can contain within its four walls. If you’re ready to embrace life and eager to share its wonder with your children, unschooling might be for you!
In What is Unschooling? we explore some of the common questions people have when they first hear about unschooling:
How will my child learn?
How do I know they’re learning?
Will unschooling work for my child?
What is deschooling?
How do I get started?
By the end of the book, you’ll have a much better idea of whether unschooling can work for your family.
What would YOU would find more helpful right now? I put together a quick form and I’d love if you could take a minute to let me know how I can better meet your needs as you navigate your unschooling journey. {I’ll leave the form up until Feb 11, 2019}
EU160: Ten Questions with Kirsten Fredericks
Jan 24, 2019
Kirsten Fredericks and her husband Carl have three boys—now young adults—who pretty much grew up unschooling. We have a wonderful conversation as we touch on how she found unschooling, the most challenging aspect of deschooling, supporting our children’s passions, moving from control to trust, what has surprised her most about how their unschooling lives have unfolded, and lots more.
Questions for Kirsten
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of deschooling?
4. What did your husband’s journey to unschooling look like?
5. I’ve known you for many years and love how you dive in to fully support your children’s diverse interests and passions. My impression is that some parents think that if a child is passionate about something, they need to take care of all aspects of it themselves from the get go or else they aren’t really as passionate about it as they say. That hasn’t been my experience, and I’d love to hear your perspective on it.
6. What has surprised you about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
7. Can you talk about your journey from control to trust in your relationships with your children?
8. What have you come to value most about your unschooling lifestyle over the years?
9. As our children get older, we hear the conventional societal message loud and clear that “kids need to move out of the house to prove they aren’t failures at life.” Yet, you have older children who are living in the family home. Me too! And they definitely aren’t “failing at life” by any stretch of the imagination. I’d love to hear your thoughts around that.
10. Looking back, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU159: Growing Up Unschooling with Max VerNooy
Jan 17, 2019
Max VerNooy grew up unschooling. I’ve known Max’s family for many years, online and through unschooling gatherings, and I’m so happy he agreed to chat with me about his experience growing up unschooling. We talk about the ebb and flow of his interests through the years, his time mentoring at an unschooling summer camp, and how, looking back, the journey of following his passions led him to the fulfilling career he has now.
Questions for Max
Can you share with us a bit about your family?
As you were growing up unschooling, what were some of your interests, and how did you pursue them?
What was it that caught your interest with karate, and how did that interest grow over the years?
Diving into any passion like that helps us learn so much about ourselves, was that what you found?
You’re working full-time as a karate instructor right now. I’d just like to hear a little bit more about how you decided that you wanted to go forward with that as you were going in and out of karate as an interest.
What drew you to being a mentor at the East Tennessee Unschooled Summer Camp? What excites you about doing that?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU158: Unschooling Book Clubs with Tracy and Erika
Jan 10, 2019
Tracy Talavera and Erika Ellis are unschooling moms who also host an unschooling book club! We dive into the flow of a typical meeting, going about choosing books, figuring out membership, what they’ve personally gotten out of being part of the book club, and lots more.
Questions for Tracy and Erika
Can you each share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Can you give us an overview of your book club and an idea of the flow of a typical meeting?
You mentioned having an ice-breaker at the beginning of your meetings. I love that and would like to dive into that a bit more. What has your experience been with that aspect of your meeting? And can you share some ice-breaker examples that might help get the brainstorming juices flowing for people who might want to incorporate that with their group?
How do you choose a book? And how long does it usually take to cover a book? Like, do you usually do a book a month, do you go chapter by chapter etc—how does that flow?
Can you talk about the ins and outs of having the membership open vs being invite only? I’m thinking that, even if you start out open, as the club grows and the number of people participating in the group starts to bump up against the length of time you have for your meeting, you may end up considering shifting.
What have you personally gotten out of being part of the book club?
What’s something you love about the flow of your unschooling lives right now?
EU157: Unschooling Intentions with Sue Patterson
Jan 03, 2019
Sue Patterson, a long-time unschooling mom with three now-adult children, joins me to talk about unschooling intentions. I love the energy of a new year, but I’m not so keen on making resolutions. For lasting change, I need something meatier. I’ve found that when I think about the kinds of changes I’d like to see in my life through the lens of intention, it encourages me to remember my WHY. What, in the bigger picture, I am trying to move toward. This connects me with the person I want to become. It changes ME; not just my behaviour.
I hope you enjoy our conversation!
Discussion Points for Sue
What kinds of intentions might be helpful for someone who’s recently started learning about unschooling, but hasn’t yet taken the plunge? Maybe their kids aren’t school age yet, or they’re contemplating taking their kids out of school.
How about some intentions that might be particularly helpful for those parents in their first year of unschooling? They are deep into deschooling and there are challenges that often come with shifting their parenting style from control to connection.
What about unschooling parents with a few years experience? Sometimes things can be going pretty smoothly for a while and we think, “We’re done. We’ve got this unschooling thing down.” But then things change, don’t they? Always. As the saying goes, the only constant in life is change. If unschooling parents find themselves here, what kinds of intentions might be helpful as they start the new year?
What kinds of fresh intentions might be helpful when you’re unschooling with teens?
Often in unschooling families there’s one adult who does the bulk of the parenting and unschooling while their partner focuses on earning a family income. We don’t want to forget about them! What kinds of new year’s intentions might help them on their unschooling journey?
EU156: Surprises on the Unschooling Journey
Dec 27, 2018
It’s time for another compilation episode! Let’s dive into how twelve unschooling parents answer the question, “What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?”
I hope you enjoy hearing what these unschooling parents had to share!
EU155: Let ‘Em Go Barefoot with Missy Willis
Dec 20, 2018
Missy Willis is an unschooling mom of two children and host of the website, Let ‘Em Go Barefoot, where she shares her personal experiences, thoughts, and research around unschooling. We dive into her journey from getting her master’s in Special Ed to unschooling, what she means by the phrase “ego-schooling,” how jumping in to help our children may actually get in their way, her favourite things about their unschooling days right now, and lots more.
Questions for Missy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
With your master’s in Special Education and having worked in special ed classrooms, what did you find the most challenging aspect of the deschooling process to be?
You have a great blog post titled, ‘You Might Be Ego-schooling If …’ That was a new phrase for me, ego-schooling, but you described what you meant so well. Can you explain?
So, we’ve worked through the need control our children because we were defining ourselves by their actions. But there are still more layers to peel back, aren’t there. For example, we see our children trying to do something and we want to jump in and help them. It’s not about us any more; we really want to help them. But that can get in their way too, can’t it?
Your website is letemgobarefoot.com. I’d love to hear the story behind the name!
What’s your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
EU154: Unschooling Dads and Documentaries with Jeremy Stuart
Dec 13, 2018
Jeremy Stuart joins Pam for an engaging conversation about unschooling, documentaries, and life. Jeremy is an unschooling dad and video editor who also directed and co-produced the documentary film, Class Dismissed, which was released in 2015. Since then, it has been screened in more than 60 countries and translated into five languages. He’s now in the home stretch of producing a new documentary, Self-Taught, which looks at the question, “What happens when they become adults?”
Questions for Jeremy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
In 2015, you released the wonderful documentary film, Class Dismissed. It’s the fascinating story of a family’s choice to pull their two children from school and the journey that follows as they take their children’s education into their own hands. What inspired you to tell this story?
I got goosebumps when, nearer the end of the film, the mom shared, “I think I’m starting to kind of let go and relax a little bit. I’m amazed at how much I’m learning now. It’s not that I have more opportunities to learn now, but I’m taking more opportunities to be part of learning and to engage with life in a more rich and fulfilling way.” It’s the return of curiosity for the parent, isn’t it? It’s like a re-awakening to the joy of learning and truly embracing that learning is not just for the kids—it’s a lifelong thing. Which, almost paradoxically, helps us better understand why this lifestyle is such great way for our kids to learn. That’s such a valuable step on the journey, isn’t it?
What is your favourite part of the film?
You’ve been working on a new documentary for a couple of years now, Self-Taught. Can you share what it’s about and the inspiration behind it?
You’re in the production home stretch right now and running a Kickstarter campaign to fund the final stages. Can you share a bit of information about the campaign and where people can check it out?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
EU153: Unschooling the Holidays with Pam and Anna
Dec 06, 2018
Anna Brown joins Pam to talk about navigating the holiday season through the lens of unschooling.
As we move into the holiday season, things can get challenging. Maybe you’re deep into deschooling and questioning everything—including holiday traditions—to see how well they really fit your family. Maybe you’re the lone unschooling family and anticipating uncomfortable visits with extended family as the holidays gear up. And then there’s the general stress that seems to build, both in the people around us and sometimes in ourselves, as we feel the growing weight of the expectations of the season—no matter how you celebrate.
Let’s talk about ways to bring more JOY to the season!
Discussion Points
First, I want to dive into the idea of holiday traditions. I remember that a-ha moment when I realized that I didn’t have to try to twist my family into all the holiday traditions that I—and my husband—grew up with. That everything was a choice—even around holiday traditions. It was another layer of deschooling for me and it felt so freeing! How has that perspective unfolded for you, Anna?
So, maybe there’s a holiday tradition in our extended family that doesn’t mesh well with us, yet they are expecting us to participate. Let’s chat about ways to navigate those kinds of situations.
Now, let’s say we have plans to visit with extended family. How can we set things up so it’s a fun experience?
Now we’re there—at our parent’s home, or our in-laws, or even a cousin’s place. Let’s talk about how can we support our children and their relationships with their relatives.
And finally, let’s brainstorm things we might do if, in the midst of our visit, someone decides to challenge us about our unschooling lifestyle.
EU152: Ten Questions with Vicky Bennison
Nov 29, 2018
Vicky Bennison and her husband always unschooled their two children—now young adults. I met Vicky years ago and we’ve stayed connected online ever since. We have a wonderful conversation diving into her unschooling journey, including what she found to be most challenging, the importance of being curious ourselves, what has surprised her most along the way, stretching her comfort zones, and lots more!
Questions for Vicky
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling?
What was your husband’s journey to unschooling like?
As you watched your children in action, what kind of things did you discover got in the way of their learning?
I think one of the challenges for parents as they move to unschooling is reawakening their own curiosity and wonder about the world. Did you find that to be a valuable aspect of unschooling?
What surprised you most about how unschooling unfolded in your lives?
Was there ever an interest or activity that one of your kids wanted to pursue that stretched your comfort zone? How did you move through that?
As your children have become young adults, have you found that your definition of “success” as a parent has changed since you began your unschooling journey?
Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU151: Escape Adulthood with Kim and Jason Kotecki
Nov 22, 2018
Kim and Jason Kotecki are unschooling their three children, and they are also the brains and the fun behind escapeadulthood.com! We have a fantastic conversation, diving into their journey to unschooling, how they got into the work of fighting adultitis, how encouraging people to see their days through a more child-like lens is remarkably similar to deschooling, the joy of bringing curiosity and imagination into our adult lives, how it all weaves together so beautifully with unschooling, and lots more!
Questions for Kim and Jason
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you guys discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I really love your website, escapeadulthood.com, and your slogan, “Break free from the life you’ve been told to live. Create the life you were made for.” I think it describes deschooling in a nutshell! Deschooling is all about questioning many of the conventional so-called rules we’ve grown up with to see if they truly make sense and mesh with the life we want to live. I’d love to know the story behind how you guys chose to focus on this work.
In your book/journal, The Escape Plan, you make the point that this is about re-programming our grown-up selves to see life through a different lens. It’s about becoming more child-LIKE. I’d love to know some of the benefits that you guys have seen from recapturing the spirit of childhood and living your grown-up days through that lens. Why is this such a valuable shift to make?
Another unwritten rule is that curiosity and imagination is the playground of childhood. In one of your newsletters last month, you made a great case for why this isn’t so. We talk so much on the podcast about the value of curiosity for adults and children alike, I’d love if you could share that insight here.
From the outside looking in, your work encouraging people to create the life they were made for seems to weave together so beautifully with unschooling. Has that been your experience?
Many listeners are in the early stages of their unschooling journey and are in the midst of discovering the extent of the Adultitis epidemic. It’s like, once you see it, it can’t be unseen. To help get them started on the road to recover, can each of you share something fun they can try over the next few days to shake things up?
EU150: Stories of an Unschooling Family with Sue Elvis
Nov 15, 2018
Sue Elvis and her husband Andy have eight children, seven living, ranging in age from 14 to 31. Sue hosts the podcast, Stories of an Unschooling Family, as well as a website and blog. We have a lovely conversation, diving into her family’s move to unschooling, the difference between unschooling and unparenting, how unschooling has grown into a lifestyle for the whole family, what has surprised her most along the way, and lots more!
Questions for Sue
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I’d love to talk about the difference between unschooling and unparenting. You recently wrote a blog post on the topic and I was recently in a conversation where this misconception soon became obvious. How do you explain the difference?
What was the most challenging aspect for you as you gradually embraced unschooling?
You also host a podcast, Stories of an Unschooling Family, and in a recent episode you and your daughter Sophie chatted about another unschooling misconception: that it means drifting aimlessly through your days. In contrast, what has been your family’s experience?
One of the fascinating things for me about unschooling was how it soon grew into a way of life for the whole family—it became intricately woven into every aspect of our lives. I’d love to hear a story about how you’ve seen the unschooling mindset weave into your adult lives—you or your husband.
What has surprised you most about your family’s unschooling journey?
EU149: Deschooling with Tatiana Plechenko
Nov 08, 2018
Tatiana Plechenko is an unschooling mom with two children. I met Tatiana online pretty early in her unschooling journey and then had the pleasure of connecting with her in person a few times at unschooling events. We have a really fun conversation, diving into her deschooling experience, including her most challenging area, how her relationships with her kids have changed, what has surprised her most, her favourite thing right now, and lots more!
Questions for Tatiana
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What was the most challenging area of deschooling for you? How did you work through it?
Can you share a bit about your husband’s journey? Was this style of parenting and learning all new for him?
How has your relationship with your children changed since you began unschooling?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling days right now?
EU148: The Value of Relationships for Learning
Nov 01, 2018
When I began unschooling my three children in 2002, it wasn’t long before I came across the idea that strong relationships with my children were essential for unschooling—and learning in general—to thrive. At first, I thought, sure, that’s a worthwhile goal, but what exactly does that have to do with their learning? That became clear over the next months and years as I continued to question the conventional wisdom around parenting and how children learn. So, let’s explore why connected and trusting relationships with our children lie at the heart of their learning.
The Value of Relationships for Learning is a talk I originally wrote for the Canadian Online Homeschool Conference and I’m excited to share it with you guys now!
EU147: Unschooling as Flow with Robyn Robertson
Oct 25, 2018
Robyn Robertson is an unschooling mom with two children and host of the podcast, Honey, I’m Homeschooling the Kids. We have wonderful conversation, diving into her family’s early travels, their move to unschooling, figuring out what unschooling looks like for them, her favourite thing about the flow of their unschooling days, and lots more!
Questions for Robyn
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
When your kids were young, you and your husband decided to embrace travel. How did that come about?
My understanding is that you guys began homeschooling while travelling because it made sense. How did you eventually discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When we were emailing before the call, you described unschooling as being more about the flow of your family. I loved that and would like to dive into that idea. Let’s start with the challenge of defining unschooling in the first place. In unschooling circles it’s pretty common to hear that unschooling looks different for different families. And on one hand, the freedom of that is great! But on the other, it doesn’t help much if you’re newer to the idea of unschooling and trying to figure out what it does look like. What did that part of the journey look like for you?
Something that I eventually came to find fascinating about unschooling is how the flow of our days changes over time. Like the flow of a river changes over time. Has that been your experience?
What’s your favourite thing about the flow of your unschooling days right now?
You host the podcast, ‘Honey! I’m Homeschooling the Kids.’ I’d love to hear the story behind that project!
Links to things mentioned in the show
Robyn’s website, home to her podcast, Honey, I’m Homeschooling the Kids:imhomeschooling.com
Pam was a guest on Robyn’s podcast, back in episode five, titled, Exploring Unschooling
EU146: Common First Questions About Unschooling with Sue Patterson
Oct 18, 2018
Sue Patterson, a long-time unschooling mom with three now-adult children, continues to encourage and support unschooling parents through her website and Facebook group, UnschoolingMom2Mom. In this episode, we have a great time tackling some of the common questions people ask when they are first exploring unschooling.
Questions for Sue
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Let’s dive into some of the common questions people ask when they are first exploring unschooling. Isn’t this just for religious people or super crunchy people?
Am I going to make my kid weird?
Am I ruining their future chances of success?
What if we get on each others’ nerves spending all this time together?
Do we have to commit to unschooling everything right away? Can we get into it slowly and see what happens?
EU145: Healing and Unschooling with Caren Knox
Oct 11, 2018
Caren Knox is a long-time unschooling mom who found that, while she has been in and out of therapy over the years, nothing has been more impactful and life-changing for her than becoming a good unschooling mom. We dive into her family’s move to unschooling, when her healing journey began, her healing process and what she found helpful, how she wove healing into their unschooling days, and lots more.
Questions for Caren
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What was most interesting a-ha moment for you as you were deschooling?
I’d love to dive into our topic of healing and unschooling. Was your healing something you were working on before you began unschooling, or was it a need you discovered as part of your unschooling journey?
You mentioned to me that you’ve been in and out of therapy and have explored many types of healing modalities. Can you share a bit about that process and what you’ve found to be helpful?
How did you weave your healing work into your family’s unschooling days?
Looking back now, what do you most appreciate now about choosing unschooling?
EU144: The Decision to Leave School Behind with Jen Lumanlan
Oct 04, 2018
As Jen Lumanlan puts it, “I don’t have much in the way of parenting instinct but I make up for it with outstanding research skills.” Her deep dive into parenting research led first to a Master’s in Psychology with a focus on Child Development, then to another Master’s in Education, and then ultimately to choosing unschooling as the path forward for her family. In this episode, we dive deep into how she came to that decision, and how she’s shifting things so that she can soon stay home with her daughter.
Questions for Jen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
In this episode, we’re going to dive deep into the journey surrounding your decision that homeschooling, and ultimately unschooling, was going to be the path for your family. So, let’s start at the beginning. School is definitely the conventional path for children and learning. What sparked you to even consider that that path might not be for you guys?
Let’s dive into some of the questions you considered along the way. I imagine one of the first questions you asked yourself was, what’s wrong with schools in the first place? What did you discover about schools that you wanted to leave behind?
Another common question when contemplating homeschooling is, do I need a curriculum? Actually, I think that might start as, which curriculum would I use? How did that line of research and thinking play out for you?
When you’re trying to decide whether or not to forgo the school system, it seems pretty reasonable to ask, how do homeschooled or unschooling kids turn out? Because as parents we don’t want to do our children a disservice. What did you find when you explored that question?
Intellectually understanding the research is great, but seeing it in action with your own child takes your understanding—and trust in the process—to a whole new level, doesn’t it?
Now let’s move to your ultimate decision to not send your daughter to school as she approaches compulsory school age and instead embrace unschooling. Was there a final question or lightbulb moment that tipped the scales for you? Or was it more the accumulation of all your research and contemplation that convinced you to choose this path?
You host a podcast, Your Parenting Mojo. I’d love to hear the story behind how that developed.
Links to things mentioned in the show
Jen’s podcast, Your Parenting Mojo, full of rigorously researched information to help kids thrive
Jen’s course, Your Homeschooling Mojo, to help you decide whether homeschooling is right for you
EU143: Follow the Joy with Natasha Allan-Zaky
Sep 27, 2018
Natasha Allan-Zaky joins me this week for a wonderful unschooling conversation! We talk about her family’s move to unschooling, the challenge of embracing fun, learning piano, her biggest a-ha moment so far on the journey, and lots more.
Questions for Natasha
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I love hearing what unschooling kids are getting up to. What are your kids interested in right now and how are you helping them explore it?
I think one of the deschooling challenges many of us face is the shift to embracing fun. And I don’t mean just for the kids—I mean for us too. For so long we’ve absorbed the message that adults and adult things are serious, while fun is for kids. It’s an important shift though, isn’t it? Can you share your experience around embracing fun?
I saw a video you posted on your Facebook page about a month ago about your daughter figuring out how to play a song she loves on the piano. I’d love to hear the story of how her piano journey has unfolded so far.
What has been your biggest a-ha moment so far on your unschooling journey?
Can you share the story behind your choice to name your blog, Follow the Joy? What does that phrase mean to you?
EU142: Second Generation Unschooling with Amanda Sharma
Sep 20, 2018
Amanda Sharma joins me this week to share her fascinating perspective as a grown unschooler who is now unschooling her own children. We dive into her experience growing up unschooling, the process of choosing unschooling for her children and family, what she’s found challenging on the journey, her favourite thing about unschooling right now, and lots more.
Questions for Amanda
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
Growing up, what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What stands out for you as you look back on your own unschooling years?
As an unschooler turned unschooling parent, I’d love to hear about the process of choosing unschooling unfolded for you and your family.
What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling and how did you work through it?
How do you see the idea of trust playing out in your unschooling lives? And how did that develop?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle right now?
EU141: Growing Up Unschooling with Alec Traaseth
Sep 13, 2018
I first met Alec Traaseth and his family when he was maybe twelve or thirteen, at an unschooling conference. I’ve enjoyed little glimpses of his life over the years through social media and I was so happy when he agreed to come on the podcast to chat about his experience growing up unschooling. We talk about his interests and passions, his experience with unschooling camps, his choice to go to college and how that’s unfolded, how his passion for math developed, and lots more.
Questions for Alec
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Can you share a bit about your interests growing up and how you pursued them?
Over the years, our families have crossed paths at unschooling conferences, and when we first connected about arranging this call, you were at an unschooler’s summer camp. I was hoping you could share a bit about your conference/camp experiences.
How did your choice to go to college unfold?
I know you’ve become deeply interested in math—how did that develop?
What are your plans for the next year or two?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
Wendy Hart and her husband are unschooling their eight-year-old daughter. They live in Ontario, Canada where Wendy runs a local un/homeschool group that hosts fun activities, like yesterday’s Not Back to School Beach Meet-Up! We dive into how she discovered unschooling, how she’s helping her daughter pursue her interests, her biggest stumbling block on the road to unschooling, her biggest a-ha moment, her blog, and lots more.
Questions for Wendy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I love hearing what unschooling kids are getting up to. What’s Hope diving into right now and how are you helping her explore it?
What was your biggest stumbling block on the road to understanding unschooling?
What has been your biggest a-ha moment so far on your unschooling journey?
You have a blog, and a children’s book, called Freeschoolin’. I’d love to hear the story behind the name!
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle right now?
This week on the podcast, I’ve put together a new kind of Q&A. It dawned on me recently that I’ve written many thousands of words in email replies to unschooling-related questions over the last few years. And I suspect that, for every person who actually emailed me, there are many others with a similar question in mind. So, I gathered a handful of questions from my inbox, heavily summarized and anonymized them, and then edited and expanded my answers.
As you listen, even if a question is about an unfamiliar situation or kids older than yours—or younger—don’t tune out. Listen and see if my thoughts about it make sense to you. My wish with this episode is not so much about solving a particular issue but about expanding your understanding of unschooling. About exploring how unschooling unfolds in our real lives. That said, some day you might find yourself in similar circumstances and you’ll already have some considered thoughts to help get you started!
{ Episode image question marks by geralt on Pixabay }
EU138: The Sparkle of Unschooling
Aug 23, 2018
This week on the podcast, I’ve put together a compilation of sixteen experienced unschooling parents answering the question, “Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?” I titled this episode The Sparkle of Unschooling because the guests are talking about THE ONE THING. It’s the thing we eventually discover that we celebrate the most. BOOM! Mic drop. Fireworks. And often it’s not the thing we thought we were looking for when we started out on our unschooling journey.
I hope you enjoy hearing what these experienced unschooling parents had to share!
EU137: The Untamed with Courtney Barker
Aug 16, 2018
Courtney Barker and her husband Dave are unschooling their three children. Originally from Australia, they moved to Northern Zambia when their first child was 12 weeks old. Four years later they moved to Chile, and four years after that they moved to Canada. We have a wonderful conversation about their journey from school to unschooling, her most surprising discovery about life with children so far, tips for handling big emotions, unschooling and atypical kids, her favourite thing about unschooling, and lots more.
Questions for Courtney
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
When people first hear about unschooling—about not following a curriculum, about not doing endless worksheets of practice—it can be so hard to imagine what that might even look like. It’s a totally foreign concept. What did that mindset shift around learning look like for you?
What has been one of your most surprising discoveries about life with children so far?
You have a great blog post about handling big emotions. As you say, being in touch with and able to lean into our emotions are hallmark traits of emotional wellbeing, resilience, and healthy relationships. Yet many of grew up being shushed and shamed for having big emotions—especially negative ones—so we have a hard time figuring out how to support our children through those moments. Can you share some ideas to help?
You’ve also shared on your blog that one of your children is neuroatypical. That’s a pretty common question: “Will unschooling work for my atypical child?” Because often parents have found that conventional school isn’t working for their child and they worry that’ll happen with unschooling as well. What has been your experience?
I think another really important realization on the unschooling journey is that things are going to go sideways. This isn’t some fairy-tale utopia, it’s life—with all its ups and downs and twists and turns. Yet, the further we are on our journey, the more we come to recognize the valuable learning and self-awareness that often grows out of the mess of things going “wrong.” So much so, that I think eventually we rarely label any of our choices as “wrong.” But life is definitely full of mis-steps, isn’t it? How do you handle those?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle right now?
EU136: Our Unschooling Journey with Jessica Hughes
Aug 09, 2018
Jessica Hughes and her husband, Micah, have three children, ages 11 to 18. When their kids were younger, they were homeschooling with a curriculum but they eventually found their way to unschooling. We talk about that journey, what you can do when you feel caught up in everyday “struggles,” supporting your husband’s journey, shifting away from fear, how unschooling has helped their family heal, and lots more!
Questions for Jessica
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I love hearing what unschooling kids are getting up to. Can you give us a snapshot of your children’s current interests and goings on?
When newer unschooling parents ask what to do about the every day struggles they’re having with their children, often the advice is basically to “stop struggling.” That can be a hard concept to grasp at first, though. How did you work through it?
Can you share some ways you helped your husband move away from conventional parenting? Sometimes it helps to remember to treat our spouses with as much care as we do our children, doesn’t it?
I love this quote from part 8 of your unschooling journey series: “If I had to guess, I’d say 99.99999% of the fear I experience as a parent comes from focusing on the adult I want to create instead of the child I have.” How do you shift away from fear?
Anna Brown is back! We have so much fun diving into her family’s move to unschooling, how she developed trust in the process, what she found to be the most challenging aspect, tips for moving from conventional parenting to consensual living, stretching our comfort zones, and lots more.
Ten Questions for Anna
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. How did you develop trust in unschooling? Meaning, what helped you move from intellectually understanding unschooling to knowing in your bones that it was the lifestyle you wanted for your family?
4. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling?
5. What was your husband’s journey to unschooling like?
6. You have a website, choosingconnection.com, home to some great articles you’ve written about consensual living. Can you share how your interest in consensual living developed and how it has evolved over the years?
7. Can you share some tips for moving from conventional parenting and toward creating a climate for consensual living in the family?
8. Over the years, I’ve heard you talk a few times about the importance of the stories we tell ourselves. We think it’s just in our heads, so what’s the big deal? But it really can be a big deal, can’t it?
9. Was there ever an interest or activity that one of your kids wanted to pursue that stretched your comfort zone? How did you move through that?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU134: How Unschooling Grows with Virginia Warren
Jul 26, 2018
Virginia Warren’s two daughters have never been to school. We have great fun diving into their journey to unschooling, her biggest stumbling block along the way, her perspective as a gamer mom, what’s surprised her most so far, what her favourite thing about unschooling is right now, and lots more!
Questions for Virginia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What was your biggest stumbling block on the road to understanding unschooling?
A mutual friend recently described you as a “gamer mom.” I really enjoy watching my kids play video games, but my personal skills top out at Animal Crossing and Phoenix Wright. I’d love to hear about your experience and perspective on video games.
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle right now?
Links to things mentioned in the show
Livre para Aprender: Cinco Ideias para uma Vida Unschooling Feliz, the Portuguese translation of Free to Learn, is now available in both ebook and print editions!
EU133: The Twists and Turns of Unschooling with Bea Mantovani
Jul 19, 2018
Béa Mantovani is an unschooling mom with two children. I’ve known Béa online in unschooling circles for quite a few years—she’s even translated some of my blog posts into French. We have a really interesting conversation as we dive into the twists and turns of their unschooling lives, including how she found unschooling, her biggest deschooling challenge, navigating learning to read, how technology weaves into their days, the ups and downs of extended travel, being trilingual and exploring languages with children, and much more!
Questions for Béa
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What did you find to be the most challenging area of deschooling in that first year or so?
One of the common questions people have as they learn about unschooling is, “But how will they learn how to read?” I’d love to hear your perspective on the process of children learning to read—both philosophically, and how it’s playing out in your unschooling lives.
Another area that a lot of people find challenging is technology. Computers, the internet, cell phones, and other electronic devices are new to our culture and change can be scary. I’d love to hear about your experience around this topic.
We’re friends online and I see you that you guys travel pretty often. And, I know that you’re at least bilingual because you’ve translated some of my blog posts into French. I definitely wanted to ask you about both these topics! But then, when we were in touch before the call, you mentioned how those topics go together. Now, I’m extra curious. I can imagine a few ways they might be connected, but I’d love to hear how travel and languages weave into your unschooling lives. What are the joys and the challenges?
What’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle right now?
EU132: Deschooling Two Cultures with Iris Chen
Jul 12, 2018
Iris Chen is a Chinese American unschooling mom who was born in the US, grew up in the US and Canada, and now lives with her husband and two boys in China. She’s been unschooling for about a year and began sharing her experiences on her blog at untigering.com. I’ve really enjoyed reading her posts, and I was excited when she agreed to come on the podcast. We dive into why her and husband decided to move to China, her family’s move to unschooling, unschooling in China, deschooling expectations around achievement, feeling like an outsider in both Chinese and American societies and lots more!
Questions for Iris
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I love how you describe your blog, untigering.com, on your about page: “Untigering is a blog about my adventures of trying to be parent in the tension of my Chineseness and Americanness. It’s about me moving away from being a typical tiger mom, but still wanting to hold on to my cultural heritage. It’s about figuring out what I believe about identity, family, and success as an outsider to both societies.” Let’s start with your shifting definition of success. You and your husband were well on your way to fulfilling the “American Dream” when you guys did a complete 180. How did that come about?
And then you had children. How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I’m really curious about unschooling in China. Can you share a bit about your experience and the pros and cons you see?
You have a great blog post about the value of letting go of expectations, especially ones around achievement. When a child dives into an interest it’s so easy for us to start envisioning that as their lifelong passion and career, like we need to rationalize to ourselves that it’s okay to let them have at it. Maybe we try to convince ourselves we’re just being supportive, but it can quickly backfire, can’t it?
I’d love to talk some more about your experience with the tension of feeling like an outsider in both Chinese and American societies. Can you share your thoughts around the process of weaving together your cultural heritage with what you’re discovering makes sense to you about children, learning, parenting, and family? What does that look like for you?
You recently published a blog post titled, ‘Unschooling as an Asian American is an Act of Resistance.’ I thought it was a great piece and was hoping you’d share your thoughts about it here.
What is your favourite thing about unschooling right now?
EU131: Deschooling with Maria Randolph
Jul 05, 2018
Maria Randolph’s unschooled daughter is now twenty, which gives her a great perspective to look back on her own deschooling, It was a fascinating journey! We talk about what she found to be one of the most challenging areas to deschool, regret and how it can get in the way, her journey through the question, “But how will they learn math?” and lots more!
Questions for Maria
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What was the most challenging area of deschooling for you? And how did you work your way through it?
Sometimes it can take us a while to work through our issues before unschooling really begins to flow in our lives. And that can leave us dealing with feelings of regret. Was that your experience? And if so, how did you move through that?
As people are deschooling, it’s pretty common for them to be asking lots of questions, often phrased as, “But how will they …?”—fill in the blank with their current pressing concern. I thought we’d tackle a couple of them today. Let’s start with, “But how will they learn algebra?”
Another common one is, “But how will they learn to work in a group?”
With your official unschooling years behind you, looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU130: Dismantling Shame with Ronnie Maier
Jun 28, 2018
Ronnie Maier has two daughters now in their twenties, who unschooled after leaving school in the early grades—plus a niece who has stayed with them part-time over the years. In a fun twist, Ronnie was the working parent while her husband Frank was the at-home unschooling parent. Ronnie has shared her family’s unschooling experience for many years, both on her blog and speaking at the Life is Good unschooling conference. I really appreciated her joining me on the podcast to deep dive into the challenges of shame.
Questions for Ronnie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Your children are older now, can you share a glimpse with us of what they’re up to?
Now let’s dive into our topic: dismantling shame. Shame is very popular tool of control, especially in the conventional parenting toolbox. Let’s talk for a moment about why we even want to do the hard work of removing it from our lives. How does the shame that we experienced as kids get in the way of unschooling? How can it hurt our relationships with our kids?
As we talk about so often on the podcast, when we find ourselves facing a challenge, the first step is often to dig into the roots of the issue. Can you share with us some of the roots of shame? Where do our feelings of shame come from?
The next step that can be helpful as we work to dismantle shame in our lives is to begin to recognize the kinds of situations that trigger feelings of shame for us, right now. It helps to know when shame might be clouding our vision, doesn’t it? Do you have examples or tips you can share with us about this step?
Now that we’ve identified the roots of our shame, and are starting to recognize situations that trigger our shame, what are some tools we can use to help us begin to heal from shame?
Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU129: Starting Unschooling as a Teen with Noah Tetzner
Jun 21, 2018
Noah Tetzner is seventeen, left school last fall, and it was not long before he was passionately unschooling. We talk about his transition from school to unschooling, what excites him about unschooling, the podcast he’s now had time to start, his advice for new unschooling parents and lots more.
Questions for Noah
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
You were homeschooled before going to private school for grades 9 to 11, and you left school last fall. What led up to that choice? What kind of conversations did you have with your parents about it?
What were you envisioning for yourself when you left school? Had you heard of unschooling at that point?
What were your first weeks and months like? How did you find the transition from school to being in control of your days?
Nowadays, you’re passionate about unschooling. What excites you the most about it?
You host a podcast as well! Can you share the story of how that came about?
And lastly, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU128: Reluctant Spouse to Unschooling Advocate with Zach & Heather Lake
Jun 14, 2018
Zach and Heather Lake join me this week to talk about Zach’s journey from reluctant spouse to unschooling advocate. Heather has been on the podcast before taking about her deschooling journey, and after the episode she mentioned that her husband has had quite the journey as well. It occurred to me that it would be interesting to have them on together to talk about his journey from both their perspectives. We talk about how Zach learned about unschooling, how Heather shared information with him, which ways he found most helpful, Zach’s most memorable a-ha moment, how unschooling feels right now for both them, and lots more.
Questions for Zach and Heather
Can you give us a quick re-introduction to you and your family?
Homeschooling was initially Gavin’s idea, right? What were each of your initial reactions to the idea?
Heather, how did you go about learning about homeschooling and unschooling?
Zach, how were you learning about homeschooling and unschooling? Was it mostly through Heather?
Heather, as you shared unschooling information with Zach, which seemed to be the most helpful ways to go about it?
Zach, was that your experience as well? What were some of the most useful ways you learned more about unschooling? Reading? Conversations? Observing your children in action? Was there anything that got in the way?
Zach, can you share your biggest a-ha moment? That moment when a valuable piece of the unschooling puzzle fell into place and your understanding took a big leap?
EU127: The Magic of Unschooling with Ann Rousseau
Jun 07, 2018
Ann Rousseau and her partner Tim have been unschooling their three boys for about six years. Ann and I have a fascinating conversation, digging into how her family came to unschooling, moving through fear and discomfort, the many ways curiosity drives their days, her documentary about her experience of alopecia, and lots more.
Questions for Ann
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
As we’re deschooling, and beyond, one thing that can be especially hard is sitting with discomfort and fear to learn what we need to move through it—that seemingly gaping chasm between knowing what we don’t want to do and figuring out what we do want to do instead. Change is hard. What have you found helpful during those times?
You have three boys, and Kelly Callahan, who was on the podcast a few months ago, describes your home as “unschooling magic.” I’d love to hear about how you approach your days with an eye to cultivating a thriving unschooling atmosphere.
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
You’ve created a film with Nicolle Littrell called Mop Cap: An Alopecia Story, about your experience of alopecia and self-acceptance. I watched the trailers on the website and was especially struck by your words: “I don’t think bald people must be publicly bald to prove a point. But for those of us who are called to do so, it is a kind of LOVE activism. Loving yourself is an act of beauty and it’s contagious.” They connected deeply with me and how it feels to go about living our unschooling lives out and about in public. I’d love to hear how you see your alopecia and unschooling journeys weaving together.
Right now, what’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle?
This month, Anna Brown and I treat you to an extra long Q&A episode as we finish up the remaining questions! We dive into questions around the challenge of deschooling while holding tight to your fears, engaging with the unschooling community before having kids of your own, the decision to unschool, the transformational impact of shifting our mindset from balance to flow, the ideas of talent and practice, homeschooling regulations, deschooling around weight and physical activity, and the back and forth of being in the moment vs planning ahead with three little ones.
Listener Questions
Anna’s Question (from the UK)
Hello! My name is Anna and I have 2 children, a boy aged 7 and a girl aged 6. We live in the UK. I am a primary teacher and my husband is a teacher, as were both my parents! I have read a lot about unschooling and REALLY enjoy your podcasts, and my husband and I really see the positive points of unschooling and feel drawn to trying it out, but it feels extremely challenging. We started our home schooling journey a year ago. My son did not do well academically at school, although he enjoyed some of it, and this is the reason we took them both out. He gets extremely focused on one thing (we think he may be ASD) and does not tend to be interested in anything else, for months and even years. Can an ASD child self-regulate? He spends most of his time sitting reading History books, is an introvert and also wants to watch a lot of TV which I am uncomfortable with. He often does not want to go outside at all.
My daughter however, is an extrovert (as am I) and loves activities and going out. They have always had a difficult relationship (only 13 months age difference) and this is getting worse. Son sits and reads and hardly plays with her any more and I think she misses playing with him. She was upset a couple of nights ago saying she misses school, more precisely playing with groups of friends and doing “proper learning” (her words), and she misses doing learning “like school.” She has asked if we can do handwriting and maths worksheets together. I tried this yesterday but when presented with the worksheets she doesn’t want to do them!
We live in a small house with a tiny garden and haven’t found many other home schooling families we are all keen on. I myself am feeling quite lonely and confused and am struggling to find joy in this journey. I can’t help thinking it would be easier with a dog, a big garden, etc but money is very tight on one income.
I am trying so hard but sometimes find myself getting so angry, for example I tried letting them watch as much tv as they wanted the other day, and they watch it ALL day. I wandered around feeling at a loose end and did what you recommend, sitting with them etc but it was just so boring! Then when tv had to go off for dinner my son had a tantrum. We were all left definitely NOT feeling joy. They ask for TV when they wake up, I tried that early in the year but it led to my son getting up super early and him grumpy and tired for the rest of the day, so now the first thing I say every morning is NO! I am not doing very well at this am I!! Please help, I have some much personal deschooling to do but it is so hard I feel I can barely do it and with 2 children who are so different and the associated guilt and feeling sorry for my daughter is very hard! Despite all this I am very sure it is ultimately the right path.
Thanks so much.
Loretta’s Question (from Philadelphia, US)
Hello! I have been an alternative educator of sorts my whole life. Either on the road or with my friend’s children, I always have people using me as a resource for finding interesting opportunities for their lives. Naturally unschooling was attractive to me for that reason.
As someone who doesn’t have children yet, but plans to adopt and/or have children in the future, how can I integrate myself into the unschooling culture now? I have always been a researcher and planner, and through my work I find that this type of schooling would fit best for my life and the skills I would like to pass on to my (future) children. As a child myself, I went to public school during the day and was homeschooled at night, so I can see both sides of the coin.
However, there are amazing new opportunities like world schooling and deschooling. I am almost obsessed with the idea of traveling with kids, especially teenagers. I want to explore and learn, but would it be weird for me to show up at these conferences or even sending you questions as a person without children yet? I’m not sure and don’t want to seem weird or out of place I guess. Otherwise thank you for being a great resource so far.
Talya’s Question (from Montreal, Canada)
What do you do when you know that unschooling is the best path for your child but you don’t feel like you have the emotional, financial or time resources to truly follow what is calling? I am an artist – a poet and theatre performer and creator and highly passionate about what I do. I have no desire to be a SAHM. I also have a teaching degree and went to an alternative arts school and am happy to follow intuitive, child-led, natural learning. But I can’t find the balance at this point.
My son is incredibly self-directed, knows exactly what he loves to do, but also has SPD (a sensory processing disorder) making all group settings and classes difficult for him (to say the least). He is highly intelligent, but when he tries to even take a music lesson (begs for violin lessons and has since age 3) he finds it terrifying and wants to flee. I feel like I am never enough to support him. And I feel like I am failing him. I want to walk this path alongside him, but quite simply feel I can’t. It seems to me like a full-time job to support a child this curious, alert, high needs and in some ways, special needs, and I am worried I will not be able to find a balance and make us both happy. He is 5.5.
Rachel’s Question (from Louisiana, US)
I am writing because I struggle with feeling like I am not present enough for my children. We have been unschooling for a couple years. I was a stay at home parent when they were both little. Then when my youngest child was 19 months I went back to work. I was exhausted physically and emotionally due to many, many years of sleep deprivation. Going back to work was a breeze compared to staying at home! However, being away from my kids all day made me realize that I missed that lifestyle (and them!) and I knew that I definitely wanted to homeschool/unschool with them for the long haul. Work seemed meaningless compared to the joy of being with them.
So, I decided to quit my job again and figure out a way to nourish myself enough that I could happily and energetically unschool with them. They are 4 and 7 years old now. I can see that things are becoming less demanding of my energy as my kids get older. They don’t wake up as much anymore, so that is a huge help. However I keep trying to find balance and focus. It would be much easier for me to find balance and stay present if I didn’t have this burning desire to cultivate my own passions. I am an artist and I also keep trying to work on writing some children’s books. Oftentimes I wonder how other homeschooling and unschooling moms or dads make sure to balance their own needs and desires with that or their children’s.
I don’t seem to be able to start working on something while my children are awake. I can’t find focus enough to break away and do my own projects. I will start doing all these mindless things like organize a room or clean something, when I really want to be painting or writing. I have played around with waking up early to paint. When I do that I can easily focus with the house so quiet and so little distractions. It can only be 3 minutes of creativity for me, but it sets the day up to be beautiful and present. I am so content and present with my children when I first have that time to myself. And I try to wake up early more to give myself that time, but then I am tired or someone woke me up at night and I just couldn’t find the energy to wake early again. So, basically I am feeling stuck because I found this great solution, however I can’t seem to realistically put it into practice. I need so much sleep to be happy and healthy. I have never been the type of person who can go with less than 8 hours of sleep.
Also, it’s not that my children require me to entertain them during the day. They have always been able to get deeply engaged in play. I think the problem is with me! But I can’t seem to figure out a solution. Thoughts? I get a lot of inspiration and guidance from your books and blog. I’d love to know how you were able to be present for your kids and devote time to your passion of writing as well.
Sincerely, Rachel
LATER, SHE WROTE IN AGAIN:
I wanted to send in an update. A few weeks ago I sent in a question for your podcast. A few days after, I listened to one of your older podcasts as I often do. It was a q&a podcast, and the person was asking how to balance her two kids needs. Well, one of your co-hosts responded how she does not think about balance, but thinks about flow. I have started doing this and it has transformed me!! I am feeling so much better about our days and am really better able to see things more clearly. Thank you so much for all that you do for unschoolers!
However if you have anything to add about finding success with nurturing your own creative pursuits while nurturing your kids, I would be all ears.
Sincerely, Rachel
Maddy’s Question (from TaiWan)
I am Maddy from TaiWan. My son has been a unschooler for 10 years. He is 16 now. I’ve been brought up in a very conservative education system and I didn’t like it, that’s the reason when my son asked me to unschool him at home when he was a first grader. I was afraid but I knew I had to do something to help him. We started from homeschooling and then to unschooling. He is interested in computer games and music. He’s got the talent in music. The problem I am encountered right now is that he knows that he has the talent in music and he likes his classical guitar teacher very much but he only practices the music spontaneously. When we talk about this and he said he knows that he has time-controlling problem, but he hasn’t found the way of controlling it yet. And he went back to his computer again. I know he has learnt a lot more than we can imagine through reddit, games, youtube…etc.
My question is: Most of the school students or those children who learns the discipline to practice for a certain amount of time. Even though they are not happy to do so most of the time, once they form the habit to do it, they will eventually experience the abundant fruits and have the chance to be the master of this field. That also brings them confident, isn’t it? But somehow when I do the research of the unschoolers’s when it comes to the achievement, of course they can live happily if they are satisfy with their life. I guess I am just thinking too much for their adulthood future cause we’re living in an eastern society. ><
Thank you very much for your time.
Dee’s Question (from Tennessee, US)
I just started homeschooling , and also just moved (TN) so we had to submit what we were going to school. But that isn’t working so, how do I start unschooling without getting in trouble?
Anonymous Question
I am firmly supportive of my kids and their choice of activities, I play with them, we are a radical unschooling family who has few if any issues with kids having agency over their choices.
One struggle that still remains even though we’ve deschooled so many over the years is how to create an environment that supports regular physical activity in all of our kids. Our daughter does an exervise class weekly and is quite active, one of her brothers is not as active but will get outside to do things periodically, but specifically we have a child who seems to be becoming more interested in eating foods that fuel him well, yet still tends toward high carb options more often than not and it’s made him overweight and a Dr would say obese. I have prepped foods he likes (cut peppers, broccoli, cut lettuce, fruits of choice) and he will eat those readily, but more often than not, he asks me to make calorie dense foods like Macaroni Salad, and Goulash, Chicken Picatta, Meatloaf/mashed potatoes, and Potato Salad. When these foods are made and in the house, he will eat them through in 1 or 2 days — that means 2 pounds of pasta in two days!!
He also loves Ramen, but has it only 1 time a week because we’ve discussed that it shouldn’t be a daily food. He only drinks sugar soda when we go to a restaurant these days and he recognizes the sugar content of soda. I am also asked to go out and get chicken fingers or tuna clubs, Chipotle burritos (of which he’ll eat twoO) or rice and refried beans. When he is eating, his hunger cues tend to be slow to signal as he can eat large quantities of food at a sitting (4 bowls of goulash, 2 chipotle burritos, etc.) Although he does mention to me when he is not hungry at times (outside of eating a meal). Over the years I’ve observed him having a sensory relationship to food and he has tended to food jag often – where he’ll be eating all of one thing and then be off it for months, then on to something else.
Snacking late at night is also an issue. He often has crackers and apple sauce and cereal, various bars, and chips in various stages of being eaten next to his bed – as he watches videos before falling asleep. My husband thinks that his odd sleep/wake schedule affects his circadian rhythms and really thinks we need to actively step in to help him control his behaviors. I know that I need to be better about providing healthier options and make them more readily available – but seriously the volume of food is large and it is hard to stock up for long and with the jags, I can stock up and essentially throw away all that food because he’s moved on.
FWIW, we live in the Northeast so winter tends to have us indoors more often than not. We also live just outside Boston in a neighborhood with few other children, so there is little daily incentive to jump outside for activites. The child of which I speak does not like to be over hot, so he only likes going outside in Spring and fall when it’s cool.
What we have done to make physical activity choices easy and accessible: trampoline, swings, offers of walks uptown in good weather, outdoor play stuff = zip line, swingset, local parks (although less interested in these now), park days (not so interesting), jump ropes, C2 Rower, med balls, weights, standing desks, ergo seats. We have yard games, bows and arrows, basketball hoop, fire pit, and I’ve started buying yard gems like cornhole and ladder ball, stuff like that.
I guess I’m looking to hear from parents who have had kids who when given freedom of choice have ended up heavier than just (a little fat here and there) and who may be concerned about the potential for diabetes. I am fearful to bring him into a pediatrician because of the potential to make him overly self-conscious of his body. I’m sure that they would suggest imposing a nutritional plan (diet) on him and I am not sure that aligns with RU (at least i have to understand how to present this idea in an RU way)
He is open to exercise, he is open to suggestions on food – but I don’t think he knows how to change his behavior and I sit in inaction because I dont’ want to create a worse issue by making him have issues around food, yet seeing the bad that comes from not having guidance here — overweight and incapable of sustaining walking or any physical activity for long out of fatigue or pain. This is why I recommended him to read the Meticore reviews since they are the best fat burning pills in the market.
I would welcome any ideas as to how to approach this. I have place one of my favorite pictures of this son from when he was 3 yrs old and smiling on my computer backdrop so I could shift my energy when I see him to seeing that wonderful smiling kiddo full of vim and vigor… that has helped immensely in my interactions with him, but I still have no idea how to tackle this in a way that supports him vs. controls his choices seems to run a fine line.
Thanks
Jane’s Question (from Johannesburg, South Africa)
From the start of our parenting journey, my husband and I have both been committed to instinctive, attachment parenting. Just before my daughter turned 1, we came across the philosophy of unschooling, which led us to investigate and start applying radical unschooling principles to our everyday lives. My daughter is now 2 and her little brother is 7 months old. We also share our days with our housekeeper’s son, who was born only 2 days after my daughter, so it’s almost like having toddler twins running around!
I listen to the old episodes of the podcast every day and I have found such amazing value from your perspective, especially with the Q&A episodes where you all give different opinions. The running theme of connection really resonates with me, and I see it playing out daily – whenever I experience conflict or frustration with the children, it is when I have allowed our connection to slip for a moment. I KNOW that the secret to connection (and joy in general) is mindfulness and being present to the moment at hand.
What I’m struggling with – and what I’d love to get your input on – is how to balance mindful presence with the necessary planning and preparation that is part of daily life with three little ones. I try to join them in their flow, and I’ve made a mind-map of sorts to help me figure out things we can do together, e.g. I can hang laundry when the toddlers want to jump on the trampoline. The obstacle I’m facing is that I need to think a few steps ahead (when to work in diaper changes/prep snacks before they get hangry/get the baby into a quiet space when he’s ready to nap/etc.) so that I can put things in place to help them do the next thing they’re interested in (prepare art supplies/keep an eye on them when they want to roam outside/etc.).
This constant thinking ahead makes it difficult for me to stay in the moment and connected to their perspective, because it seems like there’s always another thing that needs to be done (specifically for the kids, I’ve let go of my personal hobbies like sewing and such for now). The preparation is also often wasted – by the time I manage to facilitate what they want to do, their interest has been grabbed by something else. Any advice?
EU125: Challenges on the Unschooling Journey
May 24, 2018
This week on the podcast, we have the first compilation episode! I gathered clips from fourteen different episodes where I asked some version of this question: “What has been one of the more challenging aspects for you on your unschooling journey?”
I think it’s fascinating to hear them side by side, but I’d love to know what you think. Please let me know in the comments whether you enjoyed it and if you would like to see some more compilation episodes on the podcast in the future.
EU124: Unschooling the Early Years with Jen Kobrick
May 17, 2018
Jen Kobrick connected with me recently and suggested an episode about the idea of unschooling in the early years—before kids reach school age. Her son is almost three and she so beautifully explained why she thought it was a valuable topic that I asked if she’d be interested in talking about it with me. I was thrilled she said yes! We have a great conversation about her experience with attachment parenting through toddlerhood, ways to approach various parenting challenges through connection, like bedtimes, sharing, and technology, the conventional push for early childhood education, and lots more.
Questions for Jen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling?
I’ve mentioned in the past how attachment parenting can transition pretty seamlessly into unschooling as children hit school age. But that’s been based more on my reading about attachment theory than experience because I didn’t come across the concept of attachment parenting until my kids were older, and now they’re all in their twenties. So, it’s been a while! You’re engaged in attachment parenting circles right now, so I’d love to hear your perspective. Have you found the attachment parenting and unschooling mindsets diverging as your son enters toddlerhood?
Why do you think this becomes more pronounced in toddlerhood?
I’d love to dive into a few examples with you! Can you share some ideas for parents who are looking to work together with their young children rather than gently controlling them to do—or not do—the “thing.” Let’s start with bedtimes.
How about sharing? How do you approach that through connection rather than control?
What about brushing teeth?
And lastly, what tips do you have with regards to young children and technology?
Conventionally, there’s a big push for early childhood education. I suspect you’ve felt that already, and I was curious how you respond to it through the lens of unschooling.
Before we go, are there any more ways that you find the unschooling mindset valuable for approaching your days, even though your child isn’t school age?
EU123: Unschooling and Food Round Table
May 10, 2018
This week on the podcast I’m trying something new: a round table discussion on a single topic. Questions around food are very common as people are deschooling and contemplating releasing control over their children’s food choices and Sylvia Woodman, Jo Isaac, and Meredith Novak join me to talk all things food. I hope you find our conversation helpful!
Children need to consume vitamins, supplements and healthy food to grow properly, however, a coq10 examination will recommended if they have muscle pain.
Also, for the first time, I recorded video of our call as well, which you can find on my YouTube channel.
Questions for the Group
You’ve all been on the podcast before and I’ll share links to those episodes in the show notes, but can you give everyone a quick intro to you and your family?
I’d love to hear about your journeys around food and control. What did life around food look like for your family when you first began unschooling? And what does it like now?
Let’s talk about food fears. The one that comes up most often, I think, is the question of food and health. For example, sugar. When we first contemplate releasing control over our children’s food choices, we so often envision that all they’ll want to eat is sweet, sugary things. And on top of that, when we do start out, often our children are drawn to those choices, precisely because they have been so tightly controlled before. What thoughts and suggestions would you share with someone smack in the middle of this deschooling phase and getting worried?
What about when a person has strong principles around food? For example, they choose to eat vegetarian. I’d love to chat about ways parents can live their principles without controlling their children’s choices. And why is that so important?
Another question I see pretty regularly is around the question of food choices within a food budget. Can you share your approach?
EU122: Unschooling Passions with Robin Bentley
May 03, 2018
Robin Bentley is an unschooling mom who loves dancing hula, playing the yukelele, and supporting her daughter’s exploration of her interests and passions. We have a wonderful conversation about unschooling passions, including how supporting our child’s interests often ends up being a positive experience for us as well, healing our own childhood, tips and ideas for supporting our child’s interests, even if we don’t share it, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“One way to become supportive of your kid is thinking of how you would feel in that situation and what you would have liked your parents to do. You become the parent that you wish you had by supporting your kids.” ~ Robin Bentley
Questions for Robin
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What are your daughter’s interests right now? I’d love to hear about how you’re supporting her as she pursues her interests and passions.
Have you found that the things you do to support your daughter also end up being positive experiences for your as well?
Can you share some tips and ideas for unschooling parents looking to support their child’s interests?
What advice would you give to parents who, while understand why it’s good to support their child’s interests, find that they don’t share the interest, or even actively dislike it?
What’s been your favourite thing about choosing unschooling so far?
Links to things mentioned in the show
Robin first heard about unschooling in local La Leche League meetings
Anna Brown joins Pam to answer listener questions. This month we dive into questions around managing the environment when a parent works at home, when we’re not a “perfect mom,” helping our kids learn about diversity, when you’re not into your child’s passion, and helping your children process their emotions without taking them on yourself.
Hi. We are a South African unschooling family. We have two sons, 10 and 8, and a daughter who is 4 years old. My two sons attended preschool, but when my eldest was supposed to go to grade one, we took them out of school and started homeschooling them. I started on a very rigid program but started relaxing more and more as I realized that my eldest was very unhappy with sitting still and doing book work for hours. In the beginning of 2017 I made a new friend who happened to be an unschooler. She encouraged me to listen to some of the livingjoyfully podcasts. I listened to one and it was as if I have found something that I was looking for all my life, without knowing that I was looking for it. It was absolutely wonderful. It took some time to convince my husband, but he was willing to be convinced. We then jumped in completely!
My question has to do with our home situation. We live in a very small house, and my husband tutors online. There can’t be noise when he is working, so I have to silence the kids all day long. My children are very active and loud and beautifully dramatic all the time :). It is very difficult for them to be quiet and I usually end up getting frustrated and taking my frustration out on them. I try to take them on outings all the time, but I want my children to love their home. They don’t want to be at home at all anymore. I do wonder sometimes if unschooling like this is really conducive to their happiness and well being, or am I pursuing a dream that does not fit in with our current situation or lives. I know that there is no advice that can change my circumstances at home. What I am really looking for is ideas to make home more inviting and fun for them, without spending too much, as our budget is very tight. Thank you for taking the time to answer my question. Regards.
Alexandra’s Question (from France) [TIME: 15:30]
Hello, thank you for your podcasts and your help to all parents!
I was wondering whether you can help me… I have been living with the unschooling philosophy for almost 1.5 years. I do my very best but sometimes I do not do everything perfectly. I am not as good to my kids as I would like to : I can get annoyed by them when they scream without a reason, when they do not behave well, etc. And then I feel guilty. And this feeling makes me very sad and unhappy. Especially when it happens during the day when I am at work and cannot see my children for hours. I really try hard but I am not a perfect mom 100% of time and then I feel so powerless that it happened again and I was not as good as I would love to my children. Do you have any advices to such moms as me? Thank you very much!!!
Joan’s Question (from Rhode Island, US) [TIME: 23:00]
Love unschooling and wondering… kids schooled and unschooled learn about race, gender, and class constantly through everyday interactions in the world. To me, this is something that needs to be actively untaught/retaught because most grown ups have it all wrong! From my perspective, it’s a topic children like to avoid because they can sense the weight and discomfort of it from grownups. I’m wondering how you teach about race, gender, and class in an unschooling format? How can we decolonialize our children’s understanding of the world and still let them be self-directed? Thank you!
Suparna’s Question (from Vancouver Island, Canada) [TIME: 31:35]
Hi there, I just found your blog and podcast. Thank you for your clarity, gentleness and mindfulness. This is exactly the approach to learning I have been searching for, for my now 12-year-old son. Our schooling journey has been rocky and we have finally given it up. We were fooled into thinking that enrolling in a DL school was the same as homeschooling, only just found out we were still in the same bucket. Hadn’t moved an inch!
Anyway, long story short, here I am devouring your webpage and podcasts. I love the “love what they are doing” approach but my question is what do you do if their interests/passions bore you to tears? My son is mechanically inclined, he is super passionate about remote control cars/vehicles and will sit at the computer surfing for hours, pondering and poring over makes, models, whachamacallits and whosits and dodads. I have tried really hard to be interested but it’s all mind numbing to me. I am happy to encourage and provide him with whatever he needs to fulfil his passions but there is a limit to how far I can go with his interests. I am a more artistic, fluid, organic person.
So, how do you fully help your child develop his interests if you can just barely understand what he is doing? Thank you for reading!
Hi Pam, Anne, and Anna! First, I need to say how grateful I am for your podcast, especially the Q & A episodes. The discussions feed my soul and ground me.
On to my question: I am very empathetic. I have been told more than once that I am an empath. I’m not sure if I am totally comfortable with that label, but I do know that I notice, feel, and experience other peoples’ emotions without them actually telling me how they feel. For example, I teach yoga and often people come to class to release their own emotional weight. I have left from teaching feeling very sad, only to find out that one of my student’s dog died the day before.
My 5-year-old son has anxiety issues and is not comfortable in crowds. I believe that my 6 (almost 7) year old daughter is very much like me. She loves being around other people and kids, but it also exhausts her emotionally. She will also go through days of feeling sad and not knowing why, or being angry at the world, her family, life. I was very much like that as a child and my parents tried hard to shame it out of me, telling me that my emotions were hurting other people and ruining our family time. It took me most of my adult life to make peace with the sadness within myself, and I wish to impart this peace onto my children. Their unique way of experiencing the world led us out of public schools to homeschooling, and ultimately to unschooling. I am so very sure that unschooling is the right choice for our family. My son is relaxing into himself and actually finding the words to let other people know when he needs a break, and my daughter is learning so much in ways that I never could have imagined.
However, since moving away from conventional parenting styles (such as seeing my kids’ “negative” emotions as something to fix) toward a deeper, more honest and level connection with my kids (seeing my kids as they are without needing to be “fixed”), I have begun to “take on” their emotions. When I was less connected with them and they were sad, I could separate myself from their emotions. Now, I get stuck in their head space. How can I continue to connect with them without carrying that weight with me? Right now, they are going through this amazing emotional journey, finding language for feelings, coping skills, and ways find comfort when it is needed. But, all of this emotional openness has left me feeling raw, weepy and exhausted. Is this the way is just has to be because of my empathic side, or is there a better way for me to connect without falling into their struggles? Any insight is greatly appreciated. Thank you.
EU120: Unschooling and Autism with Erin Human
Apr 19, 2018
Erin Human is an unschooling mom of two and she joins me this week to talk about her experiences with unschooling and autism. Erin has an autistic son, and was diagnosed with autism herself as an adult. She’s also a wonderful artist and is the art director for Autism Women’s Network, as well as co-founding director of Autistic Families International. We dive into her family’s journey to unschooling, her autism diagnosis, why unschooling is such a great fit for autistic children, ways unschooling groups can be more welcoming to autistic children, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“I actually think that autistic children are a perfect fit for unschooling. I really see the foundation of unschooling as being that relationship of mutual trust and respect between parents and children. I think that is really the bedrock of unschooling, and that is the way that autistic children really thrive is to have that relationship with their parents where you trust that your child’s unique perceptions are valid and that their unique way of being is a valid way to be.” ~ Erin Human
Questions for Erin
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You have a great post on your blog about your own autism diagnosis. Can you share with us a bit about that journey?
Could you share a little bit about the pros and cons that you found about going through the diagnosis?
You also have a really interesting post about the language used around autism, specifically around the word “disabled,” which informed the title for this podcast episode. Can you talk about why you don’t shy away from the word?
In unschooling groups, I pretty regularly see questions like, “Will unschooling work for my autistic child?” How do you answer that question? What are some of the benefits of unschooling for autistic children?
As an unschooling mom with autism, can you share some of the day-to-day supports that you’ve found helpful?
Can you share some ideas about ways unschooling groups can be more welcoming to autistic children?
EU119: Gaming and Growing Up Unschooling with Xander MacSwan
Apr 12, 2018
Xander MacSwan left school in the 5th grade when his parents—both professors in the University of Maryland’s College of Education—decided the best thing they could do was pull their kids out of school and start unschooling. We dive deep into Xander’s passion for video games, including the difference between gaming as part of deschooling and choosing gaming as a passion, the joys of gaming, and things he learned or experienced through gaming that continue to be relevant in his life.
Quote of the Week
“To me, one of the most valuable parts of unschooling is the unconditional positive regard and acceptance that a parent can give to a kid. Just that sense of trusting, that it’s okay to be myself and it’s okay to do what feels good and take care of myself. I think that’s such a huge thing to be able give a young and developing mind.” ~ Xander MacSwan
Questions for Xander
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and what your family’s move to unschooling looked like?
One of the common worries for newer unschooling parents is around whether or not to limit the time their children spend playing video games. And there’s definitely a difference between deschooling and choosing gaming as a passion, though at first it might be hard to distinguish between them. Can you talk about the difference?
How did your passion for gaming develop? Can you share a bit about how that unfolded for you?
In my experience, I think diving into any passion, including a passion for video games, can be a wonderful way to learn so much about ourselves. And that understanding applies everywhere in our lives. Was that your experience?
Can you share some examples of things you learned or experienced through gaming growing up that continue to be relevant in your life now? What threads do you see looking back?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU118: Everything’s Connected with Nikole Verde
Apr 05, 2018
Nikole Verde and I have a great conversation about how, with unschooling, everything’s connected. Nikole is the home ed columnist at JUNO Magazine and she’s been doing a fun series where she looks at how different topics—or subjects, from a more school-ish mindset—can weave into our unschooling lives. Eventually, we notice that all of those topics and subjects weave together into living as we come to realize that everything’s connected.
Quote of the Week
“Looking back, we did recognize that she had a lot of dyslexic traits that probably made it a slower path for her, but it was not a worse path. She was still learning so much every day and getting so much information and experimenting and observing and learning through just a different pathway.” ~ Nikole Verde
Questions for Nikole
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Let’s start with unschooling and art. How might art organically weave into our days and how can we support that?
How about unschooling and reading? Outside of school, learning to read can look so different, can’t it?
How about unschooling and science? Science is everywhere, isn’t it?
Your eldest chose to go to an alternative school last year. How has she found the experience?
You also work part-time as a librarian. Can you share a bit about how you weave your work into your unschooling days?
Anne Ohman joins Pam to answer listener questions (Anna wasn’t able to join us). This month we dive into questions around meeting the needs of multiple children with diverse personalities and needs, shifting and reconnecting with the children after challenging times, shifting away from control as a parenting tool, and what to do about children who often interrupt.
Hi everyone! I’m loving listening to the podcast and really appreciate all of your voices and insight on this amazing unschooling journey.
Quick background about me: I’m a part-time yoga teaching. I teach 12 class a week, early mornings and some evenings. My husband works a regular 40 hour work week. I am home with the kids during the bulk of their time awake.
We have 3 kids ages (almost) 7, 5, and 3. We just pulled them out of school at the end of their last school year (the older two were in kindergarten and preschool respectively.) At first we tried “school at home.” But that ended with power struggles, tears, and exhaustion. We are now fully unschooling, and loving it. (Although, I know that I have some more “deschooling” work to do.) I cannot say enough how unschooling helped every person in our family find connections to each other and ourselves.
My oldest, Cordelia, is very outgoing and energetic. She lights up around other people and loves exploring the world. My 5 year old, Merric, has social anxiety and is very mellow and introverted. He gets easily exhausted from brief (less than an hour) exposure to public settings. When he is home he has a beautifully rich internal world. My 3 year old, Winifred, is very attached to me and asks for a lot of attention, and does not nap. She is a lot of fun, and is happy to do whatever her older two are doing as long as I can hold her.
Anyway, here is the question: how do I honor and meet the needs of all three of my kids, when I am the only one home? If we stay home Cordelia is miserable. If we go out Merric is miserable. And if we go out for a brief outing, and then at home I choose to have quiet time with Merric, to help him restore himself, Winifred physically fights him for my attention.
Any ideas would be very helpful. I feel like whatever I choose these days I am betraying one of my kids’ needs. They are pretty resilient, but I would like things to be a bit smoother, or at least know that they can smooth out in the near future.
Anonymous Question [TIME: 17:50]
Hi all,
We are an unschooling family with 2 little kids, aged 2&4. We have been on this journey for a couple of years now and having this podcast and deschooling really helped us to get to a point where I felt like everything was going ok.
However we have had some really really hard times with a job loss, an upcoming move and just the stress of an uncertain future. My husband and I have been fighting a lot and some of it has spilled over in front of the kids. I’m really ashamed to admit it but they’ve seen some screaming matches. I’ve also been disconnected and spending a lot of time by myself while my husband handles them. Which is fine, but I’m usually the primary caregiver so their routine has gone for a toss as well.
My husband and I are working hard to make up and work things out. We are also trying hard not to let the kids sense our tension.
Any ideas on what would help make up for what they’ve already seen/heard? I feel like the overall atmosphere of our home is so stressed and so so sad. What can I do? What can we do? Please help me.
Being raised in a standard power and control authoritarian model home, what functionally practical steps would you recommend to get started surrendering the illusion of control and practice honoring my children’s autonomy? Specifically what choices can I make when the urge to dominate and control monster where I become my authority models rears it’s ugly head? Did you face this and if so how did you deal with it? Thank you in advance love future unschooler current momster.
Alex’s Question (from France) [TIME: 38:13]
Hello and first of all let me thank you for your wonderful podcasts, help, advices and support ! It is of a great help and is a big source of pleasure for all parents who listen to them, I am sure !
I would like to hear your opinion about children who interrupt. My boys (5 and 7 y.o.) very often interrupt me and it annoys me a lot. When we are at home it does not happen so often but when we are in a restaurant, at a doctor’s office it can happen very often and it is very-very annoying. I explained them many times that they should wait for their turn and that it is not polite but nothing helps. What can help me to sort out this situation in a positive and polite manner ?
EU116: Growing Up Unschooling with Summer Jean
Mar 22, 2018
Summer Jean and I have a wonderful conversation about her experience growing up unschooling. We chat about how her mom came to unschooling, dealing with disapproval from extended family members, how her passion for glass art has unfolded, some of the common questions she gets when people learn she didn’t go to school and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“It’s human instinct to evolve. I mean, how did we get to where we are? It wasn’t from someone forcing us to learn something we didn’t care about. It was from us being curious and interested and wanting to get better at something.” ~ Summer Jean
Questions for Summer
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What inspired you to learn more about unschooling and did it change the way you saw your childhood?
I understand that you guys experienced quite a bit of pressure and disapproval from extended family growing up. How did you deal with that? Any tips you’d like to share?
How did you discover your passion for glass art and how did that unfold?
When people find out you that you grew up unschooled, I imagine they are full of questions. What are some of the most common questions you get?
Links to things mentioned in the show
Pam’s new blog post, The Nature of Time (an excerpt from her book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide)
EU115: The Unschooling Journey with Hema Bharadwaj, Part 2
Mar 15, 2018
Hema Bharawaj is an unschooling mom with two children and an amazing artist. Hema and I talk about her illustrations for my new book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide. She talks about the inspiration behind the images and shares wonderful stories about her own unschooling journey. Our conversation spanned almost two hours so I decided to break it into two parts to give you more time to savour her stories and insights—here’s part 2. And if you’d like to see the illustrations we’re talking about, be sure to check out the episode transcript! I added them alongside our conversation so you can see some of the aspects we reference.
Quote of the Week
“Even today, like at night, he suddenly says, “Do you want to have a cup of tea?” And I go, “Okay.” That’s my cue. It’s like, ‘I’m going to have a chat. He’s going to talk.’ I get so excited and I just change my plans immediately because it is incredible what comes up.” ~ Hema Bharadwaj
EU114: The Unschooling Journey with Hema Bharadwaj, Part 1
Mar 08, 2018
Hema Bharawaj is an unschooling mom with two children and an amazing artist. Hema and I talk about her illustrations for my new book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide. She talks about the inspiration behind the images and shares wonderful stories about her own unschooling journey. Our conversation spanned almost two hours so I decided to break it into two parts to give you more time to savour her stories and insights. And if you’d like to see the illustrations we’re talking about, be sure to check out the episode transcript! I added them alongside our conversation so you can see some of the aspects we reference.
Quote of the Week
“My spirit got unschooling. I got it, I had wanted that all my life but all of the parts of me that had gone through school, that had been raised by parents who were doing their best and saying, “Hey, you know, we need you to learn this and this and this, only if you learn this will you be successful in life.” All of that was getting shaken up.” ~ Hema Bharadwaj
Megan Valnes is an unschooling mom with five children and we have so much fun diving deep into her deschooling experience. We talk about finding helpful unschooling information and groups online, the parenting paradigm shifts we make as we embrace unschooling, her experience managing the diverse needs of five children, her husband’s experience as they moved to unschooling, her favourite thing about unschooling right now, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“Unschooling is a simple philosophy that when you read it, you are like, ‘Oh yes, that makes so much sense.’ But to actually implement it and fully integrate that philosophy into your life, it’s so different because it radically contradicts what we grew up knowing and understanding about the world. It’s like suddenly four plus four does not equal eight. Or, there is a possibility it might equal nine. Is it possible to stretch your brain out that far? Where you can think, ‘It’s a possibility what I have been doing all these years was not right?’” ~ Megan Valnes
Questions for Megan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
After we’ve chosen unschooling for our family, the learning doesn’t stop there, does it. We’re just getting started! And while the growing amount of information about unschooling available is awesome, it also means more sifting to find the sources with solid information that connects well with us. How have you found that process unfolding for you?
Another important aspect of the deschooling process revolves around parenting—it turns out, helping our children’s learning thrive, means shifting our parenting paradigm from “having control over our children” to “being in connection with our children.” What has that shift looked like for you?
With five children, I imagine there are a number of different personalities at play. Can you share your experience around finding ways to meet their diverse needs?
How has the transition to unschooling been for your husband? How have you been helping him with the shift to this very unconventional lifestyle?
Right now, what’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle?
Links to things mentioned in the show
Pam’s new book, The Unschooling Journey: A Field Guide, is out! You can find it on the usual retailers here: books2read.com/unschoolingjourney
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join Pam to answer listener questions. This month we dig into questions around helping a child who feels powerless and defeated, how to support a child who left school six months ago, personal hygiene choices, and the challenge of different personalities and meeting their needs.
Hi, reading Q&A episode 95 gave me goosebumps. Validating someone’s feelings makes so much sense. I know how I feel when I feel understood. Someone once said that to feel understood is to feel LOVED.
My 11-year-old, though, often says: “I have the worst luck in the world.” He gets frustrated often while video gaming and when he can’t do something (like his Nerf gun is jammed, his shoe laces are not cooperating etc) and his explanation is always: it is because of my luck. It breaks my heart to see him feeling so powerless and defeated. I guess what I’m asking is how to help him feel a bit more capable and “lucky.” Apart from validating, which I’m working on now.
Hello Pam and thank you so much for the podcasts you do. I have only discovered them recently and they have been very helpful and reassuring in our journey to unschooling.
I have a 10-and-a-half-year-old son named Julien who was attending our local Waldorf school. I myself am a trained Waldorf teacher and a professional gardener who now works at home growing sprouts. I live alone with my son but he sees his father quite often. He and I are very good friends.
My son has been out of school since May of 2017. He had become very unhappy at school. He showed little interest for most of the curriculum; not understanding why he had to learn what he was told to learn.
Socially, it was hard for him to connect with his peers in the school context. He was often left out, rejected or bullied. Since he was limited to making friends with the boys in his class, Julien found it difficult to find someone with the same interests or with whom he could truly connect.
He was diagnosed with dyspraxia and of course, all written work, handwork or any fine motor skill activities were a challenge for him.
As a result of that school experience, Julien felt that nobody loved him. His self-esteem was degrading and he just did not want to go to school anymore. Every morning was an ordeal: he did not want to get up, get dressed and he almost walked backwards as I dropped him off to school.
Julien has definitely been happier since he has been out of school. He is finally able to live his days at his own rhythm which is so important to him! He plays and plays a lot! He much enjoys the freedom and space he has to do what he wants to do. He is not the kind of child you can force things on.
It has now been 6 months of unschooling basically since I do not follow any curriculum. I felt that my son just needed to be free and rebuild his self-esteem. But now what, I ask myself?
My son’s interests are quite limited to a few things. I am trying to create a stimulating environment but it seems like very few of the things I bring are of interest to him. I suggest activities and outings but he responds with little enthusiasm. I would love to help him research stuff and work on a project together but none of that is happening!
He seems to be mostly happy with his limited field of interests but he also complains about being bored at times. I myself sense that he needs to broaden his horizons and be stimulated.
I am a very curious person who likes to explore and try everything! But he is not. I am a high achiever; he is not. Our interests are not the same and therefore it is not always easy to live our days together. I am really struggling right now. I am wondering if I should follow a curriculum or if he would be better off going back to school after all. It is hard for me to accept him as he is right now. I hear all these great stories about other unschoolers and ours is not like that.
And then the fears and worry creep in. I worry that he will never develop any other interests or passions. I worry that he will always be closed off to trying out new things and not learn a variety of things. And this unschooling experience is supposed to be fun right? How can I make it so? because right now, it is not.
His father is worrying even more and as a result, he tries to force ideas and specific activities on our son. He would like me to push our son to have interests ‘of value’ (besides video games) and to work on them as a research project of some sort. He said he was not pushed enough to perform as a child and he does not want his child to turn up like him.
I too want to be ‘living joyfully’ with my son. My main reason for taking Julien out of school was that he be happy again and that he rediscovers the joys of living on this earth. My deepest wish for him is that he flourishes with all his vibrant colours: colours that are his own. I want him to learn to listen to his own voice and to trust his heart. To never lose sight of who he is and to nourish and honour the great being he is.
So there it is! I hope you can make some sense out of this. I am just wondering what my role has to be now and am I failing my son’s education? I just feel I need to do more but what?
Thank you for your help and taking the time to answer the many different questions in this story.
Barbara’s Question (from South Africa) [TIME: 36:16]
What to do if your 11yo son flat out refuses to shower, brush teeth, etc. We don’t force him and have explained personal hygiene, but he just doesn’t seem to be that concerned.
Shelsy’s Question (from Florida) [TIME: 41:56]
Hi! My question is about honoring family members with different preferences and needs. My husband and I are very much introverts. We tend to stick to home and aren’t very social, but we like to go out as a family on the weekends when he doesn’t work. My son, age 6, is mostly the same. He likes doing things, but a lot of the time he prefers to be home. My daughter, 8, is extremely social. She is always wanting to be out doing things and talking to people. She is also content at home, but I know she would always prefer to be out and about.
The problem is, when I do take the kids out to do something, I often wish I hadn’t. Sometimes it’s because they fight the whole time we’re out, sometimes it’s because my son runs away from me or is mean to other kids. Sometimes it’s because they each have something totally different they want to do can’t agree on anything. I have tried so many times to do things with them and we have had so few successes (by success I mean everyone actually enjoys whatever we set out to do) that I really just don’t take them anywhere during the week anymore. Unless my husband can be with us so we can split up if things aren’t working out, it’s just too much for me.
I don’t like that. I want to do fun things with them, I want to take them places. I’m just not sure where it’s falling apart. When similar questions have been asked on the podcast before, the advice usually includes talking things through and having conversations about what everyone wants and how we can work it out. I haven’t been able to get that to work. My son doesn’t seem to want to listen. When I try to talk to him, if it’s something he thinks he doesn’t want to hear, he just runs away screaming, “Stop talking to me!” We have been able to work out compromises with him if we can get him to tell us why he wants a particular thing, we can sometimes make it work. But usually he doesn’t want to cooperate long enough to get to that point.
So, I stay home. I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing, but I worry that I’m not exposing them to enough interesting things. I tell them no a lot when they ask to do things because I’m just tired–I don’t want to go through it all again. When outings go downhill I start to doubt my choice to unschool–they certainly don’t act like the other unschooling kids mentioned on the podcast (if someone saw my kids at the park they probably wouldn’t describe them as kind and respectful.) I feel like I’m doing something wrong, but when I stay home I feel like I’m holding them back.
I’m trying to get my daughter involved in groups where she can go regularly to be social with other kids and help fill her up that way. But is it okay to stay home and only go out on weekends? How can I get to a point where doing things with them is actually fun? I had hoped that it would get better as they got older, but that hasn’t really been the case so far.
I hope this question is clear, I had a hard time finding words for it. Thanks so much for your help!
EU111: Ten Questions with Jan Fortune
Feb 15, 2018
Jan Fortune home educated her four now adult children in the UK and wrote many articles and five books on unschooling and parenting. Her last book on the topic, Winning Parent, Winning Child, focuses on living with children in ways that respect their autonomy. Jan is also a novelist, poet, editor, and runs Cinnamon Press, now in its twelfth year.
Quote of the Week
“We all want the best for our children but the temptation I think to over-identify with them can be quite stultifying. I am not my child and my children have the right to shape their own lives. It’s a privilege to support that and to be part of the journey as far as you’re wanted, but I don’t produce any life but my own and therefore I shouldn’t be taking credit for that.” ~ Jan Fortune
Questions for Jan
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. One of the first paradigm shifts that happens as we move to unschooling is from the conventional idea that childhood is a preparation for life in the adult world to the idea that a child’s present life is intrinsically valuable. And yet, almost paradoxically, focusing on living well in the present moment and solving today’s problems ends up being a great way to prepare for life as an adult, doesn’t it?
4. In an article you wrote for Life Learning Magazine, you dive into the building blocks of an autonomous, or unschooling, learning environment. I love the point you made about how this lifestyle transcends boundaries. And not just academic subjects, but getting to the place where there are essentially no boundaries between learning and living. Can you share some of the boundaries that melted away for you? It’s a deeper level of trust we reach, isn’t it?
5. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling?
6. In your book, Winning Parent, Winning Child, you make a great point about how consent-based parenting is not a call for parental self-surrender and martyrdom. Rather, it’s a call for engagement with our children. You talk about how there may be times when a mutual solution escapes us and we choose to put our children first, but that’s not ideal. Even though sacrifice is often held up as a virtue in society, why is simply giving in not a good long-term solution?
7. I’d like to dig into this transition to consent-based parenting a bit more. In the book, you wrote, “Consent works best when everyone in the family, adults and children alike, see themselves as free, respected people who can live the life they prefer within the family group. When this happening, adults and children can all be open to changing their wishes without ever fearing that it will mean doing something they really don’t want to do. This releases an enormous flood of innovative thinking for solving problems.”
I think that’s something that can be hard to believe until you see it in action. Can you share some tips about this transition and how it cracks opens creative problem-solving?
8. Another aspect of the transition to consent-based parenting I’d like to touch on is moving beyond the conventional idea that children will tend toward bad choices if they aren’t controlled. As we move to unschooling, we discover that what our children really lack is just experience. Especially if we’ve been parenting with rules and control for years, our children have had little experience with understanding themselves and making reasoned choices, so at first, they may behave in ways that may seem, to us at least, irrational. Yet that’s still not a sufficient justification for falling back on control and compulsion, is it? How else can we look at those situations?
9. In another article you wrote for Life Learning Magazine, titled, ‘As If…On Not Turning Our Children Into Byproducts of Our Philosophy,’ you talk about something I think is really important. I want to read a short quote from it:
“There is a temptation to want to prove that our home-educated children, and especially those who have real control over their own learning are more successful, more polite, let’s face it, just more… than their school-going, coerced counterparts. There is a real danger of advertising our learning style, and the alternative life style that is often a byproduct of it, by pointing to the product. Children, however, are not products; they are real, autonomous, human people, making their own mistakes on their own learning adventures; living out their learning for their own sakes, and not to provide examples for their mother’s most recent workshop talk.”
Even for parents who don’t chose to share more publicly about their family’s unschooling adventures, it’s still so valuable to shift away from the conventional mindset that our children are products turned out at the “end of our job” as parents. I think breaking this invisible tether between us and our children as builder and product, is a crucial step in our ability to see them as separate and whole human beings. Has that been your experience as well?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU110: Unschooling Dads & Music with Alan Marshall
Feb 08, 2018
Alan Marshall is an unschooling dad, a professional musician, and a university professor in the music department. We dive into his family’s journey to unschooling, his eldest’s transition to junior high, ways to approach music lessons, advice for dads just starting out with unschooling, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“Actually, I would discourage, particularly someone starting to do music and most other arts, from doing practice. I would say, ‘don’t practice.’ And really, I think the problem is formal practice. Like, ‘I’m going to sit down now, and I’m going to practice the piano for an hour because it’s my practice time.’ Because I think that just doing that is pretty doomed to be counterproductive. In my opinion, as a musician, and somebody who wants to help people who want to learn about music, that has discouraged a lot more music-making than it’s helped.” ~ Alan Marshall
Questions for Alan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and how did your family’s choice to embrace unschooling unfold?
You’ve been unschooling for almost a decade now. What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Your eldest chose to go to junior high school a couple of years ago. How did she find the transition, and have found it challenging to weave school and your unschooling principles together?
You’re also a university professor, teaching music, and I’d love to dive into that with you. When a child expresses interest in music or an instrument, so often the first thing parents jump to is lessons. Piano lessons. Guitar lessons. Violin lessons. In your experience, is that the best first step?
When a child has expressed an interest in an instrument and parents have rented or purchased one, the conventional advice is for us to strongly encourage them to practice regularly, if not daily. Yet that can soon be met with growing resistance. What are your tips for navigating that situation?
In the bigger picture, how do you see unschooling and learning music—or any other art—weaving together?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
EU109: Unschooling Stories with Sylvia Woodman
Feb 01, 2018
Sylvia Woodman joins me on the podcast this week, sharing some of her wonderful unschooling stories. Her children, ages thirteen and eleven, have never been to school. We chat about how she discovered unschooling, ways to create an environment in which natural learning thrives, how unschooling has been healing and liberating, technology, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“What I also didn’t understand is that what they were able to read was not connected to what they were able to understand. They had very big vocabularies, they could understand very sophisticated content, but they weren’t necessarily going to go to a reference book to learn more. They had other resources available to them. They had podcasts, they had YouTube, they had voice-to-text if they wanted to communicate with people; they had lots of other ways of getting to the same place.” ~ Sylvia Woodman
Questions for Sylvia
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and how did your family’s choice to move to unschooling come about?
One of the cornerstones of deschooling is learning how to create an environment in which natural learning flourishes. That’s definitely a process, not a single, giant step. Can you share an idea or an action that you found really helpful along the way?
One of the things that can trip us up as we shift away from the idea of curriculum to natural learning and following our children’s interests, is thinking of learning as “child-led.” How can that concept get in the way of understanding what unschooling looks like in practice?
Moving to unschooling can also be a catalyst for healing from our own childhood. Has that been your experience?
I know you have lots of stories around how technology has enhanced your unschooling. I was hoping you could share a couple of them with us.
Eventually, what we learn through unschooling expands far beyond how children learn, doesn’t it?
Right now, what’s your favourite thing about your unschooling lifestyle?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join Pam to answer listener questions. This month we dig into questions around the challenge of meeting the needs of everyone in the family, the conventional idea that you shouldn’t do things for your children that they can do for themselves, the interplay of releasing control over food and the real constraints of a food budget, and ways to help our children deal with negative comments.
Hi! I have a question about balance, which I am sure is something that all families have difficulty with sometimes!
We are an unschooling family of four. The two boys, aged seven and four, have never been to school. However, I was previously a primary school teacher so my need to deschool has been great, and is still on going (probably unending!). We are a neuro-diverse family, with highly sensitive, spirited children who find some forms of communication difficult.
Our main challenge at the moment is in balancing all the needs of our family. My older son is keen to spend time in museums and galleries and taking part in activities related to his interests. It is important for him to have time to explore exhibits and information closely, with a lot of talk with myself and/or his Dad. However, his brother is not in a place where these things are of interest, and he has an overwhelming need to run and climb and shout that is not appropriate in these sorts of spaces.
Similarly, my younger son has a need to control what is being done at home, he cannot tolerate his brother watching documentaries on the television, or reading books with me. He is unable to verbalise his reasons for this, although I think it could partly be about wanting my attention, and does not seem to understand explanations of why his brother finds these things important. We manage it as best we can with lots of options for him (we have a garden with lots of equipment, an indoor swing and trampoline, a range of tablets and Lego which he loves), but often it doesn’t seem to matter what he is doing he still needs to manage what his older brother is doing as well.
I try hard to split my time between them, or find things that will work for both of them, but this seems to be getting harder to juggle with the need to also feed them and do a little housework (I already outsource as much as I can by hiring a cleaner). I also need to balance my own mental health as I struggle with anxiety. We do not have family near enough to rely on regularly, although my parents do as much as they can to support us, and friends are currently unable to take one or the other of the boys as they find their needs to challenging to fit in with their own children.
I do worry that by acquiescing to my younger son’s need to manage and control how our time is spent may be setting him up for difficulty in later life, but I am aware that this may well be due to my need to deschool further in this area. Not acquiescing leads to destructive hour-long meltdowns, which is distressing for everyone, and I feel not part of who he is (in general he is a loving and gentle child). It feels like when he is not able to control the situation he experiences real fear. At the same time, I am concerned that his older brother is missing out on the things he feels are valuable, and he has told me he often feels I care more about what his brother wants than what he wants.
My husband tries hard to help this balance. Relaxing bedtime has really helped because it means we have more time in the evening with two adults around. However, he works long hours, often at weekends as well as all week, and has a long commute, so cannot be around as much as the rest of us need him!
I often feel that what our family actually needs is a major review of how we are living, in regards to my husband’s work and where in the country we live. I am hoping you can help me with some more ideas for short term solutions, however. Or at least reassurance that it does get easier! I am dreading the shorter, darker, wetter days when we will find it harder to get into nature as things seem to be worse on those days.
Amy’s Question (from Oregon) [TIME: 34:13]
I am becoming acquainted with radical unschooling philosophy. I have often read that you should not do something for child if they can do it themselves. Also, that kids benefit from doing regular chores/responsibilities. Based on the principles of radical unschooling, what do you think a parent should do if a child does not want to do something they are able to do for themself (as an example, putting their clothes…I have a 2 and 4 y/o). Same thing for doing chores, what if a child does not want to do a chore or to help with household tasks?
Thanks in advance, I love your podcast.
Del’s Question [TIME: 49:20]
We are an unschooling family with 3 young children – the oldest being 6. I have been really inspired by your podcasts and website to embrace the idea of allowing my children a whole lot more control over their own eating. Everything I have read and heard around this now makes perfect sense, but I feel like I need to get my head around what it is going to look like for us a little more, before I take the leap in that direction.
The part that I find the most overwhelming and confusing at the moment, is how this is going to work within the restraints of our relatively strict food budget. We eat a fairly good whole food diet, but a lot of “ingredients” have to be rationed in order for them to last the time that they need to. In your own experiences with giving your children “food freedom” and control of their own eating, how did the practical aspects of budget play out for you? I understand that this is more or a consideration while my children are young, than it will be when they are older and have a wider understanding of money, cost and availability etc. But for now, I am not quite sure the best way to approach this.
For example, there are certain foods that the children would love to snack on, such as dried fruit and cheese, but if they constantly eat it on its own then our available amount for the month will very quickly be used up. Whereas if I mostly use it as an ingredient to make other things, then this gives us much more food for the month. Once these ingredients are all used up then not only will they not have those to eat on their own, but I also will have very little to work with to make them/us anything too. I have tried explaining the need to make things last, but I can tell they are not at a stage where this means much to them – especially when they want the thing they want. I don’t want to constantly be saying “no” to them, but I am pretty sure that these things are going to be asked for a lot.
I love listening to all your opinions, and I want to thank you in advance for your wonderful insight!
Cher’s Question (from New York) [TIME: 59:47]
Hi. My 8-year-old boys compete in gymnastics. They are naturally great at the sport and my one son says he wants to go to the Olympics. All the kids on the team are in school and they are constantly calling my boys stupid and asking them to answer questions like, “What’s 11 x11? I learned that in pre-k, I am smarter than you.”
They are all older too (ages 9-14)—I think they are jealous. I am starting to take it personally (I guess I still have deschooling to do). I don’t want to say anything to the parents or coach because I am only hearing my boys’ version of the story.
What should I have my boys say? They keep replying, “I didn’t learn that yet.” I think they are naive and innocent and don’t realize that the kids are really being cruel. I have my tribe of friends who unschool with us and we get the kids together all the time (or online gaming). But the boys love the sport too much to have them quit.
EU107: Alternative Schools to Unschooling with Jessica
Jan 18, 2018
My guest this week is Jessica, an unschooling mom living in Germany. Unschooling is illegal in Germany, so we’ve kept everything on a first-name basis to protect her anonymity. Jessica decided even before her son was born that her child wouldn’t attend conventional schools, but she had no idea that the alternative schools that sounded so great wouldn’t work well for her son either. In our conversation, we dive into the challenges they found with two alternative schools, how her decision to make the leap to unschooling unfolded, what deschooling looks like for them both and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“That was one of those really big important parts about actually validating and taking that time, because I thought I was doing it before, but it wasn’t until I didn’t have those time constraints on us that I realized this can take hours and hours, or days as it needs to, and it can just keep coming up because we’re always together.” ~ Jessica
Questions for Jessica
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
When your son hit school age, you chose an alternative school. How did that decision come about?
You became a teacher at the school as well, right? But eventually you saw signs that your son wasn’t doing well in the environment. What were some of the aspects he found challenging?
Next, you tried a Montessori school. How was that experience?
How did your decision to make the leap to unschooling unfold?
Even though your son only attended alternative schools, did you find that he still needed some deschooling time?
And what about your deschooling? With schools now out of the picture, what have been the more challenging shifts as you move to unschooling?
What do you love most about your unschooling lives right now?
EU106: Unschooling Connections with Kelly Callahan
Jan 11, 2018
My guest this week is Kelly Callahan, unschooling mom of two. Kelly is now four years into her unschooling journey, and I was excited to explore how unschooling has been weaving ever more deeply into their lives. We chat about how they began unschooling, her deschooling challenges, the connections she’s seen between unschooling and her work as a homeopathic doctor, maintaining family connections with her husband when he travels for work, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“The things that challenge me are never the unschooling. It’s really because I’m super attached to something—being someway or some idea I had about it.” ~ Kelly Callahan
Questions for Kelly
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and how did your family’s choice to move to unschooling come about?
What did you find to be one of the bigger challenges as you were deschooling?
Can you share a bit about your children’s interests and how they weave into your lives?
You’ve discovered some interesting connections between your work as a homeopathic doctor and unschooling. I know as I continue to learn on my writing journey, I make connections and gain insights that feed into my unschooling journey, and vice versa. It seems that as I go deeper into one, it takes me deeper into the other. Have you found that as well?
I understand that your husband has been traveling a lot with work. Can you share your experience with keeping him in the loop and maintaining connections while he’s away?
You’ve been unschooling for four years now. At this point in your journey, do you find that unschooling principles weave their way into all aspects of your lives?
EU105: Unschooling Dads with Nick Hess
Jan 04, 2018
My guest this week is Nick Hess, also known online as The Unschool Dad. He and his wife unschool their five children. We chat about about his family’s move to unschooling, what it was about unschooling that resonated with him, what he’s found challenging, and surprising, about unschooling as it has unfolded in their lives, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“For thousands of years, humans learned naturally. When you let it happen and you get there, and you do not force it, you are just there helping them. And I think that is the important part, is that you have to be there. I mean, me and my wife are constantly with our children. You have to be there to help them, and guide them, answer their questions, or help them spell something. And when you are there, and you are just part of your children’s lives, you just see it all. You come together and it is truly a magical lifestyle that we live, it is just amazing.” ~ Nick Hess
Questions for Nick
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I love hearing about what unschooling kids are up to. Can you share what your children are interested in right now?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What were the pieces that resonated with you and helped you feel more confident in choosing unschooling?
What has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
You post regularly on Facebook and Instagram as The Unschool Dad, sharing inspirational quotes as well as pics of your unschooling lives. I enjoy following you guys and I’d love to know what inspired you to start this project.
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join Pam to answer listener questions. This month we dig into questions around when parents are at odds over parenting choices, ways to share information with more conventional parents, teens making connections and considering school, and ways to handle when a child calls themself “stupid.”
Hi, thank you so much for your great podcast and all the work you’re putting into answering our questions every month!
We’re on our journey to unschooling since November last year and it’s been very exciting. Our children are currently 8, 6 and 2. My question is about my husband. He didn’t like the idea of taking our two older kids out of school but finally agreed to it last year because I never stopped talking about it and felt my daughter (8) wasn’t thriving at all. So he agreed and changed his mind a lot about schools and learning since. He could see how much happier the kids seemed after leaving school and how much they learn every day.
However, he is much stricter than I am and expects a lot of them. The kids usually know the difference and everything seems to go well as long as they are just with one of us but the problems arise whenever we do things together as a family. I just can’t stand the way he shouts at them sometimes or tells one of them to go to their room (when they were younger he even locked them outside the door sometimes) or tells them to shut up moaning etc. So I usually interfere but then our kids have to choose sides and my husband says that I criticise him all the time. He says I don’t want to change and mould my children but I want to change HIM and he is right I suppose. He also says I should find better ways of dealing with the situation before they go out of hand but I’m often at a loss too. When I’m on my own with our children many of these situations don’t even arise because I don’t expect them to “sit still and eat their dinner” etc. I give us a lot more time to find solutions together and don’t rush them out the door or tell them to stop doing something immediately.
How can I value my husband for who he is without letting him hurt our children? He can be very gentle and loving too but usually when they are behaving the way he wants them to. Our daughter is able to play the “good girl” for most of the time now when she is with him but our 6-year-old son is much more emotional and extreme in his feelings and expressions which drives my husband crazy. I really don’t know how to improve these situations. Do I step back and let them have their own relationship without interfering? Or protect my children more?
I told them one day that their father was raised in a very strict way too because that’s what people often did back then, and that’s why he often gets so angry now (he used to smack them sometimes when they were younger but I didn’t tolerate that and he stopped, although he still thinks that a little smack isn’t that bad). I hope I didn’t make my husband sound like a monster. He has many wonderful sides too but the “parenting thing” seems to be something we can’t find any solution to. Thank you for your input!
Amy’s Question (from Virginia) [TIME: 16:52]
Hello, ladies. I first want to say what a blessing this podcast is to me each week and how grateful I am to all of you who contribute to its production. My question is about sharing the parenting philosophies embodied in unschooling with people who are not currently home or unschooling.
I have 5 children, ages 27, 24, 17, 16, and 14. We naturally fell into a respectful parenting paradigm as we saw that traditional parenting seemed to fit the description of “when you keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, that is the definition of insanity.” We are Christian parents who see our kids as our neighbors and friends and apply the lessons we learn in scripture about loving, caring for, honoring, and helping others, not just to those outside our home, but firstly to those inside it. We absolutely love the relationships we have with our teens, and don’t believe that the “typical rebellious teen years” are a given in raising children. It breaks my heart to see my nieces, who or just starting out on this adventure we call motherhood, share the struggles they are having with their kids, and just getting the same old traditionally authoritarian advice from other parents, that isn’t working for any of them. The same goes for hanging out with other parents of teens and listening to them lament their struggles, but then all agree they just need to be tough and survive it.
Are there any books, podcasts, or other resources you can direct me to, so that I may share them with other parents who might want more from their parent/child/teen relationships?
Anonymous Question (from the UK) [TIME: 34:47]
We have been unschooling our 2 children for almost all of their lives (they had just 2 years in school) and my children (now 13 & 10) have been thriving in terms of personal growth, passions, interests, knowledge, skills, making decisions, learning about life and the world and relating to others, knowing who they are and what they like and dislike. In themselves they’re content with the choices they have in their daily lives, within the constraints of our personal situation. We’re always offering new opportunities and possibilities to them, which they are free to choose from. We make family decisions together about our home, pets, meals, holidays etc. But they haven’t really made a strong connection with the local home education community here, which we did have in previous towns and I guess they are looking now for a sense of belonging. They feel they belong in our family and enjoy doing stuff together but struggle with finding their place in our local neighbourhood, despite trying various groups and voluntary work.
All around them they see children going to school and having that sense of belonging and experiencing something together. It’s in the media too. My teenager chose to go to school for a short time recently to make local friends and gain more independence (because we have to travel to home ed gatherings)…She achieved her goal and left school again having made a group of nice friends she can hang out with several times a week. I was so happy for her. Now she is thinking about getting qualifications and is considering school again…it seems easier to her to go and do all the qualifications together with the new friends in one place than taking an alternative unschooling route with some online courses, self-study, tutoring or home ed classes etc. although we have explored all these options and they are all feasible. She knows the pros and cons of school and how much anxiety it caused her when she went there briefly but seems to have really bought into society’s belief in this one route to getting qualifications…Now she is trying to persuade her younger sister to go as well, telling her she won’t learn anything or get a good job if she doesn’t. The youngest has started to consider school.
I feel disheartened. If we had a local unschooling community that they felt they connected with and were supported by perhaps they would feel more confident to be exploring this alternative way of life. It is hard for them to swim against the tide and be different! They just want security and to fit into society as they see it. My youngest child has a few good friends but she admits that she struggles to make new ones and she would like to. She doesn’t like going to the local home ed groups and when we do she is unwilling to join in or even make any attempt to interact with the other children. I want to respect her wishes and not force her to go but she has a dilemma.
I’m not sure going to school full-time at the age of 11years is the best thing for her but I want to support her in making friends and doing what she thinks is the best for herself. I fully entered into the spirit of supporting my older child’s choice to try school but I felt quite disillusioned by the whole process and somehow don’t feel I’ve got the energy to face it again with either of them but that doesn’t seem fair and I feel in conflict because I want to supportive but find that hard if I don’t really agree with the system.
Help! We’ve agreed that perhaps their dad could go through the school process with them this time and that seems fine with them but I feel like I’m letting them down if I don’t get involved and I feel like I’ve failed them in some way by not being able to help them meet their needs through unschooling. Maybe I’m being too idealistic? How do I balance my opinions with theirs? How can I be honest with my youngest daughter about how she feels and how she can get her needs met without influencing her? How do I convey the message to them both that they are loved for who they are and valued whatever they choose and that success can mean different things to different people, but also be true to myself when sometimes I have strong feelings about their choices?
Thank you for your help. I listen every week and am inspired, encouraged and motivated by your wonderful chats.
Hello ladies. The other day at the market my son, 9, wanted to write the number on a label for a package of spices. I had already done so and didn’t realize he wanted to as he’s never expressed interest in writing at all, let alone at the market. After being a bit upset, he said again, “I really wanted to write the number.” So I said, “how about we put on a new label and you can write it there.” He said, “ok.” So he tried to write it and the way he was holding the pen, ink wasn’t coming out. I told him to hold it upright and it might work better. He tried to write a “7” but it looked like an oval. He said, “I’m so stupid.” I said, “how about I hold your hand and we can write together?” He said, “Okay.” We did it together and he said again, “I’m so stupid.” And he started to cry. I got close to his face and told him, “you aren’t stupid, you’re learning. I can use your help on writing the label for the tea, can you help me?” Again, we did the same thing, amongst a few tears. He didn’t want anyone to see his tears so we faced away from others. And then I asked him to help with dispensing the almond butter and things got better.
Hearing “I’m so stupid” is disheartening. He’s never been interested in writing, nor have I asked him to do copywork or practice, etc. Only asked him to write his name on his Dad’s birthday card to which I had to show him how to do the letters.
I’m wondering if his statement can mean that as a parent I don’t praise his positive traits enough? Like he’s looking for a, “you’re not dumb” “you’re so smart” from me? Or, are his internal doubts and struggles about learning troubling him? He sees other kids writing at our weekly parkday. I’ve told him I can help him with whatever he wants to learn. Is the weight of learning weighing him down? He’s not a reader and when I or my husband try to write letters down to help him with an online code or command he says, “I don’t want to learn!”
Looking for guidance and insight. Thanks for your generous support and perspective.
EU103: The Gift of Time with Milva McDonald
Dec 21, 2017
Milva McDonald unschooled her four now-adult children starting back in 1991 and this year she published a book of essays about their experience, Slow Homeschooling. We have a great conversation, diving into her family’s unschooling journey, how music has woven its way through their lives, unschooling’s gift of time, college, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“The things that they chose pursue when they were older are very connected to the playing and exploring that they did when they were younger. And I feel like even as adults, that’s when we get the most joy out of life, when we’re getting that spirit of play into whatever we’re doing.” ~ Milva McDonald
Questions for Milva
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Music has been a big thing in your family. I’d love to hear how it has woven its way through your lives over the years.
I really enjoyed reading your book, Slow Homeschooling. In one of your essays, ‘The Gift of Time,’ you share that your kids benefited hugely from the simple availability of time. I found that as well—I think that turned out to be one of the most valuable aspects of our unschooling lifestyle. Can you share some of the benefits you saw?
Similar to the gift of time, but still distinct, solitude is also so valuable, isn’t it?
Over the last decade or so, homeschooling has grown enough in popularity that we’ve become a market for a wide range of educational products, beyond the typical curriculum-in-a-box. And while increased options are wonderful, I think they can also prolong our deschooling, including the philosophical journey to appreciate the remarkable value of large swaths of free time in our family’s lives. Have you seen this as well?
I really enjoyed your essay, ‘Do Kids Have to Go to College?’ and I’d love to chat about that a bit. I think my favourite line was, “There’s a certain amount of irony in play when homeschooling parents expect their kids to take a traditional path.” Can you explain what you mean by that? And how has college woven into your lives so far?
You’ve co-written a fiction book called Unschoolers. What inspired you guys to take on that project?
EU102: The Value of Relationships with Rachel Rainbolt
Dec 14, 2017
Rachel Rainbolt is an unschooling mom of three and author of the book, Sage Homeschooling. We have such a fun conversation, diving into her family’s move to unschooling, how connection and relationships are at the core of learning, technology, micro-adventures, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“If you are filling in all that space for them then there is no room for them to fill it in for themselves. If you are occupying all of their time, and telling them what things they are to focus on, then there is no room for them to grow into that space! You both can’t occupy it simultaneously. Once you have fully surrendered to the trust, there’s all of this space for them to blossom and to fill in and to grow into and take hold of, and then there’s just so much magic that comes from that.” ~ Rachel Rainbolt
Questions for Rachel
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
As you were deschooling, what did you find was the most challenging paradigm shift?
I really enjoyed reading your book, Sage Homeschooling, which is about your unschooling lives. In it, you have a whole chapter about connection and how relationships are at the core of learning. Can you explain what you mean by that?
In my experience, when we talk about the value of relationships to learning—and in our lives—parents sometimes take that to mean “more is better” and they focus on adding lots of social activities to the family calendar. But it’s not about quantity, is it?
Technology is often a hot button issue for parents as they move to unschooling—they perceive it as disconnecting, as taking away opportunities for connection. Can you share your family’s experience?
In your book, you talk about “micro-adventures.” I thought that was a great term because I think the adventure mindset is a wonderful way to approach our unschooling days—it evokes an open and curious approach to the moment. It was a lens we used a lot when my kids were growing up—even going to the local conservation park was an adventure, “What will we find today?!” How do you guys find adventure?
Heather Lake and her family began unschooling in January of this year, 2017, and she has been blogging about the experience. I really enjoyed chatting with her about how the journey has been unfolding so far. We talk about what prompted their move to unschooling, how her relationships with her children have changed since they left school, the hardest part of the journey so far, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“It’s like, you read it in theory, especially when you’re starting out—the kids will learn from the world around them—but it surprised me to actually see them learning totally on their own, with no direction or force; no force at all. I mean I knew it was supposed to happen but to actually see it happen, it’s amazing.” ~ Heather Lake
Questions for Heather
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling and were there any particular concerns behind your family’s decision to move to unschooling?
How have your relationships with your children changed since you began unschooling?
How is the transition to unschooling going for your husband? Does he work outside the home? How are you sharing the process with him?
Is there a question or challenge that you’re working through right now?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
I take a few minutes to reflect on 100 episodes and my unschooling work, then Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. This month we answer questions about when to share our perspectives on stereotypes etc, supporting a young adult while moving to unschooling, anxiety around technology, and helping a partner understand unschooling.
I’m curious about your thoughts on bringing up & discussing difficult topics and beliefs with very young children. Here’s what happened today, though it’s not the first time I’ve thought about it. My son (2) got a Lego Peter Pan set as a gift awhile ago. He loves playing with the Peter Pan & crocodile figurines, so we thought he might enjoy seeing the movie (which he did) but the movie has lots of racist & sexist ideas in it, and I wanted to let him know that I don’t agree with those things about it, but I also don’t want to give him a lecture he’s not interested in! He’s so young that he doesn’t really have the language for in depth discussions of these things. After the movie tonight, I asked what he thought and he just said, “There’s a crocodile in there.”
So, I’m curious how you would share thoughts about something like racism and sexism and outdated stereotypes? During the movie when it’s happening? After its over? Not at all if the child doesn’t seem to have noticed it? I’ve thought about this in other contexts, like in stories when adults are dismissive of children, or use punitive discipline, etc. Its so frequent that what I believe about parenting and about people differs from the mainstream, that I feel like I need to put my voice in there to keep my son from getting all his ideas about social norms from sources I don’t agree with!
Thanks for your thoughts & ideas!
Jessica’s Question (from Ireland) [TIME: 24:27]
Let me start by saying how much I appreciate the work you three are doing. We would definitely not be as far along on our unschooling journey without you!! And we certainly wouldn’t be deschooling with as much joy and kindness without your frequent gentle reminders. I am so grateful for you three women.
I have three beautiful children. An 18-year-old daughter, a 12-year-old son, and a 3-year-old son. I also have a wonderful, handsome, supportive (if kind of skeptical of unschooling) husband. I am an American who moved to Ireland at age 20, met my husband, and have been here 20 years. I have no family here and not very supportive in-laws. It is a tiny community and I will always be an outsider. I was told as a child I was too sensitive, too dramatic, cried too much. I spent my 20’s trying to be perfect, so afraid to make a mistake, my mother-in-law looking for any reason to speak unkindly about me to my husband. I had no guidance except my own and I had been told mine was lacking. I second guessed every move I made. 20 years ago it was very expensive for me to phone my mother or sister for support, I did it sometimes, but with guilt over the cost. There was no Skype or FaceTime. I was very isolated and lonely. My husband and I stumbled through many obstacles and have made it through the other side stronger and with a much better relationship.
However, my daughter was born during this time. With a mother who was angry, lonely, never good enough (in my own eyes). I slowly got better, and she grew with me. I say we grew up together. But she lived through harsh, unkind times. My older son is the one who brought me first to homeschooling then unschooling. We’ve been completely deschooling since May. His story is for another day.
Today I am concerned for my daughter. She went to school all the way through. Her high school years were absolutely awful, she was so desperately unhappy. I had no idea I could bring her home. I finally offered to homeschool/unschool her last year of school, because that’s when we found it and started our journey, but she declined because she had come so far, she might as well finish. We have always had a very open relationship, even when I was being the authority in the house. But here is my question. She was out of the house working and spending time with friends most of this past summer, and has now gone to college in the big city of Dublin.
We haven’t seen her very much, and all these months that she has been mostly away, the home lives, and personalities of my sons, husband and myself have shifted SO DRASTICALLY, for the better, as we move deeper into unschooling. We are different people!! It’s wonderful, but I feel she has been short changed. She missed it all. There is no do over, I can’t change the past, but how do I make the future better?? She is going through so much change. New college classes (she’s going to acting school, and loves it!!), new place to live, a big city to learn to navigate, a new job, etc.
Now I, her mother, her rock, have changed too, for the better, but I’m not the same person. She is needing to relearn how our relationship works now too. It’s so much. She is very sweet, and good and just giving everything to this new chapter of her life. I am kind to her, supportive, help her with any problem she encounters. She frequently calls and asks for my help, and I use those opportunities to show her how amazing she is. Our relationship is good.
I wonder what more I can do for her. She struggles with anxiety over making mistakes and the need to be perfect. She got this from watching me!! She gets panic attacks and has a hard time making decisions. It’s like her brain freezes and fear takes over. I would love for her to be free of this, and I realize it takes time. Do you have any suggestions of other things I could do to help? She is slowly trusting the new ways, she sees how much better things are, and I have spoken to her in depth about all of these things.
If you have any words of wisdom or advice of any kind I would be so, so appreciative.
We live in Chicago with our 3 and 6-year-old boys. We are pretty new to unschooling, but enjoy reading Sandra Dodd, John Holt and listening to your podcast.
We have been trying more and more to let go of rules/control, focus on our children’s interests and cultivate nurturing relationships with them. The majority of the unschooling philosophy resonates with us, but we are struggling in one area in particular: screen time with our 6-year-old.
I really want to let go of the regulating and not be this person in his life who is just there to say, “yes” or “no.” I want him to be able to learn to regulate himself, but I harbor my own anxiety about the hours that he is at the screen. He mostly plays games on his personal tablet or watches videos. But he is not like my 3-year-old who will watch or play on his tablet for a couple of hours and then move on to other things. My 6-year-old can be on his tablet or watching TV all day.
When it is time to go somewhere he is able to turn it off and engage with us in an activity, he does have other interests and moves in and out of things like researching sharks, but if we are at home it is what he most wants to do. He will talk constantly about it, say things like, “I only want to play with my tablet,” or “All I can think about is my tablet.” I try to engage with him in other activities at home like Legos or games, but this usually only lasts a few minutes before he is asking for his tablet again. When he is overwhelmed or anxious he asks for his tablet, sometimes he says, “the only thing that can make me feel better is my tablet.” It makes me sad and anxious to hear him say that, like his tablet is his only way to manage his feelings.
Sometimes I feel like on the days that he is on his tablet a lot that later on he is extra cranky or has trouble falling asleep, sometimes saying that he can’t stop thinking about the games he plays. (Or is it all in my mind?) We are all very close, he is a very sweet and kind boy. He is very sensitive, to the point of some sensory processing issues, but nothing that interferes majorly with his functioning. Just something that I pay attention to and try to help him learn how to manage.
So, is the tablet thing solely my own anxiety that I need to address myself or is there anything to the growing body of evidence that there are negative effects to being at screens for multiple hours a day? Do I go totally hands off and not worry that there is long term negative crutch-like relationship being formed with his tablet? Or is there ever a time where some limiting and parental management is a good idea?
Thank you for your time.
Anonymous Question [TIME: 57:30]
I’m a dad of two awesome kids 3 and 5 and recently came across unschooling. While I’m continuing to learn more about it, I’m having trouble enacting what I’m learning. I’ve always been considered the “easy going” parent, and I get a lot of push back from my partner saying I’m just being lazy and letting them walk all over me. I don’t feel like that at all. To me, I’m trying to let them learn and explore how when and where they want.
It’s become a source of discord among us, but when I try and teach her what I’ve learned, I’m told that since I’m away all day I don’t know what really works. She also went to school for education and feels that her studies make her the more qualified patent when it comes to teaching the kids. I disagree with the traditional style of parenting and see huge differences in their behavior depending on how their being parented. My son in particular struggles with traditional boundaries of specific meal times and bed times and both often turn into hour long crying sessions as he’s forced to stop playing and conform to what’s convenient. I also have concerns for my daughter who is in kindergarten and already counts down to the weekend. I hate to see them both struggle every day.
Occasionally my partner will recognize the difference in behavior, but just chalk it up to them missing me during the day, and not because I let them dictate their own behavior and preferences.
I’m not sure what to do going forward. I feel like unschooling is something both kids need, but I’m not sure how to give it to them without the ability to be a stay at home parent or change my partners views.
EU099: Book Chat with Emma Marie Forde
Nov 23, 2017
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and to choose unschooling.
In this episode, Emma and I have a great chat about the book, Escape from Childhood: The Needs and Rights of Children.
Quote of the Week
“They [children] need love, stability, consistent and unequivocal care and lasting relationships with people who are profoundly enough interested in them to look after them with warmth, gaiety, and patience.” ~ John Holt
Escape from Childhood: The Needs and Rights of Children, by John Holt
Emma and I wanted to discuss the concept of childism and how it weaves into our unschooling lives. And though it was written more than 40 years ago, and though he doesn’t use the term “childism” itself, in discussing the needs and rights of children he points out many of the prejudices against—or destructive attitudes toward—children and discusses ways we can instead welcome them into our adult lives. It’s a great book around which to frame our dive into childism.
Here’s the basic premise, taken from the book description: “Under the guise of care and protection, children are kept in the walled garden of childhood, outside the world of human experience, for longer periods than ever before in human history. But for many children and parents, the walled garden of childhood is more like a prison, where authorities compel and limit personal actions.”
The first half of the book looks at the bigger picture, where Holt talks about the problem and institution of childhood, the family and its purpose, the competence of children etc. In the second half of the book, he dives into ten rights he would like to see children gain and clearly explains his perspective and reasoning: the right to vote, to work, to own property, to travel, to choose one’s guardian, to a guaranteed income, legal and financial responsibility, to control one’s learning, to use drugs, and to drive.
I think this quote does a great job of summarizing his perspective:
“Children tend to be, among other things, healthy, energetic, quick, vital, vivacious, enthusiastic, resourceful, intelligent, intense, passionate, hopeful, trustful, and forgiving-they get very angry but do not, like us, bear grudges for long. Above all, they have a great capacity for delight, joy, and sorrow. But we should not think of these qualities or virtues as “childish,” the exclusive property of children. They are human qualities. We are wise to value them in people of all ages. When we think of these qualities as childish, belonging only to children, we invalidate them, make them seem things we should “outgrow” as we grow older. Thus we excuse ourselves for carelessly losing what we should have done our best to keep. Worse yet, we teach the children this lesson: most of the bright and successful ten-year-olds I have known, though they still kept the curiosity of their younger years, had learned to be ashamed of it and hide it. Only “little kids” went around all the time asking silly questions. To be grown-up was to be cool, impassive, unconcerned, untouched, invulnerable.”
When I talk about our unschooling journeys, I often mention how our children can be our very helpful guides—and it’s for exactly this reason: these are wonderful human qualities that we have lost, that we have learned to keep hidden, that we see in our children. So much of our unschooling journey is about excavating these traits so we can once again fully engage with our lives.
Throughout the book, John Holt reminds us to focus on our common ground as human beings; that the institutionalized distinction between children and adults adds an artificial layer that makes it harder for adults to connect with children, to truly see things from their perspective.
EU098: My Five Most Popular Blog Posts
Nov 16, 2017
I haven’t had an episode focused on my own reflections about unschooling in a while, so I thought I’d do that this week. I decided to share five of my blog posts that have really resonated with readers over the years.
Here are descriptions and links to the blog posts:
Why is it important to explore what makes us tick and what does that have to do with unschooling? I talk about some reasons why families choose to extend unschooling beyond academic learning. And that led me to ponder a common question when people first hear about the basics of unschooling, “How will they learn to get up for a job and become independent, successful adults?”
I’ve always felt vaguely uncomfortable with the typical counsel to moms of younger kids along the lines of “remember to take time for yourself.” I finally caught a glimpse as to why as I pondered the question.
Unschoolers can really be a confusing bunch to those looking in! On one hand, we appear to be sheltering our children from the real world by keeping them home—we’re overprotective. On the other hand, we appear to not really care about our children because we don’t enforce firm rules. Conventionally, it’s almost a given that at some point parents will explain to their kids, “I say no because I love you.” Boundaries equal love. What if freedom can equal love too?
Everyone wins with strong, connected, respectful relationships. Conventionally, relationships with teens are painted as either/or: either you focus on maintaining authority (tough love) or you avoid challenges altogether (let them run wild). Yet unschooling families have found the beauty of living inside the spectrum of those extremes. In this post I look at some of the ways unschooling parents view relationships differently and what that can look like in the teen years.
This is about some of the unexpected and marvelous ways that choosing unschooling has helped me grow as a person.
***
If you’d like an easier way to read more about unschooling than having to navigate the depths of my website, four of these posts, along with fifty-three others, are included in my compilation book, Life through the Lens of Unschooling: A Living Joyfully Companion.
EU097: Unschooling and Diversity with Erika Davis-Pitre
Nov 09, 2017
Erika Davis-Pitre joins me to talk about unschooling and diversity. She and her husband, Michael, have four now-adult children and they enjoyed unschooling for many years. Erika continues to speak at unschooling conferences all over the US, her favourite topics being unschooling teens, the joy of unschooling, and celebrating diversity through unschooling. We dive into the value of digging into our own fears around diversity and race, ways to encourage diversity in our unschooling lives, tips on approaching challenging conversations with extended family members, and so much more!
Quote of the Week
“I really would hope that, especially in the unschooling community, diversity is achieved by moving out of your comfort zone, your area, your neighborhood, and moving into someone else’s culture, comfort zone, neighborhood, for all kinds of art classes, library things, swimming things, opportunities for all kinds of cultural and community experiences.” ~ Erika Davis-Pitre
Questions for Erika
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
I heard you speak at an unschooling conference earlier this year about unschooling and diversity and really enjoyed it. You shared some very enlightening stories about the subtle impact of privilege in our society. Can you share one with us?
As we move to unschooling, we learn the value of digging into our own fears and questioning conventional wisdom in many areas of our lives. For example, our fears around learning—that our children won’t learn if we don’t tell them what they need to know, or if we don’t insist that they follow a certain timetable. We eventually discover that we truly can trust them to learn—that they are born to learn—and our world opens up. Can we can apply this same process to our fears surrounding race and diversity?
Can you share some ways in which we can be more welcoming to families from the wide variety of backgrounds that exist in the unschooling community?
Do you have some tips on approaching these kinds of challenging conversations around diversity with extended family members?
EU096: Ordinary Unschooling with Anna Brown and Pat Robinson
Nov 02, 2017
Anna Brown and Pat Robinson join me to chat about ordinary unschooling. They have both always unschooled their children—Anna’s daughters are about to turn 18 and 20, and Pat’s son is 16 years old. We talk about the idea of “unschooling success stories,” the impact of the conventional “independence agenda” which starts very young in our culture, the incredible value of ordinary unschooling days, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“I just want to take my moment here to encourage everybody to think about how we communicate with young people and instead of asking about school or college or life plans, talk about their favorite book or show, or have they been to any good restaurants or do they have a favorite place to hike, how their week’s going. Anything that actually connects you with the actual person standing in front of you.” ~ Anna Brown
Questions for Anna and Pat
You have both been on the podcast before, so let’s just do a quick recap for new listeners. How many children do you have and how long has your family been unschooling?
There’s a tendency for people new to the idea of unschooling to seek out “success stories” in an effort to “prove” to themselves that unschooling is a viable option before they make the leap. That’s understandable. But the challenge with that is, it can set up expectations on our children to “find their passion,” or “start a business at 15” etc. I saw a quote the other day, “Homeschooling is private school for poor people!” That attitude can make life challenging for unschooling kids, can’t it?
I think a big part of this issue revolves around how we choose to define success. That question was definitely part of my deschooling process because when we define success more conventionally, by accomplishments, that can be at odds with the unschooling lifestyle we’re trying to cultivate. How do you guys define “success” nowadays?
So, let’s talk about ordinary days and ordinary people. Unschooling parents and unschooling kids going about their ordinary days. When we redefine “success,” we see so much more goodness all around us, don’t we?
I also want to touch on the unschooling kids who are doing things that look more conventionally successful. I think what’s so different is the entire unschooling ethos within which they are living. They are choosing the things they do, not because they can be successful at them, but because they are interested in them. It’s not about having others see them as “successful,” or being judged “better than others.” It’s not about what others think at all. It’s all about their personal aspirations and goals. It takes some unschooling experience for parents to understand this though, doesn’t it?
Another thing I’d like to talk about, which is another aspect of conventional expectations that are so often tossed about, is when teens turn 18. It seems to be such a significant age for so many parents. Right there behind a child hitting “school age.” And even if you’ve been unschooling for years, when your first child approaches 18, you may find new concerns popping up around this. Or you might find others are starting to share their opinions with you. Have you found this?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. This month we answer questions about radical validation—and what’s so radical about it, sibling conflicts, unhappy temperaments, and how the three of us have worked through challenges to get to epiphanies and personal growth.
I am SO blown away by Anne’s article about Radical Validation! Especially this paragraph, “When we try to get them out of and away from the uncomfortable feelings because we don’t know how to help them (and just want them to be happy), they just go further into those emotions to protect their right to feel that way. But now they have yet another new level added to their already existing discomfort…”
We have been struggling with how to help a situation in our home for a while. Our 10yo daughter constantly criticizes and belittles her 12yo brother. The only way we know to deal with this (because it is heartbreaking to see how hurt our son is by her comments and treatment) is to remind her to, “Please treat him as kind as you’d want to be treated”. I realize that has so much weight and isn’t the ideal way to handle it. We’d love some further detailed ideas on the best way to validate.
Mikael’s Question (from France) [TIME: 18:30]
Hi,
Thank you for your kind help to all unschoolers and their parents! You are wonderful!
I have a question concerning my son who is almost 7. He has a temperament that makes him being unhappy almost all the time. He complains very often and for very small things. I have already understood that he is a hyper-sensitive person. My wife and I are doing our best to make him happy but still sometimes it is very difficult. What would you advise us to do to make things better?
Carol’s Question (from Montana) [TIME: 30:05]
I’d like to hear from you lovely ladies about your journey through unschooling. Specifically, when you felt uncertain about something that was happening with your child, how you dealt with it, and how it was later resolved. For instance, were you ever at a place where you were thinking you would like to see your child get more exercise, spend less time doing one particular thing, be more open to new experiences, etc.? How did you get through whatever the issue was for you? I love to hear from veteran moms about their reality with unschooling, especially their stories of conflict to resolution. So, I’m not asking about a specific question or concern of my own, but for you to tell your stories of epiphany and growth, and contrasting the way things were then with the way things are now.
Meredith’s Question (from Virginia) [TIME: 39:22]
My husband and I have homeschooled our two girls, ages 8 and 6, since the Fall of 2016. We LOVE it. I can safely say that bringing my girls home to learn has made me fall in love with them all over again. They are special, special people with immense gifts to share with the world.
After one year of homeschooling things were becoming even more clear about the best way for our girls to learn the important things in life. Unschooling was a concept I found that just plain made sense! Ever since then we have unschooled, or to us, just lived!
I have many questions but the biggest one and the one I will ask today is about sibling relationships. My two girls are just shy of two years apart. Lately they have begun a phase in life where they bicker and fuss with each other all the time. Or at least that is how it feels to me who is with them 24/7. To be blunt, it can drive me batty!
My oldest is craving independence and wanting more space to herself. My youngest just wants to do everything with her older sister. Both are very different in personality. My husband and I have tried to do more things with them separately but it seems like a drop in the bucket. We do not live near family who can take one child for the morning or day so the girls can have breathing room. We have wonderful friends but all have different circumstances that would prevent them from helping in this way too. We are a one income family and so signing up for activities is limited. Plus, it seems unfair to me if I let my oldest take an art class and tell my youngest, who loves art just as much, that she can’t take it because her sister needs space. Am I thinking about this in the wrong way?
Then there is the actual fussing. They are not physical with each other, but are in the throes of retaliation. Tit for tat. One does something so the other does something back. For example, one girl feels the other hid her shoe (which in reality is stuffed under her bed) and so purposely takes the last remains of her sister’s favorite cereal, which she has had no interest in before this point. The other sister sees this injustice, gets mad, lets it be known she is mad and then refuses to let her sister have a bite of her ice cream later in the day, etc. It can go on and on. When we are home I can take each aside and talk with them about what is bothering them, validate their feelings and come up with a solution. This process takes a while, which I am happy to do, however it can be mere minutes after the first argument is settled when a new one erupts. The process starts all over again! Some days it seems that is all that happens. I’m not going to lie, trying to handle this in a non-yelling, respectful way leaves me exhausted!! Some days I just want to curl back up in my bed and hide under the covers. Any suggestions for this phase in their lives? And please confirm, this is just a phase, right?? Thanks for everything.
Links to things mentioned in the show
Anne Ohman’s website no longer exists, so we don’t have a link for the Vaildation article
EU094: A Muddy Life with Ellen Rowland
Oct 19, 2017
Ellen Rowland is an unschooling mom of two children, ages 12 and 13. Back in 2008, Ellen and her husband Richard decided to leave the US and move to Senegal, West Africa with their two children, ages 3 and 4 at the time. Eight years later, they moved to small island off the Turkish coast of Greece. We have such a fun conversation, diving into how she discovered unschooling and what the transition looked like, her book, Everything I Thought I Knew: An Exploration of Life and Learning, how she broke the cycle of controlling and critical parenting she grew up with, whether it’s possible to “juggle it all,” the most unexpected but awesome thing she’s found so far from choosing unschooling, and much more!
Quote of the Week
“The first thing that I decided to do was put everything on hold in my life, except my children. And I got down on the floor with them, because I really needed to understand what the world felt like from their perspective, how it’s challenging and it’s so exciting and there’s so much to learn and so much to conquer, and at the same time it’s overwhelming and scary.” ~ Ellen Rowland
Questions for Ellen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
What did you find the most challenging paradigm shift to be as you shifted to unschooling?
You recently published a great book, Everything I Thought I Knew: An Exploration of Life and Learning. I really enjoyed reading it, and I love that you organized your chapters around the alphabet. In the ‘M’ chapter, you have a section called ‘Motherhood’ in which you talk about your decision to break the cycle of the controlling and critical parenting you grew up with. Can you share with us a bit about that process? How did you begin that change?
Your website is amuddylife.com. I would love to hear the inspiration behind that beautiful metaphor for your unschooling lives!
Let’s go back to your book. I’d like to visit the ‘J’ chapter, ‘Juggle,’ for a moment. You open the chapter saying, “Parents who are interested in moving away from a traditional schooling situation and educating their children at home often want to know how it’s possible to balance family, work, and personal time.” That is such a common concern. How do you answer the question, “How is it possible to juggle it all?”
What has been the most unexpected but awesome thing you’ve found so far from choosing unschooling?
EU093: Unschooling Dads with Robert Gottlieb
Oct 12, 2017
Robert Gottlieb is an unschooling dad with two children, ages 11 and 19. He shares that they actually discovered unschooling a few times and, after a variety of school and school-at-home settings, he’s the one who eventually brought it into the family. We chat about that transition, going against societal expectations, stretching comfort zones, what advice he’d like to share with dads starting out, and much more.
Quote of the Week
“My overall goal is peace in the world. That’s something that I really care about. And I believe that by giving our kids this ability to live life as human beings and not being told what to do, they are more likely to be peaceful than not, later on in life. They’re more likely to be more empathetic.” ~ Robert Gottlieb
Questions for Robert
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
I’d love to hear what your kids are enjoying at the moment. What are they interested in?
How did you discover unschooling and what did your family’s transition to unschooling look like?
Unschooling is a very unconventional way of living—did you find it hard at first going against societal expectations? How did you work through that?
As the working parent, are there things you and your wife do to help you stay connected with the kids?
What has surprised you most so far about how unschooling has unfolded in your lives?
Have there been times when your kids’ interests or choices have challenged your thinking or stretched your comfort zones? How did you work through those moments with them?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
EU092: Crazy Family Adventure with Bryanna Royal
Oct 05, 2017
Bryanna Royal is an unschooling mom with four children. And as if choosing unschooling wasn’t crazy enough, she and her husband chose to sell their home and everything in it and hit the road in an RV to travel full-time. We have a wonderful chat diving into why they chose unschooling, why they chose to move into an RV, some of the paradigm shifts of deschooling, how they earn money to support their lifestyle, and lots more!
Quote of the Week
“I feel like imposter syndrome is a perfect way to look at it because, on paper, I looked smart but if you asked me to talk about something that I learned in school, I could not really talk about it because I never really understood the concept, I just knew how to get a good grade.” ~ Bryanna Royal
Questions for Bryanna
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
What were some of your reasons behind choosing unschooling?
You and your husband decided to sell your home and move into an RV. How did that decision come about?
I imagine you guys are gathering some fun and interesting stories from your travels. Can you share one with us?
What have you found to be one of the more challenging things about living in an RV that you didn’t expect?
On your blog, you have a post about how unschooling works for your family, and I loved one of the points you made. You wrote that it includes, “Trusting our kids and knowing that they understand what is in their best interest. And if we know they aren’t ready, instead of saying they can’t do it, we do it with them so we can work together so they are ready to do it on their own in the near future.” It’s such a valuable paradigm shift. Can you talk a bit more about that?
I love hearing about the innovative ways unschooling families are making a go of things—often some combination of making income and lowering expenses. It can seem out-of-reach, but sometimes some creative thinking does the trick. Can you share a bit about how you guys are supporting your unschooling and travel lifestyle?
Do you have some tips you could share for unschooling parents who are considering the RV lifestyle?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. This month we dive into the the bigger picture of buying toys, negotiating boundaries, highly sensitive children and therapy, and feeling stuck around food and health concerns.
“My priority is the connection, because I’ve seen when our connections are secure that we have a much easier time navigating what comes our way.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
Monica’s Question [TIME: 3:10]
I’m very new to unschooling. I believe in the principles of unschooling, but putting it into practice is a challenge. I have put aside my bias against screens recently and have let my two girls, 5 and 8, watch what they like when they like for as long as they like. On a ‘normal’ day, they have screentime as soon as they get up. Then we usually have an activity that takes us away from the house in the late morning for a couple of hours. They are pretty amenable to going out for which I am very grateful. Then when we get back home, they have screentime for an hour or two before dinner. We often have a ‘family watch’ after dinner or they will watch something themselves.
The problem I am struggling with is that they sometimes watch YouTube shows of people unwrapping toys, or playing with various toys. I do not have a problem with the content of the shows, but they have now made the connection that these toys can be purchased! We are not rich, but could “afford it,” but I don’t want to purchase every toy they ask for mainly because I am against amassing huge amounts of plastic stuff and I see toys that they have asked for played with a few times the first day and then forgotten. It seems such a waste. I usually say that we can’t afford it, but at the same time, I don’t want to give them a poverty mindset (deny themselves things/experiences when they are grown up even when they can afford it, but feel that they can’t, like me).
What are your views on this topic?
Heather’s Question [TIME: 21:10]
We’re an unschooling family with four kids ages 6, 4, 2, and 6 months. I would say we’re 100% unschoolers in terms of academics, and we’re still working on all the lifestyle elements!
My question is about how you and your families have handled kids’ freedom to leave the house or yard by themselves. We have a fenced backyard where the kids can always play. The front yard is unfenced and faces a usually-calm street. Generally, we let the 4- and 6-year-old play in the front, ride their bikes around the block, and cross the street to play at the school playground by themselves (one good reason to have a school there, haha!), as long as they let us know where they’re going. The 2-year-old doesn’t yet remember not to run into the street, so she needs an adult to accompany her for all those things.
Even with these (I think) fairly generous boundaries compared to other families in the U.S., the older kids, especially the 6-year-old, are often trying to “escape,” slipping out the door whenever we open it and running off to neighbors’ yards, and sometimes leaving without telling us (and the 2-year-old follows). My 6-year-old complains that he doesn’t have enough freedom to go “wherever he wants without a grown-up.” It’s very frustrating because we feel like we’re giving them as much freedom as we conceivably can where we live. We’re not afraid of kidnapping or anything, but there are some busy streets around the edges of our neighborhood, so I do worry about cars. I notice that his complaints come more often when we’ve been home for several days in a row. I try to get everyone out as much as I can, but … four kids! Sometimes I need some at-home days for my own well-being.
Do you have any ideas for how to negotiate this? Thanks!
Shelsy’s Question [TIME: 34:54]
Hi! Thank you so much for this podcast. Listening every week is essential to helping me stay centered in this unschooling journey.
I have a question about therapy and if/when it’s appropriate to seek it for a child. I have a little boy who’s six and from the very beginning he has made his presence felt. He has a strong personality, an amazing imagination, and he knows who he is and what he wants. He will not bend either if he doesn’t want to do something, or if he wants to do something and is being prevented. He can be violent when he doesn’t get his way. The last six years have been extremely eye opening and I have challenged a lot of assumptions, especially since beginning to unschool 9 months ago. We have always leaned more toward natural and attachment parenting and our inclination is to resist most medical interventions unless truly necessary.
Earlier this summer the kids and I spent three weeks visiting family in Pennsylvania. When we were with my family we spent a majority of our time with their cousins, ages 9 and 2. My son is an introvert, he usually prefers to stay home and play video games. When he is around other children (besides his sister–their relationship ebbs and flows, but can tend to be violent at times) he is usually okay for awhile and then seeks to be on his own or wants to leave.
I knew this going into our trip and fully intended to escape with him upstairs to watch movies away from the other kids when he needed to, and we did often. But there were still plenty of times when his interactions with his cousins sparked conflict. The two older kids were not always kind to him. Other children always become very bossy around him–I guess because he doesn’t tend to “follow the rules.”
But when conflict arises, he is extremely impulsive, and his first impulse is almost always to hurt the other person. He’ll hit, scratch, and bite. He seems to snap into a sort of Hulk mode and it can often take a lot of effort to help him snap back out of it. Before the trip he told me that his heart wants him to do good things but his brain wants him to do bad things and it’s hard to listen to his heart.
I’m not really sure how to help him with this besides keeping him from other kids entirely or only under close supervision. It prevents him and the rest of the family from being able to participate in things where he would be in a typical childcare situation (such as church). My mother very adamantly suggested that he should be in some kind of therapy or counseling because to her his behavior is extremely abnormal. I find his behavior inconvenient and frustrating, but not completely out of the realm of normal for a six-year-old strong-willed boy, but I could be wrong. I really hesitate to take him anywhere because I have a suspicion that they will be quick to try to diagnose and possibly medicate, and I really don’t want to go down that route. I also don’t really want him to be expected to do multiple different kinds of therapies several times a week. He’s not broken–I’m not trying to fix him. But I do want to help him, and consequently the rest of the family, as well as other children he’ll come in contact with.
Since we’ve been home from the trip he’s really done pretty well, he doesn’t lash out quite as often. We babysat a 4-year-old boy for a few hours and my son did okay until he just wanted his space back and he didn’t want to share. Once we calmed him down and let him do his own thing he was okay, even though he mostly ignored the other boy.
Is this something I can expect him to grow out of? How do I help him? Would some kind of therapy really be best for him? How do I know without opening the door to a bunch of other interventions?
Anonymous Question [TIME: 51:20]
I’m feeling stuck.
I’ve done a lot of thinking about things and I realize it’s not food fear or a need to control. Maybe at one point it was, but now it’s not. I would love to let my kids eat a range of different things and learn for themselves what works for them and what doesn’t. This works great for things that give an immediate reaction like a sore tummy, rash, headache etc. But I don’t know if we can learn what makes us feel awful if the effects are not instant and also worse with a cumulative effect. Also, if we don’t have the testing to understand WHY a body is reacting in certain ways. I’m grateful for all the testing available and the doctors who understand mental health illness as a physical illness rather than just being an emotional problem.
My concern is my 8-year-old son’s health and happiness. According to his doctor, psychologist, and test results, it would be potentially damaging to his short and long-term mental and physical health to let him control his food choices. I won’t go into every medical detail as it’s complicated and involves several factors. The point is, it’s not about food or control of trusting him to make good choices. It’s about nourishing and nurturing him so that he can be his happiest and healthiest self today and in the future. I wish so much that we could just allow complete freedom to experiment and let him learn on his own what works for him and what doesn’t. The problem is that it’s not that easy. He needs a continued restricted diet, supplements and testing. It’s not easy for him, I know. Food at our unschooling table would not be restricted at all if there weren’t good reasons for it to be.
He knows he feels terrible but he’s tired of the diets and the testing and the supplements. I get it and empathize with him. But he doesn’t understand the potential implications of not doing so. And I believe it would be negligent and irresponsible of me to allow him complete freedom of choice when I understand the medical implications.
So where to from here? I love asking the question “Why not yes” and can generally gladly accommodate all other needs and requests made by my kids. But when it comes to food, I can find way too many reasons to say no. I know that unschoolers recommend to set your child up for success but also allow them freedom to learn on their own. I don’t know how that works for us and feel like I can’t have both. I read your book too and look forward to reading it many times as we continue our journey.
Please understand that this is not the same as it would be if my kids had no health concerns. My daughter has no health concerns and in the last few months since relaxing all the food rules to see what would happen, she has been fine and making varied and balanced choices. My son is an absolute mess. Exhausted, depressed, highly anxious, aggressive, pale, dark under his eyes and not sleeping. This is not his personality, he is a very different kid otherwise. Of course, I love him at all times and support him through his miserable times but it breaks my heart to see him suffering and it makes our time together much less enjoyable.
Do I let him make his choices and feel flat and miserable and hope that maybe he will choose for himself to care about his health before he does any permanent damage? Or do I step in and take full control? Is there an in-between?
In the past, I felt like we had a good balance. I always cooked foods that he liked and if there were yucky supplements to take I always hid them in something yummy or syringed them to him like a little bird. We’ve found ways to make things easier by playing games and making his favourite treats to take to parties etc. Now that he is getting older he is pushing away from this more and I worry it will hurt our relationship and he will start sneaking food or refusing to take supplements etc.
I guess the question is, are there times when it is appropriate and kind for a parent to say no and give the child as many options and choices within the boundaries as possible? I know this isn’t unschooling but I’m not sure what our other options are. Is it kind to tell an 8yo that their behaviour and attitude make them really difficult to be around and you much prefer their company when they are being positive and happy? (I’m not talking happy happy joy joy all the time. My kids know I’m very big on all feelings being ok and I love them when they’re feeling sad, angry, frustrated etc,…but this goes way beyond that and it’s stressful for the rest of the family to be around him when he’s so miserable and negative) I also have my daughter to consider as she adores her big brother. She loves playing with him and he is generally very patient and playful. When affected by poor food choices/lack of supplements however, he is very aggressive and nasty to her and she gets confused as to why he is so different and becomes very fearful around him.
I so want what is best for my son and our relationship. My kids are my priority and I spent all day happily doing things with them or for them. My son is a gorgeous kid who is kind, empathetic, thoughtful and creative. He’s amazing and I want to see him enjoying life without fatigue and anxiety. This is the only thing that is causing me stress and I don’t know what to do.
Jonah often tells me at night (when he is in his most open and chatty mood of the day) that I shouldn’t listen to daytime Jonah as he doesn’t know what he wants. For example, last night he was telling me that he wants to be able to run fast like Sonic and that every day I need to make sure he does his running practice and eats the right foods for his energy needs. But then daytime comes and I try to help him achieve what he asked for and he knocks me back. He’s also told me in the past that I just shouldn’t let him eat the foods that harm him but then if they are available to him he will want to eat them and I don’t know if he wants me to say yes or no. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t force him to run or stop him from putting food in his mouth if he wanted to. It’s like he is asking me to set limits for him but then in the moment he doesn’t want me to. This is very confusing for me. He will often tell me at night that I just need to be more firm and not give him options (what kid says that!) But that doesn’t feel right to me. Isn’t the point to let him make his own decisions in the moment so he can learn things for himself? Or am I letting him down by not setting a limit that he has previously asked me to?
I have similar confusing thoughts around his attitude to things at times. One example would be his birthday this year. He helped me plan it. All he wanted was to spend a day at a water park with his best friend and have her for a sleepover. So that’s what he got. He was really excited about it and seemed to have a great time and was very happy. But when we got home he complained that it wasn’t very fun and that he wouldn’t like to go there again. This is common for him. We often spend hours together doing whatever he wants to do and he appears happy. But then later he’ll tell me he had “the worst day ever and that he’s never happy”. I sometimes just don’t know how to respond when he says stuff like that. I feel like I bend over backwards trying to make him happy, and I love doing it and I’m not resentful. But I do wonder if, no matter what I do, he’s going to say he’s always unhappy anyway.
EU090: Growing Up Unschooling with Phoebe Wahl
Sep 21, 2017
Phoebe Wahl is an artist whose beautiful work focuses on the themes of comfort, nostalgia, and intimacy. She left school entirely after first grade and dove into unschooling. Eventually she chose to go to college, graduating from Rhode Island School of Design in 2013 with a BFA in Illustration. We have a lot of fun talking about her passion for drawing, the idea of “knowledge gaps,” what she found valuable in her college experience, how unschooling has influenced her art, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“To talk about gaps is to box yourself into a certain way of thinking about learning because I definitely have gaps in my knowledge but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t.” ~ Phoebe Wahl
Questions for Phoebe
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
How did your passion for drawing develop? Can you share a bit about how that journey unfolded for you?
One of the pretty common worries when people first contemplate unschooling is that their children will have gaps in their knowledge. The question itself speaks to how they’re still using traditional curricula as a standard of what a person “should” know because we all have gaps, don’t we? Can you share your perspective on how unschooling as a lifestyle addresses that concern?
You chose to take some classes in high school and then went to college, attending the Rhode Island School of Design. What did you find most valuable about your college experience?
How do you see your unschooling childhood influencing your art?
Your work has been described as “body positive” and in an online interview you were asked how you defined “body positivity.” You answered: “I think it is holding onto the core value that my worth does not lie in my physical features. It is being gentle and patient with myself, because truly loving, sustainable relationships are a “two steps forward, one step back” process. It is HARD work maintaining an appreciative and honest relationship with yourself. Above all it’s about trusting myself. Sometimes I breach my own trust and have to rebuild. But then again, sometimes my own strength and beauty will impress me beyond what I thought possible.” I love your answer and I think the process applies well to just about every societal expectation we may find ourselves grappling with. I was hoping you could expand a bit about how the process plays out for you.
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
Jan is the founder of The Natural Child Project, a website that houses a wonderful collection of unschooling and parenting articles. She also has two unschooling books out, The Natural Child and The Unschooling Unmanual, plus a children’s book, A Gift for Baby. Her unschooled son, Jason, is now in his thirties. Jan graciously agreed to answer ten questions about her unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“I think children are very adept at hearing our hidden messages, regardless of how carefully we phrase it. When we tell a child that a certain activity is required, we imply that it must be so unpleasant or difficult we would never want to do it. No one has ever required a child to eat ice cream—it is not that we should never make suggestions, but it IS that we should never anticipate or expect a particular response. Or be disappointed.” ~ Jan Hunt
Ten Questions for Jan
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. You have a fantastic website, The Natural Child Project, at naturalchild.org, that’s been around since 1996. I remember finding it back in 2002 when we began unschooling and hungrily devouring many of the articles—thank you so much! What inspired you to create it?
4. I discovered homeschooling when I was searching for information because my eldest didn’t mesh well with school. One of your essays made so much sense to me back then, it was an essay titled, ‘Learning Disability: A Rose by Another Name.’ Can you share your rose analogy and why it fits so well?
5. Trust is such key component of our unschooling lives. How did you develop trust in unschooling, and in your son?
6. You have a book, The Natural Child: Parenting from the Heart, a collection of your essays about parenting and education. You make a great point in the introduction that this approach to living with children has been called “attachment parenting” or “empathic parenting,” and is often considered to be New Age but is actually age-old. Can you share what you mean by empathic parenting?
7. You also edited a collection of essays written by various writers and focused on unschooling called The Unschooling Unmanual: Nurturing Children’s Natural Love of Learning. I love the title! In it is your essay, ‘How Do We Know They’re Learning?’ I think that question is an integral part of learning about unschooling. How do you answer it when someone asks?
8. You’ve written about one of the more challenging day-to-day questions that unschooling parents grapple with: ‘When Does Guidance Become Manipulation?’ On occasion, I’ve described it as the dance of parenting, or relationships. It doesn’t have a one-size fits all answer, does it?
9. What did you find to be the most challenging aspect of unschooling?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
EU088: Deschooling – A Year Later, with Jennie Gomes
Sep 07, 2017
Jennie Gomes is an unschooling mom to three young children and we thought we’d do something interesting. Jennie was on the podcast just over a year ago, episode 25, and we chatted about her deschooling journey. She graciously agreed to come back on the show to answer the same questions, but now with another year of unschooling experience under her belt. That means you guys can listen to her previous episode and then this episode to see how her understanding of unschooling has evolved over the past year and how things have changed in how it plays out in their daily lives.
Quote of the Week
“I feel like it’s her trust in us and confidence in herself that catapults her development.” ~ Jennie Gomes
Questions for Jennie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
What were some of your bigger fears or uncertainties as you first began unschooling and what do they look like now?
Has your relationship with your husband changed as your family has embraced unschooling?
Can you share what you’ve learned as you move away from control and punishment as parenting tools? Are there patterns you’ve discovered?
How do you handle the daily challenges that come with having three children of different ages, temperaments, and interests?
The curiosity and energy of young kids is just incredible, isn’t it? What are some of the little things you do during the day to recharge your own energy?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. We dive into the seeming transition from following their interests to earning a living, how passionate kids engage with the world, partnering with our children around chores, and helping a child learn something that’s challenging for us.
“When I was talking about how we create our worlds, this is it! You’re talking about what they want, and how much we can give, and “Is this enough?” and “What do you think about this?” I just think it’s got this beautiful feeling, a beautiful swirl and flow and it’s amazing, the picture that we paint, we create with our lives with just the connection. The true deep connection with our children, I just love it.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Ionia’s Question [TIME: 3:28]
I am mother to a 13-month-old boy and a real newbie to unschooling. My husband and I only came across the term when we started looking into alternative education for our son about 6 months ago, but from the moment we started to read about Unschooling we knew it was a good fit for our family. I want to thank you so much for this fantastic podcast and especially the Q&A sessions, which I find extremely interesting, challenging and inspiring.
The question I have isn’t so much about unschooling our son, but actually about unschooling for adults. This is something I have seen mentioned but I haven’t read or heard much about the idea. My husband and I are both artists and it seems to me that the way we create art is similar to how children learn naturally through play, exploration and the freedom to immerse themselves in whatever they are drawn to. There is a similarity too in the atmosphere that is most conducive to the creation of art and the atmosphere that is required to allow unschooling to happen, i.e. an atmosphere of equality, trust, respect, honesty and support. However, difficulties tend to arise in the life of an artist when our often slow creative process comes up against the need to earn a living. In fact, the only difference I can see between the life of an unschooled child and that of an adult artist is that one is provided for and the other has to provide for themselves.
So, my question is this: how do children who have been unschooled make the transition from following their interests freely to having to earn a living? I am sure that most children who have been unschooled find a walk of life that is enjoyable to them, and can support themselves eventually through doing what they love best, but inevitably, earning money from a pursuit changes the nature of the activity and puts a ‘worth’ on it. So, for example, an artist may find that they wake up one morning and have the impulse to take out their dusty watercolour set and go painting, but they have a commission they need to finish and so the impulse has to be ignored. The activity of creating the commission suddenly becomes less enjoyable as the natural creative flow has been blocked.
As an artist (unschooled adult!) and a deschooling mother I’m very curious to know if there are mental approaches that can make the relationship between work and money easier to handle. Can unschooling carry on into adulthood?
I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences around this idea.
Anonymous Question [TIME: 28:35]
Hi! Firstly I’d like to thank you for these podcasts. I like to listen to them when I go for morning walks before my boys wake up and my husband has not yet left for work.
I have 2 boys. We came to unschooling because my eldest made it so! He is an incredible child full of energy and love, but he made it pretty clear from the beginning that learning was on his terms. We decided that he wouldn’t be a great fit for school and launched into deschooling. That was 3 years ago.
So, now my children are 7 and 3 1/2. I am seeking help on how to respond to my eldest. Whenever he gets hurt or upset, his reaction is quite ferocious! He is extremely loud and hollers/squawks for quite some time. It is noticeable to people within our vicinity to the point that they think he is extremely hurt. He plays football (soccer), which he loves, and his father is his coach. My husband is becoming a little embarrassed by his reactions. I’m wondering how we can help him. We’ve never told him that it’s not ok to cry of course, and my husband is extremely affectionate with our children. When my son feels better, it is sudden and like nothing happened – there is no gradual recovery. It’s like he’s switched on or off.
I have always seen him as a child that feels things and does things with such passion. He has gone through periods where the morning sunlight bothered him so much he’d scream in pain; he’s quite particular with feeling/textures like wearing clothes or eating food; he doesn’t like being touched by others but demands close contact with me and wrestling with my husband; he makes high pitched sounds whilst watching YouTube on his iPad and randomly yells, transitioning has also been something that can cause upset. Most of these things worsen for a period and then improve, but the noises and reactions have not.
He has a lot of energy and is quite the extrovert, however he does not connect with a lot of kids—it’s like they are afraid of his unpredictability or they just don’t like him because he is seemingly ‘loud and proud.’ However, he has more empathy than any other child I’ve met and is always the first to ask someone if they are ok or help them up on the pitch.
We’ve been ok with him quitting activities—he often has a problem with the teachy nature of such things. He does not want to quit football (soccer) and becomes quite distressed at the idea of doing so. I’d like some ideas on how to help him with this sensory distress in an unschooling home. I am concerned that asking these questions elsewhere will lead to suggestions of diagnoses, labels and therapy. I do not wish to view my son through such a lens and would like to help him cope or manage in the world in which he lives whilst embracing that these behaviours are just a part of who he is.
Chelsea’s Question [TIME: 47:17]
Hi,
We have been unschooling now for over a year and a half and are loving our lifestyle. We are continually deschooling ourselves and moving towards respectful parenting. My husband and I were hoping to get a concrete response to some situations that we deal with on a consistent basis.
1. I’m getting dinner ready, the dishwasher is clean but there are dishes in the sink and I need help getting things in order to get food ready for everyone. Usually the kids sigh or complain about not wanting to help. What am I supposed to do in a situation like this when I need the help and no one is contributing.
2. At the end of the day we like the house picked up before everyone is in bed and most of the mess is from the kids throughout the day. They rarely want to help pick things up that they were playing with and most nights are not pleasant during this time.
We are understanding the concept of respectful parenting and partnership but there are specific situations that are just making us draw a blank. Thank you, ladies!
Liz’s Question [TIME: 1:04:20]
My son has been playing with coding and wants to learn how to code in Lua, which is the language that Roblox uses. After looking at lots of different options for him to learn coding, he is very clear that he wants me to learn to code and then teach him what I know and help him write scripts specifically for Roblox. He has fantastic ideas for in-game mods, but we have found it difficult so far to write scripts that work like he wants them to. I would love some encouragement and/or stories from your lives about how you’ve helped your children learn about something that is challenging for you. Thank you!
EU086: Unschooling an Only Child with Deb Rossing and Pat Robinson
Aug 24, 2017
Deb Rossing and Pat Robinson are unschooling moms I’ve known online for many years and have also met in person at unschooling conferences. This episode came about because I’ve had a few listeners suggest the topic of unschooling an only child, but since I have three kids I don’t have much experience to share on this particular topic, so I’m excited they both agreed to chat about it!
Quote of the Week
“I don’t think it’s better with an only child, it’s just different than having siblings.” ~ Pat Robinson
Questions for Deb and Pat
Can you each share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
Since an only child spends their home time hanging out with adults, did you worry about them having the opportunity to socialize with other kids? If so, did you do anything to address that?
At home with an only child, you are, in essence, your child’s only playmate. Did you feel that way often? Were there times when they wanted to play or do things you didn’t enjoy? If so, how did you handle those moments?
As parents of an only child, you are the people they come to for engagement—to share their thoughts, play their games, express their emotions and so on. I imagine that can sometimes feel overwhelming. Can you share some of the ways you found to keep yourself refreshed and energized?
At this point, what has been the most surprising thing about your unschooling journey?
EU085: Deschooling with Lucy AitkenRead
Aug 17, 2017
Lucy AitkenRead is an unschooling mom of two that you may know her from her blog, Lulastic and the Hippyshake. Or her YouTube channel. We have a wonderful chat, diving deep into what her family’s move to unschooling has looked like, what’s been the hardest part of the journey so far, what’s been the most surprising, as well her husband’s journey to unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“It’s not really so much about the very specific practical details as much as the big picture of the life you’re trying to lead, which is one where you’re not making decisions based on fear, but you’re making decisions based on connection. And having that overall philosophy is what makes then the details make sense.” ~ Lucy AitkenRead
Questions for Lucy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
How did you discover unschooling?
What has your family’s move to unschooling looked like?
Can you share a bit about your husband’s journey? Was unschooling new to him? If so, how did you help him learn more about it?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
You recently started a group and website called Parent Allies. I’d love to know the inspiration behind it and a bit about your plans!
EU084: Enjoy Parenting with Scott Noelle
Aug 10, 2017
Scott Noelle is an unschooling dad of two, an author, and a life coach dedicated to supporting parents who want to move away from control-based parenting methods. He’s the founder of the website, DailyGroove.com, where he shares his practical parenting insights. We have a wonderful conversation diving into his wonderful PATH parenting framework, the value of nonverbal communication, ways we can hold presence with negative feelings, how fear can slip into control, and, as a founding member, he also shares some great information about the history and goals of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education.
Quote of the Week
“A lot of power gets drained from us when we’re in the state of anxiety, and if we can find a way to move into trust, then it does really transform our experience, and our kids tend to respond in a positive way that leads to easier times, all in all.” ~ Scott Noelle
Questions for Scott
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You have a wonderful website, dailygroove.com, where people can sign up to receive daily emails from you. I signed up when I was early on in my unschooling journey and I really appreciated your nuggets of parenting insight as I was in the midst of challenging so much of the conventional parenting wisdom I’d absorbed. You call it PATH Parenting, and I love that not only is it an acronym, it’s also a reminder that the journey—the path—is the destination. Can you share an overview of what PATH parenting is?
We talk quite a bit in unschooling circles about communicating openly with our children and how it facilitates connection and trust in our relationships, but some children aren’t big verbal communicators. It’s not that they aren’t giving us messages, just that not a lot of them are verbal. If we find ourselves in that situation, what are some other ways we can communicate and connect with our child?
You have a great article on your website about holding presence with negative feelings, such as frustration or fear. Can you share what you mean and how we can develop that skill?
As our children get older, we can sometimes find ourselves uncomfortable with some of their choices. We start feeling fearful and protective, and that can so easily slip into control because that’s the go to response in our culture: forbid the activity and explain the consequences we’ll impose on them if they disobey. That approach can really damage the relationship though, can’t it? What might we do instead?
You’re also a founding member of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education, which advocates both unschooling and alternative schools that support self-directed education. I love that the ADSE is trying to normalize self-directed education as a whole. Could you give us an update on the work that the Alliance is doing?
EU083: Unschooling Around the World with Tami Stroud
Aug 03, 2017
Tami Stroud is an unschooling mom of six kids, ages four to thirteen. We have a great chat about her family’s move to unschooling, their journey to becoming a nomadic, sometimes expat, family, the threads that weave through the ideas of hard work, grit, entitlement, and rewards and punishment, and last, but not least, she shares some wonderful tips for unschooling with a large family.
Quote of the Week
“When you think about rewards and punishment in light of entitlement, that goes back to, you condition people to only want to do a thing if they are getting some sort of benefit. You create this reward economy that you are paying for the behaviour or the goodness you want, rather than people just being good to be good and to freely give themselves.” ~ Tami Stroud
Questions for Tami
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you discovered unschooling?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
You and your husband have chosen a more nomadic lifestyle for your family. What inspired that and can you share a bit about where you guys have lived so far?
You have a great four-part series on your blog about hard work, digging into the question, “Do people do hard things even when they are not forced to do them?” I really enjoyed the connection you made between the conventional method for encouraging hard work, namely rewards for a “job well done,” and the development of a sense of entitlement. Can you explain that connection?
With the diverging interests of six children, I’d love to hear a bit about what your unschooling days look like.
What tips would you share for larger families starting to move to unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“It’s in following your child’s light and joy and questions and interests and curiosities and conversations where the learning happens.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Anonymous Question [TIME: 3:36]
My son just turned 7 and we have been Unschooling for 2 years. I love unschooling but the one little concern that keeps popping up once in a while from my husband is about his writing skills / penmanship. He struggles writing his name or has no desire to draw. He does the occasional backwards “N” and I know that I was dyslexic in my younger years so I wonder if he maybe as well, which is why I don’t like to pressure him. Now I loved drawing but hated reading. He on the other hand he is an amazing reader well beyond his age. That is what is keeping my husband relaxing about Unschooling.
So I just want to hear from you of any cases where some children maybe natural great readers but had no desire in writing and once they reached a certain age they had the desire and picked up writing with ease. At least that is what I’m hoping for.
I do plan on sharing this with my husband so feel free to speak to him directly lol.
Hello Pam, Anne and Anna! Prepare yourself because I am about to gush! Thank you SO much for your time and wisdom and knowledge and for sharing your experiences. I absolutely love your podcast Pam, and your books and your website, what incredible resources. And I especially love the Q & A episodes, which are so rich with insight and love! All of your support has been pivotal in our Unschooling journey. SO MUCH GRATITUDE!!!!
Ok, some background first before I ask my question; I have 3 daughters, 8,6,4, all of which have never been to school. I was a teacher for 10 years (and to quote Sandra Dodd, I was “made of school”). After the birth of my third daughter I decided to leave the teaching profession to *be unschooled by the experience of Unschooling! I have been deschooling myself for the last 4/5 years soaking up all kinds of Unschooling and life experiences and resources (honestly, *millions of Unschooling books, articles, EVERY PODCAST ON UNSCHOOLING EVER RECORDED! Ha ha, quite seriously!) and still feel like I have a lot of work to do. But I am so passionate about this way of living and it has begun an incredible journey (for me especially) of changing paradigms in our life. My girls and I have incredible relationships, and they are very bonded to each other as well. I deeply believe in what we are doing and I am aware I still get pulled back into my old ways. I continue to examine new perspectives and I have been paying attention to things that make me uncomfortable, as I am learning that things that make me uncomfortable are things that I can look deeper at, unpack and examine.
We have a wonderful small community of Unschooling families who we have bonded with over the past 4 years, and there are many children of all ages who play together and it’s incredible to witness. We also see many friends who are not Unschoolers. I find that the times I feel uncomfortable in these social situations is when someone feels left out, or when a child seems to be intentionally discluded from some sort of play. (The “reporting” of this usually comes from my 6-year-old who is quite sensitive, but it also happens with my 4-year-old with her own sisters at home, and for other kids as well). Situations like these (and they seem to happen a lot) really get to me. I feel fiercely protective to the one being left out and my initial “instinct” is to want to stand up for them and help them be heard. I am aware where this uncomfortableness and strong reaction comes from (I had an overall horrible, very damaging experience throughout all of grade school and was bullied very badly and excluded from many things, I hated school and never wanted to go mainly because of the social aspect.) These are things I am examining through therapy and have been deeply scarred by and still struggle with in my own social circle as a 36-year-old woman. It has deeply affected my self confidence and sadly has shaped me in many ways. (Not all sadly, because it has contributed to many wonderful qualities of mine like my empathetic nature and sensitive super powers!)
I am aware these experiences often creep into my experience now as a mother. (They crept into my experience as a teacher and I had such a hard time navigating the social atmosphere of school as a teacher, I truly despised it).
When it is brought to my attention (either by observation or from a child), I listen to my daughter’s concerns, I am truly empathetic, I suggest things she can say or do (I am not really sure what she should do sometimes), or if it persists, I go over to the situation with her to be present and I attempt to mediate but usually end up trying to resolve it. This doesn’t feel right, and I feel very emotionally charged when this happens (I struggle to remain neutral). I am even close to or in tears after when I discuss it with my husband trying to get his perspective. I am afraid I get too involved and am making to big a deal of it? I know her experience is not my experience but it’s so hard to separate in the moment. I am continuing to work on that. I am looking for suggestions on how to handle these experiences better for my daughter(s). I think my perspective is so clouded with my school experiences (as a child and a teacher) that I am missing an opportunity to grow from it and support my daughters through these social experiences. Am I resting this from a “schoolish” perspective still? I need some outside perspective. Much appreciated!
Sarah’s Question (from Italy) [TIME: 52:20]
I’ve recently taken away all limits around TV for my 5.5-year-old daughter. Previously she was watching around 2 hours a day although we were fairly flexible. Since taking away the limits she is pretty much watching TV all day. She’ll stop only if we’re going out somewhere or if a friend comes to play. I know this is normal in the beginning however I’m uncomfortable with how much she is watching. She is incredibly bright, I suspect gifted although she has never been tested. She is a perfectionist, has low tolerance of frustration and sensory issues. I’m worried she is using TV as an escape from all of that, to avoid situations that are frustrating or uncomfortable for her. Whilst this is ok some of the time I question whether it’s good for her to watch so much. So, my question is, are there situations where certain children may need limits around screens?
Anonymous Question [TIME: 61:13]
I’ve been homeschooling for 12 years. I have 4 kids. We have tried many different things. My oldest is will be 17 tomorrow. I discovered quickly back in kindergarten that school at home didn’t work. We have always been relaxed but not true unschooling.
I’ve been reading and listening to your podcast.
So, a couple of fears that I would love others prospective on.
#1) We have friends who homeschool and they are definitely school at home. The mom was a public school teacher. So, my 12yo gets upset that she doesn’t know things that her friends knows. She still struggles with multiplication and most all math. So how do you handle or help your kids with issues like this. I keep telling her she will get it not to worry. She is embarrassed that and feels behind.
#2) I know in unschooling you don’t worry if they read really late according to society. What if something happed to the mom and the kids had no choice but go to public school. I would be so worried how they would make it. Does that even make sense?
EU081: Book Chat with Emma Marie Forde
Jul 20, 2017
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their family.
In this episode, Emma and I have a great chat about the book, The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us About the Relationship Between Parents and Children.
Quote of the Week
“The mind of a human child working in concert with the minds of the people caring for him is the most flexible and powerful learning device in the known universe.” ~ Alison Gopnik
The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us About the Relationship Between Parents and Children, by Alison Gopnik
The gardener and the carpenter are great analogies that Alison uses to describe two approaches of parenting. With the carpenter model, parents are working with a goal of producing a particular kind of adult. They are essentially trying to shape their child into a final product that fits the vision they had in mind.
On the other hand, when we garden, we create a protected and nurturing space for plants to flourish. She explains that a good garden is constantly changing as it adapts to the changing circumstances, and a good gardener “works to create fertile soil that can sustain a whole ecosystem of different plants with different strengths and beauties—and with different weaknesses and difficulties too.”
In the book, Alison discusses the evolution of childhood and love, the ways children learn (looking, listening, and play), growing up, technology, and then brings it all together in a chapter about the value of children.
Here’s how she sets us up in the introduction to dive in deep:
“So our job as parents is not to make a particular kind of child. Instead, our job is to provide a protected space of love, safety, and stability in which children of many unpredictable kinds can flourish. Our job is not to shape our children’s minds; it’s to let those minds explore all the possibilities that the world allows. Our job is not to tell children how to play; it’s to give them the toys and pick the toys up again after the kids are done. We can’t make children learn, but we can let them learn.”
Another interesting tidbit is her suggestion to move away from the idea of “parenting,” which she feels has pushed so many to embrace the carpenter model because it implies achieving a standard “outcome” once the job of parenting is done, and instead think of our role as being a parent. We’re not parenting, we’re being a parent. She explains that it’s so much more helpful to focus on the relationship.
And that’s something unschooling parents have discovered too!
EU080: Growing Up Unschooling with Kelly Nicole
Jul 13, 2017
Kelly Nicole went to school until 6th grade, when both she and her sister left for greener pastures. Her family eventually settled into unschooling and she’s now 22 and has been a professional actress for nine years. She also teaches acting and improv to kids, as well as directing children’s theatre. We have a really fun chat, diving into her family’s road to unschooling, how her passion for acting developed, what she appreciates most about her unschooling lifestyle growing up, her advice for unschooling parents just starting out on this journey, and lots more.
Quote of the Week
“The most wonderful thing about being unschooled is that I was able to pursue what I loved because I loved it.” ~ Kelly Nicole
Questions for Kelly
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
How did your passion for acting develop? Can you share a bit about that journey and what it looks like today?
I know you teach acting to kids and perform as princess characters at parties and events. Have you found that your unschooling lifestyle growing up has influenced the work you do with kids now?
What stands out for you as you look back on your unschooling years? What, from your perspective now, do you most appreciate about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU079: Unschooling Dads with Dan Cadzow
Jul 06, 2017
Dan Cadzow is an archaeologist who chose to leave his PhD program and become a stay-at-home unschooling dad of four kids. We have a great conversation that covers his path to unschooling, how he’s developed trust in the process, what the most challenging aspect has been so far, his advice for dads who are just starting out on this journey, and more. I really enjoyed the archaeological perspective that Dan brought to our conversation, it’s really interesting stuff!
Quote of the Week
“Our schooling system’s only about 150 years old. There are examples of schools and workshops and apprenticeships back into antiquity, but for the most part, kids learned organically just by being in society. I think of it in terms of the transmission of culture. And 150 years ago, somebody decided, this is really important, we need to control it. And you can hypothesize over their motivations, whether they were good or bad, but I think that it’s really hurting us as a society that we are trying to control it and limiting people’s experiences so much. But it seems like every generation seems to get a little worse and a little worse, and now you drive around the country and those iconic farmhouses are crumbling in ruins and there’s trailers next to them and six kids lined up getting into the school bus and it just kind of breaks my heart to see what we’re losing with this over-reaching attempt to control the transmission of culture. It’s like the kids are separated from the world and taught about it through abstractions.” ~ Dan Cadzow
Questions for Dan
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear what your kids are enjoying at the moment. What are they interested in?
What were the key pieces in your decision to leave your PhD program and stay home with your children?
How did you build trust in the process of unschooling? What were the pieces that resonated with you and helped you feel more confident in choosing this lifestyle?
What has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
As an unschooling dad, what piece of advice would you like to share with dads who are considering or just starting out on this journey?
Anna Brown joins me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“I think if we can just be aware that we don’t have to hold all of this weight ourself, that we can have conversations, that we can include our children, that that just helps us move forward through all these different things because it’s a common theme. It doesn’t really matter what the situation or issue is if that same solution is to just open up and have conversations with each other.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
Vanessa’s Question (from BC, Canada) [TIME: 4:10]
About 6 months ago I was seeking out homeschooling podcasts and I stumbled upon Exploring Unschooling. I was hooked. This has been our first year of homeschooling/unschooling our 9-year-old girl and 10-year-old boy and I have been balancing between the 2 methods. Luckily, I live in the best province for homeschooling and the “school” we are with fully supports the child centered approach. What I have found the most fascinating about unschooling is how natural it felt. I have been unknowingly unschooling my children their whole lives and the transition from a traditional school to a natural home environment has been a very easy one. The more I listen to your podcasts and the wonderful guests you have on the more confident I feel about our choice.
Onto my question:
I’m an only child and I spent a lot of time on my own. Along with that came 2 words that now as a mom make me cringe. “I’m bored.” My own mothers’ response was always the same “Use your imagination!” My 8-year-old self would be so disappointed in me as I have to succumb to using the 3 most dreaded words of my childhood.
When my children say they are bored I feel as though I am failing at unschooling. I don’t even think that can be possible and yet here I am trying to fill the day with busy work just to avoid boredom. So, I ask you this, did your children ever get bored and how can I help my children fill their day without directly influencing their activity or interest choices?
Many Thanks, Vanessa
Alex’s Question (from France) [TIME: 15:37]
Hello, I hope you are having a good day.
I was wondering if you could help me with one small issue. I have been helping my children to wear their clothes from their birth but now they are 4 and 6 (both are boys) and they still ask me to help them (they actually do not really participate or very rarely participate so I put their clothes on alone). Recently I was thinking that probably they should do it themselves and I have been keeping asking them to do it alone and each time they do not agree and ask me to help again and again. I don’t mind and do it with love and patience. I was just wondering what is your attitude about it and should I push them to do it themselves or should I wait until they are ready? They already put their shoes and jackets themselves but not the other clothes like the new Thrive wholesale screen printed t-shirts. Should I wait until they are ready or should I ask them more firmly to do it themselves?
Thank you in advance.
Very kind regards, Alex
Anonymous Question [TIME: 20:50]
Hi there! I am the mom of 2 kids, a daughter 7.5 & a son 6. We have been homeschooling for 3 years (my daughter went to preschool) and have been on a steady road towards unschooling. Your podcast has been an invaluable resource for me on this journey.
I have 2 questions:
1. Both kids love TV and video games. At the moment, IOS games and online platforms are sufficient for them. However, my son is in LOVE with YouTube videos where he watches people play games on other gaming platforms – Nintendo, XBox, etc. The issue I foresee is with my husband. He has issues with gaming and finds it easier to manage with IOS or online games. But the second a game controller hits his hands he can’t leave it. He will become obsessive about playing, stays up all night and gets hostile towards anyone who tries to interrupt him. Therefore, we have kept these things out of the house. We are aware that this has to do with his past but he is not terribly willing to do the work to deal with the problem head on. I wish he would so that we can have these devices in our home to allow my son to follow his delight. So, I guess I’m wondering what your thoughts are on the issues that arise for parents when their children’s delights are triggering like this to the parent? I know that for myself, I have welcomed these triggers and see how they are an opportunity for me to grow. But what about a resistant partner?
2. Do you have any thoughts on the introverted parent who unschools extroverted children?
Thanks in advance and my deepest gratitude to you 3 lovely ladies!
Anonymous Question [TIME: 35:36]
Our son is about to turn nine and is an only child. We belong to a homeschooling community where we meet once a week for a field trip and once a week for park day. He enjoys it. The other days we spend at home, for the most part, as my husband and I both work from home, albeit not full-time. Our son loves Minecraft, Skyping with his homeschool friends and just started playing Roblox. We’ve always had unlimited time on the computer and he’s on it from when he wakes up until he goes to bed, literally. When we leave anywhere he wants to use my phone to watch videos to and from the places we go to. We just went to the grocery store where he spent the whole time watching my phone to and from and while in the store. He spends more time watching a screen than not watching a screen.
I’m sad about this as he doesn’t engage with me or with my husband, doesn’t want to eat meals with us (we suggest only dinner with us), isn’t the kindest person to me, etc. I offer other things to do and he’s not interested. I ask him to not get my phone from my purse when we get in the car and he grabs it anyway and says, “ha, ha!” We went on a weeklong trip without access to a computer and no internet and I saw the kid that I once had … interested in things, more joyful, playful. I miss him. I beat myself up for not having another child, but I had him at almost 44. I feel he watches YouTube videos to pass the time cuz there’s no one else around to spark interaction with. I support him by getting food and drinks for him throughout the day. I feel disrespected and of no use to him. My husband thinks he is disrespectful to but offers no assistance to the situation.
Any thoughts about sorting out these feelings?
Thank you, ladies.
ADDED LATER: I want to expand on it as my son opened up last night about his desire for a sibling. He was crying over it and it breaks my heart. He said if he had one, he could play all the time with a brother (his preference). He said if a kid is walking on the streets, we could take the kid home. We talked about the adoption process more. We have homeschool friends who adopted three siblings and he mentioned that if they could do it, so could we. He said that he watches and plays videos a lot because he doesn’t have anyone to play with (which relates to my previous question). I offered suggestions like more playdates. No, he wants a kid to be with us all the time. I offered more playtime with us (mom/dad) and he said no, he wants a brother. I woke up crying. He asked why we didn’t have a kid right after we had him and I didn’t know how to answer. I focus on how we are so happy that he was born, and he said why didn’t we start earlier so as to have more than one.
I had my son when I was almost 44 and my husband was 48. We met and married in our early 40s. My husband didn’t want another child, and I was on the fence. I feel like he’s going to grow up thinking back on his childhood and summarizing it as a lonely time because he didn’t have a sibling. He’s mentioned it throughout the years. He turns nine in one week. I can see how his life is so different than those with a sibling. There are positives and negatives to both, I get that (I have 8 siblings, my husband has 5). I feel like I’m letting him down and not supporting him. We could do x y and z but the underlying wish he wants realized just won’t be happen unless we adopt, which I hadn’t really entertained seriously until now as he was so emotional about his desires. Oh, my heart is heavy.
Jo Watt is an ex-teacher and now stay-at-home mom of two unschooling girls, ages four and six. She blogs at girlsunschooled.co.uk and about six months ago she, her husband Kriss, and the girls moved from the UK to the US Pacific Northwest. We have a wonderful conversation, digging into learning to read, when people want to do different things, what “fair” means, the value of free time, when we find ourselves out of step with our kids, and much more goodness.
“It seemed weird choosing home ed at all, and unschooling just didn’t seem like it was enough, which, of course, is crazy because it’s everything, isn’t it? It’s opening your whole learning to everything and anything.” ~ Jo Watt
Questions for Jo
Can you share with us a bit how you and your family came to unschooling?
I was hoping you could take a moment to share what your girls are interested in right now and how they’re pursuing it?
You wrote a post a few months ago that was all about how we don’t need to rush reading. I was hoping you could share a bit about your journey through the conventional push for kids to read earlier and earlier?
With unschooling, we’re choosing to relate to our children, not through power and control that we were talking about earlier, but through connection and agreement, you know, finding a path forward that works for everyone involved. And it’s such a very different way of interacting with our children. I was hoping you share a story or two about ways you guys have worked through times when the girls were wanting to do different things?
Your husband Kriss has recently started writing on your blog as well. Can you share a bit about his journey to unschooling?
Over the years I’ve come to think that one of the biggest differences between unschooling and a conventional lifestyle is the amount of free time that our kids have to do whatever they choose. You know, you can really see, in our goals-driven society, that we’ve lost sight of how incredibly valuable that free time is. You wrote about this recently as well. I was hoping you could share what are some of the benefits that you’re seeing that come from releasing expectations around how we spend our time?
Your girls are still young, but I must suspect you’ve already experienced this. Sometimes it seems that just as we think we’ve found a groove with our children, things change. You know, we’re connecting well, we’re finding great ways to support them and their interests, and we are getting to the park, we are, figuring out ways that they can both get what they need and thing are happy, and then poof, all the sudden it feels like we’re playing catch up again, trying to figure it all out. Things just aren’t working out as smoothly as they were before. So, I was wondering if you’ve come across that situation, and how have you moved through it?
EU076: Choosing Home with Kerry McDonald
Jun 15, 2017
Kerry McDonald lives and learns together with her husband and four never-been-schooled children in Massachusetts, US. She blogs on her website, wholefamilylearning.com, is a founding member of alternativestoschool.com, and is on the board of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. We have fun digging into all sorts of things, including what it really means to learn naturally, the distinction between equal opportunity and equal participation in the workforce, and Kerry’s passion for the intersection of self-directed learning and education policy.
“No matter how wonderful the teachers are or how thoughtful the curriculum is, it’s still someone else’s ideas around what a child should know versus a child asking their own questions, pursuing their own interests, and moving along a path that’s meaningful to them.” ~ Kerry McDonald
Questions for Kerry
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and your journey from a Masters degree in Education to unschooling?
I love hearing what unschooling kids are up to! What are your children interested in at the moment and how are they pursuing it?
You recently wrote a blog post that I really enjoyed, “Natural Learning in an Artificial World.” I want to share a quote: “As homeschoolers, I think we have a tendency to seek out classes and educational experiences that foster what we consider to be natural learning. We look for programming that encourages self-direction and child-led learning. We search for teachers who connect with children and ignite their curiosity. But real, natural learning cannot be captured in a classroom or caged in a curriculum.” Can you talk more about what you mean by that?
You co-edited a book, along with Rachel Chaney, called Choosing Home: 20 Mothers Celebrate Staying Home, Raising Children, and Changing the World. Can you share the inspiration behind this collection of stories?
In your essay in the book, you talk about the consequences of society’s pursuit of equal participation of men and women in the workforce, of seeing the rise in stay-at-home moms over the past 15 years as a bad thing. What are some of the consequences you see?
You are on the organizing team of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. Can you tell us a bit about the Alliance and its plans?
You’ve been publishing some great articles lately on websites like Intellectual Takeout and Foundation for Economic Education. The thread running through most of them seems to be diving into the consequences of the conventional school system. You write with such passion and I’d love to hear what has drawn you to that aspect?
EU075: Learning Reimagined with Zakiyya Ismail
Jun 08, 2017
Zakiyya Ismail is an unschooling mom of three kids, ages 10 to 19. Earlier this year, she hosted the first Learning Reimagined Family Conference in South Africa. She also shares her wonderful insights into the unschooling lifestyle on her website, growingminds.co.za. Our conversation spans from her journey to unschooling, through the idea of deschooling parents as immigrants in our children’s native unschooling world, to her thoughts around unschooling as a tool for decolonization. With lots of wonderful stops along the way!
Quote of the Week
“They view their learning as they do their breathing, that is, they do not view it at all.” ~ Zakiyya Ismail
Questions for Zakiyya
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
I love hearing what unschooling kids are up to. What are your children interested in at the moment and how are they pursuing it?
You wrote an amazing essay, An Immigrant Deschooler in a Native Unschooler’s World. In it, you nailed something that I’d noticed but couldn’t yet articulate: how unschooling children do not look at their lives through the lens of learning. You wrote: “They view their learning as they do their breathing, that is, they do not view it at all.” Can you share your perspective on unschooling natives, immigrants, and settlers?
I would love to chat about the idea of a “successful unschooler.” I read a comment you wrote on Facebook on the topic and it reminded me of something I’ve talked about before, that unschooling isn’t about being a different path to raising a conventionally successful adult. You mentioned “the inevitable question of access to higher education and employability” that is so often asked by people curious about unschooling. It’s understandable that, at first, they have a tight grip on that conventional definition of success, but if they hold onto it for too long, it can get in the way, can’t it?
Earlier this year you hosted the first Learning Reimagined conference in South Africa. I’d love to hear how it went, and can you share something you learned, or a new insight that was sparked that weekend?
Can you share with us a quick overview of what it’s like to unschool in South Africa? What are the legalities? It seems you are actively building a community there, how is that going?
You wrote an article for the most recent edition of Families Learning Together Magazine about your family’s extended trip to India. In it, you mentioned a moment you were proud of during your visit to the Taj Mahal. Could you share the story with us?
You have created an Facebook group called “Unschooling as a Tool for Decolonization.” Can you explain what you mean by that, and how unschooling can be a powerful option when we explore decolonizing education?
EU074: Ten Questions with Robyn Coburn
Jun 01, 2017
Robyn Coburn is an unschooling mom and her 17 year-old daughter has never been to school. I’ve known Robyn for many years online and have always enjoyed her perspective. We dive into deschooling fears, sleeping patterns, tips for handling meltdowns, the differing needs of kids and teens, unschooling conferences, and much more.
Quote of the Week
“It is so much easier not to be living in a state of siege and battle every day.” ~ Robyn Coburn
Questions for Robyn
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you discovered unschooling?
2. I’d love to hear a bit about what your daughter is up to. What is she interested in right now and how is she pursuing it?
3. When you were in the thick of deschooling, what was the biggest fear that was tripping you up and how did you work through it?
4. I recall, many years ago, conversations online about sleeping patterns and I felt a virtual connection with you because Jayn’s sleeping patterns seemed similar to Joseph’s. How did you approached that?
5. I came across a great response you gave to a mom asking about things to do during a meltdown. Can you share some of your insights and tips?
6. There’s another question I see pretty regularly that I’d love to chat with you about: can unschooling spoil a child? From the outside looking in, it might look like that would be the result of our actions, but in reality it’s really different, isn’t it?
7. I find it interesting how our children’s needs change between the child and teen years. I’ve found it’s not so much that they need us less, but they do need us differently. What’s been your experience?
8. I know you and your family attend unschooling conferences pretty regularly. Can you share a bit about your experience? What is it you guys love about them?
9. What has been the most challenging aspect of your journey to unschooling?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome so far from choosing unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“The thing about thinking unschooling is about releasing parental controls, is this: I feel there is no release at all unless the parent believes they have the power to release control.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Kelly’s Question [TIME: 5:22]
We have been unschooling for just over 2 years; with one year of project-based homeschooling before that. My kids were 7 and 10 when they left school. There were no big issues, we wanted to give them the opportunity to learn with freedom and choice.
Unschooling has been great for our family and a huge source of personal growth for me as I deschool and lift the layers of my beliefs and assumptions. It has been so much more inner work than I ever fathomed it to be, but so, so worth it.
But friends, please do help me peel back the last layers that I am harboring around FOOD and activity.
We definitely controlled our kids’ food pre-unschooling, and ate organic, raised a lot of our own food, rationed treats and sweets, etc. As we lifted the controls on food, my son—my younger child—really dove into all the things we never allowed him before. Soda, candy, commercial brands of processed snacks, etc. It’s been 2 years and it really hasn’t let up.
I have been breathing, and ‘yes-ing’ and buying. I know I still hold tension inside (sometimes less so than others) but I bite my tongue and ask open questions like, do you feel like salty or sweet food? hot or cold? and other questions to help him tune into himself when he asks for food.
Sometimes I try and give a little more nutritional information, but he is very sensitive to anything that sounds like it might be a lecture and I do not want to make him feel bad, or lectured to, so I have kept this to a minimum as he doesn’t ask for the information and tells me he’s done listening after I offer some unsolicited info.
He loves to come to the grocery store with me and pick out his snacks—cupcakes, chocolate bars, juices, popsicles, other candy etc. He also picks out fruit he likes, meat, seafood! and other things.
Here’s the thing—he has gained a lot of weight in the last 2 years. He stays up very late, into the wee hours, gaming. I wake up to cartons of ice cream and multiple popsicle wrappers or candy bar wrappers on the coffee table. While I do think some could be attributed to pre-teen weight gain, I cannot ignore the hours of sitting and abundance of sweet food and desserts as contributors as well. I do not care about him getting a little chubby except the weight has made it more difficult for him to be physically active. He gets tired easily. He avoids doing certain activities, because it’s hard for him. He loves mountain biking—next to gaming, it’s his passion, with his dad. This summer he has chosen to go to a week-long camp at his favorite mountain. He’s excited and we are excited for him.
He is not in shape for it.
He does a couple of activities during the week at the Y, and a martial arts class. These 3-4 hours of activity do not balance out the hours of sitting and gaming the rest of the week, especially when he sleeps until 1-2pm. He gets winded going up the stairs, or doing a rousing play-sword fighting match with me.
As the younger brother with just one older sister who does not want to play with him, he doesn’t have a regular active playmate. We get together with friends, but it’s only a couple times a month. I do as much as he wants with him, but when he gets up at 2pm, he wants to get right to his games and it feels like our time together is short by the time I am ready for bed, around 10 or 11.
I want him to have a great time at camp. We have had casual conversations about getting ‘ready’ for camp. We live in snow country, so it is not nice out yet, but hopefully within a month or so, spring will be here. I am hoping with the better weather, we’ll get out more naturally—on our trampoline, building bike jumps in the yard…
I’d love your advice on how I can best support my son to 1- maybe consider how eating affects our bodies and our ability to engage in physical activities we enjoy and 2- that conditioning will help him to take on big taxing activities like biking for 5 days straight!
How can I do this without lecturing or scaring him off?
Thanks so much—I never miss the podcast! I listen every week.
My question is a bit of a selfish one to be truthful! But here goes…… I am exhausted at the end of the day as two of my children (both boys) are very dependent on me to entertain them, one is 10yrs old and the other is 4yrs old. I have a 9-yr-old too but he happily amuses himself on his various devices. I feel I let them go on their gaming consoles all day so I can have some peace. I am just so tired if I don’t play with them they are constantly saying they are bored. How do I manage it all? Playing with them, cleaning and general housework I am just so tired. I am not sure what my question is really I’m just struggling to entertain my boys so they are not bored all the time. Crafts they are not interested in at all or reading it is constant action parks (I don’t sit down on the bench at the park but play with them) football, shooting games or imaginative play. They can’t seem to play without me! Its lovely but I’m so tired and find I am 100 miles an hour most days!
Any advice?
Jen’s Question (from Florida, US) [TIME: 42:33]
Hi Pam, Ann & Anna,
I’ve been listening to your podcast for about 6 months now. When my son was an infant, I took him to a parent & baby class—the parent education was very helpful & started me down the path of being respectful and responsive. But the child centered portion was so ridiculous—trying to “teach” infants—even to the point of stopping them from open ended exploration of the materials.
From there I realized he was in for many years of that… unless we unschool him of course! I have had (and still have) a lot of deschooling to do, but already there is so much more joy in our interactions & so much deeper communication between us. I couldn’t have imagined that a 20-month-old could communicate so many of his needs & wishes, and even understand and voluntarily respect my personal boundaries. Already it’s fascinating to see his interests develop and weave together and to grow myself as I stretch to find the excitement in things that totally don’t excite me but that he loves. (Like motorcycles—after spending months sort of unintentionally being dismissive toward this interest and sort of giving it as little attention as possible hoping it would go away, the first time I jumped in and actively pointed out a motorcycle he hadn’t noticed he gave me a smile like the brightest sun.)
I’m mostly writing because I know you get lots of questions about “screen time” and so I thought this might be of interest. I grew up with very tightly controlled screen access and thought during pregnancy that we would literally do NO screens until 2 years as recommended by the AAP. Well we ended up introducing videos in the car because it was the only thing that would keep him happy when someone couldn’t sit next to him in the back. And then we used the phone to show him photos of himself & long distance relatives. And then we used YouTube to show him videos related to other interests (real life trains, animal sounds etc) and pretty soon, he was actively asking to watch videos. For months I would try everything to distract him from watching a video and end up giving in when he would cry because I wasn’t letting him. I didn’t like that battle for control, so after many episodes of this podcast, I took a deep breath and decided to give it a few months of letting him watch as much as he wanted and trying to suspend my fears. I started offering more options to watch, things he wouldn’t know exist to ask for, and he started selecting videos based on what thumbnail looked interesting to him.
When my fears crept back in I would return to sportscasting, and guessing aloud what it might be that he liked about a certain video. Through this process his vocabulary has grown so he can now ask me to search for videos on an ever broader range of interests. Now I can see how excited he gets when he finds a video he likes and he points and calls out the exciting things he sees. And then when we are out or in other play, I see his excitement and pride in himself when he can name or recognize something he learned from watching a video. There is so much joy in our interactions and in all the relationships in our family. This is my very long winded way of saying thank you thank you thank you for all your work and for helping me see my little boy blossoming!
And lastly, a request. I would love if you could have an episode sometime talking about applying unschooling to very young kids. Since he isn’t able to have a full conversation yet or verbalize complex ideas & feelings, finding ways to meet both our needs or to creatively let him explore without letting him be unsafe (like running out into the street for example) as well as support him when he has strong feelings that he doesn’t know how to express feels pretty one sided. As in, it’s mostly me talking & he can’t really help find the solutions, though he does sometimes give a yes or no about whether something I suggest works for him. I try to approach everything with patience, creativity, and to start with naming what I see before trying to solve anything, but I would really love some more ideas & perspectives from more experienced unschoolers about what it looks like to apply these principles with very young children.
Stacey’s Question (from Idaho, US) [TIME: 54:23]
Dear unschooling mamas,
I love this podcast, Pam. My favorite part is the Q&A with you, Anna and Anne. You all inspire me to be the kind of mama that I know I can be.
You are all so positive and filled with joy.
Sometimes I am not. Somedays I am grumpy, tuned out and long to live on a desert island far away from my family.
Will you please talk about the hard days. The days you don’t want to be creative and joyful? The days you want no one to ask you for anything. I know you have grown children and the demands for your time and attention have now shifted, but please tell me about your days when you felt like this.
Thank you so much for the good work you are doing.
I honestly feel like you are 3 of my newest best friends.
EU072: Unschooled Master of Arts with Sophie Christophy
May 18, 2017
Sophie Christophy lives in the UK and is unschooling with her husband and two children. She is a self-directed scholar and she joins Pam to chat about her personal Unschooled Master of Arts project: to explore the theory that the key to transformative social change is found via shifting parent-child education/child dynamics to a human rights model.
Quote of the Week
“I feel like just imagining our children’s adult experiences, experiences when they are older, when they are making much higher risk choices like to get married, or to buy a property or they are taking this job or that job or where they are going to live. Help them out by not disorientating them. Just allow them to be themselves the whole way then hopefully, when they reach the point of making those decisions, they are going to be so much closer to what they actually want to do, deep down.” ~ Sophie Christophy
Questions for Sophie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
Last summer you started a personal project you’ve called an Unschooled Master of Arts. I’d love to hear the story behind it.
You’re working your way through Module 1, The History of Childhood. I find the distinction between children and childhood really interesting. With unschooling, we’re quite focused on children’s lives and parenting, whereas the concept of childhood is tightly woven into societal systems. What are your thoughts around that distinction?
What is one of the most interesting connections between your studies and unschooling that you’ve come across so far?
You’re coming up on one year now, what have you learned so far about the process, and about yourself? How well has it meshed with your unschooling lives?
You wrote an post on your blog a while ago exploring some ideas about consent in education. In it, you talked about negative stereotypes of children society holds and learning through mistakes. I’d love to hear more of your thoughts around this.
I know the issue of childism/adultism is close to your heart. Can you explain the concept and share a bit about the impact you see in our lives?
Links to Things Mentioned in the Show
Dr. Carlo Ricci’s episode, an alternative education professor who strong believes children are capable
EU071: Changes in Parents with Sandra Dodd
May 11, 2017
Sandra Dodd is a long-time unschooling mom of three—Kirby, Marty, and Holly—who are now all adults. She’s also the creator of the awesome unschooling resource, sandradodd.com, and I’m thrilled to have her back on the podcast. In this episode, we talk about the changes that we go through as parents as we live this unschooling lifestyle with our children, and the kinds of questions that people have along the way that seem to break down reasonably well into beginner, intermediate and advanced topics.
Quote of the Week
“No-one is ever likely to read my whole website and I don’t ever need them to. It’s not written to be read from one end to the other any more than a pharmacy is intended for someone to start at one end and eat, drink or inject every substance in the whole room. If you find a page that does help you, guess what? It will help even more if you read it again after a year or two. And if you read it after you’ve been unschooling for five years it will seem that the first time it was a black and white postcard and now it’s a technicolour movie. Because you’ll understand it better and you’ll see the subtlety and the artistry of what people wrote and maybe you’ll wish you’d been able to understand it better sooner.” ~ Sandra Dodd
Questions for Sandra
I recall when I was beginning unschooling, my days were typically a mix of learning about how natural learning works and starting to question a lot of the conventional wisdom I’d absorbed growing up. There are many ways that preconceived ideas and prejudices can limit people’s thinking and get in the way of moving to unschooling, aren’t there?
When you’re starting out, it can be hard to figure out whether to trust a source of unschooling information at first. What tips would you give to help?
You recorded a great 5-minute video a few years ago called “Doing Unschooling Right.” I want to share a short quote: “My definition for unschooling is creating and maintaining an environment in which natural learning can thrive. The environment I’m talking about—what we sometimes call an unschooling nest—is not just the physical home, it’s the relationships within the family and the exploration of the world outside the home by parents and children both. The emotional environment is crucial.”
We’re approaching intermediate unschooling here, where natural learning is reasonably well understood and now there’s a dawning realization of the importance of our relationships. As you say, the emotional environment is crucial so that our children feel safe and secure. Why is that so important for unschooling to thrive?
There was so much tucked into your definition for unschooling! Another great tidbit was, “the exploration of the world outside the home by parents and children both.” We’ve seen our children’s learning in action, and now we’re realizing the important role we play. Parents need to become unschoolers and that process doesn’t happen all at once. Can you talk about why that’s so important?
We do a monthly Q&A episode where we answer listener questions and we’ve had a few about the concept of strewing. That was originally your idea, so I was hoping you could share with us a bit more detail about it while you’re here.
Now I’d like to talk about the perspective of those who’ve been unschooling a long time—it’s a different mindset, isn’t it? It’s not just the intellectual understanding of the principles of unschooling but also the real-life experience of having seen it in action with your own family, and moving through different seasons and different challenges. There’s an expansive feeling of openness and release that comes. How would you describe it?
EU070: Book Chat with Emma Marie Forde
May 04, 2017
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their family.
In this episode, Emma and I have a great chat about the book, Re-Thinking Autism: Diagnosis, Identity and Equality.
Quote of the Week
“The contemporary cultural autism story told about people with the label drowns out all the other stories that could be told about them. Autism is a story but it is not the story.” ~ Katherine Runswick-Cole
Re-Thinking Autism: Diagnosis, Identity and Equality, edited by Katherine Runswick-Cole, Rebecca Mallett and Sami Timimi
In this collection of essays, the authors set out to challenge some of the ways in which autism is understood by looking through the lenses of the science of autism, the cultural life of autism, and the professional interventions or treatments of autism. They note that they are writing in the spirit of “openness, inquiry, and the desire to help improve people’s lives.”
The book has four specific aims, outlined in the introduction:
To challenge the evidence base for biomedical models of autism.
To explore the impact of the diagnosis on the lived experience of people so labeled.
To offer a conceptual critique of the production, consumption and commodification of autism in the twenty-first century in a global context.
To explore ideas for service provision and practice that move beyond a focus on the diagnosis.
As I read, I was really struck with the many parallels I saw between their questioning of society’s approach to children’s behaviour and unschooling parents questioning of society’s approach to children’s learning. Emma and I really enjoyed diving in and pondering the many interesting questions the authors raised.
I think one of my favourite questions comes from the essay, The Ethics and Consequences of Making Autism Spectrum Disorder Diagnoses, by Saqib Latif:
“There is no dispute about the existence of ASD behaviours; instead the dispute is about whether these behaviours amount to a discrete naturally occurring category that the diagnostic label represents. Is it fair, necessary or useful to reduce down to a one-dimensional construct of ASD the evolving personality, experiences, diverse histories and contexts of a growing child with a highly plastic brain? Human behaviour involves social and moral dimensions, and cannot be understood without taking into consideration the values of that individual, their family and indeed their broader cultural milieu. One wonders, given that there is such a massive variation, whether it should be called a ‘disorder’ spectrum, or just a ‘human’ spectrum.”
Anna Brown and Anne Ohman join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“Unschooling is about seeing, honoring, and living in the flow of a child’s life.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Shelsy’s Question (from Florida, USA) [TIME: 3:04]
I’m new to unschooling (since December), but I’ve always homeschooled. My daughter is 7 and my son is 5. I’ve listened to hours of podcasts and read scores of web pages about unschooling, but I’m struggling. My son has always been an amazingly individual boy. He knows what he wants, will stop at nothing to get it, will accept no substitutions, etc. I admire his ability to know himself so deeply and to not back down from what he wants. However, he is also extremely physical. He has zero concept of personal space, he is constantly climbing on me, touching me in ways I don’t like, wanting to play roughhouse/tickling games, and hitting (or biting or scratching) when he doesn’t get his way. His primary target is his sister.
His individuality and aggression have led to tons of power struggles and conflicts over the last five years. I feel like I’m to blame because I’ve always been very physical with him when we play and my husband and I also have a difficult time controlling our tempers when our buttons invariably get pushed. I feel like he is both parroting our behaviors and vying for power. Being the youngest and most inflexible he has always tended to be forced into doing things because the rest of the family wants to do something else.
So instead of having a home filled with joy and connection, our home is filled with conflict, fighting, and yelling. I desperately want a reset button but I fear that in 5 and 7 years I’ve already done so much damage. I don’t see any forward progress and I feel full of doubt and guilt. Help!
Tracy’s Question (from Homestead, Florida, USA) [TIME: 18:28]
Hello, Pam, Anne, and Anna.
Thank you so much for this podcast and the monthly Q&A. You are a source of inspiration and encouragement. I have so many questions I have been meaning to send but today I will start with one. I will give you a little intro first.
I have 2 amazing daughters. An 8-year-old and a 4-year-old. My oldest daughter has a huge heart. She loves people. Her gift is encouragement. She can walk into any room and know who exactly needs unconditional love and a big hug. The little one is the life of the party. Her sense of humor astonishes me on a daily basis and we laugh together a lot. I could give you a huge list of all my favorite qualities each poses but there wouldn’t be enough time for other questions.
We’ve been homeschooling for 3 years. I don’t feel confident enough to call myself a unschooler but we have never used curriculum and I have been in Deschooling mode for the whole 3 years. My goal being to move towards a radical Unschooling lifestyle. The most challenging part of homeschooling for me is to be an active witness to the social challenges my daughters face.
I don’t want to sound negative but this is the only way I can think of posing my question: Do you know that kid in the playground that all the other children avoid? We’ve all seen them. They go from click to click, looking to connect and is generally received with a face of disgust. The other children tend to turn their backs in hopes that the child will get the hint or they straight out run from them. That kid is my eldest daughter. She is so friendly and brave that she doesn’t give up and usually does find another child to play with.
I decided long ago that homeschooling park days with big groups was not good for us. We stick to more one on one playdates to give other children an opportunity to see how amazing she is without the “group mentality” interfering. When she was younger, she was more willing to let me help. When I saw that the other child wanted space I would call her over or kneel by her and say something to the point of, “Do you see her body? How it’s pulled away? She’s trying to tell you she wants space. Let’s go look for another friend that might want to play.” Also, I have no problem being the friend that plays with them at the park and I do it often. But, lately I find that she doesn’t want my help. She doesn’t want me to talk her through the social challenge & just gets angry with me and insists on staying around children that obviously do not want to play with her or even be close to her. I think she has started putting together that it’s not that the children want space but that they want space from HER. It breaks my heart and the whole experience is emotionally draining for me. On good days, I’m able to keep it together but on bad days, I tend to break down in ugly ways.
I do not demonize the other children because I strongly believe that all children deserve the respect and consideration that I want for my daughters. I have directly asked the child/children (in a kind way) if my daughter has done something to hurt them or bother them & they usually say no.
Yesterday, the situation reached a whole new level for me and I just don’t know what to do anymore. We attend a class at a beautiful garden. From the moment we walked in, she was being rejected left and right from children that she knows. Children that she has interacted with in the past. She was extremely confused. She tried to sit with 2 children and they both made it clear that they did not want to sit with her. I called her over to me and it took some time but she came and sat with me. Shortly after, my youngest daughter went to the same 2 children and they welcomed her with smiles and she sat with them. My youngest daughter sat with them and my heart sank. I called her over. She did not want to come. I went and carried her off. We were distracting the class so I picked up our things and walked off with both of them. I could feel the tears in my throat. I told my youngest daughter, “If your sister is not welcomed to sit there then you and I cannot sit there either.” We all were upset. The 3 of us went and explored the garden on our own and when we saw the group again, we tried to rejoin but it wasn’t much different.
The wound is still fresh and I feel completely emotionally run down but it is a reality of our life. I do not want to live a completely isolated life but I just don’t know what to do with all of this anymore. I would love your perspective and guidance. How do I help my eldest daughter and my youngest daughter? How should my interaction with other children be?
Thank you.
Bridget’s Question (from Cleveland, Ohio, USA) [TIME: 40:36]
I have 6 kids (ages 18-6) we have always homeschooled. My husband and I are both educators. I have been home with the children since the first was born. We did use, what I’ve called, a relaxed eclectic approach with the first 3. I mostly focused on math and phonics. The kids basically learned to read on their own. I need to diverge a little and say I was involved in a parenting webpage that was gentle discipline, positive parenting, attachment parenting. So, I believe our homeschooling evolved out of that philosophy. I’m in Ohio and have had the luxury of attending an unschooling convention every year (except 1) since it began at a water park in our state. I admit, I first went just for the discount offered to homeschool families! However, I did find through the years, speakers who were confirming the things I’m doing here at home. So, a couple of years ago, after a convention I told the kids we were done with “school” and we have (tried) to not look back.
Here’s my hang up
It’s the math thing. My kids are thriving pursuing their interests, and I’d write it all out for you. But other “unschoolers” I know personally and on Facebook groups, seem to push math. Specifically, Life of Fred. Like it’s different because a homeschooler wrote it. Or because it’s a reading/math curriculum combined. I bought much of the curriculum before we jumped ship. It doesn’t work for us.
I’ve been working my way through your podcasts. Can I really just skip math? If one of the kids chooses to do math we go with it?
I know the answer, but I have 3, almost 4 teens and I am having a “I’m messing them up for life” moment.
For the record, my husband, 34 years in the public schools, teaches AP and Honors US History and is a better unschooler than me!!! He doesn’t ever want our kids in the schools.
Hi! Unschooling seems like a dream to me, but my son his autistic and I feel like I will have to bend the unschooling “rules” so to speak because he needs structure. I won’t be able to just let it go all the time. He will need my help on many things but rarely asks for it so I will have to hover a bit in order to find that fine balance between entirely child-led and planned homeschooling. I hope this makes sense?
EU068: Unschooling and Technology with Teri DeMarco
Apr 20, 2017
Teri DeMarco is an unschooling mom of three: twin 10-year-old sons and an 8-year-old daughter. I met her in person last year and when I decided to do a technology-focused episode I knew she’d be a great person to chat with!
Quote of the Week
“If you have a lens of ‘What is the educational value? What are they learning?’ that is a layer that goes in front of that relationship. And it doesn’t need to be there, because your kids will reveal to you all that they’re learning when they are in the flow of the relationship.” ~ Teri DeMarco
Questions for Teri
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
When it comes to technology, the conventional term that gets thrown around a lot is “screen time.” I personally don’t like the term for a couple of reasons. What’s your take?
One of the first steps in pulling apart and examining the technology issue is recognizing all the learning that is happening—and all the joy and fun! What has your journey with the technology issue looked like?
If a parent is concerned about the amount of time a child is spending, say watching TV or playing video games, instead of immediately imposing limits to fit their comfort zone, how might they explore the situation to discover what’s up? There are so many possibilities, aren’t there?
Something that can unnerve parents is when their child gets angry when asked to stop playing a video game or watching TV. Fear can quickly have them interpreting that behaviour as “addicted” and blaming the technology. But when we look at the situation from the child’s perspective, things can look very different, can’t they?
One of the big aha moments for me when I was examining my attitude toward technology was the realization that my children learned so much more about weaving technology into their lives through actual experience—like they have learned so many other things through unschooling. What are some of the things you’ve seen your children learn about life with digital tech?
As always with unschooling, it’s important to be engaged with our children, whatever their interest or passion. One of the concerns I hear regularly is that parents feel disconnected from their children because they are engaged in their interests through technology. Let’s talk about some of the ways we can engage with our children “even when” they are using digital tools.
Links to Things Mentioned in the Show
The Childhood Redefined conference (we’re putting together an online version right now)
Anna Black is a former Montessori student and teacher, now an unschooling mom to two lovely daughters in Australia. We have a wonderful conversation, digging into conventional wisdom like, “kids need to do things for themselves,” and “fewer toys is better.” We also have a great chat about how unschooling children develop their own moral compass.
Quote of the Week
“One of the greatest things that I think unschooling has given me and our whole family is the idea that it’s actually okay to be nice to your kids.” ~ Anna Black
Questions for Anna
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
You have a Montessori background, so I was wondering what you found appealing about the idea of unschooling at first?
What did the first few months of your journey to unschooling look like? Did you start out with some structure and then loosen up over time? Or did you treat the transition more like a vacation and not go back? What did it look like for your family?
I think one of the conventional ideas we wrestle with as we deschool is that, to foster independence, we should never do for the child what they can do for themselves. With unschooling, that logic doesn’t hold. We do things for them when they want us to, regardless of whether they could do it themselves. Can you share how you worked through that shift?
You mentioned to me earlier that one of your biggest shifts coming to unschooling was around general abundance. Can you explain what that looked like for you?
Again, you came from a Montessori background, which holds quite conventional views on children’s use of technology and the need to control access. Can you share a bit about your experience with that?
What are your children enjoying right now and how are they are exploring those interests?
How is your husband feeling about your unschooling lifestyle? Was he on board early or have you been helping him learn more about it? What’s his journey looked like to this point?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
Steve Jobs’ quote on creativity, from a 1996 WIRED magazine interview: “Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things. And the reason they were able to do that was that they’ve had more experiences or they have thought more about their experiences than other people. Unfortunately, that’s too rare a commodity.”
EU066: Ten Questions with Pushpa Ramachandran
Apr 06, 2017
Pushpa is an unschooling mom of two in India. I have been reading her wonderful unschooling insights for a number of years and I love the glimpses into their unschooling lives that she shares. She’s also an experienced speech pathologist, working part-time from home.
Quote of the Week
“I can eloquently talk about it but I do not necessarily know how to do it all the time. I am still learning how to be a facilitator rather than a director.” ~ Pushpa Ramachandran
Ten Questions for Pushpa
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
2. I’d love to hear a bit about what your children are up to. What are they interested in right now and how are they pursuing it?
3. Earlier this year, you wrote a wonderful article for Families Learning Together Magazine, titled: “Natural learning: 9 things l have learned about (naturally)!” where you dig into the idea of natural learning and what it looks like. I will share the link in the show notes so people can read about all nine, but I thought we’d dive into one of them today. It’s number four, that “One thing leads to another and everything is connected.” That realization was a big piece of the unschooling puzzle for me and helped me release the pull of curriculum. How did it come about for you?
4. Can you give us an idea of what unschooling is like in India? Is homeschooling in general culturally accepted? Do homeschooling regulations vary widely by state? How easy is it to connect with other unschooling families?
5. You wrote an article titled, “Being with my child” in response to a family member saying that you shouldn’t tailor-make your life around your child. Can you share some of your thoughts around the concept of “being” and what it means to you as a parent?
6. Can you share a bit about your experience around the challenges of unschooling within the Indian culture? Because, in the bigger picture, the culture in which we live definitely has an impact on our unschooling lives.
7. Can you share a bit about what your family’s journey to unschooling has looked like for your husband?
8. You also work part-time speech pathologist, and work online with clients around the world. Can you share some suggestions for an unschooling parent who might have some concerns about their child’s communication skills?
9. As unschooling parents we’re often exploring ways we might weave work and unschooling together. Can you share what that looks like for your family?
10. Looking back, what has been the most valuable outcome so far from choosing unschooling?
Anna Brown joins me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“I like to peel back the layers, I don’t focus on addressing the behaviour, because it’s just a clue. Look at the clues for the underlying need. It’s typically things like needing food, too much stimulation, not feeling heard, needing space, needing connection etc. There could be things going on in the family, so watch for those. Watch for patterns to see if it’s certain times, places, individuals, activities, etc. Understanding the environmental triggers can help you and your son work to recognize the stress before it becomes an outburst.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
Amanda’s Question (from Michigan, USA) [TIME: 5:59]
I’m single mom to two people: one a 4.75-year-old and one a 17-year-old. They are both boys, the older one in school, the younger not.
I’ve read the book Mindless Eating by Brian Wansink, and the idea in a lot of the studies done by Wansink and his group is that choice about what to eat and how much to eat is subtly denied to us based on things like the location of the food and the size of the portions. Another theme is that companies that profit know how to encourage us to eat more of what they want us to so that they will make more money.
I’d like to encourage opportunities for the kids to choose their activity, without limiting activities by time or number (i.e. we stopped those controls on computer game time a couple years ago). It seems that the results of the Mindless Eating studies could be applied to other activities in which we are offered an endless feed.
So, to apply this to another activity, turning off the “autoplay” function in YouTube is a way to give ourselves the moment to make a choice about the next thing we’d like to do. I’m not judging the value of the activities we are choosing or spending our time on. I love food and YouTube. But I don’t want myself or my kids to be on a constant feed motivated by profit, without regard for our well-being or our actual curiosities.
Another example would be a computer game: choice-maximizing set-up would be that each time you finish a chunk, it would say, “Would you like to continue to the next level or save and quit?” Auto-feed set-up just keeps going until you take the initiative to quit out of it. There’s no problem with playing as many levels as you want, but Mindless Eating studies would seem to show you would CHOOSE to stop sooner if it weren’t on auto-feed.
I am not confusing a “feed” with flow. When I’m in the flow, it’s a special state, but I’m in charge of it. A “feed” is when I look up and think, “I can’t believe I just spent so much time on that: what a time-waster.” It is times like that when I wish Facebook had some red Pringles (Wansink study reference). Wansink has found that this is not a matter of an individual’s self-control or lack of, but of how we set up our surroundings or how they are set up for us.
What are some other things that you see on auto-feed that we could arrange to give the kids and ourselves more choice in how we spend our time?
I have been listening to your podcast for awhile now (thanks to a friend for the referral :)) and I am so grateful for all of the information and support offered through the talks. I homeschool three children, ages 15, 14 and 9. I consider myself a relaxed homeschooler with the tendency to lean strongly to unschooling. My youngest is the force that steers me toward unschooling.
When I hear Anne O. in her talks in the Q&A episodes, I can really resonate with how she describes her son, Jacob. My youngest, from the get go, would not allow any teacherly stuff to happen. She knows what she wants and what she doesn’t want. It’s because of her that I have found solace in your podcasts. Her and I have shed many tears with my attempts to try and teach her. The moment I back off and let her lead the way, all seems to flow nicely in our household.
She’s highly sensitive and very active yet she refuses to do any outside classes/activities. We have tried to offer her fun classes either through our local community center, such as cooking (she loves to cook, but refuses to be taught or helped), gymnastics, martial arts, etc. I figure since she seems social and active and tends to get bored easily, that outside activities would help fulfill her. She refuses any of it and prefers to stay home. She loves to watch movies, occasionally she dives in and out of video games and she just loves to watch sitcoms/comedy with me. Her interests change daily but can include cooking, Legos, drawing, and playing with her toys.
My question is, should I continue to try to persuade her to take a class or two with the hopes of her finding something that she just might connect to? Or do I let her be. She does attend an indoor swimming lap pool, whenever she feels like it. Other than that, she wants nothing else. I tried to sign her up for an awesome cooking session, in a restaurant in San Francisco with a known chef, but she simply said no and that she doesn’t like classes. I am afraid that she just might miss out on things that she would otherwise not find without me seeking them out for her. I desperately want to fully unschool, and I see a huge difference when I lean into unschooling at home. The connection with all 3 of my children is so much stronger when I try to unschool. I don’t want to hinder any opportunities for her by not possibly encouraging her to try other outside activities. I hope I have made some sense!
Rain’s Question (from New York, US) [TIME: 29:01]
Hello Ladies. Thank you for your time, and answers.
My son, 9-years-old, has extreme anxiety disorder, and anger issues. Sometimes he is physically abusive friends and family and more frequently verbally abusive and disrespectful. We have chosen gentle parenting/radical unschooling. I have handled our issue in 2 ways #1 talking to him with no punishment, #2 Me yelling and sending him to his room and sometimes taking things away.
Nothing is working, I do not know what to do. Today he lost his last friend because of his name calling, this friends mother called me and made me feel like the worst parent with the worst child. I am so sad for my son, I do not know why he feels so negative so often.
Sorry it was long. Thank you for reading.
Sara’s Question (from Israel) [TIME: 39:26]
Hi there, I wanted to ask a question about video games and other so called “screen time.”
Whilst per se, I have no objection with “screens”—obviously they are a big part of my life, I am looking at one as I write this. I do worry about my children being exposed to and violent and sexually explicit things that either don’t need to be part of their life or that they might not need to know about until later when they have tools to process it. Do you/other unschooling parents monitor what is on the inside of the screens? How do you do this without interfering with children’s freedoms and interests?
The reason this is so pressing has more to do with my own experience than with current catastrophising about screens. I have a photographic memory and vivid imagination. I am still haunted by gruesome, violent or sexually violent things I saw in movies and TV I was exposed to as a child. I can recall the scenes in intense detail and it is very unpleasant for me… although it is a low scale irritation at this stage and not the abject terror I used to feel as a child, I still wish my parents had done more to keep these kinds of things away from me.
We don’t have a TV in our house (our choice, we don’t like it) but we do use our laptops a lot for all kinds of things, including watching some shows. As my son gets older, I’d really be interested in hearing about how people do or don’t guide their children’s usage of technologies? Is there a boundary? What is it?
Thanks a lot
Jana’s Question (South Africa) [TIME: 54:44]
Hi there. I am loving unschooling and my child 5.8 is thriving. We’ve been through the binge phase following our relaxation of TV restriction. My son still watches hours of TV and I try to leave him to it. However, I am concerned about the physiological effects on his developing brain. Medical professionals suggest less is more for young ones. We do try to talk to him about this, but he seldom responds from a kind of “self-care” basis. How do you deal with parental concerns about health without enforcing cut-off times?! Many thanks!
EU064: Grandparents! with Sheila Baranoski
Mar 23, 2017
Sheila is an unschooling mom of three, grandmother to two, and author of Dear Grandma: Your Grandkids Are Unschoolers. Sheila and I really enjoyed speaking specifically to grandparents this week. We dive into some of the questions that they may understandably have when they find out their grandchildren aren’t going to school, like how they’ll learn to read, how they’ll make friends, and some ways that grandparents can foster good relationships with their unschooling grandkids.
This episode is definitely meant to be shared with grandparents!
Quote of the Week
“We, as grandparents, can be a safe place and so nurturing and enriching for our grandkids. Not that their parents aren’t safe places too, but grandparents can really hold a special place in their grandkids hearts.” ~ Sheila Baranoski
Questions for Sheila
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
What perspective do you have that can help grandparents learn more about their grandkids’ unschooling lifestyle?
Can you give the grandparents listening an idea of what unschooling is and isn’t?
In your book, you wrote, “How children learn to read without schooling is as hard to explain as how children learn to walk without lessons.” I loved that analogy! But you try anyway because learning to read is something that grandparents understandably worry about. Can you share a bit about how your son Matt learned to read without lessons?
Another concern grandparents can have is how their grandkids will be able to make friends if they aren’t in school. Again, it’s an understandable concern, but it’s one that’s pretty easily addressed, isn’t it?
Grandparents may notice that their unschooling family gets upset or defensive if they ask their grandkids questions about what they know. Can you explain why, and how quizzing conflicts with the principles of unschooling?
Sometimes grandparents see unschooled kids behaving in ways that they would have punished. Unschooling parents are apt to take a different approach to the situation. Can you shed some light on what they are doing and why? Because they aren’t ignoring it, are they?
Can you share some things that grandparents can do to foster a good relationship with their unschooling family, and their grandkids in particular?
You also write fiction, and your protagonist is a 12-year-old unschooling boy. I’d love to hear how that came about.
EU063: Gentle Parenting with Shannon Loucks
Mar 16, 2017
Shannon is an unschooling mom to two great kids, and they are a Canadian family transplanted in California for seven years now—an interesting adventure all on its own! She shares her perspective on unschooling and gentle parenting on her website, breakingdaylight.org, because “happy childhoods are built on peaceful parents.”
Quote of the Week
“Turning toward parenting as who I am and not a job I do affords me the freedom to be my best self at each turn of the journey.” ~ Shannon Loucks
Questions for Shannon
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear about what your children are up to. What are they interested in right now and how are they pursuing it?
You wrote a wonderful article that was posted on Flo Gascon’s site about your top five fridge-worthy reminders for gentle, connected parenting. I’ll link to the post in the show notes, but I wanted to talk in-depth about a couple of them. First was your reminder to “listen more talk less.” This was such a valuable shift for me! It made a profound difference in how so many situations played out, in turn building so much trust and connection in our relationships. Can you explain what you mean by that seemingly simple idea?
The other reminder I wanted to touch on was “apologize.” A couple of episodes ago I was speaking with Emma Marie Forde about a book on attachment theory and the author David Howe mentioned that even sensitive caregivers only get it right about 50 percent of the time, but that what stands out is that they actively acknowledge and repair the disconnecting moments. Your reminder to apologize meshes so clearly with that. Can you share your experience with apologizing to your children and the value you’ve seen from it?
You have a great story on your blog about your youngest son and his love for “surprise snacks.” Can you share a bit about your journey through your own expectations around food prep to get to where you came up with a beautifully creative way to make his wish for nighttime surprise snacks come true?
Now let’s talk about gaming! Technology has developed so quickly and many of us grew up with minimal access so it’s pretty unfamiliar. Not to mention, so many of the mainstream messages are negative and advocate strict control. But it’s not “just a game,” is it? I’d love to hear about your parenting journey around technology and gaming.
I’d like to chat about another conventional misconception: teenagers. So often we’re told by family and friends that things may be great now, but wait until our kids are teenagers. We can see where they’re coming from though, can’t we? If they’re trying to hold onto their teens more tightly when they’re ready for more space, or they’re discounting their teen’s perspective and insisting they do things our way—the “right” way. But it’s a different ball game when we partner with them and try to help them reach their goals, isn’t it? They are such amazing people!
A couple of months ago, you posted a piece on your blog titled, “Parenting is who I am.” One of my favourite lines was, “Turning toward parenting as who I am and not a job I do affords me the freedom to be my best self at each turn of the journey.” Can you talk about that shift away from seeing parenting as a job and what it means to you?
EU062: Being and Becoming film review with Anne Boie
Mar 09, 2017
Anne Boie is an unschooling mom of four who is actively engaged in supporting the unschooling community as a producer of Lainie Liberti’s For the Love of Learning web show, the US distribution coordinator for the film, Being and Becoming, and the producer of a new online show, Youth on Subjects of the World. Anne joins me this week to talk about Clara Bellar’s documentary film, Being and Becoming.
Quote of the Week
“If there is anything that we wish to change in the child, we should first examine it and see whether it is not something that could better be changed in ourselves.” ~ Carl Jung
Questions for Anne
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you came to unschooling?
The film starts as Clara Bellar is about to have her first child, and not long after she and her husband realize they want to nurture their son’s creativity, authenticity, and self-esteem and want him to be a free thinker. The question at the root of their quest became, “were a place and time really necessary to learn?” And that is what they seek to answer through visiting a wide range of autonomous learning, or unschooling, families. Her first stop is with Naomi Aldort and her family. It was really fun to see some old home movies of the kids and to see how their interests began at a young age and wove their way into their adult lives. One thing that stood out for me was the point she made about how important it is for us to spend time with our children—to be aware and to be present. That allows us to know who they are—their personalities, their interests, their strengths, their challenges, so we can better engage with and support them as they pursue their goals and aspirations. What stood out for you from Clara’s conversations with the Aldort family?
Clara brings out an important distinction in the film, the idea of freedom, not licence. Naomi mentions a book by that name by A.S. Neill, and I did a quick search after and found it was published back in 1966. It was a compilation of his replies to letters he received from people who had read his classic Summerhill and had questions around how the philosophy plays out “in real life.” In Summerhill, he wrote, “It is this distinction between freedom and license that many parents cannot grasp. In the disciplined home, the children have no rights. In the spoiled home, they have all the rights. The proper home is one in which children and adults have equal rights.” Naomi describes it as protecting the child’s power over themselves—their autonomy—not their power over others. But most of us have grown up enmeshed in power-based relationships so this can be a challenging shift for us, can’t it?
Clara visits with the Fadel-Renau family in France, and the dad likened school to a “school of thought.” That lessens some of its power, doesn’t it? It reminds us that the compulsory education system as we know it has only been around for a hundred-odd years, so it’s more of the new experiment on the block—humans have been living and learning for thousands of years. His point was to do what suits your family’s needs but not to do it blindly, to realize that sending your children to school is a choice. It’s so easy to forget how new, in the grand scheme of things, the school system we have really is, isn’t it?
I meet Arno and Andre Stern a few years ago when they came to Montreal, Canada, and it was fun to hear from them in the film. I loved Andre’s point that people often mistakenly assume that a child who is free lives in chaos. Arno, his dad, made the point that, “Freedom arises out of structure, not out of chaos. A child knows there are limits—not restrictions, limits.” As I thought about that more, I realized it can be hard for people who’ve never been free to control their own days to imagine that children—people—when given the freedom of choice, will explore their personal need for structure and routine. They will find the ways they prefer to do things and make those choices more consistently—not chaos. And that there are natural limits to things, though they vary by individual—many people just rarely encounter them because the restrictions they’ve had to live with have made their world even smaller than those natural limits. They haven’t often explored the edges of their comfort zones, where we find it’s totally okay to say “no thanks” to going further. It’s like parents thinking, “if I let them eat sweets that’s all they’ll ever eat,” or “if I don’t restrict TV, they’ll watch it all day every day.” What did you think of their point that freedom does not equal chaos? Has that been your experience?
Clara ends the film by saying, “After all these encounters, the path is only beginning. I no longer need to understand everything. I can see that it’s about letting everyone simply live their own life so that they’re being and becoming their best.” It definitely takes a while to get that place of trust, doesn’t it? That place where we don’t need to know all the answers—to understand everything—before we start down this path?
EU061: Book Chat with Emma Marie Forde
Mar 02, 2017
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their family.
This week, Emma and I have a great chat about David Howe’s book, Attachment across the Lifecourse: A Brief Introduction.
Quote of the Week
“Intimate attachments to other human beings are the hub around which a person’s life revolves, not only when he is an infant or toddler or a child but throughout his adolescence and his years of maturity as well, and on into old age. From these intimate attachments, a person draws his strength and enjoyment in life and, through what he contributes, he gives strength and enjoyment to others. These are matters about which current science and traditional wisdom are one.” ~ David Howe
Attachment across the Lifecourse: A Brief Introduction, by David Howe
The book is a fascinating journey into attachment theory. And not just in relation to young children, but how the attachment behaviours we develop play out over our lifetime, as well as how they can change if we choose to do the work to make sense of our previous experiences and learn to see situations from the perspectives of others.
Part 1 of the book looks at the key conceptual components of attachment theory, part 2 looks at the four main attachment patterns (secure, avoidant, ambivalent, and disorganized) and how they manifest at various stages over a lifetime, and part 3 looks at some of the questions and controversies that attachment theory has given rise to.
David Howe writes that, “Sensitively responsive parents who can tune into, and see the world from their child’s point of view are likely to have securely attached children.” And in turn that, “Securely attached children are the most likely to develop emotional intelligence, good social skills, and robust mental health.”
Emma and I chat about the value of developing secure attachment patterns with our children—meaning strong and connected relationships—and how they not only support the development of a child’s emotional health, but also create the safe and supportive environment in which their learning can thrive. It’s where the rubber of attachment meets the road of unschooling. That made sense in my head, at least.
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“When we really hear one another and work toward understanding each other’s needs, finding the solutions that are win-win, life is just easier and more joyful.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
Anonymous Question [TIME: 4:42]
Dear Pam, Anne, and Anna,
I came across unschooling when doing a school report (LOL) on education. I have been following your podcast since the early episodes and it is great! Thank you My younger sister is still in school, and my parents are on the helicoptery side: controlling and highly valuing grades. I know it is because they worry and are too busy and stressed to think about the effect they are having on my sister. I feel for them since they are very nice people and feel worried all the time: I think on some level they feel their views about school and control protect them, and their children. So that is my background.
My question is: Some children take to school more easily and I was one of them. My younger sister happens to not be one of them. More and more I am seeing that she feels like she is not good enough no matter what she does, since my parents always compare her to me. They are harder on her, saying that she is lazy (even though she really spends a lot more time studying than I did). She is miserable and feels like she deserves it, and it makes me sad. I see her dissociating from things, like she has given up on joy and on herself.
But I see how she is good at many things like reasoning out decisions well to come to the best one, and she always beats me at every game we play on Tabletop Simulator, and how she tries to save me things she knows I love even though she is hurt by being compared to me. I deeply admire her ability to reach out even when she herself doesn’t feel good. I want her to know this.
I thought maybe if I continue to be there for her and tell her about all the wonderful things I see in her that she would feel more confident, but she doesn’t believe me. She tells me she is useless and lazy and bad at everything that matters. I wish she didn’t feel like grades define her, because I want her to feel good about herself. It feels like the voice of a sister only a few years older doesn’t do much against the voices of two parents.
I have tried talking to my parents about it. I try to explain to them rationally that I know they are worried, but controlling is actually making her have worse grades, because she is feeling so bad about herself. I tell them the effect this is having on her confidence and that I know they want the best for her, but they said that’s good, it’ll motivate her to work harder. They say I should mind my own business, that my sister’s education is her own responsibility. But all I see is that she is being motivated to give up on herself. They say they are too busy to read any articles, and I think that even if they did, they would be offended and hurt. How could I, their daughter, tell them that their parenting needs work? I think it would hurt them too much.
I know it is not my fault, but I always feel like if I were more charismatic, or wise, or SOMETHING, that I could get through to my parents, that I could convince my sister to see the good in herself. I want her to have the tools to craft the life she wants: now and always, and I see that she is being changed by all this, that not doing as well as I did in school is leaving her marked as lesser.
So I am thinking if I am missing any pieces of the puzzle. Perhaps I just need to have the patience to keep trying? Perhaps things will get better when she is graduated? I’m afraid that even after she’s graduated that she will still feel like this. Perhaps there is something I have not thought of that I could say? (And am I too idealistic and need to let go of trying to help things that I can’t do anything about?)
I know you talk a lot about validating; I’m not quite sure how to do it, can you help? Could this be why my sister doesn’t believe me? For two reasons: I’ve never really seen what it looks like in person (I just say I understand and it sucks and to me she is awesome), and because if you know about Myers-Briggs, I’m a young ENTP (who tend to be awkward with expressing deep emotion when young and I see this in myself). These are the things that are on my mind, to give you more of a clue of how to answer the question.
I feel so, so young in this moment, that I really do not know very much about people and how to reach them. So I ask for your wisdom and experience today: how can I help my little sister? (And my little cousins, and all the other young people in my life to see that they are great.)
Thank you for taking the time to read my question.
Veronica’s Question [TIME: 28:31]
I have been unschooling for almost three years now. My boys are 13 and 11. My 13-year-old is a picker. He will go out of his way to annoy his younger brother. He also is constantly trying to parent his brother rather than just leaving that to the actual parents. For instance, telling him he is walking to close to the road (even when we are all there together). By the way he was in no danger and only too close to the road in his brother’s opinion.
All this means there is a lot of friction between brothers. I’ve tried to sit back and just let it work itself out. Very rarely this will work. I’ve tried to just be there and that usually doesn’t work. My last resort is telling the older to get out of his brother’s room, or leave his brother alone and just stop talking. When I tell him to leave his brother alone, he just starts running his mouth to me.
What suggestions do you have that will help my boys get along and bring peace to our family?
Melody’s Question [TIME: 47:11]
Hi, I’m not an unschooler yet, or even a parent, but I hope to be one day. I love your podcast and enjoy thinking about how the questions might apply to my future. I am just wondering, how does unschooling not only apply to children, but relationships. I just got engaged and want to make sure our 5-year relationship continues building towards eventual unschooling of our future children. Thanks!
EU059: Unschooling Dads with Rocco Laricchia
Feb 16, 2017
Rocco Laricchia is an unschooling dad of three young adult children and is married to the show host, Pam! In this episode we talk about how he answered the typical kid questions at work, what he found challenging and what he enjoyed about unschooling, and what he appreciates most about unschooling our children.
Quote of the Week
“The symbolic language of the crucifixion is the death of the old paradigm; resurrection is a leap into a whole new way of thinking.” ~ Deepak Chopra
One of the additional challenges with the journey to unschooling is that oftentimes there is one parent who is spearheading this journey to unschooling for the family. What about the other parent? That was our situation, so before we got into the interview, I shared a blog post I wrote almost four years ago talking about ways to support our spouses or partners as they too learn about unschooling:
Let’s take a moment to go back to the beginning when I first discovered homeschooling was legal and, pretty soon after, we figured we’d try it out and see how it went. I remember it was March Break and I went around and told each of the kids that, apparently, they didn’t have to go to school and would they like to stay home instead? To which they all said, “Yes!” I remember feeling both scared, because this was so different than anything I had ever thought I’d do, and excited, because it seemed like an amazing answer to our challenges with the schools. Do you remember how you felt at the time?
I stayed home with the kids and you’d go to work every day and, especially since you were often meeting with customers, I bet you were regularly asked the typical social questions like, “Nice to meet you, Rocco. You have kids? What grade are they in?” How did you answer that question?
So, not only were you surrounded by conventional parenting and education conversations daily at work, you also weren’t at home most days to see the kids’ learning in action, which is what helped me better understand and build trust in unschooling. That’s so hard! And I know there were times over the years when you were feeling less sure about unschooling. What helped you move through those times?
What were a couple of the things you enjoyed most about the unschooling lifestyle?
What was one of the most challenging aspects of moving to unschooling for you?
Looking back now that our kids are now young adults, what do you appreciate most about unschooling?
EU058: Unschooling as a Single Parent with Melissa
Feb 09, 2017
Melissa is unschooling mom to a lively eight-year-old and, being a single parent, also works as a nanny to support them. In our conversation, she shares how they weave unschooling and her work as a nanny together, why she began an online community for single unschooling parents like her, and why her son chooses unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“If you give them that freedom to look at a situation from their own perspective, sometimes they are going to learn something completely different than what you would have taught them. It becomes so much more meaningful for them.” ~ Melissa
Questions for Melissa
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you discovered unschooling?
What was it about unschooling that inspired you to choose it as a lifestyle for you and your son?
On your Facebook page, you recently posted a picture, which I loved, of a cake your son made. With it, you wrote, “It was tasty, especially for winging it. He loves to cook this way and it’s been a great lesson for me in stepping back and allowing the learning to happen. Baking is my thing and I like to follow recipes until I get the hang of things. For him, I believe it’s more of a science experiment mentality. That choice to step back and give our child’s exploration space to unfold in its own way is pretty key, isn’t it?
You’ve shared online that you work as a nanny. Can you share some of the reasons behind that choice?
How do you to weave unschooling and your work together?
Can you share one of your biggest challenges around unschooling as a single mom and how you worked—or continue to work—through it?
What is your one of your favourite parts about unschooling with your son?
EU057: Ten Questions with Akilah S. Richards
Feb 02, 2017
Akilah S. Richards is an unschooling mom to two lovely daughters. She’s also an author, a podcast showrunner and host, and on the organizing team of the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. She answers my ten questions about her unschooling experience with candor and enthusiasm, and I hope you too enjoy our conversation!
Quote of the Week
“In a partnership when your focus is on harmony, you’re not trying to focus on what everyone should be doing, not trying to fit everybody into your unit. You’re allowing everyone to be and, in so doing, everyone feels free to be themselves. That’s how we got to see how whole they already are.” ~ Akilah S. Richards
Ten Questions for Akilah
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear about what your children are up to. What are they interested in right now and how are they pursuing it?
You’ve written a book about the beginning of your journey to unschooling, titled, Our Transition into Unschooling, with the awesome subtitle, “Raising independent thinking, information seeking, self-directed lovers of learning and life all through school-free living.” Writing about your rationale behind choosing unschooling, you mentioned your realization that children are underestimated by adults. You wrote, “I had no idea how much children felt … and processed … and understood … and could articulate their feelings.” I loved that, and it was a big realization for myself as well. Can you share a bit about how that it came about?
As you transitioned to unschooling, one of your big questions was, “What about math?” It’s a common—and valuable—question to ask ourselves. Digging into it, you got to the perspective that “Math is a living principle, not a higher learning concept meant for college professors and “smart people” who teach.” Can you talk a bit about how you got there?
You shared a tip in the book that I think is so valuable for unschooling but that can sound pretty crazy when you’re first starting out. It was, “don’t approach your children as if you already know what they need.” That turns out to be a pretty key perspective, doesn’t it?
You are one of the members of the organizing team of The Alliance for Self-Directed Education. Can you tell us a bit about the organization and its purpose?
You had a great article in the inaugural issue of Tipping Points, the digital magazine being published by the Alliance for Self-Directed Education. In it, you explained that, for you, “unschooling is a vehicle for liberation; a way to walk a path rooted in our strengths and deepest interests.” What does that look like for you and your family?
You also host a podcast, Fare of the Free Child. I’ve listened to a couple of episodes and have really enjoyed them. I love that you make the point that with your work and your podcast you represent a space, not a set of people. Can you share a bit about the inspiration behind your podcast and that distinction?
You mentioned on your most recent podcast episode that next year you guys will be travelling to Africa. Can you tell us a bit about your family’s digital nomad lifestyle and how plans for the trip came about?
Looking back now, what, for you so far, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Links to Things Mentioned in the Show
You can watch my talk, The Art of Unschooling, at the Canadian Online Homeschool Conference , which runs February 3-7, 2017 (that’s an affiliate link, but my session is free to watch February 3rd and 4th)
I’m also speaking at Unschooler’s Platform, an unschooling family conference in the Chicago area, February 13-17, 2017
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“Today I will connect with my child, expand his world, bring joy into his life and nurture and encourage what he loves to do.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Anonymous Question [TIME: 4:27]
I have twin boys (almost 8) and an 11-year-old daughter. I have always said yes, because of the whining and crying with the twins (they are high strung, zero patience and harp on things). So the boys have tantrums every day about wanting to wear a specific shirt or shorts (that they missed placed) and it’s every day and fighting in the car and punching and hitting and screaming and I am at the point where I lose it and flip out (my parents NEVER yelled at me). My husband yells; now I yell and I try not to but they get me to my wit’s end. I do not know how to fix it. I do what you say, sit with them, play games, read to them (they fight over who sits next to me…). There’s no control (not that I want to control them—they don’t value my husband or me and only act good if I break down and cry).
Sonia’s Question [TIME: 17:53]
Hi, my kids are still little (five and seven), and we follow their interests as much as possible, but, to be honest, it’s expensive. I often find that I’ll invest in something that they’ve shown a sustained interest in, only to find that as soon as I spend on it, ARGH, they are on to the next thing. I find that what happens then is that I turn into school-teacher-mum and ‘we have to do this because I’ve spent money on it.’ How do I balance providing rich resources without being rich ourselves? And teach the kids to value resources that are invested in them? Thanks!
Jennie’s Question [TIME: 31:20]
Hi Pam, Anna & Anne, thanks so much for taking the time to answer our questions. I continue to learn so much every week.
I’m a mom of 3 kids, 7, 4 & 2. I’ve been deschooling for a year and only my eldest daughter attended one year of JK.
I find myself in a bit of a dilemma after a conversation with my husband (who hasn’t deschooled to the point that I have, not that I’m that far at all, but he has less overall patience with the kids).
Here’s the dilemma, it’s the holidays so I’ve been super busy trying to do everything & think of everything plus work has been a little more involved these last few weeks (I work part time from home) and today after numerous attempts to get my older two to stop hitting one another raised my voice and got angry. Now, I have made a lot of progress with patience and compassion but I’m human and I made a mistake. Afterwards, we were getting in the car and they started again. I angrily got in the driver’s seat and forgot to pass them their iPads, normally I would have pulled over at this point and grabbed them for them but not today. Today, I decided, no iPads on the trip back home. They complained a bit. They got over it. Mistake #2!
When I picked up my husband, I explained what had happened and his reaction upset me. He said “good, it’s good for them to understand that people have limits, it’s human nature and their behaviour can sometimes result in negative consequences.”
Although I disagree with my own behaviour towards them and don’t feel it helped deepen our connection at all, the fact that he connected it to people’s human nature having limits and the kids learning I had my own jolted me a bit. It caused me for a second to think that he had a point (shocking!). Is this part of learning about one another?
I should add that I believe I often struggle with balance between being too permissive however that might be me working through more deschooling while being surrounded by people who aren’t.
Curious about your perspective, thanks!
Jen’s Question [TIME: 44:12]
I have an almost 18-month-old and I’m very drawn to unschooling. I’m curious how you would apply this philosophy to the sleep issue we are currently dealing with. I believe that sleep should be like food—that my son should sleep when he’s tired and be awake when he’s rested, regardless of whether that is on the schedule people think an 18-month-old “should” be on.
But, it seems the last couple months my son has a very hard time actually going to sleep. Often in the evening, he will start to seem tired—rubbing his eyes or getting a little cranky. So we will say, it looks like you’re getting tired & we’ll brush his teeth, get him dressed for bed, read a story, turn on the white noise in the dark & then nurse or rock to sleep (depending on whether it’s me or my husband doing it). He will be floppy, limp, drowsy—clearly ready to sleep—but it will either take 2+ hours before his eyes actually close or after about 30 mins he will wake himself up and be ready to play again. At that point, if we continue to hold onto him and try to put him to sleep it becomes a wrestling match with a lot of crying that lasts an hour or more before he finally sleeps. If we don’t fight him, he will often stay up until 11 or midnight or even later, and when he starts acting tired again and we try to put him to sleep again, it still takes over an hour before his eyes close.
If he were able to just go in his room and go to sleep on his own like an older child, I wouldn’t mind him staying up so late- but that is later than I want to be up, and it means I’m not getting enough sleep to function during the day, and it also means I’m not getting any time to myself or to spend with my husband. We don’t have this issue with his nap—when he starts acting tired for a nap, I change his diaper, turn on the white noise, make his room dark & he nurses to sleep within 10 or 15 mins.
Thank you for your insight!
Jen’s Question [TIME: 57:20]
I have 1 son, 18 months, and I am unschooling him. I love everything about it, watching him learn, explore, get excited, discover things, and share all of that with him. I love showing him the breadth of the world- for instance, he got interested in some toy trains, so I have shown him pictures of real trains, videos, we have ridden trains, and gotten him other train sets with tracks. It’s so much fun to explore each interest with him.
My question is about how to balance that with the household work that needs to be done—cooking, cleaning etc. I try to let my son participate in these things if he wants, or go off and play by himself while I work if he prefers. He is often content to play on his own without interaction with me, to the point where I could spend most of the day doing housework with little interaction with him beyond changing diapers & helping him get snacks when he asks for food. In so many of your answers to people you talk about spending time doing the things your kids love with them to see what they love & see them shine- so I’m curious how you balance that with the time needed for housework, especially with young children (since “help” from him can make a 10 min task take hours) and also any thoughts on whether I need to more actively stop my adult agenda to engage with him (sit near him and watch him play) or just let him go on his own until he asks for my attention.
It just seems like a lot of letting him do whatever he wants without engagement, but if I always engage with what he wants to do then I never get housework done. (While he’s sleeping isn’t really an option for us, because he will rarely sleep without me lying next to him, and in those rare times that is my precious alone time for self-care).
Links to things mentioned in the show
Pam’s conference talk, A Family of Individuals,text or audio
EU055: Living Unschooling with James and Taylor Davis
Jan 19, 2017
James and Taylor Davis both originally went to college to become teachers. Taylor did teach in an elementary school for a number of years, while James ended up playing poker professionally. Eventually, they settled in New Jersey and started down a pretty traditional path—until their first son was born. He has been their greatest teacher in many ways, inspiring them to start questioning everything. And so began their unschooling journey.
Quote of the Week
“Every minute that I spend living in that place of fear about whatever hypothetical thing I’m worried about might happen in the future, it’s just eating away at my time right now with my kids and with my family.” ~ Taylor Davis
Questions for James and Taylor
Can you guys tell us a bit about you and your family?
You both went to college to be teachers and now you’re embracing the unschooling lifestyle. Could you share with us a bit about that experience and what happened to change your course?
I was hoping you could tell us a bit about Camp Stomping Ground. What role has it played in your unschooling journey?
What do you do when you hit a rough patch and begin to doubt unschooling?
James, you wrote a great article that was published in the December issue of Tipping Points, which is the online magazine for the new Alliance for Self-Directed Education. Sometimes when people are first learning about unschooling it can seem like some “perfect” life for children, but I really loved how you described the real life of an unschooled child. You wrote:
“Our kids still make mistakes, but we help them work through their mistakes without shame. Our kids sometimes have regrets, but they don’t resent us for causing them to miss out on the things that are important to them. Our kids sometimes get angry, but it usually comes from frustrating moments while doing things are important to them, rather than getting angry because we are a barrier between them and their goals.”
I love that you brought up regrets because I think regrets kinda get the same bad rap that mistakes do. As parents, we can get caught up in wanting our children to have the “perfect” childhood and imagine that as no mistakes and no regrets. I think parents have an easier time understanding how mistakes can happen and not shaming their kids as they through those choices, but regrets can be harder to frame. If a child later comes to regret a choice, parents may feel bad, taking it on as their failure, thinking they “should have” insisted their child do, or not do, the thing at the source of the regret. But it’s really just more learning for the child, isn’t it? Regrets aren’t a failure on our part, are they? They are part of navigating life.
You mentioned to me that you’re both self-employed and spend about an equal of time with your kids. I’d love to hear how you’ve gotten to that point.
Links to Things Mentioned in the Show
You can watch my talk, The Art of Unschooling, at the Canadian Online Homeschool Conference , which runs February 3-7, 2017 (that’s an affiliate link, but my session is free to watch February 3rd and 4th)
I’m also speaking at Unschooler’s Platform, an unschooling family conference in the Chicago area, February 13-17, 2017
Taylor’s online community, created with Fiona Griffin: New Mama Project. It’s a “place for new moms who are feeling overwhelmed, guilty, anxious, or alone because they’re finding their postpartum days to be harder than they expected. We offer stories, information, ideas, planning and wellness tools, and connection to other moms who are in the same boat.”
EU054: From Teaching to Unschooling with Grace Koelma
Jan 12, 2017
Grace Koelma studied primary school teaching at university, but after a year of teaching in Australia she became disillusioned with the mainstream schooling system and left. She began working as a journalist, following her passion for writing, eventually finding a way to weave together her passions for education, unschooling, and writing and starting Mulberry Magazine in 2015. I had a great time chatting with Grace and digging into her journey from teaching to unschooling!
Quote of the Week
“We have a cultural notion that if children were not engineered, if we did not manipulate them, they would grow up as beasts in the field. This is the wildest fallacy in the world.” ~ Joseph Chilton Pearce
Questions for Grace
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
You studied primary school teaching at university and taught for a year. What did you discover about children and learning through that experience?
How did you go from disenchanted with the formal education system to embracing the unschooling lifestyle? What has deschooling looked like for you?
Children really are intrinsically hardwired to learn, right from birth. And when we focus on our connection with them through an attachment parenting style and support that drive to learn, that can flow rather seamlessly into unschooling, can’t it?
You wrote a great post about the 11 biggest myths around homeschooling, and there was one in particular I’d like to chat about: that homeschooling parents are micro-managing helicopter parents. It can sometimes look like that from the outside, but our engagement with our children is coming from a completely different perspective, isn’t it?
I’ve been hearing the term “childism” more often lately, referring to a systemic prejudice against children as a group, stemming from a belief that they are property and should be controlled. Can you share your thoughts around this idea?
You and your husband founded Mulberry Magazine, a quarterly digital magazine that covers homeschooling, unschooling, and alternative education. Can you share how that came about? I love hearing about the different ways families are supporting their unschooling lifestyle.
EU053: Book Chat with Emma Marie Forde
Jan 05, 2017
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk. Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their family.
This week, Emma and I have a great chat about Scott Barry Kaufman’s book, Ungifted: Intelligence Redefined, looking at the ideas through the lens of unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“A nurturing family environment is a necessity to help the child flourish, just as a fish needs water to swim and survive.” ~ Scott Barry Kaufman
Ungifted: Intelligence Redefined, by Scott Barry Kaufman
The book is a fascinating journey into the science of intelligence, interwoven with stories of Scott’s personal experience with being labeled as learning disabled in school. By the end of the book, he brings it all together with his Theory of Personal Intelligence, which goes well beyond the traditional metrics of IQ and standardized testing, defining intelligence as “the dynamic interplay of engagement and abilities in pursuit of personal goals.” And it’s great to see that he means personal goals, not grades in disguise.
As he dives into interests and passions, engagement, mindset, learning, self-regulation, motivation, creativity, and the importance of a nurturing family environment, we find strong connections with what unschooling parents have discovered through living and learning with our children.
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“[There is] so much you can do to support and honor their game playing by showing an interest in all of it, even if you don’t like to play them yourself. Just so they know for sure that you’re not going to try to take it away from them again by limiting it—that you really embrace and enjoy and trust them with their joy. And that’s how you build trust with each other. They will learn to trust in you, because of your interest and enthusiasm, and you will learn to trust in them, by exploring it more and seeing the depth of the real learning that’s happening through their joy. And let me tell you, that is a beautiful thing.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
Anonymous Question
Hello!
I consider us to be not just unschoolers, but radical unschoolers since we are life learners. It carries over to parenting and nearly every moment of our days. I would say that we are 95% radical, because of me coming from a public school background, I can’t totally free myself from this and just relax. Every time I turn around, I seem to be pulling out curriculum. Well, of course this never works for my kids! I have two adult children, whom I homeschooled. One actually unschooled. Both are doing great.
I have a teen who isn’t as driven as my previously unschooled child was and this concerns me. Hence, pulling out the curriculum. Again! Never works! I also have a 7yo and 2yo. I know that unschooling is the best fit for our family but how do I just relax?!! I’m sure that I need to deschool myself. It’s so hard though because at the end of the “school year”, we need to provide a portfolio in this state. I need to make sure that we have enough to submit for the year. I am looking forward to hearing what advice you may have. Help! And thank you!
Anonymous Question
Hello, I am unschooling my two boys, 9 and 13 years old, and recently I am more relax about the fact that they were spending so much time on the computer, before I allowed them two hours playing Minecraft, Clash of Clans, Royal… I don’t like video games at all but they love to play. Because I got very tired every day standing up next to them repeating the same words all the time to switch off the computer I stop doing that because they were angry to me later. Now I allow them to spend all the time they want playing and they are happier, but my question is: after six hours watching the screen without stopping, is it ok for their eyes? I am worried about that.
Josh’s Question
Hi Pam, my wife and I live in France and we are planning to unschool our two and a half year old son. We are a very environmentally concerned couple and take our principles very seriously when it comes to buying consumer products, especially food. We always try to know where it comes from, whether that particular industry or supplier or brand pollutes the environment, and of course how their workers are treated. We enjoy all your podcasts, but it seems you have a rather lax attitude toward how children eat. You basically say that “if they want to drink Coke, then let them.” But this conflicts with our principles, as well as the fact that Coke is pure sugar and chemicals and therefore quite bad for their health, not to mention the fact that Coke steals water from extremely poor regions of the world. In other words, there are very simple facts about some foods and beverages that are undeniable: they are bad for a child’s growth, their health, their performance and brain development, etc. In addition, it is completely irresponsible to purchase them or support their companies and brands if you want to have a planet for our children. What do we do to unschool while trying to stay aware of these facts? Thanks so much for your work and kind regards from France.
Liz’s Question
Hi Pam, Anna and Anne,
Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions, I absolutely love hearing your podcast and wait patiently every week for the next one. I really love the Q&A episodes because every question seems to answer so many of my worries and concerns as I continue to deschool. Your answers are so thoughtfully prepared and I just loving hearing the soothing calm and feeling that energy as I listen.
A little background. We have four boys, ages seven, five, three and a half, and 18 months. Our house is very busy and chaotic, but in a good way. We came to unschooling after researching alternatives to mainstream schooling. My now 7 year old had spent one year at Kindy. He did very well academically, but he struggled emotionally when at home, he seemed overwhelmed and exhausted. I started looking into other schools in the area, Steiner, Montessori, and then unfortunately we ended up moving with my husband’s work to a remote place and schooling options were dismal.
My son seemed to show lots of signs at home that he was finding it too much. The pressure of reading and writing and five full days of school with very limited outdoor play or play of any sort. The days he was at home he would be exhausted and turn to TV to relax, he also started to show signs of aggression and lots of frustration. I researched homeschooling, and shortly after we pulled my son out and started homeschooling, which within weeks turned to unschooling.
This was seven months ago and we have been really enjoying learning with each other and spending our days together. My son is still struggling with his emotions however; he has become more and more aggressive at home, so much so that it is frightening for everyone and must be frightening for him too. Since starting unschooling we have released our controls and limits on TV, computers, and so on. My son has been exploring these with such passion. He lights up when he talks about Terraria and Minecraft, and is learning so many things. I definitely have done lots of inner work in this area and am confident in his learning.
The only thing that does worry me as I find the days that he does spend a significant amount of time on his computer or watching YouTube, his aggression hits a high, he also complains of headaches frequently. We have discussed taking breaks, and getting fresh air and I am making snacks and drinks for him to keep him topped up. But he gets frustrated if I suggest that maybe he needs to have a stretch and to move around for a few minutes. With having three other young boys to care for, who are very busy and are always creating and coming up with all sorts of things they need me to help them with, I don’t get to spend as much time connecting with my seven year old. I sit with him and ask him about his games, and try to play along as best I can; I admit I am not very good, he is miles ahead of me.
However, my other children tend to be much more needing of my time. I miss my son and worry that I am failing him, especially because he seems to have such extreme emotions which I feel must be an unmet need. He is very confident, I would say he is extroverted and thrives off being around people talking, and he is always telling jokes and making people laugh. So I am always trying to organise situations where he can shine. He loves the ocean too. When he spends a day at the beach or a day playing with friends out and about, he seems to be thriving and his aggression seems to mellow. However he quite often doesn’t want to come. He will say he has a headache and wants to stay at home, then he seems frustrated and angry. Could his time in front of the computer be aggravating him, or could it be that he is using the computer as an escape from deeper emotions that are troubling him.
We have moved a lot recently with my husband’s work, and my husband has also been suffering from depression as a direct result of his work. This has affected our family in a big way, and we have been living apart recently because it was no longer a healthy or safe environment for our children. My son has always been very big hearted and emotional, he comes across as very confident, but is quite soft and tender inside. I worry that I am not meeting his needs, that he is using these things to escape his feelings. We spent a day together recently, just the two of us and it was magic; we swam at the beach for hours, crashing through the waves while he eagerly said come out further mum come on, telling me about the dangers of rips, telling me about how we can tell the time by the sun. He is amazing and I can completely see all the amazing things that he is learning and seeing and doing.
I remember Pam in one of your podcast you mentioned how you son could only have so many things happen in a day before his cup overflowed and things would go downhill from there. This seems to be my son, it seems if one or two things happen after another, he can’t cope and he will lose his temper. He will throw things, break things, pour food, water, anything on the carpet. If someone is in his way he will push them over or hit them. I will tell him that I have to hold him, to keep him safe, until he feels better. He eventually does after lots of screaming and lashing out at me, but it can take up to 20 minutes. We have tried meditation together and talk about breathing and how else I can help him. I feel like he can’t release much of his frustration in front of a computer; before he would run around, and wrestle with his brother or scoot around, kick a ball, all those things released the endorphins and he seemed to be calmer after he had been active.
Just yesterday, he woke up after going to bed with a headache and I suggested that he have a nice warm soothing bath while I get his breakfast ready—he said sounds good. After that I said would he mind trying a couple minutes of meditation with me, he said ok. It literally lasted a few minutes as he was itching to go play. He then played with his brother running around, wrestling, playing with the dog, building Lego and he just looked so refreshed and happy and he said he felt good. He then got the computer out and within an hour he was grumpy, and said his head hurt again. I mentioned taking a break for a few minutes even just readjusting his eyes and he just said no.
I feel like a bad parent just sitting by and watching but at the same time imposing a limit just doesn’t sit with me either. Is this just something he will learn if I support him and not push it.
I also have lots of concerned family saying that he is on the computer too much. I don’t find myself answering confidently enough, which shows me that I am still concerned about it myself.
Sorry if my question is a bit disjointed, but thank you again. Lots of blessings from Australia.
Susan’s Question
Hello ladies! I look forward every month to hearing your lovely wisdom!
Today, or these days in general, I think I just need some reassurance. I have two children, a 22-year-old daughter who is in college in the US, and a 9-year-old son. We live in a small town in Argentina.
My son went to public kindergarten for two years and had a very hard time adapting to some aspects. We helped start a new school that he went to for first grade and second grade, based on an Argentine system similar to Montessori or Waldorf, which he seemed to like at first. But although they were very lenient in their teaching, allowing children to learn reading and math at their own pace, they were very strict about their own social norms, and my son eventually started having a very hard time with that. Last year we took him out and formed a small (six families, seven kids) cooperative that we started thinking of as an unschooling experience, although we didn’t really understand what that meant when we started.
In our home we have worked very hard at developing an unschooling lifestyle over the last year, which has involved mostly a lot of internal work on my part, and it all feels very right to me. Each of the families sort of went its own way during the year, and only three of us are planning to continue next year. My son loves the cooperative, even though he complains about the attitudes and activities of the parents who never really got into unschooling, and he is very sad that half of the group will not be there next year (this is the end of the school year down here).
So…my doubts and need for reassurance…he spent 14 hours yesterday watching you-tubers on his kindle. That is his go-to activity lately, and he rarely accepts invitations from us to do anything else. It was a beautiful day outside, and I could see out the window behind him where he was lying on the couch, kids out with their parents playing by the river where we live. He doesn’t even stop to eat, preferring to eat while he watches. He even takes it to the bathroom. And usually wants to watch one more additional episode before he goes to bed.
The only thing that draws him away regularly (lately) is participation in the cooperative that meets at our house every afternoon, or playing with his new best friend, who is in the cooperative and lives next door. He does not like to be in groups of children where he does not know each child intimately. He is not interested in doing any outside activities—no sports, art or music classes that are provided by the government here and that the children in the cooperative who are leaving do. So after this week when the cooperative school year ends, his social circle will shrink even further.
I get Sandra Dodd’s daily “Just Add Light and Stir” words of wisdom, and today she talked about how if he is happy and engaged in what he is doing, he is learning. Well, he is CHOOSING to watch all day, and he certainly doesn’t seem to be bored. I can see some of the things he learns, and enjoy watching some of the videos with him. I know and love his favorite you-tubers, who share their hearts as well as their games with their viewers. So I don’t doubt that he is learning and happy with what he is doing, but I still have so much trouble on a day like yesterday accepting that it is okay for him to do that ALL day and not do anything else…oh, he did take a 15 minute break to shell pecans for me with a big hammer, and he told me thank you for asking me to do that because he had so much fun with it. But other than that, he literally spent the rest of his waking hours watching The Diamond Minecart!
He tends to be obsessive about things in spurts, and has gone through phases such as Sponge Bob and Spanish-speaking you-tubers, for example. He eats that way, too, some days wanting only oranges all day, and others peanut butter, or blueberries, or bread, etc. Some days he turns down his favorite foods, just says he doesn’t feel like eating them right then.
When he was younger, I tried to “mold” him, get him to eat regular meals at the table with us, nudged him towards what I considered to be “good” activities such as playing outside and getting some exercise every day, but it just didn’t work with him. He refused to be molded and I finally realized about a year ago that I could either continue those battles in order to try to get him to fit in and succeed in school and society, or back off and lovingly embrace who he is, and re-construct the bond with him that was beginning to crack.
Then I have these days and these doubts…Does it sound like what I am doing is okay? Am I doing him well by letting him do what he wants all day when all he wants to do is lie around and watch you-tube, or am I letting him down by not helping him find other things that he can enjoy and that could be good for his health and well-being? Is it okay that he is not exposed regularly to a wide variety of children and people?
Sorry this ended up being so long! I go in cycles with this, so by the time you answer I may even be out of this “doubting” slump, but today I feel I need encouragement and reassurance!
EU051: Deschooling with Luminara King
Dec 22, 2016
Luminara King is a former Steiner-Waldorf teacher turned unschooling mom. She’s also the author of Unschooling – 7 Steps to Beginning the Journey and blogs at Living the Education Revolution. This week we have a great chat about her deschooling journey.
Quote of the Week
“I think that, as parents, we have to be very careful because there is a real tendency to jump on any interest they have, and just run away with it.” ~ Luminara King
Questions for Luminara
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
You’ve written a book called, Unschooling – 7 Steps to Beginning the Journey. You have a great chapter about learning and I love how you describe becoming an unschooling parent as training to be a Zen Master. You wrote, “You learn the delicate art of allowing and following the flow of your child’s learning; knowing when to offer up ideas and when to step back.” That stepping back can be hard to figure out as you move to unschooling, can’t it?
You have a fun intro to unschooling video on your website and in it, you mention how Lego was a catalyst in your journey to unschooling. What happened there?
I love your blog post about embracing averageness. I think that’s such a valuable shift that can help us parents shed expectations that we might still carry about who our children “should” become in the future. Because that can interfere with how we see them today, can’t it?
You’ve mentioned you have a college degree. What’s your perspective on college nowadays?
One of the hot topics around unschooling is “screen time.” I put that in quotes because I think the phrase itself is part of the problem. It lumps together so many different activities and part of deschooling is teasing all that out. What has your experience been on this topic?
Recently you published a post on your blog titled, “I’ve had enough of justifying our unschooling life.” And you mention this idea in your book too, in a chapter on dealing with other people’s negative reactions. What are some tips you can share for dealing with those moments?
What has surprised you most about your unschooling journey so far?
EU050: Choosing Unschooling with Roberto and Emily Lujano
Dec 15, 2016
Roberto and Emily Lujano are unschooling their three children. Roberto approached me earlier this year about translating my book, Free to Learn, into Spanish. I really enjoyed working with him and wanted to learn more about his family’s unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“You are not trusting the process and you are not trusting your kids, but also, I realized it is because I do not trust myself and I never have.” ~ Emily Lujano
Questions for Roberto and Emily
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear what your kids are enjoying at the moment. What are they interested in and how are the pursuing it?
How did you build trust in the process of unschooling?
What has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
You recently translated my book, Free to Learn, into Spanish. You’ve also translated Teresa Graham Brett’s book, Parenting For Social Change. What inspired you to begin translating books?
What I’ve found incredibly interesting about the translation process, with French and Spanish now out and Hungarian soon to be published, is that it’s not just about translating the book word for word, but about translating the ideas. For example, translating an idea from English to Spanish may use different words entirely, a process I’ve seen referred to as language localization. Can you share an example?
I love the fluid nature of how we make income to support our unschooling lives. It can change over the years to meet our personal and family needs as they evolve. You left your job a couple of years ago to spend more time with your family. Can you share a bit about how you made that choice and how you managed the transition?
Recently you’ve chosen to return to full-time work, and you guys are moving to another state for your new job. What has that transition been like?
EU049: Unschooling and Travel with Stuart Norman
Dec 08, 2016
Stuart Norman, his wife Sue, and their daughter Annabel were unschooling in the UK when they first had the idea to travel. They let it evolve in its own way—as he describes it, we “just pointed ourselves in that direction of travel and nothing else came along that got in the way of that.” They sold their possessions and their home and about nine months ago they were off.
Quote of the Week
“What if instead of asking what your passion or purpose is, we asked different questions? What are you interested in? What are you curious about? What’s fascinating to you? What have you read or seen or heard that you want to know more about? What do you love to do, just because? What are you working toward that you want desperately to achieve for no other reason than that you want it? What if you don’t so much have a passion or purpose as much as you pursue something, or a bunch of things, with passion and a sense of purpose? And what if the deeper you get into that exploration or pursuit and the more competent you become, the more interested you get in doing and learning and discovering on a fiercer, more engaged, dare I say a more “passionate” or “purposeful” way?” ~ Jonathan Fields, How to Live a Good Life
Questions for Stuart
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
First, I’d like to dive into your journey to unschooling a bit. How did you get comfortable with and develop trust in the process of unschooling?
Moving to unschooling often has us questioning so much of what we thought we already knew. What has been the most challenging aspect of unschooling for you?
Now I’d love to dive into your travel experience. How did you guys decide to travel and how did you prepare?
Where are you guys right now, and can you share one of your favourite experiences so far?
I’m sure Annabel is learning so much as you guys travel, both about the places you’ve been, and about herself. What is she interested in right now, and how is she pursuing it?
On Facebook I recently saw someone ask you to comment on an article, and I loved your answer. The article was titled, “It turns out that traveling makes us far happier than any material wealth ever does.” Can you share your perspective?
What tips do you have for unschooling parents who are considering extended travel with their family?
I noticed you recently started a new Facebook page, The Nomadic Coach. Can you tell us a bit about that? I love to hear about how families are supporting their unschooling lives.
EU048: A Family of Individuals, Pam’s Conference Talk
Dec 01, 2016
I’m happy to share the last of my HSC Adventures in Homeschooling conference talks with you, A Family of Individuals.
In this talk, I focus on family relationships.
In our society family harmony is a prized goal, promising an easygoing peace. It can be elusive, but we see some experienced unschooling families in action and we want that joy. “Why can’t you guys just get along??” Yet focusing on the interactions between family members often invites comparisons and discord—the opposite of harmony. In this talk, Pam shares how, though it may seem counterintuitive at first, fully supporting and celebrating the individuals in the family better fosters a long-term atmosphere of joy and harmony.
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“Unfortunately most people are convinced that when control fails it’s because they didn’t control enough.” ~ Joyce Fetteroll
Listener Questions
Aparajita’s Question
Hi, I have an almost 3 year old son and we’ve been trying to make changes that lead toward radical unschooling. So we have tried to say yes more and let go of the controls we had especially over technology.
My son spends a lot of time on his tablet. I used to find it alarming but I see that he is learning and happy. However I have also read that we need to keep offering interesting experiences and activities (not constantly though) so that there are other things that are “sparkly”. How do I do this? He often refuses to go out/do anything else even when I take out other toys or activities when engaged with his IPad and sometimes feels bad that he missed an outing. I don’t want to force him at all. What can I do?
P.S. I have a 6 month old too so I feel like we stay home a lot more than we would have if it was just him and I am not able to do very long or elaborate outings on weekdays. It’s mostly just the park.
Alexandra’s Question
Hello, thank you again for taking time answering our questions. It is really interesting and useful for parents.
My question is: I usually hear about honesty in the unschooling life philosophy and what about telling children about Santa and the tooth fairy? Should parents be honest with their children or should they lie about all those invented fairy tale characters who bring their children presents and money?
Ashley’s Question
Hello, My husband and I have decided that unschooling is the path we want to take with our two daughters. They are only 2 years and almost 4 years old. We wondered what a ball park figure of money is needed for yearly expenses. For homeschoolers money goes towards curriculum, whereas unschooling comes museum memberships, trips to discover new things, art supplies, etc. What would be a good base budget for things like that per year of unschooling?
Aparajita’s Second Question
My husband and I have been deschooling for about 2 months now and we have a 3 year old. This question is about food.
He loves chocolate and ice cream but we did restrict these items previously. So once we discovered radical unschooling, we decided to try saying yes more. The problem is that then he prefers to eat mostly sweet foods. A few weeks back it was ice cream. For several days he wanted only ice cream for all his meals. We got a big tub of it and would serve it without reproach. He slowly started eating a few more things but now he’s going through a phase where he only wants chocolate chips. It’s 1pm here and he’s only had 2 bowls of chocolate chips today.
I’m trying not to show any disapproval and go with it, while also offering other stuff. I put out monkey platters, take food to him as he plays, bake different sweet treats but he is reluctant to try new stuff and honestly just prefers his store bought treats.
I’m worried. Will he ever eat properly again? Or is he only going to crave different types of sweets? It’s also making me angry because we spend so much time making meals, snacks, buying different packaged snacks that we think he may like but most get rejected. I even say “ok have the chocolate but what else will you have?” And the answer is nothing.
Help!!!
Maria’s Question
Hi. I am a mom to 3 kids, ages 16, 14 & 12. My oldest daughter chooses to go to school and is a junior in high school. We are in our sixth year of unschooling with my two sons. They both had very traumatic school experiences. Both were asked to leave the public school system due to disruptive behavior and were placed in a BOCES program, a school for kids with emotional and learning difficulties.
When we learned of unschooling, and decided to take that path, my oldest was finishing up third grade and my youngest was finishing his second year of first grade. Being that their school years were so traumatic, I understood they needed a lot of time to heal from all of the scarring school had left them with. We are into our sixth year of our unschooling journey, and we are all much happier and connected.
My question is about writing.
Both of my boys spend the majority of their time on electronic devices, and are quite fluent with texting and typing. My younger son at 12, has just started reading, not strongly, but it’s coming slowly. He really struggles with writing though. Whenever the opportunity to write comes up, say he needs to write his name on something, he struggles, gets embarrassed and gets upset with himself for being “Stupid”. I’ve tried to explain to him that kids who are in school are forced to write all day long, and that it’s just practice that makes you good at something. I started leaving a notebook on the table with the month and date written out every day, with a pencil next to it, in case he wants to practice writing. And, he often does.
It’s not a lot, but I figured it would at least put a pencil in his hand and get him used to it. His handwriting doesn’t seem to be improving at all and he is getting frustrated with himself. I’ve read a lot about reading coming naturally when kids are ready, but I haven’t heard much about writing.
In your experience, is writing something that comes naturally as well, or is it something that really takes practice to get comfortable with? I hate to watch him struggle so much and get so down on himself. I’d like to help him any way that I can, but I just don’t know the best way to go about it.
Thank you for your time. I really enjoy listening to the podcast.
EU046: Growing Up Unschooling with Brenna McBroom
Nov 17, 2016
Brenna McBroom is a 27yo grown unschooler. We had a fun conversation and touch on her transition from school, to homeschooling, and eventually to unschooling; finding connections as a teen; how her passion for ceramic art developed; her experience at Not Back to School Camp as both a teen and as staff; her new blog, Millenimalism; and her (and my) experience that young adult unschoolers are generally self-reliant and living intentionally, rather than just following societal expectations.
Quote of the Week
“We are what we repeatedly do.” ~ Aristotle
Questions for Brenna
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
The unschooling lifestyle is a pretty unconventional one, which can sometimes be both awesome and challenging in turn. Can you talk about a challenge you encountered and how you guys worked through it?
How did your passion for ceramic art develop? Can you share that journey and what it looks like today?
The conventional parent-child relationship is often steeped in power and control, but unschooling encourages a different dynamic. Can you share a bit about what was your relationship with your parents was like growing up? And now as an adult?
You recently returned from the Vermont session of Not Back to School Camp, a camp for teen unschoolers. You attended as a teen, and continue to return as part of the staff. Can you share a bit about your experience as a teen camper? What kept you going back?
I saw that this session you ran a project called Deep Dreams: Unearthing, Mapping, and Achieving Your Hidden Ambitions. What drew you to that topic? Can you tell us a bit about how it went?
This year you started a blog called Millenimalism. What was the inspiration behind that?
What stands out for you as you look back on your unschooling years? What, from your perspective now, do you most appreciate about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
As a grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU045: Unschooling on a Budget with Glenna McAulay
Nov 10, 2016
Glenna McAulay is an unschooling mom of two daughters, and both she and her husband have a wonderful perspective on living the unschooling lifestyle within their means. We talk about the perspective shifts around money and choices that have helped us over the years, as well as share some ideas for low-cost unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“I think it’s really all about conversation. I mean, we have conversations all the time. We have dad home so much of the time because we’ve chosen that. Now what that means is that we don’t have a huge ton of disposable income, so we have to make the choices of what’s important to our family.” ~ Glenna McAulay
Questions for Glenna
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I always love to hear what the kids are up to. What things are they interested in and how are they pursuing their interest?
Unschooling families are choosing a different kind of lifestyle, one in which they prioritize spending time with their children. What that looks like can vary widely: maybe they’re living on one income, maybe they’re a single parent, maybe they work-at-home etc. What does come with that, is often a lower family income. Let’s talk a bit about the challenges of that.
In my experience, when money challenges arise, fear can quickly create tunnel vision. Our minds shout no, no, no, can’t do that, can’t do that, and all of a sudden we feel trapped. Each time, I found I need to actively shift from seeing things through the lens of lack to being open creative possibilities. I didn’t see any possibilities until I moved past the fear. Have you found that kind of shift helpful?
When it comes to conversations with our kids, even with less income it still doesn’t need to be about saying no. For me it’s helped to remember not to use money as the first filter when questions come up, but rather one of the last. Just saying “no” shuts down so much conversation, doesn’t it?
With my kids, sometimes it helped to shift our perspective from consumer to DIYer. As we come to know our kids more deeply, and understand the WHY behind their requests, we can sometimes help satisfy that deeper motivation more quickly. So while we’re maybe saving up for “the thing,” we also continued to play with the possibilities, with other ways to satisfy that curiosity. And sometimes it’s super fun for them to play with ways to make their own versions of things in the meantime. Has that been your experience?
There were a couple of conventional expectations that I needed to work through over the years, One was that “new is better.” Which led me to judge myself as a failure if I couldn’t provide shiny, new things. That’s a pretty prevalent expectation in our society isn’t it?
The other conventional expectation was that as the parent, I needed to personally meet all my children’s needs. That one had me feeling like I was failing too, for a while. Then I realized the things they were wanting to do were about them, not about me. And I could reach out to the local community and the online community to find all sorts of creative ways to help them find what they were looking for. Have you found yourself making that shift too?
I thought it would be fun to finish up by just brainstorming a bunch of low-cost opportunities people might find, in their community and online, to get their juices flowing.
Links to Things Mentioned in the Show
Olive made a coin-operated Lego machine that dispenses Timbits!
Live and learn on organic farms around the world: WOOFing
Chris Guillebeau has a great website about the art of nonconformity and travel hacking
EU044: Ten Questions with Jennifer Andersen
Nov 03, 2016
Jennifer Andersen is an unschooling mom of two and the founder of ourmuddyboots.com and it’s related Facebook page. I had so much fun chatting with her! We talk about how we keep learning, over and over, that learning happens everywhere; triggers that can sneak up on us; the difference between natural and contrived consequences; how unschooling isn’t about having all the answers; her experience at the Free to Be Unschooling Conference, and more.
Quote of the Week
“Moving through that not knowing what to do, to knowing what to do—at least in my experience—was when I got those sweet spot moments of our relationship being so connected and really feeling like I got this unschooling thing. At first, those moments were so few and far between. They were kind of like, for golfers, like that perfect golf shot: they’re elusive, but they increase the more that you practice. That was my experience with moving through that period. I’d get that one moment of: this is it, this is what it is: we’re happy, our relationship is so strong and connected, look at how he or she is flourishing. Then eventually moving beyond that so those moments made up more of our day than less of our day.” ~ Jennifer Andersen
Questions for Jennifer
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear about what your kids are up to. What are they interested in right now? How are they pursuing it?
As we move to unschooling, we come to see that learning really does happen everywhere. In fact, it seems to be something that we learn over and over. You think you know it, and then a few months or years later, you know it even more deeply. Has that been your experience?
Moving to unschooling is not all about the learning, it’s also about the strong relationships that connect us as a family, which in turn, support that learning. I love how you describe this process: “Changing our family dynamic is a process of learning about who we are, who our children are, and understanding the way we want our family to relate to each other. It is never a step by step protocol to follow. Rather, it is a self examination, and evaluation of whether or not our child, and our family are happy.” And I love your insight that it’s about moving from knowing what not to do, to knowing what to do. Can you share with us some of your thoughts about that process?
Many of us have triggers that sneak up on us and have us almost unknowingly placing expectations on our children. Maybe it’s certain events, like hitting school age, or the teen years, while for others it may be a seasonal thing. You recently wrote a post on your blog about how this happens to you in the fall. Can you share how you’ve learned to recognize and move through it?
Natural consequences is a frequent topic in the parenting world, yet often they are really talking about contrived consequences. How do you see the difference between them?
Unschooling is about living together with our children, not about having all the answers. It’s okay not to know what to do, and in those moments our children get to see how we move through them. That’s really valuable, isn’t it?
You’re founder of the website, ourmuddyboots.com, as well as maintaining an active Facebook page. Can you share how you weave unschooling and your work together?
You’re recently back from speaking and playing at the Free to Be unschooling conference in Arizona. Can you share a bit about your experience?
Looking back now, what, for you so far, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“As we focus on this Mind Movie—the story playing in our heads—we become attached to it and want it to be real, somehow. The problem is that when reality clashes with the story, we get frustrated, upset, bothered, angry, disappointed. These bad feelings can get in the way of our peace of mind and happiness. They can make us behave badly and harm our relationships with others. This mismatch between the story in our heads, our Mind Movie, and reality causes a lot of our problems. The answer is to mindfully turn from the story to the reality of the moment.” ~ Leo Babauta, Zen Habits: Mastering the Art of Change
Listener Questions
Lynn’s Question
Hello! I am mum to four children 5 1/2 and under. My 5 year old should be starting prep next year (Australia) but we have decided to unschool, or essentially just continuing on the path we are already on. We’ve always tried to have a respectful and mindful approach to parenting and our relationships with our children. This has taken a lot of self reflection and work on my part though as I didn’t have this growing up.
Two of my current hurdles at the moment are tied back to relinquishing control. First, is the amount of “things” that come into our home. I am minimalist in the sense that I don’t like to have a lot of stuff in the house. If it’s not used or doesn’t hold special meaning I tend to donate it. The amount of clothes, things etc. I own is very minimal, I feel overwhelmed when there is too much in our home. I like the order and the simplicity when there isn’t too much in the house. It makes it feel a little less chaotic.
I tend to trickle this down to my children. My daughter especially loves to collect things and her room becomes filled with stuff and is often very messy. I try, over and over again to let go, to “allow” more into our, to not care about how messy her room is (it is her room after all), and I succeed at letting go for a bit. However, a rough moment or day arises and I revert back trying to get the control back on how tidy her room is, or how much “stuff” is in the house. How do I reconcile my needs and their needs? I need less to feel less overwhelmed, they need more to discover, explore and learn. We can be different, but how do I meet everyone’s needs?
The second thing I am having a hard time letting go of is around introducing TV, computers, iPads, video games, etc. My husband and I really only watch an hour or so of TV a day after the kids go bed, same with our phones or listening to podcasts, etc.. It is only ever after the kids go to bed. Since they haven’t had much exposure to “screens” they never really ask for it and I have never really had to restrict it… But at the same time they don’t really watch much. A few things here and there like a train show (they love transport) and the recent Olympics. How to do I and should I let more of this in to our home? I guess I also struggle with content. With 4 children so young I suppose I tend to worry about what they would be watching and whether or not limits should be set around that. We watched The Jungle Book as a family movie night a few weeks ago and my 3 1/2 has been terrified of monkeys coming in his room since and my 5 year old asked for it to be turned off after the building collapsed on top of the ape. So I question how much free rein I should give in regards to content. The other noise that comes into play are the studies I have read regards to TV’s “addictive nature,” that most shows are too fast for young children, etc.
Any help, advice, suggestions you have to offer to would be greatly appreciated.
PS I forgot to add that I think part of restricting what comes into the house, in terms of volume, also comes out of the fact that the more there is, the more I have to clean and tidy. The kids help to an extent, but with them being so young, to a large extent, most of it falls on me. As you can imagine, they are still need help with a fair bit. So how do I let go without stretching myself too thin?
Anonymous Question
I started out parenting thinking that we would have very limited use of TV and video games when our kids were young. I sort of built an ideal image in my mind of parenting my young children in a pretty Waldorf type way – we’d do art, play outside for hours, etc. I’ve moved well past most of that as my husband and I are (almost) fully embracing unschooling with our 3 kids (6, 4, and 5 months old).
However, I am having the hardest time deschooling when it comes to TV and video games. It’s like I keep thinking I’ve done it, and then I feel the fear creep back in. My two oldest kids LOVE video games and so does my husband. And I honestly just don’t enjoy them. I try and join them for a bit each day, and love spending time with them, but it’s just not my thing. And I fall into the trap of comparisons – on weekends I see all the neighbor kids outside playing together in the beautiful weather and often my kids are inside on the xbox or computer.
I just can’t get past my own upbringing and the messages from society about video games and sometimes really wonder if I will always believe that other endeavors are more valuable than watching shows and playing video games. I don’t want to feel this way and I want to support what my kids love. Perhaps I’m just missing when they were younger and less interested in this stuff (and also often think that 4 and 6 is still pretty darn young to spend so much time in front of a screen instead of running around and engaging in active play)?
Perhaps I just honestly can’t embrace this aspect of unschooling? Any advice for when these thoughts creep back in and unsettle me and make me question our approach? I truly want to embrace this and to support and feed their interests, but get stuck when their childhood isn’t looking like what I thought the ideal childhood my kids could have would look like. I think I’m driving my husband crazy by using him as my sounding board every time I get worried.
Sarah’s Question
Can you “not do enough” as an unschooling parent and fail your children? Or is it about changing your values and emphasis from education, to joy? I feel like I’m getting good at saying ‘yes’ to the messy and strange things my children want to do but I wonder if there is more strewing I could be doing. At the moment, I feel I don’t strew very much because most of the time my children aren’t interested in the things I suggest or strew, and so it feels like a waste of time.
Michelle’s Question
I have 3 boys ages 12, 16 and 19. We have homeschooled from the beginning – only in reading and math. My 19 year old went to high school for a semester and had a really bad experience – he now thinks he can’t learn anything! We have been moving towards unschooling for 5 years and fully unschooling for two years. A year ago we moved to another state because my husband was laid off. My 19 year old had a lot of friends but really wanted a new start. He keeps in contact via the internet/gaming. Currently all three boys spend all their time at the computer watching movies, playing games, streaming on twitch etc. They do not want to go and do anything outside the house – except maybe to see a movie. I offer them things to do but they are not interested. They do not want to go to homeschool/unschool groups. We had an unschooling conference in our town and no one wanted to go.
I miss my boys. I go to their rooms and ask questions about what they are doing. They will give me some info and I will watch them play, but usually they ask me to leave. Sometimes they seek me out to tell me new developments in their games. This summer I helped my 12 year old build his own computer and now he is streaming on twitch. It seems they come to me for food or looking for clean laundry. I don’t like to leave the house and leave them at home. I leave only to take the dogs for a walk or go to the store. I have been working on being in the moment with each one of them and loving them unconditionally. However, I worry they will never want to go out and do anything.
Celine’s Question
Our kids, 9 and 6 (and a 3 year old) have left school since February 2016. Since then, they have watched a lot of Netflix. They haven’t shown any particular interest in anything. I don’t see them being particularly excited to learn anything. They ask questions, but often don’t even bother to listen the answer or find the answer by themselves, “boring” is the word qualifying the research. So fear is growing in my mind. Are my kids so lazy?? Yesterday my daughter had a birthday party with 5 of her “ex” school friends. They seemed so happy to go to school. We discussed about it and they all said this year was fun, they all have para scholar activities and they all have this energy to learn. So I thought, ” Oh my god! I made a huge mistake! My kids were better off to school! We don’t do so much interesting stuff now.”
Obviously. I feel incompetent. I am afraid to ruin their life. It is like they are happy not to go to school anymore just to be able to do nothing!!!! Maybe I am completely wrong or not. I don’t know anymore!!!! I feel ashamed. I believed I was able to show them, but I am not!
EU042: Curious and Engaged, Pam’s Conference Talk
Oct 20, 2016
I’m excited to share another one of my conference talks, Curious and Engaged, with you! It may have been through an unfortunate series of events that it happens to be this week, but after all the work I put into developing conference talks, I’m happy to have a way to share the audio version, as it was meant to be presented!
So in this talk, I focus on learning. Specifically, three valuable characteristics of real learning that, when they are at play together, allow it to thrive: engagement, motivation, and time to think. I explore what they look like through the lenses of both the conventional education system and unschooling. And from there, I talk about the day-to-day ways we can live this learning lifestyle with our children.
EU041: Unschooling Dads & Board Games with Jamie Maltman
Oct 13, 2016
Jamie Maltman is an unschooling dad and avid board gamer. And in this episode, he shares with us what he loves about both these passions. We talk about how he built trust in process of unschooling, ways to stay connected as the working parent, learning through board games, and some great suggestions for new board games that might spice up your family fun!
Quote of the Week
“A child only pours herself into a little funnel or into a little box when she’s afraid of the world—when she’s been defeated. But when a child is doing something she’s passionately interested in, she grows like a tree—in all directions. This is how children learn, how children grow. They send down a taproot like a tree in dry soil. The tree may be stunted, but it sends out these roots, and suddenly one of these little taproots goes down and strikes a source of water. And the whole tree grows.” ~ John Holt, Learning All the Time
Questions for Jamie
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear what your kids are enjoying at the moment. What are they interested in?
How did you build trust in the process of unschooling? What were the pieces that resonated with you and helped you feel more confident in choosing this lifestyle?
What has been the most challenging aspect of moving to unschooling for you?
As a working parent, how do you stay connected with what the kids are up to?
I really enjoy the glimpses I get on Facebook of your love for board games. You play regularly, and you share your insights as a contributor to the podcast, What Did You Play This Week. Can you share with us a bit about your gaming journey? How did this passion develop?
Your segment on the podcast is about learning through and with board games. Can you talk about the learning you see with your own kids, and what tips do you have for playing with younger kids? Do you stick to less complicated games? Change up the rules?
For people who might like to bring some more board game fun into their unschooling lives, can you give us a couple of recommendations for games to play with young kids, kids, and teens/adults?
EU040: Paradigm Shifts with Cindy Gaddis
Oct 06, 2016
Cindy Gaddis is an unschooling mom to seven kids—and one son-in law! She’s also the author of The Right Side of Normal, a book about understanding and honouring the natural learning path for right-brained children. In this episode, we talk about helicopter parenting and control, cultural expectations, society’s focus on being busy, family relationships, and what unschooling looks like in larger families.
Quote of the Week
“Where did childhood go? Time and space to just be, play, explore, create, wonder, feel, discover. It’s so important to the well-being of a person, which is so closely connected to happiness.” ~ Cindy Gaddis
Questions for Cindy
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
Often we talk about deschooling as being time to recover from time spent in school and to shift away from seeing learning through the conventional school lens. All very true, but it doesn’t really seem to do justice to all the cultural paradigm shifts that are wrapped up in there, does it? I’d love to dive deeper into some of those shifts today. First up, helicopter parenting. Parents have good intentions, but they can find themselves controlling every aspect of their children’s days. How does that perspective shift as we move to unschooling?
The next shift I’d like to talk about is around socialization. It’s a question we’re often asked by others when they learn our kids don’t go to school. We can easily point out how there are lots of opportunities for children to engage with other children, with other people, outside of school, but it’s bigger than that, isn’t it?
Another shift on the deschooling road revolves around the conventional tendency to keep kids busy, scheduling their days with extracurricular activities. This seems to be wrapped up in “being a well-rounded person for college applications” and the “over-achiever mentality as the definition of success.” How does this perspective shift as we move to unschooling?
The shift to unschooling also encompasses big shifts in how we look at family relationships. One of the big ones for me was around the idea of fairness. Did you find that a valuable shift as well?
I also wanted to ask you about what your unschooling days looked like with a larger family. There’s the idea that you need more control the more children you have. What has your experience been?
What tips would you share for larger families starting to move to unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“All I am saying … can be summed up in two words: Trust Children. Nothing could be more simple, or more difficult. Difficult because to trust children we must first learn to trust ourselves, and most of us were taught as children that we could not be trusted.” ~ John Holt
Listener Questions
1. I am thoroughly enjoying your podcast and get excited when one appears in my feed. Thank you. Listening to parents share insights and wisdom has helped me on my own journey with my 8-year-old son.
I am at a point in our journey where I doubt whether I am supporting him and exploring with him in ways that he needs me too.
Some background:
He is our only child and we are older parents. I’m 52 and husband is 56. We both work from home with a flexible schedule. We belong to a local homeschool group and attend weekly field trips and park days. We enjoy our time with them. I feel he looks to me to figure out our plans for the day. Like, “mom what are we doing today?” or “mom what are we doing tomorrow?” Some days we don’t have plans so we hang at home. He primarily spends his time watching videos of Minecraft which he’s started to play a few months ago and also videos of kids playing nerf wars, etc. I offer up different kinds of videos which he usually isn’t interested in. But I still offer now and then just to see. We play nerf wars in the yard and swing. He started to play Minecraft with a friend over Skype.
I guess I’m confused because I think he’s seeking more, hence the question of what are we doing, and yet falls back to watching videos. So am I to continue to support his video watching or keep trying to find things that pull him away from that? Or both?
He’s not interested in me reading books to him, nor playing with his toys. His interest in Legos has dropped off considerably these last few months to almost no interest. No interest in learning to read or write. Taking classes he can do without.
I feel like I’m lacking in being a playmate, because he needs someone to play with when at home, as well as lacking in my role as unschooling mom. Just wondering if you can shed some insight on what this scenario looks like to you.
2. My eight-year-old only son has been home from school since February, when we chose unschooling. He has found gaming to be his thing this entire time. He currently loves Halo. It is his choice above all other activities. He will take a break on occasion to do research or enjoy videos on YouTube, to go with family on various outing or trips, and to hang out with friends when invited. Friends who come to our house are very happy to be left alone for hours to enjoy gaming with my son. I have just been letting him pursue this as he desires.
My question is: am I too relaxed in my involvement? Pam mentioned in a post (and I’ll paraphrase. Correct me if I didn’t get this right, Pam) to figure out what the child loves about the game and find things along those lines to strew. Well, I have asked him and what I’ve been able to get from our conversations is that he likes the cool armor. He likes the “good overcoming evil” aspect, and I know he likes getting better at the game and seeing himself rank up. It also allows him to play with others that are much better than his parents, through a multiplayer aspect.
Do I NEED to strew? A few weeks ago I bought a Halo novel that I thought we’d read together. He was happy to see it and held it and looked it over but hasn’t asked me to read it with him (probably too complex for him to read on his own right now). He used to draw nearly every day (often Halo related images) but doesn’t any longer (which I miss, but just hope he’ll pick up again later). Or, should I just continue to chill and let him immerse himself in this thing he’s finding to be so satisfying, strewing when he seems to lose interest and seem at a loss?
I would like to add,
– Anne’s description of her oldest son fits Gabriel to a T. Paraphrasing here, ‘his wonderfully obstinate refusal to let anyone hijack his mind and spirit brought about our decision to unschool.’
– Gabriel is still deschooling and he is still resistant to doing most things that he didn’t think of on his own. I feel remorseful everyday for sending him to school. I feel like I ruined his wonder of the world and his excitement for exploring it, his openness to discovering with me at his side. He spends most of his time playing video games and watching YouTube, researching questions about the games there as well.
I don’t know if his resistance will ever lighten up, although I think it will as it seems like a knee-jerk reaction to any invitation to look at something or go some place with his parents. It comes so fast that he couldn’t possibly have given it any thought. Two things he doesn’t react this way to are going swimming and watching most videos.
I have coaxed him into some things, a hike for instance, where he said he liked the destination so much that he was sorry he complained the whole way, and some excursions into town for various reasons. The latest was after a rainstorm when he marveled that the clouds were so low that they looked like paint on blue canvas. But it took a lot of talking of why it was important to me/us as parents of why he come along and then it was a grudging “Fine, I’ll go.”
3. Hi Pam, Anne and Anna,
We are around 2 months into our unschooling journey. My 10 year old daughter and 12 year old son are currently deschooling. We took them out of school as my 10 year old daughter was being bullied and my 12 year old son had had nothing but a tough time for the almost 8 years he had been at school. We had numerous meetings with teachers over the years, he had endless detentions, a diagnosis of ADHD (which I don’t feel is true as he is just a spirited young boy) and both have a diagnosis of Dyslexia (all of these tests were requested by the school, I didn’t feel the need to have my children labelled, however this is the way the cookie has crumbled – just a little back ground for you). My son in April lost one of his really good friends in a tragic accident, he did not cope too well and he’s a really loving empath. I feel he is holding onto much grief still as he will mention this friend every week or so. We had been looking for schools as none of us were happy and the morning tears all around and huge trauma to get to school each morning was taking it’s toll on myself and the kids, wearing us down. We could not find the right fit for both of my children, so during the July holidays I decided to take the plunge and pull the kids from school much to their delight to deschool and subsequently unschool.
Now here comes the bumpy part. My son decided that he would like an Xbox one around that same time and it was his birthday, he also wanted a game Grand Theft Auto in which he has been begging for since its release a few years back. My husband and I always felt that the content of the game was not appropriate, however along my journey and search I found many positive articles about how the game has more to offer than the violence. I explored and decided after chatting with my husband that if might be a good idea to let him have an explore the game as he had already watched so many youtube videos on the subject he was well versed in the content anyway. He has been playing day and night and even for up to 30 hours in one sitting on numerous occasions. The last time was just two days ago where he woke at 7am played until 4.30pm at which time the internet failed and he loudly expressed his frustrations and cried himself to sleep. Slept for 3 hours, woke at 8pm then played for another 30 hours non stop until midnight of the following night, where I could see that little things in the game were starting the frustrate and upset him and I could see that he needed sleep, so suggested that he come have a snuggle in bed and chat for a bit (he promptly fell asleep actually).
He’s been doing a heap on the game. Only yesterday I helped him to gather the funds by selling vehicles, so that he could purchase and office and warehouse in the game. I heard him later online telling his friends of how we had changed the structure and that he was now a CEO of his own company. He was very excited and he just loves the game immensely.
Here comes the downer. My husband works long hours and often is away from the home for 12 hours each day. All he sees is my son gaming when he leaves and also gaming when he returns, then into the night. It’s causing him a lot of angst. This has been building for a number of weeks now and he feels that our son is not learning sufficiently, learning how to rob people, will end possibly end up in prison due to all of this, has noticed my son has started calling us cuss words quite frequently, won’t know how the real world works due to such huge exposure to the game and would like him to either go back to school or for me to stop unschooling and move to school at home with set work and allocated times for gaming (he doesn’t want to remove the game completely, just reduce the time spent playing).
I have tried to negotiate a deal with my son as it’s really affecting the whole family and the tension in the house is insane (we can hear him gaming all night even though he has a headset and on quiet, so we are not sleeping more than a few hours each night). I have suggested perhaps he might go for a bike ride, come swimming, come meet up with friends to play Minecraft, go for a surf, play with the dogs and even asked him if he could go anywhere or do anything what it would be.
However, he is not open to negotiation on doing anything else, he just wants to play on his Xbox one, he may however change games from time to time if a friend on the forum suggests it (Call of Duty). He also likes to game out where he is part of the home and where the wifi is optimal, so we can all hear from no matter where we sleep due to an open plan home.
Pam, Anne and Anna, I’m so sorry for such a long post, however I wanted to shed the full light on what is happening here and hope that you can help me in any way shape or form to regain some sanity in our lives and to repair our relationships as our home is not the happiest right now and I can feel things tearing apart, whilst I’m between a rock and a hard place trying to glue it back together and make everyone happy.
4. I have twin boys 15 years of age who began unschooling in January 2016 when I pulled them out of the public school system. Now they are entering 11th grade studies and would like to attend an art institute after graduating 12th grade to become a multimedia artist.
My question is: how do I prepare a transcript/diploma of what they’ve learnt, studies they’ve taken in English, math, history, etc in order to enroll them in a college or an art institute? AR community College wants some type of transcript in order for them to be enrolled there and I’m assuming that an art institute would want something of that kind as well.
Thank you for any suggestions or advice that you may have.
5. Hi. What would you advise to a mother who wants to unschool while her husband does not want to? Thank you!
EU038: Time to Think, Pam’s conference talk
Sep 22, 2016
This week I thought I’d try something different! I want to share one of my conference talks, Time to Think, with you.
With a few months of Q&A episodes under our belt, one of the threads we’ve seen running through many of the questions is the fear that bubbles up when we project our current situation into the future. The “what ifs” come fast and furious and can spark a challenging downward spiral. In our answers, we often talk about the value of bringing ourselves back into the present moment.
In this talk, I dig into the ideas of being present in the moment, of being patient with our children, and of giving them time to process their experiences and connect the dots in their own way. I also talk about mindfulness, choice, trust, and more. It’s fascinating how time weaves its way so significantly through thinking, learning, and being—in other words, through unschooling.
And one of the things I loved about writing this talk was weaving it together with some of the wonderful insights found in A.A. Milne’s books Winnie-the-Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner, first published in 1926 and 1928, respectively. I’ve loved Christopher Robin and his gang of stuffed animals since I was young.
EU037: Ten Questions with Carol Black
Sep 15, 2016
Carol Black unschooled her two daughters, now 22 and 26. Years ago she was in a teacher education program, but when she read John Holt’s How Children Fail the light bulb went off and she dropped out. Since then she has written some wonderfully insightful essays about unschooling, which you can read on her website, carolblack.org, and she directed the fascinating documentary film, Schooling the World.
Quote of the Week
“One of the things that is most disturbing to me — on a level of justice and morality — is that you have an institution that is in place globally that is labelling millions and millions and millions of innocent people as failures.” ~ Manish Jain
Ten Questions for Carol
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
2. What are your children up to right now? Looking back, can you see a thread of interests and activities that has brought them to this point?
3. I love the bigger picture lens through which you see and talk about unschooling—through the essays on your website and through your film, Schooling the World. What brought you to explore how children learn across different cultures and incorporate that into your view of unschooling?
4. I’ve seen your wonderful essay, A Thousand Rivers: What the modern world has forgotten about children and learning, being shared in unschooling circles for years. In it you make the point that people today don’t know what children are actually like—they only know what children are like in schools. Your classic quote is, “Collecting data on human learning based on children’s behavior in school is like collecting data on killer whales based on their behavior at Sea World.”
Controlling a child’s learning—content, pace, and style—has such a profound effect on how they see themselves, as both learners and people, doesn’t it?
5. Another great observation you share about unschooling children is that they want their learning to be their own. Can you talk about some of the ways we can interfere with that?
6. You published a new essay on your website earlier this year, On the Wildness of Children: The revolution will not take place in a classroom. In it, you note that compulsory schooling is basically a social experiment originally conceived in the late 1800s to adapt children to the new industrial age—to train them in the skills needed for this new era of manufacturing. Yet in only about seven generations, school has become an integral part of childhood, this background forgotten.
With unschooling, we choose to leave this experiment behind and look at how children are naturally wired to learn. We soon come to see that learning isn’t really a special activity at all, but a natural by-product of being alive in the world, and spending much of their days in, what researcher Suzanne Gaskins calls, a state of “open attention.” Can you describe what that looks like?
7. Now I’d like to shift and talk about your documentary, Schooling the World. Here’s something you wrote by way of introduction: “The film “Schooling the World” asks us to re-examine some of our deepest assumptions about knowledge, learning, ignorance, poverty, success, and wealth. The purpose of the film is not to provide all the answers, but to ask a question, to open a conversation. Our hope is that you will be able to use the film with your friends, colleagues, students, or organization to begin conversations that will be deep, challenging, and inspiring.” I love that your goal was to spark conversations. So let’s do that.
First, let’s talk about the culture of schooling. What are some of the differences between the culture of schooling, which basically defines modern childhood, and the culture of childhood in a traditional society?
8. In conversations about traditional cultures, it is regularly suggested that those who appreciate their ways are romanticizing traditional cultures, downplaying problems like infant mortality and infectious diseases. What the film brings out so clearly is that maybe we are romanticizing our own culture and our version of education when we export it overseas. We’ve seen through experience that the school structure also brings with it consequences like lasting damage to children’s creativity, and branding so many children as failures. We also often fail to consider the depth, breadth and complexity of the knowledge systems that we are displacing.
I love the point Wade Davis makes at the end of the film: “These peoples, these cultures, are not failed attempts at being us—they are unique answers to the fundamental question, ‘What does it mean to be human and alive?’ Their answers have allowed them to live sustainably on the planet for generations.”
How might we move beyond romanticizing either side of this cultural confrontation and have deeper conversations about how we connect and engage with other cultures around the world?
9. Can you share a bit about what the filming experience was like? Your daughters came along, yes?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Carol’s documentary: Schooling the World (You can watch it free at this link for a limited time—if it’s no longer free, I think it’s worth the purchase to watch!)
EU036: Deschooling with Lauren Seaver
Sep 08, 2016
Lauren Seaver is an unschooling mom to 9-year-old River. She first considered the possibility of homeschooling way back when she was in college to become a teacher. Life took some turns, but a year (and three months!) ago, the opportunity to try out unschooling arose and they haven’t looked back. I met Lauren at the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit in New York earlier this year, and I really enjoyed chatting with her about her deschooling experience so far!
Quote of the Week
“I think my biggest concern was that our unschooling life didn’t match the picture of what unschooling looked like in my mind. I had these unschooling fantasies about what my own personal unschooling path would have looked like if I were unschooled as a child. Letting go of expectations was so huge for me to be able to really relish what was actually happening in our unschooling lives.” ~ Lauren Seaver
Questions for Lauren
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
What was the biggest concern that drove your choice to move to unschooling this last year?
What were some of your fears or uncertainties as you began unschooling?
What has your move to unschooling looked like? Pretty smooth? A few bumps? Have you talked to River specifically about it? Or have you found the changes to be more internal to you, with you choosing to change how you respond to River and the expectations you have of him?
Can you tell us a bit about how your definition of learning has changed since discovering unschooling?
Did you find a difference between understanding the principles of unschooling intellectually and living them day to day?
What changes have you seen in River since leaving school?
What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
What has surprised you most about your journey so far?
EU035: Redefining Success with Jo Isaac
Sep 01, 2016
Jo Isaac is a zoologist turned science writer and unschooling mom to Kai. She, ten-year-old Kai, and her husband Brett, live and learn in Melbourne, Australia. Her path of learning and unschooling has taken a number of interesting twists and turns and I really enjoyed hearing about some of them as we chat about ways we come to redefine success as we embrace unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“The problem with thinking of [Kai’s quieter time right now] as a cocoon phase is that it implies we’re all putting up with this cocoon phase and waiting for him to come out as a butterfly, and everything is going to be okay then at some point in the future. I feel like that’s the same as what’s wrong with the conventional idea of success: you’re always looking down the road waiting for some kind of ideal in the future and missing what’s happening right now.” ~ Jo Isaac
Questions for Jo
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear about what your son is up to. What is he interested in right now? How is he pursuing it?
What was the definition of “success” that you heard growing up? And where have you taken the idea of “success” since?
The shift to seeing college as a choice, rather than a fixed landmark on the conventional path to success, can be challenging. It can feel almost neglectful at first, can’t it?
One of the things I’ve found interesting is how differently the conventional focus on pursuing success in and of itself, and the unschooling focus on pursuing personal goals, play out, for both children and adults. Has that been your experience as well? How is life different now that conventional measures of success no longer play a key role?
School has trained most people to believe that work—and school is presented as work for children—is not fun. That’s what weekends are for. Even in the dictionary, work and fun are antonyms: opposites. I think unschooling turns that idea on its head. Has that been your experience?
Can you share with us a quick overview of what it’s like to unschool in Australia? What are the legalities? Are there active local communities?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question to the Q&A Round Table!
Quote of the Week
“Worrying about the future takes us out of this moment.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
1. I have been unschooling for a year and am loving it. Though my doubts and fears are creeping back since everyone around me is starting school again. I am a beginning deschooler and can’t help to want to be a step ahead in regards to what I can do to help my son in the future.
I was wondering if you had any insight in starting a student, digital portfolio. I have been keeping pictures of things my son does on Evernote but wondered if I should do something else on top of this. The year he was born I bought his first and last name dot com domain (I plan to give it to him as a gift when he is a young adult). I figure that is the future and that it will be a good idea to reserve it should he need it as an adult.
Oh, and by the way, my son is only six years old, haha. I may be over thinking this. LOL!
2. My 17-year-old daughter’s dream is to just be the best gamer. She has had unlimited use of screens since her adoption from Cambodia in 2001 when Gameboys were the thing. I’ve provided her with latest versions of Gameboys as they advanced to two screens, iPods, iPads, gaming, and computers. She has built a mega-computer with multiple screens, learned on her own, with assistance from Google. She has travelled to Hawaii, to spend time with a gaming team she met online and they have a deep, sisterly connection.
My question is, how do I, at 73, not worry about the unlikelihood of her getting a paying job by gaming, when I realise the market is flooded? I’m not chewing my nails over this but the worry is lurking.
3. I live in France with my husband who is American and I am a mother of a wonderful, two-year-old, unschooled-to-be son. I have a question regarding a place I take him to, a place that he loves but which is located in a nursery or kindergarten. It consists of a two mornings a week, session, open to kids and parents from birth to six years old. Kids play there and have lot of fun. There’s no curriculum or programming involved but it does take place inside of a school building.
What is concerning is that my son now associates this place with school. When we walk by during the week and he sees other kids playing outside he wants to go to school and play with them. Is it a good idea to take him to such a place? I really don’t know what to do because on one hand he loves it. He meets friends, I meet parents and it’s a nice atmosphere. But on the other hand, I don’t want to give him a taste of something he’s not going to have. Could you help me with this question?
4. My question would be, how do I get my 14-year-old to relax and make time for herself to explore something else? When I suggest unschooling because she is already anxious about how overloaded she knows she’s going to be in public high school. Her eighth-grade year was so busy; we barely saw her head out of her books. She worked very hard on so much stuff that she just had to memorize to test well. This created a wedge between all of us with her because it was overwhelming for her in addition to the uncharted territory of my first teenager in the house!
I don’t want to lose her again for all of that nonsense. I want her to learn on her own. She is so driven, and interesting, and interested in everything—mainly theatre. I’ve explained that I’d do whatever needed to help her put serious energy into that passion as well as any other she has. I think the system has scared her from leaving. Local families had a hard time digesting that my middle daughter was unschooling. “What does she do all day? How does she learn?”
I worry too many derogatory comments got into my eldest’s head. Plus we live in a very competitive, affluent community. I’m swimming against a rip tide here! I want her home away from the influence of the rat race to nowhere (we watched Race to Nowhere). She’s on the fence, it’s obvious. Just afraid to hop down on her sister’s side. I want to be more connected with her and I fear the intense overload she is heading for is going to have an adverse effect. I’m a very joyful, positive, happy 48-year old just wanting to savour the time we have here on this planet. Minimalist, and never a follower of the herd.
5. Hi. We have two daughters, Talia, age 4, and Naomi, 16 months. We’ve been toying with the idea of unschooling for a while now and I’m excited by the possibilities. However, we wanted to check out the local public school and we went to the open house. She was enthralled and of course wants to go to school and be where all the other kids are. I fear, there’s that word again, she may resent us for keeping her away and yet my husband feels that as parents we are responsible to make the decision based on her best interests.
How do we decide as a family? We have had many conversations with Talia about homeschooling and what it could look like, including being involved in extra curricula’s that she is interested in, like gymnastics, soccer, singing lessons. She also enjoyed a half-day, summer camp for a week recently and we explained that these sorts of activities would be like school for her. She loves all these things and we only put her in activities she has shown she likes and she wants to be there. Yet, she maintains she wants to go to public school. When asked why, her response was, “I like the snacks.” We saw the school kids having their lunch during the open house.
Given her limited understanding of what school truly is and our responsibility as parents to help her thrive I’m unsure about giving her complete autonomy over this decision. However, that seems to go against unschooling philosophy of letting the child lead. I would love your insight and advice.
EU033: Meeting Everyone’s Needs with Gwen Montoya
Aug 18, 2016
Gwen Montoya is an unschooling, single mom to Jamie and Zoe. She is pretty adept at weaving her work as a digital marketing consultant. I enjoy reading snippets of their lives on Facebook, so I was excited when she agreed to chat with me about relationships and the creative ways we can find to meet everyone’s needs as we move through challenges, when we trust each other and work together.
Quote of the Week
“Building the little bits of trust—I mean, it’s not big things that happen; it’s not giant big grand gestures of trust. It’s every single day; it’s little things that build on each other.” ~ Gwen Montoya
Questions for Gwen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear about what your kids are up to. What are they interested in right now? How are they pursuing it?
Can you give us a bit of an idea of the general needs that flow through your days? Are you and your children pretty similar personality-wise, like on the introversion-extroversion scale, or is there a wide range?
When conflicting needs or desires arises, what are some of the ways you work with your kids to explore the roots and parameters of what they’re looking for? Like, if they want to do something and it turns out to be at odds with something else going on, it helps to find out how they feel about waiting a day, or a week and so on. This helps you discover the room you guys have to play with possibilities. What does that process look like for you? Are you more likely to do this individually or together with everyone involved?
Especially when we first get started with unschooling, it can be hard to think beyond the conventional approaches to a problem, which usually means there’s a winner and a loser i.e. taking turns with who gets their way. What tips do you have for people about exploring and brainstorming creative ways to meet everyone’s needs? To find that win-win?
Can you share an example of when you guys were facing conflicting needs and how you found a workable path forward that everyone was reasonably comfortable with?
There’s a high level of trust that develops when everyone’s confident that their needs will be thoughtfully considered and accommodated, isn’t there? In fact, I found that after a while, my kids would notice when their sibling was really invested in something and pretty happily back off. They knew that a time would come when something was super important to them and others would return the favour. Have you found that give and take in your family?
You also have a consulting business you run from home, right? Digital marketing. I’d love to hear a bit about how you weave that into your unschooling lives.
EU032: Choosing School with Alex Polikowsky
Aug 11, 2016
Alex Polikowsky is an unschooling mom to Daniel and Gigi. Her family runs a dairy farm in Minnesota, which adds an interesting dimension to their days! I met Alex when I spoke at the Always Learning Live symposium she hosted in Minneapolis a couple of years ago, and really enjoyed the brief glimpse of life on a dairy farm. I asked Alex to join me to chat about her daughter’s choice to go to school last year and what the experience was like.
Quote of the Week
“I am convinced that the best learning takes place when the learner takes charge.” ~ Seymour Papert
Questions for Alex
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
Your daughter Gigi choose to go to school last year. Can you share how that choice came about? What the motivation behind it was?
Did you have any issues registering her? Did she want to do anything beforehand to prepare?
What did she think of the classroom experience her first week? What did she enjoy? And not enjoy?
How did you guys choose to handle the school’s expectations around homework, tests, and grades?
Looking back, how do you see your unschooling principles continuing to support Gigi while she was in school?
You recently mentioned that your son is applying to go to A level of high school in Japan. How did that come about? And what’s he doing to prepare?
EU031: Ten Questions with Emma Marie Forde
Aug 04, 2016
Emma Marie Forde is unschooling mom to two girls, Lily and Rosa. She’s also the founder of the website, rethinkingparenting.co.uk.
Before having children, Emma was a clinical psychologist, a career that informed her choice to stay home with her own children and which eventually led her and her husband John to choose unschooling for their family. Emma shares her attachment parenting perspective throughout our wide-ranging conversation, and gives us a glimpse of unschooling in England!
Quote of the Week
“It was amazing how many of the assumptions that were challenged for me by having my first daughter. The fact that we did breastfeed for longer, the fact that she was with me most of the time—I hadn’t even anticipated how intense it was going to be, even though I kind of had some idea. It’s been being guided by them, but also working in partnership with them.” ~ Emma Marie Forde
Ten Questions for Emma
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
2. I’d love to hear more about your children. How do they like to spend their days? What are they interested in right now?
3. When Lily approached school age, was she curious about it? Did she have playmates going off to school? I guess Rosa is approaching that age now too. How have you talked with them about it?
4. Can you share with us a quick overview of what it’s like to unschool in England? What are the legalities? Are there active local communities for making connections?
5. I love the article you posted on your website describing unschooling. I’ll link to it in the show notes for people to read in full because you dive into so many different aspects, and include a detailed reference list, but I’d like to dive into a couple of points with you today. The first is that unschooling isn’t child-led learning, but rather a partnership. Can you explain the difference?
6. I’d also like to dive into trusting our children’s intrinsic motivation to learn. That’s so counter to the conventional belief that children don’t like to learn, that they need to be motivated through grades and rewards. How did that trust develop for you?
7. You also wrote a great article about the benefits of play. Unschooling parents are pretty savvy about children learning through play, but can you talk about some of the benefits of parent and child playing together?
8. How do you see your understanding of psychology and your unschooling lifestyle weaving together?
9. What has been one of the more challenging aspects for you on your unschooling journey to this point?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question for the Q&A Round Table episodes!
Quote of the Week
“Whenever we are faced with particularly challenging problems, and we’ve certainly had them, I’m SO grateful for unschooling because I feel like it gives us time and space to breathe, the ability to connect, and to focus on what’s important, which is our relationships with each other.” ~ Anna Brown
Listener Questions
1. We took our son (now 9) out of school 2.5 years ago, and are about 6 months into our unschooling journey, after gradually moving from “school at home,” to “relaxed homeschooling,” and finally letting go of the curriculum altogether.
We have been saying yes more often, and are really enjoying the freedom and closeness that unschooling is giving us. The one thing I am struggling with, though, is food. I haven’t yet felt comfortable enough to completely let go. I’m definitely saying yes more often, but I have a fear that stems from my husband’s struggle with weight, which his entire family seem genetically pre-disposed to.
My son has the same body shape as my husband, carrying around the mid-section. I worry about his health, and have read that these are the formative years as far as future weight issues. I don’t want him to have the same struggles as my husband, but I also don’t want to keep making him feel bad for reaching for that extra biscuit or food late at night. I have been trying to help him make the right choices by explaining healthy eating, and if he really wants something then I wont stop him, we all have a sweet tooth, so there’s generally something in the house.
Am I doing the right thing in saying yes, but pointing out the healthier options?? How can I handle this better?
2. I’ve found there are very few published narratives about hard times, yet when I talk with friends, I feel very comforted by hearing they are struggling with similar issues in their parenting and unschooling journey. I’d love to hear more from your guests about their struggles, particularly the mundane, day-to-day-issues. Unschooling can be hard, especially at moments of transition (from school to unschool, deschooling, age transitions, moves from one place to another, the birth of a new baby, etc.) I’d love to hear how others cope!
3. We have been unschooling for awhile, deschooling for awhile even though my kids have never been in public school and our “homeschool” was very relaxed. Our oldest son is 6. We also have a 4 yr old boy, 2.5 yr old girl, and 1 yr old girl. I have a lot of children that all need attention daily, but our oldest boy is the most intense and high-need of them all and has been since birth—we practiced attachment parenting too.
My question is this: How would you recommend that I handle the outbursts that he has frequently? He’ll yell, threaten to hit (although he doesn’t) and scream and it can go on for a long time. I have tried SO many different “parenting techniques” to try to help him calm down and learn what his body is experiencing but some days I just don’t know what to do to help him and it makes the whole house feel miserable.
I too am still deschooling in various ways and allowing more freedom for the children has helped me calm down and my anger has nearly disappeared—which is nice because I handle his negative reactions with much more nurturance. How are we supposed to allow so many options and choices when it just feels like he continually expects more and explodes when he isn’t given everything at the moment he needs it (this includes my time too)? I have three other children that need my time and honestly, they get the least of it which is draining for me and unfair for them.
As a somewhat separate question: In the last few weeks we have left the TV choices up to them—after listening to several of your podcasts that made so much sense-including how much to watch and they are definitely taking it to what feels like an extreme but we are just going with it! I notice that the more shows he watches, the more he uses the iPad etc, the greater his anger. It is a direct correlation and our other children don’t experience the same feelings after any amount of TV or iPad. We try to show him how it affects his mind and body, but it is tunnel vision for him and then we all feel the after affects of his poor choice to watch too much of anything. Any advice is appreciated.
4. Our kids are nearly 7, 5 and 1 and I would love to unschool them but my husband isn’t convinced yet and I have some fears left too. I thought it might be a good idea to “show” him unschooling in action rather than convincing him to read books about it (which he doesn’t want to do). So we were happily enjoying an unschooling lifestyle for the first few weeks of my daughter’s summer break which was easy because the weather was good and we were all relaxed. Everyone loved it, even my husband.
But then some challenges came up, financial worries and stress at work for my husband. We started arguing and discussing things. On top of that our toddler was teething and we didn’t get any sleep at night. I wasn’t able to attend to my kid’s needs as well anymore which caused them to be upset and behave badly. That started a vicious cycle of slipping back into mainstream parenting techniques which made everything worse.
Now it feels like we are back to the beginning and I don’t know how to build up our trusting relationship again which had just started to develop. I’m afraid that I can only be a good unschooling mother as long as things go well and I’m not stressed or worried. How do unschoolers cope with life’s challenges without putting their kid’s needs second?
5. I have 3 small kids 6, 4 & 1.5 and I’ve been radically unschooling for about 9 months. My 6 year old only attended JK part time for 1 year.
I have a couple of questions about how to handle certain situations more gracefully with my 2 older kids. The first is how do I handle supporting them through situations I’m uncomfortable with especially as it relates to animals. Eg. We watched a butterfly cocoon & when it hatched she played with it until it passed. Same with a frog she caught. It makes me really sad to watch these beautiful insects & animals die and I understand she’s learning from the experience however it’s our disagreement in this area that negatively impacts our relationship. Any suggestions on how I can kindly navigate through this exploration with her?
Next, I have a very passionate 6 year old girl. When she believes she’s right she will challenge me. When I attempt to correct her (in the hopes that she’ll learn something from our exchange) she becomes angry & even more firm. Eg. Recently, she argued with me about the details of a particular show or how the butterfly above needs her to give it flying lessons.
I want to be there for her without judgement or fear but these are the areas I get “stuck” in.
6. I’m a mom to three children, ages 16, 14 and 11. We are on our fifth year of unschooling my two younger children, who are both boys. My oldest, who is a girl, chooses to got to school.
Both of my sons had behavior problems in school from day one, and both were asked to leave the public school and were put into the special education programs. We were not aware of unschooling at the time, and didn’t pull them out of school until they had been in the system for a few years. My daughter has had no problems with school and actually tried unschooling for a few months, but decided it wasn’t for her.
Unfortunately, my husband isn’t super supportive of unschooling and often worries aloud how our sons are “spending too much time on the computer,” or “aren’t socializing enough,” or “aren’t learning basic math skills.”
My sons pick up on these mixed messages and sometimes feel as though they are “less than” because they are unschooled.
When we discuss the merit of unschooling vs attending school as a family, I often find myself discussing the negative aspects of school and my daughter gets very upset.
My question is, how can verbally support their unschooling experience without diminishing my daughter’s choice to attend school?
EU029: What Learning Looks Like with Meredith Novak
Jul 21, 2016
Meredith is unschooling mom to Morgan and stepmom to Ray. Meredith has been active online in unschooling groups for years and I’ve enjoyed reading her writing for many of those. In this episode, we chat about what learning looks like with unschooling. It’s a big topic, and big episode. I hope you enjoy it!
Quote of the Week
“It could be said that unschooling has a recipe, but it’s not a recipe about unschooling. It’s a recipe about human nature. About people and relationships.” ~ Meredith Novak
Questions for Meredith
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
The vast majority of unschooling parents come from a school background, me included, so that’s what learning looks like to us when we first start learning about unschooling. So I thought it would be helpful to compare and contrast what learning looks like in the school system and with unschooling. I came up with five aspects to compare that I think will be helpful.
Comparison #1: school’s focus on teaching vs unschooling’s focus on learning
One of the first things people new to unschooling are encouraged to do is to shift their perspective from teaching to learning. Why is this such an important shift when we want to learn about unschooling?
Comparison #2: school’s focus on curriculum vs unschooling’s focus on curiosity
With unschooling, children are encouraged to, and actively supported as, they follow their interests, rather than a set curriculum. What advantages have you seen to learning this way?
One of the concerns people often mention is that there is a general set of knowledge and skills needed to get along in their community and world, and how will they learn them if they’re just doing what they want? How do you answer that one?
Comparison #3: school’s focus on the compulsory school years vs unschooling’s focus on lifelong learning
Unschooling and the concept of lifelong learning weave together so tightly, and leaving behind the idea that childhood is for learning and adulthood is for living can have a profound impact on everyone in an unschooling family, parents included. Have you found that to be true?
Comparison #4: school’s focus on the child to adapting to the classroom environment vs unschooling’s focus on the child’s learning style
What are some of the advantages you see for children who are learning outside the classroom?
Comparison #5: school’s focus on testing vs unschooling’s focus on being with the child
A common question from people trying to wrap their mind around unschooling is: If we aren’t testing them, how do we know they’re learning?
While conventional wisdom tells us that children resist learning and need to motivated to do it, unschooling parents see something very different. Why don’t unschooled kids hate learning?
One of the challenges newer unschooling parents sometimes encounter is interpreting the actions of experienced unschoolers as a set “rules for unschooling.” But unschooling doesn’t have a recipe, does it?
I’d love to talk about choice for a moment. I think one of the key aspects at the root of learning through unschooling is giving our children the space and support to make the choices that they think will work for them. What’s your perspective on the importance of choice?
One theme that has come up pretty regularly on the podcast is that, in the end, unschooling thrives when we have strong, connected, and trusting relationships with our children. You recently wrote something I loved: “It may help to step back from the idea that parenting is a job. It’s a relationship, first and foremost.” Can you expand on that?
EU028: Unschooling Worries with Jen Armstrong
Jul 14, 2016
Jen is unschooling mom to Joseph, soon to be sixteen. She’s also recently returned to the world of work as a Child Life Specialist. I’ve know Jen for years, having first met her online, and then in person at various unschooling gatherings. I’ve always loved her perspective on the unschooling lifestyle and I had a great time chatting with her about her journey and diving into some of the challenges we have encountered along the way.
Quote of the Week
“The things you think about determine the quality of your mind. Your soul takes on the color of your thoughts. What stands in the way becomes the way.” ~ Marcus Aurelius
Questions for Jen
Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear a bit more about Joseph. What is he interested in right now? How is he pursuing it? When you look back, can you see how that interest developed?
We’re chatting about worries this week, so can you share some of the worries that came up for you as you moved to unschooling?
When we first get started, our children’s days are SO different than the conventional childhood, and while we have enough of an idea about unschooling that we chose to get started, we’re still busy learning so much. We don’t have our own understanding or experience to fall back on when questions and worries bubble up. Some describe this time as feeling like jumping off a cliff. How would you describe that feeling? What did you rely on during that time to help you keep moving forward toward the other side?
When a worry or challenge pops up in our unschooling lives, it can trigger a fight or flight response, or sometimes the urge jump in and fix it immediately. So often these feelings are based in fear and projecting this moment into the future, but that can be hard to recognize in the moment. I’d love to hear your perspective on how you learned to recognize when fears are involved.
Once you’ve recognized that your own fears, worries, or issues are wrapped up in a situation and clouding your perspective, how do you begin to untangle them?
I think most, if not all, unschooling parents have gone through times when they found themselves questioning whether they were doing enough, whether they were creating a solid unschooling environment for their child, or children. Have you experienced that worry over the years? How did you move through it?
Another challenge that many unschooling parents experience revolves around their spouse or partner. Usually one parent will take the lead in unschooling and parenting, which means they’ll be learning deeply about it and be more actively engaged with the unschooling child or children, getting comfortable with the lifestyle. That dynamic often leaves the spouse or partner feeling disconnected and out of the loop. Can you share your experience with this?
For me, the transition from deschooling to unschooling was pretty seamless. In fact, I think part of deschooling is getting to a place where you no longer worry about getting to “unschooling.” You’re living life together as a family, and you’ve come to see that we’re all always learning, and we’re all always growing and changing. How would you describe your transition from the actively learning phase of deschooling to the living phase of unschooling?
EU027: Ten Questions with Teresa Graham Brett
Jul 07, 2016
Teresa Graham Brett is an unschooling mom to two boys, Martel and Greyson. She’s also author of the book, Parenting for Social Change.
Teresa’s background as a social justice educator brings a unique and interesting slant to her journey to unschooling. In this episode, she shares some great stories and the fascinating insights she has gleaned along the way. Of course, the journey never ends, we’re always learning. And in that vein, we talk about adultism, the conventional obsession with control over children, ways to move to more supportive parenting, and much more.
Quote of the Week
“Being responsible for the care of a child doesn’t require control—it requires being in connection, and being a partner, and being a facilitator.” ~ Teresa Graham Brett
Ten Questions for Teresa
Can you share with us a bit about your family, and how you came to unschooling?
I’d love to hear more about your unschooling kids. What are they interested in right now? How are they pursuing it? How did that interest come about?
You have written on your blog about the concept of adultism. Can you explain how you define it and give us a couple of examples?
One of the consequences of adultism and looking at life through an adult-centric filter is that we often see children as “adults-in-training.” You have a great section about that in your book. Can you share what you see as the implications of that perspective? And how can we move away from it?
In the book, you also make a great distinction between power and control. And you emphasize that, “letting go of control doesn’t mean we abdicate our responsibility to care for the children in our lives.” How do those ideas all weave together?
As people come to unschooling, they usually have a lot of questions surrounding “screen time,” or, I like your phrase, media access. I think that’s because the dominant cultural story is all about how dangerous it is: addictive, violent, mind-numbing, creativity-sucking. Can you share your story?
You identify a number of tools that parents can use as they shift from controlling parenting to supportive parenting. There are three I’d love if you could touch on for us: accepting our feelings; mindfulness; and awareness. Can you describe what they are and how they can help us shift away from the impulse to control?
You book is titled, Parenting for Social Change. Here’s a short quote I love from the book: “By the simple, but often challenging, act of redefining our relationships with children, we can begin the process of creating profound social change.” Can you talk about the social change aspect?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects for you on your unschooling journey so far?
Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Anne Ohman and Anna Brown, both veteran unschooling parents, join me to answer listener questions. Click here to submit your own question for the Q&A Round Table episodes!
Quote of the Week
“Shift out of the fear by going to your child and connecting with her over what makes her light up right now in this moment.” ~ Anne Ohman
Listener Questions
1. Hello! I’ve been listening to the podcast for a while as well as immersing myself in unschooling resources. I’ve been slowly applying unschooling principles such as focusing on connection and partnership to my relationship with my children.
However, one thing is really tough for me. I find myself at a loss of ideas sometimes when it comes to finding interesting ideas when my children (10 and 12) tell me that they are bored. So many of the blogs I read are so colorful and creative, I’m not quite sure I can keep up! My kids don’t seem to be very interested in my ideas and I’m a bit discouraged.
I would like to find creative solutions to problems too, but I find my mind keeps on going back to old tried and true ways of thinking. I’m afraid I might not be creative enough to be an unschooling mother!
Do you have any tips for being inspired when you just can’t think of anything? I feel like rather a boring mum!
2. We brought our two kids home from traditional school three years ago, and have been homeschooling since then. Our kids are now 12 and 10 and we are a couple of months into exploring unschooling! We are currently expats living in the Middle East but plan on returning to Canada in the next year or two. Our hope is to buy an RV and become a full time RV family, partly stationed in our home city, and partially traveling. Living simply, owning less, and staying out of debt are also things we feel really passionate about, and we are trying to figure it out alongside unschooling.
What are your thoughts about creating a really rich learning environment in a small space? For example, what if one of our children is really into music and we don’t have space for a piano? Or they love painting and we don’t have space for an art studio? (Or even a big easel!) While I think their exposure to the world has been amazing living overseas and travelling, and will continue to be as we travel in the future, I sometimes wonder if we are limiting them by limiting our physical space. Any insight for us?
3. We have been unschooling for one year but have only recently (as in the past few weeks) begun loosening control over food.
My 7-year-old daughter is very drawn to sweet foods. Ever since I’ve been allowing more free rein over food choices, she seems to constantly be in the kitchen, going through cupboards, looking for a cookie or some other sweet thing, or saying she is going to make a peanut butter and honey sandwich (even though we just ate a meal). It really seems like she just has this insatiable craving for sugar.
Could this be a deschooling period for us? What I mean is, perhaps we are “deschooling” not from school, but from conventional parenting on the food issue? Do I need to absolutely allow her complete and total freedom to have literally as much candy and sweets as she wants and then trust that her obsession will mellow out over time? It seems so scary for me because I have strived to be a parent who offers them a healthy diet for so many years now; I worry that it is irresponsible and it just seems very unhealthy for a person to consume so much sugar.
On the other hand, part of me is wondering if, in addition to her innate love of sweet things, she is also testing/exploring this new change in our household. Unschooling has proven to be a very successful and rewarding experience for my entire family. So there is a part of me that is curious to see if it can work out just as well with the food issue, if only I can find the confidence to go for it. Any insight or advice?
4. I recently brought my son home to homeschool. He is being treated for depression, has some personal stuff going on, and is addicted to watching YouTube. Its only been 4 weeks but I wonder how long to let him deschool and what I should insist he do. He has some executive function issues as well.
5. I wonder if you could talk a bit about “cocooning,” which I know is common in pre-teens/early teens, and your experience of the emergence into butterflies? One hears a lot about active, confident unschooling teens out there in the “real world” but so far this hasn’t been our experience, other than online. My daughter is 12 and we’ve been unschooling for a year and a half and it’s been fantastic, she’s doing all sorts of great stuff at home and socializes a lot online, but apart from special events or holidays and seeing family & close friends occasionally, she’s been “cocooning” for much of that time. I completely understand why and have very much been supporting her with it, trusting that this will not hold her back ultimately, but I do worry sometimes about how or whether the process of stepping out of her comfort zone to make the most of the many resources and opportunities in our area will evolve. If you could share your experiences or those of others you know, of this cocooning phase and the emergence into butterflies, it would be much appreciated.
6. I’m wondering if the panel can comment on the experience of encouraging a spouse to embrace this lifestyle. In my family I am the one who lead the way down our unschooling path. My husband has been amazingly open-minded and supportive thus far! Both of us were very confident about unschooling the academic stuff. However, as I have been recently attempting to relax restrictions on food, he is expressing concern. It is such a departure from the way we’ve always been with the kids (striving to offer nutritious foods and limiting sweets/desserts to quite a large extent). It concerns him deeply to see our daughter now helping herself to chocolate and other sweet things frequently. I do understand where he’s coming from, as this is very uncommon in our society. But I can easily see the wisdom in letting children gain experience in making these kinds of choices for themselves. Any thoughts?
Jennie is mom to three children, ages 6 and under, and they’ve been unschooling for a couple of years now—or more specifically, deschooling. Jennie and I have chatted on and off over that time, and she is actively working to shed the control and punishment she grew up with and not pass it on to her kids. I had a great time diving into deschooling with her!
As she mentions in the episode, she’s interested in hearing other people’s experiences with their relationships with their spouse/partner as they are deschooling—please feel free to share in the comments.
Quote of the Week
“Our greatness lies not so much in being able to remake the world as being able to remake ourselves.” ~ Mahatma Gandhi
Questions for Jennie
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family and how you first came across the idea of unschooling?
2. What were some of your bigger fears or uncertainties as you first began unschooling? And what do they look like now?
3. What has your family’s move to unschooling looked like? Did you try to do it wholesale, or are you tackling a couple of changes at a time? Have you talked to your kids specifically about it? Or has the shift been more internal, with you changing how you respond to your kids and the expectations you have of them?
4. How has your relationship with your spouse been during this transition, or deschooling, period?
5. I think a big piece of deschooling for many of us often turns out to be shedding the control and punishment paradigm that we grew up with, and that’s definitely a process. When you falter, how do you recover? Have you found a pattern to those moments?
6. How do you handle the daily challenges that come with having three children of different ages, temperaments, and interests?
7. What are some of the little things you do during the day to release any growing frustration and recharge your own energy?
8. What’s been the hardest part of your unschooling journey so far?
EU024: Growing Up Unschooling with Roya Dedeaux
Jun 16, 2016
Roya Dedeaux left school at age ten and her family began unschooling. Now an adult, she has a Master’s degree in Counseling and is a Marriage and Family Therapist Intern, as well as a lecturer at California State University. She’s also married with a wonderful child of her own, and a busy life of fun and diverse interests.
In this episode, we talk about her transition from to school to unschooling, her experience taking college courses as a teen, her appreciation for her parents’ enthusiastic support as she dove deeply into her interests, her advice for unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey, and much more!
Quote of the Week
“As we get older and our kids grow up, we eventually come to realize that all the big things in our lives are really the direct result of how we’ve handled all the little things.” ~ Pam Sorooshian, Roya’s mom
Questions for Roya
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. The unschooling lifestyle is a pretty unconventional one, which can sometimes be both awesome and challenging in turn. Were there things you found challenging over the years, and if so, what were some of the things you guys tried to work through them?
3. What stands out for you as you look back on your unschooling years? What, from your perspective now, do you most appreciate about living an unschooling lifestyle growing up?
4. The conventional parent-child dynamic is pretty steeped in power and control, but unschooling encourages a different dynamic. Can you share a bit about what was your relationship with your parents was like growing up? And now as an adult?
5. Your Bachelor of Arts degree is in Recreation and Leisure Studies. What drew you to that field of study? Did it grow out of existing interests?
6. How did you find the shift from unschooling to college classes? What were the challenges and the advantages you saw?
7. What drew you to pursue a Master’s degree in counseling?
8. There’s a lovely column you wrote for The Homeschooler Post titled “Honoring Your Child’s Creativity.” The story you share about the reactions you get from your college students when you ask them what they did for fun that week, is so telling, and you also had some great tips on fostering creativity. Can you share the story and your suggestions?
9. Have you found that your unschooling lifestyle growing up has influenced your work as a therapist?
10. As grown unschooler, what piece of advice would you like to share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU023: Learning to Read in Their Own Time with Anne Ohman
Jun 09, 2016
Anne Ohman is a long-time unschooling mom and Library Director at a small, rural library in New York state. She has been writing about unschooling since 1998, and has a been student of her children since they were born. She is the founder of the Shine with Unschooling community, and co-host (with me!) of the Childhood Redefined Unschooling Summit.
In this episode, Anne shares her perspective on why children at school are expected to learn to read early, why unschooling children who aren’t yet reading aren’t “lacking” anything, how they play with the puzzle of reading every day by living in the world, and so much more!
Quote of the Week
“What is most important and valuable about the home as a base for children’s growth into the world is not that it is a better school than the schools, but that it isn’t a school at all.” ~ John Holt
Questions for Anne
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family and how you came to unschooling?
2. School, and by extension society, is laser-focused on children learning to read as early as possible. As a library director and unschooling parent, I’d love to hear your perspective on how you’ve seen these reading expectations play out.
3. I’ve really enjoyed the stories you’ve shared on Facebook about schooled children at the library and how their outlook on reading has changed since you started there. Can you share some of those stories?
4. Our society is so caught up in reading by a certain age that if a child isn’t reading by then, most adults in their lives seem to focus on that missing piece. Why do you think that is?
5. Let’s talk about how our kids have learned without reading!
6. Something that has struck me over the years is how unschooling children are more apt to call themselves readers once they are comfortably reading adult-level books. Have you seen this too?
7. Have you had anyone judge your kids for not being able to read?
8. How do you feel now about Sam’s journey to reading as you look back on it today?
EU022: Ten Questions with Lainie Liberti
Jun 02, 2016
Lainie Liberti is mom to 16 year-old Miro. They backed into unschooling in 2009 through what was meant to be a one-year mother-and-son backpacking trip. Now in their seventh year of travelling, Lainie is co-producer and host of the weekly online show, For the Love of Learning: Voices of the Alternative Education Movement, and she and Miro host Project World School, inspiring temporary learning communities / retreats around the world for teens and young adults. They also recently gave a talk at TEDx Amsterdam, an independently organized TED event focused on education, whose theme this year was “born to learn.”
Quote of the Week
“Travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.” ~ Miriam Beard
Ten Questions for Lainie
Can you share with us a bit about you and Miro, how you found yourselves unschooling, and decided to continue travelling?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of your unschooling journey so far?
What has been one of the more challenging aspects of your travelling journey so far?
You and Miro identify more with the term worldschooling, and I love how you distinguish between unschooling and worldschooling. You describe your day-to-day lives as radical unschooling, with Miro’s self-directed learning being interest-led. But that there’s also the learning that comes from your travel experiences, immersive learning that’s not necessarily driven by interest, but rather by your environment. Can you talk about that distinction?
I’m sure you have lots of wonderful stories from your worldschooling travels! Can you share one of your favourites?
I really enjoyed being a guest on an episode of For the Love of Learning about attachment parenting. You’ve been hosting the mostly weekly show for over a year now. Can you share with us something you’ve learned that has stayed with you?
When asked about travelling, you’ve written, “My travel advice to you is about the journey inward.” That sounds similar to the roots of the unschooling journey. Can you explain what you mean by that?
In April, you and Miro gave a talk at an education-focused TEDx event in Amsterdam. It was titled, “Unschooling: making the world our classroom.” I watched it and LOVED it! I’ll include the link for everyone in the show notes. Can you tell us about the experience?
What inspired you and Miro to create Project World School? And what kind of feedback have you been getting from past participants?
Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
“How could youth better learn to live than by at once trying the experiment of living?” ~ Henry David Thoreau
Summary of Listener Questions
1. My daughter is 12 and in year 7 of high school. She is coming along nicely with her work, but is finding it hard to understand the social side of things as she is autistic. On top of this she is being bullied. We have been in school with this, but if it doesn’t stop I’m considering a school change or even home schooling. I am a little apprehensive about this for many reasons, but the main one is what will be best for her. I have a million questions and don’t know who to talk to about it. Has anybody been in a similar situation? Is there any help for me in making sure my daughter receives the education she needs? I don’t want to let her down and she be behind.
2. My concerns are around my daughter (she is 3), she goes straight to the computer when she wakes up and starts surfing ‘youtube’, I can see she enjoys the different types of storytelling she finds but I often wonder if she will be constantly interested in youtube as there is SO many interesting things that get suggested to her. She doesn’t seem to initiate getting off the computer unless she has no choice, i.e I need it for work, which is rare. When she is not on the computer she loves all types of play and spending time outside but she doesn’t initiate any of these activities once she has started on the computer. I offer myself and games I know she enjoys but she rarely takes me up on it. I also sit with her and watch when I can get a chance. So how do I work out if this is a genuine interest, or is she going there by default and getting stuck there, or is this a reaction to my previous views and controlling of screentime? I guess I want to know how I can tell if my environment is engaging enough/offering her enough choices and how other people go about setting up their home environment.
3. Could you address unschooling and depression. In my case, specifically maternal depression, which I try to embrace as it’s likely my kids will have to slog through challenges of being a human living in modern society while also on spinning planet earth, and I believe it is helpful for us to be real with each other, and to acknowledge the work it takes to truly pursue happiness.
However, there are times that my depression is sufficiently debilitating and my unschooling begins to border on neglect, though I fiercely work to prevent this and assure their surTHRIVEal. I am hopeful there are other parents who, with their sage perspective and years of experience, could reflect on this topic, and ideally reassure me that, as usual, everything WILL be alright!
4. My family has been unschooling for 2 years, and we’ve been saying “yes” more and more, whenever we can. Yes to getting messy, yes to staying up, yes to ice cream! So far, it has just been little things (like food or stuffed animals or going to the park) that the girls (5 and 7) have asked for. I love how close I am with my kids when they know that I am on their side and will help them with their goals.
Today my partner asked me: what is a good way to answer the children if they ever ask us to buy them expensive things? As the girls’ world grows I’m sure one day they will. My partner comes from a well-off family, so something a bit more expensive would be within our means. Our family has always lived a pretty simple lifestyle (my spouse and I like it this way), but it doesn’t seem right to keep any part of reality, including our financial situation, a secret from children who are learning about the world.
Knowing my children, they wouldn’t feel good about an explanation like “I’m trying to teach you the meaning of money” or “I don’t want you to grow up to be spoiled” if they ask me for expensive toys. We love the relationship with our girls unschooling has given us, and we want them to know we are there for them! But we want them to grow up grounded about money. What can we say?
5. I am an unschooling mom of three kids. I was inspired by Pam Sorooshian’s discussion of tv and screen time. It is a topic I’m very interested in and have wrestled with a lot. After absorbing the ideas in that episode, I made some changes that have had a very positive effect! Specifically, I’ve joined my kids in what they were watching and started to get into it and excited about it with them, appreciating how it made them laugh or was interesting to them. My children are young: 7, 5, and 3. My question is—how does the “no limits on screen time” idea work with very young children. Did any of you veteran unschoolers do this from birth on, or is there an age when it seemed more appropriate to allow free rein on this particular issue?
6. I am the mother of a daughter, 8 years old. I’m now pregnant with my second, and there’s a chance the baby will be born with Down Syndrome. I am worried sick, and some information may help me. Is it possible to unschool a child with a developmental disability? The information I have been reading recommends lots of therapy, and dietary control since children with Down Syndrome are prone to obesity. After seeing my daughter flourish with unschooling, I’d love to give the same to this future child.
EU020: Unschooling as Alternative Education with Carlo Ricci
May 19, 2016
Dr. Carlo Ricci is a graduate studies professor in the Schulich School of Education at Nipissing University in Ontario Canada and dad to two daughters, ages 11 and 13, who have both unschooled and chosen to go to school over the years. His research focus and teaching includes unschooling, self-directed learning, reading, free schooling, and democratic education. He founded and edits the Journal of Unschooling and Alternative Learning, is the author of The Willed Curriculum, Unschooling, and Self-Direction: What Do Love, Trust, Respect, Care, and Compassion Have To Do With Learning, and co-edited both The Legacy of John Holt and Natural Born Learners.
In this episode, Carlo shares his perspective on learning to read naturally, how he approaches his daughters choosing to go to school, some of the differences between unschooling and democratic schools, how he would re-envision childhood in our society, and much more.
It’s a fun ride!
Quote of the Week
“A number of parents, perhaps half a dozen or so, have written to me to say that one or more of their children have chosen to go back to school. They sound a little apologetic about this, as if they thought they had betrayed “the cause.” But there is nothing at all to feel apologetic about. In the first place, unschooling is not a “cause.” Our interest is not in causes but in children and their growth, their learning, and their happiness.” ~ John Holt
Questions for Carlo
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. How did you discover unschooling?
3. A few years ago you spoke at the Toronto Unschooling Conference about learning to read naturally. Can you share some of your thoughts behind how people learn to read on their own, at different ages?
4. One of the phrases I’ve heard you use regularly over the years is, “children are capable.” I love how it so concisely conveys the idea that children aren’t blank slates that need to be taught everything, but are born curious, creative, and able to learn. Can you talk about the inspiration behind it?
5. One of the unexpected but wonderful things about unschooling’s wider perspective on lifelong learning is how often we learn from our children. Can you share a couple of things you’ve learned over the years from your children?
6. What has your daughter’s choice to go to school looked like? How do you continue to bring your unschooling perspective on living and learning into your days with school in the mix?
7. Over the years I’ve seen democratic schools described as “unschooling schools” any number of times, yet I think there are some distinct differences between the two environments. What are some of the differences you see?
8. You’re the editor of the Journal of Unschooling and Alternative Learning, published through Nipissing University, which is coming up on its ten-year anniversary! Congratulations! Through it, you publish a wide range of peer-reviewed articles from around the world. What’s been your favourite part of that experience? What kind of feedback do you receive from readers?
9. If you had a magic wand, how would you re-envision childhood in our society?
Carlo’s talks from the Toronto Unschooling Conference can be found here: TUC Talks (scroll down to his name and you’ll find his three talks)
EU019: Playing with Our Children with Jody Lilley
May 12, 2016
Jody Lilley is an unschooling mom to three children, ages five to eleven. I’ve known Jody for years through unschooling conferences, and I reached out to her to chat about play because the pictures she posts online of her children at play always make me smile so big. It’s not so much that they’re busy doing lots of things, but that she captures such joy and engagement in her children even in the ordinary moments, like colouring, or playing with their toys.
In this episode, Jody shares stories about her chocolate epiphany, what she learned from a creative car enthusiast, and whittling by a winter campfire. We also chat about the creative ways she uses space in her home, the motivation behind her wonderful pictures of her children at play, and some of the ways she enjoys playing with her children.
Quote of the Week
“Fun is easy. It’s wherever you are, in whatever you are doing or sensing or thinking. It’s between you and the person you’re with or the machine you’re using or the table you’re sitting at or the path you’re walking down. It’s not something to strive for. But something to melt into, to sink into, to open up to. Fun isn’t the hard thing. The hard thing is letting yourself have it …” ~ Bernie De Koven
Questions for Jody
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. How did you discover unschooling? What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. There are two aspects of play I’d like to touch on: there’s the value of play itself and how we can support that, and there’s the value of parents engaging and connecting with our children through playing together. First, let’s focus on supporting our children’s play. As we come to unschooling, we know that play is fun, but we discover that so much real, deep learning is wrapped up in there as well. Was the connection between play and learning something you got instinctively? Or was it something you figured out as you as part of your unschooling journey?
4. I had so much fun looking through your pictures on Facebook of your kids at play as I prepared for the interview! How have you set up your home to support your children’s play?
5. I noticed that sometimes you guys also go out to play. I saw pictures from a trip to a ski hill, indoor skydiving, tobogganing, and a winter campfire. Are all of your children usually up for going out? Or do you guys usually have some back and forth conversations to come up with a plan around the outing that works for everyone?
6. I think a part of the journey is taking the time to notice our children’s fun, rather than just thinking, almost dismissively, “the kids are playing” and going about our own business. You have so many great pictures of your kids having fun and playing around the house, from tie-dying t-shirts to drawing to ribbon battles to building a computer to making candy, and the other day a stuffed puppy mud bath! Do you find that taking pictures helps you notice these joyful moments? Does taking note of them help you feel more comfortable about unschooling?
7. Now let’s shift to the value of us parents engaging and connecting WITH our children through play. Can you share some of the ways that you play with your children?
8. Many of us learned growing up that rules are hard and fast and changing them is tantamount to cheating. So changing the rules can be something that makes us uncomfortable. Yet changing the rules until everybody who wants to play can play is a great way not only to engage with our kids, but to learn even more about what makes them tick. It’s something children seem to do instinctively when they don’t have a history of fixed and unbending rules—I remember being amazed at the inventive ways my kids morphed games. This was a big paradigm shift for me that really helped me more easily play with them—it really isn’t about the rules. Everything opened up from there. Have you seen your children playing around with the rules?
9. And finally, do you have any tips for parents about ways to get more comfortable playing with their children?
EU018: Ten Questions with Jennifer McGrail
May 05, 2016
Jennifer McGrail is a long-time unschooling mom to four lovely children, blogger at The Path Less Taken, and host of the Free to Be unschooling conference. This week I had a wonderful conversation with her, touching on the topics of burnout and self-care, the disconnect between how adults treat other adults and how they treat children, the concept of natural consequences, hosting the Free to Be unschooling conference, and more!
Quote of the Week
“Start with love and respect and all the good things follow—it is not magic, and it is a lot of hard work, especially at the beginning.” ~ Marina DeLuca-Howard
Ten Questions for Jennifer
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
2. I’d love to hear more about your unschooling kids. What are they interested in right now? How are they pursuing it? How did that interest come about?
3. What has been one of the more challenging aspects of your unschooling journey so far?
4. You’re well-known for taking on parenting stories that are making the rounds on social media and sharing a wonderfully fresh view of the situation through the lens of unschooling and gentle parenting.
You recently wrote a blog post titled, “I’m Not the Meanest Mom,” in reaction to a Facebook post making the rounds from a self-proclaimed “meanest mom” in which the mom shared that when her children didn’t say thank you to the server for their ice cream cones, she threw them away. Your list of what children are actually learning in these kinds of situations was great! Can you share that with us?
5. On your blog, you mentioned that one of the questions you get a lot is “If I don’t spank, what do I do?” How do you answer that?
6. Another idea that comes up pretty often around parenting without punishment is natural consequences. I think it can be confusing though, because I pretty regularly see examples of parents setting up their kids for “natural” consequences, almost wanting things to go wrong. But if parents have to set them up to fail, that seems rather artificial to me. What’s your perspective?
7. With unschooling, we choose to actively help our children pursue their goals. We’re a team, working together. So when they ask to do things, together we can often find a way to say yes, or some workable version, but sometimes, things just don’t work out. And sometimes things just aren’t under our control. I’d love to talk with you about things we can say to our children when things don’t work out and they are having a hard time.
8. You host the Free to Be unschooling conference in Phoenix, Arizona. Can you share what inspired you to start it?
9. Can you talk about some of the things an unschooling family might get out of attending an unschooling conference? What kind of feedback do you get from attendees?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
Anna Brown joins me to answer listener questions! Thanks to everyone who has shared their questions, I’m sure many listeners have gotten so much out of it.
“Knowledge emerges only through invention and re-invention, through the restless, impatient, continuing, hopeful inquiry human beings pursue in the world, with the world, and with each other.” ~ Paulo Freire
Listener Questions
1. We’re radical unschooling with a three-year-old. I found your discussion of family visits to be really helpful (I think episode 4): briefing and debriefing, taking seemingly critical comments and questions playfully, etc. My daughter is prone to meltdowns. Sometimes just because we couldn’t understand what she said or something’s frustrating her she can’t get words out and get really upset and needs to be by herself. It makes it harder with family because these tend to be preceded by a mild loss of control–like screaming at someone that she wants something. And their response is to ask her to say please, but often by that time she’s already frustrated and has a meltdown, and some of my family members will persist in trying to make her say please even when she can’t get words out. I’ve already made a really conscious decision that it’s worth it to visit family, she really loves being with them generally, but how do I reduce this stress? It’s so hard on her. In the moment I can go with her in a quiet room to recover, but I’d like to try to coach family members to prevent these happening in the first place.
2. This is a second question about my 3-year-old. We are radical unschooling in the sense that she makes decisions about food and bedtime and clothes and baths and we give her information about those choices, and try to think of options that work for everyone. One of the last things I’ve been forcing is nail trimming. She’s really scared of it, and when her nails are too long I usually have a kind of stand off where I talk to her about it and won’t do anything else until she lets me trim them. But I’m currently trying out letting this be in her control. The result is that her nails are really long and breaking in a couple places. I don’t think she wants her nails to be long, and I try to talk to her about that, but she tells me she scared to cut them. I’ve tried asking her how to make it less scary but don’t get a response. I’m not really sure what direction to go next!
3. I really enjoyed listening to the podcast episode with Brie Jontry talking about unschooling a child with chronic illness (episode 11). We have been unschooling for three years and I am definitely still deschooling! We don’t have chronic illness in our house, but my 8 year old son as well as myself have chronic tooth decay tendencies which can be kept under control by following a very similar diet to one you would ideally follow with Type 1 Diabetes, minus the insulin. For several years I did tightly control his diet in this way (as I do my own) because we do not have dental insurance and do not have the money to pay for expensive dental work, I know of site that give help, click here to read more. I’ve recently had conversations with him apologizing for my control, telling him that I respect him, explaining how our food choices really do affect our teeth, and that Mommy and Daddy don’t have the money to pay for more big dental work. I told him that he has the freedom to make his own choices with food now, and asked him to honor what he knows about his body and our finances in his choices. I made sure to add that he’s worth all the money at the dentist, just that I don’t have it! Ha! He is not wanting to honor these things, which makes me believe there is some healing that needs to take place in his heart from the years of being so controlled. He also seems to be angry for the very fact that his body is this way and doesn’t want to accept it. What wisdom would you offer to me about facilitating healing, and shutting down the fear in my own heart as I see him reaching for foods that to me look like dollar signs and credit card debt at the dentist?
4. Can you talk a little about how unschooling with an only child is different from unschooling of siblings?
5. I have a question about evaluations. In our state, we are required to have a yearly evaluation. My concern is that we have been deschooling. I have an 11 yr old and a 13 yr old. The first couple months were challenging to us to let go of the “old model.” After a few weeks we were able to finally let it go, and my girls have been really enjoying their free time to stay up late, sleep in, watch a lot of tv, and draw. It has been 7 months since we decided to unschool, probably more like 5 if you consider our “sticky” start. We need to have an evaluation in a couple months and I do not know how to prepare for this or what to expect. My kids have been resistant to anything that appears like school work or projects. They watch a lot of TV, and definitely learn a lot from the shows they watch, but I’m just not sure how this transfers into the evaluations. Do you have any suggestions for us?
EU016: Supporting Unschooling Teens with Jenny Cyphers
Apr 21, 2016
Jenny Cyphers is a long-time unschooling mom of two daughters, ages 14 and 22. After reading her answers to unschooling questions online for years, I was delighted to get a chance to chat with Jenny about the teen years. We talk about trust, rebellion, patience, comfort zones, honesty, communication, and just how much we love our teens and young adults as real people.
Quote of the Week
“Scientific research shows unequivocally that the cognitive abilities of teens are, on average, superior to the cognitive abilities of adults. Reasoning ability peaks in the early or mid teens, for example, and so does intelligence. Most memory functions peak in our early teens, and all of these abilities decline throughout adulthood, some quite dramatically. Research also shows that the ability of teens to make sound decisions about health matters, including abortion, is equal to that of adults. Media reports suggest that teen problems are produced by a faulty “teen brain,” but a close examination of the relevant research does not support the claims. The teen brain is, at best, a reflection of teen problems, not their cause.” ~ Robert Epstein, Teen 2.0: Saving Our Children and Families from the Torment of Adolescence
Some Questions for Jenny
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. How did you discover unschooling? What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. I think that our results-oriented culture has done teens, and adults, a big disservice. It really minimizes the value of the process. I have a short quote of yours I found on Sandra Dodd’s website that I love, “Sometimes what life really requires is calm and patience. A very valuable thing to learn in life is to how to take care of ourselves and others during times of stress and times that aren’t ideal and wonderful. When there is stress and other negative influences happening around us, it’s even MORE important to take that time to seek out the beauty and the softness and the sweet and light and happy things.” Can you talk a bit more about that?
4. You have a great post on your blog about trusting teens. The conventional perspective on trusting teens is trusting that they will make the “right” choices, with “right” being defined by the parents. And it they don’t it becomes about guilt, shame, and punishment. But from the unschooling perspective, you wrote, “There isn’t an issue at all with discipline when you trust your kids absolutely. When they make choices that you don’t like, it isn’t because they are deliberately disobeying you or trying to make your life as a parent difficult, it’s because they saw that they were making the best choice at the time. Since kids are still learning, they don’t always predict all the outcomes that may arise from their choices, and sometimes they need to pick up pieces of the aftermath, but still, it was the best choice they could make at the time.” I think that’s such an important point, can you dig into that for us?
5. The conventional construct of teen rebellion is interesting. I think it’s a reaction to control. Yet it’s not inevitable, as parenting wisdom seems to suggest, because many unschooling parents have discovered that when we aren’t trying to get our teens to meet our goals for them, and instead spend our effort helping them meet their goals for themselves, the conflict and rebellion piece fades away. It’s not that things are easy breezy because it’s life, and our comfort zones may well need stretching, but we know it’s their life to live and we want to help them do that. What’s your take on teen rebellion?
EU015: From School to Unschooling with Heather Newman
Apr 14, 2016
Heather Newman is a long-time unschooling mom. She and her husband have three children, and I really enjoyed speaking with her about our shared experience of bringing our children home after they’d started school, and from there, moving to unschooling. We talk about what their days looked like when the kids first came home, how Heather came to trust the process of unschooling, and how her relationships with her children changed.
Quote of the Week
“How I hated schools, and what a life of anxiety I lived there. I counted the hours to the end of every term, when I should return home.” ~ Winston Churchill
Questions for Heather
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. What did your family’s choice to take your children out of school look like?
3. Did you know about unschooling already, or was it something you discovered once they were home?
4. What kinds of things did you and the kids do those first months?
5. Of your children, Ben was in school the longest—were there any activities he avoided for the first while after he came home?
6. What changes did you see in your children after they’d been home a while? Was there a big adjustment period for them?
7. As you were deschooling, what were some of the ways you enjoyed learning more about unschooling? Did your understanding grow in stages?
8. How did you build trust in the process of unschooling? When did you know it was working well for your family?
9. How did your relationships with your children change over that first year?
10. As deschooling shifted into unschooling, did you find any unexpected benefits with the lifestyle? Things you didn’t anticipate, but turned out to be wonderful?
EU014: Ten Questions with Joyce Fetteroll
Apr 07, 2016
Joyce is a long-time unschooling mom, and creator of the wonderful unschooling website, joyfullyrejoycing.com. She has been answering unschooling questions online for many years, in fact, I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t looking forward to reading her responses!
Quote of the Week
“Radical unschooling is about understanding human needs and getting to know each child’s particular needs and how that child needs those needs met.” ~ Joyce Fetteroll
Ten Questions for Joyce
1. First, can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. You’ve been active answering questions on Quora.com, tagged as a top writer there for 2016. I was reading your bio and I loved your answer to the question, “What is unschooling?” Can you share your answer with us?
3. What was one of the more challenging aspects of your journey to unschooling?
4. I love that you’re drawn to sharing your insights into children and unschooling through the Q&A format. Here’s one you’ve tackled: “What did you make available or do with your child to help them learn to read? I keep hearing about playing games, putting labels on furniture. I have asked my 7 yo son if he would like to do that. He says no.”
5. Here’s a question that touches on the value of learning through experience: “How do you help your child learn gratitude?”
6. Another common question when it comes to living together closely in an unschooling home is, “How can I get them to do their chores?”
7. Developing a deep trust in children is a process. I loved this question: “Even if your children are happy and joyful, how can you know whether they are learning without measuring it?”
8. Here’s a seemingly simple question, but it hits a big truth about living unschooling. “Is it bad for children to eat their meals while watching TV?”
9. Your answer to this question has been viewed over 5k times on Quora and was featured on Slate.com. I love how unschooling helps us see how children live and learn and grow naturally, which often looks very different than with children in school. The question was: “How do you raise well-behaved children?”
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
“Real, natural learning is in the living. It’s in the observing, the questioning, the examining, the pondering, the breathing, the choosing, the reading, the playing, the DO-ing, the BE-ing, the loving, the Joy. It’s in the JOY.”” ~ Anne Ohman
Summary of Listener Questions
1. I’m currently unschooling my 5 year old son and we are both enjoying it, though the thought of needing to go back to work in the near future keeps coming up. Any thoughts on what I can do to prepare myself to do both, financially support and unschool?
2. I’m homeschooling an only child–my son is almost 9. I work part time outside the home 30 hours/week. My husband takes over the homeschooling on the 2 days I’m gone all day. My son is introverted and prefers to be home and play alone or with mom and dad, draw, or watch videos, most of the time. His 7 year old cousin comes over sometimes and they play, but mostly he’s a loner and loves to be with me and his dad. We do go on outings as a family but he’s not interested in activities with other homeschoolers. As you can see, he’s not very social but he’s kind, considerate, curious and happy. I don’t want to force him to interact with others but do you have any suggestions of types of activities he might enjoy so that he could have friends?
3. I’m looking for tips to support my always unschooled 18 year old. He is interested in art and has made a goal to work on his drawing skills everyday. He is very introverted, and he’s not interested in taking any classes at this time. He took some community college classes recently and excelled in them, but decided not to take any more at this time. My husband and I are excited that he’s passionate about art, and fully support how he’s spending his days now. He’s a happy guy and finds joy in video games, drawing, watching anime, and spending time with his girlfriend. I worry, though, that he’s s little stuck, or overwhelmed about taking steps to grow and learn. He’s never had a job and has not had interest in getting his drivers license. I don’t want to pressure him, but want advice (and maybe reassurance) about how to help him take the next steps when he’s ready.
4. How to unschool without it turning in to watching cartoons all day. My daughter used to go to the library and we’d pick out books together but now that she’s nine and has figured out about DVDs, all she wants are movies that I don’t really want her watching. Also, we don’t have a TV, but she can find any cartoon or show she wants on the internet and, short of turning off the internet, it’s hard without immense power struggles to get her to limit what she watches and how long.
5. I have a question about strewing, or the idea of bringing new, interesting ideas or interests into my kids lives. I feel like I do a good job supporting their current interests, but I’m not sure I’m bringing in enough extra to create opportunities to find new interests. How did this look on your unschooling journey?
6. What have been some of your favorite aspects of unschooling that you maybe didn’t realize would be part of the process until you were living it? Are there any stories you’d like to share of your unschooling joys and delights?
7. Would you and your thoughtful panel share your experiences with parenting through your children’s transition from young child to tween? My oldest is 10 and I’ve watched him mature in some big ways during the past year. I’ve been enjoying having an abundance of time with him so much and watching him grow, thanks to our unschooling lifestyle. I have noticed recently though, that I’m missing him, as part of his growing maturity also means growing independence. He is old enough and mature enough now to choose to stay home when his younger sister and I go out. He joyfully calls goodbye as we leave and happily welcomes us when we return, and I am glad that he is able to have that quiet time to just BE by himself, but I miss him! So, I’m not sure if you all experienced that beautiful mix of emotions- gratitude, and joy, and loss, when your children started transitioning from childhood to tweens or if it was possibly later for you (or earlier!) but I’d love to hear about your feelings and thinking around this age or just about your children’s growing independence in general.
8. My husband and I have been listening to the podcast as we start changing our lives toward unschooling. While reading Pam’s book, Exploring Unschooling (it’s free), I came across something that has been bugging me for a few days. In the chapter, “Will Unschooling Work?”, she says “when done well.” This implies that there is a wrong way to unschool. I keep asking “how do you unschool,” but maybe what I should be asking is “how do you unschool wrong or poorly?”
EU012: Growing up Unschooling with Idzie Desmarais
Mar 24, 2016
Idzie Desmarais is a 25 year old grown unschooler and author of the blog, I’m Unschooled. Yes, I Can Write. I’ve know Idzie’s mom online for many years, and watched from a distance as Idzie became interested in the process of unschooling itself and started her blog, way back in 2008. In 2010, I was hosting the Toronto Unschooling Conference and asked if she’d be interested in speaking. I was thrilled when she agreed, and she spoke in both 2010 and 2011. The TUC Talks are available free on my website.
Idzie and I had a wonderful chat, talking about unschooling days, her relationship with her parents, college, the advice she has for unschooling parents just starting out on this journey, and more!
Quote of the Week
“The act of placing the power over learning and life into the individual’s hands is both empowering and motivating. The “motivation” people see in unschoolers is really a joy in learning that is seen far less often among the masses in school.” ~ Idzie Desmarais
Questions for Idzie
1. Can you share with us a bit about you and your family?
2. What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. And then a few years in, when your family was very comfortable with unschooling, what did your days generally look like?
4. For many years I’ve wondered why everyone just seems to accept that a strained parent-child dynamic is normal. What was your relationship with your parents like growing up? And now?
5. You summed up your most recent blog post, “Fun is More Important Than “Education”,” in your last line: “Have fun, and the learning will take care of itself.” I loved that. I remember when I eventually I stopped looking for the learning altogether and just looked for the fun. Do you see this step as an essential part of moving to unschooling?
6. You haven’t gone to college or university, and none of my three kids at this point have chosen to go, so let’s talk about that for a moment, because even unschooling parents can have a hard time with the idea of their kids not going to college. I see college as a tool that some might choose if it aligns with their goals, say a career that requires a degree, but it’s just as fine if they don’t. What are your thoughts on college or university?
7. You wrote a blog post I loved, titled, “In Praise of The Unexceptional: Because Unschooling Doesn’t Have to Be Impressive.” It’s true that unschooling young adults can be doing things that look impressive from the outside, but the difference is they’re doing them because they want to, not because they want to impress others. Unschooling is definitely not about being a different path to raising a conventionally successful adult. How important do you think it is to revisit our definition of success as we embark on the unschooling journey?
8. Along those lines, you gave a talk at the Northeast Unschooling Conference in Boston in 2015, which you posted on your blog as a series titled, “Unexceptionally Exceptional.” On my unschooling journey I came to value the quiet times and small, everyday moments in our lives, just as much as the bigger ones, yet that’s also a journey our children need to make on their own. Can you share a bit about your journey to seeing past the conventional noise to the profound value in downtime and being true to yourself?
9. You’ve talked online a bit about your challenges with depression. Do you think the perspective on living and learning that you’ve developed through growing up unschooling, that deeper level of self-awareness and understanding how you tick, helps you through these times?
10. When you look back over your childhood, can you see a thread or two that weaves through your interests over the years? A common theme that it uniquely you, even if the interests themselves varied widely?
11. As someone who’s grown up unschooling, is there a piece of advice you could share with unschooling parents who are just starting out on this journey?
EU011: Unschooling a Child With a Chronic Illness with Brie Jontry
Mar 17, 2016
Brie Jontry is an unschooling mom I’ve connected with a few times over the years because we share the experience of having a child who is living with a chronic illness. At first glance, it might seem like you’d need to drop some unschooling principles when your child’s health is in question, so I was excited to speak with Brie about her experience.
Quote of the Week
“Unfortunately most people are convinced that when control fails, it’s because they didn’t control enough.” ~ Joyce Fetteroll
Questions for Brie
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. When did Noor develop type 1 diabetes and what did the diagnosis look like?
3. What were some of the advantages of Noor not being in school during this time?
4. One of things that stood out for me was that because we hadn’t been controlling Michael’s eating habits, he was already comfortable listening to his body’s cues, which had some great advantages now that he had to manually manage his insulin levels. Was your experience similar?
5. Once we got a handle on the day-to-day management and it became more routine, I found it really important to shift our focus away from the illness and back onto all of Michael. Did you find yourself making that shift?
6. When we look at how children learn through unschooling, we see that the most effective learning happens when they have choices and control over their actions. That can seem scary when the consequences could be drastic and immediate, but even with health issues I’ve found life and learning flows so much better when I don’t take on the role of gatekeeper or director. Have you found that as well?
7. With unschooling, we talk a lot about building a trusting relationship with our children, free of judgement and shame. Have you still found that to be a valuable foundation for your days when there’s a chronic illness in the mix?
8. Let’s talk about the teen years for a moment. As kids get older, they naturally spend more time away from their parents. If diabetes management has been closely controlled by the parents, which is often the conventional parenting approach, this time out from under their gaze can seem like freedom from all of that. In that situation, I think teens often make choices in reaction to that parental control, rather than in their own best interest. What has your experience been?
9. Also, as they get older and their life expands, new fears crops up, don’t they? Like their first overnights away from home, then their first extended trips, and Michael will be driving on his own in the next couple of months. How do you move through those moments?
EU010: Unschooling Dads with Rick Rossing
Mar 10, 2016
Rick Rossing is a stay-at-home unschooling dad. He and his wife, Deb, have one child, Joshua. I’ve known him and his family for years through unschooling circles and we’ve met a few times at conferences and gatherings.
In today’s episode, Rick and I talk about his unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“Do not ask that your kids live up to your expectations. Let your kids be who they are, and your expectations will be in breathless pursuit.” ~ Robert Brault
Questions for Rick
1. Can you share with us a bit about your background and your family?
2. How did you discover unschooling? What did your family’s move to unschooling look like?
3. How did the choice for you to be the stay-at-home parent evolve?
4. I know for us, unschooling multiple children had some challenges, like working through sibling conflicts and figuring out ways to support different interests at the same time. I expect there are also challenges inherent with unschooling one child. What has your experience been?
5. Has Joshua develop any interests that have stretched your comfort zones? If so, how did you move through that?
6. Looking back on how Joshua’s interests have grown and changed over the years, can you see a thread that has run through them up to this point?
7. As Deb was working outside the home, what are some of the things you guys did to help her and Joshua stay connected?
8. I know you’ve been writing sci-fi novels the last couple of years. I imagine you’ve had more time for your own projects as your son has gotten older. What has that process looked like?
Amy Childs is an unschooling mom to three lovable, and now adult, children. She’s also the producer of The Unschooling Life Podcast and a happiness consultant.
In today’s episode, I ask her ten questions about her unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“Raising children with an emphasis on intrinsic rewards is not a technique, a method or a trick to get them to do what the parent wants them to by subtler means, but a way of life, a way of living with children with real respect for their intelligence and for their being.” ~ Mary Van Doren
Ten Questions for Amy
1. First, can you share with us a bit about you and your family, and how you came to unschooling?
2. I really enjoy hearing about what unschooled young adults are up to. I love the amazingly wide range of things, and knowing that even if it looks like regular young adult stuff, they are approaching it with such a different mindset. Can you share what your children have been up to lately?
3. You’ve been running number of unschooling intro sessions in Philadelphia for local parents this year. That’s very cool! How have they been going?
4. What was one of the more challenging aspects of your journey to unschooling?
5. You produced 50 episodes of The Unschooling Life Podcast, congratulations! I’d like to ask you a couple of questions about the experience. Which was your favourite episode?
6. Which of the episodes did you feel you learned even more, either about unschooling or about yourself, by putting together?
7. You took a year off in 2011. I love how you described it on your blog at the time: “All three of my kids (ages 18, 20, 23) are in transitional times of life, and lately we’d been playing with various ideas for how to accommodate their various phases. When it hit me that if my son replaced me as “head of the household” everyone’s needs would be satisfied at once, it was just … voila! All I had to do was relinquish all acquired comforts, and head solo into the wild unknown. My specialty!” How did it go?
8. Almost 14 years ago when we first began unschooling, the pursuit of joy and happiness felt indulgent, like it should be a reward after the work of the day was done. I had no idea back then that pursuing joy would turn out to be the root of so much good in our lives—cultivating our curiosity, learning, creativity, even our mindset and how we approach our days. So I love that you describe yourself as a happiness consultant! How did you come to use that description?
9. I noticed you recently posted a couple of new episodes of your podcast, Whatever, Whatever, Amen. Can you tell us a bit about that project?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
“We live in a world awash with information, but we seem to face a growing scarcity of wisdom. And what’s worse, we confuse the two. We believe that having access to more information produces more knowledge, which results in more wisdom. But, if anything, the opposite is true — more and more information without the proper context and interpretation only muddles our understanding of the world rather than enriching it.” ~ Maria Popova, curator of brainpickings.org, Wisdom in the Age of Information and the Importance of Storytelling in Making Sense of the World
Summary of Listener Questions
1. How to deal with school kids? Our daughter was asked by one of her friends (both 9) how she would learn without going to school and she told our daughter there is important stuff in school she would need one day in her life. Then she asked a question and our daughter couldn’t answer so she said, “and that is why you need to go to school.” How did your children deal with questions like that?
2. I have been getting the message that if I continue letting my kids play video games as much as they like then they won’t have any imaginations or they will lose their creativity. Where’s the proof?
3. Unschooling is such a misnomer—what word or words, or definition would you give to this way of being with children? What was the over-riding philosophy, or mantra or specific vision that brought you the most clarity about unschooling, that helped keep you on the path during difficult moments?
4. How does an unschooling parent apply “principles” at home successfully without getting in the child’s way?
5. I have a 12 year ADD boy and we are in our second year of unschooling. It’s scary for us to see him be bored all the time and not know what he wants to do so he just goes back to his computer. Could unschooling actually hurt this child rather then help?
6. We just started unschooling our two kids (son 13 and daughter 16) last March. My son, who is very focused on one or two things at a time naturally is really not showing many signs of curiosity or willingness to explore new things. I’m not sure if he is just recovering from the trauma of school, just uber-focused, or if maybe he’s not a good fit for unschooling. Any advice or suggestions? Do you see anything wrong with being so focused?
7. I have a battle in my head over a TV programme my daughter likes to watch. I find the programme to be influencing her in a negative way. By forbidding it I am probably making it more desirable. I am sure as the years go by there will be many more programmes that interest her that I am unsure about so I feel I need to really think about the best way to deal with this. Any thoughts on this would be appreciated.
EU007: Diving into Parenting with Anna Brown
Feb 18, 2016
Anna Brown is a long-time unschooling mom to two lovely daughters, ages 16 and 18. I met her online years ago through the Shine with Unschooling email list and have loved connecting with her more deeply over the years. She gave a talk a couple of years ago at an unschooling conference that I loved and I was very excited to dive into it again with her.
In this episode, Anna talks about parenting ideas that she found helpful in her family’s unschooling lives.
Quote of the Week
“We don’t yet know, above all, what the world might be like if children were to grow up without being subjected to humiliation, if parents would respect them and take them seriously as people.” ~ Alice Miller, For Your Own Good: Hidden Cruelty in Child-Rearing and the Roots of Violence
Questions for Anna
1. The first question I’d like to ask from your talk is about finding the underlying needs when a conflict arises. We’ve probably all experienced times when just asking hasn’t worked—often even adults aren’t good at verbalizing what real needs they are trying to meet by engaging in a conflict. How do you go about discovering the underlying needs at play in a conflict?
2. When your child’s upset about something, it’s not very hard to feel sympathetic, to acknowledge their feelings. But often we jump from there to trying to fix things, and then we wonder why they stay stuck in the upset. As part of my book research, I’ve been reading more about empathy. Empathy is about feeling with a person—acknowledging their emotion, and then connecting with the person on that level, helping them feel heard and understood where they are. It reminds me of how in unschooling circles we talk about validation, that step of acknowledging a child’s feelings as real and valid, connecting with the child where they are, and then moving forward when they are ready. How do you see the process of validation playing out?
3. What is the 90 second rule?
4. Another thing you mentioned in your talk really stood out for me because I also found it to be such a helpful way to approach things. It was to recognize that everyone is doing their best in this moment. Can you talk about that?
5. When you and your child are at odds, it can be tempting to try to maneuver things to get to the outcome we think is best. Even if we don’t come right out and say it, kids can often sense our agenda, can’t they? Yet that can get in the way of their learning and undermine the trust in your relationship. So how else can we approach those moments?
6. One of the most empowering ideas on my unschooling journey has been the realization that everything is a choice. Really, everything. Was that a big one for you as well?
7. An important part of deschooling is developing trust: in the process of unschooling, in our children, in ourselves. Why is that so valuable?
8. Sometimes we are reminded that we’re doing something very unconventional and find ourselves feeling anxious and unsure. What helps you move through those moments?
9. We all have hot buttons, things we react to almost unconsciously before we even realize what’s happening. Yet on our unschooling journey, as we gain more self-awareness, it’s pretty common to begin to see those automatic reactions as over-reactions to the actual situation at hand. And we don’t want to do that to our family. How can we change things up?
EU006: Unschooling Dads with Skyler Collins
Feb 11, 2016
Skyler is an unschooling dad of three children and is the editor of Unschooling Dads: Twenty-two Testimonials on Their Unconventional Approach to Education. It’s not often that we get to hear about unschooling from the dad’s perspective, and I love that you took the time and effort to pull this book together. I really enjoyed reading their perspectives on unschooling.
In this episode, Skyler shares stories about his book, and his perspective on unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“We are faced with the paradoxical fact that education has become one of the chief obstacles to intelligence and freedom of thought.” ~ Bertrand Russell
Questions for Skyler
Please share with us a bit about your background and your family.
As you mention in the book’s preface, you were the one to bring the idea of unschooling to your family. That’s unusual—as I’m sure became aware, unschooling groups are, by far, mostly filled with moms. How did you find unschooling and how did you introduce your wife to the idea? What did that process look like?
The men whose essays are included in the book come from a wide range of backgrounds, from artists to entrepreneurs to college professors. What does that say to you about the appeal of the unschooling lifestyle?
I love that you organized the twenty-two essays around the contributors’ unschooling experience, from prospective unschooling dads, to junior dads, to senior dads. Was this something you planned from the start, or did that arrangement come about after you’d gathered the essays?
It’s so interesting to catch a glimpse of the diverse paths that people take to get to unschooling. Some find it as they actively move away from school experiences that aren’t working, while others find it as they move toward the philosophical principles that unschooling embraces. What’s your impression of the interplay of anti-schooling versus pro-unschooling throughout the book?
Last week I spoke with Sandra Dodd and we talked about the paradigm shift to joy that was part of our journey to unschooling. She wrote about it in her short essay, “Rejecting a Pre-Packaged Life,” and it was so fundamental for me that 12 years ago I named my website after it: livingjoyfully. You touched on it in your essay as well. I want to read a short quote from it:
My wife’s reluctance has faded quite a bit now that she’s witnessing our children’s joy. For me, that’s the primary focus of unschooling: helping our children live as joyfully as possible. Everything else will naturally follow from that. As long as our children are happy, they will have confidence in themselves that they can achieve anything they want to in life. I truly believe that, and unschooling is the better vehicle toward living joyfully than any schooling-based alternative.
Can you talk a bit about how joy became your primary focus of unschooling?
I love the epilogue! How being asked to write an essay for the book felt like homework to your friend Phil. Can you share the story and how it relates to unschooling?
What surprised you most about the essays you received?
EU005: Ten Questions with Sandra Dodd
Feb 04, 2016
Sandra is a long-time unschooling mom of three—Kirby, Marty, and Holly—who are now adults. She’s also the creator of the awesome unschooling resource, sandradodd.com.
In today’s episode, I ask her ten questions about her unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“If your child is more important than your vision of your child, life becomes easier.” ~ Sandra Dodd
Ten Questions for Sandra
1. I’ve always loved your short essay, “Rejecting a Pre-Packaged Life.” I’ve linked to it in my intro to unschooling materials for years. I’m pretty sure I first came across it way back in 2002 and the paradigm shift you talk about was both fundamental and inspiring at the beginning of my unschooling journey. Can you talk a bit about that shift?
2. Before you began unschooling, you were a teacher. What were some of the challenges to learning that you saw in the classroom environment?
3. When you children were young, I imagine that with three at home sometimes conflicts arose. Can you share some of the ways you approached them?
4. As your children got older and spent more time in activities in the community, what were some of the differences you noticed between the schooled and unschooled kids?
5. One topic that pops up pretty regularly in unschooling groups is online safety—there’s a lot of fear wrapped up in there. How did you handle that?
6. Another essay of yours that I love is “Public School on Your Own Terms.” In it, you talk about how, even if unschooling isn’t an option for a family at the time, there are ways to lessen the power that school exerts over their lives. Can you share some of those ideas?
7. Your children have taken some college courses over the years. Can you share a couple of stories about their experiences?
8. What’s life like for you and your husband now that all your children have moved out? Can you still feel the influence of the unschooling lifestyle in your days?
9. You’ve continued volunteering your time and effort in the unschooling community—answering questions online, speaking, sending out Just Add Light And Stir blog posts every day, and maintaining your extensive and amazing website. That’s awesome for us all! I’d love to hear what has drawn you to stay involved, even after your children have become adults.
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
1. How do people successfully unschool older kids when there are babies/toddlers in the house that restrict the opportunities for the older one? For instance, I can hardly read to my 5yo because my 2yo constantly interferes.
2. This question is similar in that it deals with multiple children, but it’s a bit different perspective: how does unschooling work with three young children?
3. I feel so much pressure and guilt knowing that family and friends would not understanding unschooling, so I hide it by saying we homeschool when I’m asked. Is that ok? I feel so guilty, and then that guilt turns into doubting whether I’m doing the right thing, yet deep inside I know I am. How do I deal with this constant back and forth internal struggle?
4. I’d love to hear about games that have provided family fun. Any kind of game: board games, computer games, waiting games, word games etc.
EU003: Unschooling Teens with Sue Patterson
Jan 24, 2016
Sue Patterson is a long-time unschooling mom of three grown children. She recently released a book, Homeschooled Teens, where she shares her own insights from unschooling three teens plus what she discovered when she sent out a survey about being homeschooled through adolescence and 75 teens and young adults replied in detail.
In this episode, Sue shares some of what she found with us.
Quote of the Week
“Teens are subjected to far more restrictions than are any of the other groups—to roughly twice as many restrictions as incarcerated felons and active-duty Marines and to more than ten times as many as everyday adults.” ~ Robert Epstein, Teen 2.0: Saving Our Children and Families from the Torment of Adolescence.
Episode Highlights
First, Sue shares about her family’s unschooling experience:
How her family came to unschooling.
The fascinating threads of interests and activities that wove together to bring her children to where they are today.
What inspired her to take on this book project.
And then we dig into the book itself:
Some of the advantages that the respondents saw from not going to school.
The ways they learned outside the classroom.
What their social lives looked like.
Their experiences pursuing interests, hobbies, and jobs.
The strength of their family relationships.
Some of the advice the teen and young adult respondents wanted to share with worried parents.
What surprised her most when she was going through the responses.
EU002: Ten Questions with Pam Sorooshian
Jan 13, 2016
Pam Sorooshian is a long-time unschooling mom of three, now adult, children, who continues to stay actively involved in the unschooling community. She’s also a college professor of economics and statistics.
In today’s episode, I ask her ten questions about her unschooling experience.
Quote of the Week
“Man’s mind, once stretched by a new idea, never regains its original dimensions.” ~ Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr.
Ten Questions for Pam
1. Jumping back a few years, how did you first hear about unschooling and what spurred you to begin exploring unschooling with your family?
2. Let’s talk a bit about what learning looks like with unschooling. When one of your children was actively pursuing an interest, what are some of the things you did to support their exploration? And how did you weave together pursuing the interests of all three children?
3. One of the wonderful things about unschooling is the time we spend together. We get to know each other very well, strengthening our family’s connections and relationships, and part of that process, especially with siblings, is figuring out ways to move through moments when they are frustrated and angry with each other. When your children were younger, how did you help them move through conflicts?
4. I understand that your husband was a bit wary of unschooling for a few years, as was mine. How did you approach that?
5. One of the topics that regularly trips up newcomers to unschooling is TV watching. I’ve always loved your clear explanation of how restricting TV actually causes children to become more strongly attracted to it, the opposite of what the parent is trying to accomplish. Can you take us through that?
6. As an economics and statistics professor, you are pretty comfortable with math, but it’s an area that can be challenging for some people to figure out as they explore unschooling, especially since school has mostly boiled math down to worksheets. I have two questions for you about math. The first is, can you talk about how you see learning math through unschooling?
7. The second question is, can you suggest, especially for parents who are feeling a bit math phobic, some activities can they do with their children?
8. You’ve been actively involved with Homeschool Association of California’s annual conference for many years. What are some the benefits of going to a conference that you’ve seen for newer unschooling families?
9. All three of your daughters chose to go to college, and you see lots of schooled kids in your college classes. Have you seen any advantages in college from growing up unschooling?
10. Looking back now, what, for you, has been the most valuable outcome from choosing unschooling?
In this introductory episode, I share my vision for the podcast, an overview of my unschooling journey, and my evolving definition of unschooling.
Quote of the Week
“It is a miracle that curiosity survives a formal education.” ~ Albert Einstein
Episode Highlights
The Exploring Unschooling podcast will have new episodes weekly, and my goal is for us to explore unschooling together, through in-depth interviews with veteran unschooling parents, conversations that dig into a wide range of unschooling topics with experienced guests, and monthly Q&A episodes to answer your questions.
My school background and finding unschooling almost 14 years ago.
What my children are up to now.
How my definition of unschooling has changed over the years.
How unschooling doesn’t look like school at all.
If you’d like to submit a question for an upcoming Q&A episode, just go to livingjoyfully.ca/podcast.
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Please share with us a bit about your background and your family.
Sandra is a long-time unschooling mom of three—Kirby, Marty, and Holly—who are now adults. She’s also the creator of the awesome unschooling resource, 
Sue Patterson is a long-time unschooling mom of three grown children. She recently released a book, Homeschooled Teens, where she shares her own insights from unschooling three teens plus what she discovered when she sent out a survey about being homeschooled through adolescence and 75 teens and young adults replied in detail.
Pam Sorooshian is a long-time unschooling mom of three, now adult, children, who continues to stay actively involved in the unschooling community. She’s also a college professor of economics and statistics.
In this introductory episode, I share my vision for the podcast, an overview of my unschooling journey, and my evolving definition of unschooling.
