Tears of Futility

Tears-- tears of happiness, tears of sadness, anger, futility,change
and the kind to simply lubricate your eyes
According to this site when a photographer looked at different tears under a microscope she was amazed to see the different structure and design from the various emotional states.The photos are fascinating, take a look. Supposedly there are only three basic chemical formula though.
Gordon Neufeld talks about "tears of futility" and I've been mulling the phrase around in my mind. As I understand it, the phrase indicates a goal. Children need to explore their environment to the edges and sometimes they run into a "wall"...a "no" or something they actually cannot do because of lack of skill.

He says that a child will have tears and a parents job is to let them have tears and be available and waiting afterward. Then you can show them how to build the block stack again or solve the math problem. ."

When it is the "no" they ran into then our job is to stick to the "no" and stay calm. It might take awhile but the big ticket is to stay out of the turmoil. Afterward give them words "you are upset that I gave that answer", I often add "it is my job as a good parent to keep you safe or teach you the right way

OK, so I have been evaluating all that and wondering if it is fact or fiction.

I'm not as grouchy as I look on here, this was our Sunday afternoon Lego time

The other evening Shekinah needed to do two things for homework, one was to read her reading story aloud to a parent. The other thing was her Victory drill. I needed to make a  batch of mashed potatoes and I told her that daddy will listen to her read her story and read over the next one and I will help with the Victory drill. She cried.

I told myself, " I wonder if these are tears of futility?" It was tempting to change gears and make time to hear her read...and even more tempting to tell her to "stop crying and shape up".
It didn't take terribly long and soon she called daddy and told him she was ready to read to him. The reading went very well and by the time she was ready for Victory Drill, I was too.

So you think letting them feel their feelings and move through them might work better than telling them to "cut it out"?

I'm pondering something I heard on one of Neufeld's you tube videos "If a consequence doesn't make someone sad, it hardens their heart."

 I think I know less than I did 20 years ago.

Oh and the big news? We are adding to our family, but she will be a daughter-in-law!(Sorry to those of you that thought we were adopting again)   Ben is getting married this summer and about a month before the wedding Demetrius and Glenda will be welcoming a baby boy. So a new grand child and a new daughter-in-law in the same year!