"I barely repressed what I could only describe as a growl, as I hurriedly let us out of the claustrophobic pod, trying hard not to touch anything at all. It had been an extraordinary few months. The decision to attend the Green Man festival, which involved camping for three nights in a huge open space in the Welsh countryside surrounded by thousands of other festivalgoers - one that put me way out of my comfort zone - was the final culmination of our family experiment."
"I hadn't thought about my reaction, I'd just said "no" automatically, because I saw it as a hassle to stop what I was doing and do what she wanted instead. But, why was I turning her down? After all, I know these years where she wants to do so much with me are limited. So I brought up my feelings with my husband and we came up with a potentially fun idea."
An adult recognized a habitual default 'no' response and decided with their husband to change it to 'yes' for reasonable requests and family opportunities. A simple example involved saying 'not right now' to a child's request to be read to and then reconsidering that automatic reaction. The couple committed to the experiment, which lasted ten months and produced trips to Kenya and Thailand and attendance at the Green Man festival, including camping with young children. The experiences pushed comfort zones, revealed unexpected resilience in the children, and increased confidence in the parent.
Read at Business Insider
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]