All tagged common sense
Years ago I wrote a post entitled Flaws. It took balls to write that post which I didn’t realize until I just looked it up and I’m pretty proud that I was able to articulate my exact sentiments in a short post. Let me clarify, I am not proud of the person that I am, I am proud that I have the ability to use my words to express how I feel. The Flaws post exposes my thoughts about my mother and in the process, I face my own flaws. I remember getting so many texts and comments about that post.
When I was a pre-school teacher I observed another teacher (who was barely 21 years old) as she taught our students manners. She gave cues to the kids whenever manners were needed and she explained to me that she didn’t want the kids to perform manners. In other words, she didn’t want the kids growing up thinking they needed to act - she wanted them to know why they were using manners. It made sense to me. So before I had kids I promised myself that I wasn’t going to teach my kids common courtesies by saying, “Can you say, ‘Yes please.’ ?“ whenever the cashier at a store would ask if they wanted a sticker or a lollipop. Think about it, we are actually insulting their intelligence by asking that. Of course they can say those words! Sometimes I would physically cringe when I would hear, “What do we say when someone does something nice for us?”. I imagined a monkey on the shoulder of a street performer doing tricks.
