Conforming or Rebelling<\/strong><\/h3>\nIn his book Raising Children Compassionately<\/em>, Marshall Rosenberg tells the following story.<\/p>\n\n- \u201cNow of course, our children are often going to be in situations where they\u2019re not going to receive this unconditional acceptance and respect and love. They\u2019re going to be in schools, perhaps, where the teachers are using a form of authority that\u2019s based on other ways of thinking, namely that you have to earn respect and love\u2014that you deserve to be punished or blamed if you don\u2019t behave in a certain way. So one of our tasks as parents is to show our children a way of staying human, even when they are being exposed to others who are using a form of coercion.<\/em><\/li>\n
- One of my happiest days as a parent was when my oldest son went off to a neighborhood school. He was twelve years old at the time. He had just finished six years in a school where I\u2019d helped train the teachers, a school based on principles of Nonviolent Communication where people were expected to do things not because of punishment or reward, but because they saw how it was contributing to their own and other people\u2019s well-being, where evaluation was in terms of needs and requests, not in terms of judgments. So this was going to be quite a different experience for him after six years in such a school, to go to the neighborhood school, which I\u2019m sad to say wasn\u2019t functioning in a way that I would have liked. But before he had gone off to this school, I had tried to provide him with some understanding of why teachers in this school might be communicating and behaving in a different way, and I tried to provide him with some skills for handling that situation should it occur.<\/em><\/li>\n
- When he came home from school the first day I was delighted to find out how he had used what I had offered him. I asked him, \u201cRick, how was the new school?\u201d And he said: \u201cOh, it\u2019s OK, Dad. But boy, some of those teachers.\u201d I could see that he was distressed, and I said, \u201cWhat happened?\u201d He said: \u201cDad, I wasn\u2019t even halfway in the door, really I was just walking in, when this man teacher saw me and came running over and screamed at me, \u2018My, my, look at the little girl.\u2019\u201d Now, what that teacher was reacting to was, my son had long hair at the time, down to his shoulders. And this teacher had a way of thinking, apparently, where he thought he as the authority knew what was right,\u00a0that there was a right way to wear hair,and that if somebody doesn\u2019t do things the right way, then you have to shame them or guilt them or punish them into doing it.<\/strong>\u00a0I felt sad to hear that my child would be greeted that way his first moment in the new school. And I said, \u201cHow did you handle it?\u201d And he said, \u201cDad, I remembered what you said, that when you\u2019re in a place like that, never to give them the power to make you submit or rebel.\u201d Well, I was delighted that he would remember that abstract principle at such a time. And I told him I was glad that he remembered it, and I said, \u201cHow did you handle the situation?\u201d He said: \u201cDad, I also did what you suggested, that when people are talking to me that way, to try to hear what they\u2019re feeling and needing and not take it personally. Just to try to hear their feelings and needs.\u201d I said, \u201cWow, am I glad that you thought to do that. What did you hear?\u201d He said, \u201cDad, it was pretty obvious. I heard that he was irritated and wanted me to cut my hair.\u201d \u201cOh,\u201d I said, \u201chow did that leave you feeling, to receive his message in that way?\u201d And he said: \u201cDad, I felt really sad for the man. He was bald, and seemed to have a problem about hair.\u201d<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
RAISING CHILDREN COMPASSIONATELY RCC.1e.6p.int.sb.qxp:Raising Children Compassionately Page 13, 14 \u00a9 2010 PuddleDancer Press www.NonviolentCommunication.com<\/p>\n