Insight from Michael Brown’s Alchemy of the Heart

Writing in the London Sunday Telegraph, British Prime Minister David Cameron said today that runaway dads should be stigmatized in the same way as drunk drivers and should feel the “full force of shame.”

It’s true that there are dads who don’t involve themselves with their children. Single mothers and those mothers who are separated or divorced often find that the dad doesn’t participate in the raising of children, at least not effectively.

I worked with the survivors of the Asian Tsunami of 2004. It marked one of the most transformative experiences of my life. I will post the piece I wrote during that time soon. What I learned the most from the survivors was the human capacity for resilience. Humbled, I learned how to allow for joy despite tragedy, hope despite overwhelming devastation. 

The reason many of us are unaware of our boundlessness, our infinite potential and limitless essence is because we are confined by the cages of our thoughts. One thought after another.

Racing. Running. Jumping.

Hoops, curves, and narrow alleyways.

First we had Tiger Mom making the rounds with her extreme views of parenting. Now we have Jessica Beagley, a mom who appeared on the Dr. Phil show with confessions of disciplining her child with hot sauce and cold showers. She admitted that the reason she was on the show was because she had run out of options and wanted to get help. Disturbingly, an informal poll done by the Today Show revealed that 33% of moms felt the hot sauce method of punishment was appropriate.

Ms. Beagley was recently found to be guilty of child abuse. Unfortunately, this was only considered a misdemeanor.

“If you marry her, I’ll not give you the time of day,” says multimillionaire Oliver Barrett III, seeking to control his son’s life.

Replies his son, Oliver Barrett IV, who is finally showing up for himself, “Father, you don’t know the time of day!”

What is it about us that thinks we have a right to control the lives of others? Why do we expect them to meet our definition of what success means for their life?

The question was asked of a client by a counselor, “What is our responsibility in helping create our children’s unhappiness?”

The client simply couldn’t wrap her head around the question. She responded, “You mean happiness.”

The counselor came back, “No, I mean unhappiness.”

The client kept saying, “You must mean our responsibility in helping create our children’s happiness.”

The key to raising children well, as well as to being a superb teacher in a school, revolves around one simple quality—presence.

When we know how to be present in our own being, it changes completely the dynamic between ourselves and the children whose upbringing and education are entrusted to us.

Yesterday we began talking about the school system, a theme I want to pick up again by going back to a movie I enjoyed at the time it first came out, then watched again last evening—Mr. Holland’s Opus.

If you have a child, grandchild, niece or nephew, do you want them to be paddled in school?

The issue of paddling children in U.S. schools made it into the Washington Post Friday, as a central Texas city decided to bring back the paddle, banned long ago by most school districts across the country.

In Temple, it’s claimed that behavior has improved dramatically at the high school. But at what price?

Sure, you can cause children to shape up by hitting them. Violence has always been a way of controlling people. But what’s happening to their inner being?

What do you do when you love more than one person in your life, but they are at odds with each other, and you find yourself torn between them?

It's a pretty common scenario. For one reason or another, a daughter or son doesn't approve of who you, as a divorced person, are dating. A mother or father doesn't approve of the person you intend to marry. You colleagues at work, or your friends, don't like the person you are living with.