1430 A Philosopher As Parent
Some thoughts and suggestions on raising babies.
Aug. 5, 2009 - Freedomain Radio - Stefan Molyneux
17:12
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| Hi everybody, it's Stefan Molyne from Free Domain Radio. | |
| I have been asked by quite a few people to share some of my thoughts and experiences around parenting, which I'm very, very happy to do. | |
| I'm certainly not a psychologist. | |
| I'm certainly not trained in the field, so these are just my own personal and to some degree philosophical experiences. | |
| For those who don't know, my lovely daughter was born in December of last year. | |
| She's now, I guess, almost Seven and a half months old so you can take my somewhat limited experience with parenting with all the grains of salt in the world But these for those who have asked for some of my thoughts and perspectives on parenting I will share you What it is that I have experienced and I hope that it will be of some help to you if you have a newborn or if you are thinking of ordering one soon The first thing that I really focused on, | |
| as a parent, was remembering just how How helpless and desperately needy Isabella was when she was born, which is perfectly natural and perfectly healthy. | |
| And I had to keep reminding myself because, of course, when a baby cries or, as they say, fusses, and I don't like the term fusses. | |
| We sort of say, oh, my baby is fussy and this and that. | |
| To me, that is sort of disrespectful to the emotional apparatus and needs of the baby. | |
| I think that referring to a baby as fussy diminishes the What it is that they're dealing with and what it is that they're trying to communicate. | |
| So we have tried to avoid that word fussy in our household and have tried to substitute, you know, what is it that she needs, what is it that she wants instead. | |
| Fussy just seems kind of like a put down, like it's inconsequential or petty or something, and it's not the case. | |
| It's never been the case. So, when a baby cries or is upset and so on, it is easy to view that as something that is negative towards you as a parent. | |
| And I have worked hard, and I think with a great degree of success, to reframe that question or that issue within my own mind, which is to say something like this. | |
| Isabella and I, and I'll just talk about myself, my wife, of course, I'm all with all this stuff, but Isabella and I both have the same desire, which is for her to get what she wants and to be happy and to be content and to enjoy the life that she has. | |
| So we're a team, right? | |
| It's easy to look at a baby as oppositional, like, you know, I've given you everything you want, what more do you need, and so on, right? | |
| But... A baby is on your side, is part of your team to help give the baby what he or she wants. | |
| So I've really, really focused on that, that she's trying to help me to help her, help me help you, right? | |
| She's trying to help me to help her when she cries or she's upset or whatever. | |
| And that's really, really, really important. | |
| That she's trying to aid me to get what it is that I want, which is for her to have an enjoyable time of being a baby and in particular being my baby. | |
| So focusing that you're both on the same side, you're both on the same team, you both want the same things is really important because then it's not a frustrated kind of opposition, but it is a curious and challenging kind of teamwork. | |
| And I think that's been really, really helpful for me to process with a great deal of sympathy and empathy and curiosity if she's upset what it is that she's looking to help me to give her. | |
| And I think that's important. The second thing I think that's important to understand from my perspective is that babies obviously can't talk, can't communicate, can't express in a conceptual way what it is that they want. | |
| So, when she gets really upset or frantic or something like that, I try and sort of really empathize with trying to get my sort of mindset into that so I don't view it again as oppositional or anything like that. | |
| So, I sort of came up with this metaphor that I found really helpful. | |
| I'll share it with you. Maybe you'll find it helpful as well. | |
| Which is, if I woke up in, or I don't know, a plane crashed. | |
| Let's say I was a diabetic and my plane crashed in the jungles of Africa and I come across some tribe that rings in their noses and elongated necks with gold bars or whatever. | |
| And I come to this group and I need them to understand that they need to get me to a town or a hospital or something so I can get my insulin. | |
| And I can feel that I'm really not doing well, I'm getting lightheaded, I'm feeling tired and so on. | |
| So I'm really frantic because I need my insulin, but I don't speak the same language as these people and they don't really understand, you know, if I mime injections or whatever, they don't understand it because they're very primitive. | |
| Right. | |
| So if you were in that situation of trying to explain your need to get to a hospital, to get to a doctor, to get to a town, to get the insulin so you wouldn't fall prey and go into a coma and lose your foot or something, the amount of urgency and frustration and fear that you would be experiencing while trying to do the amount of urgency and frustration and fear that you would be experiencing while trying | |
| And that, of course, is the situation that a baby is in and a baby feels uncomfortable, can't communicate what it is and must just express and with an ever increasing amount of frustration sometimes their discomfort and they're trying to tell you, but they can't in the same way that you'd be trying to tell some primitive face painted tribe, but they can't in the same way that you'd be trying to tell some And there's a time pressure because, of course, a baby doesn't have a sense of time. | |
| So everything that is uncomfortable is uncomfortable forever, right? | |
| Because they live in the moment so much. | |
| And then when they're better, they're better forever. | |
| And then when they get uncomfortable again, it's forever. | |
| So that sense of desperation and escalation and frustration and neediness... | |
| I've tried to put myself, if I was in that kind of situation of trying to get insulin from a primitive tribe, to understand where she's coming from, right? | |
| So that I don't view it as intrusive upon me and she's overacting or acting out or it's too much or whatever, but to try and say, well, if I were in that situation... | |
| I would kind of be as stressed and frustrated. | |
| So that's really, really helped me to not look upon her emotional, the strength of her emotions and the strength of her passions as inappropriate to the situation. | |
| Because for her, they are perfectly appropriate to the situation. | |
| So that's the second thing that I would really, really recommend is to just, you know, put yourself in her diapers and really try to understand how frustrating it would be to try and get your needs met when you were desperate to have them met and you could not communicate what they were, that you would be in a very, very similar situation. | |
| And that's really helped me to empathize. | |
| With what Isabella is going through, through those situations. | |
| I mean, I remember, I think it was within 10 days of her being born, she was in the car seat and we were doing up the car seat and she began to cry and it turned out that the car seat was, that the straps had tightened somehow when we took her out and they were too tight for her. | |
| And we were very, you know, we were very grateful to her because we didn't want her, you know, too tight on the drive home because it was not good for her, right? | |
| So when she was crying, when we were putting her in the car seat and doing upper straps, she cried and some people would say, you know, don't fuss, it's fine, you know, blah, blah, blah. | |
| But because we listened and we checked and we explored and we said, oh, these have tightened somehow. | |
| We were able to loosen them and then she was perfectly fine. | |
| And those kinds of things is where we actually will say, thank you so much, Isabella, for helping us to help you. | |
| Thank you for telling us that you were uncomfortable. | |
| Thank you for telling us that your diaper was wet. | |
| Thank you for telling us that you were hungry. | |
| Thank you for telling us X, Y, and Z. And that, I think, is really, really important to thank your child. | |
| It's a tone of voice thing. It's an eye contact thing. | |
| But be grateful. For a baby telling you what they need. | |
| Because of course if your baby didn't cry and didn't express any discomfort not only would you freak out about that as a sign of something seriously awry but you wouldn't know What to do to make your baby happy, or at least what to do to remove the discomfort from your child. | |
| And so her or her communication to you, the crying, whatever it is, is really essential for you to be able to get what you want, which is for your baby to be happy. | |
| So I found that to be really, really, really important to focus on. | |
| The other thing that I think is really important, at least it's been really important for me, Is, you know, the positivity. | |
| I really want Isabella... | |
| I mean, the theory that I work with is that she's not in a voluntary situation. | |
| She didn't ask for me as a dad. | |
| And so that's not really an option that she ever had. | |
| And it can't be an option that she has, right? | |
| So what I really want for Isabella is for her to... | |
| She's not in a voluntary situation, but what I want is when she grows up, if she could say, if I were to say to her, if you could have had the choice to have any father in the world, would you have chosen me? | |
| That is the level of volunteerism that I can't recreate now because you're stuck with me, right? | |
| But I want that to be in the future. | |
| If... I want to ask her when she's older, if you could choose any father in the world, would you choose me? | |
| And if not, why not, so that I can improve my parenting? | |
| Because she's a customer, right? | |
| She's a customer who didn't ask to have me as a vendor, so to speak, right? | |
| So I think that's really, really important. | |
| And I do that to some degree now by looking for her smiles, right? | |
| If she smiles when I come into the room, if she's happy and so if she's affectionate and so on. | |
| And if not, then I can't ask her why, but I can certainly review and say, well, did I do anything that, you know, was negative or difficult for her or whatever. | |
| But when she gets older, it's absolutely my complete intention to ask her, you know, is there anything that I can do better as a father? | |
| Is there anything that I can improve as a dad to make you feel happier and safer? | |
| That's really important. It's always been something that is incomprehensible to me that in our personal relationships, particularly in our family, which is the most powerful institution and the most important institution in our lives, Why it is that people don't ask for feedback? | |
| I mean, I went to, I ordered some pizza the other day and I got a checklist of what I liked and then I ordered something at a store and on the receipt it was like, go here and give us your feedback and you might win something and so on. | |
| So all of that kind of stuff happens all the time in the free market with people who sell me pizza and staples and things like that. | |
| I mean, that's complete nonsense, right? | |
| Even when I go to a restaurant, they say, well, how did you like your meal? | |
| And was it good? And was it bad? And what can we do better? | |
| Why would that be the case with staples and pizza and restaurant meals, but not with the most important relationships in our lives? | |
| I'm always asking my wife, what can I do better as a husband? | |
| Is there things that you like or you don't like? | |
| How can I improve? That's really, really important. | |
| I would continually recommend asking people in your life, what can I do that's better? | |
| How could I improve? | |
| How could I do better? I think that's really, really important. | |
| And I certainly plan to do that, and I'm planning for planning to do that now by being as positive and as happy and enthusiastic and engaged as possible with Isabella so that if she could choose anyone, she would still choose me. | |
| That's as close to volunteerism as you can get in the parent-child relationship, and that's really, really what I'm aiming for because I want to be the best father for her possible. | |
| I want to be the warmest and most gentle and most... | |
| And most kind and most loving father that she could possibly get. | |
| And that has something to do with me living my own values in terms of integrity and affection and curiosity. | |
| But it also has to do with her feedback towards me, which is continual even in the infant stage. | |
| So if your baby's not lighting up when you go into the room, try and figure out why. | |
| And recognize that it is so important to ask in the future, is there anything you can do better as a parent so that the child has input and feels like an equal and feels like a partner in the interaction? | |
| That is so important. | |
| I mean, it's such an incredible privilege to have a life, come into your life in this way. | |
| It is... It is second to, I guess, third after my wife and philosophy. | |
| It is the most beautiful and amazing thing in the world. | |
| And it is such an incredible, deep and precious responsibility to protect and nurture this amazing little life and to make her feel secure and happy and loved and to have her really enjoy her day with me and with my wife. | |
| It is something that I'm just completely blown away by. | |
| What a deep and amazing experience it is to be a father, but it is so important to focus on your child's experience of your parenting. | |
| Plan for that feedback. | |
| Plan for that survey set of questions on you as a father, because it is the most important job in the world. | |
| To be a parent is the most important job that there is. | |
| If it's good enough for people who make your pizza, surely it is a good enough methodology to ask for this kind of feedback from your own children. | |
| A few other tips and then I'll stop. | |
| I hope that this stuff is of use to you. | |
| Don't grab from your baby. | |
| That's, I think, very, very important, right? | |
| Because, I mean, she's now in the face. | |
| She's crawling all over the place and she's... | |
| Grabbing at everything and she's not chewing quite as much as she used to, but her teeth are coming in so she's chewing a little bit more now. | |
| But I found it really, really important to not take things from her. | |
| Just don't grab the binky. | |
| Because that would be rude to any adult. | |
| Just grab something from them. | |
| So, you know, hold it firmly and say, please, may I? Please, may I? Until she gently releases it. | |
| I think that's really important because you don't want to just take things from her because then she'll feel like that space can be violated at any time, so to speak. | |
| And I think that's not... Then she's going to grab on more. | |
| The other thing that I think is really important is in order to get things away from her that, you know, she likes playing with tissues but she can't put them in her mouth or she likes tearing them up or whatever. | |
| She likes leaves and petals and she can't put them in her mouth. | |
| So I've also found it really important to practice taking and giving, right? | |
| So she'll lie there and I'll say, may I? Or to me? | |
| And then I'll give it back to her, right? | |
| So if she's got something, if she's got a ring or something, I'll say to me and she will give it to me or I'll slowly and gently take it from her and then I will give it back to her. | |
| And I think what that really helps her to understand slowly is that I don't take things from her, right? | |
| Sometimes I will, but if I can, I will always give them back, right? | |
| So she loves playing with keys like every baby on the planet. | |
| And so we go for a walk, I let her play with her keys. | |
| With my keys and then when I get home, I need to use the keys to unlock the house so I will ask her for them and I will give them back and I will say to you, to you, right? | |
| So she understands that. I'll open the door and then I will give her the keys back so that she knows that I don't just grab and I don't just take things arbitrarily. | |
| You also want to practice giving things, of course, to your baby. | |
| So you're not always in the position of taking where she feels she then has to guard things and she resists things being taken. | |
| So I think that free exchange back and forth is really, really important. | |
| So anyway, I won't go on and on. | |
| I certainly could and have been known to, but I just wanted to talk a little bit about some of the things that I have found useful. | |
| I will tell you what the payoff is with this kind of gentleness and this kind of persistence of approach. | |
| Isabella... Does not cry. | |
| She does not cry. | |
| She will cry under two circumstances. | |
| If she bumps her head on a block or whatever as she's playing around, then she might cry for 20-30 seconds maybe. | |
| She also sometimes will cry because she doesn't like going to bed, never has. | |
| She never liked being put down. | |
| We had a pretty exciting go of sleep training, which if anyone's interested, I can talk more about. | |
| She's doing much, much better now. | |
| But she does not cry during the day. | |
| She does not cry. She does not wail. | |
| I've heard it said that babies cry two to three hours a day. | |
| That has never been our experience with Isabella. | |
| And so I think that this kind of gentleness and curiosity and persistence and patience and respect Has resulted in a baby who is alert, is intelligent, is curious, explores, and so far is fine. | |
| If she goes somewhere where she couldn't, like towards some cables, we'll turn her around and so on. | |
| So I think that's really, really important that this stuff does pay off, or at least it has for us so far, and that we have a baby who is very happy, very smiley, very giggly, very friendly, and simply does not cry. | |
| Except sometimes at night or when she's put down to bed. | |
| But during the day, does not cry. | |
| And I would hold that out to you as the reward that comes from this kind of gentle and positive parenting. | |
| So let me know if you find this useful. | |
| If people do find it helpful, I will be more than happy to share some more thoughts about my experiences as a father. | |
| Thank you so much, as always, for watching. | |
| And feel free to check out the website at freedomainradio.com. |
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