Let me start out by saying – I LOVE PODCASTS.
You can find me listening while cooking, in the car, while the kids are napping – I love podcasts. As a stay-at-home mom, sometimes you just need an adult to talk to about adult things, and when no adult can be found – boom! Podcasts.
One of my favorites is Hidden Brain by Shankar Vedantam where they discuss all things social-science related. A title that recently caught my eye was “Kinder Gardening,” so I gave it a listen.
The episode was based on a book by Alison Gopnik entitled, “The Gardener and the Carpenter,” wherein she describes two different types of parents: carpenter parents and gardener parents.
You’re a busy parent, so here’s a brief summary:
First, think about carpenters. If they want to build a bookshelf, they figure out the type of materials they want to use, take their measurements, assemble the necessary tools, and if they follow all of the steps in the proper order, they will get the bookshelf that they desire. They can control all the variables. Easy peasy.
Now, think about gardeners. They, too, plan out their garden just like a carpenter plans out their bookshelf. They figure out what plants they want to plant, measure out their garden, assemble tools and seeds – but even if they follow all the steps in the proper order, their garden can fail. There can be too much rain or not enough. It can be too hot or too cold. Their garden can be growing really well until a deer comes along and eats it all, or a storm topples everything, or one of the plants takes over all the others. They cannot control all the variables, no matter how hard they try.
Gopnik says that the modern world approaches parenting from a carpenter-style attitude:
“If I just get my kids in the right schools, use the right discipline styles, feed them the right things, I will end up raising the child – and therefore, adult – I want.”
I confess this is how I have viewed parenthood as well. Every time I have encountered a parenting challenge, I flee to a book for answers, erroneously believing that if I follow the prescribed steps, I can rectify the problem. Easy peasy, right? The only problem is, we aren’t building bookshelves, we’re building kids – and kids are a lot more like gardens.
Gopnik argues that, “although caring for children is immensely important, the goal shouldn’t be to shape them so they turn out a certain way.” I am so guilty of this.
Every day I forget that my children are children, not mini adults. Children are messy. Children are LOUD. They don’t want to sit still, stay on the path, or avoid the puddles. They want to move, explore, and splash through life. Their imagination and learning potential is insanely unbridled. Where our world is colored with responsibility, theirs is colored with novelty, and it’s beyond our control. You have little say in whether your child is innately curious, shy, artistic, has brown eyes, is easygoing, enjoys puzzles, has curly hair, loves pickles, or sleeps on their stomach. We don’t control when they get sick or in accidents, to our sorrow. We can’t control all the variables, no matter how hard we try.
Sounds grim, but never fear – it’s a good thing. If I could control every variable about my kids, they would definitely go to bed on time – but they would be ridiculously boring, and my life would get boring, too. My kids and my life as a mother are nothing like I ever could have planned; they are way better. Every day my daughter’s high-strung will amazes me and my son’s baby-toothed grin melts me. Every day never goes as I planned, to my chagrin and delight. I cannot wait to see what trouble and good my kids will do as they get older, and I cannot wait to see what motherhood has in store for me along the way. The wild, the crazy, the unplanned – that’s what makes life beautiful.
The moral of the story? The best thing we can do as parents is to let go of some of those tight-fisted carpenter tendencies we hold and embrace the chaos of children as much as we can. Care for them, yes. Feed them, teach them virtues, read to them and make them follow curfews, definitely. Love them with every fiber of your being. But let them grow. Let them learn. Let them be themselves. Let them be children.
And then stand back and watch your garden grow.
So, are you a carpenter or a gardener? Which do you think is better?
