"PARENTS WORTH WATCHING: Julie and Roger Watson"

Daughter JESSICA WATSON

Everyone agrees that parents have a huge affect on their children. For the next few weeks I want to look at a number of parents that have raised children who have become daring, successful, inspiring, clever, ground-breaking, radical ... in their field. These Parents are Worth Watching and have a lot to teach us. 

How did Jessica Watson’s parents raise her so that she was personally equipped and willing for such an historic event?

“On 15 May 2010, after 210 days at sea and 24,285 nautical miles, 16-year-old Jessica Watson sailed her yacht, Ella’s Pink Lady, triumphantly back into Sydney Harbour. She had become the youngest person to sail solo, unassisted and non-stop around the world. It seemed the whole country stopped to welcome her home.” Back page True Spirit : Jessica Watson. 

Jessica said, “My parents had always encouraged me to dream..” P.20

JESSICA, AN ORDINARY GIRL –

“People often ask me how I talked Mum and Dad into allowing me to sail around the world. The truth is I put in the groundwork and gained their trust with these smaller adventures.” P.21

Jessica was the second eldest of 4 children. As a child she was timid of water and swimming. In early sailing days Jessica was frightened to go far out from shore. At times when the weather was not good, she chose to stay ashore. But as she watched others, especially her sister, come in after sailing in harder weather filled with excitement and stories, she realized her fear was keeping her out of the fun. “I didn’t want to be left on the beach, waiting for everyone to come back bragging about a race. I wanted to be in the thick of it.” P.10

From these shy and normal beginnings, how did she develop into a young woman determined to embark on such a courageous trip?

JULIE AND ROGER WATSON, ORDINARY ADULTS -

Jessica's parents, Julie and Roger, were born and breed in New Zealand. As  newly-weds they moved to Sydney Australia, and then drove to the Queensland’s Gold Coast to start a new life. By profession, Julie was an occupational therapist, and Roger was a boiler maker, worked hiring out televisions and later went into selling real estate.

PRACTICES JULIE AND ROGER INTRODUCED INTO THEIR FAMILY -

1  1. NO TV -    Julie and Roger had no TV in their home, because they believed people had become dependent on television. They saw it  restricted people’s lives and kept them indoors and inactive. “Apart from not having a television (which definitely put us in a minority) my childhood was very normal.” P.9

2. BASIC CAMPING - Julie and Roger regularly took their family camping. Mum and Dad “were big on camping trips and we would get away as often as we could. Dad would give us the choice of either going to one of the local Gold Coast theme parks for the day or spending the same amount of money to head off camping for a week at our favourite spot. Camping always won.” P.9

3. GAVE OPPORTUNITIES BUT NO EXPECTATIONS -     Julie and Roger provided opportunities for their kids but never pressured or held expectations for them to live up to. “Mum asked me once if I felt pushed into sailing. I didn’t. It was just something we did. It became our family thing and, if anything, we kids pushed Mum and Dad into sailing. We didn’t play netball or soccer or do nippers, we went sailing.” P.10

4. FREEDOM, REAL-LIFE RESPONSIBILITIES, TRUST -     Julie and Roger gave their children a lot of freedom to explore and apply what they had learnt. With this came responsibilities where they were expected to fulfil what they knew the kids could do. “When tying the dinghies on the roof of the car after a long weekend on the water, Emily and I were trusted and expected to do just as good a job as any adult. I never felt like a dismissed kid who was seen and not heard, but rather as a person with my own valued opinions.” P.11

“My parents made a purposeful choice to let us have space to explore and they trusted us to do the right thing. No matter what, in their minds, that was the right way and the only way for them to parent their children,” P.21

5. KIDS LEARNING ALONGSIDE PARENTS, WORKING TOGETHER AS A TEAM, STRONG RELATIONAL FAMILY BONDS - Julie and Roger chose to travel around Australia with their children. This opened the door to 5 ½ years of living and educating the children primarily on board a boat. Navigational studies and radio licenses were learning experiences shared with the children. “It didn’t take long to establish a routine for docking and leaving a harbour. We all had a job and were all an important part of the crew.” P.12 “..most of the time we travelled alone, just us, and because of that Emily, Tom, Hannah and I became very close.” P.13

6. BENEFITS OF EDUCATION PRIMARILY BEING THROUGH REAL-LIFE EXPERIENCES -      Julie fitted the children’s studies around the real-life experiences of sailing a boat and exploring their new surroundings. "We'd swim, snorkel, collect shells and explore beaches, islands and waterways. There would be walks up to lighthouses, down gullies and to find waterfalls." P.12 At times we needed "to stop in various ports to wait for bad weather to pass and to stock up on provisions... Mum and Dad used these stops to make us catch up on our schoolwork so we were always pleased when the good weather returned." P.13 "Living on the water also meant that we met all sorts of characters and old salts ... it was fascinating and often inspiring to hear about their sailing and boating experiences." P.14

7. PARENTS TRUSTED IN THEIR CHILD'S IDEAS -     Julie and Roger listened and waited time to see if Jessica’s idea lasted. “Mum says when six months had passed and I was still totally focused on making this dream a reality, she started to believe I would achieve my goal. She threw her support behind me.” P.19

8. PARENTS SUPPORTING BUT LEAVING THE CHILD TO TAKE THE LEAD -  Julie and Roger knew how to support, encourage, be involved but they didn't take over. “By this time Mum was behind me 100 percent because she recognised how serious I was. I would use her as my sounding board to bounce ideas off about attracting sponsorship or gathering knowledge.” P. 28  “Even if my parents had the money (which they didn’t) they wouldn’t have bought me a boat. At this point, they may have come around to the idea and were helping me where they could, but this was my thing, I had to put it together and show them I had what it took if I had any hope of their continued support.” P.28

THISWEEKWITHTHEKIDS ~ you could begin reading Jessica's book, True Spirit, to your children. That way you will definitely be inspired to rethink areas of your parenting. 

Cathy

"WHAT IS A FAMILY? A Shelter in the Time of Storm"

           Families displaced in South Sudan by conflict and floods survive in makeshift shelters.
                                   April 16 2015. Shelter BOX. Disaster relief charity.
"There is never a series of little packages of time given to you in life labelled: 'TIME FOR AN ILLNESS, TIME FOR A WEDDING, TIME FOR A DEATH, TIME FOR A BROKEN LEG, TIME FOR CRUSHED RIB MUSCLES,... TIME FOR MUMPS, TIME FOR THREE CHILDREN WITH MEASLES ALL AT ONCE, TIME FOR THE HOUSE TO BURN DOWN, TIME FOR A DISAPPOINTMENT.' You can't face the sickness, the operations, the broken arms and legs, the serious diseases, the disasters, or even the headaches, unless you realise there is never a convenient time set aside for joy or sorrow, protected by neat little walls so that the two things will not mingle and spoil each other." WHAT IS A FAMILY? Edith Schaeffer. p.103.
So true! Tomorrow my sister-in-law goes in for brain surgery to remove a tumour on her optic nerve, my mother-in-law had a stroke yesterday and today my daughter was over-joyed to find she had been written up in the newspaper for the charity she began. What a mixture of emotions and conversations!
The truth is, we are limited and can't meet all the varied needs of another person. I was fully aware of this fact this afternoon speaking on the phone with one upset adult child.
As life continues to run along, you can only give as much care as is possible in the circumstances. We have to be creative, but caring for our family when sick or hurting doesn't need to be complicated.
Examples of Care
Some people are 'naturals'. It's automatic to them. They effortlessly move from one family needy situation to the next. But for the rest of us there are lots of simple things we can do or remember to do when we are caring for a family member in need.
The Patient in Bed at Home:
Change the sheets or at least the pillowcase, daily.
Smooth the wrinkles in the sheets and straighten up the bed.
Wash the patient's face or feet, to refresh them.
Any Patient or Troubled Person:
Massage their face and head, hands, feet or legs with a natural smell cream.
Regardless of age read a humorous story to them.
Bring different drinks of different colour, in different glasses or cups.
Bring food on a tray with a flower, leaf, toy, rock, candle, photo as decoration.
On a plate create a person out of vegetables - cherry tomato head, carrot sticks arms and legs, celery body - to make them smile.
If the patient is a child, bring a tray to lean on and make a puzzle, colour in, cut out and glue on.
If an adult, bring the tray with a load of old photos or photo albums to look through.
The Patient in Hospital:
Bring physical objects into the hospital to broaden their thoughts and open up conversations to take them 'outside' the hospital room.
For example - takeaway coffee or cake from their favourite cafe, assorted autumn leaves... 
The point so often is simple, the patient needs a break from where they are, be that they are physically ill in the sick bed or emotionally overwhelmed and in pain in the chair. They need to be taken on a short 'holiday' to some place else, where there is vibrant life or peaceful beauty... You know the person so you need to think creatively about what the patient needs and how to provide that little 'holiday'.
A Continual Practice
"The knowledge of what is necessary for basic care ... should be absorbed through years of living in a family. If a person has never had good, old-fashioned, motherly nursing, nor heard any details of what can be done other than giving the medicine, then how can he or she know what is not being done and what the children, husband, wife, or grandparents are missing?" p.95.
General care and compassion should be regular elements throughout the 'normal' or 'sick-free' times in family life. 
"On the human level, children are meant to learn how to comfort others with the same kind of comfort they have received in their own pain, sickness, and deep troubles..... A family should be the place where comfort is experienced and understood, so that the people are prepared to give comfort to others. Comfort should be related to the word family." p.111.
THISWEEKWITHTHEKIDS ~ does your family think of home as a place to come to, to be sheltered when life is 'stormy'? "The togetherness will not have been perfect, the care will not have been flawless, and mistakes will have been made," p.118. But as you practice caring for your family when they are troubled or sick, as well as helping them recover emotionally or physically, you are equipping and showing them how to care for others, and creating memories within these tough times that are filled with love, happiness, connection, security, kindness and so much more.
Cathy

"WHAT IS A FAMILY? A Formation Center for Human Relationships."

       HUMAN RELATIONSHIPS
   
                O~           =O  #Z/%O  ?O???
                |             |      |   |
               / \           / \    / \ / \

The following excerpts come from another great chapter in Edith Schaeffer's book, WHAT IS A FAMILY?
- WE AFFECT ONE ANOTHER -
"Whether people treat people as human beings or machines, people are treating people in some way. ....Human relationships start at birth and continue to death, whether or not anyone consciously thinks about it." WHAT IS A FAMILY? Edith Schaffer. p68. 
It is not possible to be neutral in the way we relate to each other. Whatever we say or don't say, our facial expression, mood and body behaviour, all communicate something to those around us.
- TWO TYPICAL FAMILY SITUATIONS -
 # Tonight when Dad comes home, you will have 45minutes all together as a family, before Dad needs to leave for a meeting and the little kids need to be put to bed. You are prepared and ready to make this a special time. But Dad arrives home 15minutes later than expected, so now there's only 30minutes family time left.
In your family, what would happen next?
   Reaction 1. Annoyed at his lateness there is "Screaming, stamping of feet, tears, frustrations expressed over and over again, using up the precious ... minutes left,... What kind of lessons in human relationships are being given to three children in the midst of this? Are they being taught to yell for their 'rights', no matter what is destroyed during the yelling?" p72-73.
   Reaction 2. A pre-determined choice to not be angry, but rather to enjoy those of the family who are there, and when the late arriver appears, welcome them into the remaining family time, no matter how small that is.
 # "You have just vacuumed the living-room rug, and the hall is spic and span; now you can turn to the next thing on your list. Suddenly the door bursts open," and in runs the preschooler with extreme happiness, carrying a fistful of 'flowers', scattering grass and dirt across the floor as they come. How do you respond?
   Reaction 1. With eyes on the carpet as the mess falls, you raise your voice, making it clear to the child that this is not appropriate behaviour at such a time - the room has just been cleaned!
   Reaction 2. You enter the pleasure of the child's moment, putting aside your plan, and together find a vase for the flowers, responding in genuine thanks with a hug and kiss.
The mess can be removed later. If you wish you can chat later about care when bringing flowers into the house.
Edith's point is that parents are responsible and can choose how they will react to daily happenings, and each choice will deliver an effect. "To think of tiny, daily incidents as an unimportant string of dull happenings, rather than to remember that you have a major part in a formation centre of human relationships which is going to have far-reaching effects ... - is to be totally blind to one of the basic reasons for the existence of families." P80. 
- COMMUNICATION WHEN WE DISAGREE -
"Criticism of each other may be very necessary at times, but there must be encouraged sensitivity to the fact that the whole point of communication is to have a growing relationship come forth. If criticism is degenerating into simply a power struggle, one needs to stop short and ask, 'What is more important, our relationship as a whole, or convincing him or her that I'm right?' ... Every discussion in which two people are differing does not need to continue to the bitter end!" p82.
Do we want disagreement and competing against each other to be the patterns our children take with them to practice with their partners, and to be handed on down the generations that may follow?
"But day-by-day living in the midst of an outpouring of examples of love is needed through months and years, if love is to be a basic part of the 'warp and woof' of a person. This is meant to take place in a family. 'Oh, well, we might as well split then; we don't love each other that perfectly, and we can't live out a farce.' Is this the excuse for breaking up the only real formation centre for human relationships?" p88-89.
"Love isn't just happiness in ideal situations with everything going according to daydreams of family life ..... Love has work to do! Hard and self-sacrificial work - going on when it would be easy to be provoked and to think evil as the clock hands move, and the person hasn't yet come home. .... Love takes imagination and the balance of putting first things first, to be taught to the young pupils in their formative years."
Your family is a classrooms, and everyday, regardless of if you know what you are teaching, your children are learning about human relationships. You are a major contributor towards what is being formed day after day in your child's attitude to people, and what they have witnessed will eventually influence the way they treat  others.
Everyone is aware of how to wreck family relationships, but few people take the steps to control themselves, put their plans temporarily aside, give full attention to another, put the relationship ahead of personally 'winning', work self-sacrificially or put first things first - but the fact is - there is a live audience watching, taking it all in and onboard.
THISWEEKWITHTHEKIDS ~ take an honest, objective look at your contribution to your family's development in human relationships. Is  it time to change what you are 'teaching'?
Cathy

"WHAT IS A FAMILY? The Birthplace of Creativity"

"The environment in a family should be conducive to the commencement of natural creativity, as natural as breathing, eating, and sleeping. A balanced, creative person can come forth, developing and branching out in a wide number of areas, if some amounts of imagination and care are used. The first requirement is dignity of attitude toward the family. This dignity involves accepting the seriousness and excitement of having your own home be a very specific creativity centre." WHAT IS A FAMILY? Edith Schaeffer. p58.
Unfortunately since the time of writing this book, it has become common that parents now work at, even labour at getting their children to eat and sleep. Thankfully breathing is still something that children do "naturally", spontaneously and instinctively, so Edith uses this example to send us a message to relax, because developing your child's creativity is to be as innate as breathing.
She goes on to explain 2 things ~
1. Creativity Happens in an Atmosphere of Trust.
Your child, and all members of your family will be creatively inspired if there is "two-way communication, which involves listening as well as talking, and taking an interest in the other person's thoughts and ideas." This awareness encourages the timid, small beginnings of an adult as well as a child.
For both young and old, creative ideas often don't work out. A  "shift in direction" or diversion is needed to prevent the whole creative process being killed. It can be as simple as a good cup of tea under an autumn tree, or a picnic morning tea at the beach. The anxious pressure of the failure needs to be replaced with a time of happiness in a trusted atmosphere.
"Soon a new idea will come tumbling out from the child's lips, if he or she knows the failure won't be rubbed in or laughed about. 
An atmosphere of trust brings forth a sharing of ideas and an attempt to make things, with an expectation that the most wonderful thing is just about to come forth. This atmosphere comes if the basic attitude is one which takes mistakes and fresh attempts as quite expected." p60.
"Creativity needs the availability of reaching the attention of a sympathetic friend at just the right moment.... The spark must meet another spark, or the fire dies out and dark discouragement can flood in." p61,62.
So availability is essential for a "spark" to be shared. A listening ear. Even a university student troubled with his essay, or the shy but excited song writer, needs the supportive listening ear in an atmosphere of trust.
2. Creativity Happens When There is an Example of Adult Creativity Within the Family.
Father, mother, all members of the family are to be doing something creative. The development of creativity is not to be focused on children alone. Everyone eats, everyone sleeps, everyone breathes, so everyone in the family does creative things.
My husband works to improve his skill playing the piano, my mother worked at creating beautiful patchwork quilts, my first mother-in-law worked at lace making and gold thread embroidery, my second mother-in-law cooked, knitted and made beautiful tapestries, my father built rock steps and walls. They all did their thing around me, inspiring me to have a go at what intrigued me. Creativity is infectious and children quickly find their own creative ideas to work at.
"Simple gestures of thoughtfulness bring forth natural and spontaneous creative acts on the part of little human beings growing  up where these things are a part of everyday life - the norm." p63.
Creativity being everyday, normal, simple and used to express love, concern, reminding others in the family that they are thought about. 
Not reducing creativity to be done in "the perfectly protected place for each individual's work." It being "done with each other as well as for each other." p65.
THISWEEKWITHTHEKIDS ~ Well where do you start if there is no creative pursuits happening in your family? Have a look around for a person, a relative, a family who is creative and go watch them. Spend time in the company of creative people and wait for creative ideas to stir, remembering that creativity is not something that is taught or engineered, it is something that comes from within each person and is to be as natural as breathing.
Cathy.

"WHAT IS A FAMILY? : A Changing Life Mobile"

                                    " mobile   n.   Art.  A delicately balanced construction or sculpture of a type developed by Alexander Calder since 1930, usually with movable parts, which can be set in motion by currents of air or mechanically propelled."   Webster's New International Dictionary, published 1954.
"In so many ways a family is a mobile - an artwork that takes years, even generations, to produce, but which is never finished. The artwork of this mobile called 'family' continues, and imagination, creativity, originality, talent, concern, love, compassion, excitement, determination, and time produce a diversity which is a challenge to any intelligent human being who has been given understanding of how to begin in the studio of life itself." WHAT IS A FAMILY? Edith Schaeffer p.18.
What an accurate picture, of a family being a life mobile, always changing in endless ways, which as Edith Schaeffer acknowledges, is a huge challenge for any parent to have the capacity to work with!
"A mobile is a moving, changing collection of objects constantly in motion,... Every individual is growing, changing, developing, or declining - intellectually, emotionally, spiritually, physically, and psychologically. No two years, no two months, or no two days is there the exact same blend or mix within the family, as each individual person is changing. If people are developing in a variety of creative areas, coming to deeper understanding spiritually, adding a great deal of knowledge in one area or another, living through stimulating discoveries of fresh ideas or skills - they are affecting each other positively. ... What is a family? A family is a mobile. A family is an art form. A family is an exciting art career, because an art form needs work." WHAT IS A FAMILY? p.18-19.
Edith uses the mobile analogy to describe the unique and temporary position each family is in right now. We will never again have the combination of situations that are happening today in our family. Your family is not static, it is either developing positively or declining, and parents are contributors to which direction their family goes. 
An art form, like the family, requires time spend on it for it to develop in positive ways. Because you created your family, it is your time that it needs. Your family needs you to make the choice to make it your "exciting art career".
"The universe is a spoiled universe, and people have been really made 'abnormal' by sin. There is no possible way of having good relationships, nor of having a whole grouping of good relationships in the framework of a family, if there is no one who understands that it takes time, patience, hard times, unselfish work, sacrifice of a variety of sorts, and planning on the part of someone to insure memories of beauty sprinkled all through the difficulties. Someone has to feel the wonder and dignity of having the mobile of the family be the artwork which that person is interested in seeing develop." WHAT IS A FAMILY? p.29.
Someone - it can only be parents who take on that sort of  responsibility - to take time, be patient, work hard and unselfishly, and sacrifice, "to insure memories of beauty (are) sprinkled all through the difficulties" of life.
"Mobiles - smashed, torn, sagging, all balance gone, the delicate interplay finished - turned into something too ugly to keep around, too painful to see. Broken marriages, smashed homes, splintered relationships, shattered families, these have become the norm in this twentieth century (and twenty-first). No generation to follow a generation in the beauty of balance threaded together like the mobile! Senseless breaking up of priceless, living, balanced beauty over - so often - nothing." WHAT IS A FAMILY? p.31.
Edith Shaeffer goes on to say that all families which are heading in  positive directions, have also been "in danger of being broken." Being affected by anger, pride, frustration, impatience, being misunderstood..., is common to every human relationship "for at least minutes, if not hours or days." 
She goes on to say that there is a different outcome only where a deep, strong understanding exists of the importance of family continuity. 
This is why bringing up a family is such a challenge, requiring strength, understanding and generations of work.
"There is a beauty and continuity which can never be had unless someone in the family has the certainty that the whole art form is more important than one incident, or even a string of incidents. To smash a Ming vase which is absolutely irreplaceable - just to satisfy a violent feeling of wanting to be emphatic in making a statement, when there is a five-and-ten-cent-store plate which could be smashed just as well to suit the need - is a minimal picture of what it is to smash the living artwork of a family, and then to spend the rest of one's life paying for it and seeing other people pay for it, too. Wasted lives." WHAT IS A FAMILY? p.32.
Your family is delicate, precious as the threads in the art mobile.
Where are you heading your family? Are you influencing your family  in positive ways? If not, the outcome is clear. 
A few guidelines are suggested above, but if you are struggling and would like help and encouragement, feel free to contact me through my website - www.awaytoparent.com. I would be happy to meet with you to help. 
Cathy