A Little Help Here

You know how they say it's easy to give others advice than it is to take your own?

I woke up out of a dead sleep at 5 am this morning and realized what I need to do to get through the holiday gatherings.  Well, two things actually.  Since they are things I suggest on my job ALL the time, I don't know why I didn't think of them sooner.

Whenever a child is struggling with an activity they find overwhelming in our program, we often suggest giving them a helper job.  It gets them out of the fray if they are feeling overstimulated by all the noise and traffic.  It gives them a focus and a purpose.  They feel successful because they have accomplished the transition, just in a slightly different fashion than the rest of the class.  And that is ok.

I need a helper job!  I can't keep going to these holiday gatherings, trying to get through it the same way everyone else does.  My needs are different now.

My helper job will be to take pictures.

I got this idea, I think, from my planner/art community who has had me trying something called "December Daily" this month.  The premise is to write, take pictures, and draw about every day in December in an effort to appreciate all the joy the admittedly stressful and busy season brings.  This has been a good assignment for me.  I have a devil of a time finding joy this time of year.  It didn't go so well at first as my journal was chock full of my sad-face girls and pictures of the cemetery, which is honest and ok, but made me think a little harder about fitting Jake into the frame.

Gradually, as the month bore on, I included a memory that made me smile in public out of nowhere about holidays past with the babies.  I took some pics with friends.  I baked cookies with my son. It all went into my December Daily.  As I flipped back through my pages,it started to look not so scary and sort of nice, actually.   Conscious Discipline is onto something: you will get more of what you focus on.

That's where the brilliant part of my helper job comes in- not only will it be a distraction, it will keep me looking at the good things life still has to offer.  The coolest part is at the end of the gathering, I will have treasures of my parents and sisters to keep forever.  Until you've lost a piece of your heart, you may never know just how valuable those pictures can be.  I do.  I really, really do.

So part two of my little behavior plan here will be to pull the positives from the experience.

Stay tuned; we shall see how this goes.