The Help

Dana and I finally went to see "The Help" and I am so glad we did.  It is about being a braveheart, a compelling story of justice, truth, and courage.  And, the difference that one young person with courage can make.

Let me share two lists.  The first, observations and questions that grew from the film. And, second, how we can help our children pursue right and truth with courage.

Observations and questions:

1. The preacher in the film spoke about Moses and his lack of skill to be a world changer, being "slow of speech and slow of tongue."  But, that meant that it was more about God and His power.  Moses just had to have courage and agree.  Where do I hold back because I am not gifted, even though God is ready to use me?  And, it just takes courage?

2. Some of the whites were mean-spirited and intentional about hurting "the help."  Others knew the help were being hurt, but were passive and watched instead of preventing the injustice.  Who was more wrong?  Which am I? Where do I need courage to step up and protect those who can't?

3. Many of the whites who were "good" people ignored or didn't even notice the hurt in the lives of the help and their families.  This was especially clear in the ironic contrast between whites raising money for poor "African children" overseas but ignoring those in need a few blocks away.  What am I not noticing because it is such a part of our culture?  Where am I looking far away when real people hurt here?

4. While not quoting scripture in the film, those familiar with "the truth will make you free" from John 8:32, would have thought of that passage at the end of the movie when "truth" and "freedom" were discussed.  Where do I not speak the truth, even though I know it?  Truth gives freedom.  Freedom from lies, burdens, and sin. It is worth the price.

5. Speaking truth is in some ways the easiest and yet the hardest thing we can do.  It is easy because you don't have to work to make it up or keep working to cover it up, like a lie. It is hard because it is seldom said without impact on the hearer and the teller. It is hard because the truth teller often pays a price personally--some of the help lost their jobs and the book author needed to leave town.  But, truth tellers are the ones who change the world:  Joseph, Jeremiah, Jesus, Paul, Peter.  And many more.  Where can I be a truth teller?

6.  Personal experience with injustice inspires courage.  The author of the book in the movie was stirred through what happened to the lady who raised her and then the sad stories of others.  The "help" who told stories were motivated to help when they and friends were hurt.  Do I see and feel hurts around me that drive me to courage?  Am I looking?  If I had my Father's eyes, what would He be sad about in my world that I can help fix?

7.  The author of The Help, the book in the movie, had left the town for four years of college.  She came back with a different perspective that made her notice injustice and be willing to act, not just accept it.  Sometimes we need to remove ourselves from the intensity of day-to-day life to gain perspective on what is really happening.  How do we get a different look at our world?  Reading?  Spending time away?  Listening?

I am sure there are other observations and questions.  Those were the fresh ones, as we thought about the film.  And, as I began exploring what we can learn from the movie about building our own bravehearts.

Let's assume you want your child to be a braveheart, even knowing that the life of a braveheart is a life with danger. But, you also know that for your child to become all he or she can be, a life with courage is necessaary.  And, you are willing to let go and know that God loves your child more than you do.  If you want that life for him or her, here are a few suggestions inspired by the "The Help."

1. Support our children in their moments of helping make things right.  When one of my daughters was five, she was playing on a playground with her younger sister while we watched our son's soccer game.  We looked over and she was shoving a boy of about six to the ground.  While there were some feelings of being aghast, when we found out that the boy had been picking on her little sister and someone else, I was pretty proud.  There were others ways to deal with the problem, but I sure supported her desire to protect the weak.  She still protects the weak today. The mom of the braveheart author in the movie supported her daughter and showed pride in her impact.

2. Help our children gain a bigger perspective on life.  The braveheart author in the movie gained a different perspective from going to college out of the community.  It seems that often those most involved in injustice are stuck in a small world that they only see from their eyes and those around them. It seems that those who right wrongs have had their eyes opened with a different view.  Maybe not through living somewhere else, but travel, reading, education, visiting...learning to have a view of the world and people that isn't trapped by culture.

3. Help our children find and develop passions for important things.  Even three year olds can get excited to help Grandma or a sick neighbor.  As children see needs and have ideas, don't squelch them but help them go further.  When a middle school girl named Katie found out about congenital heart problems of children in Tibet, she found a way to save lives by creating a business making necklaces.  When some parents would have said, "You don't have time," her parents supported her, so much that Katie said, "It has changed our lives to change others. We have a passion to change the world."  Fanning sparks makes a difference.

4. Model the values of justice, truth telling, and courage.  I can't shake Micah 6:8, "He has told you, O man, what is good; And what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God."  Do our children see us speaking the truth to make things right, in love, or avoiding truth telling for the sake of keeping the peace and avoiding conflict?  This is what the passive bystanders in the film did. Our children need for us to show them how we speak truth and do justice, even in small ways. They learn so much by watching us.

5. Give our children stories of courage.  The Bible is full of people who risked their life, through faith, to help redeem people and make things right.  Look for stories of people who took stands, spoke truth into lives, and refused to go along with the crowd when things weren't right. Read good literature to your children and talk about those heroes with courage.  Tell them about people who are truth tellers,even if they are not famous.  When we lived in Iowa, there was an older gentleman in church who a lot of people found intimidating because he spoke the truth, he wasn't afraid to ask hard questions and talk about the "elephant in the room."  It didn't make for gentle dinner conversations, but his courage changed me.  When one of the help stood her ground to tell the truth, others followed.  Her story changed them.

I am sure there are more.  While there is some rough language and intensity, "The Help" might even be one of those stories you can share with your older children by watching it together.  And use the questions above to talk about the film.

May God bless you as your have courage to raise your own braveheart.

"Six Skills You Can't Live Without"

"The real risk is not risking." 

Joe Robinson in "Six Skills You Can't Live Without" demonstrates the benefits of Braveheart ideas like risk taking, initiating, experiences, absorption...really, just living life fully and richly for which we are created. But a life too many hold back from.  Joe explains studies that show how the six actions listed below contribute to long life, healthy life, and a fulfilling life where success is much more than making money or succeeding in athletics, education, or beauty.

The article supports the need for building bravehearts.  It demonstrates the values of a broad education, confidence in entering life wholly, and becoming who and what you were meant to be.

While I agree with Joe about the value of the six skills, I don't agree that they are for "leisure" time, "life outside the professional world."  I think these skills should be lived in all of life, not accepting that our professional lives and non-professional lives are handled differently, but that both should be lived heartily with the same depth and excitement that these six skills bring.

Here is part of what Joe says.  As you read, you might think about how each of these six skills can be encouraged in your child's life.

"Passions and the active leisure skills that create them work wonders for your health and outlook because they satisfy core psychological needs for autonomy, competence, and connection with others. This makeover show happens where it matters, inside. Yet this power of this health resource doesn’t filter down to us because of the ingrained notion that recreation and leisure are little removed from outright vagrancy, since they don’t produce anything (unless you want to call living a productive endeavor)."

"We concentrate all our skill-building and education on the work side, where we believe all the value is. Work skills–getting results, micromanaging, staying in the comfort zone–get you nowhere when it comes to activating your life, which is about input, not output; experience over results; letting go; and getting out of the straitjacket of habit."

"It takes another skill-set to create a fulfilling life outside the professional world. Here are some of the key leisure skills that get your life going:

1) Intrinsic motivation. Pursuing and enjoying experiences off-the-clock takes a different motivation than the work reflex of external results: intrinsic motivation. You do it for the inherent interest, fun, learning, or challenge. Research shows we enjoy what we do and remember much more of it (critical to memory, which is what tells you that you like your life or not) when the goal is intrinsic. Expect no payoff, and you get a big one, internal gratification.

2) Initiating. Instead of being told what to do or watching others doing the living, we have to break out of spectator mode and self-determine our lives to feel gratified. We need to research and plan activities and vacations, seek out and try new things, invite others to get out and participate, and if they don’t reciprocate, go alone.

3) Risk-taking. The real risk is not risking. Security is a red flag for the brain, which is built to seek out novelty and challenge. Make the risk intrinsic (the result doesn’t matter), and you’re able to venture much more, because, instead of having anything on the line, you’re just exploring.

4) Pursuit of competence. Since competence is one of your core needs, it’s a handy thing to build and sublime to feel. The idea here is that you want to get better at something–not to show off, not for anyone else, but for your own gratification. Pursuing competence leads you to build your skills at an activity to the point where it can become a passion. It’s a fabulous self- and life-sustaining skill.

5) Attention-directing and absorption. The work mind wants to get everything over with ASAP. The key to optimal experiences is being 100% engaged in what you’re doing now. That means losing the electronic devices and distractions and putting all your concentration on the activity at hand. The more absorbed you are, the more your thoughts and deeds are the same, and the happier you are. It’s called harmony.

6) Going for the experience. Observation and hanging back don’t satisfy the engagement mandate of your brain neurons. To activate a fulfilling life, we have to participate in the 40% of our potential happiness (the rest is inherited or due to circumstance) we can actually do something about–intentional activities. That’s the realm of experience. Experiences make us happier than material things because they can’t be compared with anyone else’s experience. They don’t lose value through social comparison. They are personal events that engage our self-determination needs."

"These skills take us inside the participant dynamic essential to a healthy and extraordinary life. They show us that the good life comes from a place quite a bit different than the recliner and that the script of nonstop production is about as accurate a route to satisfaction and aliveness as a divining rod."

The above is excerpted from Six Skills You Can't Live Without by Joe Robinson in Don't Miss Your Life.

The Turtle and the Rabbit

You may be thinking this should be "The Tortoise and the Hare."  But, this is a different story.

Sometimes I see the strangest things on my walks in the woods.  Today's "Turtle and Rabbit" gives insight into teaching your children at different times in their lives.  Wisdom from a turtle and rabbit.

There is one spot on my walk where the woods open and there is brush on both sides of the four feet wide trail.  Often when I get about five or six steps from there, a rabbit hops across the trail in front of me.  I can't figure out why, unless it is safer on the other side and I am frightening.

Yesterday the rabbit hopped across.  But, right behind the rabbit was a baby bunny, following mom across the trail.

Learning by Following

This is so much like our children when they are young.  Unless we have done something to hurt them, they love to follow mom and dad and do the things they do.  They are growing and learning leaps and bounds (hops?) as they find joy and comfort in seeing where a parent goes and what a parent does.  It is the "I want to be like you, Dad" stage.  What power to teach by our lives.  What a responsibility.  What an opportunity.

I know you can get tired of being followed.  It goes fast.  Cherish it.  Invite them, engage them, let them do the things you do as much as you can.  And, show them your heart.  And, courage.

But, then we hit the turtle stage, usually around twelve, but it varies a lot.

I ran into a turtle on the same trail.  He looked at me as I approached.  As I took a wide loop around him, the shell stayed put, but the head and eyes watched me.  Guarded.  Your teens are watching you.  They may not be following like they did before, but they are moving their eyes and heads to see if what you believe and what you say are for real.  They may not move their shell, but know that you are impacting their hearts as they watch what you do.  Example is powerful at all ages.

Learn by Watching

I took a turn and moved closer to the turtle.  You know what he did.  When I got too close, his head went inside the shell.  On my return trip down the trail, he was gone.

Yep.  Teens often operate the same way.  However you can do it, keep your relationship open.  Instead of expecting them to follow you like the bunny did, find things they will do with you.  But, ever so gently.  If mom and dad get too close, pry too much, there is a tendency to retreat.   And, if you keep pushing, they will disappear for a while if they can.  Give them time and they will come out again when they feel it is safe.

A few years ago I asked ten parents who had great teens what they did.  Everyone said the same thing:  "we keep a bridge open," a relationship, no matter what.  It might mean not getting too close sometimes.  It might mean being careful to "pick your battles" and let some things go that really aren't that important.  But, whatever you do, keep a relationship active.

That's it.  The "Turtle and the Rabbit."  Teaching your children isn't too complicated, really.  Know what you believe and want.  Talk about it.  Be intentional but not smothering.  Know which stage your child is in. Take advantage of the rabbit years.  And, know how turtles operate.  Young ones learn by following and they all learn by watching.  Live what you want them to learn.

Why We Need Bravehearts

Let me confess my personal agenda behind Building Bravehearts.  I want to help equip and give courage to young people to make an impact for Christ in their world.  While success by anyone's definition is best achieved with courage, my agenda--or vision--certainly needs it.

I have two dreams that have haunted me.  Years ago, in the Chicago Tribune, I read a column by Bob Greene about 12 year old Liliana Ciprianu who was beaten to death by her step-father because he didn't like the way she dusted the house.  Apparently a bubbly, sweet girl. I still see her face with long dark hair. Greene wants to know who will come up with answers before another death happens.  He says, "The answers to all of this must be out there somewhere."  I dream that someone I know will find the answer for child abuse and unreached homes.

My other dream is global.  While I worked at Wheaton Academy, Chip Huber led a connection between our high school students and a community in Zambia.  We became immersed in the big picture needs of hunger, health care, water, and AIDS.  And, we saw ways to help solve those things locally.

Max Lucado in Live to Make a Difference (Thomas Nelson, 2010) says:
"The book of Acts announces, 'God is afoot!' "
"Is he still? we wonder.  Would God do with us what he did with his first followers?"
"Heaven knows we hope so.  One billion people are hungry, millions are trafficked in slavery, and pandemic diseases are gouging entire nations.  Each year nearly 2 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade.  Every five minutes, almost ninety children died of preventable diseases.  More than half of all Africans do not have access to modern health facilities.  And as a result, 10 million of them die each year from diarrhea, acute respiratory illness, malaria, and measles.  Many of those deaths could be prevented by one shot."

Lucado says that "God has given this generation, our generation, everything we need to alter the course of human suffering."  I believe him.

So, Bravehearts.  I work and write largely with fairly privileged Americans.  Anyone reading a blog has a computer and internet, thus resources well beyond most of the world.  I would love, through Bravehearts, to help every child make a difference in his or her world.  I would love for some to change the world.  We do have everything we need.

More often than anything else, a lack of courage holds us back from making a difference.  Fear kept Israel from the best God offered in the Promise Land.  Fear keeps all of us, at times, from stepping out in faith to do something special or unique.  We live in a world with fears, real and imagined.  Courage is needed.

In one of the few passages from the Bible to tell parents specifically what to do, Paul says in Colossians 3:21:  "Fathers, do not exasperate your children, so that they will not lose heart."  Keeping heart is so important that God tells us to make sure our children don't lose it.  A child with a lost heart gives up and doesn't make a difference. 

But, a child with heart, a braveheart, will grow and become who and what God intended.  He will live out Ephesians 2:10:  "For we are God’s masterpiece. He has created us anew in Christ Jesus, so we can do the good things he planned for us long ago." 

My two dreams are only two dreams. There is a world of other needs and dreams out there, down the street and around the world.  Wherever God leads a child, I hope that each is equipped and courageous to make a difference in ways that I can't begin to imagine.  I hope and pray each one is a braveheart ready for God's adventure and use.

Fixing Overload Failure in Children

“I have found that the most dangerous disability is not any formally diagnosable condition like dyslexia or ADD. It is fear.”

Edward Hallowell says that fear of mishandling the large number of normal daily inputs is a major reason that gifted people don’t perform (in a 2005 Harvard Business Review article called “Overloaded Circuits: Why Smart People Underperform"). He continues: “Fear shifts us into survival mode and thus prevents fluid learning and nuanced understanding. Certainly, if a real tiger is about to attack you, survival is the mode you want to be in. But, if you're trying to deal intelligently with a subtle task, survival mode is highly unpleasant and counterproductive."

Hallowell explains that gifted leaders become so overloaded with inputs, information, and needs that their brain goes from an orderly and creative approach controlled by the frontal lobes to a survival mode of the lower brain characterized by “fear, anxiety, impatience, irritability, anger, or panic.” This overload creates a situation where the person “is robbed of his flexibility, his sense of humor, his ability to deal with the unknown. He forgets the big picture and the goals and values he stands for. He loses creativity and his ability to change plans. He desperately wants to kill the metaphorical tiger.”

The same thing happens to our children when they can't handle, as Hallowell says, “the hyperkinetic environment in which we live…Never in history has the human brain been asked to track so many data points. Everywhere, people rely on their cell phones ,email, and digital assistants in the race to gather and transmit data, plans, and ideas faster and faster…As the human brain struggles to keep up, it falters…” Our children are faced with the same overload, but with less maturity to handle it.

(This overload is subtle and pernicious. Without thinking, I just clicked to my email to read a response from one of six notes I sent earlier for work. And today is a vacation day!)

Hallowell suggests four approaches to either stop or control the overload. They are good ones to incorporate into our parenting, as we help our children reduce fear from our stimulated world so they can grow and live freely in the world of learning, creativity, and courage.

1.  "Promote positive emotions" by "building a positive, fear-free emotional atmosphere."  A critical role for parents is to make home a positive, supportive place; it is a hard world out there, even in First Grade.  Physical contact and relationship are essential; make time for them.  Let's start by turning off screens and their inputs and replacing them with people, play, and creative places in our homes.

2.  "Take physical care of your brain with sleep, good diet, and exercise."  Children should never suffer or do less than they can because of an adult's lack of attention in this area. The basics are so important.  Let's make sure our children sleep and rest enough, eat foods that are healthy and that maintain steady glucose levels (not white breads, sugars, and power drinks), take vitamins, and exercise regularly.

3.  Develop strategies that help handle the overload.  For adults and children, have chunks of the day when email and videos are banned.  Don't use screens as the default in parenting, make screens the exception. Create a neat space; your office or a child's room can be messy, but there should be a clear place somewhere.  Help your child organize and prioritize needs rather than adding unnecessary burdens or getting frustrated when they aren't done well.  Give your children an atmosphere for work that works for them.

4.  "Protect your frontal lobes by staying out of survival mode all you can."  Guard your children's inputs and stressors, reducing the ones you can and helping them sort out the others with a plan.  Give them chunks of time when they don't have to experience the pressure or inputs.  Do things like play games or read books that require their total concentration on one thing so they can forget all the inputs except the one pleasant one they are doing.

You might want to look at Dr. Hallowell's site Crazy Busy for ideas on being busy, Don't Miss Your Life for ideas on getting inputs and fears under control, and 45 Things about life in the workplace (the picture above is from this site).

Or, even better, memorize Philippians 4:6 with your child, "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything in prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.  And the peace of God, which passes all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus."  Maybe study Jesus' life together and how he handled pressures and crowds.  And model for your children, "Cease striving and know that I am God" (Psalm 46:10).

What does all of the input our children absorb do to them? Let me end with this quote from Luke's Commonplace Book, originating with Agatha Christie: "I suppose it’s because nearly all children go to school nowadays and have things arranged for them that they seem so forlornly unable to produce their own ideas."  How do we help our children control fear and its consequences from the overload?

An Update on Braveheart Progress

Thanks for helping Building Bravehearts grow from an idea to toddler hood.  Building Bravehearts blog began about a year ago and is one part of a vision to help every child succeed by developing the courage to try.  After digging into ideas, listening to stories, and watching young people grow, I am more convinced than ever that building "heart" deserves our attention if we want our children to become who and what they are meant to be.  Courage, in the big and small of life, makes a difference.

Below is an annual update of where we are and where we are going.

Building Bravehearts blog has been a place to serve families and develop ideas at the same time.  From nothing to almost 5,000 reads this year isn't a lot compared to many blogs, but a steady start.  We at least beat the average life span of a blog which is 126 days!

Book work on Bravehearts goes in spurts, as does some of the blog, usually tied to energies at my "day job" of principal.  A few months ago, a handful of editors and agents saw a book proposal and gave positive remarks and suggestions.  I have taken their helpful comments and am in the middle of a revised proposal and chapter writing.

Lord willing, in the months straight ahead we will begin Braveheart seminars, a three-hour presentation for parents about raising their own Bravehearts.  The three segments are:
1. "Braveheart Success" in which parents discover the connection between heart and success in a world of fears.
2. "Keeping Heart" where parents learn how to keep heart in their children by understanding the heart that children have, modeling trust, supportive parenting, cooperating with the Creator, and creating passion.
3. "Restoring Heart" helps parents find out how to restore a heart that is lost.

We will be exploring other ways to share the Braveheart ideas such as articles and presentations to educators on the importance of heart in learning and how to develop them in a school context.

Your insights, questions, and prayers are welcome!

Thank you.
Joe Neff

Dad's Courage

If you read through Braveheart blogs, you'll find a recurring theme:  the power of parents who model courage to their children.  No matter what we want our children to become, "do as I do" has a lot more impact on our children than "do as I say." That's a little frightening, isn't it?  Our children are watching.

Leslie Neff

As we move beyond the cards and grilled steaks of Father's day, I hope that we can do what my Dad did for me.  Even though he didn't always know it, I watched him a lot.  And I learned. He moved on to life with God over two years ago, but his impact on me still makes a difference every day.

From an outside look, Dad wasn't a world changer.  He worked as a machinist, lived in a modest home in Arizona, and managed to enjoy fishing and hunting as much as he could squeeze in while working and fulfilling his responsibilities.  But, the leap he made from a farm in rural Kentucky to the end of his life was over a gap that took more courage than I will ever muster.  He modeled courage to me.

I hope that when my children and your children look back they can say that they learned courage from us, courage to be bravehearts for the right things.  Here are some ways Dad modeled courage:

* He married my Mom, when he could have left her alone with child--me!  He had the courage to do the right thing instead of leaving.

* He sold everything he had and moved from his beloved Kentucky home to Arizona to help my Mom's health.  He pulled one small U-Hall behind his truck and gave up all he knew to do the right thing.

* He had the courage to give my sister and me a big vision, a vision for a life different than he had known.  His life wasn't bad at all, but he was bold to give us something new and big.

* He had the courage to quit smoking.  When he decided it was wrong, that was it. Courage and strength to decide what was right and do it without complaint and without turning back.

* He had the courage to serve my Mom for decades of illness, giving up his dreams to be at her side twice a day in her nursing home.  He had the courage to show how Jesus loves us.

* He had the courage to humble himself in his last couple of years on earth and let Jesus change him in ways that surprised me.  Sitting and talking on our porch in his last visit to us, I hardly knew this man who had God's grip on him.

My dad didn't talk much about these things, he just showed me.  That has made all the difference.  May you and I have such an impact on our children through our lives.