THE MAGIC OF STORYTELLING

We belong to the culture that has thrived on stories. Everything from customs to science to code of conduct was transmitted generation after generation, through stories. Sadly though, we got invaded and turned to "education" for wisdom instead. But somewhere in everyone of us, there are still those genes that pull us towards stories.

What do we call as stories? Everything, I would say. Even the events that occurred in front of us are scrutinized by us, before we pass them on and hence are more like stories than facts. We all are storytellers in a way. We want to tell others about something that we experienced in a very interesting way and when the audience seems to be pleased or amused by our story, we gather more confidence in our ways of communicating, perceiving things and experiencing everything. Around the age of three, the world of imagination lightens up and pretend plays begin. We can see the child talking to himself, to his toys as if they are alive and coming over to share the awe of his experiences.

Where does this vanish off in the later stage? It doesn't and it cannot. We are storytelling species and cannot live without it but it does get muted with time, if it's not fed with listening. Even though everyone can tell a story, not everyone can pull the audience. But it is also the other way. Those who get the audience, turn into better storytellers. As a parent, we are the first audiences to the budding storytellers in the house. Just a little more ears to their experiences, their derivations from the experience and occasional brooding over their stories together can boost so much confidence in them. Listening would also encourage them to become better listeners and better listeners are always better learners, aren't they?

Now, how do we turn listeners to learners? Listening, in a broad perspective also includes observation. Once they have developed the love for stories, they naturally intend to find more stories around them which brings in better observation and better listening. We need to use these skills and present more mediums of stories to enable learning. Oral way of storytelling is the most ancient and preferred way but the contemporary ways are endless, though sometimes needless. Richest form, still are the books that enhance the vocabulary but propped stories, documentaries and plays are also amazing mediums, if introduced gradually.

What is the significance of storytelling, anyways? I am not trying to say we need to turn everyone into excellent storytellers but what I want to underline here are the amazing qualities it brings out. Observation, perception, imagination are given qualities but there is much more to it than meets the eye. Every story has labyrinths of smaller stories hidden within and what you read depends on the eyes that you have grown over the years of reading stories. Eventually, the way you perceive the story increases manifolds. You are able to put yourself in every character's place and understand their part and can derive from the cumulative impact of various similar characters in different stories and different situations. These qualities trickle down into our life making us more sensitive towards others. This, I think is essential for growth.

To sum up, storytellers are not always charmers or brainy or presentable but they are always and always good humans.

LEARNING LANGUAGES

Learning was the most lucrative part of motherhood. I had a deal with my husband before planning a child, that he handles the medicine department and I handle the education department. I was and am, plain curious about how learning happens and concerned about how it should happen. And the first step to any learning is language.

So to start it early, I had borrowed some small and big words' flash cards from a friend who had attended a seminar where they told that introducing children with these, when they are as young as two months, makes them better learners. I don't exactly remember the way she had put it across to me, but I had completely bought it. Being a highly enthusiastic self proclaimed educator, I followed the advice but within a few days I found it unrewarding and eventually pointless. My two month old was more into wetting bed and lifting his head than learning the spellings, like obviously. Later, when A started babbling I thought, words written randomly in big letters is ideally not the way learning should start neither by focusing on going the A, B, C way. I shouldn't bother about how many words or letters of the alphabets he can remember before his second or third birthday and focus on talking to him like I am talking to someone who knows and understands free flowing sentences.

What followed was interesting. A did not speak a word till he was two. All he knew was the most essential word "mamma" and sign language to convey himself across. And as you know how the competitive world can influence you, I was aghast by other kids younger than him use quite a lot of words and ended up with people suggesting me speech therapists and more talking than I was doing. I reasoned that he is just plain lazy and comfortable with sign language but secretly I assumed that there was a fundamental difference in the way we progressed than did the others and so things are going to move differently for us.

Although, in the background this guy was putting together in his mind not only words but correct grammar and expressions to form sentences and within a week of commencing to talk (that was after turning two), he was making whole big 4-5 word sentences with correct grammar. We all were taken by surprise and amazed by what a human mind is capable of. I wonder how mind unpuzzles the complex concept of speech without making notes or asking for revisions.

When a child is exposed to more than one language the delay in speech is obvious and nothing to worry about. But, exposing A to many languages was a task, because for me, family means marathi, friends means hindi and acquaintances means English. I had that sorted and compartmentalized in my brain rigidly. So, we had to figure out some other way. When I was growing up, knowing languages was hardly a concern to my parents and I learned my languages from the surrounding in a very organic way. So, then why should I bother putting A for language and phonetic classes. I did try to force myself to talk to him every day for an hour in hindi and an hour in English, like we were forced in school. Honestly, it never worked then and did not even this time around. I remember, I tried to learn Tamil from a book that promised me just four weeks to a fluent Tamil. I was bored sooner than I thought. But given that the first five years learning happens faster than ever, we had to try it but in a healthy and effective manner. I mean, not through television or videos on phone or just plain words books but something that imparts foundational lessons.

And so, we brought the languages in, in the form of books (as that was also something I wished to bring in sooner than later). Story books in English and poetry in Hindi, is what we tried. Until A got quite fluent with the mother tongue, he never sat still for other languages but once he was settled with Marathi, he had no problem with other languages! He could sit longer periods for the story books. We built our capacity from one liners to lengthy paragraph books. Eventually, he started asking me about equivalent words for his Marathi words in other languages. I took it as a cue to start short conversations in different languages but he didn't seem much interested, nor is he now (His way is "all at once" or "nothing at all" way, I assume). But I got taken aback when one day suddenly he understood my conversations with other people, in not just Hindi and English but also Gujarati. Boom.....

Human mind.....!!!
Talking about language, I got speechless...!!

BUILDING THE SUBCONSCIOUS

I have brutally denied people from gifting my son chocolates, even if it has broken their heart and made them curse me under their lips. I choose my son's health over pleasing people. Shamelessly guilty, that I am. Agreed.

But yesterday a friend of mine asked me "what in the world are you going to achieve by not allowing him chocolates, biscuits and stuff, once he is off to school making friends and attending birthdays, he will eat them anyways? Don't try to control him so much." And I instantaneously replied "I know I sound like a control freak and when he has friends, he will get influenced but I am trying to be his subconscious mind." Later that day I was seriously in the awe of my own statement and even tried to think whether I made any sense or just wanted to shoot an impressive sentence and win the argument. For a few days I tried to figure out how subconscious mind worked and even googled if it can be manipulated.
I believe, that if we put something to practice everyday for a month, then it develops into a habit and when you ardently follow your habit then it trains your subconscious. And you know you feeded something to the subconscious when you naturally turn towards it rather than forcing yourself in that direction.

When A gets hungry, his mind projects to him the foods that he knows and has liked so far. He comes running to me asking for Poha, upma, chapati, jaggery, dahi or finds his dabba of Almonds and cashew nuts and goes munching around (this dabba of dryfruits, jaggery, roasted peanuts and dates is an inevitable part of our short and long trips also). We just put him, actually all of us for his sake, to practice good habits and he himself made them his second nature. And I am hopeful of many more practices that I find valuable and necessary and sow in his mind this time around, will flourish into a habit some day. So, I believe we do mold their subconscious either knowingly or unknowingly. What you want ingrained in your child should be your priority rather than assuming what is in trend will eventually influence them and let loose. At twos and threes they are more porous than any other ages and we should definitely make use of it in the right way.

ANYHOW...
This was the theory part of what I considered my achievement as a mother but I saw the practical example shortly after writing this article and so delayed sharing it to experiment every part of the theory.

A got serious stomach infection the next week I wrote my "theory". Leave alone my subconscious mind, even my common sense shuts down when he is unwell. I did all the things that I had sweared not to do ever after becoming a parent. From offering him the " no no noways food" to letting him sleep before the TV, I did everything that I consider bad. I just wanted to feed something to his frail body and make him sleep without burning his already meager calories. Though I feared he will demand all this even when he is in good health and will throw my two year long habit building efforts out of the window. But, after fasting for two long days as his appetite resumed, his habits did too.

I did not publish it yet and a few months later A caught viral infection. And this time around instead of pestering him to eat foods that I thought would help him and getting him medicated from the very first day of infection, I trusted his body and his senses and let him take the lead. He knew he was weak and needed to rest most of the day and asked for food that he felt would comfort him like warm milk, varan bhaat and pistachio all as substitutes for the main meals of the day and in very little quantities. I let him trust his body while I trusted him and things went well.

These incidents taught me much need lessons
1. The subconscious mind can be trained.
2. Like animals who have full knowledge of what went wrong in their systems and how can they cure it, we humans have it too in us and that too from a very young age. We have just eventually learned to not listen to our instincts and our bodies. And this draws my third learning.
3. I have to trust A's decisions and choices in times of sickness and otherwise, given the fact that I took care of the first learning very much successfully.

THE TRYING THREEs

Today after a long break I pulled myself to the desk to write a blog post. I kept fiddling with my pen and mulling over correct words, phrases and storyline to describe what was going on with my life but I couldn't. "Where the hell my creativity is lost? Why am I not able to describe metanoia that I am going through?" Then my son walked in declaring that he won't brush his teeth today. I rolled my eyes thinking that "chal yaar, big deal, I can spare him one day with unbrushed teeth and myself of all the drama that follows." But then suddenly the sincere mom in me yelled "you idiot, sparing him for a day will tell him that it's ok to skip brushing teeth sometimes and bathing and not being punctual and blah and blah. You are messing with his foundational habits." I rolled my eyes again and went to him with yet another story of what happens if we don't brush teeth and how fresh it feels after brushing and so on.

Him. He, on the other hand was just testing the water. He saw his mommy occupied with something really serious and meaningful to her and he wanted to check that will she put all aside and go for the rules or may be he was trying to find a hole in the loop which he can use in future for bigger things. Yes, I know you must be thinking how can I be so sure that this were his thoughts at that moment. BECAUSE after breaking my head over it, he easily gave in. No further retaliation...!! Just an eerie smile.

So I concluded that this is where all my creative juices these days are going. Persuasions, arguements, counterarguments and reasonings. And if, by chance any ounce of creativity is still breathing somewhere in my mind then that is shadowed by this overwhelming human I am raising.

If a one year and two year old is defiant then a three year old is also defiant but with a smirk on his face.