How to Relax into Your Home Education Journey

You find yourself in one of those moments where you question your ability or choice to home-educate. Doubt has crept in to undermine your efforts. Niggling voices get louder and more critical. Maybe you’re frowning a little more than usual, perhaps a little more tense, liable to snap and react and end up regretful, fulfilling that prophecy.

So how do you stop that downward spiral?

I’ve passed through a few of these moments on my home-ed journey. My youngest is not far off becoming a teenager and I have plenty of years to look back on. To take what works going forward.

Here are my tips to relax into your home-education journey:

1. Trust your children

2. Trust yourself

3. Remove the obstacles

4. Go for the connection

Trust your children

It helps to try to connect to your original reason you began home-education in the first place. For me one big reason was a belief that all that children require to be successful in life is to be at ease in their own skin. That with a firm belief in their own capabilities they will be able to do whatever their heart desires. My job is to foster that trust in themselves.

Of course, (in the words of ‘Anne with an ‘E’) this sounds ever so romantical. In practice, however, it played out quite differently.

There have been countless moments where any one of us has not felt at ease in our own skin, lost sight of our own power and potential. The blessing that years of experiencing brings is a deep knowing that this is what it is to be human. It’s all part of growing up. And we never stop that!

I’ve now come to see these moments of discomfort, (including some long extended ones!), as learning opportunities. Times when we stand of the edge of our comfort zone touching upon our feelings of shame and vulnerability, neither of which are toxic when in passing.

I like to view them as signposts that something is important. A route to connecting to what really matters. Perhaps they want to be seen in their struggle and efforting, perhaps they just need a break.

Often the route to rebuilding our capacity comes through rest, playfulness, laughter and lightness. Children have a natural tendency towards these things and need plenty of space to enjoy them. It serves to reconnect them to their source, their energy, and their trust in themselves.

Think about all those endorphins flowing! Oodles of happy hormones to bring them back into a sense of ease and harmony.

For me, the trust comes from knowing that these moments are part of the cycles of learning and growing, and children are doing plenty of that!

Trust Yourself

We feel capable when we believe we have the resources to match the demand, and resources can mean many things not just the physical.

Resources may be the actual physical materials that support learning exploration, or perhaps the financial means or community access. However, when I speak of resources, what I’m really referring to are my inner resources. The capacity I currently hold to meet the expectation, (whether mine of someone else’s).

Do I hold the physical, mental, and emotional capacity for this right now? And if not, what do I need to rebuild that capacity?

There have been many incidences where I have felt sadness for not having the physical resources to match what I wanted to do. Lack of energy used to be a biggy for me and took time to address. However, even without the desired energy, I like to be present for my children.

Again, this is easier said than done.

To trust myself to be the mother I wanted to be, meant that I had to remove the obstacles that were holding me back.

Remove the Obstacles

Obstacles are our inner critics, as well as the social and cultural expectations we live under. They are oppressive, counter-intuitive, destructive, and undermining. They are that which hold us in an invisible prison and restrict our freedom. Cause us to deny our need for true self-expression, to mask who we really are, for fear of rejection. Right and wrong thinking. Judgement and blame. Should’s and shouldn’ts that dictate whether we are allowed to belong or not.

These are incredibly strong forces from which to break free.

Firstly, we must recognise the words we are telling ourselves. Words based upon values that likely came from some distant historical system of oppression. Such as ‘Children should be polite’, ‘able to engage’, ‘be motivated’ or whatever. ‘I shouldn’t let them laze around all day’.

These words are powerful in their ability to disconnect. Unravel them.

I like ‘The Work of Byron Katie’ because its such a quick method for transforming the unempathetic words of the inner critic. Byron Katie shares her resources freely online and it’s such an easy process; You simple ask,

1. Is this true?

2. Can you absolutely know that this is true?

3. What happens, (how do you react), when you believe that thought?

4. Who would you be without that thought?

When I began this process, I found I hand tonnes of negative thought patterns to sift through. I couldn’t believe that I was acting from this baseline. From values that were not even mine! As I chose to let go of more and more of these, I started to experience life with much greater ease and confidence.

Without being withheld, I was free to discover who I really am. To enjoy the freedom of integrity. Of living true to what really matters to me.

Self-enquiry increased my capacity and therefore my trust in myself. And this renewed sense of self-connection provided the basis for extending it outward.

Connection

Now that I have the privilege to be able to enjoy connection, I see it as the route to living a relaxed and fulfilling life.

I see connection as a relational thing. When I feel disconnected, I check whether I’m currently experiencing a healthy relationship with myself, to others, my environment, or something in it that I relate to.

There are times when I feel disjointed and confused, where everything seems to involve a great deal of efforting and a lot of wanting to run away and hide. Times when I long for ease and flow but it seems out of reach.

It is especially difficult when this involves my children. Where connection feels lost and maybe even hopeless.

What I used to do was try to work out the best way to handle the situation, the best words to say, the best action to take.

What I discovered through learning NVC (nonviolent communication), aka compassionate communication, is that what is required is a quality of presence. By presence I mean being present to what’s there, starting with the feelings I’m feeling inside my body. This honesty allows me to connect to my self-compassion.

As it turned out, my discovery taught me that disconnection to others begins with a disconnect to myself, and so my mission became to learn the many ways in which I can reconnect to myself.

The motivation being that from a place of self-connection, everything else flows with ease. Even connecting to others, including my children.

One of my great discoveries has been how easy I find nature as a reconnector. Through building my relationship to the natural world, I also come into a healthier relationship with myself. Every time I remember this, my connection to my children blooms!

Of course, there are many ways to self-connect beyond nature. Nature is kind of a spiritual thing, full of awe and reverence. Think sunrise and seasons. Compost and rebirth. Seeds and mighty oaks. Salty seas and refreshing rivers. This is my favourite way to repair disconnected lines.

Other great methods are movement, rest, socialising, singing, laughing, crying, meditating, self-enquiry, empathy, compassion, and sometimes a cup of tea and a really good slice of chocolate cake!

References

Anne with an 'E'; https://www.netflix.com/gb/title/80136311

Byron Katie; https://thework.com/

NVC/Nonviolent Communication: https://www.nonviolentcommunication.com/