Let It Begin With Me

You know the phenomenon that happens when you’re thinking about buying a certain car?  You see it everywhere. Driving down the highway, you notice this car every three seconds. It just jumps right out at you when you’re not even thinking about it.

Well, it’s been the same thing for me during this peace project, which I started about 8 months ago. (You can read about it here and here.) I go through my day noticing when I can have a peaceful reaction instead of adding to the conflict.  Situations just present themselves and bam there’s an opportunity to choose or create peace.
I grew up in a family of yellers, where the first reaction to any type of conflict was to talk louder than the other person.  So, when my 4-year-old daughter does something 4-ish, my first instinct is to yell or reprimand, and I have to summon a lot of patience to remain calm. I generally do a good job at controlling my short fuse, but since starting this project, I know I am doing even better.

A few days ago, Cricket was standing at the top of our stairs as we were leaving to go to school, running late as usual. She refused to budge, whining that it was her job to open the door (it is; she was right, but I opened it because she was stalling).  She started to scream and cry, and I felt myself getting incredibly impatient.

Suddenly, something that a reader wrote on an earlier post flooded my mind. She had told me about a speech by Dennis Kucinich in which he advocates for a Department of Peace. In this speech he reminds us of the hymn line:

Let there be peace on earth and let it begin with me.

Ever since reading this comment, the words to that hymn have been in my mind.  Well, with Cricket at the top of the stairs and both of us at a critical moment, these words popped back into my mind. Let peace begin with me. Instead of yelling above her screams, I took us both back into the house, closed the door and started over. She was extremely amused by it all and instantly calmed down. As did I.

Conversely, this afternoon when Cricket was having a blast throwing her musical instrument collection around the living room, I chose the wrong reaction. Initially, in a calm, dispassionate voice, I told her, Instruments are for playing, not for throwing. Please stop throwing them or you will get a time out. Three times. She just looked at me and continued throwing them. Now clearly she was misbehaving, so I shouted (really loudly) at her to stop. She picked up a tambourine, looked me square in the face, and threw it across the room. I truly believe that if I hadn’t shouted, she wouldn’t have thrown the tambourine.  Aggression begets aggression.

I truly believe that I wouldn’t have so quickly recognized my mistake or acknowledged my part in escalating the situation if I hadn't embarked on this Peace Project. I know that for sure, as surely as I know that I need to give her more opportunity for throwing things safely and outside!

 Let it begin with me.