New Zealand’s Social Crisis
When governments remain fixated on reducing debt and growing the economy, they ignore the core social problems that cost billions and create ongoing cycles of poverty, violence, child abuse, health problems, and drug and alcohol abuse.
Treat Children With Respect
No matter how caring we are with our own children, during unguarded moments of stress we can unwittingly re-enact the way we were punished or abused as children, terrifying and confusing not only our children, but also ourselves. What forms can this abuse take and how can we change the way we treat children?
New Zealand’s Dark Secret
Today I read with shock and disgust and a sickening feeling in my stomach today about a two-year-old boy who was kicked to death by his mother’s boyfriend. The little boy had been sleeping on a couch and awoke to discover that he had wet it.
Jimmy Buffett: An inspiration to share your talents
Using one of Jimmy Buffett’s songs during a drama lesson with children and noticing their delighted faces, made me reflect on how connected we all are and that by sharing our talents, we can positively impact so many people and create good in the world.
Finding Utopia
It was the noise that started it…my sudden desperate search for Utopia. It began to intrude upon me like an unwelcome guest the day air brakes squealed and whiffed repeatedly as a huge truck…
Gifts Come in all Shapes and Sizes
I am sorting through old files and rediscovering little gifts of wisdom from the many people I met on my travels twenty years ago. It causes me to wonder, would I have…
How Can We End Family Violence?
Along with steadily increasing incidences of family violence, are the spiralling economic and health costs it creates – not to mention the huge problems caused when drugs and alcohol are used to self-medicate the anxiety family violence creates. What can we do to end these cycles of abuse and create peace within ourselves and our homes?
The 4 Most Important R’s
How different would this world be if we all took to heart and practised the Dali Lama’s three R’s: Respect for self. Respect for others. Responsibility for all your actions. But there is a fourth ‘R’ we also need to heed.
National Standards and the Big “F”
Tough assessment standards in schools can create the opposite effect of what they try to achieve, leaving many children with an ingrained sense of failure that does not serve their highest school. This is what I discovered while teaching a class of fourteen-year-old boys…
Shining Stars in the Chilean Miners’ Rescue
When an American friend asked me if I knew who the driller was who broke through to the Chilean miners, I had to confess my ignorance. After all the bad press Americans…
Child-Centred Learning: The day the rabbits came to school
Chattering excitedly, four children entered the classroom carrying boxes and a basket. I soon found out what was inside, for they could not contain their excitement…
The House My Father Built
Writing a memoir about the impact of divorce on children, Juliet discovers the dark family secrets that derailed her life. By going into the pain of her past, she gains much wisdom and learns what it has to teach her about why many children lack the resilience…
Ending Cycles of Violence is and Inside Job
The choices we individually or collectively make can create heaven or hell upon Earth. Each one of us has the power of choice within us, and the power to choose peace within our own thoughts and therefore our lives.
How Children’s Self-Esteem is Torn Apart
I learned from my students that low self-esteem was not only about parents fighting, other children being mean or calling them names, or even sibling hatred; it was also about not…
The Antidote to Violence
Violence in the home can create psychic wounds that may never heal. It can cause children to ‘harden their hearts’ by shutting down their feelings to enable them to survive it. It has also, I believe, created a silent epidemic of PTSD…
Outer Crisis has an Inner Cure
“We devote a lot of time to adult policies, trying to make a better world. But every reform is frustrated or perverted. The quality of life is not improved, because the people are the same. What changes people? …”
What Jade Goody had to Teach Us
Journalists had a field day poking cruelly at Jade Goody’s lack of education, but if they knew the cause of it, perhaps they may have seen able to see her big heart instead.
What National Standards Can’t Fix
Bouncing excitedly onto the front seat of the car, her face glowing, words burst from her mouth, “I came second in the spelling test today!” “Why didn’t you come first?”
Don’t Quit
Have you ever thought about quitting something that was important to you to do, or even quitting on life? Here are a couple of stories to inspire you not to quit…
I’m sorry. I love you…
The power of love is the most amazing ‘medicine’ I have witnessed in its ability to heal. Read how Dr. Ihaleakala Hew Len used his desire to love and heal himself, heal the inmates…
Learn from Each Other
Children see and understand far more than we give them credit for and sometimes it is worth acting on their simple wisdom, or taking their advice to heart.
Facing our fears we can learn to love
Have you built a wall around yourself because you fear painful future experiences? It may be that your wall won’t let love in or out, thus creating more pain and loneliness in your life…
Be patient with anger to learn what’s behind it
“One moment of patience can ward off a great disaster. One moment of impatience can destroy your whole life.” These words from a Chinese fortune cookie…
What do you want to do that for?
“What do you want to do that for?” was the response to my unbridled enthusiasm about writing a children’s book on self-esteem. It echoed within a hollow past of stolen dreams…
Help others to help themselves
Did you know that helping others can sometimes cripple them? Read Nellie’s story about how she allowed caring people to cripple her for twenty years.
Be positive about mistakes
Mistakes allow us to learn and grow, yet for many, making mistakes can be deeply shaming. By changing your perspective on mistakes, you can become a positive role model for your…
Dealing with self-doubt
Overcoming self-doubts to share your gifts and talents with others can inspire them to grow through difficulties to reach their potential.
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