Reprinted with permission from Calm and Compassionate Children: A Handbook. Copyright © 2007 by Susan Usha Dermond, Celestial Arts, Berkeley, CA. The book is available from your local bookseller or by contacting Ten Speed Press at 800-841-2665 or online at www.tenspeed.com.

You may be reluctant to stand up against the mainstream even if you dislike the influences of consumerism and mass media on your children.

Children beg to buy or see what “everybody else gets to” and some parents back down from their initial refusal because they equate material abundance with happiness. Other parents may be reluctant to enforce limitations because they fear friends and family will think them weird or conservative and uptight. Others are afraid of raising children who, like hothouse flowers, are too fragile to thrive in the real world.

Children are especially open and receptive to the feeling messages from the arts. They keenly feel both dark, defiling depictions of violence and meaninglessness and the inspiration of uplifting stories, films, and theater. By exposing children to uplifting, beautiful artistic expressions, we allow their hearts and minds to be filled with positive thoughts. If we expose them to art that is violent or depressing, they will either take on these moods themselves because they are so open, or they will start to shut down the heart in order to protect themselves. I have heard a few parents say that children need to develop a “tough skin” or “learn to take it” because the world is like that. However, when the heart closes, it closes to the positive influences as well as the negative.

The idea that we need to put children in environments that will toughen them up so they can cope with later life is false. You would not make a three-year-old sit at a desk for an hour a day because he will have to do it in first grade. You wait until he is developmentally ready. Before permitting our children to witness violence, cruelty, and sexual activity, we need to help them develop self-understanding and the skills for living that will help them recognize what choices lead them to happiness.

Children who are prematurely exposed to fear, violence and hatred, have problems later on, because their natural development into loving adults has been thwarted. It is true that we do not want to deprive children of the opportunity of learning the skills to overcome obstacles by controlling every part of their lives. We want children to have challenges to master; those may be academic for some children and athletic, musical, or social for others. But it is also true that, even if we provide an entirely loving, safe, secure environment, people and situations will arise that challenge them. Adults who remember childhood as an idyllic time of life are remembering the inner joy, and forgetting their childhood disappointments, anxieties, and fears that almost everyone experiences.

To prepare children for later life experiences, we need to teach them how to meet challenges with a positive attitude, rather than either fighting their battles for them or dismissing their feelings by not taking their obstacles seriously. Parents should provide the safety zone in which their children can figure out how to handle these difficulties. Do everything you can to ensure your child’s environment promotes the values you espouse, especially up to the age of puberty when they will be ready to explore, try out different roles, and test their decision-making skills.

Susan Usha Dermond has a 30-year career in education and is currently director of the Beaverton, Oregon, Living Wisdom School, a nonprofit elementary school that emphasizes nonsectarian spiritual principles and practical life skills.