I turn my shoulder for a second and kaboom!
It’s our Moishy, the baby of my little clan, and he’s at it again and again and again. He turned one not long ago and started walking at 10 months. He climbs. He tears things down. He puts everything in his mouth and explores the world with all his five senses.
Kaboom! Again and again and again.
My first child, also a boy, was a climber, too. But back then, I had two hands and two eyes that were all on him. My second child was a girl, and yes, a walker at nine months, but she was calmer. When my third child came, I had no more hands, and for him alone, I needed 10.
He had (and has) a strength of character that I thought was beyond normal. For years, I took deep breaths (I still do) and looked for solutions to calm his nature, but only one thing really helped and is still the key: I stopped trying to calm him and just worked on calming me.
He climbs on walls or on his hands and never sits still. The first word that comes out is always “no” with great will. But what is funny is that with maturity, age and my staying calm, most issues pass with time, and he surprises me with what he can now calmly do.
Fast-forward to three more kids, thank G‑d, and I see that most things are normal.
Babies are babies. Toddlers are toddlers. Kids are kids, and my goodness, teenagers are teenagers. It’s normal to have a strong personality in a strong kid.
Kaboom!
I don’t flinch anymore. I don’t sigh. Instead, I pick up the damage and laugh at my little bulldozer.
I have learned that normal is just what you are used to. Normal is not perfect or necessarily quiet, easy or without a problem.
The midrash1 says that before the Torah sage Rabbi Akiva became a great rabbi, he was simply Akiva. His wife, Rachel, married him, an illiterate unlearned man. She told him to go and learn. He went to cheder (elementary school) because that is the level where he belonged.
The children laughed at him.
It wasn’t normal. A 40-year-old man learning something new, starting something new, becoming someone new.
Akiva came home feeling dejected.
Rachel told him, “Can you go to the market to pick something up? And bring the donkey with you.”
She decorated the donkey with plants. Everyone saw the donkey and laughed.
The next day she told him to go again. Everyone saw the donkey and most people laughed.
The next day she told him to go again. Everyone saw the donkey and a few laughed.
The next day she told him to go again. Everyone saw the donkey, but they didn’t laugh. It was no longer something new. It was no longer something that they hadn’t seen before.
“Akiva,” she told him, “go back to cheder.”
The children stopped their mocking, and he learned. A 40-year-old man learning, changing, growing and becoming someone new. Look at the power and the greatness of not normal.
Was it normal at 40 not to know how to read? Maybe. Was there a solution or something that needed to be done? Yes. Did he do it? Yes.
Rachel was brilliant. She taught her husband to stay goal-oriented and wipe away the emotion that comes and goes like the rain on a windshield with windshield wipers. The way to work on a solution was not with a torrent of negative emotions. Wipe away the, “Oh, my goodness! This is a disaster. It’s crazy! It’s too much to handle. It’s not normal!”
Instead, Rachel taught us that the way to work on the not normal is by staying calm. To understand that within the range of normal, there are different personalities. Some kids start to walk at 10 months and some not for two years. Some kids say no all the time, and others are more agreeable.
All people need help in one area or another. All people have problems or difficulties in one area or another. This is normal. And you can deal with it all when you remain calm and when you realize that with G‑d’s help, age, maturity, life and experience, it generally gets easier on its own.
Kaboom!
I don’t even flinch or sigh. I pick up the damage and hug my little motor as he laughs.
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