What babies and the world seem to know

IF THE WORLD COULD VOTE
Check out this voting on-line set up by a 22 year old fellow from overseas. By a landslide, the entire world wants Obama, or at least "The Change" he promises.

If the world could vote?

Posted using ShareThis

Soon, maybe, we can all stop this "baby crying" * (see below for definition) we are all feeling.

I have refrained from political topics here related to the upcoming election, but I received an email I
couldn't resist ... the political candidates with babies and passed it along. I know babies to be the wisest of us, the most aware we'll ever be. We need to pay attention to what our babies pay attention to.

I got this back from a relative: being republican or democrat or narrow minded has nothing to do with it. stupid emails like this is what takes something away from real issues in politics. ... how many babies has obama held that cried. exactly...and who cares. i am sure on some level babies can sense evil...whatever. it is just too bad that is not how we choose our leaders in America.a little biased don't you think? what is it, like 10 pics to 1 for each of bush and mccain. pretty good depiction on how the mainstream has been holding 'Obama Biden laden' so high.

Oye, so much I could say, but I won't. Babies are my story, and I am stickin' to it. I totally disagree that the reactions of babies, children, and our youth have nothing to do with it. So, I googled both candidates to check it out, as I always do. I found a slide show of Obama, McCain, and Biden. We are a nation in trouble, and one of the reasons is that this society does not honor birth as sacred, does not honor the baby, and does not see how the human baby is fully aware and feeling. When we value and honor our babies and realize how much we can learn FROM them, we will create an entirely different values systems.

I remember the ONLY candidate I have ever wanted for President ever was NJ Senator Bill Bradley. I was campaigning for him in 1996 when he wasn't running. In 1997 I read his memoir, "Present Time, Time Past." My then three year old daughter had looked at the picture of him on the cover of his book with awe, pointed to his picture and smiled adoringly at him, peering into his eyes saying, "Ahhhhh," and she hugged the book to her chest. I felt the same way. I felt I could trust my inner judgement more because of her response. Children are not yet indoctrinated, they are sensory, and real and honest. By the way, I've never gotten over him losing to Gore in the Iowa Caucus for the 2000 election. He is the only Presidential candidate for whom I would post a bumper sticker. I try to not live in the past but I often wonder, "What if ..."

So, with my regard for babies - the new soul that has just arrived and as aware and wise as will ever be - I see the babies, children, and youth of America as our future and as "the Deciders". The youth of America are more involved than I ever remember. They need so much hope right now. As I approach being really old I remind myself to value the youth and their opinions and energy. They will be living with the decisions we make long after my parents are gone, long after I and many of us are gone. I do what I do today for my grandsons and their children. That's makes me sound over fifty, doesn't it?

So these pictures interested me. I love these pictures ... not at all because they are of Obama, but because they are of babies and children responding and engaging with him, whoever he is.

I really believe you can discern a lot about a person by how they engage with babies and children. Too often the adult, especially strangers, are just trying to elicit some response from the baby -- usually to satisfy an unconscious need of their own.

Watch people with babies with a new eye, watch yourself when you engage with a baby -- why do you engage with a baby? Do you need them to respond? Do you need them to laugh to make you feel better? Do you ask permission or wait for the baby to come to you or the parents to hand to you the baby? Or do you just pick up babies, touch babies, put your face too close to babies -- even as they resist? Do you insist on holding someone's baby (ignore their behavioral cues) even if the baby is resisting? Hunkering into the mom or dad (saying, "no")? Is the baby looking away from you? Avoiding your face and your eyes? Reaching away from you? Squirming? Are you ok that the baby is not interested in you? Or are you content only when the baby gives you a positive response? Do you perceive and are you ok that the baby or child doesn't seem to like you? Or your "energy"? Do you stop to wonder have I invaded the baby's space? Do you stop and see the baby's body language as communicating to you? "Please don't touch my body." "You are too close." "I don't want to play or smile right now." "I don't know you." Do you or do you see others holding a baby, their baby, but especially other's babies and talking over the baby, not engaging the baby?

Yes, you can tell a lot about a person by how they engage with babies and how they respond to them. And, a baby will not pretend to like you and will not care about letting you know you've overstepped your boundaries. Babies are perfect mirrors -- if we look. The problem is that adults are so overpowering, so out of touch with babies, and are disrespectful of a baby's boundaries. When parents don't protect that boundary the baby is soon overwhelm and begins to learn that their boundaries are not respected. They learn defensive postures and beliefs that form another layer on to their foundation that they will carry into adulthood.

That was a mini lesson in infant behavior and so back to the pictures. Picture after picture of Obama shows him ENGAGING with the baby in his arms. In the pictures he is seeing the baby and the babies are searching his face, making eye contact, hugging, and smiling. Even when he is looking away the baby is trying to see his face and to engage with him. This is very rare for babies to engage so directly with a stranger, in a crowd. Children don't often sink into a deep hug with strangers. Babies often have difficulty with eye contact even with loved ones. These pictures show babies engaged with him in direct eye contact. Many, many "good pictures" of even parents and babies are with baby and adult not making eye contact, not engaging. I looked on line once for pictures of parent and baby engaged with eye contact and found very few.

I don't know if it means he is ready to lead the United States out of one of the worst situations we've been, but it tells me he must be a decent fellow. It tells in spite of all the stresses in his life right now he is aware and capable of engaging with a baby as a person.

I am counting on the young people who must live with the choices of the last decade and the politicians in charge (Democrat and Republican). I see that perhaps Obama really might engage with them, us, We, the People, and as I heard him speak at the Iowa Caucus in January, he has plans to engage people in democracy at every level. I used to be a community organizer; and he talked-the-talk. If he wins, or even if he doesn't, I hope our youth will step up and reclaim democracy he has inspired in many of them, and I hope they'll walk-the-walk and hold him to his claims. It might be in baby-steps, but our youth can get us there.

Many of these pictures are from:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/21/babies-for-obama-slidesho_n_136433.html


No comment on this last picture!
except to note that she holds like a breastfeeding mother holds a baby.


IF THE WORLD COULD VOTE
Check out this voting on-line set up by a 22 year old fellow from overseas. By a landslide, the entire world wants Obama, or at least "The Change" he promises.

If the world could vote?

Posted using ShareThis



** "Baby cries" was coined by my younger son as a young pre-teen first teasing his baby sister, and then in talking about whiny people. I found later in my pre and perinatal psychology studies that "baby cries" aptly describes how a an older child or adult person acts when their early memories and emotions are triggered. It's one of those situations where yourself, or another, is over-reacting to the present situation, and others are scratching their head, trying to figure it out, and are too often the focus or the blame of the other's emotional outburst. It is when there is no logical reason for this adult to be acting this way, and all that might be missing is the lying on the floor kicking. Something in the current environment has triggered an early prenatal memory in the Limbic system and the Neocortex is struggling to make sense of it.