The first two photos of flowers in our garden represent the silent presence of many flowers of different varieties.
The third bunch of flowers received attention because a Sunbird is feeding on them.
All flowers are present to add to the richness of the garden in look and aesthetics.
Some flowers apart from being like all the other flowers also offer nectar!
There are different levels of giving.
All flowers are giving! They sustain the lineage of the species !
But the nectar giving flowers are more giving than others. They sustain the lives of birds. They seem to offer a larger purpose!
We can be present to perpetuate ourselves or we can consciously be mindful to be other person centred.
I received a message in this direction from a father, who returned after having been away for three weeks on a work related travel. He chose to spend the next day at home to connect with his family. On the day he arrived, his son of six years received gifts of remote control car, building blocks and a colouring pencil set. He waited to open the boxes till he had a long enough time sitting with his father mostly in his lap. His father was surprised to notice that the gifts, although his son longed for them, did not receive his first attention. His first attention was a relational experience with his father after three weeks. It was this which made the father choose to take his son to school himself on that day rather than sending him in the school bus. He and his wife brought him back from the school in the evening, followed by a long time of family games and conversations.
This narrative of the father brought a new dimension about parenting. Most parents are good at providing all what a child longs for such as toys, food or clothes of choice or outings, etc. Most children long for intimate contact and conversation with parents. The material provisions are no substitute for the self giving habit of parents by offering time, attention and affection.
The parents to children are like the nectar giving flowers!
The parenting presence at home can be like care givers; but parenting is self giving to nurture a child into good habits, conduct and personhood.
The gift of love, affection, instruction and affirmation are like nectar to their soul. They feel and grow upon with a sense of belonging that the traction is towards parents even when they are teenagers.
How are we to be such a source of enabling the becoming process of our children from early childhood?
One foundation Dr Maria Montessori emphasised about childhood is that they are first time learners and observers. It is what we as parents invest in them weave the fabric of their personhood. So parenting presence is all about becoming closer to them as they grow older! Her argument that children stay closer to parents in the teenage years depending on the intimacy that parents offered through their companionship in the early childhood years.
Let me suggest that parenting is like nectar giving of flowers !
Parents are more than guardians and care providers, but the very substance of life, upon which children build their lives!
Children return to parents to receive as long as parents remain open to give!
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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