THE WAY TO BECOMING AN INDIVIDUAL AND DIFFERENTIATION IS THROUGH LEARNING, AND THE WAY TO LEARNING IS THROUGH KEEPING CALM AND PAYING ATTENTION.
Have you heard the hedgehog metaphor? Hedgehogs huddle together to escape the cold weather and stay warm. However, due to their spiky skin, they start to hurt other hedgehogs as soon as they get too close to each other. As a result, when they retreat, they feel cold. Hedgehogs move a little forward, a little back, and stay at such a distance that they not only protect other hedgehogs from their spines, but also warm up and protect themselves from cold weather with the presence of others
A better metaphor than the hedgehog metaphor could not be imagined to understand the nature of relationships. Perhaps the most difficult part of relationships is always rebuilding this balance and distance! Every new word spoken, every new experience experienced, gives us an impetus, like hedgehogs, to find our life balance again.
There is no mention of the union-separation dilemma inherent in the bond between the first of these relationships, the adult individual and the newly born individual. Have you thought about it? While the baby lives effortlessly in its mother's womb, it now has to make an effort and prepare for a new existence with the first burning breath it breathes into its lungs from our world. Otto Rank defines birth as a trauma and writes his views on this subject in his work "Birth Trauma". While a person strives to be independent - to be an individual - he also wants to return to his previous effortless existence, that is, to his mother's womb - so to speak, from bread to hand, water to the lake. Now will he unite with the other person or will he separate from the other person? Or does the path to separation for a baby already pass through unity? Engin Geçtan says that this conflict between separation and unity is the nature of the universe, and he supports this with the information he shares about the subatomic world. This information tells us that when particles in the subatomic world get too far away from each other, attraction occurs between them, but when they get too close, they have to move away from each other. We can say that the same laws apply to relationships.
Let me ask you how life is going. The people I ask to define the course of life a little are usually a little out of turmoil and a little out of control. They talk a little about speed in school. Yes, while life itself is a complex phenomenon, in the century we live in, life is faster and more complicated than ever. We raise children in this chaos and speed.
We want children to be happy and successful adults, and we generally spend all our efforts in this direction. We want children to grow up to be people who can stand on their own feet, be self-actualized, and have happy relationships. Well, do we really know what we need for this?
The human being, who lies sideways and exists effortlessly in the mother's world called the uterus, has now come to this world and has to make an effort to exist in this world and continue to live. The child has to learn the necessary information for life, which is always a matter of concern for parents, and add it to his repertoire of "things I can do". When the learning that is a matter of concern occurs, the child will become independent and become a self-sufficient adult. Therefore, learning and knowing experiences are at the center of concerns. However, what would you say if I told you that the path to gaining a healthy and consistent learning experience on the path to independence and becoming an individual passes through you first? The individual, who has to learn in order to differentiate and become an individual, needs some basic skills in order for the phenomenon called learning to occur in this world: The ability to remain calm and pay attention. In order for him to learn to stay calm and pay attention, he must first cling to you and find a home in your lap. As you guessed, the path to separation is first through unity.
From the moment your child is born, he will encounter different sensations that make him feel from inside and outside, and will turn these sensations into a learning experience. While some of these sensations will be a source of pleasure, some will be a cause of tension and unrest. The baby, who has just entered the world of sensations, needs the help of the adult individual (parent-caregiver) to remain balanced and calm in the face of these sensations. In this first stage of life, mother and baby live a very united life, but they also have a separate life. The baby collects clues from the environment to calm himself against what he feels. Every child has his or her own strategy for staying calm. It varies according to biological differences. In this case, the adult caregiver must observe and know the baby well. Thus, the best strategy to calm the child is discovered over time.
While some children have difficulty internalizing images, some calm down quickly when they hear soft sounds. While some people calm down and feel safe when held tightly, some, on the contrary, calm down with soft touches. After all, there is no single prescription suitable for every child. Children learn to remain calm thanks to adults knowing them well and developing a special interest and curiosity towards their individual sensations and emotions. Babies and children who we can help to calm down learn to calm themselves over time. A child who is calm, balanced and not disturbed by overstimulation feels safe and can direct and focus his attention on stimuli.
The world is a complex place with plenty of stimuli. Being able to receive these stimuli and regulate and organize our nervous system is a life skill. If I were to ask you today, as adult individuals, you could talk about your own individual differences regarding sound, vision, gravity, touch, taste, smell, inner sense and deep pressure. For example, you can say that too much noise distracts you, soft touches calm you down, or activities against gravity trigger your fears and thus negatively affect your self-confidence. All these differences are also valid for babies and children. The world is a complex place, and the new century has transformed the world into an even more complex and faster place. Therefore, as I mentioned at the beginning of the article, if you still want your children to become adults who can become independent and learn life skills, another critical life skill you can teach your child in addition to teaching them to calm down is to pay attention and focus. After all, as we said, an individual who can remain calm and pay attention can fully learn and become independent. He can live and continue to exist without returning to the womb
I assume that you have made an effort to get to know your child's sensory and affective capacities closely so that he can pay attention and focus. What's his attention? You've discovered what's bothering him and what's bothering him. For example, you have a baby who has difficulty accepting sounds but has a high interest in images. Then you can try to develop and expand his attention through his existing interest. You will gradually add sounds to the interactions you started using images, and you will help him direct his attention to more and more diverse stimuli. You will literally encourage your child. You will not stimulate or frighten him too much with the sensations he avoids, but you will expand his learning area by adding little things he dislikes to the stimuli he enjoys.
Your child, who can calm down and pay attention to the stimuli in the world, is learning, and your learning child is growing. Your growing child is developing and becoming independent as he develops. You will be his biggest supporter through your bilateral interactions, by being at the distance he needs in this process.
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