If your child is not perfect, you are a bad parent.

Apparently, if my child pushes another child it means I'm a bad parent.

But does it really?

At an indoor playground recently a little girl who couldn't have been older than 1 stepped right into the battlefield that is 'The Exhausted Noam (TM)' and got herself quite the push so he could make headway toward the slide. Where was I? I was sitting about 8 feet away feeding my baby Adina. I had my eye on Noam but I couldn't possibly get to him in time to stop him from the inevitable fate that was awaiting this poor innocent child.

The incident: Noam shoves the girl, girl falls to the floor and begins to cry, girl's mother appears in 2.6 seconds and grabs Noam's wrist frantically looking around for this "animals" mother. She didn't say that, I added it for extra drama but in all truth I know that's what she was thinking.

So many wrong things here, let me just begin with the mother's response.

Instead of girls mother rushing to her daughter to make sure she was okay, she ran to rebuke my son and to try eagerly to find his mother in order to reprimand her as well. Because, apparently, that is more important than checking to see if her daughter was well.

See this just sets off alarms in my head about parenting in general. Firstly this was the mother of a little baby girl who is probably more gentle than a kitten and doesn't even know what hitting is. But, sorry mother of girl, one day your child too will push, shove, hit or call someone names and the question is what will you do to deal with it? I mean besides the fact that if you are taking your child to an indoor playground you have to be realistic and plan that these things happen amongst kids, we must be realistic insomuch as life in general with kids is like an indoor playground with a bunch of little tired, overly stimulated animals running around.

In my opinion of parenting, which may be limited but in defense I believe is thought out and based on real sources, is that we are here to prepare our children with the challenges of the world and to give them the tools as to how to deal with those things as they come.

Are we going to run up to every kid's parents when something happens to our child and try to parent their children or change the parents parenting tactics? That is never going to work. You will not change others this way. You can only work on your own parenting and teach your children how to stand up to adversary in life, and then in turn through example we stand a chance at teaching others how to appropriately act.

If her child is acting up in class or isn't thriving in school later in life, will she try to change the child's teacher in hopes of having her child thrive better? I'm sure there are times when changing a teacher is appropriate but in most cases, we are probably better of teaching the child that there may even be teachers they don't jive with, but regardless, they are responsible for being good students and that's that. No exception.

I fear with this approach we are robbing our children of their independence and of their entire purpose in life at that. We are taking from them the basic fundamental principal of being an adult, which is to take responsibility for yourself and to learn to deal with life in an appropriate way.

In defense of my own parenting tactics, don't think for a second that I didn't have a serious (however serious can get with a 2 year old) talk with the guy about hitting. Don't think I didn't speak about it all the way up until he went to bed and told him how important it is to be kind and gentle. And regardless of this incident, don't think that I don't praise my son every time he is gentle with his sister. The reason I say this is because I fear that mothers or fathers reactions to a child hitting their child can result in a lot of judgment of the parents or the household. I am very quickly changing my mind as to the judgments I make about parents based on their children. I think at an older age you can probably make a better judgment as to the values being taught in someone's home based on their kid's character traits, but hardly when they're two years old.

The end of the story goes that the woman found the "animals' mother (me) and yelled at me, projecting her voice higher and higher to overcast my apologies as if not to hear it, and continued with, "Your son just.....etc etc......you should have intervened!" And then, no joke, she picked up her baby and stormed out of the playground with a thick cloud of angry smoke trailing behind. Okay the smoke is an exaggeration but you get the picture.

What are we teaching our children? Are we teaching them that they must be perfect and that if something "wrong" happens it's the end of the world? Or better yet, if something "wrong" happens, it is an excuse to completely lose it on someone? This is detrimental to our children if we teach them to think they can act like angels and not like humans who make mistakes. When a child hits my child now, I really do try to feel for the parent as they look at me with those guilty eyes. Right away I tell the parent, "It's okay these things happen now let's deal with it" because I know the pressure put on us parents to have these perfect children who don't hit, scream or have tantrums. We have to be realistic and arm ourselves for when these things happen because they are going to.

What will you teach your child to do when someone hits them?
How will you respond when your child is acting up in class and the teacher is "picking" (in his opinion) on him, and he's not doing well in that class?
How will we respond when our children get fired from a job?
What will we tell our children if, God forbid, we are faced with a tragedy such as death?

We can give them the tools to deal with it. Imagine the scenario: A boy comes home from school to tell his parents that a boy in class is picking on him. The parent sits down with the child and explains to him that all he needs to do is be true to himself. Don't feel insecure about yourself because this boy doesn't know you and is picking on you only because he is not happy with himself. The parent explains that the best thing to do is to ignore the bully because that is the ultimate defeat to someone who is trying to get a reaction. Later in life, the parent tells the child, you will see that this person will come out of his shell and try to rectify these bad behaviors and relationships he's made for himself, whereas you will still be you and not have sunk to any levels below yourself.

Or we could just teach them that when things are tough, don't deal with the issue yourself just go directly to the source. If a child hits you, go yell at his mother. If school is hard, yell at the principal. If your job isn't working out, curse out your boss. If life is tough, go yell at God for all the bad in your life.

This is love, and it's beautiful.

Everyday, at 6:26p.m. the Abba walks in with a gigantic smile. He tells me it's the best part of his day, and I believe him because it's mine too. He hangs his coat, puts away his briefcase, and sits down at the table with me.

The first thing the Abba asks is, "So, how was their day?" in the most enthusiastic voice I have ever heard.

It's quite adorable, in so much as I know he really misses them during the day and can't wait to 'catch up' on all the things they've been up to. Most days, he hears the same things and each time he hears it its as if he's hearing it for the first time.

So tonight when I told the Abba about the guy's day, I learned a tremendous lesson about life and I had to share it.

Today the guy had an interesting day starting with a really early wake up time of 5:00 am, to a very rare 'short' nap as apposed to a 2 hour well rested nap, and some tantrums here and there. Yet, when the Abba asked how the guys day was, I told him all about how cute they were and how much they took care of each other and how much we all laughed!

Judaism teaches us that love is the feeling you get when you focus on the positive attributes of another person.

There is good and bad in this world. People have positive and negative traits and the most amazing feeling in the world is when you know someone so well that you can see both but you focus on the positive.

When I think of my family and my friends, I am able to focus on the positive. This is love. It's really not a complicated thing. It doesn't have to hurt and it doesn't have to be confusing. It's a pretty simple equation and we just have to realign our thinking to it. This is love, and it's beautiful.

Brush your teeth!

In desperation to get the guy to brush his teeth, I had to think up something really clever.

BUGS!

That's right, no lying as germs are really a sort of bug right? I told the little guy that we had to get the bugs out of his teeth. I'm happy to say the guy enthusiastically brushes his teeth now.

So I was trying to get in the mind of this little guy and began to think of how this relates to me? Here he is, this helpless little...guy...his entire life rests in my hands and pretty much anything I say or tell him to do he has to do it. But it's always for his good (provided that I am being a 'good' parent).

See this is exactly how we are with God.

We seem to think that we know everything because we've been classified as 'adults'. We think we know to the ends of the earth and back. Until we learn something from a mistake, and it hurts, and we promise ourselves next time we'll be more open to realizing we don't know it all, and then we do it again. Essentially this is the life of a toddler.

Sometimes we have to do things in life that we don't fully understand because we're essentially God's babies and don't 'know it all' and in the kindness that is Godliness, He speaks to us on our level. He speaks to us so we can understand what it is He knows is best for us.

We shouldn't fool ourselves, the same little guy who needs to be told to brush his teeth to get the buggys out, is the same person who has to go to work and put in a lot of effort to make money and then get paid and feel superior to the rest of the world because, well, now I am responsible and making my own decisions. And well yes, it is true, we do need to 'grow up' and take responsibility for our lives and make decisions like a free thinking adult. But we should never lose sight of the greatness of our Creator who knows far more than we will ever know. It is not to make us feel bad about ourselves, rather it should make us feel small like a child in the sense of humility and awesome to know that we are His 'babies'.

Who are we to think we know it all?

It's like the classic example of the small child who is taken to the dentists office with his father. The child is sitting in the chair with his father standing right next to him and the dentist begins to work. In the child's eyes, this mad man in a white suit is trying to kill him and daddy is just standing by his side and watching the whole thing! 'Why isn't daddy helping me?' the poor boy thinks to himself.

This is really the mind of a child! He is not able to trust yet that the father knows what is best for the child, even if it does hurt a little at times.

Our father, God, knows what's best for us, and sometimes it hurts a little. We can't always see it but there is a formula in being able to tap into it much more and it's simple. Just think of all the good in your life, all the blessings, and all the times where you really needed something and it came through or when something looked bad and ended up being the best thing for you. Think about what a great track record God has in giving you LIFE, and everything in between and realize that this too is just part of that beautiful tapestry.

When you're so close to the painting while it's being drawn you may only see a big mess, but when you stand back and look at it from a distance you see a beautiful masterpiece.

Every father wants what's best for their child. Sometimes God has to speak to us on our level, most of the time, it may seem like a daunting task but really all he's telling us is to brush our teeth, to get the buggys out, because He wants only what's best for us.

You might even cry...

Once upon a time, there was a foolish boy who had a bag full of beautiful marbles. Now this boy was quite proud of his marbles. In fact, he thought so much of them that he would neither play with them himself nor would he let anyone else play with them. He only took them out of the bag in order to count and admire them; they were never used for their intended purpose. Yet that boy carried that coveted bag of marbles everywhere he went.

Well, there was also a wise boy who wished he could have such a fine bag of marbles. So this boy worked hard and earned money to purchase a nice bag to hold marbles. Even though he had not yet earned enough with which to purchase any marbles, he had faith and purchased the marble bag. He took special care of the bag and dreamed of the day it would contain marbles with which he could play and share with his friends.

Alas, the foolish boy with all of the marbles didn't take care of the marble bag itself, and one day the bag developed a hole in the bottom seam. Still, he paid no attention and, one by one, the marbles fell out of the bag.

It didn't take long, once the foolish boy's marble bag developed a hole, for the wise boy to begin to find those beautiful marbles, one at a time, lying unnoticed on the ground. And, one by one, he added them to his marble bag. The wise boy thus gained a fine bag full of marbles in no time at all. This boy played with the marbles and shared them with all of his friends. And he always took special care of the bag so he wouldn't lose any.

And what about the foolish boy? Because he was selfish and careless, he lost all of his marbles and was left holding the bag.

If you wrote down all the things in your life that you have, from life itself to the trinkets you own, to the feelings you feel, would you feel grateful for such tremendous gifts?

Regardless of who you feel grateful to, you would feel pretty good. You might even start to cry.

Imagine what your life would look like (speaking to myself) if you walked around all day and thought "What is my responsibility?" Rather than thinking (speaking to myself) "What are my rights, what's owed to me?"

Can you imagine the profound impact it would have on your soul to always be thinking of what your responsibility is to your husband, your children, your friends, your community, your world?

You might think this is the way most people think, but a quick glimpse into the human psyche might prove differently.

What happens when you rent an apartment, pay money, money that you earned, worked hard for, and then everything from the front door to the fridge breaks within months? How would you feel?

Most of us would feel angry, hurt or used and we would probably be calling the lawyers before we called the landlord to see what can get fixed.

The Abba and I had the merit of living in the Holy Land, The Old City of Jerusalem to be exact, for a couple years. During this time we lived in one particular apartment known to many as "The Cave". The Cave was probably 100 years old, without exaggeration, and was beautiful as ever. But literally, everything in the Cave broke, front door, shower, faucets, floors, oven, fridge, light bulbs crashed from two story high ceilings onto the floor just missing my head! I'm oversimplifying the story by writing it in two measly sentences but I trust you get the idea.

The Abba decided this was going to be our opportunity for tremendous growth and enlightenment in our lives if were going to be sensitive to the messages we were receiving. I was apartment hunting.

We got to the point where when things broke, we laughed. The lessons we needed to learn were so clear! We needed to realize that none of these things belong to us, they are just gifts that can be taken away in a second. And each second they were being taken away! (This should not negate the idea of working hard for your belongings and feeling a sense of accomplishment for hard efforts, and most importantly taking pleasure in the things we have. To be discussed in a different blog!)

Recently the Abba took a trip to the Holy Land as I told you about, and after he came back we were sitting up talking, folding laundry, catching up, and he looked at me and said "You've changed". I gulped. "You are even happier now than you have ever been." I smiled.

But then I started to think, what is it that changed?

I thought and talked it out and came to the astounding realization that the only reason I am able to be more at peace now than ever before in my life is because I have somewhat, to a very minuscule degree, begun to internalize this idea of feeling "What is my responsibility to the world around me, rather than what are my rights?"

Imagine how your life would look if all day long you were only thinking, what is my responsibility to myself, to my husband, to my parents, to my children, to my community, to my world, to my creator?

Can you feel for a moment how your life would shift from the foolish boy with the marbles so scared to let go of his own, to the wise boy who gains infinity by giving to others?

No relationship can fail if each partner is thinking "what is my responsibility to this person" Every relationship can suffer if even one person is thinking "what are my rights in this relationship"

There lies a deep secret here in parenting, amongst many other things. If we focus only on what our responsibility is toward our child we will feel a deep sense of love and appreciation and if we feel that we are entitled to things in life or things are owed to us, we may find ourselves riding a roller coaster of disappointment.

I often cringe when I see ads that say, "You deserve the best." I mean let's face it lady (talking to myself) we were given this tremendous gift of life with all its beauty and pleasures and we did nothing to earn it! Nothing! We were born into it! And we 'deserve' it? Can you even imagine telling your child he deserved to be born? What does that even mean? We don't deserve anything in truth, we are just here enjoying and taking the incredible gifts that life has to offer. So we need to get outside of ourselves and stop thinking of what is coming our way and start thinking, "Wow, if I was given this tremendous gift of life FOR FREE, I wonder what my responsibility is toward this world?" What can I do for it?

Think about it. God knew what he was doing. He entrusted us with a gigantic beautiful awesome world, told us to find a spouse that is in itself a gigantic beautiful awesome task, and then to have children and that is a gigantic beautiful awesome thing and then to be part of society and change the world oh and on a side note perfect the world through morality and goodness.

That sounds like massive tasks that require a whole lot of responsibility! Alas, that is the design! God knew what He was doing. He designed the world in a way that only through taking responsibility for ourselves our husbands our children our society our world, would we be able to resemble Godliness, which in essence just means being a giver rather than a taker. Being the wise boy rather than the foolish boy.

Where do we start?

If you wrote down all the things in your life that you have, from life itself to the trinkets you own, to the feelings you feel, would you feel grateful for such tremendous gifts?

Regardless of who you feel grateful to, you would feel pretty good. You might even start to cry.

We can start by writing all those things down, feeling grateful. You will feel pretty good, you might even cry...talking to myself...

More money more problems?

I have been noticing a reoccurring theme this week in my life. The more we have the more we want.

This may shock my readers and I do suggest you sit down before reading this but, I do not own a television.

Are you there? Are you okay? Has the shock worn off?

I won't get into they why's just now but besides the obvious reasons, commercials, addiction etc. there are a plethora of very valid reasons the Abba (The Daddy) and I chose not to have one in our home.

We do, however, have family who owns televisions. Last week the Abba went away to the Holy Land to get some milk and honey. While he was away we stayed at my families house and without getting into too much detail, I'll just say by the end of the week I was signing Noam up for TAA, Television Addicts Anonymous.

It's interesting, at home he can go an entire day of reading, playing games, and hanging out with the Imma (The Mommy) and be just fine. But, when he's around a television, the more he watches the more he asks for. For some reason he cannot control himself and just watch 20 minutes. That 20 minutes makes him want another and another.

We're totally spoiled.

We all know it. We shouldn't feel guilty about it, we should take pleasure from it. Real, deep pleasure!

Do you ever find yourself complaining about your internet being down or your cell phone not working? Well come on, if you really think about what's happening in space to make your computer work on wifi and your cell phone have reception, you'd be laughing at yourself!

The more we have, the more we cannot comprehend what life was like without it and the more we want. It's a rat race really. One of my dearest friend and mentors in life recently cried to me about how her remote control car door was broken and she didn't know how she would go on! She quickly realized on her own that her fears of the manual car door future were quite silly in retrospect.

I'm not saying we shouldn't strive for more, for better. But we have to realize that if we appreciate the things we have, we can find true happiness. If we constantly look for the next thing, we'll never really live in the now. You cannot actually know if you will have the future, and the past is gone so in reality the only thing you DO HAVE is the now. So if we choose to live in the future, we're actually not living in reality!

Wow, that's scary.

We want to live in reality, and we do like nice things, and money, and we do want more and we do aspire for greater and better and that's all great. But in the process we have to figure out how to aspire and grow and climb while living and being in the RIGHT NOW.

Judaism says this is the secret to happiness.

TRULY APPRECIATE THE THINGS YOU HAVE.

So obvious, yet so hard.

It's not even a case of more money more problems then, it's really a case of more money more desire for more and less focus on appreciation for what we have now.

More money, more more more more more more more more more.....

Imagine you went outside. Grabbed your keys from your pocket, unlocked the front door to your car, got in, turned on the car and rolled down the windows; we're using our imaginations here. Pull out of the driveway, get onto the street and start driving. Now imagine that as you are driving there are no stop signs, no traffic lights, no lines on the road and hundreds of other cars on the same road you're on.

Now realize, this is the life of a toddler.

In their world, everything is new and exciting but at the same time there is so much to filter into their little minds. There is so much knowledge, action and experiences flying at their face at any given moment. I mean how would you feel? These little guys can't even control their own volume for heaven's sake! They don't know quiet from loud or slow from fast. They are bound to, actually they regularly bump into furniture, walls and even people. They often fall off their chairs, get hurt while playing without fail, and always find ways to hurt others even if unintentional.

You basically need to stay far away from them when they are awake if you don't want to get dirty, bruised or bloody.

Now when you put a child into an environment that is gated, safe and fun, you can be sure these little angels are the cutest little guys around. You could just eat them up!

Give them toys, books, activities, snacks or friends and they are so happy.

I spend most of my time with my toddler just guiding his actions in order to help him share, give, be nice, gentle, slowly, quiet, hold my hand, okay you get the picture right?

It seems that with the correct boundaries up in place for him, he's very happy, and lack of structure is destructive.

Life lesson:
Well it's pretty obvious that we can learn from our own children that what we may think we want (a life with no one telling me what to do, go and do as i please whenever i want wherever i want with whomever i want) is not at all what we actually want, won't make us ultimately happy and eventually will be destructive.

What we do want, and we may not even know it, is to have the structure in place, to have the boundaries up and then live happily within those boundaries.

It seems pretty simple and yes behold the most simple, obvious things in life, once again, are the most important ones to reevaluate constantly and the ones most often missed.

What we're really saying here is that ultimately it's the boundaries themselves that make us really happy, that really set us 'free'.

I've been very involved in sleep training my kids (without letting them cry - the baby whisperer in case you want to know) and I have been very adamant about their sleep. With my first child I decided to just feed and sleep him on demand and I quickly realized, without the proper structure, he and I were a mess! As soon as I put him on a routine schedule of sleep my life changed. It may seem pretty lame but I learned so much from this seemingly mundane or insignificant event in our lives. The moment I put him on it my husband said to me, "He's a happier baby now."

Everywhere I went people asked me, "What do you do, how do you do it?"

I had women tell me that they haven't slept in years because their children sleep whenever they want and are sleep deprived and are cranky in the day because of it.

And I realized through this that only through boundaries are we really free!

I was always a 'slave' for lack of better term, to my baby when he slept and ate and played sporadically throughout the day. Now that I know when my kids need to sleep I am able to plan around it and know exactly when I can do the things I need to do.

Someone once told me a parable that stuck with me for life and I'll share it with you to illustrate the point clearly:

Imagine you put a bunch of boys at the top of a mountain and threw them a ball. What would they do? They'd probably hang on to each other for dear life.

Now imagine you put a fence around the entire mountain so no one could fall off. What would you have? A game of soccer.


It seems, only through structure and boundaries, are we truly free.

On a very deep level this is really the meaning of Shabbat. One day where we are not a 'slave' to our phones, computers, television, shopping, errands, or even our blackberries. Just one day where we can just be really free. Shabbat is a day with many boundaries set in place (no cooking, no writing etc.) and at first glance we might think of it as a day only filled with restrictions. Why would anyone want that?

Because intrinsically we all know that the life we may think we want, with no one telling us what to do, is not what will make us happy, momentary satisfaction aside. We may think like toddlers sometimes but we all know that we'd rather have someone hold our hand to walk across the street than run 'freely' into a busy intersection.

The only thing we have to figure out as adults is who sets the boundaries now. Who knows best and wants to walk us across the street, holding our hand. Who cares so much about us that we should trust that they want only what's best for us?

It's the lack of boundaries that leads us to destructive behavior. It leads us to bump into things, get hurt and even hurt others. And I'm not talking about the toddlers.

SWITCH

Today I developed carpel tunnel syndrome, and it wasn't from my children.

I spent a considerable amount of time today driving around the city from one meeting to the next, all the while flipping through the radio stations trying to find some decent music to keep me company on my various journeys.

I learned a lot of valuable lessons today, besides from the fact that the radio stations are nearly devoid of any worthwhile content.

Now, occasionally you may land on a station with some quirky french music that is somewhat soothing. Perhaps a good classical piece or great beach tune like Bob Marley's 'Everything is going to be alright" that somehow transports you from the slushy, snow covered roads to the beaches of a remote, secluded Island. You're even more lucky if you stumble upon a station playing something like 'The Name Game Song' by Shirley Ellis and then you've miraculously figured out how to do the twist and other intricate moves that would be more appropriate in a pleated, poodle skirt rather than in the confines of your seat belt with winter coat on.

And this is where I developed carpel tunnel. For the entire drive, every time a good song came on I immediately and somewhat instinctively switched the station in hopes of finding something better. My finger was practically glued to the button. Ouch. I did this for the duration of the drive, switching again and again.

"Oh, an oldy and a goody, but maybe there's better."

SWITCH

"Classical! Yes this is the kind of driving music I need, but what if there's some good Jazz on?"

SWITCH

"Okay I found it, a French song, great I have no idea what he's saying and the rhythm is great, but what if there's something else?"

SWITCH

And that was it. I arrived at my destination only to realize that the entire ride there, instead of enjoying the music, I was in search of something better and ended up with nothing to show for it.

Isn't that how things look in our lives sometimes?

We get so caught up in the obsession to find the best, the perfect, the flawless that we sometimes don't allow ourselves to enjoy the present. We are on a relentless pursuit of perfection sometimes that we don't stop to appreciate the fine details in the imperfect now that we're living in. And of course, only in those imperfections do we find true perfection.

So on the way home, I decided to put on a CD so as to limit the decision process and ease my carpel tunnel.

The next dilemma, was which CD to choose out of the 10 CD Disk Changer.

SWITCH!

Adam and Eve were just babies

What are we teaching our children?

We all know that everything we do, or don't do for that matter, affects these little people. We have to think carefully.

I was in a very large supermarket with my kids. Seriously, when I say large, I mean gigantic. Of course everything is relative, except for this. Thirty meter long aisles stacked with mile high mounds of food is most likely Webster's definition of the word 'mammoth', or at least 'spoiled rotten'.

I'm not saying we shouldn't appreciate these things for what they are and be grateful for the plentiful generation we are privileged to live in. After all, how else would we find the low sodium, fat free, sugar free, calorie free, wheat free, nut free, pretzels we were looking for amongst all the other healthy, organic snacks?

But let's try not to get lost in the organic, new age, green generation.

I am saddened in many ways when I take my kids to the store. These days, there is so much selection, so much choice, I fear what message is being passed along. Do my children really need to know that there are 264 different types of cereals to choose from? I can bank that their taste buds couldn't even dream up a flavor that is not already sitting on the shelf. It's a message that says that whatever they want, they can have. And that scares me.

Not only that message but worse of all, in my humble opinion, is that of choice. What are we using our free will to choose? Which type of toothpaste we should use among the 46 different varieties?

Free will is an interesting topic, not one I will get into at length here. But on the most basic level, the Torah teaches us that we are only really free to the extent that we are making moral decisions.

So what's a moral decision?

Well it certainly isn't which flavor of yogurt I decide to buy this week.

A moral decision is one that's based on much deeper realities than that. It's based on a deep consciousness of self, who am I, what am I doing here, where am I going and how am I getting there? It is exactly these moral decisions that ultimately gets us to our goal.

Of course my children will eventually know how much choice is out there in the world, be it with toothpaste or with relationships, but when they're so young they just don't have the tools to know how to use their free will properly. They need to be guided.

In the Garden of Eden, we learn that Adam and Eve were told they could 'have it all'. They needed only to abide by one rule, which was not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Why? Why on earth, no pun intended, were they instructed not to eat from the tree of Knowledge? After all, wouldn't you think God would want them to KNOW? He wanted a relationship with them, he wanted them to connect to Him, so what's better than knowing?

One of the many understandings of why they were told not to eat from the Tree of Knowledge is that they were simply too young. They didn't have the tools to KNOW what they would have known as adults had they just waited a bit longer.

Our children don't know. They don't know how to use this incredible gift of free will yet and our job is to slowly guide them through the process of 'growing up' and 'growing into' this free will thinker that will use his free will on choosing loving, lasting relationships and meaningful endeavors, and leave the 'apple picking' for someone else.

Yesterday, Noam had a tantrum.

Okay, he's 2 years old, it's aloud right? Well I guess everyone has their ideas of what's the best method for dealing with tantrums. Here's what happened.

"Mine, mine, mine, mine, mine, mine."

I warned him that if he would continue screaming and not sharing we would go home. He would then play nicely and quickly resume his wild behavior.

I realized this was not fair to him. He could not control himself, for whatever reason, and his heart was beating very quickly. I could tell this was the beginning of a melt down.

The next time I heard the word "MINE" I quickly whisked him up and said, "That's it, we're going."

Now this is the part where a very creative writer will go on about the details of what it looked like, sounded like, felt like to get out of the house with Noam screaming and baby Adina looking at me bewildered. Suffice it to say, we got out, less one ear drum perhaps, but we got out the door.

Noam then screamed the entire (3 minutes) home. But this is really not typical for Noam. Usually when he's removed from the situation he just calms down. I couldn't understand what was happening.

The entire (3 minutes that felt like 3 hours) walk home I searched deep within my mind's filing cabinet of techniques and tips I've been given on how to deal with a toddler. I thought of how I would punish him so he would learn from his mistakes. Most of all I felt angry.

I could feel the anger in my chest like a big fireball contained in a tight outer layer that would explode at any moment.

We got home, I had still not said one word, he was screaming. Shut the door, picked up baby Adina and put her to nap in her crib. Walked back, whisked off Noam's jacket, he was still hysterical, threw off his shoes, walked him over to the couch, threw myself down, put him on my lap, put his pacifier in his mouth, smothered his blanky on his face, his head collapsed on my chest, and held him tighter than I probably ever have.

That was it.

He stopped crying. I rocked him gently and held him tightly. He was panting and nestling his face into my neck for extra comfort. But that was it.

He looked up at me with his big, brown, swollen eyes filled with tears and said, "Ima, sing Numi Numi."

Numi Numi is our lullabye, in Hebrew.

Life lesson number 2 right here. Listen with sensitive ears mommy or you might miss it!
I usually would have wanted to yell, scream, punish, get mad at this behavior. Obviously this is not the way to act but these small babies act this way only because they NEED something. They have needs and sometimes we are not patient with them to find out what it is. In this case, Noam was not thriving in the environment he was in. Noam really needs structure, I am assuming most kids do. I wasn't paying attention to that. But the main point really is that I wanted to attack him because I felt his behavior was a direct hit to me! He was doing this to me, my ego was not happy.

I think we always want to be in control of every situation. We don't like the idea that the results don't lie in our hands. The more control we have the more secure we feel but the more we freak out when things don't go our way.

There is a perfect child. I bet you didn't think I would say that. Well there is! But he is the child who has tantrums, or cries, or doesn't share at times. Why is he perfect? He is perfect because he is exactly the child you got from God, in order to fix yourself.

I'm sure we all have times where we look at others lives and think, "oh if only I had her problems, life would be better" or we think, "she doesn't have any problems!".

It's just not true. I don't think we all have 'problems' but we all have challenges or obstacles in life that we need to overcome and we need to realize that they are given to us because ONLY we can deal with them. God gives each one of us the exact tools we need to deal with OUR problems, not our neighbors problems. Which means, in any situation where we feel really stretched, like we want to yell, get mad, run, we have to recognize that we have the tools to USE this obstacle in order to grow from it.

By raising our children we are raising ourselves. If we choose to look at the situation as an opportunity to grow, we only stand to gain.

So there I was, sitting with Noam snuggled up as peacefully as can be in the calm of the day. And then Adina started to cry. Thank God, another opportunity.

There are two very special, holy people in my life who teach me more than I could ever learn from a textbook. They teach me life lessons, and deep hidden secrets of the purpose of the creation of the world and they both have not yet reached their 3rd birthdays.

My son Noam is a gorgeous, not quite 2.5 year old boy. Long, youthful curls, big, brown eyes and lips that pucker out no matter what mood he's in. He's delicious. My daughter Adina is a precious 7 month old that resembles a 15 month old toddler in size and in facial expressions!

Everyday I find myself learning so much from them and I always tell myself I'll write it down. I must share this! And of course, I never get to it.

So here it is. I'm not a writer, I have no pH.d, I just want to share the invaluable life lessons I learn from them with you. I think you might appreciate it, even if you're not a mom!