Great topic and an interesting conversation. I especially enjoyed Rachel Simmons' explanation of the importance to be goofy. Totally in agreement on that.
As a mother of a daughter and a former middle school English teacher I've seen, firsthand, girls struggling and reaching to find a sense of self as dictated by something internal, something they find within themselves.
If we are aiming at raising "authentic girls" I think it behooves us to turn away from the idea that there are a set of "rules" we need to follow to give our girls a sense of self. If we're telling our girls to speak a certain way and act a certain way and blow the whistle on them when we feel they're being too "this" or too "that" we're just sending them more messages that there's a given protocol they have to follow which again, leads to a model of perfection.
Authenticity comes with practice. It comes with feeling a sense of certainty about what we feel and how we express ourselves (that takes time and practice and modeling and mistake making). As an English teacher I have read hundreds of essays and poems written by girls and can say with confidence that the disparity between the literal voice I heard in the classroom and the writing voice of girls was wide. In their writing, these girls were able to exert themselves and their opinions, which led them to eventually exert themselves more vocally in the classroom. So, more than rules and avoidance of a nail salon, girls need a place where they can learn to express themselves and do so without running the risk of being chastised or corrected for it.
Right now as I write this, my daughter is home sick from school and drawing in her sketch book. Yes, I have conversations with my daughter about the importance of her being her own person, but I think more powerful than these conversations is the time she spends sketching and writing and navigating her own ideas within the freedom of the blank page. She needs the mentorship of people in the world--her teachers, authors, artists, books, friends and family--to model what it means to be authentic. But paramount is the fact that she needs a place to be messy and experiment with that authenticity. (And, truthfully, it's okay for her to see the materialistic, catty side, too. The easy, peasy world that's often displayed on television shows or on the painfully happy face of a Barbie doll--these unrealistic models of girlhood can help her discern between that which is real and that which is undoubtedly fake. She can be authentic knowing that it's a choice she has made, knowing the flip side of that.)
Our girls need the opportunity and space to express themselves--this is the "practice" of which I speak. They need the safe haven of a blank journal or page or dinner table conversation or stage or an athletic field or whatever space where they have room to create and falter and find who they are and what they want.
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Advice On Raising Girls With Courage And Confidence
Great topic and an interesting conversation. I especially enjoyed Rachel Simmons' explanation of the importance to be goofy. Totally in agreement on that.
As a mother of a daughter and a former middle school English teacher I've seen, firsthand, girls struggling and reaching to find a sense of self as dictated by something internal, something they find within themselves.
If we are aiming at raising "authentic girls" I think it behooves us to turn away from the idea that there are a set of "rules" we need to follow to give our girls a sense of self. If we're telling our girls to speak a certain way and act a certain way and blow the whistle on them when we feel they're being too "this" or too "that" we're just sending them more messages that there's a given protocol they have to follow which again, leads to a model of perfection.
Authenticity comes with practice. It comes with feeling a sense of certainty about what we feel and how we express ourselves (that takes time and practice and modeling and mistake making). As an English teacher I have read hundreds of essays and poems written by girls and can say with confidence that the disparity between the literal voice I heard in the classroom and the writing voice of girls was wide. In their writing, these girls were able to exert themselves and their opinions, which led them to eventually exert themselves more vocally in the classroom. So, more than rules and avoidance of a nail salon, girls need a place where they can learn to express themselves and do so without running the risk of being chastised or corrected for it.
Right now as I write this, my daughter is home sick from school and drawing in her sketch book. Yes, I have conversations with my daughter about the importance of her being her own person, but I think more powerful than these conversations is the time she spends sketching and writing and navigating her own ideas within the freedom of the blank page. She needs the mentorship of people in the world--her teachers, authors, artists, books, friends and family--to model what it means to be authentic. But paramount is the fact that she needs a place to be messy and experiment with that authenticity. (And, truthfully, it's okay for her to see the materialistic, catty side, too. The easy, peasy world that's often displayed on television shows or on the painfully happy face of a Barbie doll--these unrealistic models of girlhood can help her discern between that which is real and that which is undoubtedly fake. She can be authentic knowing that it's a choice she has made, knowing the flip side of that.)
Our girls need the opportunity and space to express themselves--this is the "practice" of which I speak. They need the safe haven of a blank journal or page or dinner table conversation or stage or an athletic field or whatever space where they have room to create and falter and find who they are and what they want.
October 8, 2009 at 11:29 a.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )