Ok, a whole week later, but I am finally back to write more about being an unschooler or not.
If you haven't read Tammy's post that I referred to last week, please do so now. It is a must-read for anyone who is homeschooling, anyone who wants to travel their own unique educational journey.
Freedom. Tammy begins with a cry of FREEDOM. It's such a startling realization that there are few places that we can truly say who we are or who we are not. My own life has been marked by time spent in a very structured and legalistic mindset and as i began to make my way out of that, as I began to relax and enjoy the room to breathe, to become, I found there were other people waiting to put their expectations, their definitions, their rules on my experience. The bands started tightening again and I felt myself resisting, almost to the point of rejecting some things that are very important to me.
Too many years, I gave in to people dictating what my spiritual life should be and I walked out of the place that offered me freedom when they began putting their rules on what life should look like without the institution. Beginning homeschooling was the first really radical thing that I ever did and I felt so vulnerable that I heavily leaned on "experts" to guide me in my journey. I read tons of how-to books, attended conferences and just like with my spiritual life, with any part of my life that i was measuring myself according to a human standard, I felt like I fell short all of the time.
Ten years ago, I began to make my way out of that suffocating place and began to experience a life full of love and learning with my children. The cries of freedom rose strong within me. Until I met those whose sole purpose seemed to be to remind me that I was not good enough, that I was not what I said I was, that I didn't measure up. It was reminiscent of the legalistic mindset that I had encountered in the church and in my early homeschooling years; the same mindest that those very people would mock but theirs was the same, just a different flavor.
Recently, I stumbled across an interview with Barbara Brown Taylor as she talked about her spiritual journey out of the church and at the end she said
I embraced that thought and determined that I will not let others place labels on me. I may use them to describe myself in a way that will help another person understand me a bit better but it is not the privilege of another to decide who I am or who I am not.
That is my freedom cry. It's not important whether or not I am an unschooler and one day I may say I am and another I may say I am not. That's my perogative.
If you haven't read Tammy's post that I referred to last week, please do so now. It is a must-read for anyone who is homeschooling, anyone who wants to travel their own unique educational journey.
Freedom. Tammy begins with a cry of FREEDOM. It's such a startling realization that there are few places that we can truly say who we are or who we are not. My own life has been marked by time spent in a very structured and legalistic mindset and as i began to make my way out of that, as I began to relax and enjoy the room to breathe, to become, I found there were other people waiting to put their expectations, their definitions, their rules on my experience. The bands started tightening again and I felt myself resisting, almost to the point of rejecting some things that are very important to me.
Too many years, I gave in to people dictating what my spiritual life should be and I walked out of the place that offered me freedom when they began putting their rules on what life should look like without the institution. Beginning homeschooling was the first really radical thing that I ever did and I felt so vulnerable that I heavily leaned on "experts" to guide me in my journey. I read tons of how-to books, attended conferences and just like with my spiritual life, with any part of my life that i was measuring myself according to a human standard, I felt like I fell short all of the time.
Ten years ago, I began to make my way out of that suffocating place and began to experience a life full of love and learning with my children. The cries of freedom rose strong within me. Until I met those whose sole purpose seemed to be to remind me that I was not good enough, that I was not what I said I was, that I didn't measure up. It was reminiscent of the legalistic mindset that I had encountered in the church and in my early homeschooling years; the same mindest that those very people would mock but theirs was the same, just a different flavor.
Recently, I stumbled across an interview with Barbara Brown Taylor as she talked about her spiritual journey out of the church and at the end she said
For a long time I listened to other people to decide whether I was still Christian or not. And about, I don’t know, two years ago, the great relief was I decided I got to say whether I was Christian or not. And so I’ve relaxed enormously since then. I say I am. I’m a follower of the Christ path. I’m a follower, and Ö I’m a follower.
I embraced that thought and determined that I will not let others place labels on me. I may use them to describe myself in a way that will help another person understand me a bit better but it is not the privilege of another to decide who I am or who I am not.
That is my freedom cry. It's not important whether or not I am an unschooler and one day I may say I am and another I may say I am not. That's my perogative.
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