I've been imagining a curriculum, a collection of courses, using the skills and knowledge of experienced professionals and experienced laymen and women to transform the US Family from overworked, harried, exhausted, angry, or struggling collections of folks sharing a roof, into calm, happy, supportive, collaborative, cooperative and loving collections of related people.
My first thought is to focus on re-framing or re-defining happiness. Happiness requires no purchase, requires no achievement, no attainment of a goal. Happiness is a decision about how to be. That sounds too simple. That's why there would need to be a course or two. Our culture, our media discourages the belief that happiness is possible without a promotion, a raise, a new relationship, a new car, or a vacation in Bali.
Some courses would help to understand the rational appearance of anger and its healthy influence on our lives. Expressing anger to fix an unmet need (like Nonviolent Communication teaches.)
Courses on communication would be available too. There are great books and courses with helpful advice and exercises to guide people to set personal boundaries, get agreement, disperse upsets before they become cause for divorce or assault & battery.
Where I went wrong, and I believe other families go askew is believing that what "feels right" in the parent's imagination (based on personal history & tavern-logic) is actually the best course of action. There is no American Parenting Methodology based on success of raising generations of healthy, scholarly, responsible, literate and involved citizens.
For many, US parenting is an arduous, unsatisfying, angering, limiting, challenging, 24/7 sentence for life. Let's change that.
What if family life became an opportunity to report the successes, challenges and failures of the day to a loving, supportive audience. Mom and Dad are eager to get home, and share. To find out how the kids are. To hold everyone, hug everyone, to hold everyone accountable for their actions and offer guidance for improvement. I used the term "transform" earlier. That's what it would require. But the information is available, it needs to become more accessible and an accepted pattern of behavior. Imagine receiving the RSVP, "We can't make it Monday, that's our 'Family Success' night, how about Tuesday?"
