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To be a good parent, you don't need to be Superman.
Li Yinuo
High/Far.5
Image source: Courtesy of the interviewee
Written by | The king is crooked
If a woman's label is: Tsinghua graduate, University of California Ph.D., former McKinsey Global Managing Partner, former chief representative of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in China, founder of a ichi-ed education, "slave society", then there is no doubt that she must be an invincible strong woman in the eyes of the world.
She also has three children, born in 2010, 2012 and 2014. During those years, she had children and was promoted to Partner at McKinsey. And she also has a vest line!
This is the legendary Superman Mom. She is Li Yinuo.
But she said there was no superman. "It sounds like inspirational, but in fact, all the struggles and struggles about children that people have encountered, I have experienced and are still experiencing."
In his new book, "Where Does Power Come From: Facing Every Dare Not", Li Yinuo tore off one dazzling label after another.
Where Does Power Come From: Facing Every Dare Not
She confessed: When she went to the United States to study, she did not dare to speak English for a whole month; entered the workplace, did not dare to succeed, would not be a leader; when people reached middle age, they did not dare to have children, they would not educate children; in the mature period of the workplace, they did not dare to be different, did not dare to leave, did not dare to dream...
It turns out that strong women, like us, have been afraid.
Never want children to have three children
Last year's Mother's Day, Li Yinuo did not write an article, nor did he send a circle of friends, because life was super messy.
In January 2020, Li Yinuo and his mother originally took three children to live in the United States, but it turned out to be a long-term stay. Li Yinuo needs to work across time zones in the United States, from 7 a.m. to 2 a.m., and she has been on the phone at any time.
Life has to go on. Li Yinuo's husband Hua Zhang and aunt are in Beijing, and everything in the United States depends on Li Yinuo and his mother.
However, one day in April, Li Yinuo's mother fell while playing ball with her child. What can be done in a hundred days of broken bones?
The night her mother just fell, Li Yinuo basically did not sleep, lying on the bed looking at the ceiling, both afraid that her mother would turn over and feel that her legs hurt and needed her to take care of it, and she was worried about what to do tomorrow. Just the basket of dirty clothes at the head of the bed, washing and folding first is a lot of work, not to mention anything else. There are several copies of the child's online class that have not been printed (the printer seems to be running out of ink), the homework does not know whether to do it; there is a work email that has not been sent, and there is a PPT that has not been read, and many WeChat messages have not returned.
Oh, there seems to be no milk at home! Remember to buy it tomorrow. Also, remember to throw away the kitchen waste tomorrow, or you will miss a week to collect the garbage (you have missed a week, and if you don't take it away, it stinks).
During the day, the eldest and the second had a conflict, and when they slept, they had not reconciled, and they fell asleep breathlessly. The third old man watched the hilarity, fell asleep in bed without undressing, and did not brush his teeth (nor did he brush yesterday). By the way, did your child's iPad (tablet) forget to charge? Hurry up and charge!
Many people envy Li Yinuo's work and family, but the above picture is the truth of her life.
(Source: Visual China)
"So, what else is Mother's Day?" It would be nice if I could live! Li Yinuo sighed sadly, "Those enviable circles of friends and the stories and pictures with dolls in the public account are not deceitful, they just take the most beautiful frame in a 100-frame movie clip to show you." ”
Li Yinuo once did not want children. After 9 years of marriage, she did not think clearly about why she wanted children.
She once felt that once a woman became a mother, life lost its demeanor. What is more terrible than out-of-body shape is the loss of self, talking about and, talking about school, tutoring classes, and competition.
More importantly, At that time, Li Yinuo was pessimistic about the prospects of the world: climate change, air pollution, and various social problems made people feel powerless.
In addition, his childhood experience is not so beautiful - from kindergarten to college, there are all kinds of troubles, struggles and pains, life is so bitter, I have not lived to understand, why give birth to a child, let him come to this world to suffer?
From an economic point of view, having a child is a very cost-effective thing. This has led to many women of childbearing age who are afraid to give birth and are reluctant to have children.
Even more terrible than procreation is nurturing.
You know, education is a matter of the future, and the future is uncertain. When faced with the uncertainty of the future, adults are filled with fear. Mothers who are wrapped up in the "chicken baby tide" are even more afraid of the bonus, and every educational reform will affect their sensitive nerves, afraid that their children will be eliminated and become a mainstream emotion.
They even lose judgment and don't know how to be a good mom. The environment is so bad, how do we face the fear of fertility and parenting?
Elimination education is about no winners
There are two underlying human emotions, love and fear. All the underlying emotions are connected, and it has nothing to do with whether your external label is successful or not, and whether your career is successful.
"Fear is like a big black shadow, always chasing you. Then you keep running, which is actually very difficult to dispel the fear. Li Yinuo said that if you want to dispel your fear, you must first stop, but also turn around to face it, so that you may know what this thing is running after you, what this big black and dark blob is.
"But we're in a state a lot of the time, and we don't dare to stop. We are so scared that we have to keep running. In fact, once you stop and turn around to look at the dark shadow, you will find that there is nothing. But the hardest thing to do is turn around. ”
Helping Li Yinuo stop and face the fear of childbirth are the two words of two friends.
The first sentence is: "After having children, you really feel that you have your own family." ”
The second sentence is: "Have you ever thought that maybe your children can change the world?" Aren't all the changes in the world driven by people? ”
In the matter of having a child, after having an expectation of happiness, in 2010, Li Yinuo's first child was born.
(Source: Network)
"My way of thinking is, if I think it's worth doing, I'll do it first. After doing it, go to see the mountains to open the road, see the water to build a bridge. The same goes for having children, I don't have everything ready before I give birth. Li Yinuo said, "If you take being ready as the premise of doing things, many things will never start to be done." ”
"But every woman can still ask herself a question, and that's whether I want children." Li Yinuo told me that after all, childbirth is still a very personal matter.
To do education, we also have to face fear.
In the matter of education, all problems are actually adult problems, and all fears are mostly adults' own fears. Many children's fears are instilled in them by adults.
At present, the vast majority of parents have grown up in a high screening and high elimination environment. This model of education is engraved in the bones. "Parents' inner state is usually competition, always thinking about losing and winning, thinking about going up and down." Li Yinuo said that this inner state, mapped to the child, is to let the child compete.
Until now, China's education pain points still stem from elimination-style education. This model of education has its rationality under the condition of limited resources in the whole country, but the drawbacks are also very obvious.
Li Yinuo said: "The disadvantage of elimination-style education is that there is no winner. Do you think that if you succeed, you will be happy in life? Actually not, he is still scared to death, because there is another round of elimination. ”
In this phase-out model, education is gradually instrumentalized. Instrumental cultivation of people, people will have a huge dislocation, the heart will become very painful.
Li Yinuo's public welfare scene
(Source: Courtesy of the interviewee)
The gradual increase in suicides in primary and secondary schools and the frequent problems in the psychological condition of students are the products of this drawback.
"Education should not be eliminated, but should be love and perfection, and every child has its possibilities." Li Yinuo said that if a society, only 10% of the people can live well, 90% of the people are losers, this society is problematic. A normal living environment is that everyone has the possibility of sex, and there is a possibility of a decent life.
The one-soil education founded by Li Yinuo is to create such a small environment. "What we usually talk about the most is to help children build self-awareness. If the child can know who I am, what I want to be, where I want to go, and if I have enough confidence to do it, the fear in my heart will be reduced. ”
In Li Yinuo's view, this is the most important part of education. Clear self-knowledge will eventually be achieved in different ways, some children have good grades, some children can program, some children love to draw...
Every child has their own possibilities, and this is a kind of complete education.
Always be on the side of the child
Perhaps some parents will say that I understand the truth, but the conditions are limited, and our children can only go to ordinary schools and take the road of test-oriented education. The whole education system forced me to roll up.
Ordinary parents, it seems, can only go with the flow, and there are very few things that can be done. But on the contrary, there are many things that parents can do.
Yinuo Li is a judge of the Rhodes China Scholarship. The Rhodes Scholarship is a long-established scholarship at Oxford University that supports outstanding young people from all over the world who have completed their undergraduate studies to go to Oxford University for graduate or doctoral studies. The scholarship is prestigious, sparsely spaced and highly competitive.
The Rhodes Scholarship is open to Chinese students 4 places per year. Li Yinuo found that these students who received scholarships are not from first-tier cities, and their growth paths are different, but the common point is that parents and them have a deep connection at the psychological level.
A boy who loves to run shares his upbringing after receiving a scholarship: in middle school, he got up at four o'clock every morning to run, and his father would get up at four o'clock to run with him, never absent. It let him know that Dad would always be by his side and support him.
A girl whose parents divorced said that although her parents were divorced, she and her mother had always had a good relationship. When she lived in middle school, her mother would keep writing to her.
"You will find that the parents of these outstanding students are very attentive to their children, but not only focus on academic performance, but create an atmosphere that I will be willing to support you no matter what you do, I am here for you." Li Yinuo said that when the children grow up, the love of their parents who can recall is also some warm little things, not my mother who enrolled me in the Olympic number class and let me take the first place.
Always being a supporter of children and building a line of defense of love at home is the most important thing parents need to do. If I can't do all the support, at least remind myself that no matter what happens, I need to stand with my child first and let my child know that the parent is supportive of him. These small things can have a very big psychological impact on the child.
Li Yinuo also wrote in the book that the background of children's psychological state is not formed by classes and preaching, but they are absorbed from the "field" of life. This "field" is the true state of the adults around him: the adult attitude to life, the worldview and self-perception. Our state builds up the "field" of the home, and the impact on the child is actually far greater than the tangible "curriculum" and the truth.
One Soil Education - Little Potato Drama Festival
In addition, in Li Yinuo's view, parents also need to reconstruct the "end point thinking". Life is only once, can not be repeated, children only have one chance, experience 7 years old, 8 years old. If the parent's end point is to hope that the child can live a healthy and happy life, then, often remind themselves of what the end point is, they will make different choices in many things.
Returning to the essence of education, the school should teach something that is useful for his growth, whether it is tested or not. The end of education should not be to go to college at the age of 18, but to be able to serve a healthy, happy, self-reliant person at the age of 30.
If parents can set the "end point", their hearts will not be so "afraid", and various changing educational reforms will become less important.
"In the end, the mentality becomes to respond to changes with no change, what does not change is what kind of person we want our children to become, what changes is the policy, whether it is double subtraction or not, whether it is a physical examination or not, my goal remains unchanged." Li Yinuo said, "But it is not necessarily required by society, I want to say yes, my inner choice can be different." ”
Q&A
Q: You're right, but it sounds like "chicken soup", how to solve the problem of children's learning and further education?
A: After the child reaches a certain age, the preparation for further education, of course, should be done. But parents should understand that the basis of all learning ability is concentration; the premise of concentration is peace; the premise of peace is security. It's a closed loop.
The intimate relationship of true mutual trust is the starting point of effective family education and the basis for children's happiness.
So this seeming "chicken soup" is actually building the underlying capabilities that children need to "succeed and live a happy life".
Q: You're right about security and authenticity, but it also takes a lot of special resources to grow, right?
A: Resources are needed, but not as important as you might think.
First of all, in modern society, if a person really wants to learn, then he will find resources everywhere.
Second, resources are not a prerequisite for a person's success. I was involved in McKinsey recruitment from 2006 to 2014 and saw the best talent from the best schools. Truth be told, no one succeeds because they have exclusive resources. On the contrary, sometimes the good resources in the family will become spoiled and burdensome to the children.
To be successful in the true sense of the word, one needs to know who one is, where one wants to go, have the ability to learn, and be able to find and make good use of resources.
Of course, there are some scarce exclusive resources in the world, but if your children can only rely on these scarce resources to succeed, it does not actually mean that your education is successful, but that your education is problematic, isn't it?
Mysterious force/photography
Q: Others are "chicken babies", but we are so "Buddhist", treating children in the way you say, can they adapt to the cruel competition of real society?
A: This question sounds justified, but it is actually vulnerable. Because it is precisely the unconditional love and self-confidence that children receive to cope with unfriendly environments.
To make an inappropriate analogy, if we think that the real society will take a blade to cut the child's skin, you have two ways to prepare to adapt: one is to cut the child's skin with a knife at home every day; the other is to let the child grow up healthily, be in good health, and have good recovery ability.
Which method do you think is more effective? I don't think anyone would choose the first one. Then why don't you understand when you face the invisible "knife" of competition?
Early in life, security and love are important. The lack of self-identification can only make it more difficult to cope with challenges. On the contrary, children who are fully supported will not only be better able to face adversity, but also have the confidence and ability to change such an environment.
And of course there's the most important one, we don't teach a child to adapt to society, but to create, to make the world a better place, isn't it? Otherwise, what is the point of taking him to the human world?
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