There Is No Race

We live in a world where there is such a thing as a "tiger mom." A world where one of the hottest, lower-budget documentary movies is "Race to Nowhere." A world where just a few miles from here two teenage students at a local high school committed suicide because of pressure at school. At once this incited me to link these three captivating events together and ask a fundamental question: when will the madness cease? What kind of world could we create from this place?

A Race to Nowhere provided several perspectives on the academic, social and emotional "wellness" of several students ranging from 4th grade to seniors from various schools throughout the country, some of them nearby. Expert witnesses on the film included PhDs from Stanford, physicians, teachers, psychologists and psychiatrists, parents and actual students. The theme: schools are becoming places of stress-physical, social, emotional. The symptoms: kids who have no exposure to leisure, the outdoors, time with friends; kids becoming addicted to caffeine; kids who are taking anti-anxiety medication, anti-depressants and mood stabilizers in epic proportions. Kids not getting sleep or eating. Speaking of epic proportions: kids cheating and admitting it. Kids learning to the test and retaining, well, not much. Kids committing suicide. Children stressed. Stress...is that not a "grown up" experience? Is this not a learned behavior?

Turn now a moment to the Tiger Mom story. A self-described authoritarian matriarch, a merciless taskmaster, a monster as described by a handful of incensed parents. It matters little the exact nature of the extreme measures taken by this mother with her various-aged daughters. It barely makes sense to give more attention to this abomination of child rearing practices here, but there is an interesting facet to this story that ties into the madness of the Race to Nowhere. The title for that film was taken directly from a students' mouth who said of the condition of the stress and pressure at school that "it's crazy, it's like a race...to...nowhere." There is a brilliant child. Somewhere in our perennial search for excellence and desire to maintain some kind of international ranking, we have created a culture that is perpetuating some incredible parenting practices AND sending unrealistic messages to the students about what it takes to be in the race. And the students, like machines and nothing close to human, are in a race that is devoid of any real meaning, any tangible connection to something other than "the future out there."

Time magazine made a statement that the Tiger Mom, in her description of what she describes as "traditional Chinese parenting," has hit hard at a "national sore spot: that sore spot, according to the author's account-- our fears about losing ground to China and other rising powers and about adequately preparing our children to survive in the global economy." I repeat. When will this madness end? Is there a nexus here? Is this really what it all comes down to? If you study hard and take all the AP classes possibly offered, and if you get a 4.2, and play a sport and participate in a few after school clubs and you do community service and then get into a great college and get a masters and then get into the economy at some super start off point and then climb and climb and accumulate and achieve, you too can assist the U.S. to keep it's ground as whatever it is that we are? Is this all for the U.S. to stay in some absurd position of rank? Is that not the quintessinal race to nowhere? AM I required, by being born here, to partake in this "FEAR" of losing international ground? And that is only half of the fear mentioned. The other half is the fear of: "not adequately preparing our children to SURVIVE in the global economy". Does adequate preparation equate to that earlier scenario I described of the automaton student rocketing to the 4.2 summa cum everything? Is the bell curve dead and I'm the last to know? I digress. What of the notion that our children, adequately prepared, need to learn to SURVIVE in the global economy? Do they even know what that is? Are those words commensurate with a common understanding of a set of values, principles and agreed upon "rules of play?" And is it sensible to teach children how to survive in ANY economy rather than how to THRIVE, anywhere, anyhow, anytime?

This is beyond forest through the trees. WE have gone mad. And I am here to suggest that is GOOD news because it means we get to take this mess we've made and re-create a better paradigm for this quest to co-inhabit and thrive on this planet. The cat is out of the bag that this notion of super sonic, super-sized, super charged zest for global positioning at all costs, here, largely the human spirit, has run its course. Partaking in this nonsense will be evidence of a lack of human evolution and consciousness that cannot be possible with all this information and free speech available for the taking. No big apologies needed here. It's really ok for this madness to end. No one is going to get in trouble. Oh, sure, we may slip in global rank, take a turn in some other place in the global "pack" of animals, but we get to choose a different story now. We get to choose, not have to. So let's choose that NEW story, a new scenario, one characterized by :

soul over mind,

curiosity over regurgitation,

thriving over surviving,

life over death,

ease over stress,

abundance over scarcity,

compassion over hate,

slow over fast,

courage over fear,

heart over all.

The care and feeding of the human spirit reigns high above all other pursuits and offers the foundation for any nation to rise and stand tall, ready to share the "power" from this new base and not squander. To demonstrate that we are one species on the planet that is sharing space with thousands of others KNOWING there really is room for all of us. Let's live from a place of KNOWING there is no race and the possibilities for co-existing with each other, in all our machinations, is endless. Let's play on that playground, shall we?