Become a Master Parent: Your Training Begins Now (Pt.2)

Become a Master Parent: Your Training Begins Now by Bryan Post (Pt.1)

Now Appears Wise Teacher #1

With the world seemingly in jeopardy of an oncoming disaster someone has to take responsibility, but who? This is where the battle to save humanity reaches an interesting point in the continuum. Again, thinking about traumatized childrenand our James Bond theme, we see the first wise teachers enter the picture: A happily married couple longing to provide love to a child without a family. Mind you these are not your average ordinary people. They are trained secret agents. They are equipped. They understand the ways of the amygdala and are sensitive to its signals…most of the time. Yet, what they do not realize is that their pupil has received very little training. His slate is not blank, he is no tabula rosa. He has learned that he must save the world himself, a conditioned disciple of his amygdala, who has become his master.

He does not trust others because he was never taught. He only knows to trust himself. He must do it. He knows
everything even though he is merely a child.

The encounter is interesting and noteworthy. The teaching couple have soothing and safe lessons to offer yet the student is not interested. They reach out, but he pushes away. They push closer, he fights or runs away. They say “I love you”, but he does not respond. They call him for dinner, he’s not hungry. They send him to school, he struggles and they must come and get him. The older he gets seemingly the more difficult it becomes, and before long they have forgotten their own teaching, themselves reverting back to survival. Havoc ensues. He must find a new teacher, they want a new student.

How does this look at the level of the brain? A stress sensitive, fear‐full child is not easily lulled into a state of
soothing. His teaching has been too intense. He has been led to believe that he, by himself, must save his world. Everyone else is merely a pawn at best there to please him, at worst there to do harm. He is conditioned to survive. The wise couple is not prepared for this. The onslaught of stress signals sent off from his amygdala is intense and powerful. If they are not mindful they will easily get knocked off balance, reacting with their own
amygdala rather than remembering their own teaching. It starts with his disinterest. When they are rebuffed their amygdala reacts and their hypothalamus responds. And then comes his rejection, next his hostility, his shutting down, and even his fleeing. Nine times out of ten the couple forget lesson number one in secret training: Always pay attention to your inner experience first. Be mindful. This very important lesson is what
separates the master teachers from the mere novices. The master teacher understands at a very intimate level the messages of the amygdala and the fact, that all messages arising from the amygdala are inner messages. They are replays of old experiences showing up in a new world. By failing to appropriately grasp, understand, and apply lesson one the couple slowly lose the teaching of their master, and become hostage to their own amygdala.

When the wise teachers lose the ways of their teaching they begin to replay the stories of their amygdala. They begin to personalize the behaviors of their student (the child). They see the struggle of the student as a reflection of their own insecurities and inabilities. Rejection from the student triggers an old story of not being good enough. The fighting and running away is perceived as a personal failure. Soon the wise couple is lost.

Within their brain the amygdala is sending out messages and the hypothalamus is not responding, therefore like the child slowly but surely they move into survival. Their own world (bodymind) is at risk. They become stressed out, depressed, resentful and hostile. Essentially they become much like the student they are trying to teach. Wise teacher reverts to the ways of the lost child. Oxytocin is lost both within the child and the adult. The world is in trouble for when the teacher is no longer effective the child continues to rely on his own teaching. In other words, when the teacher is no longer to teach the child how to respond to the reactions (messengers) of the amygdala the child’s system cannot be taught, cannot learn the way of responding.

Remember oxytocin is a learned response. In some situations the training ends. The student is sent elsewhere.

Now Appears Wise Teacher #2… (to be continued)

Become a Master Parent: Your Training Begins Now (Pt.3)