Less is More

Now that it's been almost 11 years since I graduated from high school, I'm beginning to feel that there really might be a place for "Cliff's Notes" in my life. While in school I always felt disgusted when people said they hadn't had time to read the book and had studied the Cliff's Notes instead. I thought about how much they were missing by skipping out on the real book and about how unfair that was to the author and to themselves. Not that I check out Cliff's Notes from the library now instead of novels. I'm talking about other aspects of life that need to be abbreviated for my childrens' sake, and how I can feel okay about doing that.

Yesterday, in General Conference, when Elder Bednar talked about having a few difficulties over the years with holding Family Home Evening and wondering if it made a difference in his kids' lives, I really related. James and I have had many such feelings. We've also had moments of epiphany where we have been able to figure out how to simplify and still accomplish the goal of holding family home evening, family prayer, scripture study, etc, without feeling like total failures at the end. We spent our summer scripture reading time in going through the Gospel Art Kit and discussing each picture a little. On "listening" days we'd read the scripture and the write-up on the back. On "energetic" days we would summarize. Did we feel something lacking from these sessions? Perhaps. Did we wish to delve into deep doctrinal discussions with the boys and draw them out into prolonged conversations about the principles of the Gospel we were teaching? Perhaps. However, did the consistency remain and the habit become formed? Yes.

Abbreviations happen elsewhere in life with young kids. After reading each one of C.S. Lewis' books in the Chronicles of Narnia I would attempt to relate the symbolism to the boys, to bear testimony of the religious teachings, and they would listen for a bit and then start asking what the next book was, or what the name of the next chapter was, or what the cover looked like. Did they grasp that Aslan is a Christ figure? Probably not. Will they someday? Yes. Will they remember sitting close to me on the couch and reading a really interesting and magical book? Yes, and that is a good enough foundation for us to have established. Anything we teach them has to come in small spurts--it has to be formulated for their developing brains at their specific level. It is so rewarding when they learn something and realize it and get excited for a moment. That is when _I_ need to take time and not cut _them_ off. That is when you have to milk the moment for all it is worth without overdoing it. That is when the careful balancing act comes in. Drive home the point without belaboring it. This is tough to do. It's like writing an essay that can only be a certain amount of words, or a poem that can only contain a few lines that must be creative and thoughtful, each word planned and precisely placed, rather than pages and pages of stream of conscious writing. And doing it without much prep time (usually) or rewriting draft after draft.

Who knew that would be one of the challenges of parenting? To have a feast of knowledge and experience you want to pass on to your children but to also require the ability and restraint to deliver it in small, "snack-size" portions, not pushing too far or too fast. And to avoid falling into the trap of making things "entertaining" or too accessible (fast food, shorter commercials, flashier movies, etc.) and still teaching the basic fundamentals of a moral education.

I guess it's like the feeling you get when you read a whole book and find a few really wonderful quotes that taught you more than everything else in the book. Or when you find one really great verse of scripture in a chapter and spend 10 minutes pondering that. I guess it's like the moment of clarity of mind when you receive a spiritual prompting. If we can live by the spirit each day, we will know which gems to impart and when it's the best timing. Not that it will happen every day. Probably it will occur only occasionally. But in the meantime, we carry on in consistency and just do our very best!

So back to the Cliff's Notes. James and I still need to "read the novel," but we can teach our children the shortened, abbreviated version and feel all right about that. As they get older, they will begin to search deeper themselves, and hopefully our relationship will be established enough that we will be able to assist them in making those discoveries of something more.