Manifesting The World We Want

The night our youngest raged on about the end of the world has stayed with me like the ghosts of a bad dream. One that sours in the moments before awakening. Except that when we're awake, the world sours even more in real time, becoming a nagging shadow that whispers bittersweet worries throughout the day.

It's not the first time it's felt like the "end of the world" as we know it (or the "end of the world" period). My wife Amy and I remember the 1980's fear of nuclear war with the former Soviet Union. The first Gulf War in the early 1990's. Then more genocides like Rwandan, Bosnia, and Darfur. September 11, 2001. Covid-19. The war in Ukraine. The Israel-Palestine Conflict. Ongoing climate change and horrific natural disasters. The insurrection of January 6, 2021, and America's slide into fascism, with truth, accountability, and the rule of law having literally gone over a cliff where the gravity of the fall could crush us all. Welcome to the Great American shakedown free-for-fall.

Our teens are now painfully aware of these current events. It weighs on their futures like a black hole's gravity. It weighs on all of us and steals our light. Doom-scrolling biased misinformation adds to this gravity, so we've all worked on moderating that behavior in our house, but it has prompted us to prepare. Amy is our disaster prepper, not in a fanatical way, but just enough so we have extra water and food and other emergency supplies "just in case". We also live with constant fire danger and earthquake danger that warrants being prepared.

Our children depend on us, the adults in the room, for safety, security, and sanity in an otherwise constantly changing world with natural disasters and manmade dumpster fires. Of course, there still are many good people trying to make a positive difference for their communities around the world. But the "powers that be" around the world seem to continually self-corrupt and suck all the light out of the room.

As parents, we do our best to talk about current events with our kids, especially when they ask about what's happening around us. We do our best to console them without compromising the truth (or as much of the truth that we can decipher) and encourage them to think positively about their lives and their futures. To live their lives and their futures. To fight for their lives, their rights, and their futures. And for everybody's else's, too. Because today, all our futures are at risk.

We've been here before and the gravity hasn't crushed us yet. I'm counting on the fact we can still make a difference, although this free-for-fall feels different somehow. Perception depends on how you feel in the moment, and I believe another moment will come. We know that worrying only helps to manifest the things we fear the most, so we'll keep manifesting the world we want, and take the actions needed to get there and stay there.

What We Get

I recognized the jacket immediately. We walked onto the lower field at school for our Saturday soccer scrimmage, and there it was, right next to another sweatshirt I didn't recognize.

"Bryce," I said. "Is that your pink jacket?"

Bryce stopped and bent down. "Yes, it's mine."

"And who's sweatshirt is that?"

"My friend's."

"Why is your jacket here on the field?"

"Because she forgot it, Dad. Why do you think?" said Beatrice.

Good answer smarty pants, I thought.

"Yes, sorry. It was an accident; I forgot it," Bryce said.

I picked up her pink jacket. It was soaking wet from being outside all night on the grass. I carried it over to where we dumped our equipment to start our soccer scrimmage between Bryce's team and Beatrice's team.

"Mommy's not going to be happy about this," I said.

"She said it was an accident, Dad. She's just a kid, you know," said Beatrice.

"Yes, I know," I said. "Thank you, Beatrice."

Beatrice has certainly found her voice at 10 years old. Although, so has Bryce at eight. And actually, they had already found their voices at a much earlier age than this. Which is great, because we want them to be confident, to set their boundaries and to be clear about how they feel. Now that Beatrice is in the pre-tween shadows, that can get a little too sarcastic at times, and we have to curb that with her, but overall they're both forthright and self-assured. And we encourage that.

During the scrimmage, Bryce fought playing and complained that she was hot and tired. I did what I do with any of our players who act like they don't want to play -- I said simply, if you don't want to play, please go sit on the sidelines and take a break.

If they don't really want to play in that moment, that's what I have them do; one of our other team members did that towards the end of our scrimmage. But Bryce did want to play, and kept on fighting with herself about it, and me, and in the end stayed in the scrimmage game, still complaining the whole time.

On the way home from the scrimmage, I pointed this out to Bryce, about being a team player and how attitude is a big part of playing any sport -- and I also reminded her about not leaving her things on the grass at school.

"That's what you get for having an eight-year-old," Bryce said, laughing.

"Yeah, Dad. That's what you get for having kids," said Beatrice, laughing.

"I know, I know girls," I said, laughing.

And yet, what we get is so much more than that; we get the future. They are our future leaders and captains of industry and sports figures, the future of our communities near and far, whatever they do and wherever they end up. And while some will struggle along their paths, we can only hope for the best as they grow older, guiding them as best we can as they do. I thought about all this when we had with some of our friends and their kids over for a little get together recently. I thought about this during our annual back-to-school barbecue, where I got to help out and play emcee, where hundreds of kids and their parents interacting positively with each other and having fun. Each of our lives so different than the other, no matter the shared values, and yet, the very nature of our shared values, our children, are ultimately all that matters the most in our collective worlds.

What we get is so much more, and in a world so divided today, and seemingly getting more so every day, it's up to us invest wisely.