Damn the Man

We all know what rules are. They have been introduced to us since we came out of the womb and we have been bombarded with them so much that now we make them for ourselves. This may not be entirely bad because I do believe that everyone should hold himself or herself to a certain standard and respect them but for the most part- rules suck. Damn the Man and his rules!

There are rules set in place by the powers that be to keep us safe and protect the innocent but I am talking about other rules. Today in the classroom the lead teacher said to my student- "don't build that tower too high Charly, you might get hurt," she warned. First of all the "blocks" were these humongous light plastic lego looking things (think Super Mario 3 in the Giant level) and would only hurt if you dropped them from fifty feet. Charly is not 50 feet tall. He's 3 and is lucky if he's 4 ft tall. Anyhow the warning irked me a bit because she was stifling his creativity!! He's 3!! He was building and exploring and creating and I hate telling kids to stop what they are creating (unless they can go back to it later) because I literally feel like I am taking something away from them. Rules like that are lame. That rule came from the teacher’s fear of other children doing the same thing and for fear that other children may get “hurt.” It may have been possible that the blocks may have fallen on someone accidentally but like I said, these were not solid wooden blocks and I was there anyway giving the children enough space each to work as they wished. I don’t care about noise or messes in the creative/learning process. More often than not, they go hand in hand.

As I mentioned before it’s very important to think outside the box and how else have we learned things in our own lives than by breaking the rules? Lets say the tower did fall, and it fell on a friend or his foot. The friend would learn to not play right next to a tower (sorry friend) and Charly would learn to be careful building towers next to his friends because if its too high it will fall. Throughout our own lives haven't we learned through our mistakes? By breaking our own rules? Have you ever gotten lost on the train before? You learned a new place to go to as well as the one you were supposed to get to. Have you ever gone out with someone because you feel lonely? You realize that wasting your time with that person does not outweigh the many pleasurable things you could be doing with your friends or by yourself. Stifling, hindering rules. Usually they come from others fears and insecurities. Rules suck.

Instead of making rules for others make beliefs for yourself. After all the only person you can truly control is yourself. Why not set yourself up in a universe where things work for you. Adopt a belief system that respects yourself and what you are or would like to be. I am not saying be inconsiderate of those around you, in fact if your beliefs are truly positive for yourself you will in turn respect those around you even more. What they do and say will not matter because you are clear on what you need. Who knows, your positive beliefs may rub off on others and cause a chain reaction of people thinking for themselves.