so many thoughts #1: karakter

school started back yesterday after a 2 week holiday for the kids. for our grade 5 activity, we started a series of lessons on "karakter" ("charater" in english).

on the board, we drew a straight line. at the one end of the line we wrote the number "0", and the other end of the line had the number "100". next to the zero were the words "swak" (translated as "difficult" in english, but with a spiritual connotation, such as "it's so swak to walk through life without jesus") and the word "Satan". next to the one hundred mark, we wrote "sterk" ("strong"), and the name "Jesus".

therefore, "0" represented a bad character, one resembling Satan. "100" signified a strong character, perfect like Jesus.

we chose 3 different children in the class, two of whom had gotten into a fight on the playground just before we started class, and the third child was our dear friend carly boy. see a couple of previous blogs i've written if you don't recognize the name.

carly boy was the 3rd child to go up. we had seen the previous two kids rate their character as a bold 70 and 90--two kids who smoke and swear and are constantly breaking the school rules.

carly boy walks up, takes the piece of chalk, and circles "10". he sits back down at his desk. the teacher looks at me with a pained face and says "he has such a low sense of self-worth."

this moment really tore me up inside. i watched carly boy, i began studying his moves. i reminsced over the many encounters i have had with him recently that have been so painful and sad. i began to wonder about the truth of his self-assessment..."does he really side himself so closely with satan? and if so, why? what has happened in his own life that makes him believe he's innately such a bad kid?" that is absolutely heartbreaking if you really think about it.

take any child you know with a stable family, a regular school attendance, and no drug problem. pick the most "normal" ten year old you know. in your mind, envision them completing this task. would they also rate themselves a "10" out of "100"? most likely, the answer is no.

so, why does carly boy think this lowly of himself? is it just his honest, childlike truthfulness coming out...does he know the depth of his sinfulness in a way most adults try hiding from the world? is it because he smokes drugs and stays out late at night? is it due to his family who takes their anger out on him? maybe he is a bad kid after all, he wonders from time to time.

but what about the drug addiction and alcoholism around him? what about the fact that his house is a drug den and gangster haven? what about the fact that he doesn't have parents who encourage him and uplift him or spur him towards right living? what about the physical abuse his older brothers inflict upon him to release their own anger? what about the fact that he hangs out at the traffic light to get money instead of going home, because at home their isn't food anyways...much less people who get excited to see him like his regular "clients" by the traffic lights?

after school, i had a doctors appointment. early that morning, i had picked up a book in our house calld "Basic Child Psychiatry", thinking i might learn something useful about the lives of the kids i work with. and with god's divine insight, he led me to this page and these words...

"the quest for a sense of personal worth, so critical to small children, remains of central importance for human beings throughout their lives. it motivates much of our activity in seeking personal attachements and meaningful work...nothing is more important for the maintenance of well-being. conversely, no experience is more obviously distressing, or more intimately linked to emotional disturbances of many kinds and, in psychiatry, to various types of psychopathology, than is a diminised sense of worth or a low opinion of oneself.

for many disturbed children, a low measure of self-esteem is a central problem. this can be self-perpetuating or even self-reinforcing. as children act out their feelings of being 'bad' people, others in their environments may react by making critical remarsk of labelling them in one way or another, as inferior individuals.

so while we must look carefully at the background factors which have led to the situations we encounter when we assess disturbed children, we need also to consider the children's current views of themselves. we should strive to understand how these are being reinforced, or modified by their environments, in order to devise suitable treatment plans." (philip barker, 23-24)

i felt so convicted. how am i actually reinforcing carly boy's insecurities and sense of being a 'bad' person when i hold a grudge against him for being rude, or a judge him for being disrespectful. there is, of course, a need to teach kids these things, but how deep am i willing to let down my own assumptions and fears in order to see just where i can meet this child's paining heart?