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KIDS OF CHARACTER 4/06/2009
Freedom’s Hand Rollo May, counselor, writer and theorist on the ways of the mind, is recognized as a significant voice of wisdom in the 20th century. He wrote, “Freedom is man’s capacity to take a hand in his own development. It is our capacity to mold ourselves.” As a young adult I began to understand the truth of these words, when I studied Abraham Maslow. His best selling book, Third Force Psychology, co-written by Frank Goble, unlocked for the layman reader the insight that Maslow uncovered in his study of the lives of mentally and emotionally healthy people, those he called the High Achievers. Maslow observed that humans are inherently wired to pursue an ever-expanding order of reality, governed first by instinct and survival, safety and security and ultimately by the aspiration to embody and live the higher values and ideals that mark the path of a significant and noble life. Essentially, we can learn from Maslow’s professional work, and the writings of the Viennese psychiatrist, Viktor Frankel, that humans are not puppets on strings, endlessly yanked around by circumstance and situations. Rather, each individual is defined by a divine impulse of self-initiation. We carry a unique capacity…the freedom to create, to evaluate, to think again, to unlearn what we erringly thought was correct and, ultimately, to discover that our life is defined by the power of choice. The freedom to choose and the self-reflection that accompanies this freedom, offers every budding kid of character the greatest lesson of life: I am the architect and craftsman of my life. Every lesson of character is built on the foundation of choice-making. There can be no discussion of character growth that does not begin with the recognition of an individual’s fundamental freedom of choice. Accompanying this freedom is the life renewing question for the young and the not-so-young: How then, shall I choose to live? Every parent, grandparent, teacher and coach can help bring life growth for the kids they love by faithfully playing the Johnny-one-note-character-lesson-of-life: I am the architect and craftsman of my life because I am freedom’s choice maker.
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