When we talk about Rites of Passage, we usually think of, say, learning to ride a bike; getting our driver’s license (oh yay!); graduation from high school (huge!); first paying job; good paying job; finishing college or trade school or military service; a career that you like or love; setting up a home; perhaps marriage and a family – to mention a few. There is, however, a rite of passage that begins in preschool and continues sometimes well into adulthood, if the lessons weren’t learned along the way while growing up.

Remember having chores to do, some paid by our allowance – if we had one, others just tasks we did as part of our contribution for living in our family? Remember needing to tell our parent or parents where we were going and with whom? Remember needing to be home by a certain time? Remember needing to complete our homework so we would turn it in when required? If our parents or caretaker were doing their job in raising us, there were consequences for not following through. Certainly, there were from our teachers, in the form of low marks. If we did what was required or agreed upon, we learned what it meant to be responsible, and the benefits that accrued from this reputation.

When my daughter Emily (6 years) and I formed a blended family with my new husband and his kids Mark (11 years) and Ann (8 years), I quickly saw there was no telling what the outcome would be with Mark or Ann to family assignments, chores, or agreements. Mark and Ann would say yes to whatever, then, all but literally, turn sideways and slide out to do what they pleased, or perhaps do the chore so poorly it would have to be redone. All bets were off. Of course, I was up against the new stepmom syndrome… Nonetheless, it was apparent Mark and Ann were not used to being held accountable for their behavior, at least the way we were describing it. Thus was born the first of several “family rules:” Do what you say you are going to, or renegotiate.

By the time Ann came to live with us full-time at age 15 ½, because her mother “couldn’t handle her,” Ann totally “got” this do what you say you are going to do or renegotiate as far as her girlfriends went. In fact, it made her mad when they would make plans, then drop them if something better came along. But she couldn’t, or didn’t want to, make the important association with her own behavior. In her thirties, Ann told me she realized she had been taking a very long time to grow up. Ann had to learn the hard way the value in sometimes needing to delay desires or impulses for the long-term goal, and for feeling good about herself, or for simply “the greater good” of all.

Although I couldn’t tell it at the time, those family rules regarding being accountable and responsible for one’s own behavior did sink in. For many, many years now, all three of the kids know the advantages, the sterling of which is self-pride and self-trust. We can’t always do what we say we are going to do. Things come up. Rather than “letting it go,” or ignoring the commitment, as soon as possible, we need to go back to the others involved and set new plans or guidelines, if possible. Thus, we earn the reputation of being trustable. The big pay-off is learning that we can trust ourselves.

Furthermore, we are responsible for our own attitudes, thoughts, and actions, regardless of who or what “caused it” – “it” being the inner disturbance we are experiencing. This personal ownership of the inner workings of our feelings, thoughts, behaviors and subsequent actions, if any, totally stops The Blame Game in its tracks. We can renegotiate even with ourselves, thus justly earning even more self-respect. This is a base-line Rite of Passage, without which you cannot claim maturity. 

Until next time, I send you warm wishes for fun and success.                                                                        

 Janis Butler, MA Spiritual Psychology