Our mother had a 2 methods of encouraging us to behave well. One was a no-touch, non-verbal method. She would gives us “the look”. It is unbelievable to me as an adult and now as a mother myself that it actually worked. Protest about unfairness and you heard her defining philosophy of parenting repeated for the hundredth time; “Because I said so”.

Remember the issue of Highlights Magazine in the waiting room at the dentist’s office? From the magazine website we learn that Highlights for Children was founded in 1946 and is dedicated to the belief that “children” are the world’s most important people™.”   The first feature I always flipped to was “Goofus and Gallant”; an illustrated lesson in , manners, self-control and unselfishness. There was no gray area in the boy’s opposite behaviors – Gallant was all good and Goofus was all bad.

Times change and Goofus and Gallant have changed as well. Popular parenting methods change with each generation as well.
So what did we learn from this all black, all white, no gray area type of world? Maybe it was far more insulated. There were more rules and the illusion of safety. In a way, maybe as children we were exposed less to the dangers and sadness and fears of life. What I do believe is that we are made partly of Gallant and partly of Goofus. I am more certain of the grays in my life today than either the blacks or whites. I also know that parenting is an awesome joy and yet an exhausting , critical and never-ending job and we all want to feel that we are doing it “right”. 

If I could have pulled off the “look” with my son, I would have done it in a heartbeat. You know why? Because I said so.