Simplicity Parenting

Chapter One



Why Simplify?

We are facing an enormous problem in our lives today. It s so big we can hardly see it, and it s right in front of our face, all day, every day. We re all living too big lives, crammed from top to toe with activities, urgencies, and obligations that seem absolute. There s no time to take a breath, no time to look for the source of the problem.

Sarah Susanka, The Not So Big Life

James was about eight years old, and entering third grade, when I met his parents. Lovely and very bright people, James s mother was a professor and his father was involved in city government. They were worried about their son having trouble sleeping at night, and his complaints of stomachaches. An eight-year-old boy is fairly well designed to be a picky eater, but James s pickiness was getting extreme. His stomachaches came and went, but they didn t seem food related.

Both parents spoke proudly of how confidently James could speak with adults, but acknowledged that he had trouble connecting with his peers. He avoided things that he felt might be dangerous, and had only very recently learned to ride a bike. And don t forget the driving thing, his mother mentioned. James s father explained that whenever they drove someplace, James would be the self-appointed policeman in the backseat, letting them know when they were even one or two miles above the speed limit, scanning the road ahead for concerns of any kind. The term backseat driver didn t come close to describing his behavior; you can well imagine how relaxing these road trips were.

As I got to know the family, I noticed how much their daily lives were colored by world issues. Both parents were avid news followers. The television was often on and tuned to CNN, whether they were directly focused on it or not. Politically and intellectually oriented, they would discuss issues at great length, particularly environmental concerns. From an early age, James had been listening to these

A consultant and trainer to more than sixty U.S. independent and public schools, Kim John Payne, M.Ed., has been a school counselor for eighteen years and a private family counselor-therapist for fifteen. Payne has worked extensively with the North American and U.K. Waldorf movements. He is currently project director of the Waldorf Collaborative Counseling Program at Antioch University New England, the director of a large research program on a drug-free approach to attention priority issues disorders, and a Partner of the Alliance for Childhood in Washington, D.C. He lives with his wife and two children in Harlemville, New York.

Lisa M. Ross has been involved with books for more than twenty years, as an editor and literary agent, and now exclusively as a writer. She lives with her husband and two children in Stuyvesant, New York.

Brilliant, wise, informative, innovative, entertaining, and urgently needed, this timely book is a godsend for all who love children, and for children themselves. It provides a doable plan for providing the kind of childhood kids desperately need today! Edward Hallowell, M.D., author of The Childhood Roots of Adult Happiness

A wealth of practical ideas for reclaiming childhood and establishing family harmony. Publishers Weekly

Brilliant. Grand Rapids Press

[Payne is] like a master closet reorganizer for the soul. Time

This book is a wake-call for all of us who have misjudged what children need and can handle, and who have wandered so far from the best practices that we are raising neurologically damaged and emotionally stunted human beings as a result. Simplicity Parenting arises from dialogues with real people, from their questions and their needs. Kim John Payne is sharp, funny, and wise, and best of all he has something shattering but positive to say to an America that is struggling to know how to live. Steve Biddulph, author of The Secret of Happy Children

If you are raising children in these anxious times, you need this book. It will inspire you, reassure you, and, most important of all, it will remind you that less is more, that simplicity trumps complication, that rhythm and routine bring peace to the soul. In this profound and practical guide, Kim John Payne offers parents a doable, step-by-step approach to simplifying everyday family life, from the toy box to the dinner table. In the process, he reveals to us the rewards to be found in slowing down, savoring our children s childhoods, and more fully enjoying our own adult lives. Katrina Kenison, author of The Gift of an Ordinary Day

Simplicity Parenting takes the unusual and unusually wise stance that sometimes less can be more. Less as in less frenetic activity, less racing around, less clutter. Payne provides