wisdom Lost and WISDOM Gained

Yesterday I got my wisdom tooth pulled out for REAL. Although I lost some “wisdom” I gained a greater wisdom of clarity. First of all, the whole thing wasn’t planned. I didn’t have an appointment by the dentist, just my father was going. So I went too, so that my dentist can look at my mouth and figure out why it was hurting me. Then he asks me if I was able to sleep, I told him “Yea, I was able to sleep, but I couldn’t eat or Talk”. So he decided I should get another wisdom tooth out.

When he took out the tooth he wasn’t even sitting on a chair, he stood, and it went really fast, before I knew it, he had the tooth out. He asked me if I wanted it, I said no, since I already had my first one, I didn’t need another. Everything went by so fast, that I didn’t even have time to think about it. I did notice he used the annoying technique of saying what he was going to do every step of the way.

Now for the gained WISDOM, I realized that sometimes you have to go through a bit more pain so that you won’t have any more pain. Although it seems not to make any sense, because why would you want to increase something that you want to decrease, but it works.

For the past few days, my mouth was hurting me, because my tooth was biting into my check. Since I decided to take care of it, I did get a bit more pain, from the shots. However, in the long run it is less pain, because I won’t have to deal with my mouth hurting me anymore, and I will get to enjoy eating food again. Although it is annoying in the short run, not being able to eat foods I want (at least its not Purim time), it pays off at the end.

Now this applies with everything in life, there is always going to be some pain in having things good. You just have to keep in mind that the pain is helping you heal in the long term. Sometimes, while the pain is lasting we can’t tell if its worth it, if at the end everything will be good, we just see the pain at the moment. But it will all clear and we will be healed. Then the pain will be in the past and we won’t even remember it because of the vast amount of good we have. The pain will be a tiny drop compared to all the good.

Be Honest Or You Will Scare Them

Last week I was babysitting and the kids were up in the beginning and I had a great time playing games with them, talking to them, and then putting them to sleep. By 9:00 I had the kids sleeping, and the parents were going to a wedding so they would be home late. Since I had no school, I had no tests to study for, so I had lots of time with nothing to do.

I decided to explore the book case a bit to see if they have anything interesting to read. I found a book called “Positive Parenting” By Dr. Tewersky. I started reading different parts of the book. I came upon one part that I found intriguing. He said that children aren’t supposed to see their parents as perfect, that they should understand their human too. There are many reasons for this, which I won’t get into now.

But there was one part, which I felt was important. He said sometimes parents should let their children know what’s bothering them, otherwise the child will think the worst. He gave an example of where a kid sees his father upset, the parent doesn’t tell the child what’s bothering him. Then through different things that happen, the child assumes the worst that his father is getting fired, when in reality it was something much more minor.

Now I don’t think children should be informed with everything going on in the house. Some stuff is just not their business. However, when the child can tell that something is eating up the parent, and they ask what is wrong. It is better to just tell them the truth. Otherwise they will imagine up a story worse than it is. They will think it’s the end of the world, when its not.

Such a story happened yesterday, where I was outside with a kid I babysit for. Some people he knew walked by, and he saw the mother was holding her stomach, not a big one. So he started wondering where they were going. So he asks the 15 year old boy where they were going. The boy answered back that not everything is his business, he doesn’t have to worry himself over everything.

Since there is a hospital a block away, the boy automatically assumed the worst, that they were taking her to the hospital. So he goes into his house, tells his family that some people he knew are going to the hospital. Now I saw the lady passing by, and I could tell she wasn’t going to the hospital because she seemed to be perfectly fine, they were just taking a walk. She wasn’t pregnant, so it couldn’t have been that she would be having a baby. The only thing was in the way she walked, possibly because of her high heeled shoes, it made her appear to not be walking normally. Which gave the child the impression that something was bothering her.

Now if the person would have just been honest with the kid, then he wouldn’t have dreamt up this whole scenario. Children have big imaginations, they will worry themselves for no reason, if you’re not honest with them.

Lesson Learned From Investing

The lesson I learned from Investing has nothing to do with money, it goes deeper than that. I had $100,000,000 and 200 trades to use. I didn’t bother doing research to see which stocks to buy, rather I just searched for the companies “I knew”. Mistake #1

At first I was hesitant to buy so many shares of stock, so I started off buying 30 shares of Target, Google, Microsoft and some others. I didn’t even bother looking at the price of the stock. Then once I got into it, I started checking every few minutes hoping the stock would go up. I would see it jump a few and see green numbers signifying a profit. All seemed good so I started buying even more shares of stock. It was such a fun game watching the numbers jump.

Then the numbers started turning red signifying a loss. I decided to sell the ones that were giving me a profit, and kept the losing ones hoping they will go higher. Then I bought some more random stocks like Sony and HP. They were all doing good. I suddenly became interested in the VIN news feed item where it would report the market position of the stock close.

I let my stocks sit for a few days then checked back once a while. After seeing them loosing, I was afraid they would loose more, so I sold them at the first time when I saw it start to come up. Mistake #2

Then later on I started following it more closely, I would watch Google finance, see when the stock became very low and I would buy 100’s of shares. Then the stock would go back up and I would gain a lot of money. Lucky for me the market was doing very good and kept going up and up.

But there can be stocks that are just going to keep going down, the companies will become bankrupt and your stock with be worth zero, so in such a case it is important to sell your stock at the first sign of loss to minimize it. Luckily I didn’t have any bad stocks.

The lesson in all this is:

1. Don’t make hasty decisions. Take the time to research and compare choices. If you make a hasty decision you may regret it later. Don’t go into something not knowing anything. First inform yourself, get familiar with what you will have to do and you will succeed.
2. Sometimes you have to stick with it, things can get rough and go down and you may seem like things are bad, but then they will pick up and end up higher than it started with. So you just have to be strong through the downs and they will go soaring high. Never give up!

So in life when your making big decisions, which car to buy, which house to buy, which job to take. Don’t make the decisions on a whim, but rather put effort into researching and seeing what is best for you. The more effort you put into it, the more valuable it becomes.

At times life can get hard, children can misbehave and you almost give up hope. But no matter how bad they are, things will turn out good, it is just a stage they are going through. In the end they are the most worthy investment to be made.

But at the same time, you can be in a situation where your in a bad relationship, in such a case it is better to leave right away and minimize your loss before it gets worse and the relationship becomes abusive.

Disciplining Children

I’ve never liked the idea of hitting children. I felt that hitting won’t accomplish anything, if anything it will cause more hate toward the parent and the child will surely not listen. Additionally its painful to the child and I couldn’t stand to watch a child cry so much from getting punished.

I felt a punishment should teach them a lesson not to repeat their bad action but at the same time it shouldn’t be too painful. So long as they learn their lesson there’s no need to make them feel more guilty. Plus a lot of times I believed that the reason why parents hit their children was more out of anger than for the child’s benefit. The parent was upset at what the child did and took their frustration out on the child.

Recently, I came upon an article of where a 20 year old had gone $5,000 over on her cell phone bill and was therefore hit by her parent, the 20 year old’s boy friend called the police and the parent was charged with domestic violence. I was wondering what the difference is if a parent hits their kid when their little or big. In either case its some sort of abuse. Although with little children they get away with it. But by little children it probably hurts them more and they can’t handle it as much as an older child that can deal with pain.

Then today I heard Shlomo Hamelech in Mishlei deals with this issue. He says there are three types of children. There is the Scoffer, the simpleton, and the one who understands. With each child he explains there is a different way to discipline them.

Basically he says that hitting will not accomplish anything in either child. But he says with the scoffer no sort of punishment could help him. There is no way to correct his actions. However, with the simpleton, you shouldn’t hit him because it will cause resentment. However, by hitting the scoffer the simpleton will see and will change his ways (the scoffer will not be harmed by getting hit). By the understanding son he says you should talk to him and explain to him what he did was wrong and he will be able to correct his ways.

“Strike the scoffer and the simpleton will grow clever; chastise an understanding person and will understand [even more] knowledge.” (Mishlei 19:25)

Kindness

Yesterday I was walking from the city bus stop on my way home when I see the mother of the triplets I used to babysit driving nearby. I haven’t seen her in over a month already, we waved to each other and I continued walking on. Then I get a call from her on my phone. She called to offer me a ride which was so nice, but I declined since I was already almost home and there was no point in her having to go out of her way. She asked a few times if I was sure, and I said yea.

It was so kind of her to offer a ride even though I don’t babysit her kids anymore. I was thinking it over and I realized it’s amazing how kind people can be. I decided acts of kindness need mentioning.

I’ve heard its a good idea to keep a folder called “Yay Me!” to archive any e-mail someone sent to you that complimented you. So that if you ever feel down you can look back at it and it will cheer you up to know people appreciate you.

I was thinking mothers may need the same boost, that a mother’s job is a cycle doing the same stuff over and over. They may feel that what their doing isn’t accomplishing anything. So sometimes they need reminders of how great a job they are doing. To let them know you appreciate their kindness.

Here is a list of some of the kind acts mothers of the kids I babysit have done (in no specific order):

1. Letting me know what time they expect to come home
2. Calling before they come back home
3. Giving me a ride back home when its late
4. Putting some nosh on the table
5. Buying me a birthday gift
6. Calling me in advance to book the babysitting job
7. Understanding when I couldn’t babysit and not nudging me
8. Being friendly
9. Being Understanding when things went wrong
10. Letting me watch their adorable kids!

There are so many more kind things they have done that I just can’t think about right now. But I have decided to keep a list and add on to it.

Shots

The one thing I’ve always dreaded about going to the doctor is the shots. The same by the dentist, I didn’t mind the drilling so much it was the shot that got me scared. Then I finally went to one dentist where they do such a smart thing. The dentist first uses some cream to numb the area. Then when its time for the shot you don’t even feel the pain of the shot. It could be just psychological, but it works.

Doctors and dentists are aware that children dislike shots and they have different ways of dealing with it. Some will tell you not to look while they give you the shot, I find this to work the best. To close your eyes, then you don’t know when you will get the shot, and by the time you get it, its already over. Then there is the other approach where they explain to you every step of the way what they will do. This I can’t stand, it just worries me more to hear what they will do.

Since I know that shots can be painful I have a hard time watching a child get a shot. One time I was babysitting and the kid complained that his fingernail was too long and his mother had warned me beforehand that his fingernail was getting long so he might need me to cut it. So since he was complaining about it before bed, I took a nail clipper and cut his nail. But it gave me a squeamish feeling, I didn’t know how much to cut, since I don’t feel his finger nails it was harder to judge, but I did cut it and he didn’t complain so it didn’t hurt him at the end. The same with putting in earrings, since your not wearing the other persons ears, you don’t know what they feel so you get afraid that your hurting them when your not.

It’s hard to imagine how children are able to give themselves shots, weather its for allergic reactions, for insulin or other things. But then it might not be so bad for these children, since they are so used to getting shots, for them it might not be so bad. After having shots for a month they probably get used to it. The next time they go to the doctor to get a shot they won’t be afraid of it. So even though they have to take a shot often for them it becomes like nothing, so they don’t feel the same dread towards shots as those not used to it.

Video from Onion that looks at shots through a kids perspective, in a twisted way it is funny

Personalization

I think personalization is great for children to have a sense of identity and to feel good about themselves. There is one family I babysit by where the girl has the hello kitty theme for lots of stuff she has. She has Hello kitty pencils, blankets, and other little stuff. Then she has a huge poster size photo of her when she was 3 years old eating an ice cream, hanging in her room. She has a bunch of stuff with her name on it.

Now she must feel great about herself because she sees her name on the things she has. It gives her a sense of identity. It also makes her want to take care of the stuff she has because its special to her. If it was just a no brand product with no connection to her then she wouldn’t take as much care of it.

This doesn’t mean that everything bought for the child has to be expensive, but if you personalize it, then it will make the child want it more. Just like a birthday card, if someone wrote a personalized message in it as well, then you will keep it and treasure it for the message hand written in it. Same thing, if you buy children personalized gifts with their name on it, or some sort of theme then they cherish it more.

Also, if children have their name on their stuff then they have a sense of ownership over it. Other kids won’t be able to take it away from them. But then again a child wouldn’t be too happy if everything they owned had their name stamped on it. But gifts and objects that are extra would be better with their name on it and a little personalization.

A child should feel good about their bedroom, they should feel they have stuff in it that belongs to them, besides for just a bed and dresser. A child’s room is the one place they can go and feel it is theirs. It’s nice to see when the room is decorated with picture frames or different things the children made. They get to see what they created and they will remember it.

So next time if you're wondering what to get as a gift, you can get any personalized gift, with the kid’s name on it or with their picture and they will be very happy for it.

How Old Are You?

When children aren’t behaving and doing things they are not supposed to do, parents will say “How old are you?”, “Your like a 2 year old”, “Your older than them”, “Don’t be such a baby” or “How old do you think you are?”.

Now I don’t think using age references helps. If your four year old child is doing something a 2 year old would do, it doesn’t help to say “How old are you? you are supposed to know better” because then when the child becomes 6 it then becomes “Your not 4 anymore”. So the age level is always increasing as the child gets older. If a child sees that the parent is always telling them not to do stuff because of age, then they will realize if when they were younger they got away with it, then now to they can get away with it.

If there are a bunch of siblings at different ages, then the older ones will always be the older ones and the younger ones will always be the younger ones. So you can’t use age references there. It isn’t fair to the older children to tell them they have to give in to the younger ones because they are older. Since if the 10 year old just got a prize from school and the 6 year old sees the prize and wants it, the 10 year old will be forced to give it since the 6 year old is younger. But then 4 years later the 6 year old will be 10 and won’t understand to be able to give, since the older one is always having to give to the younger one, no matter the age.

Rather than use the older and younger terms, each child should be treated as an individual, no matter the age. A 10 year old child shouldn’t be able to take candy away from the 2 year old because that’s taking advantage of the 2 year old who won’t remember what belonged to them. Also, a 4 year old shouldn’t be able to get the 10 year olds stuff even if the 4 year old is younger and doesn’t know better and will get more upset.

What’s That Smell?

I was on the city bus sitting down in the back of the bus when I started to smell something. I was wondering what that horrible smell could be coming from. It didn’t take long for me to spot the 1 year old on the bus a few seats down from me.

The child had a smelly diaper and needed a changing. The father of the kid was sitting next to the kid and while the kid was standing up and looking out the window, the father would put his head by her back and snuggle her.

Now the father had to be able to smell the diaper since his head was right there, but he must have gotten real used to the smell cause he kept putting his head there and snuggling her. Or he acknowledged the smell but couldn’t do anything about it since he was on a bus.

I think it would be smart to change the kid before leaving your house or wherever you are that has a bathroom. So that it shouldn’t be unpleasant for the other people, plus its not healthy for the kid to not be changed for so long.