Ep 15: Four Ways to Practice Interdependence in Parenting

[INTRODUCTION]

[00:00:00] NV: Sawadee ka, and welcome to the Come Back to Care podcast. I am your host, Nat Nadha Vikitsreth, a decolonized and licensed clinical psychotherapist, somatics and social justice practitioner, and founder of Come Back to Care. Adopt connector, norm agitator and lover of liberation. 

If you're on a journey to transform your daily parenting into a social justice practice that nurtures your child's development and promotes intergenerational family healing, I am so glad that you're here. On this podcast, we explore how social justice, child development science, parenting, and family systems intersect with one another. If you've been looking for ways to align your parenting with a social justice values, you're in the right place. Together, we find our way back to our true home. We come back home to our body and the goodness within. We come back to our lineage and come back to care together. So come curious, and come as you are. Let's move at the speed of care, and let's do this.

[EPISODE]

Welcome to episode 15 of the Come Back to Care Podcast. 

In this episode, you and I are going to look at our culture’s obsession with individualism and independence because the US’s Independence Day is right around the corner. Then, we’re going to explore an alternative which is interdependence through the lenses of human evolution, social justice action, and spirituality. After this exploration, I’ll connect these dots back to parenting so that you can play with interdependence in your daily parenting as a decolonized, embodied, and intergenerational parent.  

The norm of individualism: competition, exploitation, and dominance

Independence and individualism really fascinate me because growing up in Thailand there was no such thing as an individual without a family or community. My family and I always come in a package called “we”. Back home in Thailand, we call strangers aunties, uncles, and siblings. The social and cultural water I was swimming in was all about “we’re all in this together” and how we need one another to survive and thrive. This attitude is called interdependence. 

So my biggest culture shock when I moved to the US in my mid-twenties was, of course, people wearing shoes inside the house. But also the hyperfocus on individualism and independence. Ideas like pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, climbing the ladder, and competing to get ahead were all new to me. 

I believe that neither independence nor interdependence is in and of itself good or bad. But independence becomes challenging when you believe that it’s THEE only way to live and you measure your success and self-worth by this norm. And when you don’t structure your life around being independent and individualistic, society labels you as lazy or not good enough. Eventually you turn that shame inward and blame and shame yourself. Does this pattern resonate with you? 

And just like other social norms, independence and individualism seep into all aspects of our lives. In the workplace it looks like you striving to be the best employee on the team, the most efficient and effective, to come to the office first and leave last so you can brag to your colleagues that you didn’t sleep at all. All just to climb up the corporate ladder and get to the top so that you can keep paying bills and putting food on the table. And you do it all by yourself. And when you can’t do it all by yourself, you’re shamed for being lazy. Or, you’re sent to work with a coach to adjust your mindset so you can grind harder again in a system that sets you up for burnout while still keeping you in debt. 

The central idea of independence- “I can do it all by myself”- most certainly trickles down into parenting and we all buy into this idea without questioning it because it’s business as usual in many Euro-American cultures. 

So, independence in parenting looks like believing that you’re a good parent when you juggle three jobs while raising your child and you do it all by yourself. When you get together with your friends who are also parents, the most exhausted one in the group is congratulated by other parents and celebrated for being a really good, hard-working parent. The grind gets glorified. And I’m not knocking the hard work because in the U.S., you know, there are no policies like universal childcare, paid parental leave, or accessible prenatal and postpartum care to support you. That makes raising a child- by yourself- extremely challenging. The to-do list never ends. Even when your child’s development goes well and you’re on top of things, you can’t even relax because of the habit of constantly worrying and grinding that conditions you to think that if you stop things may fall apart. When you can’t do this parenting thing quote unquote successfully all by yourself, you’re also shamed for being lazy and that puts you in a very vulnerable spot. Where instead of listening to and trusting your inner voice, the pressure of doing it all by yourself while looking effortlessly chic has you click on the buy button of the next parent coaching package you see on Instagram because you never want to risk the smallest chance of messing up your child. 

This myth of individualism has us believe that if we just grind a little harder, adjust our mindset, buy another parent coaching program, download another child development app, or even find the right expert…we’ll pull ourselves up by our bootstraps to get to the top. Then, at the top of everyone else,  we’ll be happy. This myth of individualism has us believe that we’re a failure instead of seeing clearly that we’re in a system that fails us. 

We’re like a bunch of hamsters, each running in our own hamster wheel with blinders on, thinking that we’re all in this endless grind by ourselves. We’re so busy running that we don’t even get a chance to look up, take the blinders off, and realize that we’re all in this together. 

The myth of individualism has us believe that the only way to live, to love, and to raise our children is to compete, exploit, extract, and dominate.

It has us believe that we must compete to have food and housing. We hoard money and own land to survive instead of nurturing relationships and connections in the community to thrive. We see ourselves through the lens of capitalism so that we can identify ourselves as consumers and see others as competitors for scarce resources. But aren’t we all citizens of this ecosystem instead of only consumers of this economy? Over time, this competition and exploitation become the only reality we know. We say well that’s just how it is. We stop getting curious about other ways of being that allow us to share resources or build an ecosystem for all beings instead of an empire for the 1 percent. Dayna Lynn Nuckolls called it the cult of individualism.

And if your guilt is creeping up on you and this guilt is about to transform into shame, let me be clear that I’ve bought into these norms of independence and individualism too. 

Instead of letting that guilt turn into shame, I hope we can transform that guilt into action and accountability instead. This way both you and I have the energy we need to hit unsubscribe from this cult of individualism when it’s safe for us to do so. It’s a daily and lifelong work. 

If you’ve been listening to this podcast for a while, you already know that I have deep respect for all the babies and toddlers I work with who teach me about decolonization. As I’m talking about our society’s obsession with independence and competition as THEE only way to be, what comes to my mind is this stage in child development where young children love the predictability of categories: a teacher does this but not that; this is how we play with the train and that is how we play with the plane; this is a good guy and that is a bad guy. And as a therapist, I love challenging these curious minds to let go of the binary categories and explore the grey area in between with a simple question of “Hmm what else?” “What else can we do to play with the train? Or, what else can a good guy do or not do?” After they get over the initial discomfort of having their worldview challenged, their curiosity takes over and they’re so enthusiastic to look at the grey area, the alternatives, and the whole spectrum beyond the binary. 

So to our culture’s obsession with independence, competition, exploitation, and scarcity, I humbly ask “Hmm what else?”

One answer to that question - one path we can journey along and explore together -- is interdependence. 

Interdependence: What it means and feels like

“Interdependence is mutual dependence between things” wrote adrienne maree brown in Emergent Strategy. It means my survival and wellbeing is connected to yours, to my spirits and ancestors, to all beings, and to the land. It means that when we all have what we need and share the excess, we flourish together. It means that I got you and you got me because we both matter to each other. 

While individualism seeks dominance and competition, interdependence focuses on wealth sharing, cooperation, and earth-honoring ecosystem building. 

To paint a picture of what this cooperation and connectedness look like in interdependence, allow me to turn to my 4 best teachers: nature, children, social justice organizing, and my beloved Buddhist teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh. 

In her essay, the Serviceberry: An Economy of Abundance, Robin Wall Kimmerer joyfully and gratefully described harvesting a small fruit called serviceberries. Rooted in her indigenous wisdom, these berries are gifts. She wrote quote “we recognize that these are gifts from our plant relatives, manifestations of their generosity, care, and creativity. When we speak of these not as things or products or commodities, but as gifts, the whole relationship changes. I can’t help but gaze at them, cupped like jewels in my hands, and breathe out my gratitude.”.

Dr. Kimmerer continues quote “In the presence of such gifts, gratitude is the intuitive first response. The gratitude flows toward our plant elders and radiates to the rain, to the sunshine. Gratitude is so much more than a polite “thank you.” It is the thread that connects us in a deep relationship, simultaneously physical and spiritual, as our bodies are fed and spirits nourished by the sense of belonging…Gratitude creates a sense of abundance, the knowing that you have what you need… We take only what we need, in respect for the generosity of the giver.” End quote

Her words wake up every cell in my body because they remind me of Thich Nhat Hanh’s teaching of Inter-Be that I grew up practicing.

Thich Nhat Hanh taught that nothing and nobody exists alone. In a single flower, when we look at the flower deeply and with mindfulness, we can see sunshine, earth, rain, and the body of the cosmos. Each bite of an orange can be filled with gratitude for the grocery store workers, delivery truck drivers, farmers, the orange farm’s soil, sun, and rain…all of whom made the orange you’re delighting in possible. There’s no separation. The flower doesn’t exist without the cosmos in it. The orange doesn’t exist without sunshine and earth. We don’t exist in separation from all who came before us. So, to be means to inter-be. 

Like Dr. Kimmerer described, Thich Nhat Hanh highlights the gratitude that connects all of us in an interdependent ecosystem. In a climate where there’s so much division, my heart and my rage find so much inner peace when I remember that despite our differences in our intersecting identities we’re deeply connected with one another. Our liberation certainly binds us together. 

While gratitude deepens the sense of belonging, reciprocity nurtures our interconnection. Dr. Kimmerer describes reciprocity as “to give a gift in return.” She wrote quote “What could I give these plants in return for their generosity? It could be a direct response, like weeding or water or a song of thanks that sends appreciation out on the wind. Or indirect, like donating to my local land trust so that more habitat for the gift givers will be saved, or making art that invites others into the web of reciprocity… I accept the gift from the bush and then spread that gift with a dish of berries to my neighbor, who makes a pie to share with his friend, who feels so wealthy in food and friendship that he volunteers at the food pantry. You know how it goes.” End quote.

I wonder what other examples of interdependence you witness around you.

I see it in small acts of kindness around me when a mom pitches in to pick up her friend’s children from school and her friend practices reciprocity for that kindness by making dinner that evening. It’s not out of obligation, politeness, or you scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. They do it because they care about each other and when they’re well, they flourish…together. 

I see it in bigger acts of kindness in a community. From meal trains to mutual aid networks of parents working together to address the baby formula shortage in the US. 

I see it in social justice movements. In 1977, a group of disability activists in San Francisco staged a sit-in that lasted 28 days to advocate for disability rights. During the sit-in, members of the Black Panther Party brought food to the activists every night. As described in the documentary Crip Camp, one member explained that the Black Panthers brought food because quote “you are trying to make the world a better place for everybody so we are going to feed you.” End quote. Boom! Interdependence.

I see interdependence all around me, especially in children. 

Young children between ages 4 and 12 also know how to cooperate and work interdependently with their friends, otherwise they might be kicked out of the friend group or not invited to their friends’ birthday parties. Next time your child has a playdate with a bunch of their friends, I invite to you watch how these young children negotiate what, where, and how to play together. It’s quite beautiful to see young children who are typically assertive and spunky sort of tone their behavior down to be a team player. Michael Tomasello, an American psychologist whose work focuses on evolutionary anthropology wrote in his paper titled, The Role of Ontogeny in the Evolution of Human Cooperation, that humans learn early on to adjust their behaviors to cooperate with others or to be a team player.

It seems like our children simply understand these concepts: cooperation and fairness. So I dug a little deeper like 200 million years ago deeper. Yup, did I tell you I’m Gemini Sun and Sagittarius rising. I love getting to the root of things and getting curious. 

In the journal article, Two Key Steps in the Evolution of Human Cooperation: The Interdependence Hypothesis, Michael Tomasello and colleagues describe how our ancestors 200 million years ago had to learn how to find food together, also known as collaborative foraging. As a group, they learned to work together to find large animal carcasses that were recently killed and they had to learn how to share the food fairly. Tomasello and colleagues write quote “Individuals who attempted to hog all of the food at a scavenged carcass would be actively repelled by others.” End quote. Hello cooperation and interdependence.

All of this goes to show that interdependence is just as common and available to us as independence, even though Western societies prioritize individualism. Exploring the indigenous wisdom of interdependence highlighted by Dr. Kimmerer and the teaching of Inter-be by Thich Nhat Hanh always brings hope to my heart. My feet feel energized as they’re rooted and plugged into this web of reciprocity or in this ecosystem of interdependence. Then, I get to witness interdependence that’s already around me- in children, in social justice action, and in our human evolution. The possibilities of practicing cooperation, wealth sharing, and relationship building are already here even though the water we’re swimming in keeps asking us to choose scarcity, competition, exploitation, and dominance. 

Now shall we connect all of these dots to our decolonized, embodied, and intergenerational parenting practices?

Practicing Interdependence in Daily Parenting

I have 4 invitations for you to experiment with, if you’d like. Two of them are for you and the other two are for you to explore with your child. Let’s start with you because you’re important. 

The two invitations I’d love to share with you are first, to reconnect with the people you trust and second, to reconnect with the land you’re a guest on. 

Reconnecting with the people you trust means building your community of families that you can give love to and also receive love from when you need help. 

Angela Garbes wrote in her beautiful book Essential Labor: Mothering as Social Change quote “In the current whirl of life, when professional work, domestic work, and childcare are all happening simultaneously under the same roof, it is easy to feel defeated by the duties of mothering. To view a child as a nuisance- and to feel guilty for the thought. These sentiments are not indicative of personal failing.” Garbes continues quote “According to Andrea Landry, an Indigenous Anishinaabe activist from Pays Plat Fist Nation, they are the legacy of settler colonialism. Prior to colonization, ‘we had children with us at all times and that’s how they learned their roles in our communities’, says Landry. Children are taught by elders based on their interests. If adults noticed that a young girl was drawn to plants, the healers and medicine people would take her under their wings and mentor her. Now, occupied with work that keeps us apart from our children most day, Landry says, we’ve lost sight of our children’s strengths because we’re so busy with capitalism and colonialism.” End quote.

An antidote to the individualistic mentality in parenting is to raise our children in a trusted community where the responsibilities of parenting can be shared. 

Garbes shares that quote “in community, life feels less exhausting, its weightiness distributed. Not too much to bear, bolstered by love…Building relationships can be messy and awkward. Interdependence requires real communication, empathy, sorting through calendars and logistics. It means misunderstandings, problem solving, asking and listening, not just popping in and dropping off but sometimes lingering and running late.” End quote.

Reconnecting with the land you’re a guest on is my other invitation for you. As an immigrant and a guest on this stolen land of the Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi Nations of Chicago, I feel so humbled and grateful each time I hit the record button and make this podcast for you. While land acknowledgement is important, land sovereignty is even more critical. 

Jade Begay, an Indigenous rights and climate activist, wrote quote “One of the most critical ways to dismantle ongoing colonization is to return land to Indigenous people. As its rightful stewards, we know how to care for the planet, to make it sustainable for all life. Returning land to Indigenous hands would have a ripple effect on addressing other crises: shutting down the extractive industries that are fueling climate change, removing the violent state that defends them, and building sustainable water and energy systems for all.” End Quote.

I’d love to invite you to check out the Native Governance Center’s website. They are a Native-led organization that lays out very clear and concrete actions we can take to support land sovereignty such as voluntary land taxes, land return, and showing up to protests. I’ll leave the link in the show notes for you.

Now let’s shift gears to some of the ways you can practice interdependence with your child. 

In general, interdependence in parenting looks a lot like decentering your power as a parent so that you can meet your child where they’re at. It’s about power-with instead of power-over. For example, when you feel like you need to teach your child a lesson or set limits, perhaps connect emotion to emotion first. Then, when your child’s ready to hear you out and learn from you, teach from the stance of I’m right here with you instead of letting me control and dominate you. More on this in episodes 4, 12, and 13.

In this episode, the two invitations I’d love to offer for you to experiment with your child are first, practicing enoughness and second, practicing gratitude. 

Toddlers and preschoolers begin to understand concepts like fairness as they’re learning to share. I believe they’re at this precious point in their development to explore how much is enough and then share the excess with others. For example, after your child has had a few bites of snacks, how would it be for you to bring their curiosity to their body? Are you full? How is your body telling you that you’re full? Or, wow we have three more cookies left. We can ask your friends if they would like some cookies and then share. It’s a practice of looking at what we have as gifts that are abundant instead of as products that are scarce. So that your child can begin taking what they need and sharing the rest…out of love not charity and out of abundance not obligation. After they share those cookies or toys, perhaps you can direct their curiosity towards their feelings and body again: how do you feel when you share those cookies? How do you feel when you see that your friends can enjoy the cookies too even you have less to eat…but you’re eating together, talking, laughing, or just sitting next to one another reading a book or watching something on an iPad? This way your child can begin to sense into what togetherness and interconnection look like in practice and feel like in their body. 

Another option is a practice of gratitude through mindful eating that Thich Nhat Hanh taught me. Many cultures across the world have traditions of giving thanks to the food that they’re about to consume. Toddlers and preschoolers are also very curious about where their food came from. And you can be as scientific as you’d like. I don’t usually go into photosynthesis and all of that. I keep it sweet and simple and stick to soil, sunshine, and water that help grow the vegetables. So that , for example, these tomatoes are gifts from Earth and we have a responsibility to take care of the Earth too. Other times I talk about farmers, delivery truck drivers, and grocery store workers who put food at the grocery store. And we practice giving thanks to these people to highlight our interdependence and connection with other people. 

You know your style and you know your child. As always, please play and experiment with these invitations to make them yours. 

I know you love your child and I see the extra intentionality you put into infusing social justice concept like interdependence in your daily parenting practice. Thank you so much for doing this liberation work together. 

As always, in solidarity and sass. Until next time, please take care.