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Childhood Trauma as the Nation's Future?!

They say that today's youngsters are the Nation's future... but what if these kids suffer from Childhood Trauma?

Yesterday I was sitting with a friend of mine, debating on our pathetic lives and how each day of our lives is composed of home to office and office to home routine. Then we shifted on the subject of who's getting married who's not getting married. Soon enough we were talking about the children around us.

During the discussion I realize that we - as single adults, worry about our own little lives and how tense our work environments are or how hectic is the nature of our job. We live our lives on a day to day basis complied up to a maximum of a 30 day cycle. By the end of each 30 days we worry about our paychecks, then we sometimes worry about the size of our paychecks. We are slightly happy in the first 15 days and tensions start to pile up as we move on to the second half of the month. Our entire lives are composed of these 30-day chunks. A few of these "chunk" later we find ourselves saying "A year passed by and we couldn't realize!". We sometimes look around us and say "Mr. X got married, or Miss Y became Mrs Z! how soon", then we find ourselves saying "Mrs X had a son, he's so cute!".

What we fail to realize is that what we are doing? These 30 day chunks gather up to make up our entire lives and we fail to realize what part we play for the nation. Lets forget about the Nation for a while, we don't even play our part in our own small collection of people we interact in our daily lives. Because two Hydrogen and one Oxygen, the bond of these three elements make up more than 70% of the entire planet.

We do not realize how simple, unthoughtful and isolated within our own personalities our decisions sometimes are. The reason for this post is that when we were talking about the specific situation these days, my friend happen to describe that his sister's son comes home from school and tells his mama that we are not allowed to go out in the break time and teachers lock the room when they teach in the classes. He said that we are not allowed to go out as soon as the bell rings, we are sent one by one.

I remember when I was a kid and whenever we were naughty we were not allowed to go out in lunch time. Sometimes we had to stay a few hours more than usual school timings because we didn't study well. Or when a teacher had a big lecture prepared or was about to scold at us they use to close the classroom door.

Point is that all these things were done as "punishments" when "we" did something wrong. Psychologically speaking, our minds told us that if we do this, that will happen. Which is the whole point of school and education anyway! - to keep us from doing things that are not supposed to be done and to make us learn what is supposed to be learned. We had the fear in our minds that the result of doing wrong is bad. That fear becomes "knowledge" as we grow up, and this is what we commonly refer to as "difference between right and wrong". Differentiating between right and wrong is the only element that makes us better human beings. Our long-term success or failure depends on our ability to differentiate and decide.

Now my question is that if all those "punishments" are already happening with our kids EVEN THOUGH they haven't done anything bad then what and how are we teaching the kids? What psychological effect does it have on our youngsters? What will we do when they actually do something wrong? Would holding them after hours help when it has become a norm for them? That's one part of the story.

Second part of the story is that I was reading this article and thought that what are these parents doing? The title of that article is 'Ammi told me that the Taliban can bomb the school'. So is this ALL you have to teach your kids when they ask a question as to why they are being punished at schools when they didn't do anything wrong? If I am a kid, when I hear hear such a thing, a fear will arouse in my heart and mind which will definitely be as simple as "School = Maybe Death". I don't care about Asif Ali Zardari or the talibans, I only care about the biggest concern in my life... my homework. I do not have logical and extensive thoughts about political situations, I am a kid who do mistakes like 2+2=5 and I am happy to slide down the tunnel slide at the park or I feel extreme gratification when I jump on my bed!

Anyway, There are primarily three types of kids 1. Those who like to go to school. 2. Those who don't like to go to school and 3. Those who do what is being asked to them (neutral)... In each type of kids here is the thought they get in their minds respectively. 1. "What's the use of working hard when school = maybe death"... 2. "Oh thank god! Now I don't have to go to school because "School = Maybe Death" and 3. "My mama says stay home because "School = Maybe Death".

The whole point is that if we stop worrying about our own pathetic little lives... maybe we can think on how to and what to tell these innocent creatures when they present us with these questions and answer them in a way that won't make them suffer with something like childhood trauma. Maybe if we present them with a simple and effective answer like "bad guys don't want kids to get smart"... I don't know but maybe this is something that can put a thought in these tiny minds which is somewhat like "School = Smartness, Bad guys = bad and Bad Guys != Schools". Or something like that!

All we need to do is to stop worrying for ourselves and give a little thought on what we can teach the kids so when we die, they take control based on whatever we have taught them.

This verse was probably not said for this specific situation but it has a deep and wide meaningful nature.

Daagh-e-sajood agar teri paishani pe huwa to kya!
Koi aisa sajda bhi kar ke zameen pe nishan rahay...
- Allama Iqbal

Roughly translated to...

What if the mark of prostration (worship) be on your forehead...
Prostrate in a way that leaves a mark on the earth...
- Allama Iqbal


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