Lenny at ten years old, was the oldest of four children. The family’s Health Visitor had noted his delayed development and limited communication when he was two years old. He was subsequently seen by a variety of professionals and submitted to repeated episodes of intervention in an endeavour to effect some improvement, with limited success. Hopeful beginnings rapidly deteriorated into disillusionment and non cooperation.Finbar the Dragon Slayer
My work in Ireland introduced me to some amazingly creative children. One of them was a little boy called Finbar. I only saw him twice but he taught me that children are able to quickly gain what they need in a space free from judgement and expectation with a variety of versatile props to allow them to express themselves creatively.
Finbar was seven years old, the only child of parents who lived in a cottage deep in the Irish countryside. Finbar’s mother was a healer who used alternative therapies and astrology to solve her difficulties in life. She was warmly expressive and colourfully dressed with long dark hair and olive skin. Finbar’s father was gentle voiced of slight build with long wispy hair which fell onto his collar. At home and school, Finbar refused to sit on the toilet and refused to have his hair cut. In a previous interview his mother told me that she was concerned about Finbar’s preference for girlish things and desire to play the female role and he had difficulty maintaining friendships because of his toilet phobia .
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Yellow is a Feeling
Jim had learning disabilities and lived in a Residential Home with five other men. He was in his early fifties and was referred to me with anxiety and depression in the hope that I could discover what was causing his unhappiness. Jim had a very limited vocabulary of single words. A word he used continuously was Tuesday and to Jim everyday was Tuesday.
His care-staff were concerned because he was exhibiting what they termed ‘bizarre behaviour’. They told me that when no one was watching, Jim would slip out into the back garden, ‘pull the heads off weeds’ and put them into a plastic carrier bag. He would then thrust his head into the bag to seemingly examine them more closely.
I decided to observe this behaviour first hand, in an attempt to gain some understanding of what was going on. Observation revealed that the weeds Jim was specifically selecting were dandelions. When he felt he had gathered enough dandelion heads, he put his head into the bag and kept it there for about ten seconds.
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Don’t Stop Reading Fairy Tales
I want to talk to parents, grandparents and teachers to let them know how important it is to read fairy tales to their children, grandchildren and pupils. We are holding the light for a lost generation who are becoming increasingly disconnected from their intuition and from nature and their environment.
A child is like sleeping beauty, asleep and waiting for a handsome prince (the higher intuitive self) to wake her up. Waking up symbolises our reconnection to a deeper understanding of the joy of life and its true meaning. Original Fairy tales (not the sanitised Disney tales, the re-written ones or the politically correct ones with the anti-hero) introduce children to moral choices. These stories demonstrate that every choice, has a consequence. Fairy tales build confidence and self esteem as the characters struggle against the horrors of their situation to eventually emerge victorious.
We cannot hide our children from the horrors of life, sooner or later they will have to be out in the world and will have to learn to cope with its dangers and disappointments. Let’s help to equip our children and grandchildren , by reading them fairy stories with which they can identify and which will inspire them to be better human beings. This will enable them to face what is to come.
See also: ‘Fairytales, Astrology and Enchantment in Relation to Child Directed Creative Play’
When I met Kevin, he was only four years old, his mother had attended a workshop I was running in the Republic of Ireland to talk about my therapeutic work with children. At the end of the day she approached me for help. A single parent, she was struggling to cope with her ‘unmanageable and hyperactive’ son. She told me that Kevin was a ball of energy who refused to sit still or do as he was told and he had difficulty relating to other children. Apparently, her relationship with Kevin’s father was not good and his visits to see his son were spasmodic and unreliable. Kevin slept in his mother’s bed every night and constantly demanded her time and energy during the day. She told me that she wasn’t coping and felt unable to impose any structure or routine at home.
All children need to play and use their play to make sense of their experiences and to make sense of what is happening around them. Through play, they are able to channel overwhelming feelings and ‘play out’ situations that they feel powerless to resolve.