attention getter

ham it up, you cuties

Okay, I heard it again yesterday, a person complaining about another's bad behavior, "She's just doing it for attention. Ignore her."

I've heard this line a million times. Where did it ever even come from? It's shaming, insulting, a put-down.

No, no, no, no, no.

We could stop seeing wanting attention as a bad thing--because it is not.

Of course she wants attention! We all do. It's a basic human need, probably has a lot to do with survival. (If a baby can't attract the necessary attention, the survival rate is going to go way down.)

It's normal to want to be noticed--at any age. Everyone wants to be noticed.

And then we want to connect with other people. It doesn't have to be a lot or involved, just there.

When a kid is doing things that seem designed just to disrupt, to engage us with no real purpose otherwise, I don't blame them anymore. (It only took me like twenty years of parenting to figure this out. Dang, if only I'd known then what I know now.) They're just kids, trying to be noticed and connect.

Instead people told me, "Just ignore him whenever he does that." Well, sheeze, that's useless. That's not even half the story.

Yeah, don't buy into bad behavior, but see it for what it is: a message.

So do it--hear the message. Notice them. Seek them out when they're not pestering, just to say hi. Listen to their chirpy ramblng for a minute. Ask a few questions.

Watch the negative behavior disappear.

No, not right that second, but shortly. Within a week or two.

daring adorable stuntmen in matching pajamas, 1984

Try it on the adults in your life too--notice them. Make a bit of small talk. Tell them something trivial and foolish. Share a laugh. And watch the circle around yourself warm and brighten. Notice them reaching out to each other.

Here's the last part of an article I wrote at Christmas in 2001. Nothing changes, not even the good wishes for the new year. Ten dang years later we're still the same flawed goofballs making the same stupid mistakes, having the same predictable misunderstandings. But the same good wishes and love are there too. love, Val

"On the most important family birthday of all, our most heartfelt wish is an ordinary one: to be together. It turns out we’re not nearly as materialistic as we thought we were.

I'm telling you the same old thing: If you love someone, make sure you tell her. If you enjoy someone’s company, say so, no matter who he is. We whip through the span of our lives so rapidly, and a central part of our connection to heaven is about living those connections and that love.

We’d be fools to waste even a second. Blessings in the New Year. love, Val."