Our contributions to spirituality are equally impressive. We awaken love as BodyBeing children. Love is the ultimate human value—the definer of all other values. Love is the ultimate human meaning. This theme runs through sublime poetry and cheesy Hollywood movies. Knowing love there is nothing left to prove, only this life to lead to maximize love opportunities for others. Therein lays social justice. Therein lays the life we yearn for our children.

As mentioned, many parents find the moment of our birth one of the most intense experiences of love in their life. That love is us, is you. You cannot deny it because you did nothing to manifest it. It simply is who you are. It brings meaning and value. Everyone attending your birth knows it.

Yet, an extraordinary irony, completely at odds with social justice, exists right in the room at birth. Most people believe in original sin and bad karma. Most people believe, right in the midst of intense love, that we are wrong and bad from birth.

This confusion fuels social injustice. Development depends upon relationship. Relationships that hold us as sinful and fallen stifle development. They call for us to strive to be better, as if we are not OK or that without this negative motivation we would be, I don’t know, lazy or worthless or something. They create ridiculous expectations of perfection or (supposed) spiritual purity and so breed disappointment.

The idea that we are born in original sin or with bad karma has no value for social justice. It is the first and most pervasive social injustice. It ignores our contribution and condemns us to a life of shame. Worse, the institutions that promote these beliefs regularly commit severe social harm. Though individuals within the institutions may be champions the institutions themselves have a barbaric track record. Those who claim insider knowledge of spiritual purity regularly support social atrocities.

The hypocrisy is staggering and leads to a cultural shadow. We have to continually hide our shame, and the shameful history of our spiritual institutions. Shadows, as any decent psychologists will tell you, come out in many ways. The evangelical preacher seduces the gay boy, the insecure politician starts unnecessary conflicts, the Vatican hooks up with the mafia. The shadow of this hypocrisy—spiritual institutions generating social injustice—can be seen every time a religion supports an oppressive government, every time a religion usurps personal choice, every time a religion hides its wealth, every time a religion pretends it is the only true path. Shadow life cannot lead to social justice.

Original Sin and Bad Karma are cultural conceptions. They are institutionally promulgated myths. They memorialize the most egregious of spiritual misconceptions—separation. The misconception of children as separate is at the root of so much unnecessary suffering.

When children are seen as fallen, sinful, or tainted with bad karma, then life becomes a chore to make up for the transgression. Attention goes to the perceived evil, and parenting and education are dedicated to rooting it out. For example, BodyBeing children exploring boundaries becomes a test of wills; IdealBeing children learning to self-govern are seen as pathetically naive and selfish. In education, schools exist to perpetuate the dominant cultural values, whether of the Puritanical allegiance to Christianity or the corporate allegiance to math and science. Otherwise, it is believed, the child may give in to cruelty or self-indulgence and not become a productive member of society. In this mindset, the child is there to be molded, and her contribution only counts when she becomes an adult.

And so condemned to a life of separation before they were born, the child becomes anxious. Will I do evil? Will I succeed? The child creates personas—masks that she hopes are passports to acceptability—to inclusion rather than separation. Lost is the opportunity to develop core identity, her unique natural expression. The suboptimal relationships of her network leads to confusion. Childhood becomes a problem to be solved. Adulthood becomes a time of recovery from childhood or the continuation of the masked life that began with the misconception of separation.

Bonding is only the beginning.

Families who live in optimal well-being enjoy happiness. They meet life’s challenges together. They expect frustration to accompany learning. They know how to prevent frustration from accelerating into conflict. Family members are not seen as adversaries. In short, they actualize the pursuit of happiness, that fragile, inalienable human right.

How important is the pursuit of happiness for social justice? My answer: immeasurably. To me, social justice and the pursuit of happiness are one in the same. Democracy cannot exist unless it guarantees its citizens the pursuit of happiness. In government, the complex challenges of the world, in which the legislature and executive must sometimes weigh its importance against national security. It would be a giant step towards social justice if government provided for optimal well-being in families. Then the pursuit of happiness would not be in question. It is right there in relationship with BodyBeing children.

We often bubble with happiness during our BodyBeing years. Our unadorned giggle has the melody of a mountain stream. We unabashedly rejoice in our accomplishments. When well nourished, our egotism delights. It doesn’t degenerate into exhibitionism or cranky begging for attention. Happiness exudes with the success of learning boundaries.

It saddens us that parents relate to boundaries as prohibition. Don’t they see that we engage boundaries in every moment of our lives? We turn babble into speech but by accepting the boundaries of our mother tongue. We learn the rhythms of the people in our home through our rudimentary capacity to bind time. We sense, we build sensory based topographical maps that continually redraw the boundaries in our world. This is our happiness, our delight, our joy, for it displays mastery and yields strength. Our pursuit of boundaries is nothing other than our pursuit of happiness.

Well executed boundary learning infects all family members with happiness. This implies that parents engage and enjoy boundary creation as well. The word chore, for example, implies burden and distress. We sense that parental distress and chores automatically become burdensome to us. When parents see chores as the opportunity to improve their home life—to enrich their place—then so do we. Chores then become a locus of connection, a deepening of Rightful Place.

Recognize, respect, and nourish our gifts of bonding and happiness we know ourselves as participatory in social justice. We belong; our lives are meaningful and valuable. Parents know themselves as bonded and happy. Complaints lessen, commitment grows. We are on the same side. We are citizens.

What is the implication of this coercion dynamic for social justice and spiritual awareness? What is the cost to each of us and to society? Why must we spend so much time and money recovering from this barbaric approach to boundary settings? Can we really believe that we serve spiritual awakening by breaking the spirit of the child?

Even more ironic and heartbreaking, the responsibility lies for dissolving this pernicious, insidious, norm lays with the parent, not the child. The parent can create boundaries with loving touch. End of problem. Beginning of social justice.

Can it really be that simple? Yes, especially if you recognize and reinforce the contributions BodyBeing children make to social justice. We bloom when our gifts are appreciated.

What are those gifts? Before I describe the gifts that I see I invite you to come up with your own. Perhaps you can add to my offering. The sooner people see children’s contribution to social justice the sooner we will have a socially just society.

Our birth affirms that life is sacred, precious, and worthy of devoted service. Parents rejoice when we birth. For many, it is the most profound moment of love in their life. In almost every instance, our birth brings commitment to life, renewed commitment to a better world, and deeper purpose and meaning. Almost no parent participates in our birth and thinks: Uh oh, original sin strikes again. Or: What bad karma brought this child into my life? Or, how can I consume as many resources as possible so that few will be left for this child? No, they think, how can I create a better world? How can I assure this little miracle that life is safe, beautiful, and full of great opportunity?

We bond. We bond to the parents and the parents bond to us. Our Rightful Place is with one another. This bonding is the foundation for society. Some believe that social bonding formed as a way to procure food and for protection. But society forms to nurture the young. Look at us. Without performing a deliberate act we are the nucleus of society. Few events call forth compassion like a suffering infant and child. It would be a better war deterrent to publish the baby pictures of fallen soldiers then pictures of them in uniforms. That would strip away the cultural trappings of their patriotism and remind us of the naked fact that these people were born to live life all the way through. What price compares to the cost of this infant dying before his time?

We BodyBeing children bond easily because we accept our elders freely. Unless they strike out developmentally, parents are our home. We cannot get enough of them. We study them without judgment and devotedly imitate them.

Some believe this to be proof of weakness and dependence. That may be, though, reasonable people see interdependence and interconnection as the way of the world. Isolated, separate dependence and supposed independence are pseudo-Darwinian artifacts; cheap cover-ups for the desire to power and dominance. Individualism, which means to separate, operates only from the competitive mindset. Humans are interdependent with one another and with their environment, which spans all life. Raymond Chandler reminds us in The Big Sleep that the most dangerous traps are those we set for ourselves. Don’t do it by striving for individualism. None of us stands alone, nor could we possibly do so.

Here we are, BodyBeing children, the nucleus of society. Vulnerable, unable to provide for our own security, we have given those whom we depend upon something they need, something they depend upon. We are interdependent with our elders, each of us providing for the well-being of the other.

We offer the bonding of love. Consequently, we offer deeper meaning and purpose to life. We offer devotion. We offer whole hearted participation. In a sense you could say we offer the gift of redemption. Most parents believe what one said to me in program: I am only as happy as my unhappiest child. Parents know that they have lived well and meaningfully if they parent well.

Emotional maturity and reasonableness lay in the future, a fuzzy concept. Their foundation is the full strength of optimal Rightful Place. They come in due time. Childhood lasts 23 years. We need time to receive, to practice and to become competent in the actualization of our complex, sophisticated capacities. The most complex structure in the universe, with more connections than all the stars in all the galaxies, lives in us, as us. Does anyone really believe that all the capacities are supposed to be available as soon as can speak in paragraphs? More to the point, why would anyone need to believe that?

We are sensation based beings. Our work is to know this body in this environment (including the people); to bond the one to the other. We then live our lives from the foundation of Rightful Place.

Nourishment comes primarily from loving touch. Everything touches you through your highly refined sensory receptors. When that touch is loving—when it sings of your value and importance and reaffirms your Rightful Place—then this place is your hearth and your home, your very self.

But, you must be asking, how can loving touch and boundaries both be present? My answer: that is a question from before the switch is thrown. Once thrown, the question becomes, how could they occur any other way?

Boundaries are a locus of learning. Loving touch opens us to the learning. Adults with hearts and mind dedicated to unconditional positive regard, sensitive and respectful to our need to receive information via the senses, cannot help but combine loving touch and boundaries.

I believe that every family can find their own expression of loving touch boundary creation. To jump start the process, here are a few specific comments.

Be clear, unwavering, and direct—like a mountain. Mountains don’t judge or argue. They simply define space. Get down on the child’s level, eye-to-eye, heart to heart. Establish physical touch if possible. Firmly state the boundary, i.e. “No hitting.” Do not negotiate.

As with all learning, there will be frustration. Do not mistake frustration for conflict. Only when adults approach boundaries to prohibit do they lead to conflict. They attempt only to modify the behavior, i.e. “don’t go in the street.” Their commitment is to what is learned, rather than how it is learned. But when the how is done well then the what gets learned quicker, and without the parent becoming the policeperson. Dedication to the how confirms Rightful Place to the child. Everything fits in my world. I am home and this person speaks my language. When he speaks it again I will respond. Though I may need repetition I know that he is on my side.

Staying with the what, with behavior modification, teaches only the dangers associated with the specific behavior. Often, the parent first explains the danger. Often, this fails to impress us. We BodyBeing children rely on sensory information, not on words. Parents become annoyed. We sense the annoyance. We become confused. Do we follow the natural impulse towards ever widening sensory exploration or do we respond to our parents? Of course, that depends on the level of annoyance and the degree of pleasure of the sensory event. When the scales tip to pleasure our parents often resort to coercion. Then we learn that the how is coercion.

I know that few people want to hear this. But when we learn that the how is coercion it stays with us throughout life unless we engage serious personal work to unlearn it. If you don’t believe me ask any psychologist, and maybe even a few psychiatrists, how many of their client’s presenting problems are boundary issues. Observe yourself with your spouse, with your boss and colleagues, with your children. Are you happy with the boundaries that you create?

Does anyone really believe that we are born with a coercion gene? Coercion as a form of conflict resolution is learned. Threat and coercion poison us. Our life is literally at stake. To us, death is annihilation. We have no concept for it, though we may mimic our parent’s beliefs. We live as our bodies. Threat attacks our bodies. We are little, elders are big. When we sense the force behind that raised hand, when we sense the rage behind that shouting voice, when we sense the separation behind that damning glare we shrivel and clench, become fear filled and angry. Annihilation looms. We have no way of knowing if the adult knows when to stop. They certainly have yet to demonstrate good judgment about boundaries.

Adults see us as dependent but our egotism doesn’t allow see it that way. Adults fulfill their function because they are there to fulfill their function. We expect it. Why wouldn’t they? Of course they are going to provide safety, food, comfort, and direction. We sense whether they enjoy their participation, whether they engage it willingly. We have no idea of their reasoning for any unwillingness but take it personally when we sense it. Somehow, it is our fault. We feel bad.

Our sensory based egotistical world view social justice as retributive. This is not deliberate, calculated retribution but simply the best our capacities allow. It does not reflect selfishness, which is the product of envy, a complex emotion. Rather, our attraction to the pleasant and repulsion from the unpleasant, our placing ourselves in the center of our world, our expectation of support, limits our appreciation of justice to an eye for an eye. This will change in FeelingBeing.

Emotions reduce to four categories—bad, mad, sad, and glad. Say, for example, that you want a toy that your sibling has. Adults might think you are jealous, but you are simply mad that you cannot get an interesting sensory object. If this happens repeatedly, you might well be sad that your sibling gets more attention than you. Neglect feels bad. The sophisticated considerations that comprise jealousy, for instance, don’t register. You do not care about another’s success or balance the moment against favors you have received in the past. You will, however, respond to your parent’s if they create the boundary. It will not be the data content of your parent’s message, but the sensory content, that will register.

Nor do you care about delayed gratification, fairness, sharing, Dad’s work schedule, the war in Iraq, or your sibling’s feelings. You have an unerring read on everyone’s sensory reaction to these events but the content of the events themselves have little meaning. However, those reactions comprise a critically important component in your sensory based topographical maps.

Parents now have what they need to respond to the retributive justice of BodyBeing children. Be precise when cutting the sandwich in half, or with any other shared resource. During contention do not try to explain, or rationalize your response. Listen to each child. Ask for a solution, but don’t expect it. Make the decision, such as remove the object or taking turns. Hold the boundary like a mountain. Do not negotiate or place undue emphasis on words and promises. Never stop actively loving the child as they struggle to decipher the ways of the world.

Coercing a BodyBeing child to share is exquisitely painful irony. The intentions of the parent to promote relationship undermine our ability to relate. We learn only to avoid the unpleasant sensations of our parent. We have been coerced. If done repeatedly the coercion takes root.

The irony extends to society. There is no decrease in selfishness (and plenty of anecdotal evidence of dramatic increases in selfishness) despite ever increasing attempts to enforce sharing in BodyBeing children. Along with epidemic boundary and non-specific anxiety dysfunctions—which preempt social justice and spirituality—we can certainly conclude that we are missing the mark with BodyBeing children.