noticing

I caught the tail end of an interview on Fresh Air today with Charles Duhigg, a New York Time reporter and author of a new book about the power of habits. We had just picked up the kids from school and a playdate. I was sitting in the car with them while Mike (who is on spring break, hallelujah!) ran into a store before we headed home. Frances was buried in a Magic Tree House book she got at the school library today (the series is apparently limitless) and Gabriel was staring, heavy-lidded, at a dinosaur book in his lap. Terry asked Duhigg, who now knows so much about how we form and break habits, about the personal habits he would like to form.

After some nervous chuckling, he said he wanted to cultivate a habit of mindfulness, specifically in regard to being with his young children. He talked about how easy it was to be mentally checked out with kids, and that he wanted to form a habit of greater presence. He pointed out that breaking the mental distraction habit is more challenging than, say, breaking a more external habit, like eating cookies every afternoon. 

We apparently need rewards - something that our brain enjoys - to cement a behavior and form a true habit. There is a huge emotional reward for being present to our kids, but in order for that sort of non-tangible reward to be reinforcing and help us form a new habit - in this case parental mindfulness - Duhigg says neuroscience shows we have to notice the emotional reward. We have to stand back and realize how pleasurable it is to be together. It we don't tell ourselves how lovely this moment is, our brains won't get into habit-forming gear and whatever fleeting pleasure we enjoyed playing together won't help motivate us to turn away from the email and get back down on the floor with the puzzles and legos again tomorrow.

So maybe all those glossy magazines extolling us to take a few minutes to cultivate gratitude (in between buying new lipstick and reorganizing our closets) are kind of onto something. Maybe all those times you rolled your eyes when your mom stood back and smiled at you and your siblings in your holiday finery around the table, saying isn't this nice! - maybe you were the one missing out. Maybe she had the right idea. Maybe noticing nice begets niceness.

I think that's what this blog is: a means to notice, to cultivate gratitude and presence in my parenting. (And maybe why lots of mothers blog and find it so sustaining). No matter how faddish those words can sound these days, they're still pretty good ideals. They do seem to make everything more pleasurable, meaningful, and satisfying. 

It's not to say I didn't scream like a madwoman at the kids yesterday. (Because I did; it was dismal). But after I listened to that interview and Mike got back into the driver's seat, Frances finished her book and began telling me about her computer assignment from school today. I looked back and saw Gabriel nodding off into sleep, slumping lower and lower in his carseat. When Frances was finished talking, I nodded in his direction. She turned to her left and gasped. 

Oh, Mama! Look at him! she whispered, and we grinned crazily at each other, suddenly obligated to be quiet and conspiratorial. I reached back and gave her hand a squeeze. A little sign, a little noticing: doesn't it feel good to be together?

Okay, now you. If you feel like it, wanna share the moments you noticed today?