In this episode, Pam, Anna, and Erika dive into consent and autonomy. Moving towards respecting our children’s autonomy and consent is typically an important part of the unschooling journey. In our conversation, we talk about independence vs autonomy, looking for underlying needs, questioning societal messages, and moving from control to connection with our children.

We hope you find our conversation helpful on your unschooling journey and in your relationships!

THINGS WE MENTION IN THIS EPISODE

The Living Joyfully Shop – books, courses, including Four Pillars of Unschooling and Navigating Conflict, coaching calls, and more!

We invite you to join us in The Living Joyfully Network, a wonderful online community for parents to connect and engage in candid conversations about living and learning through the lens of unschooling. This month, we’re talking about seasons—in unschooling and in life. Come and be part of the conversation!

Sign up to our mailing list to receive The Living Joyfully Dispatch, our biweekly email newsletter, and get a free copy of Pam’s intro to unschooling ebook, What is Unschooling?

Watch the video of our conversation on YouTube.

Follow @exploringunschooling on Instagram.

Follow @pamlaricchia on Instagram and Facebook.

Check out our website, livingjoyfully.ca for more information about navigating relationships and exploring unschooling.

So much of what we talk about on this podcast and in the Living Joyfully Network isn’t actually about unschooling. It’s about life. On The Living Joyfully Podcast, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia talk about life, relationships, and parenting. You can check out the archive here, or find it in your your favorite podcast player.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

ERIKA: Hello everyone. I’m Erika Ellis from Living Joyfully, and I’m joined by my co-host, Anna Brown and Pam Laricchia.

I’m so excited because this week we’re exploring consent and autonomy, and I really think these are just such deep topics with so many layers, and maybe it becomes a bit more complicated to consider consent and autonomy when we’re in a holiday season or when we are surrounded by our families of origin.

Maybe it feels like there are more external expectations on us and our kids, and so I think it’s a great time to dive into this topic. And on that same note, I wanted to mention that the Living Joyfully Shop has courses and coaching to help you through this time of year, including the course called Navigating Family Gatherings.

There’s a lot to think about when we are preparing to spend time with family, especially during holidays with a lot of traditions and expectations. And some families may particularly have expectations of how children should show up around the holidays, and our unique families might have a different idea of how we want the gatherings to feel. The course can offer you some ideas about how to navigate some of those challenges that come up. You can learn more about that course and all the others at livingjoyfullyshop.com. And now, Pam, would you like to get us started on our conversation?

PAM: Sure, I would love to. And I do love how the ideas of consent and autonomy weave together, and also how this flows from our last podcast episode about weaving our needs into the conversation. So, I think that’s going to be a really fun conversation as well. 

With unschooling, we do prioritize giving our children choices and supporting their autonomy. But what truly lies at the heart of that is consent. In fact, consent lives at the forefront of pretty much every interaction we have with kids. Now, I know as adults we often talk about consent in a sexual context, but when we try on the lens of a child’s consent to do things throughout their day, I think it really can be so eye-opening, and a real paradigm shift.

I notice when I override their consent, what I’m often doing is not giving them the space to consider whether or not they want to do the thing, right? Maybe it’s because I think of it as a given. They’ve always wanted to do this before. We’re just going to do it. Or maybe I’m in a hurry and feel like I don’t have time for the conversations.

It’s not a callous thing. It’s usually more of a, I didn’t even really think about it kind of thing. That’s why it’s interesting to just start using that lens throughout our day. Because it can definitely have consequences if we are not really considering their consent.

One can be eroding the trust in our relationship. It’s harder to trust someone when it feels like they’re railroading you to do things to keep themselves on track. Right? It’s not even asking, leaving the child not feeling seen and heard, because really they aren’t.

Our needs are kind of overriding what’s going on. And another can be that they start to internalize this and think that they’re wrong to want to do the thing that they want to do, the choice that they want to make in that moment. And that can start to dampen down their inner voice. What they want to do in the moment or what they feel about the moment if we keep jumping in without giving them the space to process that and bring that into the conversation and fully consent to what they’re doing.

Well, if my parent thinks that I should be doing this, because they’re saying, let’s go do this, let’s go do this. We’re going to go do this now. What I’m thinking must be wrong. Or I’m wrong for wanting to, or not wanting to do those things that are expected of me.

And then they can lose their voice that way, I think.

ANNA: I think it just erodes that understanding of ourselves because I think that dissonance is actually what causes a lot of stress and anxiety in people of all ages. And we can carry into adulthood.

And that is this, they’re telling me that either what I want to do or don’t want to do is wrong. But I’m feeling it deep inside of me that I don’t want to go do that thing or that I really want to stay focused on this one thing in front of me. It just erodes this trust in our inner voice and our knowing about ourselves.

And I think that is just a really slippery slope. And I know as the parent that’s often coming from a really loving place, like, we’re going to have so much fun, or it’s going to be great, or we want to all be together. We’re not going in there thinking, I am eroding your voice, or I want you to feel bad about yourself.

No, we’re coming in with this love and excitement about the plan. Or maybe a feeling of, I know better than you. I can see this longer picture, but to me, it’s worse having them doubt or question that inner voice because that serves them so much throughout their life to really hear and listen to that.

I think it’s also a safety thing. I think it’s a personal development thing. I think it’s related to relationships and how they show up in relationships later. So to me it’s so foundational, this idea of consent and it was really consent that led me on this path.  I do not like to be controlled. So consent is something that really, even before I had kids, was really important to me.

And so then it was this new area to test and because it’s different with kids, right? Because we do have these ideas, I think we talked about it on the last podcast of – it’s my time. I’m going to be able to do the things I want to do. But then you have this fully formed human that has very strong ideas about what they want to do.

And it did not take me long again, because I don’t personally like to be controlled to go, oh, okay. I don’t want to be the person that’s controlling them and not allowing them to listen to their voice, to not hear them, because I know how terrible that feels. 

The whole idea of consent is so important to me, and it is wrapped up and weaves nicely with autonomy because that is this idea of, what do we want to do? What feels good? How do we want to move forward? I feel like this topic is so vast, though, so I have so many things I want to say, but I’ll see what you’re thinking, Erika, before I just keep going, there’s so much I want to say!

ERIKA: Right. And the more we think about it, I think the more things pop up. I remember the episode where we talked about cultivating our children’s inner voices or  allowing space for that to develop and how important that is to me. 

When I’m thinking about this topic, I’m remembering how it felt to be a kid. It is so powerful to just go back to even four and 5-year-old me, little me. And I can remember knowing what felt good, knowing what felt scary, knowing that I knew for myself what felt right and what didn’t.

And so having the space to express that as a kid is so huge. And then having someone who actually will believe your experience, believe that you could have a different opinion than someone else. And then to tell you that that’s okay. That is just the biggest gift that we could give to someone. And I really think that it is what will help them trust their inner voice.

And from my perspective as a parent, it’s fun because I’m learning about someone who I haven’t met before, which is my child. This person who is their own person through and through, and they know what they want. They know what feels bad and what feels good. And so, just cultivating that curiosity from the parent perspective.

What could I learn about my child today? What are they going to show me about how they want their life to be? Rather than me coming in saying, I know how children are supposed to be, or, I know what I like and so therefore you like it. I know that you do because it’s great 

Talking over their inner voice disconnects them. It breaks that trust they have in us. And, the more that I can hold space, leave space for them to say, I know you’re loving this, but I don’t like it, they just trust me so much more and then I’m learning about them and it’s so rewarding, I think as a parent.

PAM: I like rewarding, what a lovely word. What I find so fascinating is when we railroad over their consent, what we’re really doing too is interfering with their learning, like the choice that they want to make in that moment, what they do or don’t want to do. They will learn the most by having that experience, not by us stopping them from having that experience.

What we’re thinking might be, I don’t think you’re going to like that and you really want to go. That’s going to mean X, Y, Z, whatever story we tell ourselves about it. But you know what, if they really want to try this thing, they want to do this thing. If they can do that, they are going to learn so much in that moment.

It’s like us telling somebody else what we think the outcome will be for them. And you know what? We are not them. Right? And how often have we just taken at face value, something somebody tells us as like, yeah, you won’t like that, or you’ll love this, et cetera. It doesn’t feel good to us, doesn’t feel good to someone at any age.

When we are wanting an experience, we will learn the most by having it, and then we can say, I did not like this, X, Y, Z about it. I really learned that because I have the experience, I now have the context. I’m now making those connections in my own head, building my body of knowledge around myself and I’m gaining self-awareness.

It’s like, oh, I didn’t think it would be this way. Right? Or, I loved it, et cetera. It really helps with learning. So when we’re in that experience, it really makes connections for us. It really helps us understand ourselves and the things we do and don’t like to do.

So, when we step in, even with the biggest heart because we don’t want them to be upset or we don’t feel we have the energy for an overloaded environment or something like that. Those are considerations, but also the more we can help them have the experiences they are looking to have, the more they will learn.

So, not walking over their consent also means they will be learning something that is close to their heart right now because this is a choice that they’re wanting to make right now and that will help them take the next step. Instead of having to keep asking for that step over and over and over, they’re just kind of stuck in their learning at that point because we’re not helping them bring more in around what they’re learning.

ANNA: I love that learning point and I think we talk about consent and autonomy a lot. There’s other conversations, definitely on the network and I think even some other podcasts have hints of it as well. But I think this is just another opportunity to examine, to really look in and think about our thinking.

Because if you were to ask any person, do you want to push through your child’s consent? Most likely the answer is no, because that doesn’t sound good. We’ve all learned that consent is important and we need to understand it. And we have an expectation that teenagers will understand it and that other adults will understand it.

And we see it play out in ways and we are upset about it, where we feel like our consent has been violated. So we would say no. But this is where we can examine, but am I doing it again with this big heart thinking I know best, or thinking that if I just do this, then push them a little bit here or just not worry about that they don’t want to do that there, then it’s going to be okay.

So to maybe flip it on the other side, I think we all want compassionate people, right? We want our kids to be compassionate and kind and this is where it starts, this right here. This one piece to me is so critical in having a world that’s filled with compassion, because when we can slow things down to really hear what’s happening to someone. I’m thinking of 4-year-old Erika who knows what she needs and wants in that situation. What a different world it is when someone says, Hey, I get that. I get that you don’t want to do that, or you’re seeing it differently than I am, or that you don’t like it right now because it’s right now, and she might like it later, so I don’t have to future trip on, oh, she’s not doing this one thing, and she’ll never do it.

I can just say, I want to honor you where you are. Because again, that’s where compassion is born. And then that child wants to offer that to the next person and the next person, and it spreads from there. So I think just pausing and slowing down and maybe a little examining about what it is that we want to be fostering in our environment.

What is it that we want to be learning about, because it’s learning for me too, because it’s hard to live with other people. It’s hard to take everybody into consideration and all of those pieces. But then there’s so much reward to it and so much learning.

That’s what makes it doable for me. Because I think some people think I can’t do that. It takes too much time. Or I don’t have the bandwidth, but when I really think about what are my core values and what am I wanting to foster and create, then it makes that easy.

It makes taking that time easy, it makes spending that little bit of extra energy so much easier.

ERIKA: That’s why the work for us to do is our internal work. And being resourced, being given that time and space in my own mind is enough to leave that room for them to express what they’re feeling about a situation.

It does take intention and it does take patience. And that’s why I think that weaving in our needs from last time is also so critical here because it really is when I feel like I’m in a rush, I feel like I’m doing a million things, those are the moments that I’m the most likely to push through someone’s consent because it’s just one more thing on my plate. That’s what it feels like, you know?

We’re trying to get out the door and now they’re saying that they are worried about going. How do I have time to deal with that conversation? And so that really is the time to remember the why. The most important thing that I could do in this life is this. These conversations with the kids, leaving the space for them to have their feelings and to figure out what feels good moving forward.

And so, yeah, I just think it is all my work to do. And we were probably not modeled much of this as kids and growing up in a really controlling environment of school. And so, it’s just a lot of intention that has to come from me.

PAM: Yeah. I love the way you expressed that, Erika, that this is our intention.

This really is the important work that I want to choose to do in these moments and to feel reasonable enough that you can make that shift right in the moment when we recognize that somebody is feeling like their consent is being pushed on. And, if one of the things we were wanting to talk about that I feel is so important is not only not pushing their consent, but it’s in support of their autonomy, right.

Of them making choices. And like I was talking about before, making these choices is reflecting who they are in that moment and what they’re wanting or not wanting to do, right? We want to give them choices so that they can then pursue who they are and explore who they are and the things that they like to do.

That’s life. But one of the fascinating things is, I remember having those moments and when I’m feeling a little under-resourced too, right? Is that they want their autonomy, they want to do the thing, well then they can go and do it, right? So it’s thinking about autonomy versus independence.

We can easily make that little quick connection. That autonomy means doing it themselves. If they want to make that choice, then they can do it. It’s their responsibility to follow through and do the thing then. But yeah, autonomy and independence are very different things.

We don’t need to have the expectation that they can independently do the things that they’re wanting to do. If we are wanting to support them in pursuing their interests and learning about their interests and learning about themselves. It is for us to help them do the things. And the lovely thing is, when we’re there with them, we can help them process, right?

They have someone to talk to about this. They don’t feel judged about saying, I really wanted to come do this thing and we’ve been here a half hour and I really want to go home now because this is not what I expected. Verses it’s not okay. You wanted to come here, so we’re coming here for the whole thing.

I love the word interdependence. We are helping them explore the things that they’re interested in and as we talked about last time, weaving our lives together, we are all wanting to do the things and it’s about all of us. Everyone’s consent, everyone’s autonomy, and weaving together the things that we’re wanting to do, not wanting to do, and finding a way as much as we can, and without that pressure of time.

So maybe if there is something that I want to do but it doesn’t fit right now. Is it okay if it’s tomorrow? Often it can be, there isn’t an emergency. And that perspective also comes with experience. So, sometimes things feel super urgent for our kids and we can understand that. And help them gain those moments because that’s something that will come with time too.

But anyway, yeah, autonomy and independence are completely different. 

ANNA: Very different things. I know we have a podcast on the independence agenda, and I think it’s important to revisit that too, to recognize that there is really a difference. I think consent weaves in, so it’s so interesting how they’re all so interrelated and how different it feels to have that interdependence than to have either an independence agenda or this control.

The control paradigm of a parent telling a child what to do. I had a client that was recently sharing a story that I think is related, so I’m going to go for it for just a second. She has a strong independence agenda that we talk about a lot. And I was like, tell me where that came from. What comes to mind from when you were younger? 

And she shared a story of how they were very young children and they were told they had to go rake the whole yard. They had this giant yard and they had to rake the whole yard, two young children. And then the parents came out and it wasn’t good enough and said, you’ll do it again.

This was even though it had taken them hours to do. And they were just so devastated and had to do this again. And she’s said, but you know, I guess we learned we just have to do it right the first time and that it was just on us. I said, what would it have felt like if they had come out and said, oh, you know what, there’s still some leaves here let’s all get them up together. 

She just stopped for a second and said, I think I would’ve felt really loved and like I’m not alone. Because that’s the thing, right? What are we valuing? And again, this is may be a ‘people are different’ thing too, but what are the values?

We’ve talked about this before. Maybe independence is a value. But I think it’s worth examining, are there unintended consequences to when we’re putting that on someone else? I think we can want our own independence. We can want our own autonomy, but when we’re deciding for someone else that that’s what they need, that’s where we’re pushing through consent, potentially. That’s where we’re potentially changing the relationship. And so I think it’s also valuable to just slow down, dig in a little bit and see, does this really align with what I’m feeling inside? Or am I just repeating outside messages and then putting it on the kids in front of me?

ERIKA: It’s where the agenda becomes more important than anything else. But is that really what we want? Or is that again, this role of the good parent that we’re trying to fill? I think that’s super interesting. And then I was also thinking, just a note for the parents of young children.

I feel like this consent and autonomy can be the most challenging during those very young years because a lot of the big reactions that toddlers and little kids can have about things don’t feel logical at all. That was a challenge for me, and I see it being a challenge for a lot of parents with little kids.

I clearly see what’s going on and they’re having this big reaction that doesn’t really make any sense logically to an adult mind. And so I don’t know. I don’t particularly have advice, but I’m just thinking, solidarity with the parents of young children. And then also, for a young child, these big feelings are real.

And so I think giving the space for them to have them, taking them seriously,that’s the biggest thing you can do. Because it’s the worst feeling to have a big emotion about something, which I still do have big emotions about some things. And then to have someone say. You don’t feel like that. You don’t need to feel like that. You shouldn’t feel like that. 

It’s so invalidating. And so, doing this work of listening, leaving space, and letting even the littlest kids have their feelings and not pushing through that, I think is such amazing work.

ANNA: Right, because I want to say that, because I have that logical brain too, and it can be hard, why are we freaking out about the blue sippy cup versus the pink sippy cup? Can we just want a sippy cup?

But what I found is that when I could check that and go, okay, but what’s really happening here? It is a big emotion about something. And oftentimes there are contextual pieces or you know, HALT They’re hungry, they’re angry, they’re lonely, they’re tired.

Something else that’s going on, something else at play. And so when we can really hear, and validate that you want this particular blue sippy cup, we need to find it and clean it, even though we have 20 other sippy cups right here. You see that energy comes down because if we stay in our place of, we’re going to out logic over the 2-year-old, it’s not a winning proposition.

It’s just going to, things are just going to escalate. But like you said, we can see it as adults too. It’s like someone telling us, well that’s not logical for you to be upset about this thing or anxious about this thing, or worried about this thing. That doesn’t feel connecting and it doesn’t  help you go, okay, well yeah, I’m not going to worry about it now because you told me not to.

ERIKA: Yeah. Oh my gosh. So I’m just thinking, there could be a lot of times when I’m at a heightened emotion and so if we are moving forward with this plan that I’m feeling scared about or upset about, and we’re going to do it anyway, it feels like my consent is not being respected in that moment. But really all it would take is for someone to hear my concerns. Let’s talk through my concerns, validate that it’s okay, that I’m feeling the way that I feel. Then maybe I really am okay moving forward. I just needed to be heard first.

And so with consent, I think sometimes it can happen where we think my kid doesn’t want to do this, so I guess we can’t do it. And then that’s the end of the conversation. Rather than, my kid doesn’t want to do this. Let’s get curious. What are the reasons? Let’s try to figure it out. Let’s validate. Problem solve, be creative, and then maybe the event actually does happen because everyone feels heard and we’re able to figure out a way that it actually feels okay.

PAM: Yeah, I think those conversations are the most interesting because again, as we’ve talked about so much, it’s not about having the outcome in mind. It really is understanding the context for each person. If something somebody super does or super doesn’t want to do, that is part of the context of the conversation. I can say, yeah, well this was interesting to me, but I’m not super committed and it doesn’t matter per se. and then if I am super committed, then we get curious, we talk about what it is that they’re uncomfortable with or imagining or envisioning, just so that we can get a clearer picture of what it’s going to be and see if there’s a way to mesh them together. 

And then if we don’t find that way, then look for other ways, can somebody else come and stay with them? Can they stay on their own? Depending on their age. There are so many possibilities when we take our mind off the tunnel of this one initial outcome that we saw as the initial path.

And we discover there are so many ways. So many times over the years I found new ways to get to something with my kids because they’ve had these really cool ideas.

ANNA: Right, and we’re not having to give up something. I think this really does relate back to the other podcasts we’ve done, but it also relates to what you said at the top of this show, Erika, which is, the holidays are a good example and things where we don’t have to give up what we want to understand what’s happening for everyone.

But it again, if we tunnel in on this one outcome, okay, we’re all going to march into family dinner and we’re going to sit there and it’s going to look like this because that’s what we do. That may not work. But when we get to each individual’s preferences, hey, I like talking to this person. I like seeing the tree. I like looking at the lights.I like talking to grandma. I like playing the card game. 

Then we can figure out how we can do those things. So it’s not about giving up what we are wanting to do, to honor someone’s consent. It’s really about just weaving all of it together. And again, with very young children, it’s sometimes just giving them space for those big emotions.

And being playful about it. I’m thinking of leaving the park at the playground. That can be hard, you know? And then instead of thinking, okay, I’m going to have to drag them to the car, or are we going to stay here for the rest of our lives because they don’t want to leave. There’s a middle ground of letting them have that emotion and validating.

You don’t want to leave, we’ve had so much fun! We would always race to the tree and race to the other tree and we’d be working our way closer to the car or piggybacks to the car or things like that, just recognize that some transitions are harder for some kids. And I think you said this Erika earlier, and Pam, this is where the learning is.

This is where we’re learning about each other. It’s hard to leave something where we’re having fun or it’s hard to leave something that we’re engaged in. That doesn’t mean we can never do it. It just means that we’re taking time to be heard and seen and it just feels so different. It just really feels so different and so connected.

And again, I believe that then that is what ripples out into the world because now they have this template of,  it’s really nice to feel seen and heard and I want to see and hear the people in my life.

ERIKA: And remembering that everybody’s differences are okay and that’s just so amazing in a family, not writing the story that, oh, because you know, my kid doesn’t want to be in this crowded family event, means they don’t care about family, or they don’t like family traditions or, some big story when it’s really just, it’s a lot of stimulation or it’s a lot of people trying to talk to you and it’s overwhelming. And so, just leaving space for everyone to be themselves. It’s kind of great. 

Well, this has been so much fun and we hope you enjoyed our conversation and maybe had an aha moment like I did, or picked up some ideas to consider on your own unschooling journey. And if you enjoy these kinds of conversations, I think you would love the Living Joyfully Network.

It’s such an amazing group of people connecting and having thoughtful conversations about all the things we encounter in our unschooling lives. You can learn more at living joyfully.ca/network or on livingjoyfullyshop.com, and we hope to meet you there. Thanks for listening, and we will see you next time.

Bye bye!