Monday, January 19, 2009

What Kieona taught Mommy about Focus, Persistence, and Single-Mindedness

I find much joy in parenting my children and in the process re-finding humans' most innate abilities. Oftentimes as we grow up, we start to lose our focus and our persistence in our goals in life.

A particular episode over the weekend made me re-focus my efforts at building up our business and strengthened my beliefs in helping other parents find ways to wear their babies in more sustainable ways.

Kieona was having her music lesson on Saturday at Yamaha in Thomson Plaza and as usual, I sat in with her. She is starting to play the V7 chord and 1st chord (which means 3 fingers on her left hand depressing 3 different keys on the lower keyboard). Now this may not look very difficult for an adult, but depressing 3 keys for a child who is 4 years old is a big deal to them, as their psychomotor skills are being stretched to the maximum (not counting the fact that they also have shorter fingers).

For Kieona, she has particularly short fingers and being such a lady, I was really afraid that she may complain of pains of the disability of stretching her fingers so wide. Her teacher told me that it may hurt for Kieona (as her fingers are particularly short) and it's ok and she could just try. Try she did and this time it was on her own. I have been encouraging her to keep trying before and I was proud that she declared she doesn't need help. I saw with my very own eyes that she tried very hard and stretched it way beyond. My heart hurt a little seeing her tiny bent fifth finger stretched so wide that it looked like it was giving way. But I held back and just asked her very calmly if it was ok and if it hurt any. She declared that she could do it and that it didn't hurt one bit. It thrilled me to bits just hearing that. She didn't complain and just did what she could to learn the new chords. I was proud.

Now, this entry isn't about boasting how great my daughter is in her keyboard skills, but the attitude she has towards learning and new things. She knew that I will help her anyway, but she has willed herself to think that she can do anything despite her shortcomings. In fact in more ways than one, we have discovered that Kieona is one such great child who never fails to persist in what she believes in. All in her tiny life, she possesses in her such great willpower and persistence in getting at what she believes in. That kind of doggedness is helping her break many, many barriers in learning new skills. I am simply amazed by how much she has overcome in the past few months alone, and how that persistence has helped her overcome her shortcomings (eg. the short fingers).

I hope that she will continue to have this single-mindedness and fighting spirit in her as she grows up, as this is what has been helping her get whatever she wants.