“Where the Wild Things Are” debuted this past weekend to critical acclaim. Kidglue has a couple of interesting pieces up about it that are worth your time. To provide another viewpoint, this Psychology Today article speaks about the movie’s focus on mindfulness.
For those who are unfamiliar with the term, mindfulness is a concept that emphasizes awareness of one’s actions in the hope that by becoming aware of unhealthy behavior, one can make steps to modify or remove them completely. In the case of the “Where the Wild Things Are” movie, the protagonist Max learns to deal with his anger in a cathartic manner by traveling to a land populated by creatures whose own emotional landscapes somewhat mirror his. By making these inner hobgoblins concrete, Max is able to confront his own feelings and see them for what they more truly are. When he returns to home and his single mother, he is more capable of understanding, and thus more adaptable to his own future inner upheavals.
Mindfulness is something we, as parents, should absolutely strive for. It’s easy to simply react to the vicissitudes of life’s daily challenges — to toss out a swear word, vent anger by punching a wall, or worst of all, to snap at your child for no fault of her own. It’s easy to forget that we are modeling behavior all the time, and that our kids are always watching. But this can be a beneficial thing too. We can model mindfulness itself, teach our kids that they can master their reality by mastering themselves. More than anything else, this is a tool whose value will only increase as we get older, and giving it to our children at a younger age will reap measurable benefits as they grow.
