Body
To some degree I didn’t really know any better either and was
The last time I had cable or TV programming in my home
still learning. Wasn’t a fruit cup in light syrup just as healthy as
was 2009. We have not missed it, though it was an adjustment.
a whole apple? It’s still fruit, right?
I got fed up with spending a couple hundred dollars each
Social norms told my kids that I was depriving them. Cable
month for access to 200 channels and pay-per-view movies,
television was sending all kinds of subliminal and blatant mesbut was satisfied with watching less than five programs. It was
sages from sex to food. It was hard to monitor their daily dose
a waste in several areas, so I stopped it.
of music videos, movies, video games and
“Mom! The cable is off! Can you call the cable
It was not easy to wean my company to turn it on again,” my middle son
other mindless programming sprinkled
kids off TV but it was a win- shouted from the family room one Saturday
with alluring ads during the hours I was
win for us….Overall I believe morning. “I turned it off. We can go to the
away from home. God forbid I had to
travel out of town. Television was not a
we started to bond and learn library or rent movies. Plus I can save that
good babysitter and though they grew to a about the people living in our money and we can go to the indoor water park
point of being able to handle themselves
house that we called family. instead! In the meantime, go outside and
responsibly, all bets were off once the TV
play!” It was not easy to wean my kids off TV
was on.
but it was a win-win for us. My children’s
Tell a vision. The vision of someone else was filling the
grades improved, they spent more time outside and became
minds of my beloved children. What they should wear and
more creative – sometimes too creative by roughhousing inside
expect from life, how they should behave, what women
and breaking things, but they slowly began to learn the value of
wanted, what was cool and acceptable were the suggestions
them when I allowed more things to be cut off so I could use
coming from a mechanical box that everyone worshiped. It
the money to fix the things they broke or misused. In time
was on first thing in the morning and last thing at night, filling
they learned what life would be like without the comforts we
my home with the energies of whatever came across the screen.
take for granted and their part in keeping things up. Overall I
Even if I weren’t watching, just the sounds or words that I
believe we started to bond and learn about the people living in
could hear were disruptively annoying to my psyche and spirit.
our house that we called family. Good, bad or indifferent, we
God forbid more than one TV was on at a time. It was just
noise and I needed it to change.
CONTINUED ON PAGE 31
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Fall/Winter 2013 The Well Magazine
11