Be A Channel, Not A Dam

Picture of Hamsa

We have a saying at the camp I work at. It is one of my most favorite sayings and concepts in the whole world. It goes: Be a Channel, Not a Dam. It means this: instead of projecting onto kids what you think they should do or be, start where they are at. If a kid is feeling energetic and you had in mind a quiet activity, meet them where they are at and make it more active. It allows kids to be who they are and to channel their wonderful emotions and energy into something positive. Instead of a dam, which becomes blocked up and eventually, if not let out, will explode.

There is an ancient, beautiful symbol called a Hamsa. It originated in Northern Africa before the advent of modern religions like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Throughout the years, it has gradually become an important and popular symbol of protection and good luck for the Jewish people. In many homes in Israel, it's very common to see a whole collection of these Hamsas.

Part of my job at camp is to teach at least one Jewish activity per session with the campers, and the Hamsa was a symbol I decided to use for an activity with my bunk of 7 campers. They are 10 years old, and incredibly silly and rambunctious. They had been having a lot of fun at camp, and I wanted to also make sure they could have a more serious, meaningful experience where they could share personal feelings and get to know deeper sides of each other.

So with some help from some creative people, I designed an activity. This was the plan: Go to Arts and Crafts. Collect about 20 sticks each. On a huge piece of butcher paper, we were going to draw an outline of a body. They were all going to write some of their own perceived strengths and weaknesses on the body. After that, we would go around and share what we wrote. After each strength or weakness, people would throw a stick into the center to show that they also felt they had this strength and weakness. The whole point of the activity was to highlight all of our various unique strengths and also show that we are not alone in our "weaknesses." It's a pretty cool activity, with the potential to remind kids of their strengths and also show them their weaknesses can really be strengths.

After that, we would all decorate our own symbolic protective hamsas on a piece of plastic called a "Shrinky-Dink," which you then put into the oven so that the design remains but the paper shrinks to about a quarter of the size. Then we would make necklaces of them and wear them around camp, to remind us of our strengths and also to help us feel safe and protected.

I huddled them up before hand and talked to them about the more serious, meaningful tone we were trying to set. I wanted this for them. I wanted them to get to have a meaningful experience.

But life rarely goes as planned.

As the activity began, they started going crazy as only 10 year olds can. They collected 5 foot sticks instead of twigs like I asked them, they started trying to hit each other with the sticks. They wrote weaknesses like "I have flat feet" and strengths like "I can see with my eyes" when I had imagined they would go deeper and talk about sensitivity, or being too judgmental. When we tried to share, no one was listening, kids would get up and run around and I'd have to drag them back to the table. They fought each other for the sticks.

Boy was this frustrating. This was for them, right? I started feeling angry, telling them they weren't being respectful, that I expected more from them, that I had designed this activity especially for them. I even threatened them with not doing the shrinky dinks if they kept going. It got so bad that I reached this boiling point where I was almost about to say, "That's it. We're done. We're not going to finish the activity."

And then, and then, something magical happened. I actually got out of my head and my own ideas of how things should be and I LOOKED AROUND. What I saw was a beautiful sight. They were all laughing with each other, having fun. Some were rolling on the floor, they were laughing so hard. They were cracking jokes and sharing their humor with each other. And you know what I did? I started laughing too. Because, I realized, it didn't matter what me Ryan Cole wanted for these kids. It was about who they were and what they needed. And they weren't 22 yet, and they weren't needing to go so deep, at least in this moment, and share their most profound and intimate feelings. No, they were 10, and they were needing to be silly 10 year olds and experience the joy of the world through laughter and stick fighting and all the wonders of being just 10.

I had cast my own, unfair expectations on them. The activity was truly about them being themselves and seeing that was not just okay, but beautiful. Who was I to try to change them in this moment? Who was I to have this idea of who and how they should be? To fit them into a box that cramped their style. To mold them into what, for some reason, our society has told us a child can or cannot be? So I let go, and 10 year olds got to be themselves in a world that doesn't often allow it, and their laughter rang into the night. I handed them the shrinky dink paper and they made the designs how they wanted to, and when the night ended, we all had shrinky dink Hamsa necklaces, and they all felt a little closer because they got to be themselves in front of each other.

I go in the Tuolome River every day here. I watch and learn from it. When the river comes to an obstacle, like a rock, it doesn't get stuck, or try to burst through it. It just splits itself and goes around, and rejoins on the other side. I want to be like the river. I want to be a channel, not a dam. Life has a flow, and listening to it, and being a leaf in that river, is a very beautiful thing, I am learning.

Love,
Ryan