I did not have a sense of what a normalized child was like by definition. I had these characteristics myself, but to see these being nurtured in an excellent environment helped me to understand what education was really all about.
As I have noted on this blog before, here is the list of what makes up a normalized child.
(1) Love of work
(2) Concentration
(3) Self-discipline
(4) Sociability.
For a brief moment in history, the West had the chance to join education with religion in the nurturing of normal children.
Then, because of social and secular forces, the moment was lost.
It may never occur again.
Yes, individual parents will create normalized children, mostly through home schooling, if it is done correctly in discipline and with an appreciation of the intellectual capabilities of the child.
However, outside the ability of the few, the vast majority of youth are being trained to be sub-normal, abnormal.
Do youth learn to love to work? Do they have the natural concentration given by God, which before television and computers was determined at forty-five minutes for a three-year old on one subject? Are children trained to have self-discipline, which happens when external discipline becomes internalized? Are young people truly socialized, able to work with people of various ages and backgrounds?
The sad answer is a resounding "no". I have come to the unhappy conclusion that the vast majority of youth are abnormal and will become abnormal adults.
Those who have been baptized have not been trained to cooperate with grace. Virtue training is completely absent from most homes.
Work is not encouraged. I was trying to show a young lady with whom I was camping along with her family how to scale a fish and her father would not let me, saying it was inappropriate for a teen to learn such a thing.
I was astounded by his attitude, which was based on a skewed idea of class structure and the fact that he did not want his children to learn how to do menial tasks.
All children need to learn to do menial work. Learning to do simple chores creates confidence and reveals talents.
To be snobbish is a real fault of parents, which means they are creating princes and princesses, peter pans and peter pams, instead of capable grown-ups.
The abnormal has become the rule.
What does this mean for society?
Chaos.
With the loss of the sense of the normal comes a sense of the less than normal as being the rule.
The abnormal in behavior, expectations, even play determines that a society is doomed to fail for the lack of responsible, caring adults.
A culture dominated by the abnormal, by the narcissists, those with borderline personality disorders or co-dependencies cannot last long. A culture wherein young people do not know how to be self-disciplined or control their desires and emotions is a dying culture.
This is what is happening in the West. We have committed psychological suicide as Westerners moving away from centuries of moral sensibilities, and common sense, as well as true religion.
We have lost a sense of the normal.
See also, http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-to-create-peter-pan.html
See also, http://supertradmum-etheldredasplace.blogspot.com/2013/11/how-to-create-peter-pan.html