Country Gal wrote "Children (and adults for that matter) need to learn how to take both physical and emotional setbacks, deal with them, and then move on with their lives"... No they cant.

I was wondering where in the range, 'naive but damaging' to 'willfully damaging for oppressive control' you may be, because I interpret the above as 'I know I have acted to harm but I dont want responsibility for it, and if they act to help themselves then cant blame me..."

Ok... how much do you want to know. Perhaps the first research showing stress(particularly childhood social stress) causes permanent brain damage in rats/primates and now known in humans...http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/content/abstract/9/5/1705

Or perhaps the discovery of 'pain' and 'pleasure' centers in our brain and how they interrelate (the best discovery for food/alcoho/tobacco commercial enterprises whom have been manipulating this for addiction and so we keep buying...) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nucleus_accumbens ... good place to start then go on to http://www.paradise-engineering.com/brain/ for some 'in you face' information...

So now you will know that a teenage delinquent behaviour is actually 'reactive rage' from childhood state of prolonged 'fear without relief'... ie rage/fear are spectrum of same condition to psychological trauma expressed as extrovert/interovertion... and who caused this 'fear without relief' and why... hmmm

and you will know that when one goes beyond the usual range of balance between pain/pleasure brain stimulation, then one centre suppresses the other, so pain means pleasure center suppressed by pain centre, so person can take the easy way out with food and drugs that stimulate the pleasure center to find temporary relief; and how many of us are guilty of this[ he asked as he sips the beer while smoke pours out of his nose while maintaining his artificial poise...]...

I hope you are getting the picture...

Sam
Ps~protect childhood from stress and insecurity/premeditated psychological damage, then they will experience fear/stress in adulthood by which time they have a good 'defense mechanism developed' to cope healthily 3http://drsanity.blogspot.com/2004/08/psychiatry-101-defense-mechanisms.html and this is essential if we are going to survive as a successful society

Country Gal, that's certainly not the point I was making ... and in fact, no one really knows exactly WHAT point Daniel is making. And I think that's the idea.

He has found the Pauline Hanson technique of generalising to the point where people can hear what they THINK he is saying, and therefore many rush to agree with him.

And we all know what happened to HER. I think we'll be seeing a repeat of this with Daniel Donahoo.

Many are indeed rushing to agree with him because they want to shed the guilt that they feel about not taking care of their kids enough or not spending enough time with them, in spite of many of his arguments having so many holes in them you could drive a truck through them.

Incidentally, Daniel, why don't we see you on any of the forums for your OWN articles? Aren't you into feedback?

Sam said, I dont disagree that where there is trauma without adequate support, there can be long-lasting impacts. But please, explain to me why some people can face these same trauma's, acknowledge that they can truly be horrible events, but learn to not let that weigh them down for the rest of their lives. The people that I know that cant move on, have mostly had a victim mentality espoused to them, they have been taught that its ok to feel sorry for yourself indefinately. Kids need to be taught how to put things into perspective. Some of that can be found in reaching out to the support group around you. But remember that parents need to teach their children - none of us are born knowing anything, we only know what we learn, mostly by example. So yes, parents need to explain their motivations to their kids, why they are going to help a friend, or a stranger or whatever. And help kids distinguish between a bruised knee and a broken arm, mentally. Parents need to have more confidence in themselves as PEOPLE/HUMANS rather than workers or business-people, and impart their knowledge to their kids.

Country gal wrote "But please, explain to me why..."

Firstly, I am not sure the features you use to determine coping/noncoping...

The useful approach is "does the person/child have real time dynamically responsive feelings in usual range" or is it "blunted/compensated with artificial responses"...

Yep, the first group perhaps what you call coping in that they 'know' how they feel to their circumstances and issues, also called grounded, and so can come to decision on what they want to achieve/maintain state of happiness and set up a realistic plan...

The second group 'not sure'/dont have their own identity of themselves, also called disconnected, they have an persistent emptiness from 'non-responsive feelings' to life around them. So they compensate in many different ways, usual is become part of group then mirror others in the group, at least feel secure...eg cultivate multiple personality to different social settings eg home/work/social etc

Which person as a child most likely unable to cope with stress/fear/insecurity... generally the highest risk child is the intelligent, strongly loving and people bonded... also hurt the most and progress into catastrophic psychological decompensation if stressed/traumatized.

The saddest thing is that these children are also become the most capable/productive of us if carefully cared psychological development into adulthood as a society. The majority of children follow same pattern. Schools/kinda are harming children by providing the wrong environment(unplanned/planned for ease of management)...

On the otherside, lower intelligence/less loving/lessdepended are more resilient to stress/trauma and prefer less than challenging adult lives.

There is a vicious cycle, some traumatized children become parents and traumatize/disconnect/suppress their children for benefit of total possessive control with its security...others just enjoy it...some say stressed/traumatized population are better consumers by 'quick-hit pleasure' seeking behaviour to ease some pain...

Now go look on the streets...how many people can you say are connected/capable/balanced/happy adults...we need to do something now as our future is going to become more challenging to survive...

Sam

one more thing; and this is something I personally keep as a quiet secondary sense of to myself as a predictor to the future of outcome and to my surprise not let me down... and for those who dont comprehend the following... dont ask 'please explain', for the others who do understand(and it seems many from discussions with including my mother who says she does), well we have spiritual awareness and found ourselves on the road of spiritual development...

"keeping the 'spiritual eye open' to see nature of souls. Those with evil souls will tend to be destructive to those around them, and those with good souls will be unifying to the good souls around them"... now apply the various permutations and combinations this raises to society/parent/child relationships...

Sam