*Shadow Work - Bloody Screen Time

I’ve been confronted with something today that I was not expecting.  I went to my usual weekly Reiki session with Kate.  I love these sessions now as I can feel the energy moving everywhere in and around my body.  During the session Kate taps into higher consciousness and gets messages and gives me a rundown before I leave.

Today’s messages were about me being controlling but for a seemingly honourable reason.  Kate said words to the effect:

“You feel a massive responsibility to ensure Timmy and Jason are happy and it is time to let that go.  They both have their own inner guidance system and it is not your responsibility to push your values and judgements onto them of what you believe would make them happy”.

I knew what this was about instantly.  From my perspective it is the biggest problem in our household - Screen time!  Jason is happy to spend a large component of his spare time staring at screens.  Timmy is equally happy to do this.  I am the constant nagger – “Get off the screens”, well, lets be honest here…….. “Get off the stupid bloody screens, they are frying your brain”.  I set time limits for Timmy and try to police them.  I am constantly trying to find other things to engage Timmy.  I am harassing Jason to engage with Timmy on something other than technology.  I dread the school holidays because I have to expend so much effort finding things for him to do so that he has limited time to be bored and be drawn towards a screen.

This is a one person show really, I’m the only one who is worried about it at all.  I make them watch documentaries on what it does to your brain (ie the neurotransmitter dopamine being like a drug that pulls you back towards gaming for your fix).  I try to show them Facebook excerpts of research papers as well.  They both don’t care!

What Kate said was very confronting.  I am a mother and it is my job to ensure my child has a well rounded childhood!  I asked Kate “What am I supposed to do?  Am I supposed to just watch my child glued to a screen all his waking hours?”.  Kate understands my position but stated a few things that are true:

“It was no accident that you had Timmy in the age of technology and are encountering this problem”.

“Timmy has his own inner guidance system that will direct him and you need to trust that”.

“Timmy could be meant to work in this industry anyway…. he could be meant to spend a large amount of time on games so that he can follow his chosen path”.

“When your feelings are so strongly negative about something it is you being out of alignment with your higher self (you and your higher self have opposing views on the subject) and therefore you need to look at what you are doing rather than what Timmy and Jason are doing”.

This is a big one for me.  Tim is not a baby anymore, he is now 13.  Perhaps it is time that I focus on things I want to do and let the boys follow their own path.  Even as I write this I’m cringing.  All I can say is that I will endeavour to let things go…. somewhat…..

I can tell you one thing for sure though.  I’m not going to be sharing this information with Jason or Timmy and the likelihood of them reading my blog…. well, lets just say a lottery win would be on the cards first.

Update 16th November, 2020

FAIL!!!

I was attempting to let go and not pick and nag Timmy and, to a lesser extent, Jason. It was a beautiful weekend and they were on the lounge playing with their phones on Saturday. I didn’t react and just went about my tasks. As time went by, the pressure started building up in my brain, so I mentioned something to Timmy about sticking to his allotted time. He snapped back, with teenage attitude, that he always does and stated he had an hour left of his time. I was dubious about that but decided to leave and go to a friends house for a cuppa.

While there I was aware that Timmy was playing Minecraft with my friends son. After 1.5 hours I reached breaking point and messaged him:

“So much for 1 hour left”

My friend was laughing at me as she didn’t want me to send the message. She wanted me to get him busy doing jobs around the house, so that he has less time to sit around. I pondered the idea of more jobs but also pondered the winging and moaning about these jobs.

I’m telling you, it was impossible not to send the message. I was like a frigging pressure cooker and was about to blow! The SMS released some of the pressure but then I received a barrage of messages from Tim:

“?”

“Oh”

“Fine ill get off”

“And I did only go 10 minutes over 1 hour”

My response:

“Family Meeting when I get home”

Upon returning home I called both Tim and Jason outside (after I had briefly spoken to Jason about my plan). I started talking to Tim about what Kate had said about me needing to let go of the screen time thing as it was not good for me. I could see Timmy’s eyes brighten up as the thought of free rain for all technology 24/7 seeped into his brain.

The seepage stopped suddenly when I then stated “Clearly I can’t do that as it did not work and I just get more frustrated and want to explode. Dad and I have agreed that you need to do more jobs around the house and that we need to have a guaranteed way to ensure that you are sticking to the allotted screen time allocation. We are therefore going to put on parental control that will turn your computer and phone off after your allotted time each day. You will also be doing a number of chores each day without any argument”.

In an instant the poor kid went, in his mind, from complete freedom to complete bondage. I mentioned the dopamine issue again, it didn’t help. He was pissed off. I knew it was about the parental control switching him off after the agreed time. I asked him “why are you so angry? It can’t be about your allotted screen time as your time has not changed and you always assure me you don’t go over your time ”. I could see him squirming, searching the corners of his brain for an answer. He blurted out:

“I’m angry because you are calling me a drug addict”…. I give him points for originality here.

Later that evening I received spiritual confirmation that I was on the right track. I have my favourite deck of angel cards: The Faeries Oracle by Brian Froud and Jessica Macbeth. I specifically asked a question about Timmy and screen time and drew a card, relevant part below:

“The Fee Lion would like to be our friend. He would like to read over our shoulders while we curl up with those good books. He’d like to dance in front of the computer screen while we play those new games….. He can’t do this until we can play with a clear conscience. The longer we put these duties off, the grumpier and more demanding and more shrill-voiced he gets. But when our tasks are done, he becomes a Free Lion, and no one is more magnificent than that".

OK so, give Timmy jobs, set the parental control on screens and stop the bloody nagging!

I feel more relaxed already.