On my 27th birthday, my husband gave me a set of Charlotte Mason’s volumes, which he knew I wanted (thanks to Cindy Rollins’ incessant blogging about it). We didn’t have a real backyard at the time (just a vacant lot, a giant square of dirt that made a huge mess I wasn’t always in the mood for), so I was in the habit of driving my two little ones (a four-year-old and four-month-old) over to my parents’ house for extended play time. I’d put the baby down for a nap in a playpen, and I’d read in the sun while my four-year-old romped around.

It was glorious.

We went almost daily, and I read and I read. I gobbled up Mason’s first volume. I felt like I’d had my brain on standby since I’d had my first child four years prior; I found her difficult to read (which was embarrassing). No matter. I kept reading. It was all so foreign and familiar at the same time — foreign in that I’d never experienced it for myself, yet familiar in that I knew it was what I wanted for my babies.

Within the month I’d finished the first volume. My out-of-practice mommy brain could hardly recall what I had read. The only idea that really sunk in was that children, especially young children, should spend a lot of time outside. It was summer, and our part of California had outdoor weather ten months out of the year if you could stand triple digit temperatures (which, being native born, I could). So we went back outside, and I read it again.

This time, however, I read it more slowly, and I paused and implemented a few things with my son as I read about them. What I did was very simple, mostly just little games that I thought up, variations of games and activities in the outdoor chapters of the book.

That was back in 2005. I started this blog about half a year later (meaning the 20th anniversary is coming up!). It was the beginning of our Charlotte Mason adventure.

I had no idea then that I would end up trying to help other people learn this. I was simply trying to do what I thought was best for my children. I had this instinct that there was more I could give to my children than what I had received, if only I could figure it out.

And that’s really what I’ve been doing around here, even when I wrote the study guides, gave the talks, and coached Charlotte Mason Boot Camp: figuring it out.

Data Paralysis

In his book A Failure of Nerve, Edwin Friedman talks about what he calls “data junkies.” In its worst form, this is a disease of paralysis — the patient refuses to act because is certain he doesn’t have enough information. If he could just get enough information, then he would know what to do, and, he believes, he would do it. But for now, he must study up.

But the study is endless. Of the reading of many books, there is no end, after all.

Reading keeps us humble, yes. The more we read, the more we realize we do not know. But this does not mean that we fail to act upon what we have read. Let your reading make you more humble, yes. But do not let it crush you.

Friedman writes:

As long as leaders … base their confidence on how much data they have acquired, they are doomed to feeling inadequate, forever. They will never catch up. (p. 104)

Friedman is mostly speaking of people who feel the need to do more and more research. But I have noticed a phenomenon among mothers that, even if they limit themselves to just Charlotte Mason’s works, or just her philosophy, they still become afraid to act. It’s not that they think they need more and more research, but rather more and more understanding.

So let me say this now: you do not need perfect understanding in order to begin.

Application and Understanding Are Related

They say oldest children are prone to wanting to have it all figured out and perfect before they act. I am an oldest child, but somehow, in my parents’ backyard, where no one could see what I was doing, I felt able to act without perfection.

I’m so glad I did because doing so taught me something vital: it was in the acting, in the attempts to apply the ideas, that what I read began to connect up in my brain. This is so important! We think we must have something figured out and then act, but rarely does it work this way. Humans both learn by reading and by doing. When we read, we gain the initial ideas, but when we act, we begin to really understand.

I’ve seen it happen a million times over these past two decades of reading Charlotte Mason and trying to figure it out: I read something, I try to implement it, I see how that goes, and when I re-read I have an aha moment. Aha! Now I understand what she meant!

Wash, rinse, repeat.

If you want to really understand, you are going to have to do it. Lynn Bruce once told me that philosophy is meant to be walked. I have never forgotten that because it stopped me in my tracks. We don’t read all of this and store it up so that we can impress people at parties; we read so that we have direction for how to better love the children God has entrusted to our care. We read that we may live out the good things we have read. This is what it means to walk in wisdom.

Newsflash: You Aren’t Perfect

I have seen so many women come into Charlotte Mason Boot Camp wanting to learn more about Mason’s philosophy. And more they definitely learn! So much more! But over the years I have run Camp, I have noticed two kinds of campers, the ones that want to keep data gathering, and the ones who start experimenting with what they have learned, sometimes even in the early weeks of Camp!

In my experience, the ones that go ahead and try it are the ones that do better. The number of connections they make with the reading is directly related to what they have tried (and even failed) at doing. The relationship between their study and their application is dynamic and vibrant. Those who are afraid to act because they feel they do not know enough often do better once they are convinced to just try it and see what happens.

You will never be perfect enough to get it right each time you try. It’s been twenty years for me and I still categorize myself firmly in the figuring it out (note the present tense) side of things. Children keep growing and changing, they become adults and then new children enter your life — there is always so much more to learn.

We are often encouraged to keep learning. The learning is never through! This is true. But there is an attendant truth that is like it: keep applying. The applying is never through! There is always a new small person, desperate for nurture, to try things on.

The years go by fast, so they say. I go back and forth on that. It sure felt long when I was in the middle of it! But on the other hand, here I am with three graduates and only one student left in my homeschool. I will blink and he will graduate and it will all be over.

Don’t wait to act. That’s my encouragement to you. Be brave and try out what you have read. If all you understand is, like me, that you should go outside, then go outside. Then read it again. You will get more out of it each time, if you are always applying what you understood.

Your Ultimate Confidence

You will never be perfect enough or informed enough. Remember what Friedman said? As long as your confidence is in how much data you’ve acquired, you will feel inadequate forever.

Where do you get your confidence?

Charlotte Mason revolutionized my family first and foremost because she redirected my confidence. I was trying to find my confidence in me. I was going to become competent and then my children would be able to rely on me. There is a measure of truth in thinking this way, but it’s missing the foundation.

Where does our confidence come from, ultimately?

It comes from God. Typical Sunday School answer, I know. But I don’t just mean that we rest in His absolute wisdom and goodness, though that is an excellent place to start. I also mean that rest in the fact that when He created all of reality, He chose me to be the mother of these children. He chose you to be the mother of those children. The children given to our care are given to us by God’s design.

When I realized this, everything changed for me. Before that, I felt like maybe I didn’t have the right to be the authority in the room with my children. But I did, and you do, too. God has graciously given your children a mother, and that mother is you. Our confidence is not only in the trustworthy character of God, but in the unblemished wisdom of His design for our lives.

So go. Live out what you know so far. Read more. Do it again. And pray a whole lot along the way. Before you know it, you’ll be twenty years down the road and wondering where the time went.