Children Handbook

For the Love of Children
A Handbook
Concepts & Tools for Guiding Children
Based on the Edgar Cayce Readings

Compiled by the A.R.E. Youth and Family Staff

Chapter 1

The Cayce readings stated unequivocally that the home can be one of the most powerful influences possible in the development of any soul in a lifetime. This makes the work of creating a home of utmost importance. The spiritual, mental, and physical focus and elements in a home enable everyone in it to see and develop in that direction.

For the home is the nearest pattern in earth...to man’s relationship to his Maker. For it is ever creative in purpose from personalities and individualities coordinated for a cause, an ideal. 3577-1

Parents As Models

You are your child’s first hero in this life. Your own spiritual ideal, your attitudes, thoughts, actions and reactions all have an enormous cumulative impact on what your child senses, desires–and becomes. Not that anyone is perfect! (And your child already brings much with him or her in individuality from past lives.) But there is much to be gained by looking closely at yourself and at the images you project to your child. Then you can prepare yourself to be the person, the example you knowingly want to be.

The following are suggested activities to help you enhance your self-awareness and point a direction for the tone of your home.

Set your own spiritual ideal, and keep some small reminder of it around where you can see it daily.
Meditate regularly so that you are daily attuned to your spiritual source.
Make a list of all your personal strengths, then list your weaknesses. Find a hidden strength in each of your weaknesses.
Think of several qualities you would like to have as a parent. Then take each quality and visualize yourself doing something that would show that quality.
Observe your marriage or long-term relationships. Remember some times of special unity and harmony, and feel again the feelings that you had then. Imagine yourself sending those same feelings to the entire family.
Find time to spend with friends who share your spiritual ideal. Share and gain from each other’s awareness and experience.
Take time daily (and special occasions once in awhile) for personal self-work: exercise, rest, journaling or visualizing, spiritual exercises.
Write down your dreams, and gain insights from them about yourself, your home, and your potential.

The Home Setting

The readings indicated that each soul actively chooses the individuals through whom he/she incarnates and the environment in which he or she manifests, to meet the conditions and purposes desired for a particular lifetime. The setting and atmosphere of the home–physical, psychological, and spiritual–are created from all who participate in it, and they constantly give images to all who draw from them: you, your spouse, your child, and any others who are frequently in the home. If your family is constantly surrounded by the experience, consciousness, and symbols of the spiritual Source, that will become the directing force. Otherwise, whatever other forces are predominant will be the guiding elements in the life of the home and family.

The following are suggestions for observing your home environment and making it closer to your ideal for it.

Take a walk through your home and sense the physical elements–how do they “feel” and what do they suggest?
Visual: colors, pictures and objects, areas of light and space, angles (round, sharp, detailed), presence of nature indoors or through windows, etc.
Auditory: music, sounds of nature, your usual tone of voice and that of others in the family.
Olfactory (and taste): general aroma of each room, flowers or nature, food (fresh or cooking)
Touch: temperature, furniture and textures
Envision the home of someone else you know (parents, friends). Look around you and get a sense of some of the things that make you feel good there.
Talk over with your spouse what would be an appropriate home ideal (e.g., a place for peacefulness, a place where one feels loved). Pray about it together and meditate on what word or words would be best for your family. Look for small ways to include symbols of your ideal, or things that suggest it, at home (in arrangements, music, books, pictures, photos, food, yard or garden, etc.)
Experiment with and enjoy informal family rituals and occasions that embody your home ideal (e.g., a special greeting in the morning or at bedtime, little pictures or notes on a table, unexpected little items at meals, a reading or storytelling time, a prayer or music time, nature walks, special bedtime talking time, shared meditation, family nights with songs, games, projects or events; special seasonal celebrations as a family.)
Walk through a day in your child’s shoes. Imagine yourself in your child’s bed waking up. Sense vividly what you see, hear, feel. Consider what you sense most strongly physically and emotionally.
Talk over with your child all the things you and your child like best to look at, be near, and do in your home. What feelings do you share there?

A Balanced Lifestyle

Balance in all things was one of the keynotes of the Cayce readings–enough of each part of life but not too much. Such balance included finding equivalent time for physical, mental and spiritual activities, time alone and time with others, regular routines but not forced rituals, time for work and time for play. The readings also emphasized the finding of natural rhythms. In the home all of these elements are constantly in motion, and it is often the awareness of the parents that brings about the balance, as well as the parents’ creativity that restores balance when it has been upset.

The following is as a checklist you might use occasionally to see if your home and lifestyle are in balance.

Did your family yesterday (or today):

Enjoy physical, mental, and spiritual activities?
Have time for the individual and time for the group?
Have a general rhythm for the day (meals, work, play, sleep, etc.) though not rigid routines?
Have time for work and time for play?
Have time for both seriousness and humor?
Have time for spontaneity and for an enjoyed ritual?

A Life of Service

One of the primary focuses in the Cayce readings was on selfless doing for others, on living the Golden Rule. This very giving is a spiritual act, for by constantly doing small kindnesses a child comes more and more into it as a consciousness and becomes more attuned to the spiritual force of Love behind the rule.

The following are suggestions for making kindness a way of life and a spiritual attunement.

Read or tell stories (or use guided visualizations) that nurture compassion for others’ hopes and feelings that show kind acts to others.
Pray with your child for other people, asking that you may be channels of blessing to others.
Repeat a verse or poem each day about kindness, and praise your child when he or she puts such a consciousness into action.
Do a kind deed each day! This can be in words, thoughtful deeds, small tokens of caring, etc., to family, friends, relatives, or persons in need.
Express your own love to your child often. This, too, can be done by words, notes, thoughtful remembrances, little awarenesses, etc.
Allow your child to help you. Ask her or his advice about little things at home.
Do kind things for others as part of a larger group (family, neighborhood, organization, etc.) that is in harmony with your spiritual ideal.

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