The Biology of Belief - Bruce H. Lipton [67]
Another illustration of the influence of stress on a population is the story of the 9/11 tragedy. Up to the moment the terrorists attacked, the country was in a state of growth. Then immediately after 9/11, as the shock of the news spread to reach not just the people of New York but the entire nation, we experienced a threat to our survival. The impact of government proclamations stressing the continued presence of danger in the wake of the attack was like the influence of the adrenal signals. They shifted the members of the community from a state of growth to a state of protection. After a few days of this heart-stopping fear, the country’s economic vitality was so compromised that the president had to intervene. To stimulate growth, the president repeatedly emphasized, “America is open for business.” It took awhile for the fears to subside and for the economy to rebound. However, the residual threats of terrorism are still debilitating the vitality of our country. As a nation we should look more carefully at how our fear of future acts of terrorism is undermining our quality of life. In some sense, the terrorists have already won since they have succeeded in frightening us into a chronic, soul-sapping protective mode.
I’d also like to suggest that you examine how your fears and the ensuing protection behaviors impact your life. What fears are stunting your growth? Where did these fears come from? Are they necessary? Are they real? Are they contributing to a full life? We’ll deal more with these fears and where we got them in the next chapter on conscious parenting. If we can control our fears, we can regain control over our lives. President Franklin D. Roosevelt knew the destructive nature of fear. He chose his words carefully when he told the nation in the grips of the Great Depression and looming World War: “We have nothing to fear, but fear itself.” Letting go of our fears is the first step toward creating a fuller, more satisfying life.
CHAPTER 7
CONSCIOUS PARENTING:
Parents as Genetic Engineers
No doubt you’ve heard the seductive argument that once parents bestow their genes on their children, they take a back seat in their children’s lives—parents need only refrain from abusing their children, feed and clothe them, and then wait to see where their preprogrammed genes lead them. This notion allows parents to continue with their “pre-kids lives”—they can simply drop their children off at daycare and with babysitters. It’s an appealing idea for busy and/or lazy parents.
It’s also appealing for parents like me, who have biological children with radically different personalities. I used to think that my daughters are different because they inherited different sets of genes from the moment of conception—a random selection process in which their mother and I had no part. After all, I thought, they grew up in the same environment (nurture), so the reason for their differences had to be genetic (nature).
The reality, I know now, is very different. Frontier science is confirming what mothers and enlightened fathers have known forever, that parents do matter, despite best-selling books that try to convince them otherwise. To quote Dr. Thomas Verny, a pioneer in the field of prenatal and perinatal psychiatry: “Findings in the peer-reviewed literature over the course of decades establish, beyond any doubt, that parents have overwhelming influence on the mental and physical attributes of the children they raise.” (Verny and Kelly 1981)
And that influence starts, says Verny, not after children are born, but BEFORE children are born. When Verny first posited the notion that the influence of parents extends