Would You Rather Be a Monkey or a Human?

Art by Lim's son

By Seow Lim*

Ever since I started my transformation from a Tiger mom who only asked about, "How's your school?"  or "Did you eat your dinner?" to a much more interactive Povi Mom who always look for opportunity to connect emotionally with my kids, I have a lot more fun challenges in my life having to answer 'unexpected' questions from them.

One day, my 7-year old came back from school and finished his dinner. He was sitting there by himself, looking at his hands and feet. I knew that he was thinking about something. I let him have some quiet time by himself. I sat down beside him. I asked him: "I notice that you have been studying your hands and feet very carefully, are you wondering about something?"

At first he was a bit apprehensive to share his thoughts with me. I then asked:
_ "What do think if instead of hands and feet, you have four legs?" - I remembered that as one of the questions from our Povi Family Connect app.
His eyes lit up, and he immediately responded:
_ "Yeah, I was wondering what would happen to the world if our hands and legs look the same and everyone has 4 hands or 4 legs?"
_ "That's really interesting. What made you think about that?" I asked.
_"We are learning about animal adaptation at school, I am wondering why didn't human evolve like the animals with 4 legs. Then we don't have to use a pen to write.", he said.
_"What would you use to write then? Hmm...we learn how to write with our feet." I said.

He thought for a while, then he said:
_"Then pen might look different. It shouldn't look like how it is now." I then asked him if he could draw for me how he think a pen would look like if people were to use our feet to write. He took this opportunity to complain to me that his hands hurt a lot from learning how to write cursive in school, and how his fingers were bending. I showed my empathy to him about his effort that he was putting in and we talked about various different ways to make his hand feel better like stretching it once in a while or perhaps I could treat it with an ice pack every day when he gets home.

I continued the discussion about the difference between human and animals in brain sizes, and our feelings. He was telling me that he knows that ants talk to each other but we were wondering whether ants could tell each other if they were happy or sad. He told me that insects have such small brains they probably don't have deep feelings but he thinks that bigger mammals like monkey, dogs and cats much have.

A question came to my mine: "Would you rather be a monkey or a human?"

He thought for a while and finally replied:
_"There are pros and cons of both. If you were a monkey, you get to play all day, hang from tree to tree, don't have to go to school but you got to search for your own food in the jungle. Unlike human like us, we have to go to school, we can't play all day, we can't hang from tree to tree, but we don't have to search for our own food. I think Curious George (ed. note,  cartoon that he loves watching) has the best life. He has a city house and a country house. He has the Man in the Yellow Hat get him food all day. He does not need to go to school. He gets to play with everyone. He gets to be naughty and never gets punished. I like to be like George."

I was thinking to myself the whole time how should I respond to this conversation. Should I tell him that he can't think about play the whole time? Should I tell him how lucky he is to have Daddy and Mommy bring food to his table?

Remember what I learnt about Growth Mindset to praise on the effort, I decided to say: "I am glad that you are thinking deeper about such things. It is not always easy to see things from different angles which you did. There are always pros and cons in our lives, the most important is for us to be happy with what we have and to be able to work hard for what's important for us to be better."

During real time conversation with my sons, I can't be sure that I always can give the right responses. Seriously, it would be too stressful to always strive to give the best 'lecture' so that they 'learn the most'. I feel that the most important is to pay attention to them, encourage them for their thoughts and efforts and always give them support and lots and lots of love and hugs.

Do you have your conversation starter stories to share with us? Join Povi partner.

*Lim is CEO of Povi. Please like us on Povi Facebook.

I would love to give you a heads-up that we will be running a Kickstarter campaign on Tue, May 24, 2016. We would greatly appreciate your help to be one of our early backers to make Povi a reality.

You can choose to back our project for your family, a school, your team members at work or even non-profits.

We would greatly appreciate you also sharing this important message with whom you know will benefit from joining our community!

Thank you very much! Do email me at seowlim@povi.me to catch up anytime!

Write for Povi and Become a Partner

@povi_me is happy and feeling accomplished! He has practiced and practiced a #song on the #piano and had mastered it. Thanks for your help.

A photo posted by Povi Buddy (@povi_me) on Jan 15, 2016 at 7:17am PST

If you have experiences to share with the rest of the world,  believe in the power of emotional intelligence to help kids succeed and is passionate about story-telling, join us for a fun adventure that can turn into a job. Your child-related experiences contributed in the form of anecdotes or stories will help build a product that builds emotional intelligence (EI) and teaches kids how to navigate social situations.

We are looking for stories to use as Conversation Starters on the Povi product. Povi helps kids discuss social-emotional topics. Contributions will be curated by an expert panel (teachers and psychologists) who will select the best stories to load onto the beta version of Povi. If your story gets selected to be a Povi Conversation Starter you earn a percentage off every Povi content package sold once we actually launch the product for sale.

Tired of products that build only kids’ academic achievements and IQ? Povi’s mission is to revolutionize EI development. Draw on your experience in social emotional development to help kids navigate the social and emotional challenges in the lives. As POVI"s CEO and POVI creator says: "I have always been a busy working mom. I pay lots of attention to my kids' development. I buy toys and educational products for them. Two years ago, my son's school counselor told me, “Your child is really smart, but he is not happy.” How painful can that be for a mom! That’s how Povi was created, as you can read in the whole story here.

Satisfy your dream as a writer. Early Enthusiast offer of $10 Amazon card to the first 25 stories contributed! Click here to find the form and more details about the partnership. Povi's goal is to revolutionize family playtime for EI development. Povi is a smart, story-telling toy and app on a platform developed by Antwish, Inc. Kids and parents interact with Povi to build emotional intelligence in a fun and engaging manner.

The Povi platform consists of a smart and cuddly story-telling buddy, an app for parents and an online forum for families and experts to connect on the topic of EI. The Povi Buddy is a smart toy programmed with endless story-starters on social-emotional topics. And this is where you can play a part in developing this next-generation fun platform to enhance family interaction. If you want also help us to choose which Povi is the best looking cuddly toy, please take a look in our Instagram page and make part of this this survey.

I would love to give you a heads-up that we will be running a Kickstarter campaign on Tue, May 24, 2016. We would greatly appreciate your help to be one of our early backers to make Povi a reality.

You can choose to back our project for your family, a school, your team members at work or even non-profits.

We would greatly appreciate you also sharing this important message with whom you know will benefit from joining our community!

Thank you very much! Do email me at seowlim@povi.me to catch up anytime!

Povi has its own Instagram! Please help us to pick your favorite buddy.

Would you like to follow Povi's adventures? It's easy: Follow him on Instagram. As part of our campaign to launch our new interactive smart story-telling toy, Povi will be traveling to far away lands and to everyday places. We also would be delighted if you can share with us which of the Povi models you prefer. For that you can also visit our POVI page at Facebook or our Instagram page below. We have three options for how Povi will look. You can help us decide by picking the one you (or your child) prefers here.

How would the world be without books? Povi loves to read out loud.

A photo posted by Povi Buddy (@povi_me) on Jan 13, 2016 at 5:47pm PST

Zero to Twenty: My Ups and Downs with Parenting and Building Emotional Intelligence

By Mallika Sankaran*

At home this meant simple but dedicated conversations to develop the 5 traits of successful people: self-awareness, self-motivation, self-regulation, empathy and social skills. But this happened only when we discovered, after some eureka parenting moments, that when it comes to EQ not everyone is born equal.

The pre-school soccer field is a good place to observe these five emotional intelligence traits at various levels of development: You’ll see the emotionally mature kids _ born with higher EQ (yes, this can happen – just like higher IQ) and by 4 they have the social-emotional skills of an adult _ they get the rules and play by the rules. They interact smoothly with the kids, the coach and the parents and everyone just loves them. Think Oprah Winfrey or Matt Damon. Oprah is strong, decisive and has a great intuition on what her audience wants and how to make people open up on the most personal issues. Matt Damon, plays socially awkward guys but his real-life personality is exactly the opposite! His marriage is one of the most stable in Hollywood, his friendships last for decades and he is caring and humanitarian*. (source: camomileq.com)

Then there are the lost kids on the soccer field _ running or walking around _ aimlessly; not sure what they are supposed to be doing and why they are on the field. But, they have age-appropriate social-emotional skills _  they know how to get through the game without getting in trouble!

And last, the kids who seem ‘so out-of-it’ as described by the smug parents on the sidelines. These kids seem to have their own agenda and it’s definitely not the team or soccer. They’re climbing up the nets, kicking the ball ‘at’ the other kids not ‘to’ them, questioning the coach – and generally being un-cooperative.

What’s going on? Is it that they don't like soccer? Is it that after a day of having to follow the rules in school they just need down-time to play and not have more rules and boundaries? Is it that they are mad at their mom? The coach? Their teammates? Who’s to know, unless you talk to them, and by talk I mean chat in a back and forth, non-confrontational, non-lecturing manner – which is a building block towards higher EQ.

Now, I’m thinking back to my days as a new and short-lived soccer mom. My son had just turned 4. He had never expressed interest in soccer or martial arts or baseball or playing the piano or in learning French or in the numerous other activities I wanted him to pursue. It wasn’t like he didn't have his own passionate interests: he loved reading (taught himself how to read from with Pokeman books), watching movies and repeating pitch-perfect dialogues (my favorite was Han Solo) cooking (he learned how to make California Rolls at age 5 from a Japanese friend) and building houses (we never threw away a cardboard carton, ever and always had a construction in progress.)

 I loved all this about him, but for me it wasn’t sufficiently mainstream – I wanted him to be on the local soccer team, get a black belt in Taekwondo and star in the local production. Without knowing it I was being over-aspirational - not just happy that my son had his own unique interests and talents, I felt that I was short-changing his development if I did not give him ALL the opportunities to “be the best” a “Renaissance Man”. Putting a lot of pressure on him and myself in the process.

The term Renaissance Man is used for a very clever person who is good at a great many different things. The idea comes from a time of history called the Renaissance which lasted from about 1400 to about 1600. One of the most famous people alive during this time was Leonardo da Vinci. Not a bad aspiration in itself, but in today’s world one that can quickly lead to over-scheduled kids and stress, especially for kids who’s EQs have not quite caught up with their IQs. Too many activities, too many challenges and too little time for something really important - parent-child conversations.

Today my son loves soccer – playing for his high school and college, he makes and keeps good friends, works constantly on different teams as part of his film major and he is passionate about his many interests. To a proud (and now wiser mom) that’s sufficiently renaissance. His most defining traits are his confidence and his ability to engage and interact with people productively – vital social-emotional skill needed for success in life. Perhaps he just figured it all out as he grew up. Or perhaps what worked is that when we discovered this new (to us) world of EQ and social emotional learning when he was 4 – we began to work really hard at it as a family.

We used every opportunity (to the point of being bores) to talk about “what happened”, examine feelings, discuss alternate courses of action, use specific kid-friendly words and language – something that at first seemed deliberate and contrived and was difficult for someone like me, who likes things spontaneous. We read books that taught us “how to speak so your child will listen” and played board games that taught “self-awareness”. We used a system of rewards and stars to motivate “self-regulation” We tried many things and one can’t say for sure what worked or didn’t. May be it was just part of growing up. But at the end of the day it all added up to the fact that we spent time a lot of family time talking and listening – which creates a parent-child connection that stays on and says “we have your back”.

As Alvin Rosenfeld, author of The Over Scheduled Child,  says, “Don't coach them on how to better throw a baseball – jus throw the ball around. Don't always teach them to be better just teach them to be themselves - research shows that might be the real ticket to success after Harvard. …it was whether they had one good relationship with someone when they were growing up…someone who accepted them for who they were and not for whether they could hit the long home run.”

Today I feel roles are reversed – when I’m having issues with persistently troubling interactions with someone, I find that my son is usually the voice of reason who helps me see the other person’s point of view – which is usually a good way out of negative situations.


*Mom of a 15 year old and a 20 year old.

I would love to give you a heads-up that we will be running a Kickstarter campaign on Tue, May 24, 2016. We would greatly appreciate your help to be one of our early backers to make Povi a reality.

You can choose to back our project for your family, a school, your team members at work or even non-profits.

We would greatly appreciate you also sharing this important message with whom you know will benefit from joining our community!

Thank you very much! Do email me at mallika@povi.me to catch up anytime!