Earlier this year, I finished an audiobook of Hunt, Gather, Parent: What Ancient Cultures Can Teach Us About the Lost Art of Raising Happy, Helpful Little Humans by Michaeleen Doucleff.

This book was recommended to me when I found out I was pregnant and I slowly made my way through the audiobook most of last year. The book wasn’t a slog, nor uninteresting - I think I took so long to finish it because I’ve been more in a reading to escape rather than a reading to learn mood lately. Doucleff’s book has more of a reading to learn type of vibe.

Overall, I loved this book. Doucleff details how various ancient cultures parent their children and how we in the western world can implement some of these ideas to raise well-behaved, helpful children. It was fascinating to dive into these cultures and their bents toward the “it takes a village” model of parenting. A lot of it is extremely helpful, especially the concept of including children in the family as productive, important members, even as babies. 

Some of the villages and communities Doucleff lived in and studied show a stark difference between two contrasting views of parenthood: 1, the family’s world revolving around the children and 2, the children participating and contributing to the family. 

For example, it’s common in western homes for everything to revolve around the baby (Lord knows, Tucker and I are guilty of this). You eat, sleep, and do everything else around child-centric activities. There are strict categories for “adult” activities and “child” activites, and they tend to end up meaning "adult = work” and “child = play.”

So if work needs to be done, young children/babies are given something to do to keep them occupied and engaged (often a toy, game, or even a screen), while the adult does the work (cleaning, cooking, laundry, yard work, etc.). As the child grows, parents feel an increasing pressure to constantly entertain their children or only involve them in kid-friendly activities. 

In contrast, the cultures Doucleff highlights make a point to bring young children (even as babies) along in their family-centric activities, both work and play. Though young children (newborns especially) need a certain level of centrality in a family, they are not the center. The whole family unit, directed by the parents, is the center, and the baby must be along for the ride. If it’s time to do wash the dishes or fold the laundry, the baby isn’t set in front of toys to keep busy while the chores are being done - the baby tags along for each family task.

For young children, this is made possible by giving them meaningful tasks and roles in the family. They aren’t just the toddler who gets to play all day - they are in charge of certain age-appropriate tasks that actually contribute (not fake tasks to keep them busy and out of the way). As Doucleff admits, this way of parenting takes longer, can cause more messes in the younger years, and requires a ton more patience. But as is showcased by the families Doucleff studies, this way of parenting creates happy, helpful little humans, as Doucleff puts it, over time.

As the child grows, they begin to be helpful on their own. They seek out ways to be productive in the family, because they see “work” as family time and as fun. They actively contribute, because they don’t see helping as chores to get over with, but as a clear indicators that they are part of the family. Their contributions are just as meaningful and important as mom’s contributions and dad’s contributions. It’s really a beautiful concept when implemented well.

I loved all of that, especially as an encouragement for new motherhood. As I’ve mentioned a few times on my blog before, we want to homeschool, which means most of our time as a family will be in the home. I’ve often worried (and still do) about how I’ll keep house and teach our children at the same time without all hell breaking loose (especially because I’m determined to have a small army of children). This book makes merging those two important works into one more manageable - I have the opportunity to do them at the same time with my children.

I’ve only been a mom for less than six months, so I know I have a lifetime to go in figuring out parenting. But I’ve already witnessed how much of a mindset shift these ideas require. I’m already struggling with how to “include” my daughter in my housekeeping tasks without plopping a toy in her arms. I know she’s still little, and like I said, I’ve not been a mom very long, so there’s no rush to figure this out immediately. But I would love to practice some of these lifestyle shifts more as Amelia grows. I think the key is “age-appropriate” tasks and my little girl is still learning how to sit up on her own. I know I’ve got time to figure out how to include her in tidying the living room or making dinner. ;)

While I loved the book overall, I did have one main disagreement with Doucleff’s parenting approach: her stance on discipline and direction for young children. She ends the book with a few assertions that children are naturally good if we only let them be good. She says that we don’t need to discipline or direct them much, because they will naturally do the right thing - if we just let them. She goes so far as to say that parents shouldn’t try to get their children to obey them.

“We’re training the child to cooperate, not to obey the parent,” Doucleff writes. “Part of working together is accepting a child’s preference when they choose not to help.”

I disagree with this quote and her other similar assertions for many reasons, but the main one is the underlying belief that obedience is a preference, especially for young children. That seems like playing with fire. While allowing young children to practice autonomy is important in the right contexts, children should not be trusted to make their own decisions whenever they choose, especially when learning how to cooperate and contribute. Learning to be obedient first is vital.

Though I didn’t expect Doucleff to have the same worldview as me, I did find her logic wanting. Humans are not naturally good (Romans 3:10) - leave any child to their own devices and that will be made clear immediately. There’s been one constant I’ve learned in marriage and new parenthood - we are sinners, adults and babies alike. As many Christian parents will say (and have said to me multiple times since getting pregnant), nothing more readily and clearly reveals your own sin like having children. (I believe the same about marriage - and relationships in general. People make sin so obvious, theirs and my own.) We need direction, discipline, to be told what is right and what is wrong, to have our eyes opened. We need to be obedient.

Doucleff may have discovered some wonderful parenting strategies for raising helpful little humans, but only the work of the Holy Spirit in and through our parenting can lead our children to true life in Christ. Reading her book and finding the ending lacking, that truth was revealed afresh to me as Tucker and I tackle new parenthood. We can have read all the best parenting books out there, but apart from the work of Christ in our lives and the lives of our kids, we’ll fail before we’ve even begun.

I’m curious if my fellow moms have read this book! If you have, what did you like about Doucleff’s gathered ideas? Are you implementing any of her strategies in your parenting? If so, how is it going? With an almost-six-month-old, I’m deep in the “don’t put that in your mouth stage,” so teaching her to help me fold laundry feels miles away. ;)