Sparkle Schoolhouse

Exploring the Dry Gables Series - "Liesl Herz: Nurse"

The stories from the two Dry Gables Series include an accompanying post from the Sparkle Schoolhouse Educator, Meredith Markow. Each post offers insights into the characters and dynamics of the stories, along with suggestions for how to use the stories as parenting or teaching tools!

Warm, generous greetings, to you, warm, generous Sparkle Grown-Ups! Today we’re going to spend some time with the warm and generous Liesl Herz, Dry Gable’s nurse and healer, featured in the story "Liesl Herz: Nurse" from the Dry Gables collection.

Liesl is a member of the Herz family, and she is concerned with all matters of the heart. She finds tremendous joy simply doing good from a pure heart. Liesl is a Herz, however, and our Herzes are aware of their self-image; they are asking us to see them for who they authentically are. The same it true for Liesl. She is genuinely loving, but also she wants to be seen as loving. Being and feeling loved helps to cover up what may be an underlying feeling of deficiency. So, our Liesls do love, and they love purely, but also, they look for love as an antidote to feeling shame.

Remember, a member of the Herz community wants to maintain their image that they are good, worthy and significant, and they are asking to be seen as they want to be seen. The driving emotion that often underlies their motivations or that they are defending against feeling is Shame.

Liesls are empathetic and warmhearted, and they are also friendly, thoughtful, generous and sincerely concerned for the welfare of others. They have an extraordinary ability to feel the feelings of others, and they are willing to go out of their way to help and support others especially in times of need.

When your child is being an Liesl, you might notice that they:

Seems to know what people need without being asked

Often put other people’s needs first and rarely asks for what they need

Gets their feelings hurt easily

Are attracted to those with problems and enjoys giving advice

Loves to be with people

Gets attention by pleasing

Likes to please the teachers at school

Are very kind

Sometimes they get frustrated if they are not acknowledged for pleasing

Are emotionally expressive

Do not want to be left out

The tricky bit in parenting Liesls is that they can become people pleasers looking for ways to get closer to others, if they don't know if people love them. So, we have to make sure that their impulse to love doesn’t come at a cost to their well-being or as a compromise to their self-esteem. Sometimes our Liesls learn to fit into their families by helping parents to do housework or raise the younger kids, and sometimes they can become mature and responsible and a very early age. The danger is that they can put the needs of other people ahead of their own, and sometimes they feel they must give in order to get. They can feel they must take care of everyone else first, because only if they take care of others while others take care of them.

The goal is to find the balance in giving and receiving as our Liesl Herz has done. She is a smart woman who has learned the art of receiving care as well as giving it. “I love what I do and I do what I love.” That’s Liesls motto, and this is a common source of gratification for our Liesls. But finding this balance is difficult for her.

But why?

The primary worry for our Liesls is that, no matter what they do, and how hard they try, they won’t be loved. They need to feel loved, and at the same time, they truly want others to feel loved as well. This is what makes them, well, so love-able!

Our Liesls live strongly, fundamentally, in relationship to others, and what better way to do this than through Love! In giving and receiving Love, we are saying that the presence of the other is wanted. And this is what your Liesl wants to hear from you:

YOU ARE WANTED.

And when their behaviors, words, actions are challenging, it’s often because they don’t feel that they are.

Here are a few tips to help you to bring out the best in your little Liesl:

• Put limits on what they give, because they tend to do too much for everyone while denying their own needs.

• Be sure to take care of them, too!

• Liesls have a hard time having needs of their own, so tell them your feelings as a way of giving them permission to be open about their own feelings.

• Don’t take them for granted. Don’t overlook their deeds. The more the feel seen, then they'll be able to relax and stop trying to win you over.

• Reassure them that they matter to you!

The gift that our Liesls give to us is LOVE AND SWEETNESS

And that is what the world needs now… love, sweet love.