Customer Reviews

The Continuum Concept

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I read Jane Lieloff's book about a year ago. Where I first heard about it was at the Ishmael Community.
What I got from the book was that humans have expectations that have been passed on from our predecessers that need to be met in our human experience. Unfortunately due to our culture's mythology's about child rearing a lot of the human expectations go unmet in our human experience.
Liedloff pointed out to us that the Yequana still use the child rearing instincts of our predecessers. And as a result their children behave a lot differently from the children raised in civilization. And all in all the people of the Yequana tribe are more content in their living situation than we in civilization are.
A different cultural perspective on child rearing. Everybody who was raised and is raising children in our Taker Culture should read!!!

The simple and pure continuum concept will stay with me throughout my parenting years to come. I am very glad to have read of it before my first child is born. To hold your children, partner and friends in need, and to restrain from labelling them, makes wonderful sense to allow for their free, confident yet supported development.

However, the book contains some unworthy and potentially dangerous tangents, which are ignorant and poorly researched. The most harmful is the negetive view of homosexuality and ignorance about its causes. The damage done by expressing unsupportive and negative views about a sexuality different to your own could wipe out any benefit of having used the continuum concept in all else.

I am also not comfortable with the implied strict division of male and female roles. Although most children will fit into these expectations conveniently enough for narrow minded parents, we are all at different points along a spectrum of male and female behaviours, and should not be pigeon-holed. Other primative cultures do allow for this, and one of the benefits of the modern world is that we are relatively free to find our own place in it, and I celebrate this.

This book would be much improved by thorough revision and complimentary scientific research (which does not seem to have been done for the 1986 revision on reading the reviews here). It could then become a truly inspiring work.

So, to whoever reads this book: please watch out for its flaws for yourself and do not to take every word as the truth, but distill and absorb the beauty at its core.

This book opened my mind to see beyond our own culture and view parenting and the family from a truly human perspective - taking into account the basic needs and expectations that are natural to the human condition, no matter in what culture one lives.

I recommend this book to anyone who ever has a child, is thinking of having children, or ever was one.

Parenting with this book as a guideline can change our society for the better, one individual at a time.

I was fortunate and DID find the book (though quite by accident) before my first child was born. He is now 20 and doing splendidly in this confused world. His 18 and 15 year-old brothers are blossoming as well. The compliments keep on rolling in and the police have yet to come calling. :o) I give this as a gift to EVERY soon-to-be parent I can.

I found out about this book from reading Daniel Quinn's Ishmael. He credited this book for some of his thoughts. I wish that I had this book 25 years ago when raising my children. I always had an inkling that how I was told and what I read was not the best way to raise children. Reading this book just proves to me, even more, that we should listen to our instincts more carefully. I have already told my daughter to get the book and to tell her friends or give it to them as a gift. I hope that parents and parents to be get a chance to read this book, you won't be disappointed.

This book is remarkable and I think it should be mandatory for new parents. If we still treated our children in this way, perhaps they would not be bringing guns to school or abusing their bodies in the search for the love they never received from their parents.

This book is good in that it explains the benefits of attachment parenting/baby wearing and the need for a simpler existence to keep ourselves/our babies healthy and happy. I have always followed my own instincts, lived by these principles, and live a relatively simplistic life, yet my children (while far from being "bad") were not the perfectly content at all times children she describes. I think she ignored a major factor in her "studies" - being outdoors in nature. Have you ever noticed how calm your kids are when they are outside in the peace and quiet of nature? While attachment parenting/baby wearing did make my children happy, nature did even more for my kids. Anytime they got cranky (while following all of her principles), all we had to do was take them outside and the world became right again. I highly doubt that these Native Americans she stayed with, stayed in their homes all day long. From the way she describes it, they were outdoors all day long. I think the combination of the principles as well as being outdoors is what kept these kids so "content." However, I'm no psychologist, just a mom of 4 kids : )

Did you know that Dr. Sears' first book was essentially an instruction manual on applying the Continuum Concept ideas to modern parenting practices? Although it fell short in achieving its own goal, it nevertheless became the seed of his Attachment Parenting movement. Well, if you have found AP practices to be helpful or even just interesting, why not go back to the true original? There are biologically-correct ways to apply AP philosophy, and then there is "helicopter" and "martyr" parenting that can disrupt the continuum just as mistreatment and neglect can.

Babies and children's primary role is to learn how to be adults. It is very important for them to observe adults carrying on in the normal course of their day. They must be integrated into the family and community, not the other way around. Near-constant babywearing and holding during the `in-arms phase' provides the appropriate foundation for learning how to be an adult, but only in combination with the activity and community that supports it.

Have you ever noticed how calm babies are when being worn? Liedloff explains that their energy is "discharged" by the energy field of the person wearing them, so they can go into observation mode, which is their biological expectation of the role they should be playing at that stage. When not in arms, they have to discharge their energy through activity and jerky movements. Plus, they are constantly trying to signal that something is amiss. And in reaction to the signaling, we tend to talk to them and make them the center of attention, leading to more signaling that something is not right.

This is just one example of the amazing insight Liedloff provides into the world of babies raised in a biologically- and evolutionarily- appropriate environment, the Yequana tribe of South America. To learn more about how to raise your baby and young child in an environment that is healthy and nurturing, Healing Our Children: Because Your New Baby Matters! Sacred Wisdom for Preconception, Pregnancy, Birth and Parenting (ages 0-6) by Ramiel Nagel may also interest you.

Definetely not a light read but a very very important read for everybody in North American society. This book sheds light on some of the really ridiculous perspectives we have in our culture and provides a more loving view towards babies and children. It empathizes the importance of listening to our instincts and following a healthy continuum for the sake of our children. A must read for all parents!

I have never read this book but my mom did and used this concept on me when I was a baby. She said it was supposed to promote a secure inner feeling like everything is right with the world. Now, everyone is different and there are always many different circumstances contributing to everyone's raising, but she has said many times that she regrets using this. She said for the 1st 6 months of my life I wouldn't go to anyone but her, not even my dad. I'm now 28 & am still very attached to her, which I don't see as too much of a problem (LoL) but she sometimes says she feels like I'm smothering her. I don't feel like everything is right with the world, I mean, how could anyone really, and I'm not very independent. I don't know how much of this has to do with this concept but my mom thinks it has a lot to do with it. I really don't mind being so attached to her except that I don't think I could handle ever losing her.