“Out of an abundance of caution, we will be/ not be…”

I got several emails and texts from schools leading up to yesterday’s eclipse. They started out excited: “These are our plans for Eclipse Day!” “Eclipse Day parties all around!” “The kids will be so excited for what we have planned for Eclipse Day!”

And then suddenly the wind shifted, and we started getting these lawyery emails right before Spring Break: “Out of an abundance of caution, we will be sending the kids home 3.25 hours early.” (Very precise and lawyery.) “Out of an abundance of caution, we will not be letting the kids outside this afternoon.”

And then suddenly, this non-event for RVA, which would have been a fun sciencey thing to celebrate and learn about at school, is suddenly a scary event, with caution and anxiety and fear of the children’s eyes. And then thousands of parents are shifting their days around and wondering if they’re bad parents for not having planned better for a hyped up solar eclipse that won’t get any closer than two states away and 80% totality.

How many times do we do this? How many times do we get excited about something fun and new and experimental, and then talk ourselves out of it right before it happens, out of fear or intrusive thoughts? Or even better - how many times have we canceled projects or said “forget it” to something cool, because someone else laid their own anxieties on us? They warned us “out of an abundance of caution,” and suddenly the air is out of the balloon and we’re back to not being excited about anything. Back to business as usual.

Or, here’s my favorite one: how many times have we canceled something that sounded fun, or dismissed it out of hand, because we “knew” our kid wouldn’t like it? Out of an abundance of caution, we say no, because we’re sure we know the outcome already.

We don’t want to possibly be disappointed, or anxious, and so we say no. And we avoid the disappointment and anxiety (which, yay for less anxiety) but we also miss out on the possibility of victory. Of overcoming a hurdle. We miss out on allowing our kid to surprise us.

Out of an abundance of caution.

If you’ve been saying no to a professional photo session with me, because you’re sure you “know” how the photos will turn out, I’d encourage you to take a deep breath and send me a message with your what-if questions. Let’s talk through the worst-case scenarios so you can feel confident in saying yes to something fun.