The Challenge of the Indigo Children

Written by: David A. Hill

Come mothers and fathers throughout the land
And don’t criticize what you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly agin’.
Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend a hand,
For the times they are a-changin’.
(Bob Dylan: The times they are a-changin’ (1967))

The Issue:

Contemporary children are different.They display

• a new and unusual set of psychological attributes
• patterns of behaviour which have not been documented before

Are there children in your class(es) who display (some of) these characteristics?

• Much less likely than the other children in class to pay attention to school work and make seemingly inexplicable mistakes.
• Appear to have substantially more difficulty sustaining concentration when engaged in practical or play activities.
• Seem unable to listen even when spoken to directly.
• Do not complete tasks which they have been given.
• Unable to get hold of themselves and the set task sufficiently to organize their thoughts and plan a reasonable course of action, yet they do understand what is expected of them when questioned.
• Actively avoid and clearly dislike tasks and activities that demand sustained concentration and thought.
• Regularly manage to lose things – school items such as pens ans pencils, but also precious personal things like toys.
• Easily distracted, turning towards movement and noise. ‘Over-alert’.
• Forget routine tasks.
• Appear restless in all situations.
• Show a clear pattern of wandering around the room when the task demands that they are seated.
• Take any opportunity for running around or climbing.
• Do not engage in quiet play.
• Seem persistently active, with little need for rest periods.
• Say things which are not thought out; talk for the sake of it.
• Raise hands and blurt out answers before the question is finished, and the real answer can be known.
• Have real problems turn-taking.
• Have weak social skills; unable to join conversations and play other than by barging in.
• This behaviour in not a recent phenomenon.

Such children are described as exhibiting the three behaviours of:

• Attention difficulties
• Hyperactivity
• Impulsivity.

At best, they are labelled as being a nuisance, uncooperative, hyperactive, antisocial, negative, out of control……
In the worst case, they are labelled as having ADD (Attention Deficiency Disorder) or ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder)
The major answer to such beahviour by the authorities (Educational, Social and Medical) is to prescribe psychotropic drugs based on amphetamines:
Ritalin (Methylphenidate), Dexedrine (Dexamphetamine), Cylert, Tofranil, Norpamin, Prozac, Paxil….
There has been a significant increase in the diagnosis of ADD/ADHD and subsequent prescription of Ritalin etc. in the past 20 years:
USA

• In 1990  900, 000 children were on Ritalin
• In 2000  5 million children were on Ritalin

AUSTRALIA

• 1 in every 36 boys in New South Wales, Australia takes Ritalin

UK

• In 1992 2,000 prescriptions for Ritalin were written
• In 1999 158, 000 prescriptions for Ritalin were written
• In 2001  254, 000 prescriptions for Ritalin were written
• 73, 200 6-16 year-olds in England & Wales have been diagnosed with severe ADHD
• 1.7% of the population/6-8% of the child population has been diagnosed as having ADHD

The system has tried to ascribe the increase in ADD/ADHD to a range of causes, from poor parenting, to inadequate (junk food) diet, to environmental issues (TV/Computer abuse), to changes in parts of the brain that control impulses and concentration, and which are genetic.
However, what actually seems to be happening is that we are in the middle of a visible stage of human evolution, with new generations moving onto another plane of which the establishment is completely unaware and unable to cope with.

THE INDIGO CHILDREN HAVE ARRIVED

Why ‘Indigo’ Children?
In 1982, Nancy Ann Tappe published Understanding Your Life through Colour in which she classified certain types of human attributes which seemed to correlate to the colours of the electromagnetic field surrounding all living things – in the case of humans, the auric field. She found that a deep blue colour was being seen in about 80% of children born after 1980. She called this colour ‘indigo’.
The term was then coined by Lee Carroll and Jan Tober for their ground-breaking book 1999 on the new children.
It is no coincidence that ‘indigo’ is also the colour at which the 6^th chakra – the so-called ‘third eye’ – primarily spins. This is the chakra which regulates psychic phenomena.
INDIGO CHILDREN IN NUMBERS

The ten most common traits of Indigo Children are:

• they have a feeling of royalty
• they feel they deserve to be here
• self-worth is not very important to them
• they have difficulty with absolute authority
• they simply won’t do certain things
• they get frustrated with ritual-oriented systems
• they often see better ways of doing things
• they often seem antisocial
• they do not respond to ‘guilt’ discipline
• they tell you what they need

They respond best when treated like a respected adult.
They are also usually:

• headstrong and strong-willed
• isolationist
• easily bored
• seek real, deep and lasting friendships
• bond easily with plants and animals

The Indigo Child at School

At school this means they behave differently in important areas of classroom activity:
Knowledge
They can suck up knowledge like a sponge, especially if they like or are drawn to a subject, which makes them very advanced in their areas of interest
Experience
They know that experiencing life helps them learn best, so they create the experiences they need to help them with their current problem or area where they need to grow.
Relationships
They respond best when treated like a respected adult/equal. If you’re not playing your part of the relationship properly, they feel justified in challenging you about it.
Learning
They have an inherent strong determination to work things through for themselves and only want outside guidance if it’s presented to them with respect and within a format of true choice. They prefer to work things out for themselves.
Indigo Children live instinctively.
Education systems require research-based proof.
Indigo Children have self-esteem and a positive self-image.
Education systems require a socially acceptable ‘self’.
Indigo Children need discipline which is logical and realistic.
Educational systems have rigid and fixed rules of punishment.
Indigo Children need choices and the opportunity for experience.
Educational systems give orders and limit choice and experience.

Working with Indigo Children

• Treat them with respect
• Help them create their own disciplinary solutions
• Give them choices about everything
• Never belittle them
• Always explain why you give them instructions
• Make them partners in bringing them up
• Explain everything you are doing to them
• Let them decide what they are interested in
• Avoid negative criticism. Offer support and encouragement.

SOME RESOURCES
Books:
Carroll L/Tober J (1999) The Indigo Children. Carlsbad, Ca: Hay House
Carroll L/Tober J (2001) An Indigo Celebration. Carlsbad, Ca: Hay House
Lancaster D (2002) Anger and the Indigo Child. Boulder, co: Wellness Press
Virtue D (2001) The Care and Feeding of Indigo Children. Carlsbad, Ca: Hay House
IndigoWebsites:
www.indigo.com
www.metagifted.org/topics/metagifted/indigo (Wendy H. Chapman)
ADD/ADHD Websites:
www.netdoctor.co.uk/facts/adhd.htm
www.addiss.co.uk

POSTSCRIPT

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and the daughters of life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love, but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent  forth.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness.
(Kahlil Gibran: The Prophet (1923) )