> The hand licking incident strongly reinforced my commitment to just stop and not do things that I knew didn't work. It made me more committed to not "put out

> The hand licking incident strongly reinforced my commitment to just stop and not do things that I knew didn't work. It made me more committed to not "put out the fire with gasoline," even in the face of social pressure to the contrary. To this effect only, I have started a journal to keep my behavior in check while dealing with kids. Needless to say it has helped me a lot and often times I have caught myself in the act instead of taking things personally just because it's socially unacceptable. Earlier my default mode if thinking was to treat a kid as an adamant adult ready to shoot you down is just a not worth it.