The Giving Tree

Hands up if you have eve read or heard the book "The Giving Tree" by Shel Silverstein?

Chances are you have at some point, in your younger years and it lives somewhere in your mind. It's the story of true friendship in which a tree and a boy are friends. The tree watches the boy grow up and always wants what is best for him. He misses the boy when he is away for periods of time, but the boy always comes back and needs his tree friend to help him. Of course the tree does so every time, until the boy stays away for a very long time. Eventually, the boy comes back, a final time, and the tree has "nothing" left to give the boy, since he is just an old stump now. But that happens to be exactly what the "boy" now an old man, needs! So the book ends with them being united, once again, in this lifelong friendship.

NOT.

This book is very intense. First of all, there are only 2 characters. It is typical for children's stories in books, cartoons, movies etc. for the main character to be the one who resonates with the child watching/reading. They may go through a journey in which the character ultimately has to face some challenge, and discovers their true self, and is strengthened, and overcomes, and triumphs over their challenge, and everything turns out happily ever after. The Hero's Journey. Sometimes there is a strong second character, or a couple of other somewhat important characters. The child may resonate with one of those, but they still all contribute to the overall good fortune of the main main-character.

That is NOT the case for this story.

In this story there are only two characters. The main one is the tree, the second one is the boy. The main character is the epitome of good and kind, while they boy is.. well.. carefree and selfish, at best. As he grows he only becomes more and more self interested which makes it very clear to a young mind, that they should not associate with the boy character because he is "mean."

While this may not seem like a bad thing, (I certainly didn't think it was bad to associate with the tree character as a child), it can actually be a quite dangerous road to embark on. The character is almost silently praised, you empathize with him, I mean, he is giving that boy everything and always being there for him no matter what, he is true, loyal and loving, it is the boy who is wrong, and mean, and greedy etc. This does a perfect job at teaching how NOT to be.

The surface lesson? "Don't be like that bad boy, that is wrong."

But the underlying message is the scary part. You only have two choices, and well, if the choice to be like the boy is bad because he abandons and hurts his tree "friend," the implicit message is, "be the tree instead." There is no alternative.

The tree is a victim. The tree is exploited. It is not that the tree is loyal, the tree has no self respect. He has no boundaries or standards, he allows himself to be used and exploited more and more each time and for less and less in return. The qualities that are praised in him because "poor tree.. he doesn't deserve that.." only further cements the venerated victimized ideology. Being a victim is a reality that should be respected, but never a quality to be venerated. Children will aspire to be what is praised and lifted, and in this circumstance, you so don't want to be the bad kid, that you inevitably end up wanting to be the good tree. YOU wouldn't keep taking your friend for granted, you would be there no matter what. YOU wouldn't take and take, you would be the giver. YOU wouldn't abandon, you would be the open arms..

That is not what should be embedded into the mind of a child because they will not grasp the complications and dangers of this ideology in application of real life. As a child, they will only see the benefit in the good of the tree, and not being the bad of the boy. There is no further instruction for application, and, life is not just the tree or the boy. You could choose to be neither! You could choose to address the bad or hurtful that is happening and it could change.. there are many more ways that that story could have gone.. but it doesn't. It just ends.

And real life is like that sometimes, there are people who will be just like that boy. But we should not introduce such a character, into the reality of a child's cognition, teach them or present to them how it is wrong to be like that character, while only providing them with one other alternative, and that alternative being: a victimized noble character that uses love as his reason for allowing exploitation and abandonment to be done to him. Unconditional love is not a reason to allow an abusive person access to you as they please, throughout the length of your life, in hopes of distortedly receiving some of it back.

Don't get me wrong, I most absolutely LOVE this story. I grew up on this story. I still read it to my kids and I still resonate with the power of being giving and loving and the importance on emphasizing to not be the person who exploits or takes for granted a true friend. But I add a discussion piece after it, where we talk about:

What were some moments when the boy should have or could have acted differently?

What were some things the tree could have felt?

What were some ways he could have told his friend about how he felt?

What does a really good/healthy friendship look like?

What could the tree have done to help his friend without giving him all of his apples, and branches, and eventually his entire trunk?

We introduce the idea of how, sometimes when you give people everything they want and make it really easy for them to have everything they ask for without earning it or without consequences for things they do that are not kind, we actually teach them to keep being that way instead of helping them grow, change and be better on their own.

We explore how you can seek your wellbeing without having to use others or hurt others to try to make yourself happy.

Most importantly, we really narrow in on cause and effect, ownership over our actions and empathy in considering how what we do might affect others, for good or bad.

Depending on the age obviously, the conversations can get quite deep. It is a beautiful and powerful discussion to have, they are beautiful seeds to pant especially in a young mind. I am in NO way saying don't read this story, I am saying go beyond a simple read.