Gil Cleeton

Emily, a nine-year-old, gets a pair of scissors and cuts the back of the teacher’s sweater - while she is wearing it!  My student teacher bursts into tears.

“Emily”, I say, “You promised to take care of my teacher until I called again, so what was going on in your mind when you did that?”

Too late, I realize that this is a stupid question, because Emily obviously does not know what the word ‘mind’ means - either what the mind is, or where the mind is, and neither do I. She is not alone – the questions of what the mind is and where it is has baffled better brains than mine.

Yet it was my stupid question and Emily’s surprising response which triggered the writing of this book and led me to mind-modeling.

However, in spite of my unanswerable question, Emily rallies, throws her arms round me, and says, “I want to come home with you. I want you to be my Dad”.