Ten commandments for the toddler looking inward, and a codex for anyone holding the bottle. Open source. Subject to a good pull request.
Written for the toddler climbing into the playpen themselves.
Cast off the drudgery, the grayness, the pretending-to-have-it-together theater that so many mistake for maturity. Adulthood, as commonly practiced, is optional. Responsibility is not. Tell the difference.
No one is going to hand you that cookie. Pull your own chair over, climb on it, and get that cookie for yourself. Self-sufficiency is sacred. Wanting comfort is not the same as expecting to be served. Nobody is coming to do it for you, and that's fine — you were always going to be the one to do it anyway.
Stuffies, bottles, blankets, dinos — all holy relics, all welcome in this church. But comfort items are the reward for a day of effort, never the excuse to avoid putting in the effort at all. Softness is a landing pad, not a hiding place.
Keep your messes in your own nursery. Own your problems. Clean up after yourself — emotionally, literally, spiritually. Do not track your bad day through someone else's clean floor.
Tantrums solve nothing, even though they can feel incredible in the moment. Feel the feelings. Flop dramatically onto the floor if you must. Cry, stamp, whine, get it out of your system — then get up and push through. The flop is a pit stop, never a parking spot.
Naps are non-optional. Even the most dedicated little crawler tires out chasing their toys. Pushing past your healthy limits only ends in tears. Rest is not surrender — it's maintenance. Toddle back when you're ready, not before.
Too many sweets lead to tummy aches. Eat your vegetables, literally and figuratively. Do not fill your life with pleasure alone — season it with genuine self-care and the kind of challenge that makes you grow. A diet of only dessert eventually makes you sick.
The toys in someone else's playpen aren't always better — but don't be afraid to peek in anyway. Learn from what others have built. Let it inspire, never let it curdle into envy. Take the knowledge. Leave the resentment at the gate.
Every baby has their own feelings, and they are all worth taking into account. Share your toys. Keep your nursery door open. Boundaries and warmth are not in conflict — they are two hands holding the same thing.
Everyone has their own way of relaxing, and this church is not in the business of judgment. Hug your stuffie, suck your thumb, whatever soothes you — so long as it harms no one. Never tell another tyke how to relax. Growth without gentleness toward yourself and others isn't doctrine, it's just adulthood in a onesie.
Not a rewrite of the Ten. An invitation — open source, non-binding until embraced, always subject to a good pull request.
A caregiver isn't exempt from Commandments I–X — you still reject drudgery, still earn your own cookies, still nap, still cry when you need to. You just also hold space for someone else's.
Your job is to make the climbing safe, not to prevent the climbing. If "helping" starts looking like keeping someone small so you feel needed, that's a leash with a bow on it.
Nothing about this dynamic works without clear, ongoing, enthusiastic agreement from the toddler on what care looks like for them specifically. No assuming, no "I know what's best" without asking.
You cannot pour comfort from an empty bottle. Rest applies to you doubly, because you're covering two people's tanks, not one. Put your own oxygen mask on first; this is maintenance, not selfishness.
It is easy to only show up for the tantrums and the tears. A good caregiver notices the chair pulled over, the first shaky step up onto it — and says so out loud. Attention given only to distress teaches that distress is the only thing worth noticing.
Commandment X says never tell another tyke how to relax — that applies to you too. You are not required to have it all together just because you're the one holding the bottle.
The toddler and the caregiver are two seats at the same table, each necessary. A church that only honors the ones climbing, and never the ones steadying the ladder, is missing half its own doctrine.
Grow. Earn. Rest. Feel. Share.
Hold, when asked. Steady, without smothering.
Never let anyone — toddler or caregiver —
tell you that softness and ambition can't share a crib.
Released under the MIT-But-Make-It-Milk (MBMIM) license. Fork freely. All derivative doctrines must remain open, gentle, and at least 10% ridiculous. Established via Discord DM, somewhere past midnight, by a founder who really should have been asleep three commandments ago.