Everything that happens is either a blessing, which is also a lesson, or a lesson which is also a blessing.
If we view our children as stupid, naughty, disturbed, or guilty of their misdeeds, they will learn to behold themselves as foolish, faulty, or shameful specimens of humanity. They will regard us as judges from whom they wish to hide, and they will interpret everything we say as further proof of their unworthiness. If we view them as innocent, or at least merely ignorant, they will gain understanding from their experiences, and they will continue to regard us as wise partners.
A sense of worthiness is a child's most important need.
The secret is to learn to sit at the feet of your own life and be taught by it.
The gain is not the having of children; it is the discovery of love and how to be loving.
If we allow our one-and-a-half year old to "help" us fold laundry he will learn something about buttons, zippers, snaps, where things go, the physical properties of cloth, what happens when you drop it, how easy or hard it is to carry compared with everything else he has ever carried, what clean clothes smell like, how a big towel can turn into a small bundle, how the small bundle you just folded can turn into a big towel again, plus any songs we care to sing or stories or related or unrelated facts we care to pass on.
A child needs both to be hugged and unhugged. The hug lets her know she is valuable. The unhug lets her know that she is viable. If you're always shoving your child away, they will cling to you for love. If you're always holding them closer, they will cling to you for fear.
Awareness of having better things to do with their lives is the secret to immunizing our children against false values--whether presented on television or in "real life." The child who finds fulfillment in music or reading or cooking or swimming or writing or drawing is not as easily convinced that he needs recognition or power or some "high" to feel worthwhile.
Never miss an opportunity to allow a child to do something she can and wants to on her own. Sometimes we're in too much of a rush--and she might spill something, or do it wrong. But whenever possible she needs to learn, error by error, lesson by lesson, to do better. And the more she is able to learn by herself the more she gets the message that she's a kid who can.
The child does not begin to fall until she becomes seriously interested in walking, until she actually begins walking. Falling is thus more an indication of learning than a sign of failure.
Parenthood always comes as a shock. Postpartum blues? Postpartum panic is more like it. We set out to have a baby; what we get is a total take-over of our lives.
We do not have to get our children to learn; only to allow and encourage them in their learning. We do not have to dictate what they should learn; only to discern and respond to what it is that they are learning. Such responsiveness is at once the most educational and the most loving.
Whenever the child is given the notion that he needs to be entertained, learning comes almost to a halt.
Especially with our first child, we tend to take too much responsibility--both credit and blame--for everything. The more we wantto be good parents, the more we tend to see ourselves as making or breaking our children.
The trouble with most problem-solving books for parents is that they start with the idea that the child has a problem. Then they try to tell us how to fix the child, or else, after blaming the parent, they suggest how we can fix ourselves.
More than what we say or do, the way we are expresses what we think it means to be alive. So the articulate parent is less a telling than a listening individual.
Most of us would do more for our babies than we have ever been willing to do for anyone, even ourselves.
As parents it is well to be aware of the tendency to equate energetic activity with contest. Our children's worth does not dependon their ability to trounce one another. And surely we can find ways of frolicking and being healthy and active together in some joyful, free way that is not an adversary relationship.
We can see that the baby is as much an instrument of nourishment to us, as we are for him.
My list of things I never pictured myself saying when I pictured myself as a parent has grown over the years.
Suddenly we have a baby who poops and cries, and we are trying to calm, clean up, and pin things together all at once. Then as fast as we learn to cope--so soon--it is hard to recall why diapers ever seemed so important. The frontiers change, and now perhaps we have a teenager we can't reach.
We cannot spare our children the influence of harmful values by turning off the television any more than we can keep them home forever or revamp the world before they get there. Merely keeping them in the dark is no protection and, in fact, can make them vulnerable and immature.
Once we begin to appreciate that the apparent destructiveness of the toddler in taking apart a flower or knocking down sand castles is in fact a constructive effort to understand unity, we are able to revise our view of the situation, moving from reprimand and prohibition to the intelligent channeling of his efforts and the fostering of discovery.
If your children see that you are seeking, they will seek-the finding part is up to God.
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