Huffington Post | Parents – Katie Hurley
A Maclean’s article with a splashy, if polarizing, title made the round this weekend and, as usual, parents are divided on the topic. In “The Collapse of Parenting: Why it’s time for parents to grow up“, Cathy Gulli argues that it’s time for parents to take back parenthood. In fairness, the article is not meant to criticize modern parenting and leave parentings feeling guilty (again) about what they’re doing wrong (again). I spoke with Gulli at length about the article, and I didn’t once feel a “blame the parents” vibe.
Parenting has evolved in the past few decades, as it should. Gone are the days when young children were expected to perform manual labor before and after school and the theory that “children should be seen but not heard” is a thing of the past (for the most part).
We’ve learned a lot over time. We’ve learned that spanking causes long term damageand that yelling isn’t much better. Changes in parenting style can be a very good thing for our children.
Parenting has never been an “easy” gig. Every generation has their own set of stressors, and the obstacles faced by parents today are different that those faced by their own parents. Food allergies are a significant source of stress for some, the pushing down of academics and decline in play change the structure of childhood andchildhood stress is on the rise, to name a few.
We can dissect the negatives and find reasons to make parents feel inadequate and guilty (yes, over scheduling is our fault to some degree, but let us not forget that childhood is big business these days – we are surrounded by opportunities to spend our hard earned cash “enriching” the lives of our children) or we can focus on the positive. We can take a look at what modern parenting is getting right and build upon that.
The so-called “mommy wars” and parent shaming are old news. If we want to raise a generation of kind, capable and responsible children, we need to figure out what we’re doing right and do more of that.
As I tell my clients and my own children, every day is a new opportunity to find the good. You can choose to be positive or you can choose to be negative. Why not give positive emotions a chance and see what happens as a result?
With that in mind, I believe these five things modern parents are getting right make great building blocks for the evolution of positive parenting.
We care about feelings.
We know that all kids are different and that all kids experience shifts in emotions. We know that’s okay to feel sad, mad, anxious or overly excited and that expressing a wide range of emotions is good for the soul. We know that stuffing feelings leads to anger and resentment but that working through feelings leads to self confidence and empathy.
We are teaching our kids to identify and process their big feelings, and we are teaching them how to cope when the chips are down so that they don’t feel like they’ll break every time they bend. That’s huge. That, alone, is a big improvement in parenting.
Not sure how to teach feelings identification and coping skills? Grab a copy ofThe Happy Kid Handbook. Feeling frazzled by tantrums (a healthy expression of emotions, but completely exhausting for parents) with the under five crowd? There’s a Taming Tantrums app for that.
by MindMake via MindMake Blog
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