Your child’s nature unfolds like an oak from an acorn. Once she has tumbled onto the ground from some mysterious height, it is the soil and the wind and the rains that give her ultimate expression its particular form. Who she becomes when she’s well rooted and fully extended has painfully little to do with […]
Relationship
Spring cleaning
When the sun comes out again in Spring, we notice how much there is that needs a good cleaning, stuff we’ve tucked away during the dark months of winter. Psychological garbage we’ve forgotten to take out. Guck that clutters our senses. Lead weights that sink our hearts. Unmet expectations and stale resentments with a sharp […]
An invitation to lighten up
Children are full of spirit, passion, life force, vitality. It overflows. The world is new! The body amazing. Puddles are endless fun. Strawberries! The fur of a cat. Hard edge of a rock. (Ouch!) Tears. Up. Look. Sunlight through a fall leaf. The ocean waves. Your child can point you to where you’ve grown stiff […]
Beauty as gratitude
Beauty is made before it’s perceived. It’s decorating the dinner table with a crown of fall leaves. Singing by a fire. Hand painting a dead tree. Speaking a kind word to a stranger, Carving little jewels from elderflower branches. Gathering moss in the shape of a mandala. Dancing to the beat of a brooding storm. […]
Considered consequence
You don’t have to be the consequence visited upon your child’s choices. Let winter teach her what it’s like to rush out without putting on that extra pair of warm socks. Let molten wax on the knuckle of her pinkie teach her about a burning candle. The most loving way to parent can be to […]
Your secret lover
Your partner doesn’t know your secret lover called Plan B. Plan B is softer, more loving, doesn’t smell of onions. It has nicer parents, better health, and always agrees with the values you want to share with your child. Plan B doesn’t age. It is the other life you dream of when this one seems […]
Your body says a lot to your child
Your child knows your body better than you might imagine. He knows the meaning of your hunched shoulders, the sound of your hurried heels on the floorboards, the slowly spreading smile before you get playful. Your body language says more than your words. The tone of your voice says more about your feelings than the […]
Making humans who serve life
There was a time in your ancestry, either within living memory or well beyond depending on your particular lineage, when a child was raised not to be all that she could be, but to serve life. Raising a child like that takes a lot of cultural savvy. The songs, the stories, the games, the rituals, […]
Connect before you direct
Coming out of our house, I see my youngest son peeing all over our new patio. I’m incredulous, and tell him to get a bucket and wash the stones. Later I ask how come he peed there. And here’s what he tells me–he was competing with his brother to see who could pee the farthest […]
Fear and love and honeysuckle vines
Love and fear grow intertwined like honeysuckle vines. You cannot disentangle one from the other. Your vast love for your child braids endlessly with your overwhelming fear of loss. Your worry is a measure of your love. Sometimes you protectively hold on against your better judgement, knowing full well that love asks that you let […]
Tending a good fire under any condition
We all have a fire to tend. It burns inside of us. A good fire is welcoming. It draws people in to hear your stories, or enjoy the comfort of your good company. Sometimes your fire burns too strong. On days like that, your family doesn’t know whether to approach you at all. You’re giving […]
Music tunes your child’s spirit
In our fragmented and commercialized culture, it can be hard to know how to nurture your child’s relationship to spirit. You may not know yourself what it means for you to be a spiritual being, someone at home with all that is unknown, unseen, or beyond your understanding. You may not have an intact practice […]
Your child’s gift holds the family together
What sets every family member apart is what holds the family together. This is an old ancestral understanding. The strength of our relationships grows from our willingness to honor, celebrate and cultivate our differences. Every child has a unique gift, talent, passion that complements the gifts of others. These are the variegated threads of a […]
One-liners: parenting in a single sentence
“It’s only a mistake if you don’t learn from it.” My son spoke this sentence today. We were stuck with the car in an icy ditch. Foolishly, I had tried to reverse uphill on a crust of compacted snow and rain. There was a lot for me to learn here (and model too!). He’s heard […]
Awakening
You suddenly realize that you’ve hurt your child. You cloak yourself in shame. The monkey mind chatters about how you’ve failed, that you’re a terrible parent. You haven’t failed. You’re awakening. Now it’s up to you to stay awake.
Respect trumps understanding
I just spent twenty minutes in the car with a sullen son on the way to school. We didn’t speak a single word the whole ride there, until we said goodbye with a long hug. I had no idea why he was mad–maybe something to do with his mom and shoes that were too warm. […]
Short-cut to an embrace
It’s hard to embrace your screaming child. Often because your child isn’t receptive when he’s enraged. Or maybe because you don’t feel very loving. That’s a hard place for a parent, knowing that right now you don’t feel affection. All you want is to match your kids anger with some of your own. Arguing doesn’t […]
The origin of song
As a young, ambitious man, I sought the origin of song in the brain of an Australian zebra finch. I was training to become a neurologist. My practice was to pick apart the foundations of beauty, wonder, awe to locate the source of music and the grammar of song. Or that was the idea. All […]
Stories for the love of earth
We need children who love the earth unconditionally. Let the stories you tell your small one seed the ecology of her imagination. Go far beyond the arid fields sown with concepts, statistics, theories, information and labels about the natural world. Harness your heart to fairy-tales and myths, fables and anecdotes and journey with your child […]
Seeing a phantom
My little boy sees a woman in his room at night, a phantom, an apparition. She’s old and she scares him, though she sits there in stillness, watching him. I will not ask her to leave. I want to help my son know her better, to have the courtesy of thanking her for stopping by. […]