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 […]
guidance
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
Shoes, treasures and the true meaning of discipline
Your child isn’t listening to you. You can’t make her do as you tell her. And that can be wildly frustrating. There’s a choice here–do you enforce or do you yield? Enforcing is more of the same–power over, authoritarian parenting, hierarchies, right and wrong. But yielding, isn’t that giving up? Not if you take a […]
Validation is a fertilizer
Timely validation helps our child master herself. When we notice that she can now safely handle a knife, we help her integrate this new skill. When we decide our child can now cross the street on his own, he gets to practice his increased capacity for autonomy. Validation is a timely fertilization of emergent growth […]
We can’t fix childhood
There’s no solution to childhood. Though you’d think there would be, as so much of childhood is seen as a problem to be fixed. My kid is too angry, doesn’t sleep, can’t sit still, doesn’t talk, talks too much, says the wrong thing, is shy, is too loud, never listens, doesn’t play, plays all the […]
Be your child’s compass in times of transitions
The world is new to a child, so many things encountered and sensed for the first time, so many transitions from comfort into the unknown. Being born from the coziness of the womb into the harsh light of day. The slow descent of the sun and the onset of the dark night and dreamland of […]
Too much support for the sapling topples the tree
A newly planted sapling needs stakes to support it against strong winds. If you leave the stakes in too long, though, the tree suffers. It grows taller, but its roots don’t spread. When the stakes are removed, the tree is thin and weak, and breaks or falls in the first storm. Too many stakes prevent […]
When praise blocks your child’s joy
Your child cleans her room, plays a beautiful tune on the saxophone, draws an apple tree by a lake. And you praise her for what she’s accomplished, sharing your excitement, gratitude, amazement, pride. Your intention comes from a loving place, but it may land differently than you expect on your child’s ears. She may hear […]
Restoring harmony through attunement
There’s a story I’ve heard about the Aka pygmes of central Africa and their gift of polyphonic singing. When a person among them is out of tune, tense, disconnected, the community sings him or her back into harmony. Developmental scientists might call this attunement and attachment. Attunement means bringing into harmony. When a mother softly […]