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 […]
advice
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 […]
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 […]
Nothing is good for a child’s growth
Every child needs a healthy dose of nothing to do. Nothing germinates their imagination, cultivates their delight, develops their relationship to self. Nothing gifts them with the discovery that their selves hold an infinity of world’s within worlds. Nothing teaches them something about life that nothing else can do. Too much to do, too many […]
Flood the troubled child with love
Any child gets troublesome when there’s a tear in their most cherished relationships. She may be passive aggresive, anxious, manipulative, or fight with her sibling. There may be nothing you can say to resolve her pain. But there may be something powerful you can do. Flood your child with love. When all else fails, take […]
Want your child to care? Cultivate your empathy.
A mentor of mine once told me we don’t learn how to be more loving or empathetic. We’re naturally loving from birth. The difference is small but significant. We don’t have to strive to feel more or improve ourselves. This perspective is a cultural illness. It affects us when we internalize the industrial ideals of […]
Rules govern every family, even when they’re unspoken
Our family rules guide our conduct, how we are with one another. They’re a vital influence on family health. The rules we live by are often unspoken, unwritten or assumed, which causes a lot of needless grief and strife and confusion. We may feel that our child is unruly. Or our partner! Yet when it […]
Change the rhythm to get the fruit
It’s time to make cider on our farm. I climb the apple trees, and shake the branches to tumble the fruit for harvest. But they don’t fall from an even rhythm. It’s the changes in rhythm that breaks the stem and drops the apple. Sometimes we get into routines and ruts in our families when […]
Time for yourself
The arrival of a baby changes all relationships, including our relationship with time. Our days, and hearts, reorganize to tend to this new, tender life. One day we feel a tinge of panic, and realize we are losing our autonomy. We have hardly any time for ourselves. Listen to that tinge and take it seriously. […]
Crown a King or Queen to ease sibling rivalry
If you have two children or more, you’ll be familiar with siblings fighting over candy, toys, holding your hand, or most anything. It’s a tug of war that can last till morning come. Or more likely, until you simply can’t take it any longer and you either yell enough, or step in to sort out […]