Parenting and Family Education

Posts Tagged ‘Good’

Parenting is the toughest, most important job most people will ever encounter and yet there is no license required, no training required, and no 24/7 hotline. This is rather short-sighted on the part of society as the cost of bad parenting is immense, but in truth the situation is not as dire as it seems. While no training is required for new parents, it is very easy for parents to learn the ways and means of good parents as well as the traps and pitfalls of bad parents. All it takes for parents to learn more about parenting is to watch, listen, and learn.

Watching is a key element to learning more about parenting. Watch the parents around you and you can learn all sorts of lessons about how to interact with your child, how to discipline your child, and how to teach your child. Almost everywhere you take your child there will be other parents and their children. Watching means observing but also listening. Hear the tone of voice as well as the words those parents use. Some parents use the right words but their tone and physical manner contradicts those words. Watch the children to note their response. Some children respond more readily to their parents. Why? What is different about that parent-child relationship? What can you take away for your own parent-child relationship?

Listen to advice. You don’t need to take every piece of advice that is offered to you. After all, there are many people who are free with advice and yet have clearly demonstrated they are in no position to offer it. However, there is often some really good advice shared by people you know and trust as well as good advice offered by passing strangers in the supermarket checkout line or in the stands at a soccer game. Be a sponge. Keep your ears open. You don’t have to take that advice but keeping your options open gives you the chance to sort out the jewels and benefit from them.

Be an active learner. Seek out information when you face a parenting challenge. Perhaps your child is acting out in a new way and your old discipline technique isn’t working. Search the internet, flip through parenting books, and ask some experts in your circle of friends. Sometimes great advice will come to you but other times you will need to seek it out. The more proactive you are about finding solutions to your parenting problems then the better parent you will become.

Parenting is a challenging job, no question about it, but it also comes with wonderful built-in rewards. Some times parents are forced to take a tough unpopular stand but in the end good parenting comes with its own rewards. Those rewards include a happy, successful child and a warm, loving relationship that will extend long past childhood and span the rest of your life. So who needs special training. If you watch, listen, and learn then you can be the parent you want to be and your child deserves.

Parenting is difficult enough. And so is skill. And so is good. Putting them together is like doing Calculus while balancing yourself in the 50 meter- elevated pole. Good parenting skills.

Some parents feel that they fail as parents when they compare themselves to other parents. This is not the way parenting goes. Like you, other parents have different sets of circumstances. Points of comparison are small like having kids with the same age as you have.

On the other hand, parents feel that they are a failure when their kids grow up and become people they as parents like them to be. Some parents feel that when a child becomes a singer touring with the band instead of a doctor, they feel that they failed. No. Parenting is not a one blue print of what you as a parent want to do to your children.

Good parenting skills involve time. You do not just become the good parent in two weeks. Like other skills, parenting involves time. You learn as your children are growing up. And learning as parents simply do not stop even if your children have their own children.

Good parenting involves a lot of sacrifices. As a parent, you simply cannot go on one week vacations with your friends to stay on a nice beach resort. You can do that when you were single but as a parent, your children are your responsibility. You sacrifice some things that are important to you but you have to remember that your family is the most important.

Good parenting also is a big commitment to become worthy of emulation. Good parents are their children’s role model and hero. Little kids especially watch the way their parents talk, react and act. They simply do not perfectly know yet the difference between bad and good and right and wrong. Children depend on their parents for wisdom.

Children will discover the world more as they grow older. This is when the foundation of good morals and values will be tested. Your children will encounter difficulties and struggles along the way but when you raised them up good, you will not worry so much because they are grounded.

One good parenting skill is the skill of forgiveness and acceptance. Sometimes, because of extreme disappointment and frustration over their children, some parents simply give up. However, this is when your children will need you the most. The moments when nobody will ever care to accept them. As bad as they may seem, parents are still the number one source of forgiveness and acceptance. Of course it will take time because of the pain but love should never fade away.

Good parenting skills are not simply a to- do list or a checklist of what is right to do as a parent. Rather, good parenting skills are something that is learned through time and experiences and are based very much on what is in your heart. May love, grace, hope and faith rule in your heart as you begin to reflect them on your children. Happy parenting!