What is Conscious Parenting? (1 Viewer)

[Golmona]

I was thinking about what 'Conscious Parenting' actually means to me, so I decided to do a little research. Not surprisingly, conscious parenting just like much else in life comes back to the individual's healing journey. It involves truly knowing yourself, your emotional triggers and making yourself whole by healing your emotional wounds.

"In the absence of reflection, history often repeats itself, and parents are vulnerable to passing on to their own children unhealthy patterns from the past. Understanding our lives can free us from the otherwise almost predictable situation in which we re-create the damage to our children that was done to us in our own childhoods. Research has clearly demonstrated that our children’s attachment to us will be influenced by what happened to us when we were young if we do not come to process and understand our lives." - Dr Dan Siegel, Parenting from the Inside Out

"Conscious parenting involves thinking deeply about your own childhood experiences so that you can develop a deeper understanding of your own life story, and so that you can identify your own emotional triggers.

It involves taking the time to consciously examine the internal experiences that provoke your intense emotional responses to your child so that you can stop yourself from being ‘emotionally hijacked’, and so that you can make mindful choices about how to interact with your child.

It is about healing yourself so that you can be the parent you want to be."
http://theflourishingchild.com/what-is-conscious-parenting/

In this very short video Shefali Tsabary, PhD Psychiatrist & Author, explains the concept of Conscious Parenting, which very much resonated with me.

So what is your take on conscious parenting? How do you put it to practice?

 

[Linda]

I especially liked her statement about disengaging from our connected and activity focused culture and take time to see the child in front of you.

 

[Laron]

Something I was saying to a friend today, which was really triggered in me because of the celebration of Easter, is that if I had a child I would be doing my best to provide a range of alternative traditions, beliefs and celebrations, rather than just the one every year, not to only educate, but to enable the child to not have something forced upon them.

It's important for us to step away from our family values and beliefs, and go beyond, past our cultural and society expectations so that we can become our own person, find our own truths and connect more easily with higher aspects of our being.

All these things that are pushed, and sometimes forced, upon us when we are younger, can create major blocks in our energy, and have to therefore be addressed later on in life, whether negative, positive, or neutral. We have to make transition through what we were told something was, and open up to how it actually is — for us, as a unique individual vibrating as energy, consciously, within a human vehicle — by tapping into not just our intuition, but those aspects further beyond, far through the veil.

 

[Anaeika]

Laron , that is conscious parenting in action that you just gave an example of during the holidays. Love this! Thank you!

 

[Anaeika]

It’s about overcoming our biology and upbringing to being empowered to draw on a blank slate. It is a lot of work and worth it!

 

[Golmona]

Laron You would make a great dad!

 

[Golmona]

In my experience so far with my son I see that parenthood itself is a great healing journey. If done with awareness it can definitely give a great impetus to our consciousness evolution.

I love Laron's idea of exposing your child(ren) to a variety of traditions, beliefs and celebrations. Perhaps that's why there is an influx of Third Culture Kids in the last decades, a term coined by Van Reken in a similarly named book to explain people who were raised in multiple cultures speaking various languages. I myself was one of these kids and although as a child I often felt rootless and out of place, I've now come to appreciate the advantages of being exposed to such a great variety of cultures, each with their own traditions, beliefs and celebrations.

diversity is the spice of life!

 

[Laron]

It makes you wonder what they will get up later on in life if they are shown a variety, as then they may create their own.. whatever!

 

[Jeanne Barrimore]

Reading these posts made me feel I should share a message I just sent to Angela who loves children's books with an underlying spiritual truth.
Well this one (or two actually because there's a Grown-Ups Book and a children's Activity book) tells these stories of a penguin soul working its way up from the tiniest penguin to becoming an Emperor. The adults' book also has several articles about reincarnation and how to use the book with children aged 2 to 7 the time when they're most likely to remember something.
My daughter Laura loved these stories and I've pass the book on to a couple of friends. One of them seemed to really discover something with her little boy aged 4 . The video tells you about it and there's a site. You'll find it if you search for "reincarnation antarctica" Please share any experiences. I'd love to hear about them.

 

[Lila]

Wow, how great to see awareness as a spectrum, a place one can be to change the present (which changes our perception of our own past as it changes our own and our child's future!)

Just now I am catching up on a few threads I had missed. This one is a real jewel.
Also, I see that I am not the only one 'rediscovering' this 'lost thread' today. Seeing some of the new tools for parenting such as the 'Pengos' book makes my heart jump for joy at the possibilities opening up for parents and children.
And I am realizing that great old threads can be reincarnated, just like the rest of us

Thank you, Golmona for starting this thread and for all the wonderful contributors who posted such amazing content

 

[Jeanne Barrimore]

So happy you like this. It has been - and still is - an inspiration for me.
By the way, since it's mentioned in this thread, in the "GrownUps" book, with the "How to Use this book" advice, there is also reference to QHHT. Gender identity too, which has so much to do with reincarnation and one very good way of introducing the subject to people who have never given much thought to the subject. Just point out how many of TGs say..."I was born in the wrong body..." Says it all, doesn't it?

 

[Lila]

In this video by Sadhguru he talks about (among other things) how, in the school he is planning spirituality won't be a teaching. Rather, the goal will be to allow a child space to figure out to figure things out for themselves. In his words,
"If you are allowed to figure out things for yourself there is no other way than to turn inwards to learn things about life", thereby allowing a child to explore their spirituality on their own.
The bulk of this part of the discussion starts about 17:21


In his usual Saghguru style, smiles, shrugs and jokes are interspersed with a provocative talk about what we really want from our educational system and how we have gotten what we have asked for (in our current educational system), to our children's detriment.

 

[Lila]

Ooh, I just saw a Sadghuru talk on 'how to handle teenagers'.
I know that's on my list!

I find his videos are a lovely way to have a laugh with/at myself so that I can easily move on to another track than the one I've been butting my head up against, wondering why I am not getting where I've wanted to go