good parenting

This beautiful human, one of my dearest friends, and a recent bride, is about to become a mother today (latest tomorrow).

Over the past 9 months we've had many conversations about family, parenting, discipline, attachment, happiness and success. 

How do you raise a child that's well-adjusted and well-prepared for an unknown future? How do you become a "good" parent?

I think there is a natural tendency for most of us to correct, fix, and problem solve when it comes to our kids - but I'd argue that approach is not only less effective, over time it tends to alienate children. Punishment of any kind creates resentment, diminished trust, rebellion, and sometimes even revenge. Some children are defiant, others retreat into themselves and suffer, others lie and hide. 

By validating a child, you allow them to be separate and different, and show them they are still loved and accepted. 

Good parenting might be as easy as showing up to a field free of judgement and negotiating how to exist together in harmony, without making one's needs superior to another. 

Ultimately, our children go on to write their own story. They create their own masterpiece that is their life. If we taint it with our ideas and hurtful reactions before they even begin to create, we are amputating their creativity. Yet, how often do we think we are helping? We believe we know what is best, and we push our agenda on them, often angrily. 

If only they would do x,y, and z, they would be guaranteed _________ (happiness, success, whatever). But the funny thing about life is, there are no external guarantees. The only thing that lasts in life is not a relationship, or a job, or money, or a gold star sticker - it's how we feel about ourselves on the inside. And this is shaped primarily by our parents, and it probably determines our future more than any other factor. 

Maybe the best thing a parent can do, maybe the only thing a parent needs to help a child with, is to nurture the treasure within their child, or at the very least, not to damage it. The only parenting mantra we might all need to recite is: