The Power You Hold as a Parent

You have the unique power to shape the life of another human being – either positively or negatively. 

You have the power to change the future of your own family (for generations), and at the same time the future of this world.

Our children are crying out for us to show up differently than the way we were raised. We need to set aside our preconceived notions about how children should be in order to fit in to the norms of this society, and give them what they really need to thrive. Children have a lot to teach us – if we will listen to understand. 

Here’s a powerful truth: 

When we become better humans, we raise better humans. 

The potential to change the future is in the hearts and minds of parents. We have an opportunity to re-parent and grow ourselves into the guides and mentors that these next generations need.

What do you want for your children?

Many parents when asked what they want for their kids say pretty much the same thing – 

You want your kids to be healthy and happy.

I’d like to take this a bit deeper…

In addition to being healthy and happy, do you also want your children to value and love themselves and grow into their full potential? Do you want them to be emotionally secure in all their relationships, including their relationship with you?

Peaceful empowered parenting is not about raising children to become what this society deems to be acceptable or successful. There are plenty of people considered to be successful, showing distressing signs of low self-worth and doing destructive things. Perhaps it’s because their feelings and needs were not accepted or understood as children, or their authenticity was crushed by the people who cared for them. Our society is in a world of trouble since it’s been created out of a paradigm of control, violence, manipulation, and suppression of feelings and needs. 

We have to do things differently in order to raise emotionally secure, resilient, thriving children. 

Gabor Mate MD shares a powerful truth in his book – The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture: “Our society devalues the things that children need to develop.” He writes, “it so happens that parents today take their cues from a culture that has lost touch with both the child’s developmental needs and what parents require to be able to meet those needs.” 

Mothers are blessed with innate parenting instincts that are perfectly aligned with children’s developmental needs. Yet most mothers are alienated from their own deepest instincts and intuition. 

Mothers are NOT to blame, though. Most moms are dealing with an enormous amount of ongoing stress, judgement and pressure. As a mother, you may be handling everything and everyone’s needs to the point of exhaustion. With no time for yourself, it’s no wonder you may not be able to see, feel or hear your inner voice and to be present to what’s happening beneath your child’s behavior. 

You may have started out with great intentions to raise a happy, healthy child. But along the way something went wonky and you may have a child who’s acting out with distressing behavior. It’s difficult to not react negatively to this behavior, so you end up over time damaging the most important thing – your relationship.

If you are recognizing this in your family, give yourself an enormous amount of compassion. You were not given the understanding and tools you need to raise children within a culture that doesn’t value or support healthy parenting or the true needs of children.

For many people, parenting has become all about managing behavior. There are plenty of parenting books, courses and posts that will give you the nuts and bolts of how to control your child by managing their behavior. It becomes all about getting compliant kids. Compliance might seem like the goal, except control and manipulation don’t work for building healthy relationships and intrinsic motivation to do good things. 

Yet when you don’t know what else to do, it’s easy to get caught up in the constant struggle of trying to manage behavior.

Can you imagine a different path?

Imagine if this was your parenting experience…

• You are an empowered leader in your family, and everyone feels safe, secure, and connected with each other. 

• Your children feel unconditionally loved and accepted, and they are empowered to grow into their full potential.

• They are emotionally secure, and they know how to be with all of their feelings, including disappointment or anger.

• Your home has a relaxed, peaceful and fun atmosphere, without power struggles. 

• There is respect and cooperation between you and your kids and you listen to each other. 

• You prioritize your needs and honor your feelings, so you are emotionally equipped to support your children in their feelings and upsets. 

• You have a deep connection and a strong, healthy relationship with your kids. 

• If there are siblings, they look out for each other and when conflicts arise, they work it out. 

• You feel a sense of calm and confidence in relating to your kids. 

• They trust you and will confide in you when difficult situations arise in school or with friends.

• You find the work of parenting to be deep, meaningful and fulfilling. And you’re actually really enjoying your children!

Let’s go a little further into the future. Imagine if you could say this about your teen-age or adult children…

• They have a strong sense of who they are and fully believe in themselves. 

• They know their value and don’t look outside of themselves for approval.

• They are emotionally secure, empowered, resilient and self-motivated.

• They trust their feelings and intuition. 

• They are independent and confident in managing their lives.

• They like to hang out with you, and you have a life-long healthy, positive relationship.

• They are free from addictions and feel secure to say no in unsafe situations.

• They are present, focused and fulfilled in work and healthy relationships.

• They have developed an inner strength and an ability to face life with confidence. 

• They are in harmony with themselves and their environment. 

• They are critical thinkers and creative problem-solvers. 

• They have the ability to collaborate and communicate. 

• They love themselves unconditionally and value their authenticity and uniqueness. 

• They love others unconditionally and value the authenticity and uniqueness of others.

Does this seem unachievable? I don’t think so. There is a paradigm shift happening right now where parents are committing to raising up the next generation to create a better family life – as well as a better world for us all. We are fostering the future adults needed to create peace, healing and change in this world.

No one does it perfectly, that’s not possible. But even if you were able to create a little bit of this outcome for your family, would that be fulfilling for you?

I invite you to believe in your children and in yourself. I invite you to step into your ability to be the empowered leader in your family and take on this most sacred and important endeavor. 

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