Conscious Parenting

by Greeting Dawn

I don’t know what Conscious Parenting is? I’m not a psychologist or a child expert. But I do know that conscious parenting is about being conscious of being a parent. 

It’s intentional, and it’s not by default. It’s about stopping on our crackberry’s and I-things(sp) and observing the details that go in our children’s lives. Call it attention to detail, if you must. It’s about not taking events, situations and happenings at face value but looking for a deeper meaning that allows us a peak inside the workings of our children’s minds.

It’s not about control – rather it’s about letting go. 

We, parents tend to bring up our children the way we’d been brought up or sometimes its the opposite. “I was brought in a strict disciplinary environment…it stifled my creativity. So, I’ll let my kids enjoy and have fun”. Not that both ideas are wrong, but a fixed set of ideals will lead to extremities which won’t be a healthy thing – either for parents or for children.

So the idea of conscious parenting is to simply be aware of finding the balance. Looking at a one-off event in isolation and making judgements on that will probably pull in the sand. It’s the series of events that lead up that one event is crucial. Most often…rather, each and every time I’ve found from my experience that if me and my wife try to understand what the kid’s thinking about - not what we assume she must be or ought to be thinking – but really thinking, then we can get to the crux and it’s the little things that we just overlook which are the things that may bother them.

So, what I’ve tried to do here is find those pearls of experiences in my family’s daily life and wrap them with words. Real thing is well…real – words can’t express the feelings, the loving touch, the hidden tears, nuances in tone and speech – but whatever I can express – it’s here.

Happy Parenting…a conscious one!

(Greeting Dawn, 2011)