The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering Our Children (2010) - Plot & Excerpts
Another book I wanted to love because of the glowing reviews & the premise of seeing your child and your parenting journey together with your child, as a spiritual guide. I would choose Peaceful Parent, Happy Kids (Laura Markham) over this book any day.The book is aimed more at parents of teens, so maybe I am blissfully unaware of the battleground that is teen parenting (my kids are 4 and 1). However the example she gives of parents in trouble are often very extreme (verbal and sometimes physical abuse, at least that's how I view belittling, name-calling, and pushing kids around) and not at all relatable. Then there are other examples of "difficulty connecting" and other vague terms/behaviours, which are connected to the parent not having been able to meet the emotional needs of the child when they were very small. She says you can absolutely turn this around, but compared to Markham's book (or How to talk to kids..), there is very little practical advice.I just found it alienating, depressing and also a little insulting how the author assumed the readers would be parents who know nothing of gentle parenting: I feel the people who read this book are more likely to already be in that camp, than to be of the more authoritarian or punitive parenting camp.It was also far too long, it seems that the main idea or goal of the book is to indeed see your child as a sort of spiritual compass, someone to show you where you can grow and to do so together (which I really like); but because it is a parenting book, it had to have some more discipline/stages of life chapters in it, but none of them are then complete (quite a few pages on infancy, then toddlerhood, then "school" 2 pages and then middle school, very short indeed.)I think I would have liked the book better if the author had:- Stuck to the main idea of spiritual guidance through your own parenting journey;- Given a first part, describing where the idea of this come from, the basics of mindfulness & stillness, the 'as is' world;- Then given a second part with lots of practical examples from all kinds of different parents (ages of kids, family type, etc.) and prompts on how use those situations (or how those parents used those situations) to reflect on their spiritual path and internal growth;- And then given a third part with more general meditations, resources and possibly things like games to play with kids, activities, conversations, etc;- And had done a little research on who the main audience of the book would be.One last thing I didn't agree with (but that may be more to do with spiritual choice) was the idea of helping kids disassociate from their feelings and thoughts. I know this is an important concept, but I personally prefer to teach my kids that I accept their feelings, their opinions and their thoughts for what they are, and also help them deal with them by learning to understand them and to emotion coach them. Tsabary suggests leaving a tantrumming toddler alone (if it is safe) but that teaches the kid nothing except that strong and scary emotions are something s/he is left to deal with by him/herself, something I strongly disagree with.Good/new things I learned from this book:- Extra emphasis on the idea that your child is who s/he is meant to be. This helped me solidify the concept of "acceptance" in every day parenting;- To look at my own restlessness, inability to be still and how my kids will learn that from me if I don't change it now;- The positive idea of growing together, of seeing your child and your struggles in parenthood as a compass to direct you to those areas that still need your loving attention. As the parent of three children, 17, 18 and 23 I feel I have the right to suggest that if you are having difficulty with raising children or know someone who is, this might be the single best gift you can give. My own upbringing was frought with so much tumultuous and chaotic behavior on the part of parents who only knew to do the best they could based on a history and generations of dysfunction passed down, becoming a single mom at 31, I knew I had to do better. And I knew I had to stay home and raise my son and be with him, seeing to it that the first five years were filled with exploration, fun, creativity and lots of just doing nothing but being. He is a tremendous gift to all today. I believe that we hold the key to bringing up children who are compassionate, empathetic, honest and loving, if we are brave enough and willing enough to explore our own deep-seated, unanswered problems. Children are guides to our own spiritual awakening, meant to be loved and honored, not broken and split open from wounds and sores indebted to us. We can learn a great deal from the innocense of a child whose only goal is to be and live in the moment he or she is experiencing untethered by fear, anxiety, complaints and depression. We set them up for the best life or cause them to fall victim to the worst that life has to offer. It (their life) and they are in our hands not to be molded to our own expression, but to be allowed to flourish and be the wonderful expression of soul they were born with. Since each is so different, we must be malleable enough and flexible enough to bend toward them and not away; to raise them to become conscious individuals, we must become conscious parents. What a great new approach, some may already have the gift and the intuition to be a conscious parent, but I suggest with all this modern technology, we are all to fast becoming all to unconscious. REad and give it as a gift, for sure!
What do You think about The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering Our Children (2010)?
A great book that helped me examine my own parenting. A little repetitive at times.
—Darkcrusade1
Rarely give a book 5 stars... This deserves it. Love the questions in the appendix.
—aglasnovich
Excellent read for EVERYONE!A way of true BEING that could revolutionize us all
—esslashay
