Need to find greater peace in your parenting? Get your FREE Stop Yelling & Start Connecting Starter Guide today!
Need greater peace in your parenting? Get your FREE Stop Yelling & Start Connecting Starter Guide today!
Do you ever wonder why you are able to talk yourself out of doing something that you know is good for you? You set out to change your habits, and several days in, you find yourself back in your old patterns. It’s likely your childhood messages that are holding you back.
Every adult was once a child, and this child experienced life in its purest form. Home to our authentic self, our inner child is where we carry our childhood messaging. In order to live authentically, we need to first heal our inner child.
To be a cycle breaker means you are willing to ask the tough questions that relatives couldn’t or wouldn’t ask. It means seeking to understand your behaviors and uncover patterns passed down from previous generations. It requires you to be vulnerable, but the rewards are worth it.
Some families pass on heirlooms from one generation to the next. Sometimes those heirlooms are valuable pieces of jewelry or furniture. Sometimes it is a box of letters our great-grandfather sent home to our great-grandmother during the First World War. For others, rather than a valuable or sentimental item, the history of generational dysfunction or trauma is passed from one generation to the next.
The parenting relationship involves two people: you and your child. When there is strife in the relationship, we often look to the kids. We question why they aren’t listening, why they are making things so difficult. Rarely, do we turn the microscope back at ourselves. But to become a better parent, we should.
Authoritative. Authoritarian. Permissive. Neglectful. Tiger. Helicopter. Lawn mower. Gentle. Responsive. Conscious. Respectful. The list of parenting styles is endless. Add one more to that list: authentic parenting.
THIS IS YOUR YEAR!
Or is it?
Are you over it yet? The “New Year, New You,” “Grab the bull by the horns!” “MAKE THIS THE BEST YEAR EVER!” posts yet?
? I am.
The start of a new year is all about going hardcore. How this is YOUR chance! New beginnings! Capricorn energy! Full moon!
Maybe it happens frequently. Or maybe it only happened once. Suddenly, you find yourself screaming at your child. You’ve lost all control, but you don’t remember getting there. You feel ashamed and vow it will never happen again. But it does. Learning what got you there is the first step to preventing it. It’s time to know your triggers.
Whether it is during the toddler years when tantrums are an almost hourly occurrence, or during the teen years when simply walking past them in the hallway is enough to garner an eye-roll, or somewhere in between, our children are not out to give us a hard time. They are having a hard time.
Being an authentic parent means that you are real – you show a full range of emotions. But it also means recognizing when those emotions impact others in a way we don’t intend. To be an authentic parent also means having the ability to recognize a mistake, own it, and correct it.