Like so many others around the world at the start of this year, members of the Global Wellspring family and I watched with alarm the growing spread and impact of COVID-19 in our country and elsewhere in the world. Our biggest worry was the pandemic’s potential to spiral out of control and cause mental and relational struggles within individuals and families.
I don’t know about you, but this has been a tough parenting season for many people and even more challenging for individuals parenting in two different homes. The fear is real, the hard conversations are in full swing, and it seems like the smallest things require significant cost/benefit analyses. Some of the best parenting strategies rely on modeling the behaviors we want to see in our children. It turns out that we need to be the adult that we want our kids to grow up to be.
There is immeasurable power in our children watching us practice self-kindness vs. berating ourselves or putting ourselves down when we stumble, fail, or make mistakes. No matter how we encourage them to talk to themselves, what they watch the parents do is what really matters.
And, letting them in on our process is equally as powerful: “I dropped the ball today, and I’m struggling to be kind to myself about it and talk to myself the way I’d talk to someone I love.” Modeling, normalizing that it isn’t easy, and connecting with your child helps build significant and lasting relationships with your children.