Peaceful Parenting

Parenting in an a new normal

What has this past month been like for you? If you're the parent of school-aged children you may be feeling a lot of pressure these days. Some of you are working from home while hands-on parenting. Home schooling used to be the practice of a minority (myself included), and is now the norm. If you have a child with special needs or learning challenges, you may have added complications.

Are you finding support in all of that? There are resources available to you. Do seek them out. This is a time for asking for what we need, and leaning into available resources.

Kim Golding on peaceful parenting

My colleague forwarded this on to me just yesterday. It's from Kim S. Golding, 2015, with an added acknowledgement of Clover Childcare, Norfolk.

This gentle 7-step guide may be a helpful resource for all of us as parents? First, it offers a reminder for us to take a minute to check in with our self when facing into a parenting conundrum. "Calm begets calm; peace begets peace." So say parenting specialists. That calm begins with us as parents. Take a look at this:

That trusty oxygen mask

The well-worn metaphor of the oxygen mask on the airplane applies here: Mom? Dad? Take your own deep breaths first. Then tend to your kiddo.

One of my practice instructors has patiently reminded me, "When we change the dialogue with which we speak to our self, we'll change the way we speak to others. As we transform inwardly, we'll change outwardly." What does she mean by that? Be nice!

This is the time to be "excessively gentle" (John O'Donohue) with ourselves. And as we turn compassion inward, we'll find ourselves more able to be patient and understanding outwardly.

May peaceful parenting bring about peaceful kiddos in a decidedly un-peaceful time in history. You've got this! And where you need back-up? Reach out. You are not alone.

pick n pull

“Self-isolation” and other new normals

Self-isolation. Quarantine. Social distancing. COVID-19. Home school. PPE. The language and practice of our times has shifted forever. Virtually overnight, we've adopted a new set of priorities (toilet paper!). Our vernacular includes words that we had little frame of reference for when the calendar flipped to 2020.

Living in our Sci-Fi-like world

What has it been like for you to suddenly face into a world where masks, gloves, and empty grocery shelves are commonplace? Are you doing well?

In my other life I have a unique "job": I listen for a living. Not as a therapist or counselor, but as one who holds story and asks questions. Challenging questions. Questions that help us to sink deeply into the mysteries and fears and wonderments of life. "Why is there suffering?" "What can I do about feeling completely overwhelmed?" "Is grief a form of mental illness?" "Am I broken?" "Is there a God? And if there is...what the heck is going on here?!"

The weird and wobbly shift we're experiencing globally burbles those questions to the surface for some of us. When getting in a car and driving to run an errand feels like you've landed in a B-grade pandemic movie...well...it can get the curiosity about the deep things stirring.

Boredom...and overwhelm

Do you have the sense that we're living in an altered reality of extremes? Those who are isolated alone, without work or resources, facing into unrelenting boredom. Others who, overnight, began juggling full-time work, hands and eyes-on parenting, and pandemic fears. Seniors with loved ones desperately reaching toward them; elderly feeling abandoned and fated to fall sick...alone. Essential workers grinding out hours of minimum-wage labor in the face of moment-by-moment risk of illness. Helpers (so many many many helpers) working flat-out to heal, relieve, come alongside suffering.

Where do you land on the spectrum? Are you okay? Maybe you feel this is all a hoax and you're just weary of the news reel. Perhaps you're grateful for the relief that the demand that you remain at home has brought into your overworked, over-extended life?

We're all in this together

However we're experiencing this wildly disruptive upheaval, we're all in it. Those of us that have enough food to eat and a place to shelter (in self-isolation...with, or without loved ones) may come through this quite comfortably. Many will suffer much more intently. There are speed bumps to getting medication, mental health care, financial aid, and the critical social contact of human touch. Some families are sardine-canned into tiny living spaces. Some rough and rocky relationships are unsafely confined behind closed windows and doors.

Our entire charity roster has taken a tremendous hit as everyone collectively holds their breath. As many of us clutch our wallets and resources close: what if I need what I have? What if there isn't enough to go around? I feel this shift in myself, absolutely. Where I might typically give without thinking? Now, I think carefully and do the math slowly.

When giving money and groceries isn't an option

Donate a Car Canada continues to work on behalf of almost 1,000 Canadian charities. If you need more space in your garage to create a little distance between you and your self-isolating loved ones, consider donating that recycle-ready car through our program! Clear the driveway. Clean out that back patch in the yard that's been cradling your, "I promise I'm gonna' fix it up one day!" old collector. We can help you reach toward the cause you love!

pick n pull