“The reason we struggle with insecurity is because we compare our behind-the-scenes with everyone else’s highlight reel.” Steve Furtick
No matter how well we think we are doing as a parent, in our minds someone else is always doing it better. And if we think that we are inept at it, well then, every other household in the free world is experiencing “parenting’s greatest happy endings” daily. Toss culture into the mix and we have a series of feel good moments along with wondering why I even said that experiences that can sometimes be counterintuitive to who we really want to be as a parent.
This is what I call Mind Full – Parenting. Our minds are full of all the things that were done to us, said to us, passed on to us even those things that are buried in our subconscious. Our minds are full of our cultural norms and criticisms to measure up to what kind of parent our culture requires, whether it’s our nation’s culture, ethnic or racial culture, pop culture. Our minds are full of our fantasies of how we measure up to other superhuman parents, full of all the useful techniques we’ve learned in our parenting classes, stress management workshops and that new parenting book we are ferociously reading (like this one.)
No matter how much you try to imitate the folks next door or how much knowledge you obtain, shifting things in your household continues to be difficult until you are able to create a more realistic vision of you as a successful parent.
What do I mean? I am sure we’ve all experienced the excitement of learning the latest, greatest stress management technique or turned the last page of the most recently touted parenting book energized by the prospect of eradicating those endless tantrums or those get-on-your-last-nerve sibling wars. We go for it right? Feeling totally empowered with visions of parting the red sea through our heroic efforts to breathe, listen carefully, talk them through the process and come out on the other side happy, harmonious and stress free.
But when they turn and look at us like nothing we just said or did matters, or worse they continue with their exasperating behavior, and emotions derail us and we return to yelling, threatening, swearing or all the “bad” reactions we swore we would never again engage in after finding this virtual panacea, we are back to feeling like an epic parenting failure.
A New Vision
The truth is… it’s not that you are a failure or even that the techniques are faulty. It is that in this fast food, instant results society, we do not give ourselves the time or the confidence to achieve good results. I would go so far as to say, in this celebrity driven, airbrushed, bling- chasing consciousness that permeates our culture we envision the results to be glamorous, without blemish, and sparkling.
My experience, as a practitioner in the world of conflict resolution, mindfulness and stress management who is also parenting with these techniques, has shown me that the best results are often not so pretty, filled with human frailties with sparkling moments waiting to be acknowledged underneath. Getting there requires being committed to becoming a parent who is Patient, Present, Persevering and Willing to Break Culture and I am here to show you how. But first, you have to see yourself in the above description and know that you are ready for a different path.
This an excerpt from my next book. As I write about leadership, I absolutely cannot leave out one of the most important leadership roles there is… parenting. Please know that parenting is defined by me as taking on the loving commitment and responsibility of raising a child at whatever age they are when you take on this commitment.
