Conscious Parenting

[Terell Kirby]

Completed the Ultimate Life Puropse Course and found out my mission in life is to eradicate dysfunctional families and empower children through making their parents more wiser/conscious.

This is deeply rooted in my own experience growing up in a dysfunctional family and the burdens it carries in ones adult life.

I am now working on a life coaching certification, specifically parent coaching. For those interest, please post me what conscious parenting means to you and what are some things you wish your old folks did better in your childhood.

Edited May 6, 2021 by Terell Kirby
Typo

[Nahm]

@Terell Kirby

I believe in and am aligned with your purpose. My youngest is 10 and my oldest is 27, so I’ve pretty much screwed up in all ways which can be screwed up. Happy to share from experience, and share some of the household best practices. If you’d like to chat sometime let me know. Godspeed. 

[SgtPepper]

Hey, I work with family and children.

In my experience, conscious parenting comes with clear communication, clear rules (ie. no yelling, no cursing), realistic and defined expectations, and being consistent. Not feeding poor behavior choices with your energy and attention, instead feed positive behavior even if it is a small step towards parent's desired behavior. 

Using reinforcement instead of punitive - too many parents are too punitive which just surpasses the "bad" behavior and does not teach the envisioned behavior they want to see.

Parents may not even be aware of how their behavior to their children actually create the behavior they are so conflicted with. It can be pretty challenging to untangle.

Resources: 

1. Non-violent communication by Marshall Rosenburg. It is the most conscious way to communicate with another person.

2. Nurtured Heart Approach by Howard Glasser - Best way to consciously uplift children.

Furthermore, I'd say we need some knowledge of behaviorism. You gotta learn what motivates individuals to engage in behaviors you like, and you gotta learn what is motivating "bad" behavior too which can only be known through observing behavior and environmental changes.

Edited May 9, 2021 by SgtPepper

[Yarco]

I'm having my first kid later this year and it's something I've really been thinking about and trying to plan for.

To me the two biggest things are "positive discipline" and "non-violent communication". Still wrapping my head around them, especially the first one. I'm not sure how to use these things in the moment when a child is acting out yet.

When you grew up with parents who yelled and hit, I think it's going to take a huge amount of mental energy to adapt to these new strategies. In the short-term it seems so much easier to just yell and threaten. But I know personally how damaging that can be in the long run. Doing one of the visualization exercises in the life purpose course showed me that you can have a "traumatic experience" from something that was seemingly minor and small in the moment, but changes your mindset and life trajectory entirely. You don't know what little thing you say or do might mess your kid up forever.

I would like to give my kid the best possible upbringing and traumatize them as little as possible. But I can already sense how exhausting that's going to be. I'll have to be particularly conscious not to fall into learned behaviors from my parents, especially when I'm really tired and stressed.

Edited May 9, 2021 by Yarco

[Bob Seeker]

I have a friend who is a parent coach, she has a background as a psychologist as well. Her podcast is called The Parenting Presence. Her name is Julia. Maybe check it out. Some good practical advice.

[Bando]

@Terell Kirby What do you think about "Disciplinary spanking" Unpopular opinion but I think a spanking for serious mistakes with a lesson added in the end is a suitable way to teach your kids how to not to behave, only up until the child is 10 though. 

[SgtPepper]

18 hours ago, Bando said:

@Terell Kirby What do you think about "Disciplinary spanking" Unpopular opinion but I think a spanking for serious mistakes with a lesson added in the end is a suitable way to teach your kids how to not to behave, only up until the child is 10 though. 

What do you think about the police smacking your face every time you speed? 

That's a recipe for teaching your child poor conflict-resolution skills man. 

You teach kids how to behave by shaping the behavior you want to see. If kids are doing "Bad" behavior, they generally do not know they are and are getting some pay off out of it - so the answer is to remove the reward and increase the reward for engaging in good behavior.

Also have clear rules - "no ______" <-- fill in the blank. 

Edited May 11, 2021 by SgtPepper

[Terell Kirby]

Thank you all for the feedback and resources. @SgtPepper I couldn’t agree more with your point about shaping behavior.

[Bando]

@SgtPepper

On 5/11/2021 at 4:13 PM, SgtPepper said:

What do you think about the police smacking your face every time you speed? 

That's a recipe for teaching your child poor conflict-resolution skills man. 

You teach kids how to behave by shaping the behavior you want to see. If kids are doing "Bad" behavior, they generally do not know they are and are getting some pay off out of it - so the answer is to remove the reward and increase the reward for engaging in good behavior.

Also have clear rules - "no ______" <-- fill in the blank. 

Nice straw man, I didn't say spank your kid everytime they do something wrong only for serious mistakes, little kids dont understand "no means no" even if you take away the "reward" because their ego hasn't expanded enough to consider other people's perspectives and will continue to do the same behavior if there's no negative consequence.

I remember when I was little I would see friends of mine say the most disrespectful things to their parents and i would be thinking "how tf can he say that to his mom, i could never" Ofc this needs moderation and should always be accompanied with a lesson. 

[Raphael]

If you become able to create a system that widespread information about healthy parenting and help parents all around the world, your life purpose will be one of the most impactful ever and you will be seen as one of the most important individuals who ever existed on the planet.

[Terell Kirby]

@Raphael thank you for your powerful words...that means a lot.