About the Book
This guide is a commonsense approach to the challenging art of parenting. It is an offer of genuine suppport and guidance to encourage parents to believe in themselves and their children. The book helps parents gain a deeper understanding of parenting children from both a practical and holistic, spiritual perspective. It posits suggestions and useful insights into ways of bypassing the inevitable hurdles of parenting without compromising the enjoyment of the process.
Table of Contents:
Introduction - understanding the task: changing needs, artful parenting, protecting the child, seeing the whole, knowing your goals. Finding the way - understanding spoiling, defining the issues, in simpler times, our invisible times, families apart, beyond common sense; knowing the child - meeting the inner reality, the inner wisdom, machines can't grow, animal instincts, uniquely human qualities; allowing humanness - human thinking, heartfelt thinking, recognizing feelings, handling negative feelings, allowing individuality; the child meets the world - learning boundaries, guiding interests, rule of three, learning from the environment, valuing harmony; punishment or discipline - understanding the difference, power needs, learning respect, social consciousness, behaviour is learned; from discipline or self discipline - learning healthy choices, finding balance, social learning, personal values, sharing with others; learning values - taking responsibility, resolving conflict, checking the rules, family rules, making right choices; image or reality - caring for things, valuing nature, looking beyond image, seeking inner reality, cooperation from caring; nature, needs and humanness - knowing the whole person, need or want, understanding nature and needs, developing trust, setting limits, need for acceptance; learning for harmony - society's ways, observation, realistic expectations, self esteem, solving problems; affirming the child - notice me please, sharing tasks, building self confidence; calm mealtimes - physiological/psychological needs, personal likes and dislikes, avoid eating wars; presenting healthy food, the pitfalls are many; eating with gratitude, avoiding rewarding with sweets, enjoying eating; happy bedtimes - the need for ritual, the miracle of sleep, relaxing in comfort, transition to sleep, value of ritual, fear of the dark, bedtime problems; listening to your child - communication through words, communication through listening, "I" messages, understanding through words, excuse me please, different views; growing socially - practising for life, the value of rules, experiencing differences, enjoy the experience, fair play, the urge to grow; the world we live in - seeking values, becoming aware, human qualities, honouring others.
