The Art of Parenting: Learning to Live at the Edge of the Unknown

As parents — as people! — we all (I’m pretty sure all of us, yes?) wish there were a simple way, a method that is tried and true and guaranteed to get us the results we hope for… be this a fitness program, a healthy diet, a supplement protocol, a parenting handbook, a financial plan, a spiritual practice, a qualified approach to ANYTHING.

“Just tell me what to do and promise me it will lead me where I want to end up, and I will do it!” Sound familiar?

Our ego-minds want so very much to know, to be sure, to have the secure, guaranteed path and outcome laid out for us.

But, as you may have noticed, Life has other plans. This earthly existence keeps derailing the “for sure’s”, keeps throwing curve balls our way, keeps nixing our perfect plans and visions, and instead nudges, forces, coaxes, calls, yells, whispers and pushes us to: let it go.

What?!!

Yes. To let go of this fabricated, deeply ingrained notion that “there is one way to do it right and if I just know what that one way is, everything will be all right”.

Let it go.

Are you sure?

Yep.

You know, as we all do, as we all experience repeatedly, that Life is otherwise.

And, when it comes to parenting — this crazy, exquisite dance between our self and our child—Life utterly derails any such notion of “predictable, known, for sure and for certain”.

This is not to say that many of the parenting books and parenting methods and parenting tips and parenting know-hows and parenting experts and parenting “fill-in-the-blanks” are not helpful; they often are, supplying encouraging tips and insights to try out and help us along.

But all of them will only go so far.

They won’t ever get you to that solid place that you so wish you could get to. It’s impossible to provide the “right” response to the zillions of possible parenting moments, dilemmas, disasters, questions and curve balls you encounter.

You will still come face to face with situations in which you are at loss, in which you really have no idea what to do or say, in which you have tried all kinds of things and nothing seems to be working. At the end of the day you will still be left wondering if you shouldn’t have, couldn’t have done “it” differently—“it” being any aspect of parenting you can think of. You will never know for sure whether you should have protected your child more or challenged her more. You will still wonder if he needed more guidance or less, if she would have been better served had you trusted her more or directed her more, if he needed more comfort or more stimulus, more independence or more connection.

When traversing the territory, when engaged in the actual doing of parenting, it is not this or that method that will offer you a solid handrail to clutch on to. It is not the “apply this or that” technique that gives you the ultimate ground to stand on as you seek your way through the storms and the sunny sky days.

It is INSIGHT. Learning about how children develop, how they mature and flourish. Understanding how their brains, their hearts, bodies and spirits: grow, make sense of the world, integrate or get stuck, release tension, connect and repair.

It is DISCERNMENT. Making choices from a place of seeing, rather than guessing. Making sense through awareness, rather than because someone else said so.

And it is EMBODIMENT, which is another way of saying lots of practice.

The practice of learning to stand calm and steady, to breath with a cracked-open heart, and to keep breathing when a knee-jerk reaction is about to burst out of you.

The practice of self-awareness. Knowing your self—your tendencies, your type, your strengths and growing edges, your shadows, your soul. Also, continually inviting yourself into a fuller sense of belonging. You are not alone. You belong. You matter. You are loved. Receiving that fully, and living from that knowing.

The practice of presence. Of slowing down and being there, for your child.

The practice of listening between, beneath and beyond words. Listening for the emergent response, not memorizing what the ‘parenting book’ said.

The practice of trusting your innate, silent voice that knows because it loves. The voice that is there when all else becomes quiet.

The practice of forgiveness, to yourself and your child, for being human.

The practice of choice: thinking outside the hand-me-down box. Being brave and creative so that you discover and live what matters most to you and your child. So that you stand up for what is true for you and your family.

The practice of releasing attachment to your own subjective perspective, and of looking behind your child’s eyes, over and over.

The practice of meeting and engaging with your child as a sovereign person, while guiding and parenting him.

The practice of making love bigger than whatever else may be happening.

The practice of including and transcending ego. Gradually and consciously, coming home to your true self and enabling your child to live and flourish in his true self.

And the practice of practice! We can easily trip up on “Oh no, I’ll never be the perfect parent and I’m so stressed about that!” To evolve rather than perfect. To strive for consciousness while enveloping your efforts with generous doses of kindness, forgiveness and humor. One step at a time.

Discovering the simplicity on the other side of the complex territory that is Life, that is parenting, is about getting a hang of how to relax in the middle of the unknown, in the plenty of chaos, in the multitude of possibilities—that is the spiritual practice. That is the way forward to dancing at the edge of the unknown and coming through with your heart and her heart intact (perhaps a little frayed, but good and solid).

Remember: Your parenting flows from your being, much more than from your doing. As you become comfortable with living at the edge of the unknown, finding calm confidence within yourself while life continues to whirl and spiral in and around you, you will have truly learnt how to “dance in the rain, instead of waiting for the storm to pass”. You will become weatherproof!

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If you would like to join me and a wonderful, international group of parents as we explore and practice this comprehensive and underlying approach to parenting, I invite you to “Parenting as a Spiritual Practice – an 8-week online course that runs Oct. 10 – Dec. 5, 2016.

This course is designed to bring to life the full potential of parenthood: a transformative vessel for evolving yourself, your child, and the future. During these eight weeks I offer you perspectives, practices, discernment and insight that will help you discover an unshakeable ease and delight amidst the inevitable ups, downs and doubts of parenting.
www.integralparenting.com

 

Article originally posted on Huff Post, Sept. 29, 2016

 

Tender Hearts Walking Around in Adult-looking Costumes

June 21, 2016

A daily practice that is growing in me and becoming a welcome habit is to view my fellow adult beings with the additional perspective of imagining them as the child they were. I find it a quick, effective way to have more compassion, to understand an other more fully, to judge less and inquire more.

We are tender hearts, wrapped in adult-looking costumes.

Let’s not forget this as we interact with one another.

Behind the facade, behind each exterior is a tender heart, a vulnerable self.

Remembering this can help us soften, listen, bring forth kindness, curiosity and a generosity of spirit as we relate with each other.

Tender hearts walking around in adult-like costumes.

Yes, even the grumpy co-worker. And the impatient woman standing in line behind us at the grocery store. The nervous, fluttery chitchatting mum and the quick-to-react, intense spouse too, as well as the “whatever” uttered too often too easily. All of them. All of us.

There is an innocence tucked in each person. There is a vulnerable tender heart at the centre of us all. Under the mask of the coolest styliest person, under the slightly distant turning away of the shy one, under harsh words that are uttered, under the closing down of communication, under the overbearing loud in-your-faceness, under all of it, there is the tenderness, the innocence we share, we all had and were at the beginning.

Keeping this in mind opens us to seeing deeper, not excusing current behaviours, but understanding more completely, and then, with this bigger view, possibly hearing under- and overtones that could easily be overlooked, swept by and missed… and yet, if seen and heard, can provide doorways to presence, to healing and regeneration.

So this my invitation today: look for the tender hearts walking around in adult-like costumes.

With great love to your tender heart, whether you carry it out on your sleeve, tucked in gently and safe but within easy reach, further under the surface or deeply buried,

Miriam

Miriam Mason Martineau's photo.J

To Wait Actively

Today I offer you these questions from Sue Monk Kidd’s “Where the Heart Waits”:

“What has happened to our ability to dwell in the unknowing, to live inside a question and coexist with the tensions of uncertainty? Where is our willingness to incubate pain and let it birth something new? What has happened to patient unfolding, to endurance? These things are what form the ground of waiting.”

I invite you to sit with these questions. Don’t think too much, just sit with them, next to them. Or hold them on your lap or in your heart.

What arises in you?

Read more

Exploring Trust

Last week, during our homeschooling English class, A. and I watched this wonderful talk by Brene Brown on the Anatomy of Trust.

We took our time, we paused it here and there, discussed sections, took notes, and had an incredibly rich and insightful conversation about how and if we trust ourselves, and others.

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Regret: Facing, Feeling and Healing the Heartache of Lost Possibilities

A friend and colleague, recently turned 40, shared the following sentiment, “I have now reached the age when I experience regret. And it sucks.”

There, he said it. Just like that. I remember the relief I felt, hearing someone speak this out loud. Not whitewashing the experience with something like, “But it’s all good!” or negating the uncomfortable recognition by focusing one-sidedly on all the benefits of choices made and all the good intentions held. Just the raw and honest expression of regret, which, I find, gets spoken rarely these days.

Read more

Inspired by Moments of Emotional Brilliance — Tender and Tuned In: Part 3

Here’s the third and final vignette in my three-part blog series on delightful expressions of emotional health and capacity in children, ones that surprise and hearten us amidst the journey of helping them develop emotional intelligence (you can find the first one here> and the second one here>). This one was shared with me by a fellow mother about her daughter:

Since she is little, Maggie loves visiting stores with cuddly, soft stuffies, pretty shiny things, cute booklets, dollies, and the wide array of beautiful, creative toys and trinkets available in certain stores – these things make their way into her heart on a weekly basis when she goes to town with her mother. For the past few years, each time they are in town, she has felt compelled to get something, one thing. Sometimes her mother has acquiesced. Other times she hasn’t. Quietly her mother has wondered (and at times worried) why her daughter feels such a need to have and get all this stuff. “Have we raised her too materialistically?” “Why this drive to consume?” “She has so much already”. Read more

Inspired by Moments of Emotional Brilliance — Tender and Tuned In: Part 2

Here’s the second vignette from my three-part blog series about delightful expressions of emotional health and capacity in children, ones that surprise and hearten us amidst the journey of helping them develop emotional intelligence (you can read the first one here>):

It’s a golden late summer’s day. My daughter — 11 now — steps on a lazy wasp while playing with a bundle of kittens she is fostering from the local animal shelter. Startled by the immediate and powerful sensation of pain zipping through her foot, she tries to shake it off, and gets stung a second time. Read more

Inspired by Moments of Emotional Brilliance — Tender and Tuned In: Part 1

Children rely on our support and guidance in navigating the emotional ups and downs of life. Developing emotional intelligence takes time and is an ongoing journey for every human being. And yet our children sometimes also surprise us with delightful expressions of emotional health and capacity.

Over the past few months I have witnessed a few of those and find myself heartened every time I ponder them. I’d like to share some of them with you in a three-part blog series. May these vignettes encourage you too. May they inspire you. And help you notice the gems that may be happening right in front of you.

Here’s the first one: Read more

Ode to the Elasticity of the Mother Heart

I was a real family girl as a kid… well attached, loved my family to bits, substantially more prone to homesickness than my siblings. I remember the feeling of being curled up with my mama as one of the most all-encompassing experiences of complete goodness and safety.

And now? I live a long ways away from them. An ocean and a continent lie between us — about 8329.41 km (or 5175.67 miles)!

Home has shifted. My new family is now “home.” My daily heart-orientation circles around them, even as I still dearly love and appreciate my family of origin, and cherish our rare times together in person.

Such is the common story of growing up, of course, while taking place in all styles and variations. Generally this is how it goes: we start out close with and fully dependent on our parents. We grow up. We move away and make our own lives.

Now here’s the thing: Up until becoming a mother myself, I never fully appreciated just what that meant for the parent, and in this instance, for my mother. Read more

What to Do When My Child Lies? 13 Ways to Respond, Prevent, and Strengthen Honest Communication

Think of the times in your life you have lied. And why.

Were you afraid of what would happen if you told the truth? Worried how the other would react? Whether you’d get into trouble?

Or because you felt ashamed? Because covering up the truth seemed easier than dealing with the lie? Because you felt the other wasn’t ready to hear the truth?

Or perhaps because you didn’t even know the truth yourself, weren’t yet in touch with it? Or you just wished so very much that things were different? Read more