Parenting Principles

From diapers to decisions. This phrase captures the essence of parenting because, once you’re a parent, you’re in it for life.

As brand-new parents, wouldn’t it be nice to have an instruction manual to bring home with our precious little bundles of joy? Something that would teach us how to nurture this being into the best possible version of him or her self?

As we grow, we learn more about and better understand what parenting is. As a society, we model what we know and with the high demands of life, parenting can often turn into days filled with putting out fires, helping kids with their homework, and shuttling them to and from afterschool activities. Sometimes it feels like a vicious cycle. Or better yet, it’s like the Groundhog Day of parenting.

As someone who is constantly trying to learn as I go through life, I feel we, as parents, need to look at things from a totally different lens…or at least remind ourselves of the lens we had when we held our babies for the first time. Before our new bundle arrived, we stocked up on all the books on “what to expect when you’re expecting,” Lamaze classes, breastfeeding and the countless other guides designed for new parents to make sure we’re prepared for what’s ahead. But are we ever?

As new parents, our primary instinct is to protect and love. We know nothing else and, in fact, as new mommies and daddies, this is what gets us through the tiresome days and sleepless nights.

As our children become mobile, we’re first to cover every electric socket, stove and toilet, and install every alarm and lock known to man. Then the “terrible twos” arrive and a shift seems to take place. Honestly, this is where the work really begins. As our children transition out of diapers, this is the time to start molding, modeling and mentoring them to give them the necessary social skills they’ll need to get through this thing called life.

I’m not talking about helicopter parenting, or what I call “ostrich parenting” (head in the sand parenting). I’m talking evolutionary parenting. Why are we parenting our children the way our parents raised us or how their parents raised them? Times are different, struggles are different and, as a society, we know different. We learn through the years and, as parents, we have an opportunity to infuse these ideas into our everyday parenting.

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