When we desire to parent differently from how we were parented, to listen to our child with compassion and caring, to hear their feelings as they arise - we mostly need to begin with ourselves first.
This is because our own yet to be healed hurts will get touched by our children, often and relentlessly.
We can find this process hard and painful as we get activated by our children and it is why many more behaviourist orientated parents can look towards rewards or punishments to ensure children are more compliant.
Children are mostly held to even higher emotional standard than most adults simply to prevent adults from getting activated.
When we are thinking things like our children are over reacting, being manipulative or selfish when they express their emotions; or when we find it irritating when they do certain things, it is a sign we need to look at how we were responded to when we were children and cried and expressed emotions.
As parents when we think harsher things about our children it is mostly a sign that we were responded to harshly, and healing is needed.
When we get activated by our children it is an opportunity for us to heal and finally have heard what couldn't be held and heard by our own parents.
Mostly we need someone else to hold our feelings as they arise. This is because when our hurts first occurred, when we were children, there was an absence of safety and connection. Now as adults we need internal and external safety and connection to heal.
This is why I have a membership specifically with this in mind.
When we can listen to what comes up for ourselves first we can then listen to our beautiful children. Listening to our children then changes from being hard and taking effort to listening with ease, presence, compassion and authenticity.
What I love about aware, gentle attuned parenting is that there is often a beautiful flow backwards and forwards between ourselves and our children when we undertake our own healing.
As we listen and love and tend to our children often it becomes easier to do this for ourselves, and as we do more of this for ourselves we give more to our children, and so an every deepening compassion process flows between us and our children.
Often my clients will say to me, as part of this process of reparenting, I can understand why parents treated me in the way they did because of their own yet to be healed trauma, and are therefore hesitant in their healing because they don't desire to make their parents wrong. This process is not about making our parents wrong and it is about acknowledging and being with the impact their parenting had on us.
We all make mistakes as parents and at times inadvertently hurt our children and we do the best we can, with the information we have in the moment, and when we have support and have our own experiences and feelings listened our lineage trauma heals and change finally becomes possible for us and for our beautiful children as we parent differently.
Much love
Megan
