Having worked with parents for the last 35 years and written books on parenting and relationships, I've discovered that one of the greatest challenges for us as parents is to be loving role-models for our children, showing our children through our behavior how to take personal responsibility for their own feelings and needs. Our children need to learn from our role-modeling how to nurture themselves within and how to create a sense of safety in the world. In families where both a mother and father are present, both parents can participate in nurturing the child emotionally and taking care of the child in the world, and both parents can role-model what it looks like to do this for themselves.
Single parents have a far greater challenge - they have to be both mother and father to the child. Mothering energy is that energy that nurtures while fathering energy is that energy that protects in the world - that is, earning money, setting boundaries with others, speaking up for oneself. While our society often defines women as the nurturers and men as the protectors, both men and women are capable of both nurturing and protecting in the world.
In order for a single parent to successfully be both mother and father, he or she must have learned how to be both mother and father to the Child within. In other words, we have to have learned how to nurture our own Inner Child - how to take responsibility for our own fears, pain, anger, hurt, and disappointment, and how to take care of our Inner Child in the world - earn money, set boundaries, and so on. There is no way to successfully teach our children these skills until we are doing them ourselves, which means that each of us needs to be in a process of learning how to do this.
We have developed a process that teaches us how to care for and nurture ourselves, while also loving others. This process, called Inner Bonding, teaches us how to become a loving Adult to our own Inner Child and to our actual children. Inner Bonding is a six-step psychospiritual process that can be learned and practiced daily, and that leads to the development of a spiritually-connected loving inner Adult.
Inner Bonding defines the Inner Child as our core self, who we are when we are born - our natural creativity, intuition, playfulness, imagination, talents, feelings, and ability to love. Our Child is our inner experience. Our Adult is everything we learn after we are born. It is our thoughts, beliefs, and ability to take action. We start learning how to be an Adult from the moment we are born through watching our parents and other caregivers. The Adult we learn to be is a child-adult, the part of us that learned many fears and false beliefs and learned addictive ways, such as using substances, TV, spending, anger, or compliance to avoid pain. A true loving Adult is that part of us that is spiritually connected to a Higher Source of truth and love and is able to bring that truth and love down into the Child and share it with others. The adult many of us operate from most of the time is really a wounded child masquerading as an adult. It is our unhealed wounded self that causes us problems with ourselves and our children. Inner Bonding is a process for healing the wounded self and developing a spiritually-connected loving Adult.
In Inner Bonding, there are only two possible intents at any given moment: the intent to learn about love and the intent to protect against and avoid pain. The intent to learn says that we want to learn about our own pain in order to understand what we need to do to be loving to our Inner Child and others; The intent to protect says that we want to avoid experiencing our pain at all cost. The child-adult is always in the intent to protect and the loving Adult is always in the intent to learn.
The six-steps of Inner Bonding are:
1. The willingness to become aware of our pain rather than protect against it with our various addictions.
2. The conscious decision to move into the intent to learn.
3. Dialoguing with our wounded self to discover the false beliefs and resulting behavior behind the pain. Releasing anger and pain in appropriate ways.
4. Dialoguing with our Higher Power to learn about truth and loving behavior.
5. Taking loving action in behalf or our Inner Child.
6. Evaluating the action.
All parents needs to be in a process of healing themselves. It is particularly important for single parents to be in this process since they are the primary role-models for their children. The more you heal the fears and false beliefs of your wounded self, the more loving you will naturally be with yourself and your children. Learning to utilize these six step throughout the day, especially in times of anger, fear, anxiety and stress, will eventually heal the false beliefs leading to these difficult feelings.
About The Author
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the best-selling author and co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You?" She is the co-creator of the powerful Inner Bonding healing process. Learn Inner Bonding now! Visit her web site for a FREE Inner Bonding course: http://www.innerbonding.com or http://www.innerbonding.com. Phone sessions available.
maid service near Mundelein ..The small, lilac colored hexagonal box, with Winnie the Pooh... Read More
Be sure to respect the intellectual changes that mark adolescence.... Read More
The teenage years are a crucial time in a child's... Read More
Back in college, I wrote for a five-day-a-week, award-winning campus... Read More
Although it might seem pretty corny to a lot of... Read More
If you are currently homeschooling or considering homeschooling your child,... Read More
When you're a parent it's a difficult decision to know... Read More
Child Car Seat Safety:We know you love your children, but... Read More
Everyone knows that exercise is good for your health. Exercising... Read More
By not planning for the future we guarantee that we... Read More
Not Letting Them Think.We all implicitly know that anything questioning... Read More
Q. We recently caught our son smoking pot, and we... Read More
"Setting the alarm on Sunday mornings is inhuman?..God should know... Read More
Be aware. You may become totally overwhelmed when you get... Read More
Q. My daughter is a junior in high school and... Read More
For the most positive daycare experience for your child, partner... Read More
Individualism is a common thing in today's modern society. Many... Read More
Have you ever watched your teenager make a mistake (that... Read More
It's no surprise that the self-image and self-esteem of overweight... Read More
Did you know that inconsistency on matters of discipline gives... Read More
Most of us when asked what we want our children... Read More
Are you a professional?Notice how the questions differs from, "Do... Read More
I have a bit of a different response than most... Read More
There are few thoughts as terrifying as the abduction of... Read More
Do you really want your child to enjoy playing with... Read More
high-end home cleaning Bannockburn ..It can be said that any man who procreates is... Read More
Do you want to create a deeper, more loving relationship... Read More
Well first off, please to don't institute the ? hour... Read More
The last decade has seen heightened interest in and awareness... Read More
So you have just returned home from your third meeting... Read More
Imagine a child who lacks ownership of his own life,... Read More
NY -- Strange as it may sound, bordom promotes happier,... Read More
Yesterday my husband Wade took the day off (that's one... Read More
The 'phone conversation had nothing at all to do with... Read More
IntroductionChildren are the gifts of God to parents. That young... Read More
There are many things to like about the television show... Read More
Search for Assurance: The Power of BelongingThe job hunt is... Read More
As the father of a toddler, I am an expert... Read More
In our last issue we posted some of our suggested... Read More
"He is happiest, be he king or peasant, who finds... Read More
Strattera came out around January of 2003, and is becoming... Read More
I had my first two children on either side of... Read More
Children are notoriously bad at drinking enough liquids. They are... Read More
Did you know that the school system is only able... Read More
I recall somewhere in the recesses of my aging brain... Read More
Many of us have grown up drinking caffeinated diet sodas... Read More
If you are currently homeschooling or considering homeschooling your child,... Read More
I've often thought that in 6 million years, archaeologists will... Read More
Article based on a friend's experienceI just wanted to share... Read More
The initial state of happiness about an own child is... Read More
Parenting |