How to raise successful kids without over expecting, over parenting and micro managing? How to be a conscious parent and develop deep connection with your child through unconditional love? This blog discusses some tips on how to be a great parent.

“Your children are not your children.
They are sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you.
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. ”
― Kahlil Gibran

When parenting, ask yourself what is your parenting style? What values and beliefs you’re modelling as a parent and see if they make sense.

Reflect on your parenting Style

1. Do you emphasize Safety and security versus adventure in your parenting?

If your child wants to try out something new, do you let him try out? Or alternatively,  you encourage safety and security at the cost of experimentation, taking risks, moving into unknown territories? 

2. What is your parenting value: Perfection versus Participation?

Do you emphasize perfection instead of participation? Do you demand that your child excel at everything she does or involvement is more important than success? Does she feel free to Sketch, draw, paint, swim, ski, sculpt or take pictures because of the enjoyment that this activity gives her or is only allowed activities that you or your partner endorses.

3. Is your love conditional based on the child’s success in activities you endorse or is it unconditional? Is failure considered part of the game?

Is your love and approval of your child based on how he performs or your love and approval is unconditional. If your love is conditional with performance, he will consider his self worth dependent on performance and will always be under stress to match your expectations.Do you react or respond to mistakes? Is failure considered part of the game or winning is mandatory? If self worth is equated to failure or success, he will start developing the weeds of self rejection and self doubt and will be afraid to try new things. 

In this Ted Talk, Julie Lythcott-Haims on How to raise successful kids without over-parenting, former Dean of Freshmen at Stanford, Julie Lythcott-Haims, shares the idea that parents load their kids with high expectations and micromanage their lives, which does not help children. Instead, what children need is unconditional love.

4. If your child has lofty dreams, do you show how and why they are unrealistic

When your child has big dreams, do you highlight limitations,reiterate the resources or skills that your child is lacking, how unrealistic and unreasonable are those dreams?

5. What is your parenting style: Do you let your child think and act independently?

Has your child been conditioned to check everything with Mommy or Daddy: what to eat, who to play with, what activities to engage in, what to say where, etc.? Do you treat your child as too little to think, act and feel for herself? Does she have the confidence to handle her own issues or she relies upon you to address all her difficulties?

Ideas shared by experts on how to be a better parent

Dr. Shefali Tsabary’s conscious approach to parenting

In this video, Dr. Shefali Tsabary, author of The Conscious Parent: Transforming Ourselves, Empowering Our Children, shares ideas on how to be a better parent by adopting what she refers to as conscious approach to parenting.

Ted Talk: Create memories, not expectations | Austeja Landsbergiene

In this Ted Talk, CEO and founder of a private chain of pre-schools in Latvia and Lithuania, Austeja Landsbergiene, shares that the most important thing that parents have to give their children is unconditional love and childhood memories filled with parent kindness. Austeja believes that by creating memories, not expectations kids can flourish in their lives.

Ted Talk: Parenting in the modern world | Kyle Seaman

Entrepreneur Kyle Seaman spent more than a year trying to reverse engineer parenting and shares his fascinating conclusions.

Parenting Quotes for you to reflect upon

“When a man dies, if he can pass enthusiasm along to his children, he has left them an estate of incalculable value.” –Thomas Edison

“The best way to make children good is to make them happy.” –Oscar Wilde

“Encourage and support your kids because children are apt to live up to what you believe of them.” — Lady Bird Johnson

“Children are educated by what the grown-up is and not by his talk.” –Carl Jung

“Most things are good, and they are the strongest things; but there are evil things too, and you are not doing a child a favor by trying to shield him from reality. The important thing is to teach a child that good can always triumph over evil.” –Walt Disney

Concluding Remarks

Based on how you behave, react and interact with your child, you may be raising a child who believes too much in practicality, safety, limitations, self rejection, low self esteem and confidence, is afraid to try new things or a child who is open to life, has high self confidence, believes in himself more than what others tell him, and is ready to take risks and figure out his own way.

Photo credit:  Caroline Hernandez (Unsplash)