Conscious parenting means taking better care of ourselves, so we can take better care of our children.
I had three unplanned hours to myself the other day.
It was rather strange.
A family friend had just pulled out of the driveway with boys in tow, on their way to a baseball game. I had already finished my writing for the day, cleaned up from dinner and done a little yard work.
What to do with myself?
I took a long walk with my MP3 player for company, followed by a solitary bubble bath. I called my mother to chat.
It was lovely.
It reminded me of the importance of self-care. I have written about this topic before, but it bears continued focus: We cannot possibly hope to take care of the needs of our children, if we are a walking mass of unmet needs ourselves.
We cannot fill our child’s love bucket if our own is empty.
In How to Raise Loving, Cooperative Children, we saw that most negative behaviors – the things our children do that really push our buttons – are actually an expression of unmet needs for connection.
Are you connected to your child? Is your child connected to you??
The challenge many parents face today is a lack of psychic energy to forge these all-important connections. I’m not talking about mind-reading and telepathy here. By “psychic energy,” I mean the emotional and physical capacity – and the time – to reach out and connect with our children mind, body and spirit.
Why is this so hard for us? Surely, we love our children as much as is humanly possible. Why can’t we connect?
Because our own needs are not being met.
Because we drag our tired, cranky bodies out of bed in the morning, to drag our tired, cranky children to school. We spend a stress-filled day at the office and come home to a stress-filled family.
We come home to children who need to be driven from one place to another all over town. We come home to battles over homework, food choices, boyfriend choices and money. Then we all fall in bed exhausted and unconscious.
Or, we toss and turn through a sleepless night, worrying about the next stressful day to come.
Our love buckets are running on empty and there is no one in sight to fill them.
As a single parent, it is perhaps just a little bit easier to accept reality: Adults need to learn to fill their own love buckets.
Being an adult means knowing how to take care of yourself. It doesn’t mean waiting for things to get better, or back to the way they used to be. It doesn’t mean blaming our stresses on our spouses, our employer, the government or the weather.
Oh yeah. I forgot.
That doesn’t mean we can’t ask for help. More and more, I am practicing this. I am learning to ask for help from my friends, family and neighbors. And regularly, from God.
We can also share our ideas with other over-burdened, slightly insane parents like us. On that note, here are three ideas that I have incorporated in my Conscious Parenting Toolkit.
1. Create Space for Self-Care.
I recently had the pleasure of listening to Cheryl Richardson, author of The Unmistakable Touch of Grace and The Art of Extreme Self-Care: Transform Your Life One Month at a Time. In working with many of her coaching clients, Cheryl said, a very important first step in “fixing” their lives was to do less.
This is a hard reality that many of us do not want to accept. We are proud of our ability to multi-task. We are waiting for our medals for soldiering on, regardless of the absolute exhaustion and chronic illness attacking our bodies. We have no other choice!
Or do we?
If I gave you a 100% guarantee that your current pace and schedule would lead to heart disease, cancer and/or total alienation from your spouse or child, would you figure out a way to do less?
Back in my corporate days, I used to say things like, “This job is sucking the life out of me.”
The only problem? It really was. I eventually took the rather drastic step of leaving my job and career behind, to be at home full-time with my children. And I haven’t regretted it for a moment.
Talk about creating space.
2. Find What Makes You Happy and Make a Habit of Doing It
What are your passions? What do you love to do? What feeds your creativity, calms your nerves and nourishes your spirit?
Use the space you are creating in your life to do this regularly.
My friend Ruth is a great example for us. She teaches seventh grade in San Bernardino County, CA. I’m not sure if there is a more stressful way to spend your day, short of the armed services.
And yet, she is a strong, vibrant, healthy and enthusiastic person most days of the week.
What is her secret?
Well, she loves horses. She breeds them, raises them, shows them, loves them.
She gets up at 4am to feed them, rides them when she gets home from work, and feeds them again before she goes to bed. She calls them her therapy.
She also doesn’t try to do too much else, aside from being a loving mother, loyal wife and very good friend(!)
She lives a simple life, in a small house with a small garden.
She has learned how to make herself happy and she has organized her life around what she has learned.
I want to be just like her, when I grow up someday.
Well, except for the getting up at 4am part. And shoveling all that manure.
3. Learn to Live in the Moment
Here’s the thing: Every moment can be joyful. Every moment can be an exercise in self-care. Every moment is an opportunity to find joy, comfort, emotional sustenance and gratitude.
Every moment is absolutely perfect, just the way it is.
It’s all a matter of perspective.
Doing the laundry can be a meditation on gratitude, as I described in Deepak Chopra and My Washing Machine. The mundane, everyday details of life can be overwhelming, but they are what life is all about.
Practice being present in each and every moment of your day. Remind yourself to look around, see what is wonderful and be grateful for it.
Borrow my favorite affirmation, “I am exactly where I am supposed to be right now, doing exactly what I am supposed to be doing.”
Acknowledge that this moment is the only thing you can truly influence. How do you want to use it? Do you want to worry or take action?
What could you do right this second, to make yourself feel good?
DO IT!
If you are really struggling right now, here are some hints: Smile. Hug yourself. Laugh out loud. Phone a friend.
Know that every second you spend taking better care of yourself is another drop in your love bucket. Watch it fill up, and share it with your children.
Blessings.
Recommended Reading:
Learn how to create your own “Extreme Self-Care First Aid Kit” in Cheryl Richardson’s The Art of Extreme Self-Care: Transform Your Life One Month at a Time. It’s never too soon to start taking better care of yourself!
Related Post:
Give yourself a present – something just right for you. Learn how in, The Perfect Gift.
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