Parenting - Remaining connected with Children

Parenting –the process of keeping oneself connected with our own children

“LIGHTEN UP....YOU’LL ALL HAVE MORE FUN, AND A STRONGER RELATIONSHIP” The above is the advice given by Richard Templar in his book “The Rules of Parenting”. I completely agree .With all the pressures and stress of these times, suddenly happiness is moving out of our lives. The latest issue of outlook magazine (Dec 29,’08) features a beautiful cover story “How to be happy in these gloomy times”. Ms Sheela Reddy asking “Are you happy” finds people staring at her as if she has asked “Have you seen God lately ?”. She asks 77yr old, the People’s President Mr A P J Abdul Kalam, the mantras for happiness. Family life , Being taught early in life to overcome problems rather than let them overcome one and Good Books are the first three in the list of five mantras given by him for self.

Hence, let me express my gratefulness to fourteen parents, who could make time to be available for our follow up interactions after the workshop “ Light the Lamp Within” for their children. Lots of insights were obtained, relationships blossomed and happy moments were shared. One of the parents remarked that the interactions helped her in doing away with the curtain drawn between her and her child. Interestingly, the other ninety- six could not make time due to one thing or the other. At least three children apologised on behalf of their parents for their absence. This made me really understand as to how stressed parents are today. However, since their children love them, this should reduce their stress.

I also shared the response of 110 children from their parents to the query “What three things they expect from their parents ?” and expectations given by them are given below-

Love ,Attention and Time top the list and the findings, to my mind, does not mean that they do not get these from their parents but definitely they wish to have more of these in their childhood and specially in teenage, when they are being exposed to number of new perspectives, dilemmas and questions.

On being asked to respond to question “What three sentences they will like to hear from parents? the responses were as given below-

Some sentences they wished to hear were-
1) You are the best /make every child like my child(55)
2) Appreciation/noticing improvements (53)
3) We are proud of you (41)
4) Encouraging/inspiring/keep it up (35)
5) I love you (35)
6) Suggestions for improvement/pointing major mistakes/scolding when needed(20)
7) Things/gifts/allowing junk food, playing computers, cycling(20)
8) Words of guidance(17)
9) Words of happiness(14)
10) About me/acknowledging me (9)
11) Dreams fulfilled by the child (8)
12) Assurance of being with a child/help in fulfilling his dream(3)
13) Believe me / not force me(1)
This clearly indicates that the craving for child to be considered outstanding and appreciated is so predominant. They do want their parents to be proud of themselves and want to be encouraged with strokes of love and guidance. May be today, even parents consider academic achievements as the criterion of success of their children. In the process, the support and nurturing of children, their values and beliefs to attain their potential is diminishing.
What should the children do now in this situation? I will be happy if children are able to convince their parents of necessity of the above and demand from them effective parenting in the interest of building a bond, which will make their parents also happy in times to come. After all, isn’t happiness the ultimate goal of life?

Learning's from Mumbai Seize
All the people of this country, including people like us (who normally do not give more than half an hour on average to TV), spent more than few hours helplessly watching on one hand the drama of terror, cowardice and inertia and slow response of our bureaucrats and politicians to respond and on the other hand the gallant reply by our soldiers and armed forces to unknown might of terrorists and finally the elimination of cold blooded murderers of innocents.
This post is to kindle a fire in the belly of my friends, the children of our country, to learn what to do from the bravery of our heroes and what not to do from those, who failed all of us, mostly the political leadership and administrative machinery.
The moments of fear and agony, which survivors of the tragedy, went through can be only similar to what an innocent lonely child faces in darkness of a moonless night in a jungle full of wild beasts. This generation has a right to demand from our generation as to why we made them see all this.
What can the children do? The least is to pronounce guilty in their hearts, who allowed the terror to reach here unnoticed and also those, who did not respond in time, did not allow our soldiers facilities for much more quicker reply and denied our armed forces the pays and perks at par with those, who sit in cosy ,comfortable air-conditioned offices without ever getting exposed to dangers of loss of life. The children can also discuss formally and informally the situation and decide, what India of their dreams would be. Let it be done fast as already there are many wanting to come to stage now once peace is there to steal the show.