So just checking in with everyone who is working through this live round of our Peaceful Parenting Step by Step eCourse. The Step by Step eCourse was the first one that Tabitha and I developed with the aim of reducing the overwhelm and confusion for parents. It presents the main strategies and approaches in a step by step process over about 6 weeks, which forms a great foundation for further learning and deepening. This eCourse contains 7 modules broken into 4-5 units of about 20-30 mins each. Whether you’re just now starting in Module 1 today or you’ve already started working through it this week, or maybe going through it again, I want to make sure you’re getting the most from it! You’ll have also received this information by email btw.
The tools and strategies shared in this eCourse equip parents with some great skills to deal with the day to day tricky parenting challenges. You’ll be introduced to our Centre, Connect, Communicate model. You’ll learn the steps we go through to centre ourselves, connect kindly with our children and communicate in respectful ways that help our children trust and respond positively to our care and guidance.
Action steps: Over this next 4 days, listen to each of my 4 Stress Relief for Parents tracks in Modeule 1 Unit 4 at least once. Use the pause button and your journal to record any insights that arise. Note down what you find or imagine to be useful from each one of them relating to different challenges or situations.
When a parent knows what TO DO, only then are they empowered to start phasing out all the ineffective and counterproductive authoritarian or permissive approaches that most parents are using most days; like the threats “if you don’t, then … “, the pleading “will you PLEASE please just this one time do what I say!”, the punishments “that’s it, you’ve just lost your ‘privilege’ of … “, the bribes “if you tidy your room, we can have a sweet”, the passive aggression “ok fine do what you like but somebody has to make the food!”
Every parent and every child craves harmony in the home. But when a parent really learns and practices these connection, relationship-focused approaches, the dynamics really do shift away from power struggles into much more calm, connected and cooperative communication. There really is a much easier and better way. The changes don’t happen overnight and it can feel like driving on the wrong side of the road or speaking a foreign language for quite some time, but inch by inch it becomes the new normal if practiced consistently. Dedicating yourself to immersing in the learning over the coming weeks will slowly start to change things in your mind and psyche and you’ll find yourself starting to tune in to your child’s feelings and needs at an even deeper level than before and what a beautiful experience that is for parent and child alike!!
Moving away from the power struggles. As you’ll likely know well, judging by the fact that you’re on this learning journey, the authoritarian and permissive approaches sadly tend to result in lots of power struggles. Parents can lose touch with, or simply be unaware, that it’s the parent’s approaches and responses that result in their child resisting cooperation every single step of the way! Parenting is very very hard work and it’s very very VERY easy to get caught in a stress cycle and feel at a loss as to what DOES work, what WOULD help! It’s easy for parents to think they’re already using a peaceful approach because they’re being so much more connected, caring and fair than their parents were, yet there’s often still a lot of hit and miss and to’ing and fro’ing between different parenting approaches that result in lots of confusion and chaos, for parent and child equally!
The Audios and Printable Summary Sheets in Unit 4. If you’ve made your way through the short units in Module 1, you’ll have found the 4 audio downloads of my Stress relief for parent’s cd in Unit 4 and also some helpful summary sheets summarising some of the tools to print out. These resources alone have made a HUGE difference to so many parents who make use of them. Do download the audios in your Peaceful Parenting folder on your PC and save and print out the summary sheets and put them in a clear file Peaceful Parenting folder.
In Module 2, we start to really delve into the peaceful parenting tools and approaches. Do make use of the forums to share your thoughts or ask any questions that your reading, watching or listening evokes for you.
The questions don’t need to just be about the course material. If you have a current parenting challenge you want advice or guidance with, post a question here in the eCourse forum, or in the main Village forum or the PP Trainee’s forum, we’re here to support you.
Remember you can change your email preferences at the top of any of the forums, you can receive new topics, daily digests, weekly digests or no emails.
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