In recent years, I have often shied away from parenting podcasts and books because the older our kids get, the more I feel like they’re “cooked.” That is, until I started parenting coaching with our friend Dr. Hope Seidel. (This was the one piece of my mental health journey I’ve addressed now.)
Through our sessions, we’ve reframed the way I parent for the better starting with the basis of our unique family values. Have you ever thought about your family values and how you would put them into practice? In our podcast this week, we have Dr. Seidel on to discuss reframing our parenting starting with these values.
Family values help prioritize what is important from any given situation. For example, if “kindness” is one of your family values then the first question when your kids get home from school should not be “how did you do on your test?” It should be “who were you kind to today?”
Using Our Magic Words
You’ll hear in the podcast how Dr. Seidel reminds us that we have to let our children be their own person. She wisely told me earlier this year that our children are seeds. It’s our job as parents to cultivate those seeds, but we cannot change what the seed will grow into. If the seed is a tomato, then it’s going to grow into a tomato.
Penn pointed out that a lot of her advice was reminiscent of the marriage book on communication we wrote, Everybody Fights. How did we not see that those relationship strategies for better understanding could be used in parenting? Often times, we aren’t supposed to fix everything for our kids. We are supposed to be there for them, be an audience to their story, and guide them to make their own decisions.
Hear more from Dr. Hope Seidelbelow (andsubscribe to our newsletter to be the first to hear about our new game launch!) Happy listening.
