The Conscious Parent

Transforming Ourselves empowering Our Children

by Shefali Tsabary

Number of pages: 264

Publisher: AMACOM

BBB Library: Parenting

ISBN: 9781897238455



About the Author

Dr. Shefali is a keynote speaker who presents at conferences and workshops around the world. Dr. Shefali is a world-renowned clinical psychologist who received her doctorate from Columbia University, New York.

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Editorial Review

To parent perfectly is a mirage. There is no ideal parent and no ideal child. The Conscious Parent underscores the challenges that are a natural part of raising a child, fully understanding that, as parents, each of us tries the best we can with the resources we have. Thus, the objective of this book is to illumine how we might identify and capitalize on the emotional and spiritual lessons inherent in the parenting process, so that we can use them for our own development, which in turn will result in the ability to parent more effectively. As part of this approach, we are asked to open ourselves up to the possibility that our imperfections may actually be our most valuable tools for change.

Book Reviews

"If every parent parented in the way this book portrays, or at least aspires to parent consciously—as conscious parenting is an ongoing process—even given the flaws in her disciplinary approach, the world would be a better place." Authentic Parenting

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Wisdom to Share

Some children need only one look from a parent to stop what they are doing.

How we communicate “no” to our children depends on a child’s temperament.

No matter our age, the word “no” is still the hardest word to hear. Yet we utter this word countless times a day to our children without regard for how this must feel to them.

None of us enjoys being told “no.”

If children are afraid of punishment, they may then try to cover up their mistakes by lying.

It isn’t easy to reflect back a person’s feelings and thoughts without contaminating them with our own.

The minute our children try to talk to us, we tend to jump in to advise them, critique them, admonish them.

Some children need only one look from a parent to stop what they are doing.

How we communicate “no” to our children depends on a child’s temperament.

No matter our age, the word “no” is still the hardest word to hear. Yet we utter this word countless times a day to our children without regard for how this must feel to them.

None of us enjoys being told “no.”

Unless we allow our children to become comfortable with quiet aloneness, they become strangers to themselves, alienated from their essence.

It might frighten you to engage your children in such a “hands off” manner.

When the bar is set so high, how can a child feel anything but dwarfed?

Setting the bar too high and too early undercuts a child’s potential.

Children come to believe that only the grand and the fabulous are to be noticed and applauded, and hence constantly pursue “bigger” and “better.”

When we deny our children’s ordinariness, we teach them to be enthralled only by exaggerations of life.

To encourage exploration is a way of honoring a child’s being.

A parent who was denied the experience of ordinariness during childhood will be unable to tolerate their child’s ordinariness.

We have been raised to live in a state of constant “doing.”

We project an energy that treats others as less than ourselves.

When we grow up feeling we aren’t good enough, we displace this feeling of inadequacy onto the world around us.

If you were neglectful of your children or absent, they now refuse to connect with you.

If you were too strict with your children, the teen years are a time when they break free.

No longer in the intermediate years one should be the ever-powerful parent, but must instead become an ever-present partner.

During these intermediate years of middle school, our children’s sense of who they are undergoes a dramatic overhaul.

The middle school years are a time of tremendous transition, often painful and wrenching for us to witness.

Our Children need to know that we trust them implicitly because we see them as fundamentally trustworthy.

Because very few really trust the wisdom of life, people tend to project their lack of trust onto their children.

The anticipation of the pain is often more intolerable than the actual pain.

When our children are permitted to feel their feelings, they are able to release them amazingly quickly.

Surrender means we first accept whatever emotional state we are in.

If we want our children to master their emotions, we have to teach them to surrender to what they are experiencing.

When children are hurt either physically or psychologically, it can be intolerable for the parents.

We believe an outburst of emotional expression is a weakness.

Write your children a note saying how blessed you are to get to see them first thing in the day.

Our children need to grow up with the awareness that who they are is worthy of celebration.

Can you imagine how it must feel for a child to be starved of our approval and fearful of our disapproval?

It’s so important to consciously free ourselves from our unconscious state and move toward an enlightened way of being.

Indeed, we want what we consider to be “best” for our children.

Children aren’t ours to possess or own in any way.

It is crucial as a parent to realize you aren’t raising a “mini me,” but a spirit throbbing with its own signature.

A single misplaced response can shrivel a child’s spirit, whereas the right comment can encourage them to soar.

When we teach our children to find the emotional lesson behind every experience, we teach them to own their life with zest.

As parents, unless we learn to live from being rather than doing, the parent-child journey will be fueled by anxiety and drama.