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Parenting Quotes

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Parenting Quotes

“[Context: Discussing the subject of dealing with difficult & stressful situations, such as dealing with a child's tantrum.] Q. Is it ok that it this way right now? A. Yes. Q. Why is it ok? It's crazy, it's stressful, it's chaotic, it's not what my mind wants at all... A. It's the experience. Q. What am I experiencing? A. Life. Q. Is it ok to experience life in all of its glory, even the tantrums? A. Yes. Q. Is it ok for my mind to have a tantrum while the child is too? A. Yeah. Q. Why is it ok for my mind to have a tantrum with the child? A. Because we're learning together.”

“Talking to a child about future health issues is also not the correct course. First of all, it can scare the child and make her have excessive worry about herself. Unfortunately, we hear parents tell their children that they will get diabetes or have heart problems if they don’t lose weight. Secondly, the concept of future heart problems is too abstract, even for an adult, let alone a child. Worry about future health issues does not have the power to motivate behavior change. Feeling physically better in the moment has far more impact.”

“The best antidote to worry is action. If there is an action that will lessen the likelihood of a dreaded outcome occurring, and if that action doesn't cost too much in terms of effort or freedom, then take it. The worry about whether we remembered to close the baby gate at the top of the stairs can be stopped in an instant by checking. Then it isn't a worry anymore; it's just a brief impulse. Almost all of the worry parents feel about keeping their children safe evolves from the conflict between intuition and inaction. Your choices when worrying are clear: take action, have faith, pray, seek comfort, or keep worrying.”

“...The life of the parents is the only thing that makes good children. Parents should be very patient and ‘saintlike’ to their children. They should truly love their children. And the children will share this love! For the bad attitude of the children, says father Porphyrios, the ones who are usually responsible for it are their parents themselves. The parents don’t help their children by lecturing them and repeating to them ‘advices’, or by making them obeying strict rules in order to impose discipline. If the parents do not become ‘saints’ and truly love their children and if they don’t struggle for it, then they make a huge mistake. With their wrong and/or negative attitude the parents convey to their children their negative feelings. Then their children become reactive and insecure not only to their home, but to the society as well...”

“When I was little my balloon burst as we were walking home from a children’s party one afternoon. I saw a balloon about once a year so it was a huge loss. Mum bent down, picked the flaccid piece of rubber off the pavement, stretched it tight across her lips and twisted it as she sucked in her breath. Then she tied the old piece of string tightly around the little piece of rubber dangling from her lips and pulled a miniature balloon out of her mouth. She said the balloon had had a baby, it was a baby balloon. I stopped crying and trailed it after me all the way home. A baby balloon.”

“Age is only a number. Keep an active life.”

“As a parent, you have authority because God calls you to be an authority in your child's life. You have the authority to act on behalf of God. As a father or mother, you do not exercise rule over your jurisdiction, but over God's. You act at his command. You discharge a duty that he has given. You may not try to shape the lives of your children as pleases you, but as pleases him. All you do in your task as parents must be done from this point of view. You must undertake all your instruction, your care and nurture, your correction and discipline, because God has called you to. ... If you are God's agent in this task of providing essential training and instruction of the Lord, then you, too, are a person under authority. You and your child are in the same boat. You are both under God's authority. You have different roles, but the same Master.”

“Nothing about parenting Shiv is simple, because we're this at once recognizable yet totally unfamiliar amalgam of a twenty-first-century family: white mom, brown mom, black son. We push a lot of cultural buttons[...] We draw attention without trying to, and the world doesn't always know what to do with us. We are still a novelty for most of the people we encounter, and almost everywhere we go, one of us or all of us are in the minority. [...] There is a consciousness about our family's visibility, what it means, how our choices will be judged, and, on top of that, the extra consciousness of trying not to let that factor into our decisions too much.”

“In thirty years, the narratives of my sons will be different from mine. Because today I am telling my truth and standing in a pool of my trauma, making myself uncomfortable and, hopefully, making you uncomfortable too. Today, I am making it known that when color is clear, when race and inequity are not ignored, and when our differences are not only acknowledged but championed as one of the most valuable aspects of life, we can work together to make meaningful strides toward true social justice.”

“By protecting our children from adversity, have we made them deathly afraid of it? By bolstering their self-esteem with false praise and a lack of real-world consequences, have we made them less tolerant, more entitled, and ignorant of their own character defects? By giving in to their every desire, have we encouraged a new age of hedonism?”

“I don't want to be a mother. I want to be a writer. I want to be taken seriously. I want money. I want more time. I want to lose weight. I want to be beautiful. I want a day completely to myself, though I don't even remember what I used to do with them, when days to myself were a thing I had.”

“Part of the ache, I know, comes from my own sense of still not being quite up to the job of being me. Not a good enough mother, wife, friend, no matter how much I care or what I do. not a good enough writer, or yoga student, or meditator, no matter how hard I try. Not a good enough public speaker, or checkbook balancer, or wage earner, no matter how much effort I put in. I know that where I see lack and failure, others may see competence. But I compile my own secret list of insecurities and shortcomings, certain that what seems to come so easily and naturally to others must be harder for me. I want to be better at living my life than I am these days. To feel sufficient, more certain of what I'm meant to do now and how I'm meant to be.”

“...when you're reading article after article where the author is complaining about their kids, their spouses, their messy houses, and their demanding bosses, you start to see your own life through that lens. You get annoyed when your toddler spills their snack, instead of chuckling and realizing that's what toddlers do. You get mad when your spouse leaves their toothbrush out, instead of realizing that it was because they were in a rush to get to work after they fed the kids breakfast that morning. You start to think that if you had a nicer house, your life would be magically more organized. ...”

“If I had to sum up motherhood in one philosophical statement it would be this: They come out of the womb as narcissists, and you have eighteen years to try to change that. If, by the time they move out of your house, they are able to consider others with some level of empathy, attend to the feelings of others, and see the world outside themselves and the people who inhabit it as valid and important, you've done your job.”

“When your kids fail—and they will, no matter how bright or talented they are—you can meet them with empathy and understanding as well as help them learn how to treat themselves with their own inner voice of empathy and understanding.”

“ACTIVE LISTENING OBVIOUSLY REQUIRES THE RECEIVER TO SUSPEND HIS OWN THOUGHTS AND FEELINGS IN ORDER TO ATTEND EXCLUSIVELY TO THE MESSAGE OF THE CHILD. IT FORCES ACCURATE RECEIVING; IF THE PARENT IS TO UNDERSTAND THE MESSAGE IN TERMS OF THE CHILD’S MEANING, HE MUST PUT HIMSELF INTO THE CHILD’S SHOES (INTO HIS FRAME OF REFERENCE, INTO HIS WORLD OF REALITY), AND HE CAN THEN HEAR THE MEANING INTENDED BY THE SENDER. THE “FEEDBACK” PART OF ACTIVE LISTENING IS NOTHING MORE THAN THE PARENT’S ULTIMATE CHECK ON THE ACCURACY OF HIS LISTENING, ALTHOUGH IT ALSO ASSURES THE SENDER (CHILD) THAT HE HAS BEEN UNDERSTOOD WHEN HE HEARS HIS OWN “MESSAGE” FED BACK TO HIM ACCURATELY.”

“Active Listening facilitates problem-solving by the child. We know that people do a better job of thinking a problem through and toward a solution when they can “talk it out” as opposed to merely thinking about it. Because Active Listening is so effective in facilitating talking, it helps a person in his search for solutions to his problems. Everybody had heard such expressions as “Let me use you as a sounding board” or “I’d like to kick this problem around with you” or “Maybe it would help me to talk it out with you.”

“Active Listening “keeps the ball with the child.” When parents respond to their kids’ problems by Active Listening, they will observe how often kids start thinking for themselves. A child will start to analyze his problem on his own, eventually arriving at some constructive solutions. Active Listening encourages the child to think for himself, to find his own diagnosis of his problem, to discover his own solutions. Active Listening conveys trust, while messages of advice, logic, instruction, and the like convey distrust by taking over the problem-solving responsibility from the child. Active Listening is therefore one of the most effective ways of helping a child become more self-directing, self-responsible, and independent.”

“Active Listening influences the child to be more willing to listen to the parents’ thoughts and ideas. It is a universal experience that when someone will listen to one’s own point of view, it is then easier to listen to his. Children are more likely to open themselves up to receive their parents’ messages if their parents first hear them out. When parents complain that their kids don’t listen to them, it’s a good bet that the parents are not doing an effective job of listening to the kids.”

“Big brotherhood is a burden. The first message he needs to hear from you is that you understand. It isn't easy having to share your parents with a smelly baby or a two-year-old pest! The more we try to convince our kids that it's not so bad, the harder they'll work to convince us that it is indeed that bad.”

“Instead of simply teaching our sons that girls are meant to be protect, we need to get them excited about helping to to create a world where girls don't have to be afraid anymore. We need to make it very clear to our sons that they are not just doing women a favor by standing up against sexism. They are actually fighting for a stronger, smarter, kinder world, one that is possible only if women are treated equally. Let's raise incredible guys who will know their worth as decent, responsible men and capable, involved, loving dads.”