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Parenting requires a lot of patience; anyone will tell you that. But I think most people don’t realise just how much patience respectful parenting takes.
It would certainly be easier, in the short-term, to raise my child with a firm authoritarian hand and manipulate, threaten, force and punish her into doing what I want, when I want it.
In the long run, however, I believe this approach would be damaging, not only to my child, as she would grow up feeling disrespected, and that my love is conditional upon her obedience; but it would also be damaging to my own spiritual journey.
Because parenting is a spiritual journey of the deepest and most challenging sort. It’s also one of the most rewarding.
At times it can be incredibly difficult to take a deep breath and relate with respect, compassion and love with our children, who occasionally seem to take delight in pushing our boundaries and testing the outer limits of our patience.
Before And After
Before my daughter, Sequoia, was born, I meditated and practiced yoga every day, and attended Vipassana retreats and various other healing and spiritual practices. I also played my mandolin every day, wrote poetry, and did art and crafts. I kept up my morning yoga through my pregnancy, thinking I would continue after the baby was born.
Of course, once I had my baby, I rarely had time for such things, and barely had energy for them. At first, I found it frustrating that all my time and energy was taken up with caring for a child that didn’t do much more than scream, eat and poop, but I soon found that child-raising is, of itself, an advanced meditation, requiring much dedication and patience.
Story Of Patience
Recently, during a festival, I was at a sacred women’s circle, where we were in ceremony, chanting, singing and sharing our empowering experiences. It was a powerful circle and I was not only learning a lot from the other women as well as sharing my own teachings, I was really enjoying being there.
Sequoia come up and sit by me, I put my arm around her, and continued listening to the circle, but Sequoia was fidgety. She began whinging loudly that she was bored, and groaning in a way that was distracting to everyone.
I tried to comfort and hush her, but I wasn’t very effective. By the time the talking stick came around to me, Sequoia was becoming insufferable. I wanted to share some wisdom with the women about my experiences, but with a whinging child wriggling on my lap, it was impossible.
Frustration welling up inside of me, I felt the urge to shout at Sequoia, and punish her for behaving in that way. I thought I was being very patient with her, but then I realised how busy I’d been at the festival – I had barely seen Sequoia outside of meal times for a few days.
I understood that it was my daughter who had been very patient with me, not having had any one-on-one time with me to reconnect for some time, and she was now communicating with me, very clearly, that’s what she needed.
I took a deep breath, taking a moment to centre myself and release my frustration when I exhaled, and carried Sequoia away back to our camp.
We made a snack to share, then we lay together in the hammock for snuggles and I read her some stories. After about an hour, we both felt recharged and refreshed; Sequoia was chatting calmly, no longer whining or wriggling, and I was relaxed.
Patience Is The Key
One of Sequoia’s friends wandered by and Sequoia jumped up and ran off to play, laughing and happy.
Calm and centred, I was able to return to the Women’s Circle to share a lesson about patience. I had learned that parenting is a journey on the spiritual path that can be not only fulfilling, but enlightening.
Children don’t always have the same verbal communication skills that we have – if I have a headache, or I’m feeling tired, I can say so, and excuse myself for being short-tempered. Often, we judge children’s behaviour as being “bad” without really looking at the underlying issues that cause them to act this way. “Acting up” is a child’s way of expressing frustration and communicating what she needs: connection, patience and love.
©iStockphoto.com
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