What If Worrying Doesn’t Equal Good Parenting?

Susanna Mittermaier

Access Consciousness® Certified Facilitator

The world is topsy turvy, all that we knew has been turned on its head. Parents frazzled with juggling working from home, sometimes homeschooling and or trying to figure out how to get their kids online for school or just keep them out of their hair long enough to get some work done!

Something I have observed as a psychologist and Access Consciousness Certified Facilitator is that children seldom have the issue. Say what?!

No, really it’s true. Instead, their behaviour is often just a symptom. More often, the root of the problem stems from parents judgement of themselves that creates the problem.

We are often taught that we have to teach our kids to make good choices and rise to our expectations. And if we don’t worry about them making good choices, we are are a lousy parent. However, this worry creates tension that starts to affect our kids. You may never voice these concerns aloud, but our kids are so aware that even if they go unsaid, they can perceive them.

However, what if you permit yourself to be a bad parent? It’s not that you would be a bad parent; it is just that you would let your self be you.

What if there’s no right or wrong or good or bad? What if it is all just an interesting point of view?

So where do you start? Well, the first thing I ask parents is, “Does your child have a problem?” Their answer most is often is no. What we generally neglect as parents is to acknowledge the child for who they are and what they are aware of. And it is the lack of acknowledgement that doesn’t allow us to get to the source of the issue.

Once you acknowledge them and say, “Hey, what are you aware of? What are you sensing that’s going on in the world?” Then they get acknowledged for what they are aware of, and it’s okay that people have different points of view.

A primary example of this is children of divorced or separate parents. There is an assumption that because children may have two different lifestyles and parenting style from two different households, the children must be struggling.

But what if it is our projections and expectations that are the problem, not different realities of where our children live.

Having people in their lives that have different perspectives is like a buffet of ideas they can choose from. By listening to different people and their differing views, it allows them to find out what works for them. That’s just part of finding ourselves, it’s how we did it.

My top tip to parents is to relax; the greatest gift you can give to your child is that it’s ok to relax.