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Parenting with Grace
(Posted on Thursday, August 1, 2019)
If you ever feel like you are failing as a parent, do one thing…
Give yourself some grace!
Why?
Because it’s okay not to be perfect! In fact, it’s best not to be!
If we were perfect as parents, perfect in every way [impossible], how would this make our children feel? What would it teach them?
Might it make our kids feel like they have to be perfect too?
If they fail at being perfect, could they start to feel like they don’t add up?
One day will they ask themselves, why can’t I seem to keep it together like my mom always did?
Even, would they want to hide their imperfections and mistakes from us thinking that we wouldn’t understand?
Most importantly, if we were always perfect, we would never teach our kids or model what it means to give ourselves grace.
Parenting with Grace
It’s hard to give ourselves grace. In fact, the word I chose to focus on for this year’s “new year’s resolution” was grace. Why? Because I was having such a hard time letting myself off the hook. I was holding myself to too high of a standard.
As humans we are supposed to make mistakes. How else would we learn? When we make mistakes, we can model this for our kids: I messed up and it’s okay, because I am going to grow! And then we can show them how we grow.
A Building Block for Self-Esteem
I would argue that one of the most important things we teach our kids is how to give ourselves grace. It’s a building block for self-esteem and feeling good about oneself, for accepting oneself for who we are, and for not being so hard on ourselves.
There are many ways to teach this concept, one of which is modeling it for them. Another way is having a simple conversation. Here is a personal example. When my kids make a mistake [after providing a consequence if needed], I try tell them: Everyone makes mistakes and it’s okay! The problem comes in when we keep making the same mistakes over and over—when we don’t learn from them. We brainstorm ideas of how we can avoid making a mistake again. The goal isn’t perfection. The goal is to utilize the mistakes we make to help shape us into who we are meant to be. Finally, we talk about what we learned. Every lesson makes us grow as a person.
So mamas, do you ever feel like you aren’t doing enough? Are you ever unsure whether you handled a behavior issue correctly? Unsure if you disciplined enough or maybe if you did too much? Are you too hard on yourself? Let it all go! First, there is no one right way! And second, if we focus on grace for both us and the child, and on what we can learn, I don’t think we can go wrong.
Just remember, it’s okay not to be perfect!
Without the lessons, without the mistakes, and without the growth, where would we all be? When in doubt, give yourself some grace!
To learn more about Lauren and her blog, check out: About Lauren
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