Best Parent talk

"Your children are not your children.  They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.  They came through you but not from you and though they are with you yet they belong not to you." - Khalil Gibran.

I taught a class on How to be the BEST parents to Young Adults and Teenagers.

It was good to get some of my thoughts on paper.

1.  What makes a successful parent?   You just love your people and know that parenthood is good and bad and you get to decide, "I'm a good parent."  It's how YOU turn out, not how your kids turn out.  Have you learned and grown while raising your kids--then you are a successful parent.

2.  Difference between emotional childhood and emotional adulthood and how you need to help yourself and your children move into emotional adulthood.  Emotional Adulthood is taking responsibility for your results and mess ups.  No blame.  Get out of compare and despair.  Everyone is worthy just by being born, so now work on loving yourself and others and taking ownership of thoughts and feelings.  No one MADE you do anything.

3.  Life is 50 /50 and that's how it was designed. It's called the human experience.  There will be good days and bad days.  That's how it's supposed to be.  Nothing is wrong with you, or your family just feel it all and keep moving forward.

4.  It's all going how it's supposed to go.  You don't know how it's going to turn out...you really don't.  I had a friend tell me how excited she was to have all of her kids in the temple with her and I said, "I am so happy for you.  That's amazing. That will never happen for me."  She said, "You don't know that."   I was ready to give her all of what I thought were facts of the situation-- but really I don't know.  What I have are today's circumstances, and my thoughts about them, but I don't know what the future brings.  I just embrace that my life is exactly how it's supposed to go and I love it.  This thought serves me well.

5.  "What are you making it mean?"  When your young adult does something, says something,  ask this question.  Ask this question when your teenager is having issues at school; when teenager misses curfew, or doesn't do homework; when your young adult goes against your wishes.   It's a good one.  If you are making it mean something about YOU as the parent- there is only pain there.  If you are making it mean that you need to be the police of your child's life -- there is only pain there.  There are the facts of the situation and there is the drama.  Deal with the facts, drop the drama.

6.  Drop the manuals-- We have manuals on how people should behave.  We have "shoulds" for all of our relationships....these really will cause pain.  He should respect me.  She should talk nice to me.  He should get good grades.  She should agree with me.   Quit "shoulding" on people.  Adults will do what adults want to do-- Young adults are no exception.  You can't control them.  You can request, but you can't need things to happen for you to be happy.  Don't hand over your emotional life to someone else.  Keep ownership.  For teenagers, you will have a set of rules and consequences.  Communicate these, then when teenager misses curfew per se- he already knows the consequence-- no drama on your part.  "Bummer dude, you missed curfew.  That stinks for you.  You know the consequence.  You can be mad if you want, but I need your keys."   No drama.

7.  You are the thinker of your thoughts, so choose thoughts that serve you. Tell a better story.
This is huge.  Pick powerful thoughts like, "My family is amazing just like it is."  "I learned so much from my past, and now I am moving into a wonderful future."  "I can do all things through God who strengthens me."  "My teenager is learning and growing and so am I."  "It's all going to work out and it's all okay."  "I love my life with the good and the hard."

8.  Fear and Love can't exist in the same space.  We know this by experiencing this in life and from the scripture.  So think about this and drop the fear.  Don't be afraid for your kids or their futures.  Just love them in their complete package.  When my daughter was going through her Jr. high years she was "rebelling"  in all her 13-14 year old glory.  But the more I was afraid for her and us and what the future was going to be, the less I could love her.  The more drama I put into the situation with negative thoughts, my fear escalated.   Love was the answer.  When I let go of fear and just loved, she did a 180... BUT.... I wasn't loving her thinking my love will bring her back, or my love will fix her.  I'm just loving her because she is worthy of love however her life turns out.  It's her agency and it's her life.

9.  View everyone with curiosity, compassion, and love.  Get out of judgment.  I am a child of God and EVERYONE else is too.  This is true for all of your children from 0- 33 years and beyond. Our brains love to judge, it's how we make sense of the world, and our brains rank where we fit into the social structure because it thinks it's keeping us safe or our kids safe.    It thinks we will be kicked out of the tribe and die if we don't judge.  This could be true about our surroundings, but it's not true about people.   So much better to think, "Isn't that interesting that he does this.. I wonder why?  I wonder what's up with that person that they make those kinds of choices.?  So  Fascinating.  So interesting.  They have a momma who loves them...and I do too.  I am grateful there are a lot of different types of people in our world.  How boring if we were all the same."

As a parent, I  want to show up for the whole human experience, the whole ride, whatever that looks like and not be afraid of it and not judge it, just move into it with full trust in my Heavenly Father that he has my back and my Young adults back too.