Learning from the Heart

The following reflection is from Isabella—a member of the Parentology community. We’d like to thank Isabella for her kind heart-felt words.

By Isabella Henning

I’ve just completed my first Parentology course—a three-day workshop in Dubai Knowledge Village. I must admit that I learnt with my whole heart and being and I cannot tell you how incredible it was. I was blown away by the simplicity and purity of the information and by the realization that we as parents often spend our lives ignorantly controlling our children and others inadvertently causing misery and damage when our intentions are the opposite.

The course teaches parents how to:

• Allow people to be who they already are—naturally creative, resourceful and whole.
• Ask our children how they feel about things so that they learn from an early age to be in touch with their own feelings and don’t in later years become emotionally frustrated due to never being acknowledged nor given a chance to express themselves.
• Be an observer and look objectively at situations before just blindly reacting to our children out of habit and ignorance.
• Ask our children questions rather than instructing them all the time. This is an amazing skill. I’ve had such fun with it and have been so delighted by my children’s answers.
• The skill of deep listening—Our children blossom with self-confidence when we as parents give them our undivided attention as though no one else exists.
• Stop sweating the small stuff pertaining to our own imperfect and society-dictated expectations. This allows us to stand back and assess our children according to their own unique individual strengths—not in comparison to anyone else. If we want them to win within their own comfort zone so that they remain whole and beautiful then it’s about them, not about what we expect of them.

There’s the simplicity – allowing – never controlling ever, empowering our children each step of the way. Inspiring stuff!

Since my Parentology experience I have been so excited about the changes I’ve witnessed at home as a result of this course. I’ve learned:

• Our children are mirrors of us: A calm me = calm children. An in control, calm and self managed me = manageable and peaceful children.
• To drop all labels. No child is to be called lazy, sloppy nor anything bad as it teaches them to feel ashamed, damages their self esteem and sets them up for failure in life.
• To compliment my children in a way that doesn’t put undue pressure on them. Instead of saying “You are the best in your class!” saying, “Jason, this drawing you did is excellent and I can see that you did your best!”
• To forgive myself for past parenting mistakes. Guilt serves no one. We must move on and begin a new chapter of our parenting in which we co-design the relationships we’d like to have with our children.

The beauty of the Parentology course is that there is no real effort to recall what was learnt. The experience is not passive, but rather one of active discovery. This is not cognitive learning. It is heart learning. One does not have to go over notes to bring back learning of the heart. I have never experienced this in my life before—post-training day implementation without any recall efforts. Wow!

I wish this course were compulsory for every human being as it is life changing. The wisdom you will take away will stick with you and blossom in the most beautiful way. In our natural state we are already good parents. These insights will just make us that much better!

NOTE: The image above is by Marie.LL and is made available under the CC Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.

No related posts.

Tags: deep listening, empowering children, labels, learning about Parentology, Observer, parenting course, Parentology

Category: Guest Bloggers, Reflections