Parenting Quotes - Page 19

Having kids means taking care of them, raising them, loving and supporting them, and none of those things have anything to do with who makes them one night in the bedroom or the experience of being pregnant

We can easily teach our kids hot to be kind, compassionate and respectful when we are kind, compassionate and respectful to them.

Mothering you is the first thing of consequence I have ever done.

A virtue is a habit that includes all of these things: actions (you take care of your child even when you don't feel like it), emotions (you are often overtaken by feelings of tenderness and delight), perceptions (you understand your little children better than they understand themselves), choices (you choose to get out of bed and go to the children's room even when you'd much rather not), and thoughts (you think differently, more thoroughly and carefully, about your children than about anyone else in the world). The habit of love includes all these things, but not necessarily all at the same time.

Don’t spoil kids by trying to buy them off, to buy their time. Kids aren’t stupid. They know a bribe when they see one. They want a parent not a payoff.

Take any two-year-old through a car wash and their skulls are blown. FLAPS! FOAM! ROLLING THINGS! It's the closest they'll ever get to being inside a working spaceship.

A Christian understanding of the world sees a child's character not as genetically determined but as shaped to a significant degree by parental discipleship and discipline.

what I want you to be - I don't mean physically but morally: you are very well physically - is a firm fellow, a fine firm fellow, with a will of your own, with resolution. with determination. with strength of character that is not to be influenced except on good reason by anybody, or by anything. That's what I want you to be. That's what your father, & your mother might both have been

It takes courage to gather children from whatever they’re doing and kneel together as a family. It takes courage to turn off the television and the computer and to guide your family through the pages of the scriptures every day. It takes courage to turn down other invitations on Monday night so that you can reserve that evening for your family. It takes courage and willpower to avoid over-scheduling so that your family can be home for dinner.

With children the clock is reset. We forget what came before

Ask a child's guardians what it takes to be good at their jobs, and most will answer with a single word... SACRIFICE. Parents give up so much: time, sleep, freedom, money, intimacy... pretty much everything but complaining how much they sacrifice.

A successful father is not more successful than his children.

I worry about exposing him to bands like Journey, the appreciation of which will surely bring him nothing but the opprobrium of his peers. Though he has often been resistant - children so seldom know what is good for them - I have taught him to appreciate all the groundbreaking musicmakers of our time - Big Country, Haircut 100, Loverboy - and he is lucky for it. His brain is my laboratory, my depository. Into it I can stuff the books I choose, the television shows, the movies, my opinion about elected officials, historical events, neighbors, passersby. He is my twenty-four-hour classroom, my captive audience, forced to ingest everything I deem worthwhile. He is a lucky, lucky boy! And no one can stop me.

She was deemed an unfit mother, in spite of the fact that she goes to the gym every day,' Hal once told me. . . .Beautiful people are often forgiven for many things--and maybe she's gotten through life that way, but I don't forgive her for anything--and I don't even know what awful things she's done other than showing a lack of parental fitness.

Let those parents that desire Holy Children learn to make them possessors of Heaven and Earth betimes; to remove silly objects from before them, to magnify nothing but what is great indeed, and to talk of God to them, and of His works and ways. before they can either speak or go.

I never thought the brightest smile would come from a mouth without teeth.

Instead of feeling an urge to fix the problem or make amends, punishment prompts a child to think selfishly. What television shows will she be forced to miss? What dessert will she have to give up? She’s likely to be filled with resentment instead of remorse.

That I growed up a man and not a beast says something for me.

Reject the fearmongering. Adopt best practices. Slow down.

Quality time is not the same as the everydayness of being together. Let’s neither glorify nor undervalue.

Too bad for any parent who has become accustomed to ruling by force, because at some point the kids just get too big to slap around.

We hear a great deal about the rudeness of the ris- ing generation. I am an oldster myself and might be expected to take the oldsters' side, but in fact I have been far more impressed by the bad manners of par- ents to children than by those of children to parents. Who has not been the embarrassed guest at family meals where the father or mother treated their grown-up offspring with an incivility which, offered to any other young people, would simply have termi- nated the acquaintance? Dogmatic assertions on mat- ters which the children understand and their elders don't, ruthless interruptions, flat contradictions, ridicule of things the young take seriously some- times of their religion insulting references to their friends, all provide an easy answer to the question "Why are they always out? Why do they like every house better than their home?" Who does not prefer civility to barbarism?

You'll never be hurt as much by being open as you have been remaining closed.

I didn’t know how I could live with that knowledge, without it eating me up, without it poisoning every happy memory I had of growing up. Without it ruining everything Beck and I had.I didn’t understand how someone could be both God and the devil. How the same person could destroy you and save you. When everything I was, good and bad, was knotted with threads of his making, how was I supposed to know whether to love or hate him?

Gracious words revived our spirit and restored our soul.

Protecting our kids from sexual abuse is not accomplished in a single conversation, but in ongoing conversations grounded in honesty and trust.

I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom.

With the gentle force of their words, the dogged warmth of their embrace, and the assuring touch of souls softly bared, mothers are silently shaping whole societies and authoring entire cultures that sit poised on the horizon of the future. And although we ignorantly relegate such roles to some lower caste status, we would be wise to understand that the role of a mother sets the cadence of the future.

Perhaps, she had dreamed, she would teach some future King, shaping his child mind for a new and better world.

The progress of a struggling teen has less to do with the application of specific parenting techniques than with the parents’ own patient, persistent efforts to construct relationships with their son or daughter.

Parenting is the greatest pay it forward system on earth. We don't owe our parents anything. We owe our children everything. The same was true for our parents. The same will be true for our children.

For a child, it is in the simplicity of play that the complexity of life is sorted like puzzle pieces joined together to make sense of the world.

In my entire life, I never once heard either of my parents say they were stressed. That was just not a phrase I grew up being allowed to say. That, and the concept of "Me time".

Reckless behavior, particularly in young boys, may be the uncontrolled expression of a legitimate, even Godly, desire to strive after great and noble deeds. And when the desire for adventure follows a God-honoring course, exciting things can happen.

I had a friend whose family had dinner together every day. The mother would tuck you in at night and make breakfast in the morning. It just seemed so amazing to me.

Let them learn at school whatever they learn to pass the examinations, but at home let the education that you provide be the kind that widens their perceptions and takes away the germs of prejudices that infect them while they are out in the world.

Parenting is a partnership. Loving each other has a big impact on your children.

Although it is very easy to marry a wife, it is very difficult to support her along with the children and the household. Accordingly, no one notices this faith of Jacob. Indeed, many hate fertility in a wife for the sole reason that the offspring must be supported and brought up. For this is what they commonly say: ‘Why should I marry a wife when I am a pauper and a beggar? I would rather bear the burden of poverty alone and not load myself with misery and want.’ But this blame is unjustly fastened on marriage and fruitfulness. Indeed, you are indicting your unbelief by distrusting God’s goodness, and you are bringing greater misery upon yourself by disparaging God’s blessing. For if you had trust in God’s grace and promises, you would undoubtedly be supported. But because you do not hope in the Lord, you will never prosper.

They visited him in saris, clumping gracelessly through red mud and long grass ... and introduced themselves as Mrs. Pillai, Mrs. Eapen and Mrs. Rajagopalan. Velutha introduced himself and his paralyzed brother Kuttappen (although he was fast asleep). He greeted them with the utmost courtesy. He addressed them all as Kochamma [an honorific title for a woman] and gave them fresh coconut water to drink. He chatted to them about the weather. The river. The fact that in his opinion coconut trees were getting shorter by the year. As were the ladies in Ayemenem. He introduced them to his surly hen. He showed them his carpentry tools, and whittled them each a little wooden spoon.It is only now, these years later, that Rahel with adult hindsight recognized the sweetness of that gesture. A grown man entertaining three raccoons, treating them like real ladies. Instinctively colluding in the conspiracy of their fiction, taking care not to decimate it with adult carelessness. Or affection. [emphasis mine]It is after all so easy to shatter a story. To break a chain of thought. To ruin a fragment of a dream being carried around carefully like a piece of porcelain.To let it be, to travel with it, as Velutha did, is much the harder thing to do.

I raised my three teens with love, perseverance, tenacity, sweat, tears, prayers, lighting candles, and the list could go on.

...failure promotes success only if you actually take the time to analyze your mistakes.." "Failure has to be separated from fault, and for many people that requires a bit of deprogramming, as we learn early on that they are one and the same." "In this framework, intention is extremely important.

Carrie is my child, and I love her with every ounce of strength I possess. If love alone could cure our children, they would always be well.

Try as we might, we cannot force our children to reach their full potential. Theirs is the life that they alone must live. The role of the parent is to prepare the most fertile soil and appropriately water the seedling so it can most fully blossom.

My parents were two-faced. To me, they showed no mercy. They preached from theBook of Fallen Children - Commandment 1: The Child Is Always Ungrateful. At eighteen, the free ride would stop, and I'd be dumped into the mess of the world. But in their private moments, they were soft, cowed by love. They critiqued their own parenting skills and thought of all the ways the could help their kids get ahead.

Don't go overboard in praising required behavior: 'We have only done our duty' (Luke 17:10). But do go overboard when your child confesses the truth, repents honestly, takes chances, and loves openly. Praise the developing character in your child as it emerges in active, loving, responsible behavior.

My job is to make you think what you think is your businessRjS

Have a little faith in your sons. This journey will be the making of them.

The partnership between nurses and families is based on mutual trust, and defining the boundaries and rules clearly will help everyone involved, especially your child.

I had come to realize that you must do what you must for your children, even it if called for the sacrifice of your very soul.

Turn off the device and take your child for a walk through the woods or on a hike up a mountain. Go on a camping trip. Late at night, when it's absolutely dark, take your child's hand and ask her to look up at the stars. Talk with her about the vastness of space and the tininess of our planet in the universe. That's reality. That's perspective.

We all know that parents do not make children but that children make parents…Authentic parenting is one long sacrificial act…parenting reveals the way that sacrifice at once diminishes our life as we knew it…while at the same time revealing to us larger and infinitely more fascinating forms of life…Parents know experientially that the very process which makes them suffer also makes them grow.

Mind is the Alpha – Mind is the Omega. There is nothing else in the pursuit of knowledge. And more importantly, there is nothing else in education. All systems of the society should serve the mind, instead of the mind serving the systems.

A small step forward . . .every . . single . . .day. The sun is coming up and I am wondering, 'What wondrous thing shall I witness today?

Just remember something, okay? And this is neither here nor there but it’s something I really want you to know. Not that I think you have much trouble with this, but let’s be clear: you don’t owe your parents anything if they don’t respect you. That’s bullshit, to be taught that just because they created you and made sure you didn’t roll over in your crib and die, you owe them anything. So what I’m saying is use him. Use him if you can, if he lets you. But then don’t think you ever have to look back if he doesn’t respect you.

People have a much greater chance of finding something they’ll enjoy doing and making those greatest contributions when they trust themselves and are free to make their own life choices (are not marionettes in the hands of their parents).

Reflection can be painful, but reflection can also be productive.

I think that the best thing we can do for our children is to allow them to do things for themselves, allow them to be strong, allow them to experience life on their own terms, allow them to take the subway... let them be better people, let them believe more in themselves.

Motherhood:The most exhausting, emotional, rewardingand life-enhancing journey a woman can take.

The author says his young son, adopted from South Korea, occasionally burps and says thank you but otherwise is doing all right.

Asking a parent not to be a parent is like asking the sun not to be hot or snow not to be cold.