Conscious Parenting
We keep using the word conscious for a lot of our posts. Why? Sadly, most of us are navigating this life on auto-pilot. Many of us wake up zombies, and go to bed zombies and we call this “living.” We’re going through the motions of trying to pay for our living situation, our vehicles, put food on the table and so forth. It’s no secret that the world’s priorities are out of balance, which causes us to have to participate in this matrix system that keeps us feeling and being enslaved. So what does it mean to be conscious? Oxford defines the word as: “aware of and responding to one’s surroundings; awake.”
Are we awake? Truly? I cannot answer that for you, but we can take a look at how to remove the sleepers from our tired, parent eyes so that we may live more present in our day to day lives with both ourselves and our children. Let’s take a look at three areas that we have the ability to change right now for the betterment of our children:
TIME SPENT: We all want a break. We all need breaks–it’s part of our design. When you become a parent, time is no longer your own. Depending on the age of the child, there are stages that are more demanding of time than others. Our children truly spend a short amount of time with us over their lifetime. I challenge you to take an audit of how you spend your time. Can you save your time on social media for after they’ve gone to bed? Can you include them in that special recipe you are making? Can you break away during the weekends and take them into nature, where they are free from societal distraction?
MONEY SPENT: Much like our time, our money is also a huge indicator of where our priorities are. We generally have to work so hard to earn a little bit of green, and then we spend it on meaningless and wasteful items. The next audit I encourage you to partake in is an audit of your finances. Where are you spending money at? Is that money spent for the betterment of you and your family? Are you living lavishly in one area, and scraping by in another? There’s no judgment here, ever. This is an exercise to cause you to get conscious.
WELLNESS: It’s a known fact that we cannot be present and conscious in our lives if we’re not here to live them. It’s really easy to get bogged down by the tasks of everyday life, and unfortunately we’re usually the ones that suffer, and more specifically, it’s our health that suffers. This is where balance is hugely important. I have been trying to achieve balance my entire life in this arena. It’s no easy task, and society has not exactly made it an easy task for us either. However, we cannot use excuses to write-off our wellness. Take an audit of your wellness practices, your food choices and your level of activity. Is there anything that you can cut out that does not serve your body? Can you involve your family in activities that stimulate the body and provide exercise?
These three categories seem to be the firm foundation in which other categories stand upon. Nobody is asking for you to do a drastic overhaul of your life–unless, that is something YOU want to do. Sometimes it takes someone just asking simple questions in order to spark conversation in your own mind. We often get into habitual routines, without even really evaluating those habits. It’s very easy to give credence to something in your life just out of sheer convenience. Our children are ever-vigilant of the things we do, the conversations we have and the events we partake in. We’re not ever going to get it perfect, but we can get it conscious. Love and light to you.
