Spirit and Parenting
Know yourself - Know your child - Be Love
Some people know they will be a parent. If you know this, if it is part
of your very being, this article may be interesting to you.
No matter what your path in life, it is well to know yourself, to
consciously dive into your own being, to contemplate who you are and to know
the vibration of your own soul. This e-zine and the connected web site can
help with knowing yourself and traveling a path to your own spiritual home.
As a parent interested in spirit, you will be guiding your child in these matters,
so it is well to know your child. To what is the child drawn? About what is he or
she passionate? What does the child avoid? What are the gifts and the
challenges in your child's life? As a parent, you are the closest and most
intimate person in your child's life. Take the time and make the effort to
know your child - not as an extension of yourself - but as an entirely
complete and whole being unto themselves.
Most of all, love your child - again, as a separate and complete person.
Open-handed love is hard; but if you are interested in your child's spirit,
you must know that it cannot be contained. Kahlil Gibran said it so well in his
book The Prophet:
"Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of
Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet
they belong not to you.
You may give them your love
but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but
not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the
house of tomorrow, which you cannot
visit, not even in your dreams.
You my strive to be like them,
but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor
tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your
children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon
the path of the infinite, and He
bends you with His might
that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the
archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
No one can do this alone. Parenting is a community effort. Allow
family and friends to help you to know yourself and your child. Likewise, help your
child to see him/herself through the eyes of others who will also nurture and
sustain him or her.
It is my pleasure as a mother and teacher of young children to invite
you into a conversation about spirit and parenting. On life's journey, the most
wonderful gift is to share and relate one's understanding and one's self to
others.
Vicki
