"Understanding Parenting"

“Life is like riding a bicycle. To keep your balance you must keep moving.” Albert Einstein

The historical challenge we have faced in understanding parenting is making sense out of the entire parent-child system. It is the very nature of what and how we think that have limited our ability to understand parenting in the context of both time and space. This dynamic relationship between parent and child is an ongoing process that is characterized by the changing world we live in. In short if we truly want to have a better understanding of parenting we must become more flexible in accepting a more inclusive model. It is only by considering the interactive dynamics of the entire parent-child system that we can fully comprehend and appreciate the complexities of parenting.

Our current parenting models have seemingly lost their way on the modern technological information superhighways. They have not been able to keep pace with the ever changing landscapes of our expanding world. It is only by building a more inclusive approach to parenting that we can develop a model that has the adaptability to guide us into the future. By asking better questions we can start to better understand of what means in “Becoming a Better Parent.” What we need is a more comprehensive approach to parenting that takes into consideration the complete context within which they are embedded. 

I have often found myself both professional and personally struggling to recombine and add to the current parenting resources in finding the right solutions at the right time. The problem remains that although there is a great deal of helpful information it often miss the boat by focusing on only a relative few aspects of the entire parenting process. It is difficult for these approaches to provide the dynamic flexibility needed to account for the influences of a multidimensional perspective of parenting. If we look at the context of parenting from the vast array of individual and group influences, our current one size fits all model lacks the necessary ingredients for understanding.          

Minimalistic views of parenting have often tried to reduce our overall understanding of the entire parenting continuum to only a few variables. Advice to parents is often handed out like candy at a parade and although popular these situational based onions lack the sustenance for true change. Still other approaches often over emphasize the tools, techniques, strategies and styles of parenting and miss the purpose behind the meaning. However the important of these existing models of parenting cannot be ignored and they provide the foundation for future parental growth. The underlying fault created within the heart of parenting has been our inability to grasp the true nature of the relationship between parent and child.