Three amazing teenagers. How did that happen?!? Parenting tips from the pleasantly surprised.

Sunday, September 3, 2017

E is for Empower

This week we finish exploring the meaning behind my chaplaincy mission statement. I hope these short thoughts have helped you develop a personal parenting mission statement.

Take Time to CARE

Empowerment is a word that demonstrates a small thing – trust. We empower others when we give them authority to act. Leaders that empower the people around them have healthy growing businesses. Parents that empower have maturing confident children.

Trust exists where compassion, attentiveness and reconciliation are taking place. We teach our children to be compassionate when we are inclusive (rather than playing the Us VS Them game) in the way we talk and act. We demonstrate attentiveness when we communicate openly and honestly, building relationships through time in conversation. Children learn the skills of reconciliation when they see the adults in their lives follow the golden rule, make mistakes and heal those broken relationships by admitting their wrongs, asking for forgiveness and offering forgiveness when others apologise to them.

Empowerment happens in trusting places. We empower others by providing a safe place for them to try new things – to fail, to try again and to succeed – without fear of anger, shame or judgement. We empower others when we give them healthy space to try and encouragement to try again.

The only way to learn is to try. Adults unleash the amazing creativity in children when they become a trusted safe place and then empower kids to give it a go. While we cannot control the feelings in our children, we can provide a safe place where feelings of trust, belief and confidence thrive. This is how we empower children.

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