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1
Parenting

from the

Inside Out

By Rifka Schonfeld, Director of S.O.S.
(Strategies For Optimum Success)

“This is the way I was brought up.
There’s no way I can change.” allows you to take the memories and
“My mother did this too… I can’t help experiences of your childhood and
it!” -
“It’s in my DNA. That’s the way it is.” ing system.

It’s the popular belief that your early Being mindful. The idea of mindful-
experiences as a child determine who ness is to be present in your thoughts
you will be as an adult. If your parents
spoke to you in a certain way, then
you will inevitably speak to your chil- child (not every minute of every day!)
dren that way. If your mother gave you are not worrying about the past
you guilt about that second cookie or the future. This living in the present
you ate, then you will give your daugh- moment helps your children not only
ter guilt about her second cookie. The learn about you and the way you func-
-
from the Inside Out comes to tell us
once again that our childhood is not to our children, they develop a deeper
- sense of themselves and their ability to
interact with the world around them.
Shaped by them? Sure. But, you don’t
have to repeat those experiences, you
can use them to learn and grow as a
parent.

because it is impossible to happily
method that the authors Drs. Daniel carry a burden for twenty-four hours
Siegel and Mary Hartzell call “parent- a day, seven days a week, for a life-
ing from the inside out.” Those points