Korea Institute of Psycho-education: [Mother Therapy] Healthy standards of parenting

2/19/2024

[Mother Therapy] Healthy standards of parenting

Are you swayed in parenting by paying attention to other people’s opinions and advice or blaming some external situations or other people for difficulties in parenting? It is easy to be swayed by other people’s words or advice even when you are doing so well in parenting when you don’t accurately understand what is important in parenting. You may also keep changing parenting strategies losing consistency and causing problems in children.
      Other people’s words or advice come from their own life experiences, which are all different and unique for everyone. They may apply their own thought standards instead of the fundamental operational mechanism of human mind and psychology and of children’s psychological development.
Of course, you can ask others for advice during parenting but you should be able to make your own judgment based on your own thought standards and take full responsibility for your decision. You should never be swayed by other people’s opinions or advice.
Many parents refer to information they learn through other parents’ examples or social or mass media for parenting strategies. When they have healthy standards on parenting, they will base their own standards for adopting and applying whatever they and their children need. However, when you don’t have your own standards for parenting, you will keep following others’ examples disregarding your and your children’s circumstance and keep being swayed by every external information you encounter on the way. You may end up blaming other people or some external sources when problems occur.
  Every parent and every child are different and unique. Their circumstances and environments are all different. It is only natural that you will end up experiencing difficulties in parenting when you adopt this and that famous or fancy looking strategies without your own standards. It is crucial for parents to accurately understand how children develop psychologically until they become adults and adopt the right parenting strategies that suit their situation. When you have healthy standards of parenting, you will be able to discern specific parenting strategies that you can successfully adopt and help your children flourish.