Unconditional Love & Unconditional Parenting

The other day I blogged about helping in the development of our children's self-esteem. One of the concepts in assisting this development is giving our children unconditional love. What does that mean or look like exactly?

In a strict sense it means not placing any conditions on the love of your children. You love them no matter what happens. You may not like what they did or how they behaved BUT you still love them.I'm not saying it's easy but in whatever interaction we have with our children, they need to know and understand that we love them. Taking away love or making love conditional on behaviour does harm to our children.

One of our forum members posted that her favourite parenting book was Unconditional Parenting by Alfie Kohn.

In reading an interview with Kohn, I was struck by a number of comments he made about today's parent. He states that "The real parenting epidemic in our society is the tendency to overcontrol children." On this I would agree wholeheartedly. Too often parents seem to be looking for ways to control their children, manipulate their behaviour, and intrude on their space.

The second point that Kohn makes is that "Kids don't need us to back off and let them do whatever the hell they want, any more than they need us to control them....The real alternative to doing things TO kids is to work WITH them."

Although I have not read the book, both of the above statements resonate with me. Children are persons in their own right and as such need and deserve the love and respect that we expect to have accorded to us.

The concept of unconditional love requires a shift of thinking and acting on the part of parents. We need to rethink and reframe our responses and communication with our children.

Try to think of how to work with your children in difficult situations and they still know that they are loved.

"When your child is the least loveable, he needs the most love." (A quote that inspired my blog of May 11th.)