What's Your Parenting Mantra?
“Lower the bar, then limbo under it" might work
It’s thread time again! I LOVED meeting so many of you last week in our introductions (and I know I still need to respond to a few recent comments, gah!).
This week, I’m curious if you have a parenting mantra. I wrote a piece years ago for a women’s magazine — I honestly can’t remember which one, lol — about the benefits of having a mantra, and I was just able to find my very rough first draft on my computer. Here’s some of what I wrote:
Mantras — short positive phrases you repeat to yourself over and over again — have been used since at least the first millennium B.C. by people in many cultures to rise above intrusive, obsessive thoughts. In ancient Sanskrit, the word “mantra” literally means “to cross the mind.” But these motivational and spiritual phrases aren’t just ancient relics — they’re still used by millions of people, and a growing body of research suggests that they can help you stay focused on your goals, lower your heart and breathing rate, quench potentially dangerous stress-related hormones.
The most useful mantras are the ones that positively remind you of your goals, serving as mini pep talks…. and they don’t have to be particularly complex to have an effect — in fact, short and sweet is really what you’re aiming for. “The most famous mantra of all time comes from The Little Engine That Could, who kept saying, ‘I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.”
I’m cracking up over here because I think I can is definitely NOT my mantra. I mean, I guess I don’t have an official mantra — nothing I recite every morning in the mirror or anything — but one thing I do say to myself (and, really, anyone who will listen) all the time is it’s good to make mistakes. I’ve written here about all the benefits that can come from parenting mistakes. They illustrate to our kids that humans are never perfect, that we are all lifelong learners, and that growth comes from failure — and they are excellent opportunities to model accountability and apologizing.
So what’s your parenting mantra? Or what do you think could be your parenting mantra, if you were to be the kind of person to adopt one? Please share in the comments!
I can’t remember where I got this, but when things are tense between me and my husband we remind each other that “I’m not the enemy - the children/dog are.” It always makes us laugh and lightens the mood.
“This is temporary, this will pass” is what I find myself saying over and over when a child has grown into their latest irritating phase. Currently dealing with sleep training a 5.5 month old after having a great-sleeping 5 year old, so it’s getting repeated a lot right now.