7 days
Guided Parenting: Your Role as a Parent
Breaking down childhood anxiety from its evolutionary roots to the power of empathy and open communication.
Milestones
5 minutes
Your Role as a Parent
Welcome to Day 1 of this Pathway, Guided Parenting: Your Role as a Parent. Each day of your Pathway you’ll have the opportunity to walk your Daily Path. Daily Paths provide a quiet space to grow and reflect on your child and yourself, in just a few minutes.
As you walk your Daily Path you’ll be asked questions to help you reflect on your journey. Try your best to answer each question thoughtfully and honestly.
Let’s start by exploring how you see your role as a parent.
Reflect: What do you consider your role to be? A friend? a teacher? a disciplinarian?—a mix of these? How does your role differ from the role your parents played in raising you? And is that a good thing? Are there roles your parents played you hope to emulate or avoid?
The Guide
When it comes to nurturing a secure attachment, research points to one parental role as highly effective: The Guide.
Imagine yourself in need of a guide. On a vacation to somewhere completely new, a dramatic change in weather surprises you, and you’re caught in a storm.
Close your eyes and go there for a moment…
Now, think of how a professional guide might act, signaling to you how to manage the difficulty, reminding you of what you’ve brought along to get you through, what you’ve prepared for, and what you’re capable of.
Now, consider how you look from the perspective of your child: You take them across every terrain, in all weather, through a hundred challenges, constantly encountering surprises. Again and again, they find themselves in need of a guide. How can you ensure that when they look to you, they find one? What are the attributes of the Guide your child needs?
Guided Parenting teaches us to be:
- Stronger
- Wiser
- Centered
- Kind
When you display these traits, your child trusts you’ll lead them where they need to go. You help your child build trust in themselves—and in their relationship with you—when you adopt and display the four traits of a Guide.
Stronger, Wiser, Centered, & Kind
This might sound like a lot, but it will be easier than you think and Era can help get you there. We’ll consider these traits of a guide in more depth over the next several days, starting tomorrow.
Let’s wrap up today’s path by reflecting on what these words bring to mind for you.
Reflect: Think of a recent challenge you experienced with your child. How might one of the 4 traits of a guide have enabled you to guide your child through the experience?
Stronger
In this Pathway, you’re learning the Role of a Parent as a Guide. Last session we talked about how your child needs a Guide who is Stronger, Wiser, Centered, and Kind.
Today we’ll learn about what it really means to be Stronger.
As a guide, there are absolutely moments when we need physical strength–when we must pick up and move our child. Being strong isn’t only about being actually physically stronger, but also about emotional strength. In guided parenting Stronger means someone who is able to set boundaries and enforce them. Someone who has developed emotional strength and resilience, vital for handling parenting challenges without overwhelming stress or emotional breakdown.
It is not that you need to be stronger all the time, but that is the way your child needs to see you in order to feel safe.
Reflect: In what moments in your parenting might your child perceive you as “stronger”?
Recall again being caught in a storm in an unfamiliar place, dark clouds gather and lightning flashes overhead. What type of guide would make you feel safe?
No matter how strong they are, your guide won’t be able to stop the storm, but a good guide will know how to weather it. The belief that your guide can carry you if you’re hurt, find shelter from the storm and is strong enough to protect the group at all costs is what will make you and others feel safe.
Throughout your child’s journey you won’t be able to protect them from everything. It’s the belief that you are Stronger, strong enough to protect them both physically and emotionally, that makes them feel safe and secure.
Reflect: What comes to mind when you think about “Stronger” as a positive attribute? Is there a time in your life when you were glad for the strength of another? Can you recall a time when you were glad to be stronger than your child?
Wiser
You’re learning about your role as a parent: being a Stronger, Wiser, Centered, and Kind Guide.
Last time we contemplated how a guide is Stronger. A successful guide is also Wiser.
In the context of Guided Parenting, being wiser means making calls based on knowledge and experience.
Being wiser also means choosing when to show your child your Strength, and when it’s more important to show them Kindness (a trait we’ll explore further in the next session).
You won’t always feel wiser, but it is important that your child sees you this way. Your child feels safe when there is someone who will make decisions when something unexpected happens.
Children are not always capable of making decisions that serve their well being. When they are aware that there is someone wiser than them helping to make big decisions this makes them feel safe.
Being wiser is about guiding them through life’s challenges with a gentle hand and an observant eye, knowing when to step in and when to step back. Is is the ability to see the big picture.
We need to be aware that the ultimate goal is not to do things for the child but to equip them with the tools they need to navigate the world themselves.
Reflect: Recall a time when you did not have enough knowledge of a situation, and someone with more knowledge helped you feel at ease. What happened during that moment? Is there someone in your life that you see as Wiser? How do you feel when you approach this person for help?
Centered
In previous lessons we explored the importance of being a Stronger and Wiser Guide for your child. Today we’ll unpack what it means for a Guide to be Centered.
Being centered is like holding a calm pose. When you’re able to stay centered with your child, they’re more likely to reflect this back to you—or to calm down faster than they would if you were not remaining centered. Your staying centered helps your child see you as a stable and reassuring presence. This is crucial for fostering a secure attachment in your child.
The benefit of staying Centered is not lost if you aren’t perfectly calm in every moment. We’ll get into this concept more in a later lesson, which is about screwing up – becoming uncentered — and how we repair.
Reflect: What helps you feel centered? Some examples might be social time with friends, activity and exercise, gardening, or meditation.
Are there tools that you use to regain your center when you lose it? Breathing exercises? mantras? quiet corner? music?
What do you think you need to do to help yourself be a more centered guide for (your kids)?
Kind
Today we will focus on the last attribute of a parent guide: Kind. We will look at what kindness really means and how it makes our children feel.
A Guide is Kind
Your child will perceive you as kind if you balance being authoritative with showing affection and warmth. You cannot spoil a child with kindness. And if you are only functioning as a Stronger and Wiser guide, remember that kindness is required often. If you looked at balance scales, you would want them to tip heavily on the side of kindness!
This is an invitation to remain warm, friendly, and loving in your approach to your children, regardless of the type of interaction you are having. If your children fear your reactions, or worry about how you might treat them, that is not conducive to a secure attachment. When it comes to fostering a secure attachment, being a Kind Guide makes a big difference.
What is Kindness?
First and foremost, kindness is your child feeling you light up when they enter a room.
Kindness is not yelling when a child makes a mistake. It is a warm hug when a child feels sad. It is an encouraging smile or a little squeeze when a child feels nervous.
Kindness is helping your child learn emotional regulation (which means holding boundaries). It is playfulness when things are too serious or when there have been too many demands.
Kindness is getting down to your child’s level and seeing things from their point of view.
Reflect: Think of a recent time when someone was kind to you and describe it. It can be as simple as a soft touch when you were upset or someone checking in with you when you seemed withdrawn or something more dramatic like bringing you flowers or making you a meal when you were stressed out.
Is there a time you recall being unkind with your children that you regret?
Your milestones are precious ✨
Keep your milestones safe by downloading the app.
Why We Screw Up, and Repair
We have spent some time making it clear that a guide should be Stronger, Wiser, Centered and Kind. We need now to recognize that we cannot always be all these things. Today we will talk about what gets in the way and what to do about messing up.
By now you’ve discovered the ways your child benefits when you’re their strong, wise, centered, and kind guide. But here’s an important thing to note: no parent could possibly be all of these things all of the time. Faltering on making the right decisions with your child is all part of being human.
When we’re really upset, for example, we lose some contact with the part of our brain that helps us make logical (wise) choices. When we’re sleep deprived, excessively stressed, or hungry, we’re more likely to get upset.
So, no, you will not be stronger, wiser, centered and kind all the time.
Reflect: Think about the last time you felt like you “messed up” with your child. What happened?
Did you follow up with your child afterwards?
Being aware of why your child needs you to be Stronger, Wiser, Centered and Calm creates a compass you can use to guide your actions. But you still make mistakes.
Acknowledging and apologizing for these mistakes is a big part of forming a secure attachment. This crucial act of repair teaches your child that mistakes are a natural part of life, and that what truly matters is addressing them.
These moments of repair not only reinforce the secure base you are striving to provide but also model for your child how they can navigate their own relationships in the future.
Reflect: Think about the last time someone made a mistake that hurt your feelings. What could they have done to help mend the relationship?
Being the Guide
This week we looked at your role as a parent and how to guide your child toward a secure attachment. Today we will wrap up this pathway and find ways to take this role into your daily life.
In order to form a secure attachment, your child need you to be Stronger, Wiser, Centered, and Kind. They also need you to recognize and repair your mistakes so they can learn to do the same.
As we close out this Weekly Path, we’d like to help you implement what you’ve discovered into your parenting.
Reflect: Stronger, Wiser, Centered and Kind. Which of these do you think you are most comfortable with. Which do you want to work on the most?
Given the importance of understanding your role and how your child perceives you in shaping your relationship, what can you do to integrate this awareness into your daily life? One idea to create an affirmation.
An affirmation is a positive statement that you repeat to yourself to encourage and reinforce a desired belief or mindset. A good affirmation can help you improve your focus and enhance your overall well-being. You could try something like, “I am Stronger, Wiser, Centered and Kind” or if you have one trait that you need to work on more than others, it could be, “I am emotionally stronger than my child.”
You can say these out loud, write them over and over each morning or leave them as notes where you will see them several times a day—on the inside of often used cabinets, on your bathroom mirror or your nightstand, on the dashboard of your car.
Reflect: How will you bring this knowledge into your daily life?
