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Authoritarian
Parenting, Permissive Parenting, Or Loving Parenting
By Margaret Paul, Ph.D.
Angie was brought up by rigid,
authoritarian parents who kept her on a tight leash. They rarely
considered her feelings about anything, showing a complete lack of
empathy and compassion for her feelings and desires. If she came home
five minutes late from school or from an activity, she was punished.
Yelling and hitting were their favorite forms of punishment.
Angie was a good girl. She did
well in school and did what she was told, but was often sad and lonely
and never felt important. When she married and had her own children, she
knew that she didn't want to treat her children the way she had been
treated. She wanted to consider their feelings and needs. She wanted
them to feel valued and important.
Angie was a very loving mother.
She spent lots of time with her children, playing with them, listening
to them, and giving them much affection and approval. However, because
it was so vital to Angie that her children feel valued and important,
she often put herself aside and gave in to their demands. Because Angie
had never felt important, it was easy to put herself aside. She actually
believed that her children's feelings and needs were more important than
hers. As a result, Angie swung the other way from her own upbringing and
became a permissive parent.
The consequences for Angie of
authoritarian parenting was that she didn't value herself. The results
for her children of permissive parenting was that her children grew up
with entitlement issues, thinking they were more important than others,
and often not being caring and respectful toward others.
Neither authoritarian nor
permissive parenting is loving parenting. Loving parenting is parenting
that values both the parents' and the children's feelings and needs.
Loving parents do not attempt to control their children – other than in
actual situations of health and safety - nor do they allow their
children to control them. They do not violate their children with anger,
blame, or hitting, nor do they allow their children to violate them.
They do not expect their children to give themselves for others, nor do
they give themselves up for their children.
Loving parents are parents who
deeply value themselves enough to not worry about being rejected by
their children. They are willing to set solid limits on unacceptable
behavior and are not available to being manipulated by their children.
Their identities are not tied into their children's performance in
school or in other activities, such as sports. Nor are their identities
tied up in how their children look. They are accepting of who their
children are as individuals, even when their children are very different
from them. They do not impose their way of being onto their children,
yet at the same time they solidly reinforce a value system that includes
honesty, integrity, caring, compassion, kindness and empathy.
As much as we want to be loving
parents, unless we have done our own inner work to heal our own deep
fears of rejection and domination, we will automatically be acting out
of these fears without being consciously aware of it. If you grew up
with fears of rejection and/or domination, you will automatically
protect against these fears in your relationships with your children.
You may find yourself trying to control them out of a fear of being
controlled or rejected by them. You might be controlling with your anger
or with your giving in and giving yourself up. Fears of rejection can
manifest with children through trying to control them with anger, or
through trying to control their love through giving yourself up to them.
Fears of domination can manifest through controlling them with anger or
violence to avoid being controlled by them. Insecurities can manifest
through attempting to get your children to perform in the way you want
in order to define your worth.
In one way or another, whatever is
unhealed within you will surface in your behavior with your children.
Raising healthy children means first healing the wounded child within
you – the part of you that has your fears and insecurities, and your
desire to protect against rejection and domination.
Our society has swung back and
forth between authoritarian and permissive parenting and the result of
both is far less than desirable. We have only to look at the number of
people taking antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs, as well as the
number of alcoholics and drug addicts, as well as the rise of crime and
the number of people in prisons, to know that neither method works to
raise healthy individuals.
Perhaps it is time to accept that
we need to be in the process of healing ourselves before becoming
parents.
Margaret Paul, Ph.D. is the
best-selling author and co-author of eight books, including "Do I Have
To Give Up Me To Be Loved By You?" She is the co-creator of a powerful
healing process called Inner Bonding. Learn Inner Bonding now! Visit her
web site for a FREE Inner Bonding course:
http://www.innerbonding.com or
margaret@innerbonding.com
Phone sessions available. |
