Permission to Parent

Don’t be afraid to be in charge.” —Daphne Hirsh, MD, pediatrician “Parenting is a benevolent dictatorship.” —Robert Landaw, MD, pediatrician “Don’t let the inmates run the asylum.” —Ken Newman, MD, psychiatrist

Your children and your children’s children will thank you. CHAPTER TEN Out of the Mouths of Babes Ask the young.

“Be impeccable with your word. Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean.” Don Miguel goes on to quote the definition of integrity as a state of wholeness or being unbroken. Think about that. Every time you tell even a tiny lie, you are chipping away at your own wholeness and eroding your self-esteem. It’s so much healthier to stay true to yours

So I came up with Family Talking Teasers. Now we ask things like: ‘If you were parent for a day, what rules would you make?’ Or ‘If you could wake up in any country tomorrow, what would it be and why?’ Or ‘What’s your idea of heaven on earth?’ ”

Without missing a beat he replied, “It was so easy. I let hard work teach the lesson. Every summer I would scour the want ads for the hardest, most physically taxing summer jobs that I could find that paid minimum wage. One summer I had my son Dan loading heavy boxes onto a truck from morning until night. When he asked me to buy him a pair of baske

Remember, childhood’s greatest legacy is how we felt loved.

Trust me, I hear stories daily of adults who were scared of their parents or fed a diet of shame. I can promise you that this is not the recipe for self-esteem.

Home is not just a place. Home is a state of being.” —Laura Carlin, author and blogger

Thirty years later, his heart is still full as the memories of that night flicker on. CHAPTER NINE Love’s Lasting Legacy There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as if everything is. —Albert Einstein