Your Children Are Listening: Nine Messages They Need to Hear from You

played out in the formation of who you are in adulthood, and how they might affect your parenting:
     
• What was the emotional tone and style of your family life when you were a child? For example, was it calm and reserved or expressive and chaotic?
• What values were expressed in your family, such as faith, charity, achievement, or fitness?
• What attitudes or beliefs were evident in your family, for example, humility, compassion, hope?
• What activities and experiences did your family share, for instance, sports, games, or gardening?
• What healthy messages did you receive as a child that you want to pass along to your children?
• What unhealthy messages did you receive as a child that you don’t want your children to get?
    Note that I used rather positive examples, but the above list could just as easily include anger, bigotry, selfishness, and alcohol abuse.
    Then, talk about the messages that each of you believe are most important to instill in your children. Ask yourselves the following questions:
     
• What values do you most want to instill in your children?
• What beliefs about themselves do you want your children to gain?
• What attitudes toward others and the world do you want your children to develop?
• What values, beliefs, and attitudes do you want to protect your children from?
• What activities and experiences can you share with your children to communicate healthy messages and obviate unhealthy messages?
    Based on both my professional experience and the answers that Sarah and I arrived at in response to these questions,
Your Children Are Listening
offers what I consider to be nine of the most important messages that young children need to get from you: love, competence, security, compassion, gratitude, Earth, respect, responsibility, and emotion. At the same time, I encourage you to explore messages that may differ from mine. Though I believe that my nine messages transcend individual and cultural differences, the reality is that people’s values, beliefs, and attitudes, which act as the source of the messages, can vary based on upbringing, culture, faith, and any number of other factors. As your own ideas about the messagesyou want your children to get become clear, you can substitute or complement those that I have offered. Regardless of the messages you decide to emphasize with your children, you can use the information and strategies that I offer in this book to convey them in the most effective way.
    Of course, this discussion won’t conclude in one sitting, but rather should be an ongoing conversation as you gain new information and perspectives, have fresh ideas, and as your positions shift and the messages that you value most become clarified and prioritized. Your goal is to establish an agreed-upon set of messages and create a powerful and united front that will increase the chances of your children getting the messages that you want them to get.
    One important benefit of having this discussion early and often is that you can frequently resolve conflicts before they arise. For example, before we had Catie and Gracie, Sarah and I read a lot of parenting books and talked to many parents about how they were raising their children. Though we were of like minds on most things, we didn’t agree on everything at first—for example, how much popular culture to which we should expose our girls. Where there were differences, we discussed them and found consensus. We were able to prevent a lot of potential disagreements and create a unified front about how to raise Catie and Gracie before they were even born. Once they were born, when conflicts arose, we reminded each other of our earlier discussions and considered any new information or experiences that might have changed our views, which minimized our disagreements about our messages.
    There may not always be middle ground or compromises on message issues; you and your spouse may just disagree. In this case, someone has to give, otherwise your children will get mixed messages, which will not do them a bit of good. One of you should accede to the other in the name of a cohesive message if one feels strongly about an issue and can offer a compelling argument for his or her position. This kind of conflict can be particularly touchy on fundamentally important messages, for example, those related toreligious belief (e.g., Christian vs. Jewish), exposure to popular culture (video-game player vs. book reader), and health and