Love and Fear
How we interact with our children depends very much on what we think children are. If we believe that children are the “work of the devil,” then we will feel obligated to be all over them at every little hint of misbehavior. We will need to “put the fear of God in them,” to keep them in line, because as the old saying goes: “If you give them an inch they will take a mile.” If our view of children is that they are “all light,” and if left alone they will only express goodness, compassion, and consideration for all living things, then we might...
Read MoreBringing the Eternal into the Now
This week I thought I would frame this dialogue on wholeness by sharing with you Essential Parenting’s Statement of Purpose. Hopefully it will give you a taste of the “big-picture view” that I am working from. The health of a society is directly related to the overall health of the individuals within it; that is the physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual health of each of us. And though it is true that human beings are infinitely complex, we have learned of many of the patterns that shape the relative health of individuals, especially how child-caregiver...
Read MoreWholeness, not Perfectionism
“Do not doubt your own basic goodness. In spite of all confusion and fear, you are born with a heart that knows what is just, loving, and beautiful.” Jack Kornfield, The Art of Forgiveness, Lovingkindness, and Peace Sometimes when I speak about the importance of wholeness, I see signs of fear and stress appear in parent’s faces. For some, Preserving Wholeness is just one more thing that they have to do in their already busy lives. For others who are really doing their best to give their son or daughter everything that they themselves never had as a child, it’s another...
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Chris White, M.D. is a board-certified pediatrician whose parenting work aims to optimize the developmental potential of children and their parents. He regularly writes on 
