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e23a7d0 Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person's character lies in their own hands. right-of-passage self-determination inspirational self-responsibility personal-responsibility growing-up innocence parenting Anne Frank
d007b3e I believe that what we become depends on what our fathers teach us at odd moments, when they aren't trying to teach us. We are formed by little scraps of wisdom. wisdom parenting Umberto Eco
0812cc5 I think that the best thing we can do for our children is to allow them to do things for themselves, allow them to be strong, allow them to experience life on their own terms, allow them to take the subway... let them be better people, let them believe more in themselves. motherhood kids inspirational-life inspirational-quotes life-and-living living inspiring life inspirational parenting-children fatherhood growing-up parenting children childhood parenthood C. JoyBell C.
164a53c Each suburban wife struggles with it alone. As she made the beds, shopped for groceries, matched slipcover material, ate peanut butter sandwiches with her children, chauffeured Cub Scouts and Brownies, lay beside her husband at night- she was afraid to ask even of herself the silent question-- 'Is this all? marriage feminism inspirational housekeeping existentialism purpose parenting Betty Friedan
ca5985e I don't remember who said this, but there really are places in the heart you don't even know exist until you love a child. love parenting Anne Lamott
b23f653 But kids don't stay with you if you do it right. It's the one job where, the better you are, the more surely you won't be needed in the long run. motherhood parenting Barbara Kingsolver
0beacb9 Being a mother is an attitude, not a biological relation. motherhood mothering parenting mother Robert A. Heinlein
2aa787e Adults constantly raise the bar on smart children, precisely because they're able to handle it. The children get overwhelmed by the tasks in front of them and gradually lose the sort of openness and sense of accomplishment they innately have. When they're treated like that, children start to crawl inside a shell and keep everything inside. It takes a lot of time and effort to get them to open up again. Kids' hearts are malleable, but once they gel it's hard to get them back the way they were. parenting teaching Haruki Murakami
96d6ba1 To be in your children's memories tomorrow inspirational parenting Barbara Johnson
015d2d5 "Babies are soft. Anyone looking at them can see the tender, fragile skin and know it for the rose-leaf softness that invites a finger's touch. But when you live with them and love them, you feel the softness going inward, the round-cheeked flesh wobbly as custard, the boneless splay of the tiny hands. Their joints are melted rubber, and even when you kiss them hard, in the passion of loving their existence, your lips sink down and seem never to find bone. Holding them against you, they melt and mold, as though they might at any moment flow back into your body. But from the very start, there is that small streak of steel within each child. That thing that says "I am," and forms the core of personality. In the second year, the bone hardens and the child stands upright, skull wide and solid, a helmet protecting the softness within. And "I am" grows, too. Looking at them, you can almost see it, sturdy as heartwood, glowing through the translucent flesh. The bones of the face emerge at six, and the soul within is fixed at seven. The process of encapsulation goes on, to reach its peak in the glossy shell of adolescence, when all softness then is hidden under the nacreous layers of the multiple new personalities that teenagers try on to guard themselves. In the next years, the hardening spreads from the center, as one finds and fixes the facets of the soul, until "I am" is set, delicate and detailed as an insect in amber." -- motherhood parenting children vulnerability Diana Gabaldon
775dbbb Perhaps it takes courage to raise children.. parenting John Steinbeck
4e19b7e (24/7) once you sign on to be a mother, that's the only shift they offer. parenting Jodi Picoult
f9a1acf I know it is hard for you young mothers to believe that almost before you can turn around the children will be gone and you will be alone with your husband. You had better be sure you are developing the kind of love and friendship that will be delightful and enduring. Let the children learn from your attitude that he is important. Encourage him. Be kind. It is a rough world, and he, like everyone else, is fighting to survive. Be cheerful. Don't be a whiner. inspirational parenting Marjorie Pay Hinckley
3ffe4c6 I would have given anything to keep her little. They outgrow us so much faster than we outgrow them. Brian Fitzgerald, talking about his children. parenting parents Jodi Picoult
00c7bc7 Was it the act of giving birth that made you a mother? Did you lose that label when you relinquished your child? If people were measured by their deeds, on the one hand, I had a woman who had chosen to give me up; on the other, I had a woman who'd sat up with me at night when I was sick as a child, who'd cried with me over boyfriends, who'd clapped fiercely at my law school graduation. Which acts made you more of a mother? Both, I realized. Being a parent wasn't just about bearing a child. It was about bearing witness to its life. motherhood parenting children Jodi Picoult
4e08ef3 Of course, everyone's parents are embarrassing. It goes with the territory. The nature of parents is to embarrass merely by existing, just as it is the nature of children of a certain age to cringe with embarrassment, shame, and mortification should their parents so much as speak to them on the street. parenting parents Neil Gaiman
675513f But she needs me more than she needs him and I guess being needed is almost as good as being loved. Maybe better. love parenting Betty Smith
89af7b6 Mother is a verb. It's something you do. Not just who you are. family inspirational parenting Cheryl Lacey Donovan
0174a94 Sometimes the strength of motherhood is greater than natural laws. parenting Barbara Kingsolver
33e2dfe In a culture which holds the two-parent patriarchal family in higher esteem than any other arrangement, all children feel emotionally insecure when their family does not measure up to the standard. A utopian vision of the patriarchal family remains intact despite all the evidence which proves that the well-being of children is no more secure in the dysfunctional male-headed household than in the dysfunctional female-headed household. Children need to be raised in loving environments. Whenever domination is present love is lacking. Loving parents, be they single or coupled, gay or straight, headed by females or males, are more likely to raise healthy, happy children with sound self-esteem. In future feminist movement we need to work harder to show parents the ways ending sexism positively changes family life. Feminist movement is pro-family. Ending patriarchal domination of children, by men or women, is the only way to make the family a place where children can be safe, where they can be free, where they can know love feminism parenting bell hooks
dcdc88f I've found what makes children happy doesn't always prepare them to be courageous, engaged adults. courage parenting Brené Brown
69220d7 Who we are and how we engage with the world are much stronger predictors of how our children will do than what we know about parenting. inspirational-attitude parenting self-help Brené Brown
b377606 Parenting is really just a matter of tracking, of hoping your kids do not get so far ahead you can no longer see their next moves. parenting Jodi Picoult
d320edc My father liked me, when I wasna being an idiot. And he loved me, too -- enough to beat the daylights out of me when I was being an idiot. Jamie Fraser spanking parenting Diana Gabaldon
431335c He could not construct for the child's pleasure the world he'd lost without constructing the loss as well and he thought perhaps the child had known this better than he. loss parenting Cormac McCarthy
8f82b5f "Sadie," he said forlornly, "when you become a parent, you may understand this. One of my hardest jobs as a father, one of my greatest duties, was to realize that my own dreams, my own goals and wishes, are secondary to my children's." self-sacrifice parenting father Rick Riordan
8a1edb0 "You can't cling to the side your whole life, that one lesson every parent needs to teach a child is "If you don't want to sink, you better figure out how to swim" life parenting Jeannette Walls
a25c9e3 [My dad] didn't do much apart from the traditional winning of bread. He didn't take me to get my hair cut or my teeth cleaned; he didn't make the appointments. He didn't shop for my clothes. He didn't make my breakfast, lunch, or dinner. My mom did all of those things, and nobody ever told her when she did them that it made her a good mother. parenting parent mother Michael Chabon
4f8a7b3 Be a full person. Motherhood is a glorious gift, but do not define yourself solely by motherhood. Be a full person. Your child will benefit from that. parenting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
340892d The Children's Hour Between the dark and the daylight, When the night is beginning to lower, Comes a pause in the day's occupations, That is known as the Children's Hour. I hear in the chamber above me The patter of little feet, The sound of a door that is opened, And voices soft and sweet. From my study I see in the lamplight, Descending the broad hall stair, Grave Alice, and laughing Allegra, And Edith with golden hair. A whisper, and then a silence: Yet I know by their merry eyes They are plotting and planning together To take me by surprise. A sudden rush from the stairway, A sudden raid from the hall! By three doors left unguarded They enter my castle wall! They climb up into my turret O'er the arms and back of my chair; If I try to escape, they surround me; They seem to be everywhere. They almost devour me with kisses, Their arms about me entwine, Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine! Do you think, o blue-eyed banditti, Because you have scaled the wall, Such an old mustache as I am Is not a match for you all! I have you fast in my fortress, And will not let you depart, But put you down into the dungeon In the round-tower of my heart. And there will I keep you forever, Yes, forever and a day, Till the walls shall crumble to ruin, And moulder in dust away! poetry love parenting children Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
4bf0d19 We pretend that we know our children, because it's easier than admitting the truth--from the minute that cord is cut, they are strangers. It's far easier to tell yourself your daughter is still a little girl than to see her in a bikini and realize she has the curves of a young woman; it's safer to say you're a good parent who has all the right conversations about drugs and sex than to acknowledge there are a thousand things she would never tell you. parenting Jodi Picoult
cd640fc If you, as a parent, raise your children well, they won't need you anymore. If you did it properly, they go away. letting-go parenting Neil Gaiman
a9206fc If you want to be treated like a mother, act like one. mothers parenting Jeannette Walls
a18df4b To look deep into your child's eyes and see in him both yourself and something utterly strange, and then to develop a zealous attachment to every aspect of him, is to achieve parenthood's self-regarding, yet unselfish, abandon. It is astonishing how often such mutuality had been realized - how frequently parents who had supposed that they couldn't care for an exceptional child discover that they can. The parental predisposition to love prevails in the most harrowing of circumstances. There is more imagination in the world than one might think. love parenting Andrew Solomon
ad96ff1 "Ask your child for information in a gentle, nonjudgmental way, with specific, clear questions. Instead of "How was your day?" try "What did you do in math class today?" Instead of "Do you like your teacher?" ask "What do you like about your teacher?" Or "What do you not like so much?" Let her take her time to answer. Try to avoid asking, in the overly bright voice of parents everywhere, "Did you have fun in school today?!" She'll sense how important it is that the answer be yes." parenting Susan Cain
c3269e5 Hey, great idea: if you have kids, give your partner reading vouchers next Christmas. Each voucher entitles the bearer to two hours' reading time *while the kids are awake*. It might look like a cheapskate present, but parents will appreciate that it costs more in real terms than a Lamborghini. reading parenting gifts Nick Hornby
32b6a6f Without the support from religion--remember, we talked about it--no father, using only his own resources, would be able to bring up a child. religion parenting children father Leo Tolstoy
ffc0fe1 And have your mother put my head on a stake? Do you have any notion what that would do to my handsome good looks? parenting obedience Catherine Gilbert Murdock
3c7399a We are all, I suppose, beholden to our parents - the question is, how much? parenting Jodi Picoult
559b050 If the justification for controlling women's bodies were about women themselves, then it would be understandable. If, for example, the reason was 'women should not wear short skirts because they can get cancer if they do.' Instead the reason is not about women, but about men. Women must be 'covered up' to protect men. I find this deeply dehumanizing because it reduces women to mere props used to manage the appetites of men. motherhood parenting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
b9bae0b The last time Assistant Principal Parker called, a girl in the school's locker room had accused Julie of being a whore during the two years she'd spent on the street. My kid took exception to that and decided to communicate that by applying a chair to the offending party's head. I'd told her to go for the gut next time- it left less evidence. parenting Ilona Andrews
ae9975a What we are teaches the child far more than what we say, so we must be what we want our children to become. parenting-tip parenting-advice parenting Joseph Chilton Pearce
4547f7e No child is born a delinquent. They only became that way if nobody loved them when they were kids. Unloved children grow up to be serial murderers or alcoholics. life love parenting Jeannette Walls
7053c16 The danger of motherhood. you relive your early self, through the eyes of your mother. motherhood parenting Joyce Carol Oates
dcf34fc The best way to guide children without coercion is to be ourselves. parenting Madeleine L'Engle
19bf3b6 With children the clock is reset. We forget what came before motherhood parenting Jhumpa Lahiri
d49f54d Your father, Jo. He never loses patience,--never doubts or complains,--but always hopes, and works and waits so cheerfully, that one is ashamed to do otherwise before him. He helped and comforted me, and showed me that I must try to practise all the virtues I would have my little girls possess, for I was their example. It was easier for your sakes than for my own; a startled or surprised look from one of you, when I spoke sharply, rebuked me more than any words could have done; and the love, respect, and confidence of my children was the sweetest reward I could receive for my efforts to be the woman I would have them copy. parenting Louisa May Alcott
e047006 I wondered how long it took for a baby to become yours, for familiarity to set in. Maybe as long as it took a new car to lose that scent, or a brand-new house to gather dust. Maybe that was the process more commonly described as bonding: the act of learning your child as well as you know yourself. motherhood parenting children Jodi Picoult
d358f9d It's not politically correct to say that you love one child more than you love your others. I love of my kids, period, and they're all your favorites in different ways. But ask any parent who's been through some kind of crisis surrounding a child--a health scare, an academic snarl, an emotional problem--and we will tell you the truth. When something upends the equilibrium--when one child needs you more than the others--that imbalance becomes a black hole. You may never admit it out loud, but the one you love the most is the one who needs you more desperately than his siblings. What we really hope is that each child gets a turn. That we have deep enough reserves to be there for each of them, at different times. All this goes to hell when two of your children are pitted against each other, and both of them want you on their side. love favoritism parenting Jodi Picoult
873cafc "I went away and cried to the Master of the Universe, "What have you done to me? A mind like this I need for a son? A heart I need for a son, a soul I need for a son, compassion I want from my son, righteousness, mercy, strength to suffer and carry pain, that I want from my son, not a mind without a soul!" compassion intelligence hasidic-judaism judaism parenting Chaim Potok
13e92cf Why children?' he asked. 'Why always children? For love to end where it begins is far more beautiful, and Nature knows it. nature love homosexuality sterility parenting E.M. Forster
c5670bf But no one is easier to delude than a parent; they see only what they wish to see. parenting Karen Joy Fowler
577bb48 Babies don't come with instruction booklets. You'd learn the same way we all do -- you'd read up on dinosaurs, you'd Google backhoes and skidders. And you don't need a penis to go buy a baseball glove. humor life parenting Jodi Picoult
8b36cfd History repeated itself. The 'don't do the things I did' mantra was tiresome pish. The best way to make sure your children don't grow up as cunts is not to be one yourself - or not to let them SEE you being one. This is easier as a sober artist in Santa Barbara than as an alcoholic jailbird in Leith. parenting Irvine Welsh
c8d9e6a What doesn't kill you will make you stronger life parenting Jeannette Walls
5265e36 A stodgy parent is no fun at all. What a child wants and deserves is a parent who is SPARKY parenting Roald Dahl
a1265cf God, why does a mortal man have children? It is senseless to love anything this much. parenting Barbara Kingsolver
918281b "...Ty grabbed my phone and threatened to tell Otter that I liked being spanked during sex. This proceeded to lead up on a long tangent where I had to have him explain to me how he knows about stuff like people getting spanked during sex. He said he might have heard it mentioned while watching MSNBC. I told him he was grounded from watching the news channels for a week. That's where this whole sidebar should have ended, but then I was forced to explain S & M and bondage to my little brother, who was persistent on the topic, and who kept staring at me with mounting horror when I finally /did/ explain, and I realized I had maybe gone too far, and we had to spend the next five minutes swearing to God that I had never nor would I ever attempt to do anything like that. He might now be the only nine-year-old who has heard the terms "cock ring" and "fisting". My parenting skills are unparalleled." romance funny m-m parenting child T.J. Klune
10a09d2 I guess you just have to trust your kids, trust that their innate interest in life will win out in the end, don't you think? life love parenting parenthood George Saunders
0682fd1 My parents were nonmaterialistic. They believed that money without knowledge was worthless, that education tempered with religion was the way to climb out of poverty in America, and over the years they were proven right. money religion inspirational parenting James McBride
a0423b7 No, Miss Wright didn't want to meet her kid. To her, that relationship was just as important, just as ideal and impossible as it would be to the child. She'd expect that young man to be perfect, smart, and talented, everything to compensate for all the mistakes that she'd made. The whole wasted, unhappy mess of her life. relationship snuff parenting parents parent children Chuck Palahniuk
a0d5526 There is entirely too much tut-tutting in this realm, if you ask me. All these kings would do a deal better if they put down their swords and listened to their mothers. olenna-tyrell queen-of-thorns parenting mother George R.R. Martin
5138a1f From the time he was young, he dressed the way you told him to dress; he acted the way you told him to act; he said the things you told him to say. He's been listening to somebody else tell him what to do... He hasn't changed. He is still listening to somebody else tell him what to do. The problem is, it isn't you any,ore; it's his peers. youth teenagers-and-parents peer-pressure parenting children Barbara Coloroso
24ee7b5 People worried too much about their children. Suffering when you're young is good for you. It immunized your body and soul... kids-funny suffering parenting Jeannette Walls
70f89d6 "But, Dad..." She hesitated. "It will mean raising me all over again. It means suffering through my childhood for a third time. No parent should be asked to do that." Sol managed a smile. "No parent would refuse that, Rachel." -- love parenting Dan Simmons
6585750 Now and again, one could detect in a childless woman of a certain age the various characteristics of all the children she had never issued. Her body was haunted by the ghost of souls who hadn't lived yet. Premature ghosts. Half-ghosts. X's without Y's. Y's without X's. They applied at her womb and were denied, but, meant for her and no one else, they wouldn't go away. Like tiny ectoplasmic gophers, they hunkered in her tear ducts. They shone through her sighs. Often to her chagrin, they would soften the voice she used in the marketplace. When she spilled wine, it was their playful antics that jostled the glass. They called out her name in the bath or when she passed real children in the street. The spirit babies were everywhere her companions, and everywhere they left her lonesome - yet they no more bore her resentment than a seed resents uneaten fruit. Like pet gnats, like phosphorescence, like sighs on a string, they would follow her into eternity. science life fertility parenting tom robbins
d520aa2 "Don't even think about it." "Well, when I walk by myself?" "When you get your driver's license." "You always, always say that." Dillie scowled at him. "That's when happens." "It's going to be a busy day," Phin agreed." parenting Jennifer Crusie
8655986 Father had stretched out his long legs and was tilting back in his chair. Mother sat with her knees crossed, in blue slacks, smoking a Chesterfield. The dessert dishes were still on the table. My sisters were nowhere in evidence. It was a warm evening; the big dining-room windows gave onto blooming rhododendrons. Mother regarded me warmly. She gave me to understand that she was glad I had found what I had been looking for, but that she and father were happy to sit with their coffee, and would not be coming down. She did not say, but I understood at once, that they had their pursuits (coffee?) and I had mine. She did not say, but I began to understand then, that you do what you do out of your private passion for the thing itself. I had essentially been handed my own life. In subsequent years my parents would praise my drawings and poems, and supply me with books, art supplies, and sports equipment, and listen to my troubles and enthusiasms, and supervise my hours, and discuss and inform, but they would not get involved with my detective work, nor hear about my reading, nor inquire about my homework or term papers or exams, nor visit the salamanders I caught, nor listen to me play the piano, nor attend my field hockey games, nor fuss over my insect collection with me, or my poetry collection or stamp collection or rock collection. My days and nights were my own to plan and fill. imagination benign-neglect parenting curiosity childhood Annie Dillard
a762a40 Patty believed that parents have a duty to teach their children how to recognize reality when they see it. reality religion page-81 parenting parents Jonathan Franzen
aa241bf What did I tell you about plastic ties? Only for humans, Julie murmured. If you don't listen to me, I can't teach you anything. kate-daniels parenting ilona andrews
accd664 Fussing over children who cry only encourages them. That's positive reinforcement for negative behavior. cry parenting Jeannette Walls
aaef0a6 The only power that can effect transformations of the order (of Jesus) is love. It remained for the 20th century to discover that locked within the atom is the energy of the sun itself. For this energy to be released, the atom must be bombarded from without. So too, locked in every human being is a store of love that partakes of the divine- the imago dei, image of god...And it too can be activated only through bombardment, in its case, love's bombardment. The process begins in infancy, where a mother's initially unilateral loving smile awakens love in her baby and as coordination develops, elicits its answering smile... A loving human being is not produced by exhortations, rules and threats. Love can only take root in children when it comes to them- initially and most importantly from nurturing parents. Ontogenetically speaking, love is an answering phenomenon. It is literally a response. spirituality religion parenting Huston Smith
abc0cff What makes people good communicators is, in essence, an ability not to be fazed by the more problematic or offbeat aspects of their own characters. They can contemplate their anger, their sexuality, and their unpopular, awkward, or unfashionable opinions without losing confidence or collapsing into self-disgust. They can speak clearly because they have managed to develop a priceless sense of their own acceptability. They like themselves well enough to believe that they are worthy of, and can win, the goodwill of others if only they have the wherewithal to present themselves with the right degree of patience and imagination. As children, these good communicators must have been blessed with caregivers who knew how to love their charges without demanding that every last thing about them be agreeable and perfect. Such parents would have been able to live with the idea that their offspring might sometimes--for a while, at least--be odd, violent, angry, mean, peculiar, or sad, and yet still deserve a place within the circle of familial love. self-knowledge family communicators self-acceptance communication parenting parents children Alain de Botton
21acfec "Fear of the Dark I've always been prone to worry and anxiety, but after I became a mother, negotiating joy, gratitude, and scarcity felt like a full-time job. For years, my fear of something terrible happening to my children actually prevented me from fully embracing joy and gratitude. Every time I came too close to softening into sheer joyfulness about my children and how much I love them, I'd picture something terrible happening; I'd picture losing everything in a flash. At first I thought I was crazy. Was I the only person in the world who did this? As my therapist and I started working on it, I realized that "my too good to be true" was totally related to fear, scarcity, and vulnerability. Knowing that those are pretty universal emotions, I gathered up the courage to talk about my experiences with a group of five hundred parents who had come to one of my parenting lectures. I gave an example of standing over my daughter watching her sleep, feeling totally engulfed in gratitude, then being ripped out of that joy and gratitude by images of something bad happening to her. You could have heard a pin drop. I thought, Oh, God. I'm crazy and now they're all sitting there like, "She's a nut. How do we get out of here?" Then all of the sudden I heard the sound of a woman toward the back starting to cry. Not sniffle cry, but sob cry. That sound was followed by someone from the front shouting out, "Oh my God! Why do we do that? What does it mean?" The auditorium erupted in some kind of crazy parent revival. As I had suspected, I was not alone." love parenting vulnerability Brené Brown
c7538bb As his children, we were treated as some species of migrant workers who happened to be passing through. My father was the only person I ever knew who looked upon childhood as a dishonorable vocation one grew out of as quickly as possible. maturity parenting Pat Conroy
1f3c377 How much [vastly {immensely tremendously}...] Anwar loves [t]his child. It continues to take him by surprise [even when she confounds him with the havoc of her room {for example} which she will proudly describe {defend!} as clean {those beautiful messes } even as {in the next moment} she will astonish Anwar with her fearless interest in life {despite the harrowing blows life continues to deliver her }]. love parenting Mark Z. Danielewski
1f7047d "If one were to list all the cruelties and maltreatments, both physical and emotional, that parents and adults inflict on children under the guise of love, the list would be a long one. But, going beyond such sinister examples, even kissing and hugging may or may not convey to a child that he is loved. Love is a feeling, an emotional state. Artists, writers, philosophers, poets have tried to define it. Marcel Proust says, "Love is space and time measured by the heart." What is space and time? It is the here and now. It is you. As unfortunately I am no poet, I will try to recall from my own experience how it feels to be truly loved by someone. It makes me feel good, it opens me up, it gives me strength, I feel less vulnerable, less lonely, less helpless, less confused, more honest, more rich; it fills me with hope, trust, creative energy and it refuels me. How do I perceive the other person who gives me these feelings? As honest, as one who sees and accepts me for what I really am, who objectively responds without being critical, whose authenticity and values I respect and who respects mine, who is available when needed, who listens and hears, who looks and sees me, who shares herself - who cares. Cares. To care is to put love in action. The way we care for our babies is then how they experience our love." parenting Magda Gerber
8535d8e Siddhartha began to understand that it was not happiness and peace that had come to him with his son but, rather, sorrow and worry. But he loved him and preferred the sorrow and worry of love to the happiness and peace he had known without the boy. love parenting Hermann Hesse
0590a0c "Life-transforming ideas have always come to me through books." - Bell Hooks" hope social-skills stimming meltdown disability parenting mental-health Win Quier
421f3e2 It was love without reason, love for something futureless, love that appeared to exist only to be itself, imperious and all demanding, the kind that would cause him to make a fool of himself in an instant. unconditional-love parenting Flannery O'Connor
c09da91 Children, who have so much to learn in so short a time, had involved the tendency to trust adults to instruct them in the collective knowledge of our species, and this trust confers survival value. But it also makes children vulnerable to being tricked and adults who exploit this vulnerability should be deeply ashamed. manipulation parenting Rebecca Goldstein
f8b2513 Wonder isn't about finding answers; it's about becoming more comfortable with questions. awe elizabeth-gilbert adventure-travel parenting Leigh Ann Henion
c8e4de5 Do not expect too much from your child and she will grow in your love... But if you push her too much, you will push her away. A child is not yours to own but to raise. She may not be what you will have her to be, but she will be what she has to be. Remember what they say, that 'Wood may remain twenty years in the water, but it is still not a fish. family daughter parenting parenthood Jane Yolen
c46c2da Anyone can make a baby, but it takes a man to be a father. fatherhood parenting parents father Ta-Nehisi Coates
af4e341 "Those books made it crystal clear that giving honey to your baby before he was a year old made you a terrible mother. The moment a spoon of honey would touch his lips, the words "Awful Mother" would appear on your forehead, forever branding you as a parenting failure." parenting expectations Ilona Andrews
26155ba "Who we are and how we engage with the world are much stronger predictors of how our children will do than what we know about parenting. In terms of teaching our children to dare greatly in the "never enough" culture, the question isn't so much "Are you parenting the right way?" as it is: "Are you the adult that you want your child to grow up to be?" -- example parenting Brené Brown
0a88eb7 A father is as much a verb as a mother. motherhood parenting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
8cdc6ee It is as hard for our children to believe that we are not omnipotent as it is for us to know it, as parents. But that knowledge is necessary as the first step in the reassessment of power as something other than might, age, privilege, or the lack of fear. It is an important step for a boy, whose societal destruction begins when he is forced to believe that he can only be strong if he doesn't feel, or if he wins. parenting Audre Lorde
64a13fd The only persons who seem to have nothing to do with the education of the children are the parents. family education parenting parents G.K. Chesterton
f2de0e2 "If there is a single factor that spells out the difference between the cafeteria fringe headed for greatness and those doomed for low self-worth, even more than a caring teacher or a group of friends, it is supportive, accepting parents who not only love their children unconditionally, but also don't make them feel as if their idiosyncrasies qualify as "conditions" in the first place." mentoring parenting Alexandra Robbins
e113642 "The recent spate of magazines for "parents" (i.e., mothers) bombard the anxiety-induced mothers of America with reassurances that they can (after a $100,000 raise and a personality transplant) produce bright, motivated, focused, fun-loving, sensitive, cooperative, confident, contented kids just like the clean, obedient ones on the cover. " parenting Susan Douglas
d530cab All those adorable towheaded kids in the promotional film are going to turn thirteen. Once a family member hits puberty, odds are that everybody is not going to have the same ideals. Unless everybody gets together and agrees that the new ideals involve turning the front yard into a skate ramp and officially changing Dad's name to Fuckhead. humor florida parenting Sarah Vowell
81c531c Instruction is good for a child; but example is worth more. youth lead-by-example raising-children example role-models parenting teaching children Alexandre Dumas
51b7a6f ". . . Mrs. Lambchop sighed and shook her head. "You're at the office all day, having fun," she said. "You don't realize what I go through with the boys. They're very difficult." Kids are like that," Mr. Lambchop said. "Phases. Be patient, dear." kids parenting Jeff Brown
006d33d Morality in the general is well enough known by men, but the particular refinements of virtue are unknown by most persons; thus the majority of parents, without knowing it and without intending it, give very bad examples to their children. morality example parenting young Anne Robert Jacques Turgot
a6c163c More than Captain America your kids need Amelia Earhart - more than Ant Man, they need Abraham Lincoln - more than Green Arrow they need Gandhi - more than Iron Man they need Isaac Newton. fairy-tales parenting-children child-psychology parenting-101 parenting-advice parenting-teenagers parents-advice parents-and-responsibility parents-and-teenagers parents-quotes parents-responsibility raising-kids parenting fiction-fantasy parents parents-and-children children parenthood Abhijit Naskar
1eb51c8 New Rule: Don't name your kid after a ballpark. Cubs fans Paul and Teri Fields have named their newborn son Wrigley. Wrigley Fields. A child is supposed to be an independent individual, not a means of touting your own personal hobbies. At least that's what I've always taught my kids, Panama Red and Jacuzzi. names humor bad-decisions baseball chicago chicago-cubs naming sports-fans parenting parents children sports Bill Maher
7009222 How often does a man know, without question, that he has done well? I do not think it happens often in anyone's life, and it becomes even rarer once one has a child. parenting Robin Hobb
2edcf00 Pray that your children will develop a heart that seeks after God. prayer god life parenting power Stormie Omartian
5531e18 Children who have faith have distinctly different characteristics from those who don't. In fact, one of the main manifestations of a person with strong faith is the ability to give--not just in terms of money or possessions, but also time, love, and encouragement. faith god raising-children guidance parents-quotes parents-responsibility encouragement parenting Stormie Omartian
b5cdf26 One of pleasures of parenting, future reader: parent can positively influence kid, make moment kid will remember for rest of life, moment that alters his/her trajectory, opens up his/her heart + mind. joy parenting George Saunders
a5e382b I would be the first to admit that my maternal instincts are not well developed--though in defense I must add that the raising of Ramses would have discouraged any woman. motherhood maternalism parenting-humor parenting Elizabeth Peters
bb07fcf One of the things that happens in the world is that people try to conflict. Whereas in the home, you can't. You'll end up getting divorced or becoming estranged from your kids. Keep in mind, the hardest part of any negotiation is agreeing to start it. Once you've gotten past that emotional barrier, the solutions usually present themselves. parenting Bruce Feiler
7016dc8 Parents drinking is the reason you came into the world, and if we didn't keep doing it then, by God, it would be the reason you went back out of it. drinking conception parenting children Caitlin Moran
75b0c65 It was what Aunty Ifeoma did to my cousins, I realized then, setting higher and higher jumps for them in the way she talked to them, in what she expected of them. She did it all the time believing they would scale the rod. And they did. It was different for Jaja and me. We did not scale the rod because we believed we could, we scaled it because we were terrified that we couldn't. parenting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
1eeddcd "Father to teenage son: "My relationship with you is more important than anything I've got to say to you." lecturing relationship fatherhood parenting Randy Alcorn
5f20ded You could slap his wrist for saying it, but then he said it with his face, and you could spank him for making faces, but then he said it with his eyes, and there were limits to correction--no way, in the end, to penetrate behind the blue irises and eradicate a boy's disgust. parenting punishment Jonathan Franzen
7dabf10 She brought a chair into the room and placed it alongside the top of his bed. Then she held his hand as he drifted off to sleep. It was so small in her own hand, and it felt warm and dry. She pressed his hand gently, and his fingers returned the pressure, but only just, as he was almost asleep by then. She remembered, but not very well, what it was to fall asleep holding the hand of another; how precious such an experience, how fortunate those to whom it was vouchsafed by the gods of Friendship, or of Love. She thought she had forgotten that, but now she remembered. friendship love parenting Alexander McCall Smith
5e09f18 (Taft's mother's) losing her firstborn had convinced her that children are treasures lent not given and that they may be recalled at any time. Parents, she firmly believed, could never love their children too much. parenting Doris Kearns Goodwin
5277083 A man who indulges in parenthood for the first time at the age of fifty-four deserves all he gets. parenting Raymond Chandler
8ba950e Too bad for any parent who has become accustomed to ruling by force, because at some point the kids just get too big to slap around. parenting Barbara Ehrenreich
51c47af If we can keep ourselves from interfering with the natural laws of life, mistakes can be our child's finest teachers. nature learning life teacher parenting mistakes Randy Alcorn
f5fb273 Imagine what it must be like for teenagers who don't feel they have room to breathe in their own homes. If you are a parent reading this book, you care about your child. If she is quirky, unusual, or nonconformist, ask yourself whether you are doing everything you can to nurture her unusual interests, style, or skills, or whether instead you are directly or subtly pushing her to hide them. mentoring parenting Alexandra Robbins
e019b41 [P]arents need to step back from their own preferences and see what the world looks like to their quiet children. parenting Susan Cain
629b15c "You are born into a family and those are your people, and they know you and they love you, and if you are lucky they even on occasion manage to understand you. And that ought to be enough. But it is never enough. Abe had not been dressing up, styling himself, for all these years because he was trying to prove how different he was from everyone else. He did it in the hope of attracting the attention of somebody else--somewhere, someday--who was the same. He was not flying his freak flag; he was sending up a flare, hoping for rescue, for company in the solitude of his passion. "You were with your people. You found them," I said. He nodded. "That's good," I said. "You're early." -- finding-your-people tribes fatherhood parenting Michael Chabon
08d9a93 It wasn't right that you could only understand your parents' pain once you'd experienced the things they had, and by then they were gone. pain life-lessons wisdom maturity growing-up parenting knowledge parenthood old-age J. Courtney Sullivan
6fe8feb There can be no fooling ourselves into thinking this is something other than what it is--the willful ejection of Molly from our nest. It's too late for second thoughts, anyway. She has to be moved into her dorm in time for freshman orientation. It's been marked on the kitchen calendar for weeks--the expiration date on her childhood. parenting Susan Wiggs
14afbfe "When we say fathers are "helping," we are suggesting that child care is a mother's territory, into which fathers valiantly venture. It is not." parenting gender Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
48a5cf9 "I think of your grandmother calling me and noting how you were growing tall and would one day try to "test me." And I said to her that I would regard that day, should it come, as the total failure of fatherhood because if all I had over you were my hands, then I really had nothing at all." parenting Ta-Nehisi Coates
0758002 But in her loneliness in the palace she learned to know him, they learned to know each other, and she discovered with great delight that one does not love one's children just because they are one's children but because of the friendship formed while raising them. parenting Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez
7deda1f "The lessons my parents taught are still with me. I keep a tighter leash when raising my kids than my parents did, but I often find myself doing or saying the same things they did. My mom, for instance, was always cheerful when coming in from work; I try to behave the same way when I finish writing for the day. My dad would listen intently when I came to him with a problem, to help me find a way to solve it on my own; I try to do the same with my own kids. At night, while I'm tucking my kids in bed, I ask them to tell me three nice things that each of their siblings did for them that day, in the hopes that it will help them grow as close as Micah, Dana, and I did. And more frequently than I ever would have imagined possible growing up, I find myself telling my children "It's your life", or "No one ever promised that life would be fair", and "What you want and what you get are usually two entirely different things"." parenting Nicholas Sparks
e10fa1f The passion for such children contains no ego motive of anticipated reciprocity; one is choosing against, in the poet Richard Wilbur's phrase, 'loving things for reasons'. You find beauty and hope in the existence, rather than the achievements, of such a child. Most parenthood entails some struggle to change, educate and improve one's children; people with multiple severe disabilities may not become anything else, and there is a compelling purity in parental engagement not with what might or should or will be, but with, simply, what is. parenting Andrew Solomon
e0f64bd Here's a tip for new parents: Start lowering those expectations early, it's going to pay off later. parenting parents expectations Colson Whitehead
99a4720 You can't predict the outcome. You can't raise a child and then tell them what to think. raising-children parenting Aimee Bender
a00007b The more a family can be splintered apart, the weaker and more ineffectual they become, and the more the enemy has control of their lives. One way to avoid this is through prayer. When you cover your family relationships in prayer, whether it be with your children, parents, stepparents, brothers, sisters, grandparents, husband, or wife, there will be far fewer instances of strained or severed relationships. relationships prayer truth parenting Stormie Omartian
944be20 "Sometimes Eli believed his mother was embarrassed by him. "I swear, my mom thinks if I do one thing differently than the average person, I'm weird," Eli said later. "It's like she thinks I'm a freak or something. No matter what I do, it's not 'normal' enough for her." mentoring parenting Alexandra Robbins
8532ab2 My heart broke not only for the daughter who already was forced to become her mother's alarmingly narrow ideal, but also for the middle daughter who knew that her in mother's mind she had already failed. parenting expectations Alexandra Robbins
1e6e565 Until she had had children of her own she had not been able to contemplate the death of either of her parents; when the subject had arisen, in conversation or in her own imagining, she had said only: I just don't know what I'd do. family-relationships growing-up parenting Sebastian Faulks
a9ee191 Talk to her about sex, and start early. It will probably be a bit awkward, but it is necessary. sex-education parenting Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
e3516f0 "Oh, go ahead and giggle," Lady Danbury sighed. "I've found that the only way to avoid parental frustration is to view him as a source of amusement." parenting Julia Quinn
c136cb8 Your son is heir to an enormous fortune and name. Someone would be bound to bid for you him and take him as his ward. parenting Philippa Gregory
40db674 Drawing from 1.7 million Gallup surveys collected between 2008 and 2012, researchers Angus Deaton and Arthur Stone found that parents with children at home age fifteen or younger experience more highs, as well as more lows, than those without children... And when researchers bother to ask questions of a more existential nature, they find that parents report greater feelings of meaning and reward -- which to many parents is what the entire shebang is about. rewarding parenting reward parenthood Jennifer Senior
af42735 How much [vastly {immensely (unfathomably) tremendously}...] Anwar loves [t]his child. It continues to take him by surprise [even when she confounds him with the havoc of her room {for example} which she will proudly describe {defend!} as clean {those beautiful messes (beautiful even today)} even as {in the next moment} she will astonish Anwar with her fearless interest in life {despite the harrowing blows life continues to deliver her (and so delivers to Anwar...)}]. love parenting Mark Z. Danielewski
a42503e I like uncovering the cultural prejudices I didn't even know. education heritage biases conventional-wisdom parenting A.J. Jacobs
eb3c78d "Good tennis players are those who beat other tennis players, and a good shot during play is one the opponent can't return. But that's not a truth about life or excellence -- it's a truth about tennis. We've created an artificial structure in which one person can't succeed without doing so at someone else's expense, and then we accuse anyone who prefers other kinds of activities of being naive because "there can be only one best -- you're it or you're not," as the teacher who delivered that much-admired you're-not-special commencement speech declared. You see the sleight of hand here? The question isn't whether everyone playing a competitive game can win or whether every student can be above average. Of course they can't. The question that we're discouraged from asking is why our games are competitive -- or our students are compulsively ranked against one another -- in the first place." parenting Alfie Kohn
47bf231 "I myself," said Gibbon, "am slightly underdone in the personal worthlessness line. It was Papa's fault. He used no irony. The communications mix offered by the parent to the child is as you know twelve percent do this, eighty-two percent don't do that, and six percent huggles and endearments. That is standard. Now, to avoid boring himself or herself to death during this monition the parent enlivens the discourse with wit, usually irony of the cheaper sort. The irony ambigufies the message, but more importantly establishes in the child the sense of personal lack-of-worth. Because the child understands that one who is talked to in this way is not much of a something. Ten years of it goes a long way. Fifteen is better. That is where Pap fell down. He eschewed irony." parenting Donald Barthelme
3b341ac I thank my mother (Ma, you're only second cause you got the dedication), who used to make me write essays whenever I got into trouble, explaining exactly what I'd done and why I'd done it. mothers-and-sons mothers parenting Ta-Nehisi Coates
63e707f People say a mother is only as happy as her least happy child. But what if the state of that child's happiness has become a mystery? What if that child is no longer a child but a young man who has removed himself to a great distance and encased himself in silence? parenting Jan Ellison
02d1321 "In my entire life, I never once heard either of my parents say they were stressed. That was just not a phrase I grew up being allowed to say. That, and the concept of "Me time"." india indian-culture stress parenting Mindy Kaling
374819a We just want you to be happy. Rand and Marybeth said that all the time, but they never explained how. parenting Gillian Flynn
d89bc8b Nothing between us was ever planned--not even you. We were both 24 years old when you were born, the normal age for most Americans, but among the class we soon found ourselves, we ranked as teenage parents. With a whiff of fear, we were very often asked if we planned to marry. Marriage was presented to us as a shield against other women, other men, or the corrosive monotony of dirty socks and dishwashing. But your mother and I knew too many people who'd married and abandoned each other for less. The truth of us was always that you were our ring. We'd summoned you out of ourselves, and you were not given a vote. If only for that reason, you deserved all the protection we could muster. Everything else was subordinate to this fact. If that sounds like a weight, it shouldn't. The truth is that I owe you everything I have. Before you, I had my questions but nothing beyond my own skin in the game, and that was really nothing at all because I was a young man, and not yet clear of my own human vulnerabilities. But I was grounded and domesticated by the plain fact that should I go down now, I would not go down alone. parenting Ta-Nehisi Coates
a9afe36 I am wounded. I am marked by old codes, which shielded me in one world and then chained me in the next. parenting Ta-Nehisi Coates
afb0050 Each of Nora's children had arrived on this earth as him or herself, the more she knew them, the more she felt it to be true. They were so different from one another, and from her. motherhood personality individuality growing-up parenting parents mother parenthood J. Courtney Sullivan
cdb21be He never cried, not even when his alarm went off. Swaddled in his Moses basket, wires trailing out the bottom, his monitor flashing green, green, green, his entire four-pound body motionless except his eyelids, it seemed he understood everything I was working so hard to understand: his mother's love, his brother's ceasless crying: he was alreday forgiving me my shortcomings as a father; he was a distillation of a dozen generations, all stripped into a single flame and stowed still-burning inside the this slip of his ribs. I'd hold him to the window and he's stare out into the night, blue tributaries of veins pulsing his neck, his big eyelids slipping down now and then, and it would feel as if tethers were falling away, and the two of us were gently rising, through the glass, through the trees, through the interweaving layers of atmosphere, into whatever was beyond the sky. nights parenting Anthony Doerr
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