The Parenting Process

Parenting is a process. I am 5months into this crazy adventure of love, and if nothing else... I know this, parenting is a process. If it isn't, I am way behind. If it is, then we, as parents, must wake up each day trying to learn how to better love and care for our children. Ironically, this isn't too unlike our marriages, our single-celibate vocation, or our religious vocation. They are processes.

In fact, to fully attain your vocation you must endure many processes. Marriage has friendship, courting, engagement, marriage-preparation (pre-Cana), and finally the Sacrament of Matrimony. The single life has friendship, dating, heartbreak, confusion, discernment, and acceptance. (I am not 100% on this one... because well, I was called to marriage. For more info please see Adoro Te Devote's: Catholicism and Single Life) The religious life has the longest and most complicated of the processes, and depending on what form of religious you become the process can take YEARS!

Parenting too is a process.

The fact that one is in a process, does not give them the latitude to make big mistakes along the way knowing that there is still a "long road to travel." In fact, the early periods of a process might be so vitally important that how you function early on, could quite easily have profound implications for the later part of the process. This is true in parenting... as I am learning. So, while reading a post today, of a blog that I have on my RSS feeder, I found a section of a post that succinctly explains how this idea of process relates to parenting.

Andrea, over at The Escape posted about parenting and the importance of parenting PROPERLY even during your child's early years. Her post Parental Failings struck a chord with me, because of the way it spoke about the importance of being mindful of how this process is not a license to "wing it" early in your children's lives, just because they are young and "seem to be none the wiser." Most importantly she said:

How I treat my children now is important whether they remember it or not. In these formative years, they will learn how to function in society and how to treat other people. More importantly, the way my husband and I treat our children will affect the way they see their heavenly Father and mother.

I think she is dead on. Love, is also a process. How many times have we heard that we pick spouses like our parents, that we model relationships like those that we see around us, and that we seek that which fills us? If we want to model positive aspects of love, so that we can learn to love perfectly, and teach love perfectly - we must model it early and often. (This is not to say that we will ever attain perfection.)

She goes on further to say:

My children are young and there are many years to come in their formation. When my part is finished, I want my children to hear the word mother and think of a kind, compassionate and loving person, not a tired, stressed out woman who is always on edge. I know this is only one occasion and there will most likely be many more where I lose my temper, but that is no excuse for the behavior. Every occasion effects not only my soul, but the soul of my child which God has entrusted to me. May God grant me patience and peace so that I may raise saints for His heavenly kingdom.

The Escape is not a blog I have on my sidebar, because it is more of a "Catholic Mom" blog in the line of "Catholic Family Life" blogs. I have it in my RSS feed that I read, which consists of about 75 different blogs, but it isn't one that fits in the same niche that I generally post in. That being said, certain parenting posts, like this one, fit right into my wheelhouse. So click on over to The Escape, give Andrea a bump, and comment on her post.