Peace part two

This is a continuation of an early ramble related to the Parenting in Peace article. It's a fairly disorganized ramble, though by definition it might be required to be. To resume...

The ideas the author presents don't seem like they should be revolutionary. That's what gets me with that article. She talks about understanding that your child is an individual apart from yourself, with different interests. Obviously. But it goes deeper than "I was a near-champion swimmer, so I'm going to start my daughter in swimming lessons when she's two!" It also applies to personality traits; the example the author gives is a shy, introverted parent urging her social child to not be quite so enthusiastic about people. (Or telling her child that strangers love to kidnap little blond blue-eyed girls, but that's a different story...and part of my problems with V's mother.) That segues (because I say so) into not holding your child to a higher standard than yourself. Spanking is a separate post, certainly, but one of my hypocritical moments occurs when I catch Lilly hitting Patrick, and my first response is to smack her hand and say "No hitting!" I don't, but it's still my first though, and, really, what kind of a message does that send? That (logically) segues into respecting your child. I like her summary:

"Respect your children by listening to them, accepting their individuality, accepting that they are not perfect, allowing them to make mistakes, and allowing them to make decisions and have input about things that affect them (as age appropriate). And remember, if you must demand a child's respect, you don't really have it."

Pause button on the ramble again, because two certain twins are starting to get out of hand. Or rather, Lilly's starting to have quite good control of her hand, and it's aimed at Patrick's face.