What Is Good Parenting?

There’s no such thing as a perfect parent, and there’s no manual that can teach you how to be a good one. Yet there is such a good thing as good parenting, just as sure as there’s bad parenting. Almost everyone gets married and many of those people have children together and end up being parents, so knowing how to parent effectively is something good to know and worth learning. However, a lot of the learning comes not from an outside source but from yourself. There’s no template for being a good parent; you might encounter examples of good parenting out there but every set of children and parents is different, so you can’t take some other family’s model and just apply it to your own. You have to figure out what works for your family, drawing from your experiences and from common sense.

Of course being a parent isn’t easy. You have to take care of someone who depends on you, fulfilling their needs and giving them guidance while paying attention to your own life as well. You’re playing the role of protector, role model, nurturer, friend and disciplinarian all at once. When you put it all into perspective, good parents are really amazing people indeed.

So what does good parenting consist of? Simply put, a good parent raises their child to be capable of surviving in the world. Some people confuse good parenting with just providing their children with everything possible like food, money and possessions but this actually inhibits children by not allowing them to fend for themselves. In order to survive in the world, one needs to be able to stand on their own two feet while depending on support every so often. Support often comes in the form of social relationships. In order to form relationships, one needs to be reasonably kind and open. In order to be kind and open, people need to have that demonstrated and enforced in them, and this is where parents come in.

There’s bound to be many bumps along the way, sometimes you’ll feel like putting your kids up for adoption but in the end you stick together because you love each other. Loving your children and showing it the right way is at the heart of good parenting. Be there for your children when they need it, don’t overindulge them, equip them with the tools necessary to be self-sufficient so that when they have their own children, they will do the same.