Confident Parenting

ELENI VARDAKI: Hi Marléne.

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: Hi Eleni, lovely to see you.

ELENI VARDAKI: And I’m excited to see you, and also to hear the advice you have to share for our parents here. I know that you’ve written a book on confidence. And the topic I’d like us to talk about today is, you know, what parents can do when they’re losing their confidence in their parenting skills.

I get a lot of parents say to me:

• “I don’t know how to help my child.”
• “I feel like I’m doing it all wrong.”
• “I keep losing my patience with my child, and then I feel guilty, or frustrated. And despair.”
• “We’re arguing all the time, but it’s not going anywhere.”
• “It’s not constructive conflict. I’m exhausted.”

So what can we do for parents who want to get their parenting confidence back, and have a better relationship with their child? What does having a good relationship with your child really mean?

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: Yeah, well first of all, I’d like to say don’t be so hard on yourself. You know? Being a parent is, you know, it’s one of the hardest jobs we ever do. So, you know, be kind to yourself.

To have a good relationship, you know, it’s about that. It’s about seeing it as a relationship. And I think sometimes we get caught up thinking it’s a job, you know, “we have to get it right”. And actually we have to remember that it’s not a duty. It’s not a job. It’s a relationship. We’re the grown up, and they’re the child, and we’ve each got something to contribute to that relationship and to bring to that relationship.

If we can focus on being a guide, shining a light on the path for children rather than seeing ourselves as having to be the perfect parent. And actually understanding that we come into this world to evolve.

We all come into this world to evolve. And our job as parents is to help our children do that. Making mistakes is natural, for us to make mistakes and for them to make mistakes. It’s a natural part – that’s how we learn and we grow. It’s when we support them in that and help them to learn through mistakes that we are really helping them to grow.

And trust is a very big part of it. If we can tell our children that we trust them to make the right choices, then they will begin to trust themselves. And that will give them their inner confidence.

That’s what parenting is all about. It’s not about us telling them what they should do. It’s about encouraging to learn for themselves.

ELENI VARDAKI (02:35): And what about, what would you say to a parent who’s feeling a bit jaded, maybe exhausted and frustrated and just finding it really hard to not lose their temper with their child, and lose their patience?

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: If they want to sort of relax, you mean be a bit more relaxed? {Eleni nods} I think we get caught up in the have tos.

We get caught up in the have tos:

• “I have to…”
• We’ve got this “have to”, and “must” and “aught” in our heads.

And the same for kids, you know:

• “They have to…”
• “We have to be perfect.”
• “They have to be perfect.”

And actually, if we can just get rid of all this expectation all the time, and just relax and realize that again, it’s about a relationship of mutual learning.

We might have been around on planet earth for a lot longer than our kids, so we’ve got that wisdom to bring to the relationship. But our kids teach us as much as we teach them. You know? They can teach us to be free. They can remind us what it’s like to be inquisitive, and to be open, and to be creative. And actually, if we can see our kids as teaching us just as much as we can teach them, then we can relax a bit and realize that it’s about acceptance. And it’s about just enjoying the journey.

ELENI VARDAKI (03:52): What would you say to a parent who’s really struggling to enjoy the journey cause they’re worrying about the future. How could they stop worrying about the future and get their parenting confidence back?

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: Well as I say in my recent book, Seven Questions Highly Confident People Ask Themselves, at the beginning of that book I talk about how we mistakenly rate our confidence on the goals and the roles that we play in life. And one of those big roles is being a parent. As I say, it’s probably one of the most important jobs we ever do. So we have to be a bit kind to ourselves around that. But we can mistakenly rate our confidence as achieving those things.

Those are great, but actually real confidence comes from self-knowledge and self-awareness. It’s about the relationship that we have with ourself. And the better the relationship we have with ourself, the more strong we feel. The more confident we feel. And then we can navigate any other relationship or any other situation in life.

So it’s about learning to have a great relationship with ourselves. And then we have the most amazing relationship with our kids, because that just happens naturally.

ELENI VARDAKI: Oh my goodness, I love it, especially also from the teacher perspective when it’s like, when you think of questions, that’s what moves the needle forward. And it’s exciting that you’ve structured your book in terms of powerful questions rather than powerful tips. Cause that’s something that actually opens the dialogue up, instead of closing it down inside ourselves. So I’m very excited to read your book for myself!

I’ll also have a link for anyone else who’s interested, so they can access your book.

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: Yeah, it’s called Seven Questions Highly Confident People Ask Themselves. It’s based on many many years helping clients have great relationships and have great confidence. It’s about seven powerful questions that you can ask yourself that really raises your self-awareness and really raises your self-knowledge, and makes you feel super confident.

ELENI VARDAKI: Thank you so much, Marléne, for sharing your wisdom over here with my audience.

MARLENE ROSE SHAW: You’re very welcome, Eleni.