In this fast-paced world, where life can often feel like it's spiralling out of control, and the only thing more overloaded than your checking account is your kid's jam-packed activity schedule, the idea of some downtime is increasingly appealing. Maybe during this econonmic low it's the perfect time to scale back on both the time and money we're spending trying to push our kids into high-status, high stakes perfection, and just let them be kids.
Enter the slow parenting idea. Although he did not coin the phrase, author Carl Honoré just might be its patron saint. The author of The Power
of Slow: Finding Balance and Fulfillment Beyond the Cult of Speed and Under Pressure: Rescuing Our Children from the
Culture of Hyper-Parenting spoke by email with Lisa Belkin on her New York Times blog, Motherlode. One snippet:
Slow parents give their children plenty of time and space to explore
the world on their own terms. They keep the family schedule under
control so that everyone has enough downtime to rest, reflect and just
hang out together. They accept that bending over backwards to give
children the best of everything may not always be the best policy. Slow
parenting means allowing our children to work out who they are rather
than what we want them to be.
For more, check out Motherlode. And don't forget to skim the comments, most of them laudatory, some hilarious (one simply says, "Dear God, please make sure Judith Warner reads this!").
I hope a lot of people do. As fun as it can be to take your toddler to classes and enjoy her burgeoning intelligence and enthusiasm, you'll see it just as clearly (and for no money, and with no time constraints) when you take her to a local park, or just walk down to the library together.
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