Good Inside: A Practical Guide to Resilient Parenting Prioritizing Connection Over Correction

This book changed my parenting journey in many positive ways! Amazing book for parents, or even those working trough family trauma.

A guide to becoming a good human would be a better tagline.

This is my favorite parenting book. I cannot tell you how grateful I feel to have read it. The author starts with the premise that children are prosocial. That they would like to relate, belong, and conform to group norms. She then asks why they do not?

She concludes the answer is not out of malice, but rather inexperience. They face a baffling array of new challenges, from emotions to social dynamics to disappointments to guilt and sorrow. They confront this cacophony not with the calm poise of an experienced 35 year old that can recognize these feelings as temporary. Rather they confront these feelings with abject confusion and terror.

If that's the case, what role for the parent? Shepherd. Consoler. Caring authority figure. The goal is to help the kid navigate these treacherous waters. And you should focus your attention on that, rather than worrying too much about whether the child does this or that *right now*.

I cannot tell you how touched I have been by the lessons of this book and incorporating them into my parenting instinct. Honestly, I'm just so grateful to the author for putting this into the world.

FIVE STARS. The embodiment of the parent I feel called to be.

Here are my favorite quotes:

1. "Research has shown that therapy for the parent is more effective at improving childhood behavior than therapy for the child. This is because much of a child’s development is simply a reflection of the behaviors and reactions they see in their parents." Real look in the mirror check.

2. "Childhood should teach you to how to have feelings and manage them. To find yourself amidst feelings and urges rather than have urges overtake you." At this point in the book, I'm suddenly thinking mainly about my own childhood and did I learn this and nope I didn't learn this and does that explain the hardest experiences of my adult life? Yeah, geez, it sorta does. How motivated am I to help my kids with this.

3. "You can’t prioritize the perfect outcome. You should prioritize growth and attachment." Stop. Reverse. Re-read. You can't prioritize the OUTCOME. Holy shit. I don't even think I knew that was possible. And by the way, some of you are probably thinking - but if you don't prioritize the outcome you're teaching the kid they can fail? I disagree completely. I've been doing this for a year and what happens is the kid takes personal responsibility for things *because* they give a shit about you and your relationship with them and they don't want to let you down. So you get hte outcome AND you get an amazing, heartwarming relationship with your child.

4. "Parenthood is a journey of personal development. We have to confront our childhood and our own patterns and tendencies while also caring for another." This is exactly how I feel about parenting. It's constant. The flashbacks to your own childhood. You either become psychologically comfortable with your childhood or you pass on a lot of weird shit to your kid. It's either or.

5. "More powerful than memorizing a script, be guided by one question: am I helping my kid tolerate and work thru this or avoid and get away from thus."

6. "Behavior is not the main event. That is the underlying emotions and feelings that bring about the behavior. If you just focus on adjusting the behavior, your success will be limited and short lived. If you can connect with the underlying feeling, then you can work on resolving the issue."

7. "When we control our kids with charts and punishments, we give up a chance to connect with our kids and instead tell them their behavioral compliance is all that matters." Kids are instinctual. They have not yet learned to mediate the world through the conscious minds, yet. They engage less self consciously. Charts deny that reality. Punishments diminish it. Be with your kid as they are. Communicate about what they actually care about. Forget communicate an hold their hand and acknowledge it can be hard to be frustrated and you would be frustrated by the same experience. Let them know you can understand these terrible feelings they are having. That they are not alone in confronting them. Through your presence and engagement more than your words.

8. "We can parent with firm expectations AND be playful. We can say no AND be worried about our kids feelings." Kids DO NOT care about contradictions. They are just engaged. If you tell them they can't do something and dance around with them while doing it - they can accept the no and enjoy the dance. Adults could do this too if we weren't so in our heads. But we are, so it's best to keep this to kids.

Great book for parents of toddler through elementary age.

This is focused on parenting younger children but good generally as well. It functions as a reference book but it's probably also valuable to read the whole thing as there are repeating themes about growing a full competent human.