Loosen the Grip: Strategies for Raising Independent and Confident Critical Thinkers

How can parents take back their power to discover and develop the best way to parent for their child?

By hitting the pause button, shutting out all the noise that tells them how they should parent, and building the confidence to create the relationship that best nurtures and supports their children's well-being and independence.

Three years into parenting, Lisa Anderson realized that the way she was parenting wasn't healthy for her or her daughter. She sought counseling to help her figure it out, and so began her journey of discovering the best parenting approach for her child.

Lisa had her work cut out for her. When her daughter was six, the advisors at her school expressed concern that she had ADHD. Lisa took her to a psychologist who, after months of testing, diagnosed her with BRAT syndrome. "It took me a minute to realize what he meant--she was a brat."

It was at this point that Lisa realized she had never said "no" to her daughter, not because she thought it was best for her daughter, but because that's what she knew.

"I was going to create a little monster if I didn't change my way of thinking and shift my focus from what I needed to what my daughter needed."

It was a difficult concept to understand, and an even more challenging task to achieve, but through her work on her own trauma coupled with her education and experience in social work and counseling, Lisa figured it out. Not the way to be a perfect parent, but the way to be the best parent for her child. Isn't that what every parent really wants and what every child deserves?

Fear, guilt, and social pressures are driving parents to be over-involved and their children to be overscheduled and overstressed. Children's freedom to develop their autonomy is being restricted under the guise of keeping them safe from things we simply cannot control. Hypervigilant parenting comes at a significant cost to all of us, as is evident through the increasing number of anxious and depressed children and the emerging adults who lack the confidence and the skills to be self-sufficient. Somewhere along the way we have forgotten that our number one job as parents is to raise our children to be capable, independent adults.

Something needs to change.