When you see a dandelion do you see a wish or a weed? When you hear a child cry do you hear a need or a demand? When you wash a sticky face do you feel blessed or burdened? As parents, our perspective determines our response, and our response determines our children's reality. So let's wish wishes, meet needs, and count blessings to make childhood a magical, peaceful, joy-filled reality for both our children and ourselves.

Join them in their world when they're little so you'll be welcome in their world when they get big.

Strong-willed children often grow into strong-willed adults who become world leaders, world shapers, and world changers. Parenting them peacefully is not only possible, it’s imperative because sowing peace in their hearts now while they’re in our care will grow a future of peace later when the world is in their care.

Parenting our children peacefully is a gift of peace to the world. Children learn what they live and live what they learn.

Broken children grow into broken adults. To create a more peaceful future, we need to create a more peaceful present for our children. Our world needs more heart-whole adults, not more refugees from childhood.

Not coincidentally, the best way to parent a child is the same as the best way to treat other humans... with kindness, respect, compassion, honesty, acceptance, and peace.

You know that moment right after your child says or does something that pushes your buttons? That oh-so-brief moment before you say or do something in response? That is the moment you have a choice...to react or relate,to command or communicate,to belittle or to be an adult.That moment is a gift of time that can make a lifetime of difference. Use it wisely.

The most effective way to raise a nice child is to be a nice adult.

You're going to make mistakes as a parent. It's literally inevitable. You're human, and mistakes are just part of being human. It's how you handle your mistakes that matters most. Acknowledge them. Apologize for them. Make them as right as possible. Learn something from them. And then let them go. It's okay. I promise. After all, how else will our little humans learn that it's okay to be human.