A Tool for Empowered Parenting- Questions
Using questions for yourself as well as for your children can make a HUGE difference in being an effective, empowered parent. A question empowers, an answer dis-empowers. Asking a question will change the energy from the limitations you are creating with confusion, worry, and frustration to allow possible solutions to show up; creative ones that can be life changing. The key to asking questions is to allow the possibilities to show up without you trying to figure it all out. This is the part that becomes easy. It is time to stop analyzing, comparing and forcing a decision or answer.
It is worth the time to practice using these questions on ourselves as well as with our children and other people we connect with. Notice the shifts of energy that come up when you ask these types of questions.
Here are some examples of questions that you can ask yourself as situations arise:
It is worth the time to practice using these questions on ourselves as well as with our children and other people we connect with. Notice the shifts of energy that come up when you ask these types of questions.
Here are some examples of questions that you can ask yourself as situations arise:
- What is right about (my family, my child, me, this situation) that I am not getting?
- What is right about (my family, my child, me, this situation) that I am not willing to acknowledge?
- What can I receive from this (person, situation,) that I haven’t been willing to receive?
- What am I making wrong about this?
- How can I be in more allowance of (me, this situation, this person)?
- What choice am I refusing to choose that if I would choose it would give me more ease, more possibility, more awareness, more joy and more choice?
- What is the value of holding onto (my worry, frustration, confusion, anger, shame, guilt, fear)?
- What am I resisting here?
- What question can I ask?
- What contribution can I be and receive (from this person, from myself)?
- What would it take for parenting to create more ease and joy in my life than I could ever possibly imagine?
- How does it get any better than this?
- What do I know about this?
- Can I change this? If so how?
- What else is possible here?
Open yourself to receive any awareness that comes from asking a question. Keep in mind that the awareness may not come in the same moment, hour or day that you ask. It will come when you are ready and open to receiving it.
Here are some examples of questions that you can ask your child as situations arise:
- I wonder what you will choose to do about that.
- I wonder what other options there may be.
- How can I be of any assistance?
- Is that true for you?
- What do you know?
- When they tell you they don’t know, ask, “If you did know, what would you know?”
- If you could be anything right now, what would you like to be?
- Do you have any ideas about how this can work out? (Kids like to be of help to you when you ask. You can let them figure out what would work for them.)
- Is this your (best choice, only choice,) now?
- What are you aware of that could happen if you choose that? What are you aware of that could happen if you don’t choose it.
- What is true about that?
- What else may be possible that you haven’t considered?
- Who are you being right now.
- Who else might be able to help you?
- What would you like to change about this?
- If you could do this over, how would you do it?
The more you use questions with kids the more you get to know what they truly do know and you empower them to figure things out. They begin to acknowledge their own capacity to make choices after asking questions and learning from the choices that they do make. What's your most used go to question?