Throughout my journey through motherhood there have been countless times when I’ve had to be understanding often in ways I never imagined. While being an understanding mom isn’t easy, it is very important.
As adults we often forget how it was to be kids, the hormones kicking in, feeling misunderstood, etc. These are important reasons that we must be understanding mothers.
Our children need our guidance, but when we try to give it without understanding what they’re feeling, the situations they’re struggling with or the thoughts they’re having, then we miss out on important relationship building and might give our kids the incorrect guidance because we failed to take time to understand.
Time truly is key to being an understanding mom. We need time to grow as a mom, time to observe our children, time to talk with our kids, time to pray for them and the guidance we need to raise them as God calls us too.
Understanding also requires observation and listening. While time is passing we need to be watching and listening to our kids at home, church and while they’re playing. There are many things we can learn about our kids if we would just stop and listen, often we’d find things out that they’d never think to tell us or wouldn’t want to tell us.
The things we find out during these observation and listening moments can be used to grow our relationship with our child by talking about it at a later time. Be sure to use discretion as to when, where and how you bring up topics or situations you observed/heard. For delicate conversations, I recommend a one on one outing with your child, this will allow them to feel that the conversation isn’t a lecture, but instead is mom wanting to understand and guide them. A walk on the beach or a picnic are great outings that offer open conversation opportunities.
No matter what age our children are, in some way we must try and understand them. The younger we start applying ourselves to being observant and listening to them, the easier it will be as they start tackling the tough topics in the youth and young adult years.
There is no perfect way to become an understanding mom, just like the rest of our motherhood journey, it comes by trial and error. The most important step to being an understanding mom is taking the first few steps…take time, observe, listen and communicate. Though it is only the beginning, that’s the hardest part!
