As parents, we cannot help but yearn for our child's success.  Obviously this is rooted in a beautiful and healthy love.  But sometimes that love can give way to fear, and that fear leads to anxieties that are unhealthy, not only for us, but for our children as well.  What can we do about this?  How can we care deeply about our children, without worrying so much that our worrying actually begins to weigh on the little guys we’re worrying about?

This week, we bring to you a recent Heights Lecture given by Mr. Alex Berthé, Licensed Clinical Social Worker and former Heights teacher/mentor.  Blending clinical expertise with his own personal experiences, Alex helps us unpack the forces—rooted in love, though often expressed in fear—that are feeding our anxieties.  In particular, Alex offers reflections on four key areas: 

1. The importance of delighting in your children and really getting to know them, as they really are and not as you wish they were. 
2. Why it is essential to put the relationship with your spouse first and to find trusted partners in parenting.
3. The need to leave behind perfectionism: good enough is enough to move our children toward the good.
4. The necessity of deepening our faith in God and respecting the freedom of our children.  

Anchored in hope and optimism, Alex shares how we, as parents subject to these powerful yet often subconscious forces, can reinforce our boys' confidence in their identity as children of God through rediscovery of our own.  

As we hear, wisdom in parenting often consists in learning what things to ignore.  If wisdom begins in wonder, as we hear from Socrates, then perhaps our worries will end when we learn to view our children—even at their lowest points—with the wonder with which our heavenly Father views us.  

Highlights

• What causes parental anxiety? 
• The stages of child development and how parents respond. 
• Striking the balance between demanding too much and letting too much pass by. 
• Why comparisons in parenting can be detrimental. 
• How much energy are you putting into achieving a particular outcome for your son? 
• The importance of reframing in parenting. 
• Why Charity must be our number one priority: don’t cry over spilt milk. 
• Wisdom in parenting is learning what to ignore. 
• How our own fears and anxieties can manifest in our anxieties about our children. 
• The importance of being vulnerable.
• We don’t always need a solution; sometimes accompaniment is enough.
• Love the child that you actually have. 
• Faith and freedom: your child is not you and you are not God. 
• How parents themselves develop, even as their children do.
• What is the root of parental frustration? 
• Why you should let your child make decisions for himself, even if he may err at times. 
• People over papers: setting priorities straight. 
• More than they show: why we must be attuned to what is occurring beneath the surface. 
• Name it to tame it. 

Further Reading

Compass: A Handbook on Parent Leadership by James B. Stenson

Also on The Forum 

Toughness for the Adolescent Boy by Mr. Kyle Blackmer

Learn to Turn: Tom Royals on Parental Prudence

In this episode, we speak with Michael about: 

1. The significance of the title: why the beyond part is crucial. 
2. What “the talk” is and how parents can approach it. 
3. Why his book is especially relevant in today’s current culture.
4. The broader context—both historical and philosophical—for his book’s insights. 
5. Some key messages that his book seeks to convey. 

As we hear from Michael in the episode, it is not enough to present God’s plan for human love as a series of negative rules.  What is needed, rather, is to form men and women who are prepared to embrace the positive adventure that love entails.  We need to help our children be daring so that, when they are sent into the world, they will be prepared to live out that crusade of manliness which our world needs, and to undo the savage work of those who see man as merely a beast. 

“To be happy,” wrote St. Josemaria, “what you need is not an easy life but a heart which is in love.”  And, we might add, to have a heart in love is not the work of a single moment, but the task of a whole life.  Indeed, this is the task of each day: to grow ever deeper in love.  

Show Highlights

• The meaning of the title 
• The talk: what it is and how to do it
• Why the beyond part is more important 
• How to communicate the beauty of God’s plan for the love between a man and a woman 
• Why both indirect and direct means of formation are necessary 
• Why it is not enough to just have the talk and then move on 
• Importance of the book in today’s culture. 
• How this book relates to Michael’s other projects
• Why a child’s identity ought to be rooted in God
• On the broader context for navigating cultural trends 
• What is the role of educators in these matters?
• How literature, movies, and other forms of entertainment shape our children’s notion of love
• The importance of telling the love story of mom and dad
• How do you prepare kids to enter a wounded world 
• Why we need to set our sights very high

Further Reading 

Irreversible Damage by Abigail Shrier

Decisive Parenting by Michael Moynihan 

The Father and His Family by Michael Moynihan