Hello, we’re continuing our relationship series today! After looking at how to boost your relationship and how to live well as a single person, today we’re going to look at how to equip your children properly. A family begins with a man and a woman coming together to become one and to found a family together by having children. Paul Carvel once said, “To experience the birth of a child is our most accessible chance to grasp the meaning of the word miracle”. A child is a true miracle. Becoming a Father or Mother doesn’t begin with the birth of a child, it begins long before. God made plans for his children long before they were born. We have a responsibility to lead them into those plans and toward the best, constantly remembering that they are pearls entrusted to us by God. There are no perfect parents, but if God has entrusted them to you, it’s because you’re capable of taking them where He wants them to go, with His help. Today, I’d like to help you with a few points about the stages and needs of a child. I believe these will help you to give your children what they need, at the right time, and to love them by giving them not what they want, but what they need. Childhood/adolescence is a critical period punctuated by major physical, cognitive, emotional and spiritual transformations and changes. To give them what they need, it’s important to understand the human development cycle, as follows: 1. Birth: understand that a child’s life begins long before birth, with the story of his parents. To prepare your child for the best, you must first prepare the environment in which he or she will evolve. Taking care of your couple and your home to make it a safe and secure haven will provide him with an optimal learning ground for his growth. 2. The age of trust (0-9 months): this is an essential period of fusion. During this period, the child is based on the feeding function. Much more than a response to a basic need, nutrition is the best opportunity for him to enter into a relationship with the outside world, with the senses he has developed. At this stage, the mother’s presence is essential to ensure the transition from the womb to the outside world. This does not exclude dads, whose physical and emotional presence provides security and avoids the fear of abandonment. 3. The age of discovery (9-18 months): in this important phase of his life, the child learns not only to discover his own world, but also to distance himself from his parents, especially his mother. It’s a time when play and communication play an important role. Make sure you let him explore the world at this time! 4. The age of assertion (18-36 months): children tend more to assert themselves than to oppose others. Opposition to others is simply a manifestation of this desire.
At this point, it’s important to consider the following 2 points: an insecure parent will see the child’s opposition as a conscious and voluntary defiance of the parent. The child is simply learning how to react to opposition. 5. The age of the imagination (3-6 years): this is the “why?” period. The child will spontaneously answer why to everything you say? During this period, the child lives in a dream world. This is also the period when the child falls in love with the other sex. Your reaction is important for the child. Act in a “safe” and balanced way. Bring truth into love to provide the child with emotional stability and an example of identification with daddy if it’s a boy, or mommy if it’s a girl. Life as a parent isn’t easy every day, but let’s never forget that our children don’t belong to us. It’s God who entrusts them to us. He has put his trust in you because you are the best person to carry out this task, despite the ingratitude that can sometimes arise. You are capable of making of this child an unshakeable pillar to impact and positively change this world where he is called! You’re on your way to making him a superhero, and God is by your side every day! In our next newsletter, we’ll be looking at how children grow from the age of reason (8) to the age of choice (18-20). To make sure you don’t miss out, be sure to sign up by clicking on “I subscribe” at the end of this article. You can also follow us and share our page on social networks: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn and so enjoy our news by letting others know about it.
See you soon,
You are wonderful!
Joachim Fontaine
Coach | Consultant | Formateur
