The Second Principle of New Danish Parenting: Relationships Matter Most
New Danish Parenting (NDP) is the the new paradigm of parenting and being a human being in the world of relationships.
Through the lens of Internal Family Systems (IFS), attachment theory and the new child view from Denmark, NDP helps you understand yourself and your children from the inside out.
NDP consists of three principles. In the last article, and this episode of Parenting from the Inside Podcast, I focused on the first principle: Children Always Make Sense. And in the present article, and this episode of the podcast, the parent-child relationship is in focus. This second principle of NDP is titled: Relationships Matter Most.
The third principle: Conscious Parenting will follow soon.
I’m an IFS trained Family Therapist from Denmark. You can learn more about mere right here. New Danish Parenting (NDP) is a term I’ve created and developed from the Danish “New Child View” coupled with modern Attachment theory and the Internal Family Systems (IFS) human view and understanding.
Relationships matter most
The environment we grow up in consists most importantly of our close relationships, first and foremost the attachment relationship to our caregivers. Mom and Dad are not just who birth me, feed me, clothe me. Mom and Dad are who keep me safe and love me for who I am no matter what. Mom and Dad are who I can always come to and they are where I have my safe base.
When the relationship to our parents is safe enough, we develop an outer secure attachment to them, which slowly facilitates a secure inner attachment inside of us between what we in IFS call Parts and Self; Between our inner children and our inner parent or loving caregiver.
Through a secure enough outer attachment I am open and free to love myself — to have a felt sense of Self-esteem — because being loved, accepted and kept emotionally safe by my caregivers facilitates a felt sense of safety inside, a foundation to stand on and an inner openness for parts to lean into Self.
When the relationship to my caregivers is not safe enough, I shut down. Shame, as a protective function, creates distance inside and out.
In this way the parts of us that are accepted and loved by our parents can grow and thrive, and the parts that are not, get shunned and exiled. Who I can be with my parents shapes how I know myself, what I shut off inside, how safe I feel in the world, and it shapes my feelings and beliefs about myself and others.
It is the responsibility of us as parents to create an environment safe enough for our children to be and become themselves.
Leadership and power(abuse)
In the relationship between children and their caregivers there is a big power difference. As adults we are both bigger, stronger and more experienced. And as parents we have a responsibility for our children’s emotional and physical safety and for their development and happiness.
This is how it’s supposed to be and it is a huge responsibility, one that can easily be misused.
As our modern societies are founded on an old paradigm human view and to a large degree structured based on morality — on should and doing instead of being and being you as you are— You can read more about Morality and Existence in the first article on NDP and also hear about in this episode of Parenting from the Inside podcast.
Since parenting will always reflect the visible and invisible norms of the societies we live in, the old paradigm way of relating to human beings of course seeps into our parenting.
In this way a care-giver whose responsibility it is to protect and care for their children; the care-receivers, easily becomes a bullying presence misusing the difference in power in the name of parenting.
When our children learn to do as they are told because we’re bigger and stronger than them, that is; for fear of the consequences if they do not, we’re not parenting from a place of caregiving but from the presence of the bully.
Many of us do this in different ways without even realising it:
“If you don’t come now, I’m leaving without you!” (threat of separation).
“Get up again or I’ll give you something to cry about!” (threat of violence and not acknowledging feelings and reactions).
“Don’t be such a crybaby. Big boys don’t cry!” (ridicule and defining).
“Go to your room and think of what you’re done!” (separation and blame).
When the parent-child relationship is not a safe base for the child, nothing is really safe, because there is safe nowhere to seek comfort. This leads to shutting down, self-isolation, acting out and numbing to not feel.
To feel safe in our own skin and safe enough going out into the world, we must feel safe (to be ourselves) with our parents.
“I am safe, I am good enough as I am. And even if other people hurt me it doesn’t go as deep because of the protective wings of the relationship (ie the secure attachment of my parents)”
The more closed off we are from our own hearts, from our loving core, or in IFS terms, from our Self-energy, the harder it is for us to be the loving caregivers that our children need and deserve.
1. Equal in worth, not in power and experience
As human beings we have worth or value inherently, just being born, just being us. Worth and value is not something we have to work at, it is not about doing.
You do not need to pay taxes on the piece of land that is you. You are simply taking up space in the world. This is your birthright.
Unfortunately our modern societies have shaped us to equal human worth with bringing value in the form of cash and financial growth; that is by doing and doing “the right way”. In this way we learn that worth and value is something we earn, as opposed to something we have (and are) no matter what.
Therefore most of us go out into the world trying to feel worthy by doing, by taking the right or enough educations, getting the right job, having the right house, the right kind of family, looking like everything is perfect even when it is far from.
This is how we built self-confidence. Self-confidence is not bad in itself, but it is not who we are, it is something we built on the outside and it will never be able to fill the hole inside when the foundation of Self-worth and Self-esteem is missing.
We are all worthy as human beings just being us, but most of us don’t feel it because we learn otherwise growing up.
Part of that is abuse of power. When we as parents exert our power over our children in unkind, unloving, abusive and unequal ways, we are making them feel small, not important, bad and unworthy of respect and love.
Therefore it is important that we as parents really take to heart that, yes, we have power (and experience/knowledge) over our children, but this does not mean that we have more worth than them and it does not mean that we have the right to treat them as less than.
A basic rule is: If you wouldn’t say it to an adult, don’t say it to a child.
Would you say this to another adult:
When another adult is angry or upset: “You’re just tired”
When you’re cold but your friend is not: “Put on more clothes!”
When someone is scared or feeling shy: “No you don’t feel like that”
When your partner is tearful: “Don’t be a (cry)baby”
When a co-worker hurt themselves: “Come on, up again. It didn’t hurt.”
When your partner is full: “Eat two more bites” “Finish your plate” “No dessert if you don’t eat up!”
If you wouldn’t say it to an adult, don’t say it to a child.
2. Set boundaries around yourself, not around the child
My boundary is the meeting point between me and the world. It keeps something out, it keeps something in, but it is also the place where we can meet.
Having our boundaries overstepped is invasive — it is a threat to our survival — and not feeling or setting our boundaries also washes us out or makes us unclear.
Where do you end and where do I begin?
Where’s the boundary between me and the world?
Who am I and who are you (in this moment)?
What do I accept and where do I have a no?
In this way personal boundaries is something that protects the individual: Helps us be safe and differentiated in the world.
And other people’s boundaries — especially the boundaries of our parents in childhood — helps us feel safe. It is something to feel ourselves “against” and something to lean into.
Who you are helps me know who I can be in the relationship.
How do I feel my boundary?
Feeling our own boundaries can be a lot more difficult in practice for those of us who have grown up in the old paradigm of parenting, because we have been told who to be, scolded or ridiculed for being angry (ie having boundaries), met with rage (ie having our boundaries overstepped) or not been met and regulated in our emotions.
Therefore we have learned to shut down and not feel (or show) what we feel.
How do I set my boundaries while respecting the boundaries of my children?
In not wanting to repeat the pattern of overstepping and shutting down boundaries of our children, we easily end up not setting our boundaries (especially if we have a hard time feeling them) and will often end up pendulating between no boundaries and rigid boundaries or rage/scolding when no boundaries doesn’t work.
Of course this is not helpful. It confuses our children and does not feel very safe.
So the golden rule of NDP is: Set you boundaries around yourself, not around your children.
On a practical level this often means saying “I” instead of “You”
“I want you to put your shoes on” not “Can you please put your shoes on?”
“I want you to go to bed now” not “Can you go to bed this very minute?”
“I don’t want you to hit your brother” not “What is wrong with you?! Stop hitting your brother!”
“I want you to turn off the computer” not “You are so spoiled! Turn off the damn computer!”
Boundaries around me: This is me = boundaries.
Boundaries around your child: “You are like that” = shaming and defining.
When we say “I” we tell our children who we are right now, what we want and don’t want (ie setting the boundary around ourselves) which helps them feel safe. Feel us.
When we set the boundary around our children, we are not telling them who we are right now. They have to guess. Instead we are telling them who they are and who they can and cannot be.
And the sad thing is that, when we tell our children who they are, they trust us more than what they feel inside. This makes them not feel themselves and their boundaries and it makes them not feel lovable and good enough as they are. And it induces a shame-response to protected themselves.
The way we see, define and treat our children, becomes the way they see, define and treat themselves.
Children are not looking for boundaries (around themselves); they are looking for you.
When people say that children are looking for boundaries, meaning that they need us to shut them down, scold them, tell them who they can be, this is an old paradigm misunderstanding.
Our children are not looking for boundaries in the old paradigm sense of shut down and definitions. What they are looking for is YOUR boundaries. They are looking for YOU.
Who can my mom/dad be with me right now — Is safe. It is something to lean into.
3. Children don’t stop loving us, they stop loving themselves
Simply put, shame and separation is the opposite of love and connection.
Shame stands in when love is not felt.
Shaming our children or not helping them out of natural shame states, separates them from us and the only way for our children to stay in a semi-relation (and thereby ultimately survive and feel somewhat safe) and keep loving their parents (ie keep connection) is to stop loving themselves. Stop loving the parts of themselves that are deemed unlovable. In this way inner separation (and exiling) happens in order to stay safe in the relationship. To keep outer connection we lose inner connection to our parts, our core, our foundation, our truth, our selves.
Shame protects in the absence of love.
As children our parents are our survival in this world, so not to love them is much more dangerous than not loving ourselves.
Therefore we make meaning that keeps us in the relationship:
My mom treats me badly = I am bad
My dad doesn’t show love (in a way I can feel it) = I am unlovable
My mom doesn’t see me = I am not worthy
My dad is always too busy = I am not important
Co-regulation leads to Self-regulation
Co-separation leads to Self-separation
These examples are just a few of the core burdened beliefs that our exiles carry deep inside of us, which in many ways become what we navigate from as adults in unconscious attempts to keep them below the surface of consciousness.
For instance if I am bad I might need to fawn and overstep my boundaries all the time in order to be good.
If I am unlovable I might need to build a very solid career even though it does not make me happy.
If I am not worthy I can never respect myself enough to leave my abusive partner.
And if I am not important I’ll never get up in front of other people and show who I really am even if I long to do so.
The greatest gift we can give our children is loving them as they are and communicating our love in a way that they can feel and trust.
That way they can go out into the world feeling safe and lovable as they are.
Relationships matter most — inside and out — and the attachment relationship of our children matters most of all. It is the inner foundation they take with them out into the world. Let’s make it a secure one.
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