Love Practical Love

How do I love thee? Let me count the ways...

Love.

...It's the one and only word in the English language that expresses the meaning of a deep life-sustaining sense of connection; perhaps even, one could say, our reason for living.

For one single word it sure does include a lot: romantic love, selfless love, affectionate love, passionate love...

Too bad our language isn't more like the Eskimos' who have thirty different words for snow- where it's a matter of life or death to live in and survive the arctic.

Wouldn't it be helpful to have many words to express all the different ways love is felt and recognized in the landscape our lives... 

...especially the way that directly affects the optimal development for our kids, turning something so ephemeral as "love" into wired brain-pathways for a healthy, happy human?

One of these expressions of love is

Compassion.

Compassionate love isn't lovey-dovey. It isn't showy. It's not gushing.

Compassionate love is Engaged. Reasonable. Empathetic.

Compassionate love is the language of The Heart People, the three steps we use to parent our children.

Here's an example:

We ask our child to put their shoes on. It doesn't go well.

If we stay calm and connect to our child, they feel seen and heard and understood. Once they feel this they can hear us.

Our child doesn't put their shoes on because they're afraid they'll be punished or yelled at. Our child puts their shoes on because:

• they feel connected to themselves: yeah I felt mad! I DID want to keep playing with my toys!

• they feel connected to the parent: Mom knows it's hard for me to stop playing, and now I'm aware that she needs to get in the car, that's why we came up with the idea to take my toys with me.

• they feel connected to the joy of being in relationship, a part of the clan: I love it when Mom gets me and I feel great when I get to contribute by helping out too, we're all in this together.

...and the putting on of shoes goes a lot faster more easily, and the time and energy it took is either equal to, or a fraction of, the time spent arguing about it.

Not only is your child finally listening to you and doing their part, but bonus, the pathways getting wired in the brain are the building blocks for a thriving and connected life.

For today, see if you have a moment to experience this type of love. It might even be just a moment of compassion for you alone, that's great! Try it on, see how it feels, let me know what compassion is like for you in your life or how you imagine it to be.

I can't wait to hear from you.

With so much love,

Vanessa