We’ve all been there.  The frustration we can feel as parents and adults when a child has behavior that feels unmanageable – and just isn’t changing.

Over my 7 year journey of empowering young minds and founding Acton Academy Omaha, I’ve discovered that the transformation we desire to see around us often must first begin with our own transformation deep down inside.

In this three-part series, I’m excited to share three tools that have helped transform the way I engage with children.  I hope my story and experience will empower you to create more peace and alignment in your family relationships too.  After all, these tools go far beyond parenting advice – they are valuable for all relationships.

Get ready for the first tool… a handy pair of gardening gloves.

“What do gardening gloves have to do with transformation?”  You may be wondering.  It’s a fair question.

Over the past 7 years, my journey could be encapsulated as an invitation to surrender.  And in the surrender, I’ve found waves of new life flowing over me, washing away old mindsets and ways of being and ushering in new possibilities.

One of these new mindsets is the identity of a gardener.

After all, a child isn’t a thing to be nailed in place, sanded and shaped perfectly so as to create the vision I imagine.  Playing the role of a carpenter in my children’s lives, however good my intentions were, didn’t work.  It created such frustration in our relationship and in the midst of it all – I had lost connection with their hearts.

Instead, for a mysterious, alive, constantly unfolding being like a child, the best response is a gentle one that nurtures, honors, celebrates, and waits in anticipation to discover who this miraculous, resilient child is meant to become.  Even in the middle of the behaviors.  Especially here.

Gardeners are patient.  They focus on preparing a nutrient-rich environment, and are filled with belief that the seed’s potential will spring forth in time. They are focused on the long game, caring for the delicate life that is growing and unfolding right before their eyes.

I invite us all to lay aside our carpenter’s hat and courageously slip on our gardening gloves, and with gentle parenting, cultivate our children to become all they were created to be.

Until tomorrow, (when I’ll share a personal story of how this all is playing out… along with Tool #2!)

Rachel