Last year, my family was featured in a Sacramento Bee article about how my husband and I utilize mediation techniques to parent our children.  I have received very positive feedback on the piece since it first appeared in the paper.  People have enjoyed reading an encouraging article and appreciated the constructive parenting tips.

In our home, we use family meetings to make sure everyone gets an opportunity to be heard about what is and is not working in our household.  They can also make suggestions for improvement.  Although we never abdicate our roles as parents, our children are given the chance to have their voices heard about issues affecting each of our day-to-day lives.  Using this technique opens up the lines of communication between all of us – something that is so important today in our fast-paced, busy lives.

As I do with my clients in mediation, we validate each other (“It sounds like you’re feeling frustrated, happy, etc. about . . .”) and each person has a chance to speak.  It is amazing what miraculous things can happen between people if they hear each other and truly understand one another.  This is especially important in families today where misunderstandings between family members can fester for years causing serious problems.  I see this breach between family members usually surface later when parents become the children and the children become the parents (reversing roles to care for their elder parents).  By putting an affirmative communication system into practice early on, it is my hope that families can prevent conflicts and enjoy closer relationships.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 29th, 2009 at 11:25 am and is filed under Conflict Resolution Tips, News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.