Dedicated to the Moms manning the fort at home, who have unwittingly become single mothers. But this is relevant to any mother, at any time, and anywhere in the world.
Parenting has challenges, struggles, and conflicts, especially during crises such as wartime. Everyone is more sensitive, edgy, and stressed out, and rightfully so.
Moms are getting plenty of advice on managing alone with the fathers called up to army reserve duty. Essentially, the wives of the IDF soldiers unwittingly became ‘single mothers,’ dealing alone with conflicts and struggles on the home front.
And that takes a lot of energy.
Where do we get energy from? According to the laws of physics, power always exists in one form or another. The question is – how is it appropriated? Is it being used suitably, or is it wasted energy?
Let’s apply this concept to parenting to get a new perspective on parenting in general, explicitly parenting in wartime.
Let’s call it ‘energy-saving parenting.’
To save energy, we identify where power is expended without any benefit, i.e., wasting energy, and reassess the situation. For example, if we notice that a device doesn’t function, we won’t keep pressing the power button because that’s not helpful; there’s no point in repeating the same action time and again if we get no results.
Every mother can identify situations where she expends energy pointlessly without results. You may repeat the same sentence, action, or even thought many times with no apparent change. A typical example exists in almost every home – the children constantly fighting. You want them to stop the brawls and coexist peacefully in brotherly love. So you intervene, explain, lecture, punish, appease, even ignore.
Please note that ‘ignoring’ falls into the category of useless thoughts. There is a profound difference between ignoring and not intervening. The difference between the two is that non-intervention aims not to waste energy since it doesn’t help anyway. Conversely, ignoring is often a ‘method’ attempting to cause children to change behavior, leaving you wholly involved – usually without any change whatsoever.
In short, a lot of effort and minimum or no results = energy being wasted for naught.
This principle is relevant in many other situations at home. You can presumably choose from a wide assortment of examples.
It’s discouraging to waste all that energy with no results, but here’s where the plot takes a twist-
Don’t despair! Cheer up! Because the opening to meaningful action and change is by understanding what not to do. Non-intervention doesn’t mean surrendering or neglecting your children’s upbringing; it saves energy instead of wasting it. When you stop doing what doesn’t bring results anyway, you keep your precious strength. And that’s what you need – now more than ever!
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