Parenting 2.0: Empowering Moms & Dads in Raising Resilient Children in Digital Age

By Ko Teik Yen

How can we instill self-discipline without the need to shout or nag?
How can we teach our children sense of responsibility without turning them into rebellious teenagers?
How can we empower our children and get them to respect others at the same time?
How can we train our children to be resourceful without turning them into manipulative, cunning little creatures?
How can we cultivate resilience in our children without creating resentment and low self-worthiness?

Ko Teik Yen aka TYKo is a parent and practicing Clinical Hypnotherapist who conducts workshops and seminars on parenting skills and related emotional, psychological and behavioural issues. He speaks regularly at local and international events. He works with children, adolescents, parents and adults in his daily clinical practice too.

Modern parents have become the new SANDWICH generation, squeezed between their work, children, and aging parents while grappling to shield their children from the invasion of digital technology right in their home.

In Parenting 2.0, TYKo looks into the changing world of parenting and questions if we are heading in the right direction?

By sifting through the latest evidence in brain science and child development and with his personal experience as a therapist and as a parent; TYKo has discovered how parents can be guided with mindfulness and compassion as well as insights from the research in human development and brain science to the way forward.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 13, 2014
• ISBN: 9789671266014

Book preview

www.AsianParentingAcademy.com

Kuala Lumpur. Singapore. Jakarta. Shanghai.

Parenting 2.0

ISBN 978-967-12660-0-7 (Print)

ISBN 978-967-12660-1-4 (eBook)

Copyright © 2014 Ko Teik Yen

Published by Academy of Asian Parenting and Hypnotherapy

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means – electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning or other – except for brief quotation in critical reviews or articles, without the prior permission of the copyright owner.

Printed in Malaysia.

Disclaimer: The information in this book is based on the expertise, informed experiences and opinions of the authors. While a great deal of care has been taken to provide accurate and current information, the ideas, suggestions, principles and conclusions are not guaranteed to be appropriate for everyone. The reader is thus advised and urged to consult competent professionals for resolving problems of a medical or psychological nature. This publication is not intended as a substitute for complete, competent professional advice on these matters.

Foreword

Are you a parent with young children or someone who works with young children? Do you need a manual enriched with loads of practical exercises, new approaches and the appropriate way to engage you and your child effectively?

This book is different. It is written from the heart with insights that will connect you to the most important journey that any of us will ever take. Ko Teik Yen aka TY Ko as he always introduces himself has literally created the manual on parenting for modern parents in this digital age. Using his gift as a writer-facilitator; TY Ko combines the best in western science and eastern wisdom distilling the latest findings and integrating them into everyday language and stories that parents resonate with.

It is a modern classic and one that should find its way onto every bedside table and consulting room.

You will find insights into parenting stressors that will make you laugh and then understand how it was for your parents. It is packed full of research, brain science and common sense which allows you the opportunity to overcome your own childhood issues and create the path for a long-lasting impact of a better future for our children and future generations. What could be better than that?

I savoured each chapter slowly, like a delicacy. Every page ringing so true, capable of making me think deeply. Honestly, parents out there, when was the last time you had a book that could speak straight to your heart?

This is a book that provides valuable insight and information for parents regarding the emotional needs and development of both children and yourselves. It is easy to read with the ability to provide the reader with profound insights to understand their own patterns of emotion. The unique balance of science and practical insight makes it highly readable to both a lay and professional audience with the additional benefit of learning exercises designed to transform the information into a practical guide.

I recommend this book to all parents of young children, to those who work with children, and to those seeking understanding of their own emotional behaviours, not just parents. This is not just a passive read. Be engaged with the book: complete the checklists and exercises at the end of each chapter, and you will grow and mature. As a Clinical Hypnotherapist, I am eagerly awaiting the publication date as this is a book that I will be recommending to my parent-clients to enhance their therapy and enable them to progress more thoroughly. It is also one for students of psychology and clinical hypnotherapy.

This is a book to read. It is a great book for expecting parents and it is one of the few books that parents will pick up again and again. It worth every single cents.

Let’s Parenting 2.0!

Ms Sheila Menon

Principal, London College of Clinical Hypnosis Asia & Australia

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface & Introduction

PART 1: PARENTING IN A WHOLE NEW WORLD – IT’S NO KIDDING!

1.   Parenting then and now

2.   Children then and now

3.   It’s a whole new world

4.   What we once were but now are losing

5.   Invasion of digital technology into family life

6.   Managing your energy – not your time

7.   Family financial frustration

8.   The best of times, the worst of times

PART 2: PARENTING AS A DYNAMIC SYSTEM

9.   Redefining the purpose of parenting

10. Parents need ROOMS

a. Reconnect with our inner child

b. Observing changing of family dynamics

c. Observing roles of fathers and mothers

d. Managing oneself

e. Support from the community

11. Understanding Parenting Styles

12. Situational Parenting Leadership

13. Six Stages of Parenthood

14. Children need SPACES

a. Secure base

b. Parents as role model

c. At their own pace

d. Contribute to the family and community

e. Exploring time for self within and world outside

f. Setting Structures, Routines and Expectations

15. Connecting parents and children

16. Attunement – the key to your child’s heart and mind

17. Child temperament and parents

18. SURE way to demystify misbehaviour

PART 3: PARENTING A DREAMER

19. Parents and dreams

20. Dream setting – The compass and map of life

21. Children and dreams

22. Three simple steps to dreams setting

23. Multiple Intelligences and children

Epilogue

Notes & Suggested Reading

Resources

Acknowledgement

Preface

Parents are facing unprecedented challenges in this modern ultra-competitive digital era.

‘My son was addicted to the Internet’. That’s how a mother consulted me.

Alex is currently 16 years-old and addicted to computer gaming four years back, he refused going to school after his PMR (lower secondary) examination last year (it’s already September now). In fact, beginning of this year, we received warning from the school Headmaster that Alex started a fight at school. Since then, he refused going to school and spending most of the time playing online.

His addiction is getting worse; he will pester me for money every day so that he could spend it to play computer game at the internet café for the next seven hours. We have stop subscribing to the internet at home as not to allow him playing non-stop the whole day and night. If he doesn’t get what he wants, he will either gone into rage and start to destroy things or retreat into his room and refused to come out.

We have tried every method, persuading, negotiating, making deals, withdrawing privileges, stop subscribing to internet and once, I literary threw his computer laptop away. In return, he threw my mobile phone away too. He is now stronger and taller than me, at times I even felt afraid of him. We are worried that if we push him too far, we would lose him; he could just run away from home, gone into depression or turned into a raging monster.

In primary school, he used to be the top student, he scored straight A’s in UPSR (primary six) examination and represented school in chess and mathematics competitions but his school performance has been deteriorating since he enter secondary school and addicted to computer games.

His father and I know that this addiction is ruining his life, but there seems little that we could do to help. We had already tried conventional approach, at first, seeking for counsellor, child psychologist and then psychiatrist that diagnosed him as Bipolar disorder and prescribed him with antidepressant and mood stabilizer (which he refused to take, complaining of side effects). You are my last resort, I don’t know where else to go if it doesn’t work

After speaking to the mother, I have a one to one session with Alex. For the first half an hour, it was not easy to get him engaged in conversation. He kept falling back to his own world after giving me a simple answer to my question. Only when I started to discuss about the game he is playing, the character that he choose, the level that he currently is and the difficulties going into the next level that he started to open up.

By using a combination of timeline and solution focused approach, I was finally able to enter his reality and understand his world.

The fact is that Alex is aware that his obsession with living in a virtual world is consuming his life, and destroying his education and future. It had left him without real-life friends — or the skills needed to acquire them and he felt lonely, he doesn’t know how to reach out. He felt afraid and frightened of the world out there, in school he gets bullied and he tried to avoid those bullies; once he was forced into a corner and he fight back in rage and that’s what get him into trouble.

According to Alex, initially, the virtual world makes him felt, at ease, hide away from the pressure of getting the grades, behaving and looking the way adults expected. He simply hate being judged all the time. He found his ideal world in the form of massively multiplayer online role-playing games (MMORPG) — a type of Web browser-based game in which huge number of players interact within a virtual world, often a sci-fi or fantasy scenario. Here, he lived a parallel universe, one of his choosing, where he could defy reality and its complications. It was peaceful, ego-boosting and compelling. Online, Alex had created a character of his own (avatar) adept at gaining skills and being respected by his peers. He felt validated and worthy.

When asked about his past and what are those moments that are happiest and memorable to him; he described during kindergarten time and he gave ten out of ten for the most enjoyable moment where he get to learn and try new things without any worries of being judged.

What about when you achieved straight A’s in your UPSR examination, shouldn’t that make you proud and happy? I asked. Only 5 out of 10, he responded.

What about now? Since you get to play all the time and need not going to school, I asked again. Zero out of 10, he answered.

Zero? How could that be? Won’t you having fun every day now playing computer games?" I asked.

It is fun but I’m not happy. Alex answered.

How would you see yourself in the next five years?

I don’t know. I’m worry that I will be very lonely when I’m getting old. I want to work and earn money but I don’t know what I can do.

This is not an isolated case. As a therapist, there is a similar pattern that I observed more frequently at present and at a worrying rate. And its heart wrenching to hear this over and over again, even for a therapist.

And that’s one of the main reason that compel the author to not only writing this book, also to develop a whole new parenting programme, dedicated to all parents in this modern digital era.

While some of the challenges parents face have been around over many generations, such as understanding and dealing with temperamentally ‘strong-willed’ children, disciplining without breaking the child’s spirit, cultivating positive habits instead of constant nagging & reminding, teaching confidence and courage in unsafe neighbourhoods, and dealing with economic pressure; new challenges have emerged in the past decade:

Evaluating and managing our children’s access to the internet and the social media with its potential benefits as well as exposure to violence, vice and risks of falling victims to cyber predators,

Persistent response to children who are easy targets for advertisers that see them as the ultimate consumers,

Maintaining order, honour and respect in the face of media that portrays parents as either ignorant, incompetent or outdated,

Developing community and spiritual values in a changing culture that highlights the message that our self-worth depends on the type of house we stay in, the cars we drive, the clothes we wear and the holiday destination we last visited,

Cultivating healthy social networks in the era of hyper-competition that values only academic achievement where children that are not performing-to-expectations are seen as lazy, stupid and bad students while parents were blamed as lousy and incapable, directly or indirectly.

And yet:

We were told to cultivate confident children and with high self-esteem but not how to deal with children who are demanding and throw tantrums if they don’t get their way.

We were told to let them play and be creative and yet we worry that our children will be left behind in academic achievements if we don’t send them to tuition classes, for mathematics, art, ballet, swimming, etc.

We were told not to allow children to spend too much time in front of the TV or play computer games, yet we were worried to let them to play outside, for fear of mosquitoes and crime.

We were told to teach our children to love and protect each other but not how to deal with sibling rivalries when they fight, tease and compete for every single thing they come across.

We were told to have cordial and close relationship with our children but nobody tell us the importance and how we can be an effective leader to our children in this digital era.

Society expects us to have children who are well-mannered and cooperative but no one show us how to set limits and expectations without getting them to be resentful or rebellious.

Being a parent and a practicing clinical hypnotherapist, as well as with 20 years of experience in coaching and holding leadership roles strengthened my belief that parents need and deserved better support, understanding and encouragement with comprehensive parenting insights and skills as well as trust of their parental instinct.

Modern parents have now become the new sandwich generation, squeezed between their children and aging parents; struggled to protect their children from the invasion of digital technology right in their home. Parents have been treated for burnout, anxiety, insomnia, depression, anger management and even addiction. Some suffer marital relationship problems while their children are turning into school refusal teenagers and addicted to the internet. Many parents are feeling powerless and helpless; perhaps with a dose of guilt, at a loss and doubting of their parenting ability.

It does not need to be this way. We all can have a fulfilling life, as an individual and a parent. The world already has the necessary insights, knowledge, experience, strategies and tools to guide and coach us so that parenting is inspiring, enriching and invigorating!

Ko Teik Yen B.Sc (Hons), MBA, PDCHyp, BSCH (Member)

Clinical Hypnotherapist

Principal of Academy of Asian Parenting

Founder of Asian Hypnotherapy Centre

Introduction

Why Parenting 2.0?

As parent, you tried everything; you placed your child’s priorities above yourself, you sacrificed your own desires and your time for your children’s welfare and yet, you feel you didn’t do a good job at bringing up your children or something gone wrong somewhere when your child don’t respond or behave or turn up as what you hope for. You truly care for your children and frequently go out of the way to be a good or even the ‘best’ parent ever. Yet, the children are not satisfied or happy. They don’t believe you are doing a thorough job. They repeatedly give examples of someone else’s Mum or Dad who’s a better parent. You started to doubt yourself.

In my therapy work, these are common statements from the children. To the easy going parents, they say that they are not firm or strong enough to make important decisions. To the parents who are there for their children, they tell me that their parents are over controlling and they are suffocating. To the parents who gave freedom to their children, the kids say that their parents just didn’t watch out for them, they felt neglected.

Seems like every parent is in you-can-never-win game. Send your daughter for piano lessons, and later she will complain that you wrecked her love of piano. Let your daughter giving up piano because she didn’t want to practice diligently, and later she will complain that you should have insist her to keep going – because now she play piano badly. Send your son to go to Cambridge English classes in the weekend afternoon, and he blamed you for having kept him from becoming another Cristiano Ronaldo or Lee Chong Wei. Allow your son to skip those english classes, and he will later blame you for not able to articulate fluently in proper English. Your daughter blamed you for only giving her art lessons, swimming lessons, music lessons but not ballet lessons and she said, The only thing I wanted, you don’t give me. Or, I’m not doing it for myself, I’m just doing it for you. And you still owe her or him for that ‘favour’.

How should parents go from here? That’s the purpose of this book. Working hard and raising children in a good environment may not necessary be enough anymore. There are too many distractions, challenges and dilemmas. To regain order and a sense of control, parents must learn to understand and see clearly the many forces at work both around their families and within themselves.

However, Parenting 2.0 aims to go beyond piece-meal advice and not merely about simple techniques, we would like parents to have greater insights, to gain understanding not only how, also why we do what we do as well as what are purposeful outcomes that we want to achieved in raising our children.

Hence, we want parents to understand and see the big picture in parenting, making sense and finding their feet in this chaotic world of distractions. We want parents to be proactive and conscious in their parenting approach rather than merely firefighting or reacting to conflicts and crisis all the time (although at times, this is unavoidable). We want parents to be in control and empowered and yet enabling their children at the same time, be it during peaceful moments or challenging moments. We want parents to learn how to acknowledge their children’s feelings and yet able to communicate clear intolerance of misbehaviours such as tantrums, disrespect, disobedience, aggression, stealing, lying and such. We want parents to be able to apply these techniques in the proper context, integrating into their own parental instincts and recognising appropriateness related to their children’s age and strength.

In a nutshell, we want parents to know how to develop and shape their children:

from being dependent to responsible and resourceful,

from the need to enforce external discipline to cultivating their children’s capacity to self-regulate,

learning to allow their children to develop internal satisfaction and personal motivation instead of relying on external reward,

able to deal with life’s ups and downs and bounce back when they are alone or their parents are not available,

the ability to share and contribute instead of asking and demanding.

Parenting 2.0 aims to provide a compass and a map for parents to first become better observers of their own thoughts, emotions, inner desires and behaviours which are crucial for their children’s current and future success in life.

Parenting 2.0 helps parents to take a step back from their busy routine, and take notice of their daily parenting practice. Are they teaching by instilling confidence or fear? Are they enabling or stifling their children? Are they creating clear structure and direction or are they merely setting limits? Do they see emotional upheaval as opportunity for connection or a source of stress? Do they focus on cultivating positive habits or just reacting to problematic behaviours? Do they encourage whole person development or are they merely manufacturing academic performing machines?

Parenting 2.0 allows parents to take proactive steps to shape their children’s mind-set and emotional development by recognizing and building upon their own inner resources and strengths for connection with their children’s temperaments and preferences.

Parenting 2.0 empowers parents with evidence-based practices, techniques and toolkits that promote their children’s emotional, spiritual development while enhancing their children’s resilience to set-backs and their ability to bounce back from the frustrations and failures in life.

Parenting 2.0 strives to make parenting easier and more effective. It enables parents to enjoy parenting as a new phase in life that provides new discovery and inspirations. It renews their dreams and hopes, building emotional connections and spiritual growth within themselves and within their children as well.

Although parenting is seen as a job which primary object of attention and action is the child, it also has consequences for parents. While parenting is about giving and responsibility, it too has its own intrinsic pleasures, privileges, and plenitude as well as frustrations and fears. Parenting can enhance psychological development, self-confidence, and sense of well-being. Parenting also affords opportunities to confront new challenges and to display and appreciate diverse competencies within us.

Parents can derive considerable and continuing pleasure in their relationships and activities with their children which may be fraught with small and large stresses and disappointments.

Last but not least, parents receive a great deal in kind for the hard work of parenting—they are often recipients of unconditional love. They gain new insights and new skills and they can even play immortality in the form of creating their own self in the next generation.

Hence, Parenting 2.0 presents the many positives that accompany parenting, offering solutions and even parenting toolkits for the many challenges ahead.

It’s not just about educating their mind, it’s also about educating their hearts!

This book is drawn upon my own experience as a parent; a clinical hypnotherapist who treats parents, teenagers and school children; a former corporate leader that not unlike others; struggled with keeping work-life balance and the challenge to sustain energy for family and work.

I am writing this book to make sense of emotional and behavioural patterns observed as social and parental pressures in families. It is to put the relevant parts and pieces into the big picture, which hopefully, parents can relate with. It is to provide a parenting map that parents could look at to make things easier, enjoyable and fulfilling in discovering parenting life with their children.

I have a few objectives. The first is to reach every parent, those typical parents or busy couples that we meet in the supermarket or at the childcare centres/schools that deal with everyday challenges families faces in these difficult times.

My second is to offer support, reassurance and guidance to parents dealing with temperamentally vulnerable children and youth.

I hope this book can give a pat on the shoulders of all parents who are reading, providing them with encouragement. ‘Hey, buddies, stay calm and keep cool, as long as we know where we are going, and don’t forget to enjoy the journey too!"

Parenting 2.0 is divided into 2 volumes. Volume One encompasses part one to part three. Volume Two covers the final three parts. Volume One serves to provide the latest insights and deep understanding of both the psychological needs, challenges and mind-sets that parents, children and their interactions with each other’s. Volume Two will provide the necessary strategies, techniques and skills for effective parenting that would empower parents and enable their children.

Part One, Parenting in a whole new world – it’s no kidding, explores the many challenges that parents face in this modern, fast changing and ultra-competitive world. It aims to seek