Stiffelman Susan - Parenting with presence: practices for raising conscious, confident, caring kids

Praise for Parenting with Presence

This is exactly the advice and support you need as a parent! Seasoned, wise, and practical, Parenting with Presence helps parents take a deep breath and tend to themselves and their kids with compassion, love, and mindfulness.

Jack Kornfield, author of A Path with Heart, and Trudy Goodman, PhD, founder of InsightLA

Ive led a community of hundreds of thousands of parents for six years, and during that time Ive recommended only one parenting book: Parenting Without Power Struggles. Now I finally have one more to insist they read: Parenting with Presence. I trust Susan Stiffelman with my heart, my family, and my community because she understands that parenting is not just a job but a spiritual practice a path to healing, to truth, to God. She knows that what goes on in my home every day is brutal and beautiful and hard and holy. She understands that while we are raising our children, we are still raising ourselves. In Parenting with Presence, Susan comes alongside parents not only as an expert but as a guide, a counselor, a friend, a healer. This book will help adults heal so they can raise children who need a little less healing.

Glennon Doyle Melton, author of the New York Times bestseller Carry On, Warrior, president of the nonprofit Together Rising, and founder of the online community at Momastery.com

Parenting with Presence is a gentle but powerful reminder that our own awareness, our own calmness, and our ability to respond and not react to stressful situations are fundamental to raising healthy kids. Its more about us as parents than it is about them as children. And if we do the work on ourselves, then we can be circuit breakers for the flow of negative energy that escalates stressful situations. This is an important work.

Tim Ryan, US Representative from Ohio and author of A Mindful Nation

With her clear, wise, soulful, and poetic writing, Susan Stiffelman shows us how both the blessings and challenges of the delicate child-parent relationship can be a hotbed for mutual growth, healing, and connection. With children determining the future of our planet, Susan lays the groundwork for us to usher this new generation toward a more healed, humane, and connected world, starting with our very own selves. I am so grateful to Susan for having written this powerful book.

Alanis Morissette, singer/songwriter and activist

Who knew that the child or teen crying in the next room is actually our spiritual teacher? Who would have thought that annoying outbursts and provocative behavior could lead to more conscious, spiritually tuned-in, effective, even enjoyable parenting? Susan Stiffelmans groundbreaking, immensely readable guide teaches all we need to know about how to nurture our children and ourselves to become more conscious, compassionate, and, believe it or not, calmer human beings.

Kathy Eldon, founder and chairman of the Creative Visions Foundation

I stole it from my mother and devoured it! A fantastic read that should be mandatory for all parents. I cannot wait for it to come out so I can hand it out to everyone I know.

Amy Eldon Turteltaub, cofounder of the Creative Visions Foundation and vice president of Creative Visions Productions

An empathic tenderness runs through this wise and down-to-earth guide to parenting with greater awareness. You can feel the love that Susan Stiffelman has for the families she works with in her therapy practice and her confidence in all of us to grow into the challenges and gifts of being a parent. This book offers a beautiful, multifaceted articulation of what our children most need from us, and practices for both developing these competencies and drawing upon them for our children and for ourselves.

Myla and Jon Kabat-Zinn, authors of Everyday Blessings: The Inner Work of Mindful Parenting

One of the best parenting books Ive seen in a long while. With clarity, warmth, and wisdom, Susan Stiffelman bridges the world of spiritual transformation with the down-to-earth realities of parenting. Parenting with Presence is full of insights that will set parents on a path of healing and joy. I highly recommend it!

Elisha Goldstein, PhD, author of Uncovering Happiness: Overcoming Depression with Mindfulness and Self-Compassion

As a mother, I found myself powerfully moved by the insights and exercises in Parenting with Presence. Susan Stiffelman delicately explores what many parenting experts avoid the deeper layers of fear, guilt, and shame that thwart our ability to be fully present for those aspects of parenting we find most challenging. A beautiful offering to us all. I will forever be giving out this book as a gift to new and seasoned parents alike.

Katherine Woodward Thomas, author of Conscious Uncoupling

An enlightened guide to parenting for anyone wanting to raise caring, happy, resilient children while healing their own unfinished childhood issues, Parenting with Presence is filled with parental wisdom intelligently presented and richly woven with examples from real life. A gem of a book!

Marci Shimoff, author of Happy for No Reason

Parenting with Presence is an invaluable guide for any parent wanting to raise children who understand what it truly means to live a successful life. With her mix of practical tools and personal stories, Susan Stiffelman shows how to create close, loving family relationships and captures just how transformational and fulfilling parenthood can be.

Arianna Huffington, author of Thrive

In Parenting with Presence, renowned expert Susan Stiffelman offers a unique way to bring up our children that combines both wisdom and compassion. Thoroughly practical, the approaches she shares in this remarkable book could help us parents create a strong basis for a truly loving and compassionate connection with our children, while also bringing out the best from us our presence, joy, understanding, and kindness.

Thupten Jinpa, principal English translator to the Dalai Lama and author of A Fearless Heart

While reading Parenting with Presence, I kept saying to myself, I wish my parents had read this book! Finally a book on parenting that speaks to all aspects of our inner child and gives each of us the kind of guidance that not only educates but transforms, uplifts, and nurtures both child and parent. Bravo!

Janet Bray Attwood, New York Times bestselling author of The Passion Test: The Effortless Path to Discovering Your Life Purpose

The core secret revealed in Parenting with Presence is that presence is the only effective way to interact with children. Presence includes support and structure with that, children thrive; without that, children experience chaos, and parenting can be a nightmare. The second secret is that parenting is a growth process, and your child is your best teacher. Understanding both secrets prevents parenting that nurtures without structure and parenting that shapes without nurture. This book brings new awareness about a parenting process that increases the health of our culture itself. Recommended to all parents and parents-to-be.

Harville Hendrix, PhD, and Helen LaKelly Hunt, PhD, authors of Giving the Love That Heals: A Guide for Parents