Ten Simple Rules for Being a Better Parent
in a World Turned Upside Down
A handbook to help parents do a better job starting today
There are many crises demanding our attention today. The world does indeed seem to have turned upside down. You have to look hard to find positives today, while problems fly at us from all directions. There is one crisis, however, that is getting far less attention than what the facts demand. It cuts so straight to our core that even if we solve all the others but leave this one unaddressed, the prospects of our society succeeding are slim. We can fix all the money problems, all the environmental problems, and all the political problems, but if we don’t fix this problem our foundation will continue to be weak. It will continue to be weak because this crisis is about what type of people our children will turn out to be. This crisis is about how we’ve lost our ability to be good parents.
In today’s world we are confronted with children who are rude, overly dependent, spoiled, and in pretty poor shape physically. It hasn’t always been that way, but what has changed? Certainly the world has progressed technologically—video games are now in every home, and all children seem to have cell phones permanently affixed to their text-happy hands. Despite the shifts that society has undergone, it is fundamental changes in parenting that have led to the pervasive problems with today’s children.
In Ten Simple Rules for Being a Better Parent in a World Turned Upside Down, author John McPherson argues that when parents improve their parenting, there will be a marked improvement in their children. Too often parents want to be their children’s friend, and what results is an unhealthy degree of laxity with regard to diet, exercise, learning, discipline, and respect. From simply making time for one’s children to being consistent to regulating diet and indoor down-time (i.e. video games), McPherson lays out a course for being a better parent. McPherson’s ten rules guide parents through the steps of asserting themselves as the boss and of cultivating healthy habits and values in their children, all while fostering a great parent-child relationship in which the children know they are their parents’ first priority. By taking positive action now, parents can ensure their children’s smooth transition into successful, healthy, and well-adjusted adults.
