During my college days while checking out books in a bookstore I laid my hands on a book named Spiritual Parenting authored by Gopika Kapoor. The book starts with a poem “If I Had My Child to Raise Over Again” written by Diana Loomans. It was a beautiful poem and it touched my heart and soul. I made a mental note to read this book when I have a child.
Years later when I was blessed with motherhood and was struggling each day juggling baby with housechores and work I remembered this book to read to find some solace in my life. And I must say I was not disappointed.
Anyone specially a new mother like me will instantly relate to this book, Spiritual Parenting, as it is written by a mother of twins for the parents. Every child grows up but it is a challenge to raise a child in the right way. Such kind of books really helps to remove mental blocks, provide some handy advises and who knows one could find solutions to problems as well.
Recently I posted a summary of the book Family Wisdom by Robin Sharma another excellent book on parenting. I was tempted to write a summary for Spiritual Parenting as well. But after reading the entire book I thought otherwise. The book is short, precise, to the point, clear-cut and crystal clear in limited words. There are no build-ups in the book which otherwise makes reading a book such a pain in ass.
Initial few chapters were about the pregnancy days. Though I thought they were unnecessary. Gopika has written a separate book on her pregnancy days named Spiritual Pregnancy. Yet it was heart-warming to reading and made me nostalgic about my own pregnancy days.
The author instead of sticking to some fix topics and writing pages and pages of gyan opted for writing on wide range of topics and keeping all of them concise and to the point. Some of them were related to kids and a few were directed towards parents.
It is very necessary that parents also remains in good shape both physically and mentally for the overall development of their offspring.
She also choose to write on a very tricky topic white lies. White lies are difficult to justify but are very much a part of everyone’s life. Expecting children to be hundred percent honest and parents telling white lies every now and then really leaves a contradictory impression on child’s mind. It was a very thought provoking chapter in the book.
Gopika has shared many tested tips and tricks and advises which worked in her case while bringing up twins. While these might not necessarily work in every case as every child is different. But one could modify them to suit their child. Many of her advises were seriously good and helped me out from tricky situations.
Gopika gave two advices in the book, First ‘Just do, don’t think and second, Accept that you will have no sleep, then everything will be fine.’ These words by the author made me introspect for hours. Accepting the situation and just keep doing the task at hand sends strong positive signals to our brains and we adjust to the situation without much fretting. It automatically eases things, puts mind to rest and the baby in true sense becomes a bundle of joy.
There are some other good pieces of advice by Gopika jotted down as points which could be read here.
The Verdict: A must read for parents especially new parents. Advises are scattered for new mother but few are solicited and valid for our time. And this book has those precious little suggestions which could make life of a mother a little easy.
