It gives us more flexibility, so we can do more, but it also creates the expectation of the instant response. It can take away your sense of control over your time.

Often, when there is a conflict between parent and child, at its very hub is an expectation that the child should be acting differently. Sometimes these expectations run counter what is known about children's growth. They stem from remembering oneself, but usually at a slightly older age.

In families children tend to take on stock roles, as if there were hats hung up in some secret place, visible only to the children. Each succeeding child selects a hat and takes on that role: the good child, the black sheep, the clown, and so forth.

It gives us more flexibility, so we can do more, but it also creates the expectation of the instant response. It can take away your sense of control over your time.

Parenthood brings profound pleasure and satisfactions--the unparalleled pleasure of caring so intensely for another human being, of watching growth, of reliving childhood, of seeing oneself in a new perspective, and of understanding more about life.

If you never allow your children to exceed what they can do, how are they ever going to manage adult life - where a lot of it is managing more than you thought you could manage?

There is nothing intrinsically better about a child who happily bounces off to school the first day and a child who is wary, watchful, and takes a longer time to separate from his parents and join the group. Neither one nor the other is smarter, better adjusted, or destined for a better life.