Key: National has plan to help 'suffocated' families (NZPA via Yahoo!Xtra News)

More info... More info... (http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/search/families/SIG=11f76i6ss/*http%3A//nz.news.yahoo.com/080511/3/5cvc.html)National Party leader John Key says his party has a five-point plan to ease the financial burden which is "suffocating" New Zealand families. In the 35 years I have worked with clients, I've learned that our lives can change instantly. Sudden death, life threatening diagnosis, accidents, job loss, marriage, or divorce can shake us at our inner core. I also know that conflicts in relationships can be devastating and confusing. I strive to provide a safe, caring, compassionate and professional environment for you to work and find solutions. Feel free to call for a brief telephone consultation (no charge) to determine if I'm the right person to help you with your concerns. Membership: Indiana Oncology Social Workers; National Association of Social Workers. Darlene is a therapist-in-training at the CTS Counseling Center and a life coach. She specializes in personal professional growth and development as well as lifestyle change. Please feel free to contact her for a complimentary coaching session and for information about the services she offers. Call Darlene today to experience the growth you've been seeking!! The presents have been opened,we all feel 10 pounds of e xtra weight and we’ve spent time with family. Now that its January, and the whole year is ahead, I’d like to suggest that instead of the traditional New Year’s Resolutions, each of us take a look at our family situations and evaluate how they impact our life. The purpose of this reflection would be to determine if we are happy with the status quo or if we would like to make changes before next year’s holiday. In essence, I am suggesting something akin to tax planning. We all have to pay taxes. Can we analyze the last holiday season and determine if we paid too much or just the right amount. If it was too much, is there anything we can do to reduce next year’s payment? Parents For those of us who still have living parents, is it worthwhile to examine this relationship? When you are with your parents, do you feel like an adult or do you revert back to the roles of childhood? Are these old roles still useful or even relavent? Are you angry and hurt after spending time with your parents? Could this be because you are carrying old resentments and expectations of them? How likely are your parents to change? Unless they are highly motivated or insightful, people who have lived their live a certain way are unlikely to change no matter how much they love us. What can potentially change is how we view our relationship with our parents. Many things factor into our openness for change. Perhaps we realize that our parents’ health is declining. Maybe we consider the pain that our parents faced in their own lives and as we mature we can better understand how this might have impacted their world view. Finally maybe we get to a point in our life where we just try to forgive them and move on. If there is tension when spending time with parents, consider changing your view of them to reduce this tension, not for them but for you. This is difficult to do alone and may require the aid of an objective person like a therapist. Siblings Siblings share the same upbringing and often know us better and longer than any other person in our lives yet distance can be present both emotionally and geographically. Issues like birth order, perceived favoritism and simply differences in personality can contribute to this distance. When evaluating the sibling relationship it is useful to look at if you were ever close to each other and when this changed. How are you alike and different? If there has been a rivalry since you were both little, what were you competing for? Does this still matter to either of you? Often siblings unite as their parents age and they begin to parent their parents. If you have the opportunity to spend time with your sibling, try to get to know them as they are today. Often our perceptions of our siblings are as they were as children. Be open to the possibilty of discovereing a new friend in a sibling. Friends Just as we analyze our family relationships, so may you also analyze your friendships. At times when family bonds are tenuous, friends fill in the emotional gaps. Other times friends may disappoint for a variety of reasons. Now might be a good time to review your freindships. Are my friends good friends to me? What kind of a friend am I? Who might I like to get close to this year and how might I accomplish that? As you examine relationships in the post holiday season, consider if they are they are working for you. If so, keep up the good work. If not would you like for things to be different. Specifically what would you like to change and what would it cost to make that change. Consider being as intentional about your relationship planning as you are about your taxes. In the end, the payoff might be greater. One of the greatest challenges in parenting is setting clear, consistent rules for your children. Although the content and consequences vary by age, consistency in enforcement remains crucial regardless of the age of the child. Here are some ideas to help with setting rules that are effective and consequences that are workable for you as a parent to enforce. Know your own rules. This seems obvious, yet how are children to know the rules if you don’t have a clear idea of what is important to you. Some rules are safety issues and are never negotiable, like crossing the street without looking or leaving the home without permission. Other rules set guidelines about how to treat others or family standards. Determine for yourself if your rules involve safety issues or values that you want to impress upon your child. Most parents have rules that fall in both categories. Make a list of rules that are important to you. Make sure that the rules are clear. Define rules by specific behaviors. “Don’t get in trouble” leaves too much room for interpretation by both you and your child. “Treat me with respect” can be equally vague for a teenager. Behavioral requests such as: look at me when I am talking to you, do not begin to talk until I am finished, do not roll your eyes or walk away while I am talking to you are helpful. Have conversations about rules when they are not being broken. Define the rules with your children when you are not angry and when they are open to listening. If you chose, you may even explain why you are setting a rule. Keep in mind that an explanation does not open the rule to negotiation but rather allows for understanding. Discussing a rule prior to its violation allows for clear expectations for the child and consistency in enforcement from the parent. Set clear, simple consequences. These must also be discussed when the rules are set. There may be different levels of consequences. If a child breaks rule X, they might lose TV for a day. Subsequent violation may lead to a loss for a week or grounding (be sure to define what grounding means if you use it). Some safety rules may have more severe consequences on one violation to enforce the importance of the rule. Follow through on the consequences that are set. Without this step, setting rules is a worthless exercise. Help your self in this area by not setting up consequences that limit you. Don’t take away a movie if you want to see it. Determine how you will find support when enforcement is difficult.Parenting isn’t easy but rule setting and enforcement can become easier if you are intentional about your rules and consequences and are clear about how rules will be enforced. Life Coaching Share Your Opinion. (0 posts)

 

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