Among the five levels of raising a baby, which level have you reached?

It is said that raising a child is a process of cultivation, just like practicing martial arts. From a novice to a master of martial arts, you have to go through countless \”secret book learning\” and \”real sword and gun\” practice. In Jin Yong\’s martial arts novels, martial arts training is divided into five realms: self-cultivation, mental cultivation, physical and mental cultivation, enlightenment, and spiritual connection. If you think about it carefully, it is exactly the same as the psychological process of raising a baby. Every level is difficult. Among the five levels of raising a baby, which level have you reached? The first level: It’s not easy to get started, and you have to figure out how to cultivate yourself: I am a novice, and I don’t have the “essentials of martial arts”, so I can only start from the surface. This is how raising a baby is, there are many things that you have not experienced personally, no matter how many stories you listen to or books you read, you will still be a novice. For many mothers and fathers, the state of becoming parents for the first time is confusion and collapse. In a variety show, Bao Wenjing, who was raising a baby for the first time, collapsed and burst into tears. In the beginning, her daughter\’s \”baba\” was the stench that she couldn\’t bear. She claimed, \”I can give you my life, but I don\’t want to wipe your shit.\” As mothers, we all know that no matter how hard we try to convince ourselves, \”my baby is a daddy.\” \”It doesn\’t stink.\” When it comes time to wash diapers with my own hands, I still feel nauseous. However, we also understand that compared to what happens next, Dad is really nothing. For example, Bao Wenjing\’s problem with coaxing her to sleep is that her two-year-old daughter is a fan of Peppa Pig and refuses to sleep even after watching cartoons until early in the morning. Bao Wenjing seeks advice from everywhere, using various methods to distract her attention and stage painful tricks. To no avail. The anxious Bao Wenjing reached the breaking point and called her father, saying that she couldn\’t bear it anymore. Bao Wenjing\’s level of confusion is a reflection of many new parents. As parents, we have all experienced that kind of helplessness. The second level: Pay attention to moves, maintain the heart in the middle range: meet many \”parenting heart sutras\” and start on the road. In the information age, it is quite easy to smoothly pass through the \”novice period\” and move on to the next level of martial arts. There are various parenting manuals on the Internet, various parenting articles on the Internet, and countless groups of mothers in between. We who have just received these \”tricks\” are like nectar after a long drought. We can\’t wait to absorb every drop of water. Every detail strictly follows the scientific parenting method: feeding every two hours, how much to eat at each meal at different months of age, How many months to add complementary food, how many months to start taking calcium drops, how to take probiotics, how old to attend early childhood education classes, when to wean, when to sleep in separate beds, how to overcome separation anxiety… I have a friend who has all these rules. If you follow it strictly, the child will be very worried if the amount of milk he eats is less. I’m so busy every day that I can’t handle a child, and there are always things I’ve missed. There are many mothers like my friends who are trapped in strict rules and regulations and cannot extricate themselves. After all, a child is a human being, not a strictly functioning machine. This kind of parenting is a double burden for children and parents. There are not a few parents who stay in the second level, and they feel a bit of pain and anxiety at this time. If you can break through this level and enter the third level, it will be much easier. The third level: All the techniques in the world are for me. I use my body and mind to practice together: I have learned the essentials and absorbed various parenting scriptures for my own use. Experts and books seem to make us more comfortable, but we will soon find that those rigorous operation guidesInstead, it leaves us at a loss. If you want to truly break through the shackles, you must find a path that suits you from a broad knowledge network. Before the child was to be weaned, I sought various scriptures. Experts suggest that it is recommended to feed babies until they are two years old, and it is best to be able to wean naturally. But I couldn\’t. When the baby was one and a half weeks old, I had to wean myself due to chronic poor sleep and endocrine disorders. Some people in the group of mothers said that they should be cruel and let the child\’s grandma take care of it for two days without letting the child see the mother, and then the baby would be cut off. I can\’t even think about it. It\’s already very pitiful for a child to have no milk to eat. If he\’s not allowed to see his mother, it will be a psychological problem. After thinking for a long time, I came up with a weaning path suitable for my own children. I took annual leave and played with her for two days, diverting her attention during the day. During the play, I told her that the mother had no milk and that the baby had grown up and should drink milk powder. I said it many times and she seemed to understand, but when it was time to feed at night, she still cried heartbrokenly. I held her in my arms and walked around, talking to her, telling her that her mother just had no milk, but she would still love her and protect her. I didn’t expect that I would be weaned without realizing it. Without going through too much pain, and without fully listening to those opinions, I actually did it according to my own ideas. In fact, all martial arts moves are to defeat the enemy, and all parenting tips are to make children and parents grow up happily. No matter how many books or professional lectures we read, we can\’t completely achieve it. It is better to plan one that suits our children. The most important thing is to learn the \”moves\” and also learn the connotation, so that all the martial arts in the world can be used by me. The fourth level: Create your own martial arts and achieve enlightenment: abandon books and have your own parenting philosophy. In \”The Legend of Heaven and the Dragon Sword\”, Zhang Sanfeng taught Zhang Wuji Tai Chi swordsmanship, but after teaching it, he asked Zhang Wuji to forget it. Why is this? The essence of martial arts is to not stick to the moves, but to look deeper and grasp the more fundamental things behind the moves. Absorbing hundreds of martial arts secrets is not as good as creating your own unique skills. On the road to parenting, only you can understand your own baby. In the movie \”Girl Genius\”, Mary is a girl with extremely outstanding mathematical talents. Her mother, who also had mathematical talents, committed suicide due to depression. Mary was adopted by her uncle Frank. Grandma Mary was a senior mathematician. She accidentally discovered Mary\’s mathematical talent and was extremely surprised. She hoped that Mary, like her mother, would attend a special adult school and take a arduous road to education. Image source: \”Girl Genius\” My uncle witnessed his sister\’s depression and suicide due to this kind of education. He hoped that his niece would go to a regular school and grow up like a normal child. Frank allowed Mary to live a different life from her mother. There was no devilish training. She was just a child who could play willfully, laugh boldly, love bravely, and experience the same fun as her peers. Image source: \”Girl Genius\” There is no fixed formula on the road to growth, and nothing is absolutely correct. When we truly accompany our children to grow up, we will find that all methodologies are inferior to respecting their growth and giving the initiative to them. The fifth level: There is no way to win, but there is a way to reach the gods: let goFly to yourself, have a good attitude, and adopt Buddhist parenting. In \”Tian Long Ba Bu\”, the Murong family\’s way of repaying the enemy with their own way is the highest level of martial arts. I will use whatever you use to hit me back, and the soldiers will cover up the water and cover it up with the earth. The highest state of parenting is nothing more than this. Parenting is like planting a tree. If you interfere too much, it will not grow well. If you allow it to develop, and occasionally correct it when it goes awry, the tree will easily grow into a towering tree. Unlike many celebrities who share their babies, Hai Qing does not hype or show off her children, and she never shows her son’s true face, but her son is really outstanding. Not long ago, my son won three gold medals in swimming competitions. His calligraphy puts many adults to shame. There are also those who are unshakable and do their homework first before going to play, just like \”other people\’s children.\” So how does Hai Qing raise children? To put it simply, it is Buddhist. Even simpler, it can be anything. During the World Cup, she actually asked her son to stay up late with her to watch the game. It is really rare to find such a \”big-hearted\” mother. But this is exactly the case. Children who are raised as they please without paying attention to any tricks will actually have their own opinions, independent thinking, and the ability to take care of themselves. There is a sentence in \”The Global Middle Class Has Parenting Anxiety\”: Compared with the mother\’s anxiety, the father feels that there is nothing that the four words \”let nature take its course\” cannot solve. The more parenting knowledge we receive and the more people tell us what to do, the more we become confused and anxious. You might as well remember this four-character mantra and let nature take its course. When something happens, tell yourself, it’s okay, it’s okay, it doesn’t matter. Turning the tangible into the intangible, and using no tricks to win, is the highest state of parenting. Fan Deng once said that raising children should be a very happy thing. If you feel pain in the process, then your method must be wrong. From being a novice at the beginning to scientific parenting later, we have experienced too much anxiety. Only by continuing to go deeper, getting rid of the shackles, and treating the child as an independent \”person\” can we truly get the secrets. Yuan Hong once said, \”Children\’s lives are happy because they are simple. In fact, we have thrown away this kind of thing. We have lost a lot in the process of growing up.\” When children grow up, the most real happiness is the simplest but the most precious. Hope We should not forget the original intention while looking for various tricks. The most important thing is to let nature take its course.