Customer Reviews

What Do You Really Want for Your Children?

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I think this book is really about what we want for OURSELVES. All parents want the BEST for their kids but they rarely apply it to themselves. This book teaches you how to model the most healthy, sane and life-affirming behavior and attitudes so your children will learn these attitudes. The only way to effectively model this behavior is to actually become this kind of person ourselves. It requires an open mind toward one's own behavior, thoughts and beliefs. Here are the chapter headings:
"I want my children to value themselves
I want my children to be risk-takers
I want my children to be self-reliant
I want my children to be free from stress and anxiety
I want my children to have peaceful lives
I want my children to celebrate their present moments
I want my children to experience a lifetime of wellness
I want my children to be creative
I want my children to fulfill their higher needs and to feel a sense of purpose"
Don't you want to live this way too? I know I do.

All parents start with grand expectations for their children. However, many parents are not specifically clear what characters they really want their children to have. Not knowing where to go and how to get there, it results in frustration, friction, conflict, mistrust, ... between the generations. Dr. Dyer's book is an invaluable guide for all serious parents to set the correct goal, make the goal approachable, and make every day of the parent-child relationship a deep enjoyment.

This book is not an easy book. As other readers have pointed out, this book is not just about raising kids, but also (perhaps more importantly) about changing the parents themselves. As I read through some of the paragraphs, I often felt my regret for things that I should have not done to my kids (I hope I can be better next time...).

Not only did the author set the goals that were founded on sound human development theory (mostly Maslow), but he also gave numerous detailed daily advices that are well organized around these goals. Examples include as simple of an advice as "Do not create monsters in the minds of young children to temporarily quiet them" to the more thoughtful "Try making your adolescent right rather than arguing with them any longer." Another observation worthing everybody's thought is "If you use guilt on children on a regular basis, it will not be long before they start using it on you."

I also enjoy the many profound sayings that the author quoted. One is "A mother is not a person to lean on, but a person to make leaning unnecessary." The other is "The greatest evil that can befall man is that he should come to think ill of himself."

If you are looking at this review and care about your children or even about yourself, BUY THIS BOOK! I was at a low point in my life, wondering which direction to take and starting to lose sight of who I am. While browsing through parenting books, I found this amazing book and have been highlighting left and right. I discuss it with everyone I can and have found it to be immensely helpful in re-directing my own way of thinking. Postive thoughts surround me, I no longer feel pity on myself, I take action!I am happy to say that although it will make a difference in how I parent my daughter, it already has changed me and how I think. I realize now that I should not allow situations to control me, and this book is wonderfully adept at helping with this. If you have unbridled anger or frustration...this book is for you. Share this book with everyone you know, it will only affect them postively. Although there were some issues which I do not agree with personally, I did understand and respect all of Dr. Dyer's thoughts. It is a powerful and enriching book, which will enhance your life and that of those around you. We need more like this in such trying times.

My mom is in the childcare business. She has been using this book as a guide to help her rear happier children, with less conflict and more support. She has done an amzing job with some tough to handle kinds...who thanks to her and the help of the book are no longer so tough to handle, and are happier and more cooperative.

To this day this is our favourite gifts to new moms we know :)

Until I read this book, I was unaware of how much influence I as a parent make on my child and how much influence my parents were on me. I think it is very helpful to understand why we are the way we are and how we can help our children to become the best they can be. There are a lot of things we just aren't aware of in life that influence our children and this book brings a lot of them to your attention. I am doing a lot of things correct in raising my child, but I also have a lot to learn. This book is terrific! I highly suggest it to parents of children of all ages (even those with adult children)!!

The point of the book is your own life & behavior as it affects YOU and YOUR children, rather than your parents' lives & behavior and how it affected YOU. If that fact was missed by a reviewer with A Bone to Pick, that reviewer did, indeed, totally miss......the point.

The reviewer states: "That's BULL. The author is negating the importance of his book with that statement. Why are there so many parenting books if there weren't so many adults out there with major problems BECAUSE of how they grew up? Why don't we just parent any way we want to--we can abuse our children--and then turn around and say "Don't blame me for your problems".

I would have to assume that anyone who was attracted to this book, if only because of its title, would not be of the mindset to abuse his/her children. More importantly, we can't coulda shoulda - we can't redo our own childhoods. The point of the book is to help us find more effective ways to raise our OWN children, in spite of our own childhoods, and to help us see very clearly what we TRULY want for our children. Dr. Dyer is marvelously successful in helping us to do just that. In this book, there is no room for blame, retaliation, recriminations, or lingering hostility. The point of Dr. Dyer's statements is that if we hang on to those negative feelings and long ago reactions, we will damage our own kids as well as continue to damage our ourselves. The name of the book is "What Do You Really Want for your Children," not "How Much Were You Abused as a Child? Let Us Count the Ways."

I had these audio tapes about 10 years ago, when my son was just a little fellow, and was truly enlightened by the common sense conveyed by Dr. Dyer's insights. It's time to listen again!

This book has helped me become a better parent by looking at my own behavior first. It is very practical and down to earth, obviously written by someone who has done the job before.

I highly recommend this book as a parenting guide as well as a self improvement guide. Author goes into the depth of human behaviours and not only he explains why some kind of behavior is not acceptable, but he also explains how we express that behaviour and what's our psychological need to behave that way. I found this really helpful because lots of time we are not even aware of when our behaviour is a bad influence on our kids. But the way author explains -why, when and how we do it, it becomes all crystal clear.

Wayne Dyer has brought his widsom and wit to the hard process of parenting with this inspiring but daunting how-to designed to raise "no-limit" children. Sadly, it's discouraging to realize the amount of hard work, discipline and self-control that are required from parents to pull off this challenging protocol for raising kids to be non-blaming, empathetic and self-confident adults. The main precepts tend to be repeated many times, but that's helpful for learning things well. As you might expect, there are plenty of helpful self-improvement tips for adults, who must really be exemplary people to follow the child-rearing advice Dyer gives. It would have been nice to have this book much sooner in my parenting career - now, as a grandparent, I'm finding it difficult to convince my daughter that the Dyer approach is workable. Even if you only adopt a few of his ideas, you will be rewarded, I think, with happier and better-adjusted children.

Being the father of three children, I enjoyed reading this book. This book helped me to see many of the negative parenting patterns that years of conditioning had created in my ego. The number one thing that I walked away with was the understanding that my children have to make their own lives (with my wife's and my guidance, of course), and that it is not my place to control them. Wayne also provides ways to help you see yourself and then how to correct any negative traits you possess concerning parenting. While I may not agree 100% with every idea he has regarding parenting, I would say I agree 90% (now that I've read it). I have seen many of my fallacies and have seen how they have affected and will affect my children negatively; I have seen how to change those ways also, thanks to this book.

I believe EVERY parent should read this book, and I've given it to new parents and have recommended it to others. No matter how old your children are, Wayne has written this book for you, now. It's never too late to correct your mistakes and help your children grow to be mature, responsible, creative, limitless adults, and Wayne stresses that in this book. I believe you will appreciate it, therefore, I highly recommend it.