Be open to healing in relationship

This month, in honor of Mother's Day, we talked about healing relationships between mothers and children. There was such a great response to that column, I felt it necessary to further explore this issue.

Father's Day is just around the corner in June, and there are so many out there who need to mend broken relationships with the mothers and their fathers as well.

How do we begin this process?

I often say in communication and life, we must first seek to understand and not just to be understood.

Parents are people, too

When we are first born, I think God gives us all this great ability to believe our parents can do anything. Ideally, they really should be our first representation of God on the Earth. We should be able to depend on them, learn from them and ideally aspire to be a lot like them.

But what if we could rarely rely on mom or dad to follow through on their promises? Or if we saw arguing, depression, anger and hopelessness in them as our example? How can we learn to love, forgive and have a strong relationship with our parents?

It starts with first understanding they're people too.

They started out just like we did, as babies, influenced by their environment and life's circumstances.

Moms and dads have hurts, disappointments and concerns just like us. If you've been hurt by your mom or dad, don't walk in bitterness and try to return a wrong.

Be understanding. I Peter 3:8 tells us to "be of one mind, having compassion for one another... being tenderhearted, be courteous, not returning evil for evil, but on the contrary blessing knowing that you were called to this."

As their children, we often only see them in the role of a parent. But they had an identity as individuals far before you came along. Think about the way they were raised, the things they went through that shaped the person they eventually became. The relationship they had with their parents also plays a major role in the kind of parenting style they used with you.

Ideally, each generation should go a step beyond the one before them. I hope your parents were able to do more and be more for you than your grand- and great-grandparents did for them. Now you have the responsibility to work to take that a step further for your children.

Talk to your mom or dad about the changes you'd like to see them make and pray for their ability to change. No matter what we've been through in life, we all still have the ability to change who we are. But that is a matter of decision.

If they're not willing to make those changes, move forward and make a personal decision that you will be quick to change, grow and reshape yourself when you receive constructive criticism from those closest to you.