Simplicity Parenting: Using the Extraordinary Power of Less to Raise Calmer, Happier, and More Secure Kids

by Kim John Payne

Will our love and guidance give them the grace they need to grow?

To have moments of calm—creative or restful—is a form of deep sustenance for human beings of all ages. Relationships are often built in these pauses, in the incidental moments, when nothing much is going on.

We are building our daily lives, and our families, on the four pillars of too much: too much stuff, too many choices, too much information, and too much speed.

Stress that is damaging is either too large, or too constant to move beyond. If our abilities (or a child’s abilities) can’t match it, then he or she can’t understand it, or work through it, and they become stuck in a reoccurring cycle of stress reactions.