Whole Child, Whole Parent, 4/E

I first bought this book in 1976, before my first child was born, and the book and I have undergone many transformations. It is the book I have most often had to replace because I've lent it so often, and cannot be without! It's my favorite gift to expectant parents, too. I am frustrated with guides that only include advice about products, or about discipline, or how-to advice on anything. This book includes those, but has a unique perspective about them and helps us understand our reasons for being and doing and becoming parents. It's a cliche, but WCWP helps expand consciousness! The best aspect of Whole Child, Whole Parent is its foundation in spirit (not religion). The chapter titles are: Wholeness, Spirit, Happiness, Freedom, Unity, Beauty, Truth, Love. The book gives us the basis for why we have children, or even enter into relationship, and it fills a deep yearning for truer knowing. I always find the book reassuring on the most fundamental levels, and have read it many times over, even now, when I am an empty-nester. Polly Berrien Berends, the author, speaks from a very calm and knowing place, and reading her work is like having a deep well of loving kindness right next door to chat with. Simply the best!

Wow, this book is the one parenting book that I have read that I can say changed my entire way of looking at my job as a mother. The spirituality of being a parent and the spiritual lessons that await us every single day are now so apparent in my mind after reading this book. My relationship with my spirited child and nursing babe has completely been transformed as I process this book and consciously live out the spiritual moments of my day. Please give this book at least a chance to enter into your journey of parenthood.

I discovered this at the discount table of a bookstore in Lexington, Kentucky. It does not get old or outdated.How easily this book could have drifted off into self-indulgent Freudian psychobabble, Fundamentalist moralism or New Age narcissism--all of which Alice Miller has warned us against--in the hands of a less gifted writer. The fact that it doesn't at any time in 340-plus pages is nothing short of miraculous. Polly Berends not only challenges one's view of parenting and loving, but also of Christianity and culture and the universe itself, by bringing mysticism back to the modern Christian mind while not alienating those of other (or no particular) faiths. Filled with transcendent prose, quotes of everything from Buddhist sacred text to the New Testament to e.e. cumming poetry, and the writer's own heart (the heart of a proud mother and wife who walks with God), this is a truly beautiful work that made my mind scream what was important about my personal relationship with my son to me, above the distractions of my ego, with virtually every page. Consider yourself the child, and this book will help you raise yourself. And then imagine what kind of real parent you can be while following its lessons. This is the ultimate holiday, Mother/Father's Day or birthday gift for anyone with children, bar none.Beautiful.

I had the fortune to begin to read this book 10 years before our twins were born. Whether you are a parent or not Berend's statement of the perennial spiritual wisdom is to be savored and dipped into over and over again. The book is so rich, so moving, so poetic that frequently you will find that you need to stop and reflect on her words after a page or two.This book, along with Berend's unfortunately out-of-print "Coming To Life", is a true spiritual classic.

Every now and then a rare book appears which can change your life. This is one. Polly Berrien Berends is wise and gentle. She brings lofty or deep spiritual insights to the rubber-meets-the-road issues of daily parenting: how is one to approach fears of childbirth? How should one talk to a toddler? How does one decide which toys to buy? I had the good fortune to read this book just prior to becoming a parent, and if possible, you should too. It is not a quick or easy read, rather a very meaningful one. Sometimes I had to stop and think after only three or four pages. But this was well worth it. If you are already a parent, or if you may never become a parent, read this book. Although it addresses parenting issues it is really a book about human-being-hood.