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Mallika Chopra shares what she has learned about parenting, while immersed in the journey, in her book, "100 Questions From My Child."
Mallika Chopra:
My second book, “100 Questions From My Child,” was actually inspired when my elder daughter was about 3 years old and she asked the question, “Mommy, what’s a bomb?”
It was the morning when the London bombings had just taken place and my husband and I had put on CNN and we are seeing all this news not realizing of course that our 3-year-old was watching, both the television but also our reaction to what was happening, and when she asked that question my immediate thought was, “How do I answer this question?”
And so the book, “100 Questions From My Child,” is really an approach to being a conscious parent. You know, our children ask us questions every day, both verbally and non-verbally, and they are looking to us for answers and the way in which we answer the questions, not just the words that we use but the way in which we answer the questions sets the foundation for the rest of their life in terms of how they are going to learn, process information, and just trust the universe and the world.
So really, this book is about how we can be conscious parents and answer our children’s questions with honesty, compassion and just an openness and often vulnerability that there are some questions that we can’t even answer.
So answering some questions we have to admit that to our children as well that it’s very difficult to answer. When my child asked me, “Mommy, what’s a bomb,” I decided that the best approach at that moment in time was first to hold her and to make her feel secure and protected and then we slowly had a conversation about how when people are hurt sometimes they hurt other people and you know, it’s a very difficult conversation to have.
She asked me another question, “Mommy, why do bad things happen to good people?” That happened while my cousin had been diagnosed with a brain tumor and in the process of going through chemo and radiation had become blind and deaf and my three-and-a-half-year-old from three-and-a-half to four-and-a-half saw this happening and really, I couldn’t think of a great explanation.
I think it’s important to just explain to children that sometimes we don’t know and maybe we can explore these questions together and I think while there are some questions that we feel more comfortable answering, I think it’s as empowering to children to think of life as a journey of asking questions and thinking about questions and so that’s really been my approach, especially with some of the difficult ones that I can’t answer.
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