L.R. Knost Quotes

#1. The fact is that hurting people hurt people, and children raised with condemnation in whatever form it takes are hurting people. Period. Words matter.

L.R. Knost

#2. No matter the problem, kindness is always the right response.

L.R. Knost

#3. The parents' perceptions all too often become the reality. In other words, who they believe they are raising is who they will raise.

L.R. Knost

#4. Discipline is helping a child solve a Problem. Punishment is making a child suffer for having a problem. To raise problem solvers, focus on solution not retribution.

L.R. Knost

#5. Saying someone can't be sad because someone else may have it worse is like saying someone can't be happy because someone else may have it better. ~Unknown

L.R. Knost

#6. It's not our job to toughen our children up to face a cruel and heartless world. It's our job to raise children who will make the world a little less cruel and heartless.

L.R. Knost

#7. It is time for a return to childhood, to simplicity, to running and climbing and laughing in the sunshine, to experiencing happiness instead of being trained for a lifetime of pursuing happiness. It is time to let children be children again.

L.R. Knost

#8. Taking care of yourself doesn't mean me first, it means me too.

L.R. Knost

#9. If perfection were possible, the Cross wouldn't have been necessary. (Galatians 2:21)

L.R. Knost

#10. Growing independence, though, doesn't have to mean growing separation. Humans were created to be relational beings. We may outgrow our dependency, but we never outgrow the need for community, interaction, appreciation, reassurance, and support.

L.R. Knost

#11. Instead of raising children who turn out okay despite their childhood, let's raise children who turn out extraordinary because of their childhood.

L.R. Knost

#12. Want to help stop the bullying epidemic? Don't act like a bully. Don't hit, threaten, ignore, isolate, intimidate, ridicule, or manipulate your child. Children really do learn what they live ...

L.R. Knost

#13. Some say they get lost in books, but I find myself, again and again, in the pages of a good book. Humanly speaking, there is no greater teacher, no greater therapist, no greater healer of the soul, than a well-stocked library.

L.R. Knost

#14. As Maya Angelou, American author, poet, and self-described Renaissance Woman, wrote, Do the best you can until you know better. Then when you know better, do better.

L.R. Knost

#15. Parents, choose your words wisely, carefully, thoughtfully. In the same way that violence begets violence and anger begets anger, kindness begets kindness and peace begets peace. Sow words of peace, words that build, words that show respect and belief and support.

L.R. Knost

#16. Keep working on you. Remind yourself that it's your emotions and experiences and expectations that are causing your outbursts, not your little one's behavior.

L.R. Knost

#17. For a child, it is in the simplicity of play that the complexity of life is sorted like puzzle pieces joined together to make sense of the world.

L.R. Knost

#18. When you're lying in bed at night and regrets from the day come to steal your sleep ...
"I should have"
"If only I'd"
"I wish I'd"
... grab one of them and turn it into an "I will" and sleep peacefully knowing tomorrow will be a better day.

L.R. Knost

#19. Forgiving ourselves and learning from our inevitable mistakes transforms failure from a stumbling block into a stepping stone.

L.R. Knost

#20. Giving our children rest means being their safe harbor, their place to retreat when life hurts and the world looms large and people disappoint and mistakes are made. Becoming that safe harbor means being free ~ freely available, freely offered, freely welcoming.

L.R. Knost

#21. Forgiveness empties the past of its power to empty the present of its peace.

L.R. Knost