Genetic Parenting – Prioritising Our Genes

Living for our Children; Living for our Genes.

The basic premise of Genetic Parenting is that we should live for our children, live for our genes. It is an aspect of parental behaviour evident throughout Nature and essential to our continued survival.

By giving our offspring the best chance in life, we are more likely to be genetically successful; we are more likely to secure our genetic continuation.

It is therefore up to parents to maintain their Genetic Priority, which means doing their best for their genes. To do this, parents must seek to manage both the environment and the “Impressionable Moments” their children experience. In so doing, this will help ensure that their children have what it takes to realise their genetic potential and go on to be genetically successful.

Childhood is the formative stage of our physical, mental, emotional and attitudinal development. Our environment will determine which of our bank of genetic traits are activated; our “Impressionable Moments” are the life-impacting experiences which can direct our genetic attention – the death of a parent, the change to a new school, the birth of a sibling.

Together, our environment and our “Impressionable Moments” will shape our individual being.

However, despite recognising the compelling impact of these forces, we do not always give them the priority they command and deserve. Distracted – perhaps even pressurised – by society, the focus and pursuit of our Genetic Priority is an aspect of our lives that we often overlook or that we are becoming increasingly divorced from.

This has meant that society has had to step in to increasingly support and reinforce parents’ roles. Society, recognising the inconsistencies, haphazardness and neglect that regularly occur in parenting, has sought to further intervene in our children’s upbringing, mainly through the expanding remit of educational provision – nursery care, school meals, after-school clubs, and the curriculum within schools providing more “Life” lessons.

Unfortunately, society’s involvement is too often either too late or insufficiently impactful for many children. Their life course will already have been set by the environment and the “Impressionable Moments” provided by their parents.

That is why we all, even before we embark on our parenting journey, should be fully aware of our genetic responsibility. We need to know what we should and should not be doing in our reproductive and child-raising behaviour. We need to have a better understanding of Genetic Parenting.

Genetic Parenting comprises a mix of parenting principles, parenting psychology and practical advice. When combined, they give our parenting behaviour a sense of solidity, directing us towards our Genetic Priority.

Within Genetic Parenting, a distinction can be made between prenatal and post-natal parenting.

Prenatal parental considerations for our genetic prospects include:

Pre-conceptual Parenting: This is the basis for determining the raw materials that we have to work with. We need to invest in our reproductive future. Our choice of partner, the quality of our reproductive material, the timing of the conception, and the nature of the environment will all be factors in determining our genetic prospects. It’s important that we get these things right. If we only have inferior or sub-standard raw materials to work with, then we are hardly likely to produce a top-quality product.

Instead, we should strive to use the best conceptual inputs available. As athletes train to be in peak condition for a particular competition, we too should prepare ourselves for our reproductive activity.

We might also consider that our pre-conceptual health and lifestyle may affect the amount and type of genetic mutational activity that occurs at conception. If we are in good shape, this may encourage beneficial mutations; if we are in poor condition, it is perhaps more likely that poor conditions lead to unwanted, corrosive genetic mutations.

This suggests that one of the greatest threats to the weakening of our Genetic Priority during pre-conception is casual sex. When this leads to conception – as it sometimes will – it will produce an offspring that is of poorer quality than would be achieved if better care were taken in choosing a more attractive reproductive partner, that is, one that contributes to a person’s genetic make-up.

Casual sex is an example of inordinate genetic neglect – we are serving our own interests rather than those of our genes.

The reality is that in pre-conceptual parenting, as evidenced throughout the rest of Nature, there can be no romance, no spontaneity, no passion, no mystery, no element of chance. Instead, it is all about delivering on our Genetic Priority.

We should always remember that once conception has occurred, there is nothing more we can do to change the genetic makeup of our creation. The die is cast!

Parenting in Pregnancy: Life does not begin at birth; it begins at conception. We should therefore be aware that an unborn baby is being influenced by the environment and the “Impressionable Moments” it has during pregnancy – the nutritional resources it receives, any contaminant exposures, and the sensory experiences it has.

Pregnancy is a time when a child’s life chances can be substantially enhanced or weakened. This is because our offspring are in their most formative state. As such a tiny being, any influences are likely to have a marked impact. These influences may well stay with the child throughout their life.

We should also recognise that not only do we have a duty of care to our unborn child, but we have a duty to actively and positively manage our prenatal child so that it can go on to achieve all that it might be capable of. The more we do this, the more genetically successful our child will be.

Parents at Birth: Even though we may not remember anything about it, being born is perhaps the greatest “Impressionable Moment” a child experiences. As such, it can have a significant bearing on that child’s future. We should therefore make every effort to ensure it is a positive, enriching moment.

This means that we have to be wary of certain types of medical intervention, appreciate and nurture the bond between mother and baby, and be aware of the sensory experience the baby will undergo.

One of the most challenging aspects for medical authorities in relation to giving birth is the extent to which, during a troublesome labour, they should act in the interests of the mother compared with the interests of the child. It’s a difficult genetic dilemma. When lives are endangered, where does our Genetic Priority rest?

Post-natal parenting identifies four aspects of raising children that we need to actively and positively nurture to ensure those children can go on to be genetically successful.

Parents for Learning: As parents, we should have a strong focus on the learning our children receive. The more our children learn, the more able and the more successful they will be. It means that our children are not only more likely to achieve genetic continuance, but they are also more likely to go on to make a positive contribution to the improvement of their genetic stock.

Many parents fail to realise the importance of learning in young babies, that it drives and directs their future creative development, and that it will shape how their genes reveal themselves. Parents can become too preoccupied with meeting their baby’s physical needs – feeding, changing, sleeping – or trying to adapt the baby to the family’s daily routine – when to sleep, when to eat.

Children learn through play. And Parents should be far more mindful of their offspring’s play and learning needs.

It is up to parents to ensure that a child’s play contains two essential elements: variety and stimulation. In so doing, parents provide their child not only with the opportunity to ascertain where the child’s particular interests and abilities are, but they also enable the child’s learning to match their developmental growth.

Parents for Discipline: Society is an ordered environment that, if we want to be a successful part of it, we are obliged to learn how to obey rules. The more disciplined we are, the better suited we are to living in society, which means we will be more successful and, consequently, more genetically attractive.

Discipline is acquired early in life and is determined by a child’s parents’ effectiveness in establishing and enforcing rules.

Getting off to a good start is vital. It sets the tone of what parents want and expect from their child.

Good behaviour in young children is like building a house: it doesn’t happen immediately. It’s a gradual process with the completed structure only revealing itself towards the end of the construction. It requires a plan (a set of rules), competent builders (committed parents) and, ideally, a surveyor (a role increasingly filled by society) to ensure the plan is complied with. Once complete, the house will then only require ongoing upkeep – nothing major – just enough to keep it looking good, a sound structure already being in place.

Parents for Communication: In a societal environment, communication is the key to getting ahead in life. Society necessitates and thrives on sociability. It is not only necessary to ensure that we do well in society, but also to ascertain who is and who is not a suitable reproductive partner.

The nature of conversations parents have with their young child will significantly influence that child’s future. It will affect their behaviour, their ability and their emotional development. It will then determine what they can go on to achieve.

Parents must therefore teach their child different communication techniques and encourage them to practice them.

Parents for Achievement: Although learning, discipline and communication will help us survive in our prevailing environment, the key to being genetically successful is to maximise our potential, to get the most out of us, and to make us as attractive as possible.

This is what parents should be seeking to do for their children. They must coach their children to discover their talents and provide them with opportunities to realise their potential by nurturing those talents.

The aim of Genetic Parenting is to guide us towards being better parents. It is to reinforce and, where it has been lost, to re-establish our genes as our priority in life. It is, after all, to their interests that we should be directing ourselves. They are our investment in the future. They are the future.

Quite frankly, we should be living less for ourselves and more for our genes, doing what is good and right for them.

It is only by doing this that we can consider ourselves as having properly fulfilled our genetic responsibility.

Ultimately, parents need to re-establish and reinforce their Genetic Priority, which has gradually been undermined by the emergence and expansion of society. The problem being that society may offer too many distractions, pressures and temptations for us to properly concentrate on our true purpose in life – our genetic continuation.

For a more detailed understanding of Genetic Parenting an e-book is available on Amazon.

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