We all know parents are important. But just how impactful are they? Parents, or primary caregivers, aren’t just important for their contributions to our biology and genetics, but also because of all the other ways they shape us, especially during our early and formative years. They are the only relationship we experience on earth where someone both loves us as their own child and has direct authority over and responsibility for us.

Nothing replaces the parent-child relationship and its influence on how we develop and grow into adults. If this relationship does so much to form the persons we become, how can we honor and invest in this relationship throughout our lives?