Simple Mom

Houses Have Windows, Homes Have Stories

Emily — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 06:00:05 +0000

My 5-year-old daughter is obsessed with words. She spends her days at school learning sounds of words, what words mean, how to spell words and how to read words. So, when I said to my husband the other day, “We’ve really made this house a home, haven’t we?”, she quickly replied “House and home are the same word!”

Having lived in a fixer-upper for nearly as long as she can remember, I knew she’d understand when I sat down to explain to her the difference between a house and home. I started by saying, “houses have windows, homes have stories.”

While my family has spent the past nearly four years making what was a barely livable house a home, I still believe that it’s not the walls or the flooring, or the decor that make the places we live home.

What makes a house a home?

Think about your home — what comes to mind?

For me, I think of my family. I also think of smells – delicious food cooking in the oven or simmering on the stove. I think of the games we play here, the laughter, the memories created in the simplest of moments. I think of reading books on a rainy day in a comfortable chair. I picture Saturday morning pancakes.

All of these things have nothing to do with what a house looks like, what kind of countertops it has, or how shiny and new it is. The most important things are who you are with, and what the moments are made of.

Embrace the stories your home has to tell.

Think about all the times you’ve put your kids to bed giggling. The times a meal has been wrecked and you had to order pizza. The times you laughed so hard at something your child said, your gut hurt. Those are the moments that matter.

Those are the things that make the places we call home. Not the pretty stuff on the walls, or the view. It’s the moments you create in your house that make it home.

Making memories at home…

Photo by Remodeling This Life

Creating memories and making a home is not always as easy as laughing at someone messing up dinner, or having a big tickle fest at bedtime. Sometimes you have to create moments, make memories that will last – if not a lifetime, at least a little while.

If I had to choose between painting my living room or giving my kids an afternoon with finger paint, I’d take the finger painting any day. Making a space that is safe and comfortable for everyone to create is so important.

For me, home is providing a place for everyone to know it is okay to make a mess. Home is a place where creating and learning and enjoying life is more important than white walls and perfect furniture.

The place you live is just that – a place to live. Home – whether rented or owned, big or small, new or old – is what you do, who you are with, and the memories you make.

What makes your house a home?

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Relinquish Your Power on the Things that don’t Matter

Tsh — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 06:00:49 +0000

This post was first published on February 2, 2009.

I don’t share many parenting tips here, mostly because I don’t have a lot. I’ll venture into pantry organization or budgeting — but raising up the next generation? Now that’s territory in which I feel rather unqualified to write.

That said — I do have a few tricks up my sleeve. And this one is one I use often, and usually works brilliantly.

Offer pre-filtered choices.

Young children think concretely, and they often see the world in black and white. They’re also vying for control in their life, and are constantly testing the waters of independence.

How often do you hear “I wanna do it!” from your young preschooler? If you’re me, you hear it all day long. And it’s not a bad thing — it’s a sign of healthy confidence when your preschooler wants to put on her own socks, or carry his cereal bowl to the table.

The trick is to know when to give her the independence she wants, and when to reel her free spirit closer to you.

A few years ago I read the book Parenting With Love And Logic by Foster Cline and Jim Fay, and it really transformed my parenting philosophy. One of the authors’ key points is to allow freedom for the 95 percent of decisions that don’t matter, so that you can fully claim control for the 5 percent that do.

In other words, when the outcome isn’t important, give your child the power to choose. When the outcome is important, make the decision unwaveringly and unapologetically — and hopefully, you’ve made enough independence deposits into your child’s account to keep him from being crushed when his freedom is relinquished.

Because young kids are easily overwhelmed, help narrow down their choices, so that they have finite options for decision-making.

You probably already do this, in some sense. Let me show you what I mean.

Scenario #1

Your daughter, Anne, likes to dress herself in the morning. You’re not going anywhere today, so it doesn’t really matter what she wears. But if you give her free reign, she’ll unload her entire dresser and change six times before breakfast.

ANNE: I want to pick my clothes!
MOM: Sure. Here is your pink shirt and your purple shirt. Which one would you like?
ANNE: The pink shirt!

Anne was given the freedom to wear the pink shirt from a finite amount of options — the pink one or the purple one.

Scenario #2

Photo by Margaret Wyker

You can also invent decisions to be made, almost in a silly way:

DAD: Hey bud, I’m having a ball with you at the park. We need to go soon. Should we leave now, or in ten minutes?
ETHAN: In ten minutes!
DAD: Sounds good.

Ethan was given the “power” to choose, but they’re still leaving the park. Staying at the park all day wasn’t one of his options.

Scenario #3

This doesn’t always work — sometimes your daughter takes too long to decide, or she has a whiny attitude even about the choices she’s been given. In this case, you simply make the decision and move on. You be the adult.

DAD: Lucy, I’d like you to pick the vegetable for dinner tonight. Would you like green beans or broccoli?
LUCY: But I don’t want vegetables at dinner!
DAD: We need a vegetable at dinner because they’re good for our bodies, and besides, they’re yummy.
LUCY: But I don’t want one. (Ten seconds pass)
DAD: I’ll make the decision. We’re having green beans.

And then the subject is changed to something else, and the decision is made and over with.

Scenario #4

Hopefully, if you’ve given your child enough decision-making power throughout the day for the insignificant choices, you can claim your responsibility as a parent by standing firm with the decisions that do matter.

MOM: Alright, Peter, it’s 7:30. It’s time to brush your teeth and get ready for bed.
PETER: But I don’t want to go to bed!
MOM: I understand. But your bedtime is 8 o’clock, and you were given lots of choices today. Now it’s my turn to make the choice about what we do next.

Photo by Juhan Sonin

Peter was probably given the decision about what cereal to eat for breakfast, whether to play with blocks or trucks after lunch, and which book to read before his quiet time. So Mom can more easily claim the power to decide when he needs to hit the sack.

I don’t share this with the experience of 100% success. But this idea has worked well with our incredibly independent four-year-old, and she is almost always a happy, compliant child.

To sum up:

• Let your child “do it” when she asks, if the end result doesn’t matter.
• Allow her to make choices all throughout the day, choosing from a finite amount of selections.
• When your child doesn’t cooperate, make the decision for him and move on.
• You make the decisions that do matter, and claim your position as a parent cheerfully and unwaveringly.

For more on this idea about making independence deposits into your child’s account, along with other parenting ideas, I recommend picking up a copy of Parenting With Love And Logic.

Do you have any experience with this technique in your relationship with your child?

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Grace… Heap it on Yourself

Tsh — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:00:25 +0000

Parents have a lot on their plates. Even when everything is normal — the daily routine hums steadily with cleaning, cooking, running errands, kissing owies, and paying bills — I wouldn’t be surprised if your default mode is exhaustion by the end of the day. I know it is with me.

But take the daily load and add some unusual circumstance, an unexpected kink in the routine, or a family crisis of some sort, and you can easily add emotional weariness to that physical exhaustion.

In moments like those, you have only one key that opens the door to your sanity: grace. Heaps of it. For yourself, and for those around you.

Are you in one of those unique moments in life?

I am.

Perhaps you’re in the throes of parenting a newborn.

Maybe you’re a first-time mama.

The typical breadwinner in your family is still looking for work.

One of your children is going through a physically debilitating circumstance.

Maybe your entire family structure is rearranging, and not in a good way.

Or it could be a simple walk in the valley called depression.

If you’ve got stress of any type in your life, it affects your physical well being. This basic inventory by psychologists Thomas Holmes and Richard Rahe lists the most common stressful events relating to life change.

Note which of these you’ve experienced in the past year, and total the number. If your total is over 300, you have a high stress level, and an over 80 percent chance of physical illness because of it.

Personally, my total right now is 484. Guess that means I’m stressed.

We’re in the process of relocating to the States for one year, which means my husband is currently in our host country packing up our home, and I’m in the U.S. unpacking our new home. All of this has been a complete surprise to us in the past month. I’m also parenting our two littles. And oh yes, I’m pregnant with minor complications.

We all have these seasons in life. They ebb and flow as the wind changes. And when you’re in one of these unique circumstances that will inevitably end (even if that end is unseen at the moment), grace is the only way you’ll plow through.

Photo by D. Sharon Pruitt

Grace means knowing where you stand in life. Whose you are.

It also means making sure you get enough sleep, sunshine, and exercise. It’s spending lots of quality time with your spouse and children, and it’s getting enough intentional downtime.

In short — it’s taking care of yourself.

Are you in one of those challenging seasons of life? If so, are you giving yourself grace? I hope so.

Take care of yourself, mama.

And also… Because of this unique time in my life, I wasn’t able to load the questions for this week’s Book Club discussion yesterday (like how I tied all this in?). They’re up today, so if you’re reading The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, join us! Or even if you’re not, please pop over and throw in your two cents as well.

If you take that inventory, are you up for sharing the stress level in your life? If you’re in a stressful season, in what ways are you showing yourself (and others) grace?

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Understanding Your Personality: Balancing Tasks and People

Mandi — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 06:00:14 +0000

While personality tests and reading about personality types have been regarded by some as self-indulgent navel gazing, there is real value that comes from identifying your natural tendencies. Every personality has strengths and weaknesses, and understanding what yours are allows you take advantage of the strengths and create a plan to overcome the weaknesses.

The most popular personality test is the Myers-Briggs typology, but I’ve always been fascinated by the task-oriented versus people-oriented personality spectrum. Perhaps it’s because I am so strongly task-oriented, and I appreciate having a name for the focus I tend to place on my to-do list and getting things done.

As with all personality types, there is no right or wrong here. We need a balance of both personalities within society. People-oriented personalities build relationships and community, while task-oriented personalities get things done, and both are important.

Just like we need a balance of both to make the world go round, we also need to find a balance of both within our homes.

If you’re like me, your natural bent toward one end of the spectrum or the other may be so strong that you know without a doubt which personality type you are. If you’re somewhere toward the middle, you may have to spend more time thinking it through. But either way, it’s important to capitalize on the strengths of your personality while being aware of the weaknesses so that you can look for ways to improve.

Defining Your Personality Type

First, let’s look at the characteristics of both personality types to help you identify which describes you.

Task-oriented personalities tend to:

Focus on their to-do list and the things they hope to accomplish.
Be concerned with productivity and efficiency.
Have concrete goals and detailed lists.

People-oriented personalities tend to:

Focus on the needs of the people around them.
Be concerned with building relationships and keeping people happy.
Place more importance on the feelings and happiness of people than on their to-do list.

Photo by omniNate

Finding Balance

Although I am strongly task-oriented, I obviously care about my husband and my children as well. Understanding my personality means that I have to consciously take a step back from a project, idea or task to consider their needs and the time I’m spending with them so that I’m not neglecting those relationships in favor of my to-do list.

On the other hand, if you are strongly people-oriented, you may find that the opposite is true. You may need to figure out ways to balance your people focus with your responsibilities, whatever they may be. While it’s true that in 20 years you won’t regret taking extra time to play with your children, valuing our role as home managers means prioritizing the tasks that keep our home running smoothly as well.

So how do you find a balance between both focuses? Here are some tips for both personality types:

Task-Oriented Personalities

1. Schedule time to focus on the people around you and commit to setting aside your to-do list during that time.

2. Consciously make eye contact when your husband or children speak to you so that they have your full attention, even though you may be tempted to multitask.

3. Add relationship-building tasks to your to-do list, such as sending birthday cards, calling your mom or having a date night with your husband.

4. Go outside, to the library, or to a museum where you can just enjoy being with your family without the distraction of things that need to be done.

People-Oriented Personalities

1. Get your husband and children involved in your chores. Turn on music and work together to get things done while having fun and spending time together.

2. Look for opportunities to get things done in smaller chunks rather than saving them all up to do at once. For example, you can wipe down the bathroom as part of your morning routine or load the dishwasher immediately following a meal.

3. Use the time you spend on the phone with your husband or a friend to do routine chores, such as folding laundry or dusting.

4. Rather than feeling like you have to choose between cuddling your little ones or getting chores done, use a sling, wrap or carrier to combine both.

How would you characterize your personality? How do you balance your natural tendencies with the needs of your family and your home?

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New on Simple Homeschool: How to Homeschool with a Baby or Toddler

Tsh — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 15:30:04 +0000

Jamie at Simple Homeschool wrote a sweet post today about straddling that fine line between parenting a preschooler and educating an older child at home. It’s something I’m mulling over as we make plans for my daughter’s first year of kindergarten in the fall.

From her post:

“The only thing you can predict when you have little ones is that things will be unpredictable.

“That’s why you must remember that family relationships are just as important as the other three “R’s.” Through spending extended time together each day, our children develop a closeness and security that will provide a stable foundation to their relationships as adults.”

Head over to Simple Homeschool to read the rest…

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20 Tips for Finding your Routine with Kids

Tsh — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 06:00:12 +0000

This post was first published on March 23, 2009.

Reader Marilyn asks:

“I am struggling to set some kind of schedule for my family. I’m new to the SAHM thing (I went back to work after my son was five months) and have a five-month-old and a three-year-old who is now at home with me. I’ve been kind of going with the flow, but that is losing its effectiveness, and I have to take a bit more of a proactive approach. I’d love any tips on balancing the bedtimes, eating, naps and various activities of two different-aged kids.”

I had a five-month-old and a three-year-old at this time a year ago, but no matter the ages, I think it’s always a struggle to juggle multiple kids throughout the day.

The key is to just plan something. As the COO of your home, it makes complete sense to have a work schedule to your day.

Just as zero-based budgets require a name to every dollar coming and going, I think the best routines put a name to every hour (even if that name is “nothing time”). Kids thrive on a routine as well — it’s comforting for them to know what’s next in their day, even those things they don’t like.

Now, I’m not talking about planning every single minute of your day, nor am I talking about the weekends. We all know that moms work 24 hours a day, but I suggest allocating tasks to total a roughly 40-hour work week. This will help you direct your energy appropriately throughout the day.

Photo by Lindsey T

There’s nothing magical about any one particular routine — it’ll probably change in a month anyway, as routines often do with little ones in the house. But simply having some sort of written-out plan helps me know what’s next, how to stay focused, and not feel like I’m running in a hamster wheel.

Here are a few observations from my routine.

1. Write a set-in-stone schedule, but keep it soft as clay.

The planner in me likes creating a weekly schedule of my work, and if you were to see my color-coded spreadsheet, you would think I was a schedule nazi. Not so. I write it with specific times in mind, but rarely does it work exactly. I say we do story time at 4:00. Many times it’s at 4:30, or sometimes at 3:00, or even at 5:30, while dinner’s in the oven. Dinner is really the only thing to which we try to stick a hard-and-fast time. Everything else is subject to change.

2. Re-visit it weekly.

Just because your schedule worked well last week, it doesn’t mean it will this week. You may have a play date when you’d normally pay the bills, or your son has a dentist appointment right during your younger one’s nap time. There’s no rule that there has to be a “master schedule” – just make a new one each week.

3. Touch base with your spouse.

Sit down with your spouse for 30 minutes on the weekend to discuss the upcoming week.
It helps me so much when my husband and I touch base with each other about our upcoming work weeks. I ask him if there’s anything I can do for him, and he’ll find out if I need anything from him.

4. Do what you can to have your little ones help you.

Marilyn, you specifically asked me about handling little ones. Most preschoolers think chores are great fun, so have your older one help. He or she can put away silverware, fold towels, pick up toys, and even wash dishes (just put a bit of watery soap in the sink with some safe dishes and a sponge).

Photo by Rolands Lakis

5. Teach them the value of waiting.

Along with the suggestion above – it’s okay for kids to learn that Mom has a job, and she can’t play all the time. The world doesn’t revolve around them, and this is a good truth to learn as early as possible.

6. Clean as you go.

Completely clean from each mealtime before moving on to the next task. Loosely straighten up a room before heading to another. Set a timer for three minutes, and have a fun pick-up blitz with your child. It may sound stressful to clean so often during your day, but I’ve found it to be much less stressful than tackling the entire house at one set time of day. It’s usually much more chaotic if I wait, and it feels overwhelming before I begin.

7. Find your three MITs.

Out of a ten-item to-do list, identify your three Most Important Tasks, and focus your energy on those. Don’t try to get your to-do list completely scratched off, because it’ll very rarely happen – accept the fact that in this stage of life with littles at home, the to-do list doesn’t end. But you can probably accomplish three things each day. Pick the three things that, if finished, would make you feel like you had a productive day. Work on those when your energy is at your highest, and if you accomplish anything else – well, those are just gravy.

Photo by Nadia Badaoui

8. Write things down.

Have a brain dump at least once during the day – transfer everything swimming around in your head on to paper. I usually do this during or right after breakfast, and I immediately feel so much better. Don’t bother trying to do this neatly – just jot it all down as it comes to you, and then you can organize your ideas.

9. Be happy with partial solutions.

Meredith wrote about “good enough” on Friday, and I’m certainly learning this in my own life at the moment. I call these things partial solutions – it’s not exactly how you’d have things if life were perfect, but it’ll work for now. So you wanted to scrub the bathroom, but you only got around to tidying it up. Or you planned to roast a chicken for dinner, but you didn’t get a chance to thaw it, so now it’s taco night. That’s okay. Don’t aim for perfection.

10. Identify daily chores, weekly chores, monthly chores.

You probably have a general rhythm of doing repeated things each day, week, and month, and you might not notice it. Jot down those things you find necessary to do each day, and when you create your week’s routine, make sure you’ve allocated daily time for those tasks. Make a master list of weekly chores, and fill in your week’s routine with them – check them off as you go. And make sure you put those sporatic-yet-important jobs you do only monthly (paying bills or menu planning, for example) on the calendar.

11. Create a calendar-type system.

Speaking of – find a good system for maintaining your schedule, whether it’s using a manual Home Management Notebook or a digital calendar like Google Calendar (I happen to use both). There’s no right or wrong way to do this. It just needs to fit your lifestyle.

12. Don’t try to do everything.

I’ve read some rumors on the internet that I can do everything. This is allegedly based on this blog, but I can promise you that it isn’t true. I suppose there are a few things that I can do pretty well, but the flip side to that coin are things I freely admit to not doing well. No one can do everything. There are probably lots of things you’re good at, and with other things you’re… not so good. Welcome to membership in the human race. We still need to do certain essential tasks, even if we don’t feel up to par, but play up your strengths, and don’t sweat over your weaknesses.

13. Don’t watch much TV.

I’m still amazed at how much more I got done once I stopped watching most TV. Cut back to only those few shows you really love. You won’t miss the rest.

Photo by Lauren Ventriello

14. Make naps and quiet times essential.

Don’t blow these off – little kids need lots of sleep, slightly older kids need to learn the value of alone time, and mama needs a break to do grown-up work.

15. Have everyone eat, sleep, and play at the same time.

This isn’t always seamless, depending on your kids’ ages, but you can tweak ideal situations a little to have everyone down at the same time, eating at the same time, and playing together as often as possible. If your baby needs his nap at 1:00, and your daughter really needs some rest time at 2:00, have nap and quiet time start at 1:30.

16. Accept the messes.

Okay, I’m telling myself this as much as you, because it really is hard to accept the fact that most kids don’t care about the messes as much as you’d like. They need to learn the value of work, and we home managers need to model that hard work by keeping our home neat. But that doesn’t mean our homes are never messy. I have a friend who has this quote hung on her fridge – “Cleaning house while kids are growing is like shoveling snow while it’s still snowing.” It’s true.

17. Know your energy levels.

Are you a morning, afternoon, or evening person? When do you hit your slump? I’m a morning person, so I make every effort to rise before my kids and get my much-needed quiet time in then. I hit a wall at around 3 p.m., so I know I’ll be spinning my wheels trying to get anything significant done then. In the morning, I focus on tasks that require full brain engagement. In the afternoon, I fold laundry and wrestle with the kids on the floor. Make the most of your energy.

18. Think of your job as a job.

Don’t apologize for keeping a thorough work routine. Don’t feel guilty for turning down a friend for coffee because you have work to do. Just as you’d have those limits with a paycheck-earning job, so you need to create boundaries with your job at home. It’s a job. Make it a priority, and do what you can to excel in your vocation.

Photo by Chris Scott

19. Have intentional down time.

Right along with that, schedule in down time, and make it really good down time. Don’t answer phone calls while you’re taking a walk with your family. Only check your email during certain times of the day, and certainly don’t use down time for your inbox. Treat relaxation as a vital part of your schedule, just as you would cleaning or cooking.

20. Get enough sleep, water, and exercise.

Finally, don’t forget to take care of yourself. How silly that we all often forget to take care of ourselves while we take care of others under our roof. Get rest. Stay hydrated. Make your health a priority.

You’ve all learned your own tips and tricks for getting things done around the home with little ones underfoot. What else can you add to the list?

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Weekend Reading

Tsh — Sun, 07 Mar 2010 21:36:05 +0000

Homemade One-Size Cloth Diaper Pattern & Wipes Recipe :: Keeper of the Home
The Myth of Monthly Payments :: Money Saving Mom
Decorating with Serving Dishes :: Nesting Place
Works for Me: Medicine Spoons :: Rocks in My Dryer
Inspired by Life: Finding Your Style :: The Inspired Room

And while you’re enjoying your weekend reading, go ahead and subscribe to the Simple Living Weekly newsletter. You’ll get links to the best of SLM from the week, and you’ll be privy to some awesome deals found only in the newsletter. Those of you who subscribed in time for the launch found out about the $100 gift certificate giveaway from Lisa Leonard! It was so fun to surprise you all that way.

So if you haven’t yet, go ahead and sign up. It’s free, it’s sent just once a week, and it’s a short summary of SLM highlights. And did I mention you’ll find out about exclusive deals and giveaways?

Have a good weekend!

It’s spring fever. That is what the name of it is. And when you’ve got it, you want – oh, you don’t quite know what it is you do want, but it just fairly makes your heart ache, you want it so! -Mark Twain

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Big Rocks First

Tsh — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 06:00:56 +0000

The concept is simple: You have a jar, and you need to fill it with rocks of different sizes. The most logical way to make sure they all fit is to first place the big rocks in the jar, and gradually follow with smaller rocks, until you top off the jar with the pebbles and gravel.

Big rocks first.

This well-known illustration describes how we should prioritize our life’s obligations — take the time to make sure the “big rocks” are where they need to be, and everything else that needs to fit will fall into place.

Habit #3 of our current Book Club selection, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families, deals a bit with the concept of “big rocks first.” Like in our recent discussion of understanding the difference of the urgent and the important, focusing on the big rocks forces us to allot the right amount of time to the things that really matter, and to let those lesser matters wait their turn.

There was some great discussion on the Book Club forums last week. Here are some of your thoughts on what it looks like to put the big rocks first:

“…I think if we have too many big rocks, we limit the little things which can be just as important sometimes. I also think sometimes my big rocks are not on the same page as my husband’s. …I am going to start a family night once a month and make it fun and make it a no-techno night. …I don’t remember anytime with my parents growing up; just my grandparents because they watched me all the time. It’s all about the choices you make.” -Organized Mama

“Our big rocks are daily family time — that means that even if I’m not in the mood, I change my mood because that time is my kids’ time with me, and we are going to have fun. It is also very clearly not TV or computer time. We also eat together. Everyday. We set the table and sit together and eat and talk. For me, that is my biggest rock right now. The second biggest rock is spending 20 to 30 minutes talking with my husband. Doesn’t that sound ludicrous? How could we possibly go through a day and not talk 20 minutes??? Well, I don’t mean, “Did you remember to pick up milk on your way home?” We try (if we aren’t falling asleep) to spend the last half hour before sleeping talking with each other about our dreams, worries, plans, jokes we heard, whatever — but not the mundane details of daily life…” - JenT

“Both my husband and I recognize that the biggest rock for each of us is our relationship with God. We make it a priority to spend time with the Lord each day. That keeps each of us focused on the important things in life, and our relationship with each other is significantly better because of it. I can always tell if we’re not spending time with the Lord.

“Since our kids are still young, the other big rocks are in our marriage. My husband and I put our marriage first. That includes regular date nights as well as turning off the TV in the evenings so that we can talk. We know that we need to stay closely connected to each other. Another big rock is to make sure that both of us have personal tank-fillers in our schedule, whether that’s time with friends, reading a book, or playing golf.” – csott

I’d love to open this discussion to the rest of Simple Mom readers. What does it look like in your family life to put the big rocks first? What does it look like when you unintentionally fill your jar with all the pebbles, and then you don’t have any room for the rocks that truly matter?

Please share your thoughts in the comment section today (and feel free to pop over to the Book Club, if you’re in the mood!). I look forward to hearing your thoughts.

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Thursdays are Book Club day… Again

Tsh — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 06:00:26 +0000

Today is Book Club day, where we’re discussing The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Families by Steven Covey.

This week we’re discussing Habit #4 — what does it look like to have a win-win mentality in your family? I look forward to our chats.

I’ve only posted a few questions this week in order to encourage YOU to post some as well! You all did a great job with that at the beginning… Let’s bring it back!

Anyone and everyone is welcome to join us, so whenever you’re ready — and whenever the forums are ready — grab your book, start some discussion questions, and share your own.

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The Lie Many Parents Believe

Corey — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 13:25:40 +0000

Let’s face it, being a parent is oftentimes overwhelming. Come to think of it, so is marriage.

The most important people in your life are probably the members of your family, but they are also likely the people who drive you the most crazy.

Don’t worry — if this is true for you, you’re completely normal.

There are two factors that contribute to the pressure and stress of family, particularly parenting:

One is our emotional reactivity,
And the other is a lie that many parents believe.

1. Our emotional reactivity is our own worst enemy.

Families are systems. One person impacts another, and each member feeds off other members within the system.

Look at it this way – have you ever had a time when you were anxious about something, and your kid’s behavior escalated because he or she was feeding off your anxiety? Or your spouse had a bad day, and you can sense it as you enter the house, even before you set eyes on him?

The simple truth is you probably spend a great deal of time trying to control things you cannot possibly control – your child’s reactions, behaviors, choices, and even your spouse. I can’t blame you for trying, really. I’ve done it, too.

There’s a great deal of pressure with parenting today.

We are bombarded with messages about putting family first. Keeping our children safe in a crazy world. Being saddled with the idea that parents are the ones molding the future of our world.

It’s overwhelming.

So rather than spending a great deal of energy on things you can’t control, spend time working on the things you can. This starts, and ends, with you.

Photo by Nina

2. The lie: You are responsible for your child.

Many parents have bought into the idea that it’s our job to get our children to think, believe, feel, and behave like a good person. We are responsible for their life. After all, they are a reflection of ourselves. Right?

Wrong.

Hear me out. They are a member of our family and will act out our family patterns and beliefs; hence the importance of the first point. But ultimately, your child is his or her own separate being.

We are much more responsible TO our children than we are FOR them. Our children have been granted the same power of choice as us. And if you think you can program your child to act, think, and behave a certain way, you’re fooling yourself.

As parents, we do have tremendous influence on our children, but we have more responsibility to them than for them.

And our main responsibility to them? Be consistently cool in the face of ever-present change.

After all, the only thing you have control over is yourself.

Marital application: To apply this idea on another level, read this again and replace the word children with spouse. The same idea applies.

Would you agree? How does your emotional reactivity bite you back relationally? And do you agree that you are not responsible for your child?

Source ScreamFree Parenting by Hal Runkel

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