Tag Archive for priorities

Communication in the Microwave?

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We live in a fast-paced world. We use “fast acting pain relief,” complain about a slow internet, and microwave our food. On the other hand, healthy marriages do not happen quickly. You can’t throw your marriage into a microwave for 30 seconds and have a healthy, fully developed marriage pop out. No. Healthy marriages require time. They are built on intimate communication, and intimate communication is a “slow cooker activity.” Intimate communication demands more than the “140 characters allowed.” It requires “unlimited characters.” You just can’t microwave (or text) good communication. Good communication needs time to simmer. It needs time for all the ingredients to mix and grow into a more nuanced understanding.

In other words, if you want a healthy, life-long marriage you need to intentionally and proactively communicate on a regular basis. Set aside at least 30-60 minutes every day to converse with your spouse, to talk openly and honestly. You may think that sounds like a long time to fit into your already busy schedule. If so, you may need to consider what priority your marriage holds in your life. Is your marriage more important than the 30-minute sitcom you watch? Or the 30 minutes you spend on social media? Consider how you might adjust your schedule and activities to truly reflect the value your marriage holds in your life.

You may also wonder what you will talk about for a full 30-60 minutes a day. Start by pouring yourself and your spouse a cup of tea or coffee. Then, pull up a chair and consider some of the following topics.

  • Recall how you met as a couple? What attracted you to one another? Reminisce about your first date, your first kiss, and your overall time dating one another.
  • What’s going on at work? What are the best and the worst things happening at work?
  • Your best childhood memories. Your worst childhood memories.
  • Your dream vacation as a couple and as a family?
  • What would you like to do as a couple the first day all your children are in school or when they all begin college?
  • Reminisce about the best trip/vacation you’ve had as a family or as a couple.
  • Talk about the news and your personal thoughts and feelings related to a particular news item. Consider ways you might respond as a couple to the struggles brought to light in the news.
  • Share things you have been reading or learning about on your own.
  • Talk about your spouse’s hobby and what about that hobby excites them.

Really the possibilities are limitless. Allow your curiosity to lead you into the journey of knowing your spouse. Take your time, let the conversation “cook slowly,” and feast on the love that grows.

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Protect Your Children from the Dangers of Loneliness

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Chronic loneliness is a killer. In fact, loneliness is as harmful to our health as smoking or a poor diet. Loneliness can also contribute to depression. We do everything we can to protect our children from the dangers of smoking or a poor diet. Why not do what we can to protect them from the dangers of a growing sense of loneliness. We can do that by helping them develop a sense of purpose in their lives. Encouraging them to nurture a healthy social group can help. But, a sense of purpose offers additional protection against loneliness, even beyond what their social interaction can contribute.  How can we help our children find a sense of purpose that will protect them from the dangers of loneliness over their lifetime?

  • Recognize their strengths and talents. Take time to appreciate your children’s abilities and interests. Provide them with opportunities to engage in activities that nurture their abilities and interests. Listen to what others—their teachers, peers, other parents, youth workers, coaches—value about them. Such outside parties can help you see areas of strength that you simply thought of as typical. Identify what your children care about and value. What activities seem to make them “light up”?  What passions seem to drive them and command their attention? This can range from music, theatre, or sports to environmental issues, social issues, or even politics. Once again, nurture those passions with learning opportunities, readings, or activities.
  • Read with your children. Reading provides an opportunity to explore the values of others and how their sense of purpose flows from their values. This exploration can lead to a clarification of purpose and inspiration of purpose. Reading can also nurture a sense of purpose. For instance, reading the biography of people we admire or with whom we share a similar passion, can nurture a sense of purpose. 
  • Turn hurts into healing. Sometimes a painful experience, or empathically witnessing another person’s painful experience, can reveal your child’s passion or even contribute to them developing a specific sense of purpose. 
  • Cultivate awe and gratitude. Both awe and gratitude help us discover our sense of purpose. They point us to our sense of purpose by revealing “something greater than ourselves” and inspiring us to grow beyond our small, self-focused world.
  • Build community with other people who have a similar sense of purpose. Relationships do help us decrease loneliness. However, communities built around a sense of purpose can give added protection from loneliness. You can build such a community around a common interest, volunteer efforts, sports, youth groups, etc.

Not only will helping your child develop a sense of purpose protect them from loneliness, but it will add meaning and joy to their lives as well. And, as a parent, isn’t that what we all want?

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Are You Kind or Image Conscious?

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Imagine you were faced with a choice, a seemingly innocuous choice. For instance, you could watch a movie you’ve been dying to see or go to the fifth game of the fifteen-game series your child will play in this season. Or you could go home for dinner with your spouse or to an after-work social with coworkers at your favorite restaurant.  These examples seem like small, common place choices, don’t they? Let’s add a small caveat to make it more interesting. A wizard or “fairy godmother” shows up. (I know they don’t exist. But stay with me for a moment.) The wizard can tell you exactly how your child or spouse will feel and respond based on your decision in this moment. Do you want to know? Or do you remain in the dark? The choice is yours…and that’s the real choice of this scenario.

Interestingly, in a meta-analysis of 22 studies, 40% of participants chose to remain ignorant of how their choice would impact other people in their lives. And compared to those who were simply told the consequence (with no choice to refuse the information), those who chose to learn the consequences were significantly more likely to show generosity or kindness.

Why would someone intentionally avoid learning the impact of their choices or actions on other people? Why would someone choose “willful ignorance”?  This meta-analysis revealed a disturbing and rather convicting reason. Some people might avoid learning the consequences of their choices so they can maintain a view of themselves as kind while still engaging in what “I want to do,” AKA—selfish behavior. You’ve heard some version of that rational before, I’m sure. Maybe even used it yourself. Sadly, I have. You know, the “I would have come home for dinner, but I didn’t know it mattered so much to you.” “I would have cleaned up the cat’s hairball, but I didn’t see it.”  We tell ourselves we are kind and missed the opportunity to act in kindness because we “just didn’t know” when, in fact, we chose not to know.  By willfully choosing to not know the consequences of our behavior or the need at hand, we believe we have established “deniable culpability” for our lack of kindness. In other words, our willful ignorance becomes a cover for our selfishness.

On the other hand, the psalmist tells us that those who “speak the truth in their hearts” can abide with a loving God (Ps 15:1-2). Perhaps those who “speak the truth in their hearts” are also more likely to abide in a loving family. After all, when we “speak the truth in our hearts” we aren’t going to willfully choose to remain ignorant of our family’s needs nor are we going to willfully choose to ignore needs under the guise of “not knowing.”

Even more to the point, Paul tells those in Corinth that “love…does not seek its own,” it is not selfish. When we choose to remain unaware of how our choices and actions impact our family, we become selfish. We have “sought our own.”  Love “does not seek its own,” not even through willful ignorance. Love is kind. Kindness takes the time to intentionally consider how our choices and actions will impact those we love. Based on that knowledge, kindness compels us to mindfully act in a manner that will prove most beneficial to the ones we love. No hiding the truth so we can do what we want under the guise of not knowing. Just intentionally seeking truth so we can lovingly act in kindness… because love is kind. Will you act in kindness? Or will you join the 40% who choose “willful ignorance”?

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The Threat to Our Families of Divided Times

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We live in divided times. Division rears its ugly head in so many areas of our communities and our world. These divisions have driven us into more disparate and polarized “tribes.” Sadly, they have also infiltrated our families. Division has reared its ugly head in the family to divide parents from children, spouses from spouses, siblings from siblings. You’ve seen it, perhaps even experienced it, in one of these three ways.

  • Families have become divided in response to busy-ness.  Children rush from activity to activity. Parents work extra hours. Churches and community organizations demand time of individual family members. When at home, each person is so exhausted they hide in their own room, watch their own TV, play their own game, eat their own meal. Each family member ends up living in their own world, caught up in their own activities and agenda, separate from the family…divided.
  • Families have become divided in response to the political and cultural environment. The ugly divisive nature of our world does not allow for differences of opinion or time for growth in understanding. So, families have become divided rather than supportive, polarized rather than curious about one another’s thoughts and ideas. They argue and fight rather than seek out the truth together. They become embittered, leaving no room for agreeing to disagree on matters in which there can be multiple opinions. They have shunned family members who disagree or sat on the other side of the “elephant in the room,” hiding behind unspoken resentment. In other words, divided.  
  • Families have become divided in the pursuit of materialism and extravagance. Materialism and extravagance demand more finances which may demand more hours away from home working to earn the money to “pursue the dream” house, perfect vacation, best car, or…. Unfortunately, family members become distant as they each pursue their own material desires. It reminds me of the scene in RV in which each family member sits in the RV wrapped up in their own music on their own headset, yelling the words to the song they hear to the neglect of everyone else…divided.

This is not the original intent of family…no is it what we want for our families. We want connection. If our children cannot learn to connect within our families, how will we learn to connect within the broader world? Connection brings a sense of security and joy to the lives of our children and our spouse. Connection teaches us to love. Connection gives us the confidence to explore and grow. Connection is perhaps our greatest desire and need. With that in mind, let me suggest six simple ways of combatting the polarizing division of today’s world and bring connection to your family.

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Excellent Parenting Begins…

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We all want to be excellent parents… and that it is no simple task. Still, as difficult as it is, I do know where to begin. Excellent parenting begins with self-awareness. That’s right. Excellent parents practice self-awareness. They have learned that raising a child demands that we, as parents, take a deeply honest look at ourselves. What does this self-awareness, this deeply honest look at oneself, consist of for a parent? Let’s consider a couple of questions to get us started:

  • First, we need to take an honest look at our feelings about our own childhood. What was it like for you as a child and as a teen? Were you shy or extroverted? Did you enjoy sports? art? academics? What were your happiest memories? Your least happy memories? Times are different today, but it still helps us to parent more effectively when we recall what it was like to be a child or teen.
  • Second, we need to take an honest look at how we were parented as a child or teen. How did your parents parent you? Every parent makes mistakes, our parents and ourselves included. So, take an honest, nonjudgmental look at your childhood and recall those things your parents did that you now see as helpful. Also, consider those things your parents did that you now see as not helpful. Take time to determine the positive practices you can learn from your parents and what you will do instead of the practices you found unhelpful.
  • Third, take an honest look at your expectations in regard to your children. Our expectations have a huge impact on our ability to parent well. What are your expectations for your children? Are they reasonable and age appropriate? For instance, we cannot reasonably expect a toddler to sit quietly in a restaurant for half an hour before eating.  In a similar manner, we don’t want to discipline our toddler in the same way we might discipline a teen. Assuring our expectations remain reasonable and age appropriate may require some self-education. Take time to learn about children’s physical, emotional, and mental development.
  • Fourth, take an honest look at your self-expectations in regard to parenting. There are many parenting myths out there that will sabotage your efforts at parenting. Make sure you don’t fall prey to those myths. Consider: what are your expectations in regard to time spent with children? How easily your children will listen? How your children’s behavior reflects on you or does not reflect on you? Your life after your children leave home? Take an honest look at any expectations you hold for yourself and your spouse as parents.
  • Fifth, take an honest look at your priorities and goals. Parenting is a journey and any successful journey demands that we know where we are going. The perceived end of our journey shapes the priorities along the way. Do you want to raise adults focused on “winning” and achieving at any cost or adults focused on “doing their best” and displaying good sportsmanship? Do you want your children to believe achievement or kindness is most important? Do you want to promote “taking care of yourself” or helping others? You get the idea. What priorities will shape your efforts to raise your children? Your answers will shape your behavior and your parenting style.
  • Finally, take an honest look at your fears. Do fears drive your family? If so, what fears are aroused in your efforts to raise healthy children? Watching our children and teens venture into the world can arouse many fears. We need to acknowledge those fears honestly. Recognizing and acknowledging our fears will help us to not overreact to them. Instead, we can plan and prepare for whatever transitions, times, or activities arouse our fears. As we address our fears in a healthy way, our parenting can be led by love instead of fear.

Taking an honest look at these six factors will set you on the road to parenting with self-awareness. It may prove challenging, but the long-term returns of healthy children and a healthy relationship with your children are well worth the investment.

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Thanksgiving Dinner? What’s the Big Deal?

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Norman Rockwell captured the iconic moment of Thanksgiving Dinner in The Thanksgiving Picture. But really, what’s the big deal about a family dinner? Who cares about family dinners anyway?

Family dinner is about so much more than simply sitting at a common table to eat food. We learn important lessons at the family dinner. It is during family dinner that we learn we belong. As we pass the potatoes and negotiate who gets the turkey leg, we learn that life is shared. We are not alone; and we have to think about the “other guy” and his welfare, not just ourselves. We have to listen to learn what others have to say, to learn about their wants and desires. And we learn to leave enough of the “good stuff” for everyone to get some.

At the family dinner table, we also learn that we have something to say, and that others will listen to us. We have needs and desires to express and others will not only hear us tell of those needs and desires but will graciously adjust their behavior to satisfy our needs and desires.

We also learn that manners and civility are important while sitting around the dinner table. We learn that respect leads to greater generosity and that moderation is important to fairness.  And what better place to practice respect, generosity, moderation, and fairness than at the dinner table.

Why have Thanksgiving Dinner? Because our families and our children need to learn these important lessons of belonging, listening, sharing, respect, generosity, moderation, and fairness. Our communities are crying out for these virtues. Why celebrate with a Thanksgiving Dinner? Because changing the world starts with how we share Thanksgiving Dinner with our friends and family. (For more, read Everything I Needed to Know I Learned at Dinner.)

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Tame This Natural Bias Before It Destroys Your Parenting

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Sometimes we are our own worst enemy… even when it comes to innate abilities that protect us. For instance, we tend to pay attention to and learn from negative or threatening stimuli more than we do from positive or lovely stimuli. Psychologists call this our “negative bias” and note how it protects us. For instance, it’s more important to attend to the rattlesnake in the flower garden than your lovely daisies when you’re pulling weeds. The car speeding toward the crosswalk where you stand with your child elicits a more immediate and stronger reaction than the cute elderly couple walking their dog on the sidewalk.

In such instances, the “negative bias” is natural and protective. But it can destroy effective parenting when it dominates our parental radar. A parent’s “out-of-control negative bias” can lead to excessive criticism, overprotectiveness, and undue correction in our attempt to protect our children from every danger and mistake out there. In response, our children become discouraged and defeated by the constant negative focus.

Effective parents learn to tame the “beast of negative bias” by focusing on strengths as well as dangers. They focus on their children’s positive character, acknowledging and nurturing it every chance they get. “I appreciate the kindness you showed when….”  “You showed a lot of patience when you….”  “It was very courageous of you to….” When we notice and label specific actions and responses that flow out of our children’s strengths, we begin to develop our own trust in their ability (as well as their positive self-concept). This trust can help tame our “negative bias,” which leads to the next way of taming “negative bias.”

Effective parents also tame the “beast of negative bias” by learning to trust their children. We learn to trust our children’s abilities to take care of themselves by carefully observing them rather than constantly warning them. We learn to trust our children by allowing them to manage the consequences of their mistakes and so learn from those consequences rather than jumping in to save them. We learn to trust our children by allowing them to take risks and observing how they manage those risks, remaining present to help them if they request our help. (Read Do You Rob Your Teen of Victory for more.) Ironically, most parents are often amazed at how well their children manage a risk independently and the amazing way they learn from those consequences. Sometimes it’s hard to not intervene but doing nothing can prove the best course of action at times.

Effective parents tame the “beast of negative bias” by nurturing their children’s talents, providing them opportunities to gain experience. Whether their talent lies in athletics, music, acting, writing, landscaping, mechanics, or…well, the list goes on. Whatever their talent, providing them opportunities to grow in their knowledge and skills related to that talent helps us, as parents, see them in new light. It helps us see them mature and realize their growing competence and independence.

Effective parents tame the “beast of negative bias” and enjoy practicing a positive bias as they watch their children grow and mature. You and your child will be glad you took the time to tame the “beast of negative bias.”

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New Year’s Resolutions to Strengthen Your Family

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The time has arrived to reflect on the year gone by and our hopes for the coming year. If you’re like me, you might decide upon some goals for the coming year. This year, I would like to suggest 12 goals that, though challenging, will strengthen your family and fill your life with greater joy. You can pick one or pick them all. The most important aspect of choosing is to enjoy the reward of a more intimate family.

  • Resolve to listen intently and deeply to your spouse and children.
  • Resolve to go on a date night with your spouse at least one time a month. (You don’t even have to leave the house for these date nights.)
  • Resolve to set aside 20 minutes a day to talk with your spouse about your lives and the life of your family—not the controversial things of politics or the drudgery of daily “to-do’s” and planning, but of your hopes and dreams, things you’d like to do together, or fun things that happened during the day.
  • Resolve to tell your spouse and each child “thank you” at least one time a day.
  • Resolve to play, laugh, and smile every day with your family.
  • Resolve to write each child and your spouse a letter of gratitude and appreciation this year.
  • Resolve to read a marriage or parenting book with your spouse and put the ideas into practice.
  • Resolve to attend a marriage workshop.
  • Resolve to learn the stats for your children and your spouse.
  • Resolve to learn about a topic or activity that interests your spouse or one of your children so you can discover ways to support them in their passions.
  • Resolve to look for daily opportunities to serve your spouse and children. This could be as simple as getting them a glass of water when they’re thirsty or something as complex as completing a chore they normally do.
  • Resolve to say “no” more often to things of lesser importance (surfing the web, video games, a TV show) so you can prioritize spending time conversing with your family or engaging in activities with your family.
  • Pick a hobby or activity that your child enjoys and engage in that activity with your child at least one time a week.

That’s actually a “baker’s dozen” resolutions from which you can choose. Each one will strengthen your marriage and/or your family. Pick one. Pick two. Pick them all. Whichever you choose, resolve to strengthen your family this year.

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In Our Families, Keep It Close Enough for Jazz

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I enjoy jazz. I love listening to musicians as they share the stage and play together. In seemingly magical ways, they interact with one another through the music and share in the fun with everyone present. They seem connected, like they can read each other’s mind. They anticipate the next move, the next chord, the next phrase. They are in sync…perfectly attuned to one another.

These musicians teach our families an important lesson. They teach us how to “get in sync” with one another, attuned to the subtle nuances of each other’s communications. When we do “get in sync,” we will resolve discord more easily and find greater harmony more quickly. Plus, when mistakes or conflicts arise, we will back one another up and reestablish the harmony of the home more quickly. How can you get in sync with your family? Follow the example of jazz.

  • Develop mutual goals and priorities. Healthy families established priorities they can all support. Like the over-arching structure, theme, and direction of a piece of music, these priorities represent something bigger than any one person within the family. Long-term goals of vacations are a simple example of this. Other overarching themes are more complex, like becoming a family known for engaging in kindness or for being actively involved in their community. Having these overarching themes and structures will allow your family to get in sync by working together with “their ear to the overarching direction” of your family life.
  • Learn one another’s nonverbal cues. Yes, verbal communication is important. But nonverbal communication is essential for attunement. Paying close attention to nonverbal cues gives you a wealth of information that will help you resolve discordant issues among family members and more effectively work to create interesting harmonies. “Listening” to the nonverbal communications of facial expression, eye signals, and even body movements allows you to make small adjustments to your behavior that will decrease misunderstandings and increase effective interactions, strengthening the theme of a strong, healthy family in your home.
  • Balance one another’s strengths and weaknesses. We all have strengths and weaknesses. The most effective couples and families are more aware of one another’s strengths and weaknesses. They step up and support one another in their strengths. They humbly ask for help in areas of weakness. They learn when to step back and allow another to take the lead as well as the appropriate time to step up and utilize their strengths to enhance the beauty of the family interaction.
  • Practice a give and take. Listening to jazz groups you will notice different players taking the spotlight at different times When one player begins an improvisational solo, the other players play more quietly and support the solo. They follow he soloist’s lead. In families, there is a time and place for each family member to take the lead. The other family members can gather around them and support them in the “solo.” If anything goes awry, the rest of the family can quickly jump in to help them out, lift them up, and get them “back on track” while making it all sound so easy and good.

Four hints we can take from jazz as we strive to make our families “close enough for jazz.” Of course, we will never be perfect. But those imperfections allow us to grow, learn to better tune to one another, and maybe even make some new, interesting harmonies. After all, we don’t have to be perfect…just “good enough for jazz.”

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What Values Do You Prioritize in Your Family?

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The conflict and chaos in the world today have brought priorities and values into the limelight. Whether you agree with the values and priorities portrayed by various groups and leaders or not, we are all forced to stop and reflect. What priorities do I want to pass on to my children? What values do I want them to learn? How do I model those priorities and values in my daily life? And how do I teach them to my children? Those are tough questions that require reflection and thought. Let me share some of the priorities and values I deem important for family. Wait…on second thought, my daughters are young adults now. Let me ask them what priorities and values they learned from my wife and me. Perhaps their answers will shed light on our practical values rather than my “philosophical ideals.” So, I asked them, “What priorities and values did you learn from us?” Their response?

Of course, this is not an exhaustive list. What priorities and values would you add to the list? What priorities and values do you want your children to learn from you? How do you model them for your children to see?

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