The Bible tells fathers not to irritate and provoke their children to anger (Ephesians 6). Children are naturally selfish, undisciplined and irrational. They want to play all the time, they don’t want to share, and they rarely act rationally. It seems to me that to be a good parent, given the job of teaching our […]
Do you find it hard to connect with your teens? Is the “teenage angst” just a stage of life with your teen that you have to live with, or is there something you can do about it? My podcast is an interview with teen expert Aurelia Williams. Aurelia is the author of Real Life Guidance […]
“My kids don’t talk to me.” You’d think that since we’ve known our kids all their lives and even live with them every single day of their lives, communication would be natural. But those very factors may work against us. Our children may have had too much of us! All we get is a grunt […]
In the course of the day, with meals to cook, messes to clean up, and homework to do, it seems inappropriate to talk to your children about those deeper issues of life. Yet, as days and months pass, pants get outgrown and the training wheels are off, it seems inappropriate to not have talked to […]
When Facebook.com opened up for anyone to join, several Facebook groups “against parents on Facebook” popped up with hundreds of members. It seems that the college students for whom the site was geared did not want to have their parents on Facebook. Well, I am a parent and I’m on Facebook. I think every parent […]
I have this tendency to jump on my children and lecture them. Yesterday, my daughter came home and says, “I’m tired.” This seemingly innocent remark set me off! “You probably didn’t eat your lunch. You didn’t even drink half of your water bottle. And you stayed up too late last night. You better get your […]
I believe it was Gary Smalley who taught that everyone has an emotional tank. We function at our best when our emotional tank is full. Here’s how it works. When an emotional need is met, our tank gets a “deposit.” It fills up a bit. A hug, an affirming word, a listening ear, laughter, good […]
My mother-in-law often says, “If you treat people well, they will treat you well.” Do we want our kids to obey us, respect us, and be civil to us? Then we have to do our part not to annoy our children. Of course, if I am doing the right thing and my kids don’t like […]
“My kids talk for hours with their friends, but they don’t tell me anything!” Communication problem? Generation gap? The problem is actually an occupational hazard of being a parent. Since day one of our children’s lives, we’ve told our children what to do: put on your shoes, eat your vegetables, pick up your socks, don’t […]
This is our pet bunny Smokey. When we tell her to come, she doesn’t come. When we tell her to jump, she doesn’t jump. But when we dangle a carrot a front of her, she’ll go anywhere the carrot leads! Dale Carnegie tells this story of of Ralph Waldo Emerson: One day, Emerson and his […]
