“Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” - Mathew 7:7-8 The door to your child’s spirit is seemingly closed. Their behavior is not in alignment with your wishes. Their tone in dialogue with you is conflicted and bordering on disrespectful. Is [...]
“Ok, bud. Get on the chair and we’ll play a game that will show you something that is really, really important to Mommy and Daddy. It’s called Trust. Climb up there and I’ll show you.” Each of our 3 kids went through this exercise at around 4 or 5 years old. The barstool stands 3 feet off the ground, so the height is very intimidating. “Ok, put your hands by your sides and close your [...]
Communication is when the thoughts, ideas, and emotions within a person are effectively re-created in understanding within another person. Perfect communication would be a 1:1 event which rarely occurs, particularly in exchanges with children. Using words, for example, a parent would ask a child “Bring me the small red ball” out of numerous colored balls of differing sizes. And if the child sorted through and picked out the small red ball and brought it to [...]
In the first segment of Dodging Tragedy – Thoughts on How to Avoid Self Harm, we discussed factors that played a role in our son feeling isolated and depressed. However, the deeper contributing factor were well entrenched feelings of shame that ultimately manifested in the question of ‘to be or not to be’. Time alone for a person that has yet to develop self-control or gain understanding on the ways of being human can be [...]
When our youngest son was in high school, he contemplated suicide. The length and seriousness of those thoughts aren’t definable, but that he had them in our family is not just a statistic to us. We didn’t know that he felt isolated and depressed, we only heard it in an offhanded way many years later. We asked his permission to write about this topic as a gift and a warning to you. If you’ve read [...]
In our Encouraging Courage (Girls) Letter was a neat little message that had clear edges and the takeaways fit the title where we came away looking like competent parents. But life isn’t always so cut and dried. Encouraging the heart can often be vague platitudes that miss the mark and confound parents and frustrate children. That was the case when dealing with our son Kevin whose sweet spirit was occasionally a puzzle to us. Dave’s [...]
These Letters are intended to provide you with whatever insights we have gained over the last 30 years of parenting and marriage. Our perspectives are not comprehensive, just intending to spark thought on how to take your parenting and marriage to the next level of effectiveness. There is so much to say to you which we hope is instructive and encouraging, perspectives we wish we had ‘back in the day’. We had to figure it [...]
In the last 2 installments of Dad the Spiritual Leader, we attempted to introduce the notion that spiritual leadership isn’t just adherence to traditional notions of going to church, reading the Bible, and leading the family in prayer. Rather, an engaged Dad should get major credit for living out Biblical principles when fully engaging with each member of the family and taking on the responsibility of his role. The last bit of part 2 left [...]
Another basketball story. The two brothers, ages 11 and 9, are close. They homeschool together, live well south of the Metro area in rural Colorado. But like brothers, they occasionally compete and tussle, make up and have fun. These two are probably best friends now and will remain so the rest of their lives. But that isn’t a foregone conclusion. Their competition and jealousies could expand and get out of hand; their hard feelings remain [...]
In talking with a dad of two boys, ages 9 and 7, he proudly told me the story of how his boys overcame adversity this past weekend. He had volunteered to be their basketball coach and, as such, was faced with corralling boys and girls into some sort of team, teach them some skills, and identify various positive qualities within each of them over the course of the season. It’s not about winning. The season [...]