Father Knows Best

  Below’s  a link to a great article I just found on MSN.  It’s a list of things every father should teach his kids and ranges from Teach a Solid Handshake to Calculate a Tip.  For the most part, they’re things a lot of parents take for granted - thinking, ”My kid knows this…”  Probably not.A link at the end of the article asks, “What else should dads teach their kids?” So I juiced my brain with a little caffeine and got the gears humming.  I’m not a father, of course - but I am a mother of three and have watched two very good fathers at work.

• Life isn’t fair.  That’s why everyone says so.  You never hear anyone exclaim, ”Life’s fair!”  Sometimes Good people get sick, innocent people get blamed, bad people get rich, and the guilty go free.  Don’t dwell on it, accept it and move on.
• Trust and respect have to be earned - not demanded.  This one, of course, goes for the parents as much as it does for the kids.  Parents have a way of demanding respect and kids have a way of demanding trust.  These “awards” are like paychecks - you earn them and they’re yours.  But if you don’t earn them, don’t stand there looking for anything but the dis-.  This one leads into the next one…
• Earn what you want from life, don’t ask for it.  Everything in life pretty much has to be worked for….sometimes even fought for.  Parents who hand their kids everything think of it fondly as “spoiling” them.  Since when is “spoiled” a good thing?  If you sit a spoiled apple next to a perfect apple - it’s quickly obvious just how attractive “spoiling” is.
• Manage your anger or it’ll manage your life.  Yelling, sarcasm, tantrums, hitting walls, throwing things, and namecalling are immature and sub-human.  I’ve always tried to teach my girls that in order to be heard, you need to have something worth listening to and you need to say it in a manner that invites your listener to listen.  The only way to do that is to stay in control.  I tell them to listen to their own voice - if it gets realllllly loud or reallllllly shaky….it’s too late - their control is a thing of the past.  People do not listen to, respect, or honor a screamer.  They simply avoid the screaming.  Kids need to be taught to be calm, and granted with the world we live in, that’s may not be a small feat, but it is a big need.

To drive that last point home:  One night recently, I got bold and ventured away from my beloved Food Netword.  I turned on CNN’s Headline News, to see what was going on in the world outside of Emeril’s kitchen.  I found out that the answer can be summed up in a word - ugliness.  About 15 minutes was all I could take, so I switched over to an adorable Discovery Channel story about gorillas. 

Inside of a 30 minute span, I saw animals acting like humans and humans acting like animals.  Without looking at what my hand was doing, my remote control and I ran back to the Food Channel and Rachael Ray’s smiling face.

Here’s the article - The Book of the Dad.

Joi