Last week my husband and I had a chance to have a sleep over at our senior pastor’s house. The few hours we were there left a lasting impression on us. During dinner, we all sat at the dining table and shared a meal together. After the sumptuous meal, the whole family including the house help gathered at the sitting room for devotion time.
“Yes we have done this for the last 20 years. It is one of the rituals we do every day as a family,” the pastor shared with my husband and I after the rest of the children went to sleep.
From our evening with our spiritual mentors, we learnt some little things that we take for granted yet they shape our children’s world view and determines how they turn out in future.
1. Family routines: Little things like reading for the children a bedtime story or tucking them in bed go a long way in shaping them into sober, well rounded adults. My husband and I have made a deliberate effort every day to have story time for kids just before they sleep.
The routine is so engrained in the children, when my husband and I are running late, the house girl has to read the girl a story otherwise she will not go to bed.
Much as children love spontaneity, they also enjoy some predictable routine. My daughter looks forward to her bedtime stories and it is the highlight of her day. I know families that bake together every weekend and the whole thing is a big family affair where everybody, including the children, is given a role. The children love and look forward to it every weekend.
2. Celebration and affirmation: The world is a cold and harsh place for raising children. What the world does is to mess your children’s self-esteem with negative comments and vile words, so it is up to you to build their confidence with words of affirmation.
Yes when they do wrong, discipline them, but that does not mean there is no room for affirming them. In our parenting role, we also ought to celebrate and affirm our children to build their confidence.
While the world will tell them ‘no you can’t,’ it is your responsibility to always remind them, “yes you can.”
3. The way you treat your spouse: They say monkey see monkey do. The way your children see you and your spouse relating is most probably how they will conduct themselves once they grow up and start dating.
How they see you behaving is what will shape their future engagement with the opposite sex. One thing I noticed about the pastor is his chivalry. He would open the car door for his wife, pull the chair at the dinner table and he assured us, he has done it for the decades they have been married.
If your kids see you treating each other with love and respect, it will shape their future relationships.
The writer is a married working mother of a toddler boy and a pre-school girl. She shares her experience of juggling between career, family and social life.