Being Present With Our Children
How much of your time with your children is spent worrying about other obligations?
When we are getting our children ready for school in the morning, but also fretting about work, or imagining how a meeting will proceed, or planning the next event, we are not being present with our children.
The same is true when we email from our smart phones during sporting events or rush through dinner in order to make a conference call—we get things done for our children, but we are not really being with them.
About ten years ago, I heard a speech from a powerful lawyer whose kids had grown up. He said, “when I look back now, there wasn’t a single phone call that couldn’t wait another 30 minutes to an hour for me to attend to, rather than skipping reading bedtime stories to my children.”
Attending to other thoughts, obligations and stresses when we are with our children is often a choice we make unconsciously. We think the phone call is important, or that the email can’t wait, but in the bigger scheme of things, we must say to ourselves, “This is the time I spend with my family and children. What is so important that I should compromise this time?”
What can you do to be more present with your children? What would change if you were more present with your children?
-Gonan Premfors
Co-Founder, Parentology
Image available under CC License by futurestreet
Related posts:
- Amelia’s Trip
- When Children Say Something, But Mean Another
- It’s time to trust our children
- When Kids Grow Up
- Sacrificing Ourselves for Our Children
Category: Reflections, Skills