Wednesday, October 17, 2012

OK, so what now?

I had it all laid out, the day all planned.  I even wrote the list in a pretty pen color and used my best handwriting.  But then we all woke up and within the first ten minutes reality just laughed in my face and here we are.  What do I do?  We have already had one angry, one in tears and one in complete meltdown mode...TWICE and it is not even eight am.  What do I do to turn the day around? 

Well here is what I am going to do.  First of all we all sat down around the breakfast table and had a heart to heart.  You know one of those talks that says "your feelings are ok, it is ok to feel angry, sad, etc;" BUT "how you handle that is what we need to focus on."  I do not agree (personally) with telling your kid this is how you should feel about a, b, or c (like we should not get angry about that because it doesn't matter etc;).  Because they are unique, they have their own feelings and perceptions and see things WAY differently than I did as a kid or their sibling does or the kid across the street might.  And even if I, with the maturity that I have gained with thirty plus years of living see the big picture, sometimes gaining the trust of their heart is worth just listening as they pour their heart out.  Because in a few years when they are teenagers, I want them to be able to come to me and not worry that I will ridicule or criticize or try to control their feelings over a matter.  With that said, I do give try to teach them how they need to handle their anger, their sadness, their joy etc; so that it does not spill over onto those around them.  Because they might be OVER THE MOON excited and happy but running into Daddy's work in the middle of the workday screeching their joy at the top of their lungs would not be appropriate.  And we do hand out consequences for when they mess up in how they handle their feelings, but never for the feelings themselves. 

So now that the hugs have been given, the tears have dried and we have talked about what is ok and what is not, we shake it off.  I light a pretty smelling candle, we put on some praise music, we sing along and we forgive and we move on.  We pick up where we are on the schedule and pray and release the rest of the day into His hands.  Because even if it is written in pretty ink, sometimes there are bigger lessons to be learned than we anticipated.

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