Past, Present or Future?

I thought of something last week I would like to share.  

The secret to being happy is being grateful.  My divorce was the worst crisis of my life.  I had grown up going to church, but I had gotten disconnected from God.  So, after the divorce, I turned to God and started to read the Bible…..and every page I turned to, talked about "giving thanks".  I was not in a mood to be giving thanks.  I was very sad and could not believe this was happening to me...my family was being broken.  But everywhere I turned to in the Bible, I came to a place where it talked about giving thanks no matter what.  I was angry, I did not want to give thanks and I did not think there was anything to be giving thanks for.

Finally, I gave in and started thinking about what I could give thanks for.  I started giving thanks for very basic things...we were living in my parents' house in one room and so I was grateful we were warm, grateful my boys were healthy, grateful I had formula and diapers for them, etc.  (my brothers and sister gave me me money for gas, formula and diapers for like 8 months - looking back, it was probably a good thing I didn't have a job because I've always thought that if I did have one, I would have gotten fired because I was in no condition to be working)  Anyway, what I discovered.....was that I could not be depressed while giving thanks. Later,  I remember people wondering how I was handling it so well...I just started looking for things to be grateful for...anything and everything, nothing was too small.  

Well this last week, I was reading something about the fact that our brain cannot be in the present and the past at the same time or in the present and the future at the same time.  If it is in the present, it's in the present, if it's in the past, it's in the past and if it’s in the future, imagining some wonderful vacation, it’s in the future.  It occurred to me that when we say we are grateful, it is in the present tense or when we say “I am grateful for this”.....”I am grateful for that”....same thing.

So....that explains why we can't be depressed at the same time that we're giving thanks!!!!  Isn't that cool?!!!!  I LOVE THAT.

So what does this have to do with parenting?  When I went to college, I met a lot of kids who came from families who had money and I noticed that some were nice and some were not...I came to the conclusion that the nice ones were grateful for what they had and didn't take it for granted....so I decided that I could spoil my boys as long as I taught them to be grateful....and thank God, they are VERY grateful.

Matthew sets a PR - 5:24!! Go Matthew Go!

These last two weeks I been sharing my “affirmations” with my sons and one of them is “I am not afraid”. (It’s basically a list of goals that you want for yourself – how do you want to be?   Kind of like your personal mission statement.)


This morning while Matthew was sitting at the kitchen table eating his breakfast he said “that phrase keeps coming to my mind”.

Then he said, “Do you think God is ever afraid?” I said, “hmmm….I can’t think of a situation….”. He went on with, “well as Christians, I think we’re afraid of gays or people who use drugs or alcohol cuz parents don’t want their kids to get involved with those things…..although people seem more incensed with gays than with drinking…I’m just saying we shouldn’t be afraid”.

He went on to say,”it helps even with little things …..like Vanessa (his girlfriend) is really into pet names especially lately and it occurred to me that I don’t need to be afraid, that’s just who she is…we can’t change people…..me… I wouldn’t use pet names with anyone until they were like my fiancé.”

He went on to say that one reason he did not want to go to the prom was that he knew kids did things he didn’t and he was afraid he would feel uncomfortable. He went on to say, he shouldn’t be afraid, that he knows who he is and what he does and what he doesn’t do and that he shouldn’t be afraid.

Matthew is so right. Right now I’m thinking how could God be afraid? God is love and there is no fear in love.

Three things….as a parent, I’m thinking, “but isn’t there a difference between going because “I am not afraid” vs. not going somewhere because it’s just the wise thing to do, why play with fire? Yes, there is….but at this point in our lives, Matthew turns 18 next week!), I would say building confidence and/or learning to trust himself in different situations is more important.

Second, being afraid that your kids might use drugs or become gay because they have a gay friend is not productive nor does it help in any way shape or form. Especially since fear causes anger.  Anger causes hate, which leads to doing mean things. And mean things do not make you or your family attractive….and since the opposite of “attract” is “repel”, you would in effect be repelling your kids from yourself/family. If you are a Christian your behavior will seem especially incongruent with what you say and kids see right through us, so get your story straight.  

Thirdly, I would go as far as saying that fear is the underling cause of most disease.  It will undermine your life and your health.  Again, fear causes anger.  Anger causes hate.  Hate will consume you with continual suffering. 

Focus instead on making what you have so much more attractive that they won’t feel the need or want to go and experiment.

SHARING IS CARING

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