THE HIGH ROAD TO BETTER BEING

            

     A number of years ago a young boy was found in the jungle.  He had lived with animals.  He had not been taught how to act in the presence of human beings.  So, undisciplined and untaught he continued to live as he had always lived.  Take a tiny baby and as that baby grows teach it no discipline.  Teach it no manners.  Teach it no morals.  Let the little darling do as he or she pleases and that little darling will not grow up to be a little darling.  The Book of Proverbs puts it well, “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.”      

    

     Teach the habit of affection by demonstrating it.  A quick hug.  A note on a pillow that reads, “Thanks for being our son.  Thanks for being our daughter.  A spoken word, “I was so proud of you…I’m proud of the fine young man (or lady)  you’re becoming…I’m proud of you for many reasons and I just had to tell you.”  Little verbal prods for excellence embedded in words of praise. 

     Nor does it hurt to spread the art of admitting mistakes.  “I was wrong.”  Can you say it?  If not, your child probably can’t either.  And a household filled with people who must always be right is a hearthstone filled with chaos. 

           

     Have you taught your child the sweet scent of otherness?  How inclined is the average child to give rather than take?  To share a toy?  Watch another television program to make someone else happy?  Give up something to make another playmate glad?  I still remember one woman who had come to me for counseling.  Forty years later she still remembered being berated by her mother for sharing some cookies with a playmate.  “I made those cookies for you and don’t you forget it!” her mother had screamed.  And she didn’t forget it.  And she grew up to be a very selfish, self-centered me first human being.

           

     The height of arrogance is the lowliness of prejudice.  Even if you are stuck with prejudices because they have been with you too long, don’t use your child as a conduit to a new generation.  If only adults could shut up about their prejudices for a generation maybe prejudices could die. 

           

     Don’t believe your child will automatically be a compassionate and considerate person. Teach them the great shame in being crude and rude. Listen to any group of children playing and eventually one or more will show they’re past masters in the art of insult.  Don’t let your children fall into the trap.  Teach them that if they can’t say something nice to say nothing at all.  Tell them that as Christian’s they are held to a higher level of behavior.  George Washington Carver said it, “How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and tolerant of the weak and the strong because someday you will have been all of these.” 

           

     Some families can’t sit down to a meal without a blessing.  Others can’t do the same without an argument.  It is a great opportunity for family enjoyment and thereby family improvement. There do need to be ground rules such as; no television, the discussing of only pleasant things that have happened during the day and no fried neighbors or business acquaintances.

           

     I remember years ago when one of my girls was into Capezzio shoes. Only Capezzios. For a man not much interested in clothes, I just couldn’t and still can’t, relate. Well, designed items are still in.  Bigger and better and more costly.  Even boys are into this now with Air Jordans, Niki’s, etc.  Therefore, how do I feel about parents subsidizing such snobbery?  I’m agin it!  Tell your children you’ll spring for the price of regular shoes, jeans, etc. and if they want the high priced must-have-it items, they’ll have to make up the difference themselves.  If they want to mow some lawns, give up other things their allowance is buying, be creative or entrepreneurial, fine.  Just let them put their money where their mouth is, or feet, or body.

           

     What all of this is about is not letting your child grow up painting his or her life’s picture with a brush dipped in tattletale gray.  To have them follow the old admonition of Ben Franklin “Would you live with ease?  Then do what you ought, and not what you please.”

(THREE RECENT THOUGHT PIECES ON WYRICK’S WRITING’S “Wisdom is”  “Who Wins if You Do Nothing but Battle Life?”  “A Journey Through Grief”

 

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Quotes from tomorrow’s One A Day blog entitled HOPE

Hope has been called foolish, Pollyanna, unrealistic by some. Actually, it is getting on with life rather than choosing paralysis. It is believing in better tomorrows rather than imagining a terrorist hiding around every corner. It's getting back on planes, and eating out in restaurants instead of supping on paranoia. It is you and I looking for a place to let the best in us come alive.

This story appeared in the Dec. 8, 2001 edition of The Miami Herald. An 11-year old boy was told five months before that he had two to five days to live. His skin was ghostly white. Tubes were everywhere - his body, skin and bone.

He suffered from a rare form of muscular dystrophy. He was asked "Would you like a new toy? A favorite food?" "No," he replied, "but I would like for someone to publish my poems so others can find in them the strength and resolve I've found."

Fast forward to many days beyond