"Do you want instant peace and joy in your life today? Here is what you do: Watch a child play…"
I love quotes, I love inspirational quotes and I stole this inspirational quote from this self help website (have to give credit where credit is due!)
Although the advice is inspirational and thought provoking - it's often harder to do something that sounds so simple. Life and day to day stresses tangle us up and we forget the basic premise of stopping to smell the roses. Even as I sit here, dilegently 'working' to provide information and content for my website, The Girl is playing quietly beside me. I know that I could stop and smell the roses now but my mind is telling me "right after I'm done this" but why not this after I'm done smelling the roses? How did my priorities become skewed?
Don't get me wrong, it's not all like that all the time - last night for instance I was thorougly enjoying watching the Dervish and The Girl play tag on the deck - there was a little shrieking and gentle screaming but for the most part they were having a wonderful time and it made me smile.
Partially it was just because it's such a rare opportunity to see these two intense children play together and have fun and not fight for such a good chunk of time but a lot of it was just the sheer pleasure of watching 2 little kids laughing and running and feeling joy. (I even forgot about their intensity for a while) It rubs off on you if you let it!
As I mentioned in an earlier blog, one of our goals for 'now' is to spend more time in "family time". This is all part of the smelling of the roses but isn't it a shame that we get to the point of having to plan it?
"Do you want instant
peace and joy in your life today?
Here is what you do:
Watch a child play…"
I'm going to print this out about 20 times and put it on every wall!
One of the other goals we set was to re-establish a routine in an attempt to gain some control in our lives - less chaos = happier family. I found another tidbit of good information on the same self help site - it was an item about teaching your children to set goals.
Admittedly, I could stand to teach myself how to set goals and it looks like I'll be printing that one out too... we can all learn together - FAMILY TIME!
Comments
Tue, 01.02.2011 15:28
In regards to the sentiment that teachers are in the lower 25% of college graduates, being an educator makes me a member [...]
Tue, 03.08.2010 08:59
Thank you, we're not alone! My daughter will be 5 soon and she's crying ALL THE TIME at school. The teachers are [...]
Thu, 29.04.2010 08:12
THANK YOU! My son is 5 and has been a pretty emotional child. My father-in-law passed away about a year and half ago and [...]
Thu, 11.03.2010 14:08
EVERYONE PLEASE LISTEN. Now that I have your attention. My 2nd grader is currently being bullied by his teacher. [...]
Wed, 17.02.2010 09:05
I know you posted this forever ago, but if you're still out there I would love to here how things turned out, if the [...]
Wed, 10.02.2010 18:47
if teachers were paid an appropriate salary for the level of education and effort required, you could get rid of these [...]
Wed, 16.12.2009 07:53
I have a 7 yr old step daughter that comes from a mother who has alot a mental health issues, tho my daughter seems to [...]
Tue, 27.10.2009 10:48
Child Behavior Modification is so tough. There are moments that yelling at them is not enough. Tantrums in toddlers [...]
Thu, 17.09.2009 16:26
I appreciate your sharing of this situation and applaud your directness with the principle that your goal is to remove [...]
Sat, 29.08.2009 17:03
Hi there, I am totally with you with the no spanking. I was telling my mum the other day about my 2.4yr old son hitting [...]
Mon, 06.04.2009 20:06
My seven year old son cries alot. I can completly relate with the parent. It is something you worry about when [...]
Tue, 24.02.2009 16:31
This is great stuff! My husband and I were wondering what was happenig to our son who just turned 7. He was very tough [...]
Sat, 03.01.2009 23:49
Thanks for the article, It was important to hear the part about not bottling up emotions otherwise later in life, that [...]
Wed, 24.12.2008 00:11
my two year old daughter cries all the time and i don't know what is wrong.she gets up at night and scamming and then [...]
Wed, 12.11.2008 21:10
I did this one time, my kids had slept over at a friend's house and were up 'til all hours and super crabby the next [...]