Today I was on my way to a friend's birthday party. She lives about 20 km out of town. My girls was in the car singing and laughing. I was listening to them and realize how fun life seemed to them. They approach every day with smiles, kisses, laughter and excitement. They enjoy every moment of it.
I't made me think. When did we loose our childhood spirit? When did life get so serious for us?
All the responsibilities that we as parents face is not taken lightly. No one prepared us for this. But one thing is for sure that we need to laugh more and even be like a child sometimes. When last did you do something silly? When last did you laugh so much your face hurt?
We get so occupied in our work that we loose the joy of life. We loose the ability to enjoy the nature, the sun shining every day and even the time to just enjoy what we love the most.
Every year we all have new years resolutions, that only lasts for maybe a week or maybe a month. My new years resolution is to enjoy life, to see the small things that I sometimes miss.
I want to share something with you that made me want to start this year different.
Me and my husband have a congregation here were we live. It means that to sustain a good health and also to be spiritually full we read a lot. This December holiday I stated reading a book on how to live a let go life. It sounds a little weird but it made me want to be so much more than just a co-worker, wife, mom and just a friend. I don't know about you but I want to laugh so hard that people hear me rooms away. If I look at my children they don't care what people say or think, if they want to do something out of the ordinary, they do it.
The older we get people's opinions matter to us. It matters more than our own opinions. This book taught me a few things:
We want our children to life stress free - but we stress...we weren't made to handle stress but to let go of it, because our Father in heaven already won it for us.
We want to control every situation, except by enjoying every situation...yes I know this sounds easy but its not. Did you see that when we want to control something, sometimes it ends up worse than it started! Let go of it and start trusting the Father to give you wisdom how to go through the situation.
Here is an example: This holiday we went camping with our two daughters. It was their first time and they loved it. I always want to make sure that they are okay. One of the evening we had a storm. The lightning was really bad and to close for comfort. My husband and girls were fast a sleep, unaware of this storm outside our tent. I was so afraid, I felt so hopeless. I started praying....during my prayers I decided to let go of my fear....what can I do to make a storm go away? NOTHING. It was about 10 min then the storm stopped, my prayers got answered. The following morning I asked my girls if they knew about the storm, they replied: "What storm mommy?"
You see here I learned again, if you stay calm like they did, the slept through all of this. Then only can I go through a storm more calmly. To them nothing happened that night because they knew they were save with us. Its the same if we trust the Father to take over our stress and storms we will be save and then our childlike happiness and faith will return.
We want our kids to be happy, to have a happy home, But we need to be happy again. Our children do what they see us do, not what we tell them to do.
How do we do this:
By setting an example of enjoying life, enjoying what we do.
When you come home from work, go to the park with your child. Help them chase butterfly's, or skipping stones in the pond.
Learn them how to handle stress...if you get angry in a situation they will follow your example. But if you handle it calmly they see it.
Being positive and full of hope, it will help your child to see all thing in life as an opportunity.
Last but not least do what you enjoy. If we learn our children to start dreaming and to love what they do just imagine what an incredible human being they will be. They can change the world for the better.
Remember we are raising adults and not just children.
I hope that it will encourage you to start dreaming again, being hopeful and start living like a child again.
