Design by Sawyer Pennington
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I'm glad you didn't ask how many New Year's resolutions I've kept! I'm going to address the worse resolution first. It's the one where I promised myself that I was going to keep on top of emails because at any given time I can have tens of thousands (yes, that's the number) of emails in my inbox! They've all been read; I just haven't figured out what to do with them. I guess figuring that out should have been the resolution. On the other hand, the best resolution was to listen to my kids more. I have a bad habit of finishing their sentences or interrupting their thoughts with thoughts of my own. Granted I'm far from perfect at it, but I'm getting better. And making a conscious effort to let them complete their thoughts before I talk has really improved our conversations, for both them and me. |
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Easy question … because I do not make New Year's resolutions. I see goals and resolutions as ongoing efforts that start when you identify an objective – not because it is January 1 st. Some may be small and achieved fairly quickly, while others may take a lifetime. They key is finding a way to remember them and realizing you may hit roadblocks, detours, and/or delays … but there are many roads that will take you to the same destination. |
Design by Sawyer Pennington
| My children are no longer young. My younger daughter is now a teenager, so between her friends and social media, she's bombarded with different messages and information. Luckily, ever since she was young, I made sure she felt comfortable coming to me with questions or even just her thoughts. (She still does.) So, I think besides making sure your explanations are age-appropriate (I used to have a tendency to provide way more information than necessary), I think it's critical that your child knows not to bottle up any emotions or confusion about information they're seeing. I usually could tell when there was something bothering them, and if they didn't say anything, I'd gently try to start a conversation. The most important thing you can do is let them know they have a "safe space" with you to discuss what they're feeling and thinking. |
| First, to address the elephant in the room, we fully
appreciate the topics of discussion will be different for people of different
races, but that does not change the fact … Communication is absolutely essential.
Although I do not have children, I believe that children are born as "clean slates" with no preconceived beliefs or opinions. However, I also believe that children are sponges and "learn" from everyone around them. Especially people they look up to and trust. That means you need to be very careful of what they may hear you say – not only when you talk with them, but also out loud to yourself (if you are like me, and sometimes talk back to the computer screen) or to another person. Children will parrot their parents and others they see as role models, in both words and actions. |
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Design by Sawyer Pennington
| I'm guessing this is due to the pandemic, but before that you could substitute "children" for "partner" so I'll give you my "mom" perspective (although dealing with children may be easier). Anyway, when the girls were young and "driving me crazy" I decided to follow Black's advice – rather than trying to be the "perfect mom" all the time, I just did a timeout. For me, not the girls! I'd find a way to take a short break from them. The same was true when my husband got fired and was home all the time. Then I'd escape with a magazine to Starbucks or, even better, a movie. With the pandemic, you might not be comfortable with those options, so maybe a walk? A very long walk if they're driving you really crazy. |
| As Red noted, being around people (even those you love) "too much" is not a new phenomenon – the pandemic just brought it home to so many people (sorry, could not resist). Find some space when you need it – and accept the fact you and your partner might need space at different times. I suspect that you are driving your partner crazy, too. Do not take it personally, and recognize everyone has very different coping strategies. (Red likes to default to her theater degree and get emotional, and I have learned telling her to "calm down" only makes it worse.) Try to have a quiet conversation to acknowledge the situation, talk things through, and, if possible, laugh about it. But you may want to position it as, "I need to figure out how to be less cranky when I get overwhelmed" versus "You are driving me crazy!" |
Design by Sawyer Pennington
| Honestly, I just don't know. My heart hurts for the families of those that passed in such a tragic and senseless way. This could be any of us! This could be me or my girls. We all live our lives, never thinking, until such a horrific event happens, that merely doing something as ordinary and routine as going to the grocery store could end everything. Is it better gun control? Is it more emphasis on mental health? Is it getting back, if that's even possible, to where we just have more respect and tolerance for each other as human beings? The answer, of course, is all of the above. The problem is how do we, as a country, as a people, make this happen?! |
| Obviously, two mass shootings in less than a week, in Atlanta, Georgia, and Boulder, Colorado, have placed a renewed spotlight on the problem of gun violence, and have people asking how can we stop it. This is not my area of expertise, but (of course), I have my opinions. There are various highly-emotional and highly-political gun-related strategies that involve changes to gun laws that will be debated, and this will also re-focus attention on mental health issues. However, what I think is just as critical is what is happening in terms of legislation in so many states that would result in voter suppression. Currently, in some places, it is easier to buy a gun than to register to vote. Think about that … |