Spare the Rod
"Children don't need beating. They need love and encouragement." Brigham Young
"Use no lash and no violence, but ... approach them with reason, with persuasion and love unfeigned." Joseph F. Smith
"Spare the rod and spoil the child"
is, to some, wise counsel, indeed.
When children misbehave they say,
"A spanking is what those kids need!"
Because why teach children with love
when they learn so well from hostility?
I know I behaved best as a child in my day
when being smacked was a real possibility.
And now, thanks to my mom and dad,
I know how to teach my own kids.
They do as they're told and never talk back
and never, ever do what mom forbids.
I don't really know what I did as a child
that made my parents not think I was verbally teachable.
They probably could have talked to me,
I think I was pretty reachable.
And now, come to think of it,
did they teach me a lot?
I may have just learned to hide all the bad stuff
and only do it when I wouldn't get caught.
I learned on my own the reasons why
we don't do bad things to others.
But I certainly didn't learn from them
not to hit my sisters and brothers.
Because while with their words
they said many times, "Don't hit,"
they then turned around and hit us themselves,
so I guess there was really no point to it.
Actually, there's a lot that I learned.
I learned that big people get what they want.
You're stronger, you're bigger, you're better,
you have muscle and size to flaunt.
I learned that no matter the reason,
no matter what anyone says to defend,
if one does something annoying or wrong,
they're gonna get hit on their rear end.
I learned anger gets the best behavior,
I learned, no matter what, dad's always right.
I learned children should be put in their place,
there's no need to put up a fight.
Here's what I could have learned,
that patience is the key to parenting.
I could have been part of a new generation
where love and logic are worth inheriting.
If mom and dad had thought to use
a more gentle form of correction,
I probably could be a much better parent,
and with my own had a better connection.
But my children are young, there's still time.
I could change the things that I do.
I could change my thinking and grow.
There's another method that I could fall into.
"Love and understanding,"
I think this is a much better motto.
It's hard to admit I've been doing it wrong,
it's a pretty big pill to swallow.
But imagine the difference there'll be!
My kids might really have a chance
to gain knowledge of reasons we have certain rules
rather than blindly obey in a trance.
"Spare the rod and spoil the child,"
what foolish nonsense, indeed.
When children misbehave I say,
it's love and talking to they need.
6 April 2013
Divorce is quite common in today's world, which leads to remarriage, which leads to blended families. There are a lot of stressers that come along with such a situation, but they can be managed and moved past. First of all, expect that trials will arise. If you combine 2 families and think everything is going to fall into place, you are setting yourself up for disappointment. Certainly there are exceptions, but it's better to be prepared.
Be aware of the children. Remarriage isn't just about the husband and wife; children are involved. Pay attention and care about their feelings. Let them know you care. Have frequent conversations with them, as well as with each other as a couple. Discuss what you can do to make things easier on the kids.
The majority of struggles in blended families are around holidays and the 1 year mark. This has a lot to do with reminiscing, feeling sad, and missing "the old days". Be sensitive to this fact and work out the best situation for your family. Sometimes this may mean bringing people together who aren't exactly best friends. But fairness and a pleasing compromise can be reached.
There are so many aspects to blended families. It's not the ideal situation, but it happens, so we need to push past the hurt. And never hold the children responsible for your marriage falling apart in any way.
5 April 2013
Satan means accuser. This was something I learned in class one day and it seems significant because it is so fitting. He is the one who helps our minds down the path of self-accusation, self-doubt, uselessness, etc…
This is why we need to learn to control our thoughts. Satan may take our moments of weakness and intensify negative emotions, but ultimately we are the ones in control. How does this apply to families? In every relationship, be it parent/child, husband/wife, or friends, there can be miscommunications. I believe I addressed this in a previous post, but to reiterate: Sometimes we think the worst when the other person meant no harm.
Going along with that, sometimes our minds get carried away. We think that something is wrong with someone else, or even (I'd venture to say most often) with ourselves. But, while there is usually room for everyone to improve, our thoughts are not necessarily in line with reality. Which is why we need to gain control!
To put this into practice, we must first become AWARE of our thoughts. How can we fix something if we don't really pay attention to the problem? Second, ASSESS. Discover the untruths that are creeping into our thoughts. And finally, REPLACE negative thoughts with truth and more positivity. Obviously this is easier said than done, but it can be done. Our relationships can be so much stronger if we practice seeing the good and recognizing others' good intentions.
3 April 2013
As children, did you want your parents to prove they were in charge? Or would you have preferred they work with you, show you they liked you as a person, and given you the respect you felt you deserved?
There are 3 purposes of parenting that we have discussed in class that I would like to share:
1. Parenting transmits values to future generations, brings children closer to God, helps them develop, and teach godly qualities. It also helps us as the parents to become more emotionally refined, bring US closer to God, and to improve ourselves. We share love and learning and provide protection. Parenting is for the parents, as well as for the children.
2. "To protect and prepare our children to survive and to thrive in the world they are going to live in."
3. Parenting is a sacred duty. We have a responsibility to "rear [our] children in love and righteousness", and we are called of God to do so.
25 March 2013
Finances are, of course, a big part of families. The biggest thing that stood out to me this last week was the comparison of double income households to single income households. Several years ago there was an episode of 20/20 where they took an average double income family and did the math. They worked out how much they were spending due to both parents working and came up with a surprising and devastating result: They were paying THOUSANDS more than the mother was earning so that she could work! When they revealed this to the couple, the family asked that the cameras be turned off. When they came back on it was obvious that there had been tears. The wife said something along the lines of, "You're telling me that I've been sacrificing time with my family and [many other things], and I'm paying to do it??" The family was under the impression that having both parents work was going to benefit them financially. But after expenses of a second reliable car, gas, eating out more, daycare, etc, the benefits disappeared.
Remember that this was an average household. Just something to think about.
16 March 2013
I forgot to make a post last week. To do a quick recap, last week we talked about dealing with family stress. This week was about communication. I think they go very well together, but I will mostly address communication.
My favorite thing about this week's discussions was the idea of holding a family council. This is not a new idea, but it has been presented in a new light, for me. Family council - between husband and wife, and between parents and children - ought to be held on a regular basis. (Weekly is recommended.) It should be held in a sacred place - the home. Open with expressions of love and appreciation, and then pray to invite the Spirit. The topics of family council ought to be discussed with love, and when problems need to be resolved they should be discussed until you can come to a consensus.
We talked about the difference between compromise and consensus. In a compromise, each party is feeling a loss so that each party can be somewhat satisfied. A consensus is unanimity. We should set our preferences aside (a divine ability, so work hard) and come to an arrangement where everyone can be happy because - as the second part of this family council step goes - we are doing as the Lord would have us do.
When all matters have been discussed, a consensus has been reached, and love expressed, end with prayer and give thanks. Finally, have treats! Why not??
There are not always big problems to be resolved, so do we really need to council together every week? Good question, Cassie. The answer is yes. Why? Another good question. Because when we build the habit of good communication with the little things, it becomes much easier to work through the big stuff. Husbands and wives need to have open communication, of course, but it is also important that the children feel a part of decision making, and that they feel like they can discuss their problems with their parents.
I have a lot more to talk about, but I know nobody wants to read a dissertation, so I'll keep it brief. One more thing about communication:
There is a process of having thoughts and feelings, then encoding them and sending them through a medium of communication to another person. They then decode your thoughts and feelings and come to their own. Pretty much all of the time, wires are getting crossed and we may misunderstand what it is that someone is trying to get across. So take your time and think before you react to what you interpret as offensive. Chances are, the other person was not trying to hurt your feelings or express anger or hate. A lot of us just need to work on our decoding. As for when it's our turn to do the encoding, take care to be clear.
"Don't [communicate] so that you can be understood, [communicate] so that you can't be misunderstood." - William Howard Taft
1 March 2013
This week was all about SEX. Did she just say the 's' word in all caps? There were soooo many different routes to take in this topic, and we probably could have talked about it for the rest of the semester.
There are 3 aspects to sexual intimacy: Physical, emotional, and spiritual.
Wait. There's a spiritual aspect to sex? Oh yes. And it's a BIG part. Sex, when conducted inside the bonds of matrimony, can bring us closer to God and to each other. How can it bring us closer to God? We're talking about something that He created with purpose. It is for procreation, and for the enjoyment of husband and wife. It is a sacrament: a sacred act. When we make Him a part of it, we can feel even more love between us all.
Also addressed was the topic of loyalty. This is really important. We know that any sexual relations with anyone other than the person to whom we are legally wed is adultery, and it's wrong and that's a fact. But sexual relations does not mean just sex. There are a lot of things that fall into that category and the rules are apparently not clear enough for some people. What constitutes adultery? It is stepping outside our marriage and allowing ourselves to be bonded (be it physically or emotionally, with or without another's knowledge) to another person, or even image.
- Pornography is a big contributor to unhappy marriages. Is it cheating to look at another woman and feel sexually aroused, and then continue the behavior? YES.
- Here's something I've never had to think about before: Role-playing is a way of introducing someone new into marital intimacy. It is a fantasy affair.
- Becoming emotionally intimate with another person. When a woman shares her thoughts, feeling, hopes, and dreams with another man, she is of course going to feel connected to him. She begins to think, "Gosh. I just feel like he knows me. He listens and understands. I think I love him!" Well of course he knows you. You've been pouring out your heart to him instead of your husband. Sharing intimate details creates bonds; bonds that should only be had between husband and wife. That's not to say you can't ever talk to anyone else, or share little things with your friends. But shouldn't your first impulse and desire be to share those things with the one you chose to love for all eternity? "No family can have peace, no life can be free from the storms of adversity unless that family and that home are built on foundations of morality, fidelity, and mutual respect. There cannot be peace where there is not trust; there cannot be freedom where there is not loyalty." (Gordon B. Hinckley, "In Search of Peace and Freedom", Ensign, Sept 1990)
I could keep going on and on, but I don't want to post something that is impossibly long and impossible to read. To end, I will just briefly mention the role that parents play in educating their children about sex. It is not a dirty thing. That is one of the most important lessons. It isn't wrong, but it needs to be gone about properly and between husband and wife. We need to teach our children about their bodies, about their feelings and urges, about reality, and about self control. It is our responsibility. Do not wait or shy away and let them learn from peers or teachers or the media. When they are educated, they can be confident with their bodies, in their choices, and in intimacy in their own marriages.
23 February 2013
This week we talked about transitions into marriage. We covered why people do or do not get married, the early adjustments in marriage, and children and the struggles that can occur when they arrive. Today I'm going to focus on something we learned yesterday that is interesting. To start, many people believe that stress is a bad thing. Well, it's sure not a pleasant thing, but it isn't the stress that hurts us; it's the reaction to the stress. Having stresses doesn't automatically tear us apart. Naturally we may be strained and pulled, but even though the potential for a negative effect is present, it is not definite. We don't have to do what's natural!
The thing I really took away was that young college students, who are poor and scraping to get by, who get married are at a big advantage over those who wait until they are "financially stable". Here's why: Prestressed is good! When those young couples enter into marriage, bringing with them their financial insecurity, they are working together from the beginning. They know what it is like to struggle together. On the other hand, those who wait are at a disadvantage because they are not prepared or practiced when financial hardships occur. Often, those couples don't know how to work together in this situation because they lack experience. Struggling together and working through trials as a team builds us up and makes for a stronger marriage.
15 February 2013
This week's focus was preparing for marriage. The topics we discussed were love (there are 4 kinds), dating, and cohabitation versus marriage. Cohabitation is of great interest to me because it seems that more and more people are falling victim to the belief that living together before marriage will somehow give them an advantage in the future of their relationship. That is so, so false. Psychologists used to believe that this actually was the case, but that is now referred to as "not one of psychology's finest hours". The evidence is now clear: There is absolutely no lasting benefit that outweighs the negative effects of cohabitation.
For one thing, those who cohabit have a much higher divorce rate than those who wait until after marriage to move in together. I also thought it was interesting (and tragic) that women are 9 times more likely to be killed by their significant other when they are shacking up. NINE TIMES! I don't know the exact reason, but I would assume it has to do with the fact that they are in a non-committed relationship and many feel they have no obligation to work things out in a civilized manner. I don't know the exact science.
When a couple cohabits, they are not living in the same way that a husband and wife live - regardless of their hopes and expectations. There is always an aspect of "what's mine is mine, what's yours is yours" and their lives are lived in a parallel pattern, rather than in one joint system. Often, when and if these couples get married, they have a hard time breaking that pattern of separate lives in one abode because they've become comfortable with that original situation. A part of them continues to think of themselves as an individual, rather than a team.
There are a lot of reasons a couple will decide to move in together before marriage. One reason is that they see it as an alternative to marriage. Another is that they feel they need a "test run". Or they need to "make sure he/she is really my soul mate". Well, they decide "yep! Soul mate!", get married, hit bumps in the road, and decide "crap. I guess they weren't my soul mate after all." And then they go looking for another candidate. And some decide on cohabitation because it's easier than making the ultimate commitment and might get the other partner off their back for a while. More often than not, men are interested in this situation because they are getting free sex - and they hope as often as it pleases them - and women are interested because they believe marriage is the next step. First of all, research has shown that married people have better sex lives. So neener neener. Second, living together is NOT a clear transitional period towards marriage! Only around 40% of cohabiting couples actually reach the alter... and that's after several years of dragging feet and apparent fear of committal.
In most things there is usually an exception to the rule, but why gamble in this situation? If the majority has proven it is a negative, why waste your time? And most of all, when it comes to cohabiting vs. marriage, why not respect and place more value on yourself than just settling for the shorter stick of the two?
9 February 2013
This week the class discussions were very important to me. The discussion of gender and same-sex attraction is something I pay special attention to and feel is critical. The fact that a lot of people are trying to convince the rest of us that there are, for example, not just two genders is so sad and if things like this continue it will be detrimental to mankind. There are men and women for a reason. We are not the same and we do not need to play exactly the same role. Men and women work together in harmony and create functional families, while doing the things they were called by God to do. In the Proclamation to the World about families, it says that "gender is an essential characteristic of eternal identity and purpose". Gender serves a purpose and is not to be discriminated against, tampered with, unappreciated, or underrated.
When it comes to same-sex attraction, it is the idea of a "gay gene" that bothers me. There has never been, nor could there ever be, found an element in the brain that suggests that those who identify as homosexual are "born that way". It could never be confirmed because science requires empirical evidence, and there are no experiments that could be ethically performed to provide such evidence. (Does anyone consider brain surgery on a large number of infants for no good reason ethical?) One thing we can say for certain is that those who identify as gay nearly always fall into a category of having certain commonalities and going through certain patterns.
We love everyone, regardless of orientation. There is no hate here. It is just so important that we continue to teach our children the importance of traditional marriage, and - YES - traditional roles. Girls don't need to wear an apron all day and do nothing but make babies and boys aren't required to be rough and tumble and never show any sign of sensitivity... in fact, it is encouraged that men have a gentle side... but we are what we are for a reason.
2 February 2013
This week we discussed social class and cultural diversity. The way class affects our family relationships is something I've thought about before, but never really delved into. As for culture and what that means for some families, I'd never thought much about it. We talked specifically about illegal immigrant families and the toll it can take when members of the family are separated for long periods time (most likely longer than they planned) and how the family dynamic completely changes. Rolls are reversed and relationships diminish... It's a sad subject but it's important to be aware. The thing that stood out to me was that it was mentioned in class how a general authority (I believe President Packer?) spoke to a group of stake presidents and told them to tell their Elders Quorum presidents to tell their quorums to bear in mind that when these people come to the states, they are not coming for the financial prosperity they think they are coming for. They are coming through the Spirit so that they might have easier access to the gospel of Jesus Christ.
We need to reach out to all families. No matter the class or the culture, we are all children of God and we should not put each other into labeled boxes and let them be. We can make a difference not only in the lives of other families, but in the lives of our children as well. We do this by giving them room for growth and by being an example of someone who reaches out.
23 January 2013
We've been discussing "Family Theories" and I've been really interested in all that's been mentioned so far. It's interesting to find the correlations between what's in the text and what's actually a part of my life, or the lives of those I observe. Systems Theory is what we talked the most about and I find it's the easiest to apply. "The whole is greater than the sum of its parts."
One little tidbit I learned in class today: Family therapy got started with schizophrenia! Pretty kool.
18 January 2013
The thing that stood out most to me this week was our discussion about children, population, fertility rates, etc... One thing in particular was the quote from Brigham Young about how there will be many children who will suffer a great deal because we (as Latter-Day Saints) didn't welcome them into our homes. When we deny those spirits, they still have to go somewhere, and sometimes that "somewhere" is a much worse alternative.
It also simultaneously annoys me and breaks my heart that the world is unaware of the decreasing population. And not just unaware, but believes that instead the world is overpopulated! Not the case. The birth and fertility rates have decreased. Through different "revolutions" children and families have become less important and, unless that changes, the world is going to continue to slide down a path of moral decay.
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