The January Family Resolution
This year, I set 12 different resolutions for my family, one for each month of the year for things that my family and I thought we needed to work on as a family. Things we wanted to do as a family. Of course they had input into these resolutions, as I asked them what they felt we needed to work on, how we wanted to refine ourselves and what we thought we needed to work on and then I translated them into English (rather than our family slang) wrote these family resolutions down and published them back in December, so that we'd be able to share our progress with you and of course, be able to look back on it in years to come and see when and how we started certain positive habits.
The resolution for January was that we would put the family first.
This resolution on the surface seems a bit silly because obviously we always put family first. It's why on any given day we all get up, why we do our chores or cook food, but it was really more of a case of making sure that everyone in the family knew that they were important and knew that when they came home from wherever they had been that the rest of the family would acknowledge them. There was a second part, that we were supposed to play a game together each Saturday night, but we kinda forgot that part!
Okay, so mostly the greeting was a request from Flyfour, but it was something which we had noticed as a family as slipping. It was just most noticeable when Flyfour would come home from work, and everyone would be busy doing something else and couldn't even grunt in acknowledgement to his greeting (mostly the children I hasten to add!) but it was important for the rest of the family too!
The idea was that every time someone came into the home, the rest of the family had to greet them. This meant that a few times Top Ender had to stop watching a TV show in her room or step away from her homework in order to acknowledge the arrival, and Dan Jon would often have to stop whatever computer game he was playing but the change in the family was significant.
Everyone felt happier being greeted when they came into the house. Everyone felt that they were home. Everyone felt the love.
I can see now, that each time someone was greeted at the door, or had the door opened for them, or had the other person drop what they were doing to kiss and hug the person coming in, it wasn't just allowing that person to be recognised as important, to recognise that they mattered. It was topping up the emotional reservoir that we all have and need to call upon when we are apart, or having a bad day or feeling low or unworthy. Sure, they were small deposits of love that when looked at individually might not mean a whole lot, but when totted up over time was a flood of love.
It's the constant reassurance of knowing that home is where we are loved.
The resolution for January was that we would put the family first.
This resolution on the surface seems a bit silly because obviously we always put family first. It's why on any given day we all get up, why we do our chores or cook food, but it was really more of a case of making sure that everyone in the family knew that they were important and knew that when they came home from wherever they had been that the rest of the family would acknowledge them. There was a second part, that we were supposed to play a game together each Saturday night, but we kinda forgot that part!
Okay, so mostly the greeting was a request from Flyfour, but it was something which we had noticed as a family as slipping. It was just most noticeable when Flyfour would come home from work, and everyone would be busy doing something else and couldn't even grunt in acknowledgement to his greeting (mostly the children I hasten to add!) but it was important for the rest of the family too!
The idea was that every time someone came into the home, the rest of the family had to greet them. This meant that a few times Top Ender had to stop watching a TV show in her room or step away from her homework in order to acknowledge the arrival, and Dan Jon would often have to stop whatever computer game he was playing but the change in the family was significant.
Everyone felt happier being greeted when they came into the house. Everyone felt that they were home. Everyone felt the love.
I can see now, that each time someone was greeted at the door, or had the door opened for them, or had the other person drop what they were doing to kiss and hug the person coming in, it wasn't just allowing that person to be recognised as important, to recognise that they mattered. It was topping up the emotional reservoir that we all have and need to call upon when we are apart, or having a bad day or feeling low or unworthy. Sure, they were small deposits of love that when looked at individually might not mean a whole lot, but when totted up over time was a flood of love.
It's the constant reassurance of knowing that home is where we are loved.