Tuesday: Relationships

Fully Attending

A great way to develop and maintain relationships with members of the family is to spend time with them, of course, but what do you do in those times? Just being in the same room as someone, if distracted by some other activity, isn't a wonderful way to strengthen relationships.

I have a friend I've known for 10 years now and I appreciate her personality and enjoy spending time with her. She seems to value our friendship, as she will often call me to spend time with her. However, she almost always has to fit me in to her schedule in awkward ways. For example, she'll take several long, chatty phone calls while she's at my home for lunch, or she'll bring other friends of hers, that I don't know, along to a meet up with me in a café, or she'll clean her kitchen while I sit at her breakfast stool and watch, trying to converse with her. :-) I *know* she doesn't mean anything bad by this, but it does hurt me. That's because the relationships I value are those where someone is willing to sacrifice something to give me their full attention.

As a parent, I know I frequently failed to do this for my children. Now that they are grown up, I deeply regret that and wish I could have 30 minutes back from 10 years ago, in order to speak words of life into my child or listen to their dreams one more time. I can't have a single moment back, but you have years ahead of you to not make the same mistakes.

Surprising my kids one Christmas morning!

 

You can make some time to *fully attend* to each of your children. I don't mean just being in the same room with them or involved in the same outing together; I mean fully attend, give your full attention, listening with open ears and a willing, servant heart to meet their need for relationship. Because, they will soon be gone and no amount of regret can bring back a single moment with them as a child under your roof.

The days may be long as a young mother, Dear Daughter, but the years are short.

Mimi is a wife to Jamie, mother to two grown up children, a mother-in-law and a grandmother to a darling little grand-daughter. She home-educated her children and now teaches exam subjects to groups of home-educated children. She's a Worship Leader in her church and has a passion for helping women raise children to adulthood with a strong faith in the Lord Jesus.