Number two principle is, unity is essential. You have to be
unified. If you're divided against yourself, your house can't stand. So in parenting, you always present a united front. These are practices of
unity. Let me just give you
points here. Number one, always present a united front to your children,
and never let your children divide you. When you're a parent, we're a
two-headed monster, and you'll never deal with one head. So when they come up
and they say, "can i go to the movies with my friends?" "well,
let me talk to your mother." Ok now, if it's a simple decision, that's
fine. But what my wife and I would do is go in our room by ourselves when our children typically were
in bed and we would sit down and sometimes we would argue. So we would represent
the kids to each other, always knowing that our marriage was more important
than our children ( raising children).
So at the end of the conversation, we would say, this is
what we're going to do, right? We would walk out, they didn't know anything
about the conversation, only thing they
knew was mom and dad was a two-headed monster. You're going to get both of us
and we're both saying exactly the same thing. But what does that say to kids?
You know, you're divided at that point. We are unified on everything that we do.
Number two, always
honor each other in front of your
children and make your children
honor your spouse. You shall never disrespect each other in front of your
children. So if I’m sitting there, you know, in the living room and I would
hear my daughter, for example,
disrespect my wife, I never make my wife defend herself. I'd say, oh,
no, you don't talk to your mother that way. Unity means what you do to her, you
did to me. Division means you can pick on them all day long and I’m just going
to sit here and watch it. I'm just a spectator ( raising children).
When i heard a tone
in their voice, anything like that, I would get up and I'd walk in there and say, you don't talk to your
mother that way. You apologize to your mother. And they knew, you pick a fight
with her, you got a fight with dad. And the same was true of my wife. And so
always honor your spouse--if you have something to say, you say it behind
closed doors. But don't put each other down when your kids are around, don't be
sarcastic, don't be demeaning--because,
if you do, the kids will pick up
on that, and they're going to do
the same thing. So always honor each
other ( raising children).
This is Adam Norman, a 30-year-old father and a journalist. I consider being a father as my full-time duty, which comes before my actual job of journalism. As a father, there will always be new challenges for me to face everyday while raising my kids. This is where the idea of this website came from. I wanted to give out my experience, along with the experience of others, to all parents out there who need an advice with raising their kids.
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