Talk is Cheap

Read the following last week and had to share. It's lengthy but sooo good!

"Are you a frustrated parent? Is your brow drawn tight as if pulled by drawstrings? If parenting is not enjoyable, be assured, you have a bad attitude. When your children look into your face, what do they see? They are not fooled. They know how you feel toward them. Your face is a graph of approval or rejection. The smooth tongue of 'positive affirmation' is not enough; in fact, it is worse than nothing if there is not genuine delight in your heart...If they see disappointment and criticism, they will answer in kind. Discontented parents breed discontented children. Your attitude is the root of the family attitude tree. A bitter root cannot produce sweet fruit.

Personal attitudes are highly contagious, and children usually come down with a worse case. 'More is caught than taught.' And children seem more highly susceptible to catching a bad attitude than of being taught to have a good one...

'Our actions speak louder than our words,' but our attitude screams louder than our actions. The first need and the most lacking element in child training is a right attitude on the part of parents...

Who you are is more important than what you do...

Your children are playing follow-the-leader...

The bad news is that you are responsible for the condition of your children. The good news is that you don't have to be frustrated over attempting to change them. You only need to change yourself. Since their attitudes are reflections of yours, you need only change your attitude, and the reflections will change...

Children living under condemnation are not motivated to good works. None of us seeks to please someone who is condemning us...You may nag or gripe them into relenting to your will, but you can never bad-attitude them into a good attitude. Children cannot be intimidated into positive character. To stand off and criticize their performance will not induce them to a rectifying shame. No one has ever been motivated to climb out from under a pile of disapproval to win the praise and affections of his or her accuser.

The law of human nature is such that condemnation and shame cause an alienation that only produces more disobedience...

If you are always ready to show them what is wrong, but do not constantly exemplify what is right, they will cower under your judgments while continuing to grow into the likeness of your graceless bitterness.

The parental spirit of displeasure holds the child in 'death.' A new spirit in the parent will allow the child to serve from a joyous spirit and not from the decrepit bondage of legal depression...

Your children will begin to develop positive character only in an atmosphere of forgiveness and acceptance. The first step to recovery and the ground on which it continues is the parent's smile...

If fellowship with God provokes His children to holiness, what will be the result of a child's fellowship with his parents? The best training is done under the supervision of a smile. There is a time for discipline, rebuke, spanking, and even controlled anger, but such should be temporary signposts on a path of communion that you walk with your children. If they see your delight and appreciation, they will have the courage to try to maintain that sweetness.

These excerpts are from No Greater Joy, Volume One by Mike and Debi Pearl.

Good stuff, don't you think?