Children are wonderful. Children can teach us so much...if we allow the teaching to take place.
I had such a moment. It was about a year or two ago. I don't recall the details of the conflict but basically I was led to believe Nate, our then 7 or 8 year old may not have told me the truth about a particular issue. I was convince he was not telling the full story.
Thinking I knew the truth and that he was holding back, I told him to go to his room and think about things and come out when he was ready to tell me what really happened.
After he was in his room for around 5-10 minutes his older brothers came to me and explained that they felt Nate was telling the truth and that I had wrongly accused him. Wow! That was when I knew I was off base when older brothers actually came to his rescue.
How do I approach this little boy? Pride was kicking in. How do I admit now that I was wrong? I was now frustrated with myself for not listening. Maybe some of you can relate as a parent. I thought, the best thing to do is simply go in and speak to him even though I was not sure what I was going to say.
When I opened the door, I found him just finishing a picture that he drew for me. It was a picture recapping the "daddy Nate/date" that we had that day. We had gone to the skate park and hung out together. On the picture he had written the words, "I love you Dad". Wow! My heart melted. I hugged him and apologized for not believing him. Those words "I love you" disarmed the situation. What more could I say but that I was sorry and I too loved him.
May I propose that if things get tense in your home for whatever reason, try those words. Profound teaching from a child!
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