The Importance of Time With Your Children

The world of a child is made up of very few people and very few contacts with people, at their young age of 2 or 3 and many times even to 6 or 8 years old. The time we spend with our children is ten times more important to them than it is to us. Imagine that, if we enjoy our time with them at all, they must thrive on it.

Of those people they want to know, to spend time with, their father is the most important, often because we work and are away from them so much of the time. Reading stories to them before bed can be one of the best times to interact with our children. We can ask them how their day was and relate characters in the story to the days they are having or things they have done. By reading to them and sharing with them, they will believe and realize that it is important to you to spend time with them.

Children from a young age know they want something from us. Sometimes they are not sure what that “something” is. We have to provide them with ideas about what they can do with us and let them know that it is ok to ask to spend time with their father, with their parents. Reading stories to them that give them ideas of what they might want to do with their parents on that special day is a great idea. Without conjuring up these images for them through these stories, a child may never know what would sound like fun to them or how fun spending a day with their dad might be.

Father’s have nothing to lose and everything to gain from spending time with their daughters, with their sons. We have so much to learn from them. If we really try to see the world through their eyes, what they see, what questions they have about what they see, how much fun it can for us to share in their imaginations, we would discover ourselves and become part of the shaping of our children’s personalities and their view of the world around them.

By introducing our children to the world around them, how big it is, how diverse it is, we are giving them the tools to deal with the “little” things, the little problems, they will undoubtedly encounter in their world, their school or at their friends house when you are not around.

One of the most important things we can do as fathers, as parents, is give our children a self identity, a foundation of self that is solid and built on a world larger than our everyday life. In a larger world, the problems of a smaller everyday world seem less intense, less overwhelming. We need to over-exaggerate our feelings of love for them. We need to over emphasis the importance to us of spending time with them, doing something that they are truly interested in doing. Make sure your total attention is on them when taking this time with them. They know the difference and it won’t be nearly as important if you are answering your phone or texting someone while out with them.

As parents, let’s send our children a consistent positive message, that they are VERY important to us and that WE do, truly enjoy spending time with them from the time they are born to the end of time. Let’s make sure they know they are at the forefront of our minds. We can give them the confidence they need to tackle the world and come home positive and ready to do it again.