On New Year's Resolutions

I’ve always thought this tradition of making New Year’s resolutions was odd.  Every year people make decisions and set goals to begin the year doing something new or different and then a couple of months later they stop.  Setting goals is usually the easy part – accomplishing them is a whole other story.

So why do we do torture ourselves with setting unrealistic and unattainable goals?  In the words of my high school auto mechanics teacher, “You’re setting yourself up for failure.”  So, again, why do it?

There are so many resources out there that teach us how to set goals; whether it is for personal enrichment, for business, for weight loss or for pretty much everything else.  But, underneath all of the goal setting tips and tricks and motivational speeches and goal setting guidelines and processes there is one common theme…on reason why we are constantly drawn to bettering ourselves;  HOPE.

Where are we without hope?  We all want to feel like things will get better; like good times are sure to come; like the past was the worst that life could throw at us and that it’s going to get better from here on out.

I’ve never been really good at accomplishing the goals I’ve set for myself, whether it’s a New Year’s resolution or at any other time of the year.  But, I always do have hope.

So, as I sit here on the brink of a new year I hope that each and every person that reads this has, and always has, hope.

I hope you become a better father every day.  No matter what kind of a father you are there is always room for improvement.  I hope you never stop improving.  Your children hope you never stop improving.

Happy New Year!

Getting Started

There are so many styles of parenting.  I’m not going to even begin listing all the different nuances of each style.  The list would be far too long and probably really boring.  Besides, what does it matter?  For as many dads are there are in the world there are just as many styles – so be the one you want to be.  Just make sure it is only one style.  Being multiple dads causes stress, frustration and confusion for both you and your child.

You must decide what your style is going to be.  Style sounds a lot like some new fashion trend or a new body style for the latest luxury vehicle.  Those “styles” change almost instantly and become outdated – leaving disappointed souls in their wake.  Just like those kinds of styles, there is so much out there that tells you who you should be, what type of dad you should be.  Again, just like advertisements for the latest gadgets I implore you to ignore all of it.  If you’re a father you’re probably old enough to know right from wrong, good from bad and left from right.  We all make mistakes and stray and wonder from time to time, it’s only natural to do so, but by and large we know what path we’re on and we keep moving forward.  So don’t let yourself be lead astray.

Your dad style is a conscious decision, not a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants decision.  It’s so important to take a look at ourselves and see what our style is, and if we need to make any changes we can focus on what we want our style to be.

I’m actually not going to get into all the different styles here – or anywhere for that matter.  Instead I want to focus on one thing; patience.  Before we can begin dissecting our dad style we need to look at our patience.  In all things in life the more patience we have the better we are at handling life’s curveballs.  Children are always throwing us curveballs and we need to be ready for that.

To help with this, I keep a thought running in the front of my mind; my children did not ask me to be born and to come in to this world, I made that decision for them.  Remember that the next time you’re feeling impatient because your child has asked you “why?” for the ten-thousandth time.  Remember that everything is new to them – and no matter how many times you’ve answered the same question, to them it’s either a new question or the same question from a new perspective – remember their brains are sponges and are soaking up new information and growing every second.

You have to be patient with yourself too.  Even if you’re on your 5, 6, 7 kid – you may have been around the fatherhood block a few times, but each kid is a different ballgame.  You must always have patience with yourself.  You are going to make mistakes – probably lots of them by the time your little one is all grown up.  That’s ok – being a father and figuring out what your style is is more of a process than a goal.

As dads we need to be patient with ourselves as we learn to be patient with our children.  The same rules for any situation in life requiring patience apply in fathering as well.  Take a deep breath and relax.

What is The Daddy Craft?

At the time of this writing I’ve been a dad for just over 7 years.  From the time I knew I wanted to be a father I always found myself looking for tips and advice on fatherhood.  What I found was a pretty scarce supply of good material geared towards dads.  Much of what I found was more tongue-n-cheek material than actual useful stuff.  I’ve journalled a lot about my thoughts about being a father, my successes, my failures, my questions, and I finally realized that while I think I’m actually pretty good at this whole parenting thing I also have no idea what I’m doing. 
 

So while reading a blog about living a more peaceful and intentional life, I had a thought; maybe I could blog about being a really good dad.  Not that I have the answers, and I really hope none of my writing ever gives that impression, but I figured there must be other dads out there dealing with the same issues and maybe a blog like this could help (help me and other dads).

What I’d like The Daddy Craft to become is a resource for dads where they can go for the types of tips and pieces of advice I was searching for, and am still searching for.  Like I said, I don’t ever want to pretend I have all the answers.  In fact, what I’d really like is for other dads to make their contributions to this blog and provide their own tips – I think we can all learn from one another.

So I hope you enjoy what you find here and return as often as you need or want to.

Thanks.