I am excited to share this thought with you today…

Last week I was thinking about my role as a father, when this inspiration came to me:

I make a lot of mistakes as a dad…but inaction or lack of teaching/mentoring is not going to be one of them.

Be Active in Teaching Your Children

I often wonder if there is too much mentoring you can do as a parent.

I don’t want to be the parent who is so overbearing that it lessens the influence I am having with my children.

Conversely, if we are not teaching truths, our kids will be persuaded by harmful ideologies elsewhere.

I have accepted the fact that as dad I am going to make mistakes, but what I cannot accept is doing nothing.

I want to be able to look back and see that I fought tirelessly to prepare my kids for the world they will face.

There is truly a war taking place – good versus evil – and I feel a strong desire to make this truth known to my children.

How Do WE Have Influence on Our Kids?

This past summer I was trying to help my boy get ready for wrestling season.

I would give him a list of exercises and ask him to do them while I was working. He was specifically working on pull-ups.

The progress was so slow I wondered if I needed to set up a camera to see if he was actually doing the workouts.

I found myself getting frustrated by his progress.

Each morning we were also going out for a run, so he was making progress there, and I hoped it would carry over to these other exercises - but that didn’t seem to be happening.

I decided to change my approach.

I told him that I had a goal to do 100 push-ups a day and made sure that he saw me doing them.

It only took a couple days and he was setting goals for how many he wanted to do – I didn’t even have to say anything to him.

It has been over six months and he has missed very few days.

It is now something our entire family is doing…what makes this so cool is that they saw it happening with my son and I and they decided they wanted to do it as well.

It hasn’t taken any persuasion or compulsion, it is just something we do – and even enjoy.

The lesson I learned is that doing something alongside my kids is more impactful than just asking them to do it – this also helps me grow as well.

Kids generally want to make progress but need strong examples to lead them.

Be the change you want to see in your kids.

Teach Your Kids the Truth

The word is confusing place. As a parent, it is our duty to give our children a foundation of truth that they can build upon.

If we are going to do this, we must have that foundation ourselves.

In my opinion, the pursuit of truth is extremely rewarding – and is life’s most important endeavor.

If we are willing to take this journey ourselves, we will better understand those truths and be able to teach them to our kids.  

My wife and I take time each week to teach these principles to our children. Some of it is planned, while other times it is unexpected and happens as the opportunity presents itself.

While there are many ways to have a strong influence inside your family, I personally feel like teaching these important principles is paramount.

Teach your children true principles and as they grow, help them learn how to govern themselves – this is key because you won’t always be by their side.

If we are not taking the lead on this, there are many influences who are willing to teach your kids their ideologies – to me, that is not something I am willing to accept.

Learn these truths so you can teach your children!

Conclusion

There are many important ways we should be having influence inside our families.

Every situation is different, and every kid is their own person, so what works for one may not work for another.

Despite how different all children are, there are fundamental truths that are relevant to each of them.

I believe what we have discussed in this newsletter to be two of them.

First, we have to be an influence for good in the lives of our kids.

Be the change inside of yourself that you want to see in them, because they are more likely to follow our lead and example – for better or worse.

Second, learn truths so that you are equipped to teach them.

Kids need a strong foundation of correct principles to help them govern their lives.

The world is full of incorrect perceptions of truth and if we follow those things, we are guaranteed to have a negative result.

It becomes our privledge as parents to learn these truths so we can teach them to our kids.

Raising kids is hard. I wish I had it all figured out.

I feel strongly that our key to finding success in doing it will be proportional to the work we put into growing ourselves.

Kids don’t require perfection from their parents, but they do expect us to be growing in the same ways we are challenging them to.

It’s okay to make mistakes, but it’s not okay to do nothing!

Keep up the good fight, your kids are worth it.

Thanks for reading,
Darron Rowley
Founder of Freedom Elements