Things I Want My Kids to Know: The Door is Always Open

This week, I had a talk with my 19-year-old daughter about leaving home. Because some of her friends had left home and then had to come back due to financial difficulties, we talked about the emotional aspect of “going back home”.

When we talked, she told me about the feelings of shame, failure, disappointment and many other negative feelings that would be associated with having to go back home. It was after this talk that I realized there is one more thing I want my kids to know.

The following is a very true story.

Read Things I Want My Kids to Know: The Door is Always Open »

Great Expectations

When I was training to be a life coach, our instructor said to us that our level of disappointment is related to the gap between two things – our expectations and the facts. Although this may sound simple in principle and you may be saying to yourself, “Well, of course”, stop and think about real-life situations where you find yourself disappointed and you will soon see the problem.

I went out to lunch with a few other future life coaches, and one of them, Sarah, told me about some challenges she was having at the time with her teens. Sarah was married for the second time and had two teens of her own and two teens who were her husband’s kids. Most people would already cringe at this stage, right?

Anyway, Sarah said that her kids were well organized, but her husband’s teen daughter was “very messy” and kept leaving her clothes on the floor, which drove Sarah bonkers. When Sarah tried to confront her stepdaughter about tidying up her room, she got the “You’re not my mother” treatment.

Read Great Expectations »

Best Parenting Quotes that Will Change Your Life

Great parenting quotes are an awesome way to inspire ourselves as parents. These words of wisdom can help change our life and the life of our kids.

As you may know, I love quotes (and if you’ve had a chance to read my book or my life coaching website, you know). Since I was young, I believed that the quotes we choose to adopt help us plant thoughts in our mind.

If we choose inspiring, motivating and encouraging quotes, we develop have an inspiring, motivating and encouraging mindset. If we choose sarcastic, pessimistic and disappointed quotes, we will have exactly what we bargained for.

Read Best Parenting Quotes that Will Change Your Life »

How to Take Care of the Environment and Make a Difference

After hearing many people talk about the movie “An Inconvenient Truth”, we decided to rent it from the video library. We watched it with the kids and they were very surprised to see the world drying up right in front of their eyes.

I was not sure that it would have such a great impact on them, because, as kids, I thought they would be too preoccupied with school, friends and fun. Well, watching it was not fun at all, but I was very surprised when “Earth Hour” was announced and the kids wanted to take part in it.

They did not complain, they did not talk about computers or watching a movie, they did not even say anything when we suggested taking a shower in the dark.

Read How to Take Care of the Environment and Make a Difference »

Talk to the Heart

One day, I got a phone call from a mother, who was interested in our child coaching. I talked to her for a while to get a good understanding of her situation. During this conversation, we talked about things that were application to many parent-child situations, which I have since repeated with many parents, so here it is for everyone’s benefit.

Margaret: I have a problem with my teenage son, Jeff. He is 13 years old and I have completely lost control of him.

Gal: How do you mean?

Read Talk to the Heart »

Just Wait Until Your Kids Become Teens

About 16 years ago, I went to visit a family member, who had her first child at the age of 42. I was very happy for her and traveled for 2 hours to see her precious new baby.

She was so overwhelmed by the 10 days of the “mom experience” she had had – sleepless nights, initial breastfeeding pains and crying – that for about 3 hours, she kept saying to me, “Ronit, just wait until you have a baby. Then you’ll see”, and I just smiled.

You see, motherhood can be hard at first, but when she said that, my own daughter was already 3 years old and I loved every minute of raising her and considered it a lot more rewarding than difficult.

Read Just Wait Until Your Kids Become Teens »

Kids are Disappearing: Ideal Family Size (poll)

I have been asked many times about the ideal family size. It is funny, but the answers to this question change every couple of years.

World statistics show that population growth is slowing down and that the desirable family size at the moment stands at 2.1 kids (2 kids and an arm…). In Iceland, Guatemala and Taiwan, people prefer to have bigger families, with an average of 3 kids per family.

While most people believe the family size depends on women’s preferences, the world statistics find that men and women mostly agree on the size of their family. Only in France, Singapore and Lithuania do women have a slightly greater desire for a larger family than men.

In the USA, the ideal-sized family between 1936 and 1967 had “3 or more children”. In 1973, this dropped from 3.6 down to 2.8 and in 1980, it dropped again to 2.5.

Read Kids are Disappearing: Ideal Family Size (poll) »

Are We Clear?

Some time ago, my daughter Eden had a very busy time with her Event Management studies, work and social life, and Ronit and I tried to keep up with her by asking for her plans and then keeping each other up to date.

One day, Eden said to me “I have no classes tomorrow”, and I thought she might be spending the day at home, catching up, and maybe we can spend some time together.

In the evening, when we were talking about the next day, however, Ronit said to me “Eden is going to study tomorrow”.

“That can’t be”, I said, “She told me she wasn’t going to study”.

Read Are We Clear? »

Where is the Center of Your Home? (poll)

For many years, I wanted a big house. Growing up in a small place, sleeping in the living room with my other 3 sisters, made me think that having your own room was everyone’s ideal.

So when I had to choose my own house, I thought I would make sure there was enough rooms for everyone. For a long time, I was convinced that this had to be what everyone wanted – their own room.

However, after having my first child, I found a small hole in this theory, and after each additional child (I have 3), this hole in my belief that everyone has a need for privacy only got bigger and bigger.

It was only last night though, when my 6-year-old daughter opened her homework book on the dining room table, that I realized it was time to let this perception go, because, in my life, it did not survive the reality test.

Read Where is the Center of Your Home? (poll) »

Kids Shopping for a Feeling

Among the roles of a parent, the one role that parents do not like very much is being a bank. How many times have you heard yourself say, “Do I look like a bank?” or “Money does not grow on trees”? At one point, every parent wishes they could give their children everything they desire, until they realize that not everything their kids want is what they actually want to give them.

The “Daddy, buy me!” syndrome is a modern disease of our materialistic world. Once upon a time, everyone was poor and the heroes of our old stories were of a time when people always shared their last remaining bits of food with animals and people who “needed it more”.

Nowadays, in our world of abundance, there are advertisements everywhere, encouraging people to buy things they really do not need. Those ads treat everyone as if they had an enormous budget and try to convince you that you cannot possibly live without this and that even your “Daddy bank” cannot stand in your way.

Read Kids Shopping for a Feeling »