research Tag | Family Matters

Who’s Your Favorite Grandparent? (Poll)

For the 21 years of our oldest daughters’ life, we have been contemplating the issue of our kids’ relationship with their grandparents. You see, our kids have grown up far away from their grandparents most of their life, but their relationships with one side of the family is stronger that with the other side.

To my surprise, the relationship to grandparents has nothing to do with how nice the grandparents are or what culture they are from, how nice you are, how nice your kids are or where you choose to live around the world. It is linked more closely to evolution – that survival mechanism of humanity to keep the dynasty and strengthen it. Grandparents invest in the grandchildren they are convinced are theirs.

In 1998, a researcher named DeKay came up with a theory to explain findings from researches conducted two years previously (Euler & Weitzel, 1996 and Boon & Brassoni, 1996) who claimed that grandmothers on the mother’s side invested in their grandkids the most. DeKay came up with a theory linking the relationship between grandparents and their grandchildren to certainty. His theory was that grandparents invest in the grandchildren they are certain are their offspring. In other words, the grandparent who has less doubt of being genetically related to the child and therefore to the grandchild, is more likely to invest in this relationship to support his or her “breed”.

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Do Glasses Make You Smart?

It started when my sister, who is 3 years younger than I am, brought home her prescription glasses. I was about 15 and thought it was cool. Kids are like that. They think strange things are cool. From time to time, I would steal her glasses and try them on. I was shocked to discover that the TV looked different, and that the whole world looked clearer.

When I was 16, I brought home my first prescription glasses. I was very happy. For a long time, I checked what the world looked like with and without my glasses, and I was a bit disappointed that the optometrist had told me to wear them only when I needed to watch TV, movies or to sit far away from the board in class.

Surprise, surprise, once I had my glasses, I got to be one of the top kids in my class in 11th Grade, after having been kicked out of school in 10th Grade for having failed too many subject. It was as if the glasses had helped me to see my homework better.

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Teens Today Aren’t Like We Used to Be

In my work with parents and teens, I here many times the phrase “Teens today aren’t like we used to be”.

Really?

I remember this from a friend of mine from high school and his dad when we were 18. Every time when we came to visit my friend, his dad gave us the spiel about how motivated, well mannered, hard working and respectful his generation was and how horrible, suffering from peer pressure, disrespectful and lazy we were.

I remember asking him one day if his parents did not say the same thing about him when he was 18.

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Is It Better to Be Poor and Happy or Wealthy and Miserable?

When coaching people on wealth creation, it is amazing for me every time to discover how strongly people who are not wealthy believe that this question is valid. Don’t get me wrong. I came from a simple family, where my mom and dad both worked hard, very hard, at more that one job, to provide for 5 children.

When my clients discuss this, I know what they are talking about because we had such discussions around our dinner table.

People who do not have “enough” money (90% of our society) have some beliefs that support their identity as “poor”, “struggling”, “cannot have what we want”. Here are some of them:

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How to Be Happy in LIFE with a simple "Thank you!"

Surprise, surprise, but saying “Thank you!” can change your life.

Do you remember Barney singing for the children “Remember please and thank you, ’cause they’re the magic words”? Well, apparently, Barney was right. A research described by Alvaro Fernandez in his post How “Saying Thanks” Will Make You Happier, has found that gratitude can change your health and general well-being.

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Hugs: The Ultimate Antidepressant

For a while, I’ve been thinking of ways to motivate my readers to live an inspiring life that will make a difference. Many people think that the way we can make a difference is by doing big things and I think we need to re-define the meaning of “big”.

I think we can make a difference, a big difference, by changing the depression statistics in the world. One person at a time, we can teach how to put happiness in our hearts and chase away the darkness. And you are probably asking yourself, “And how do we do that with no budget, without the support of the government and without organizing ourselves in a formal way?”

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