Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label parenting. Show all posts
Monday, December 5, 2011
Post No. 176d: Article of Interest: Tiger Woods BEFORE His Win Yesterday
Yesterday, golf and sex legend Tiger Woods won his first match in almost 2 years. The following article authored by Tiger himself appeared in the "My Turn" section of the November 29, 2010 issue of "Newsweek" Magazine. We thought that you might find it to be of interest, on many different levels.
"Last November, Everything I thought that I knew about myself changed abruptly, and what others perceived about me shifted, too. I had been conducting my personal life in an artificial way - as if detached from the values my upbringing had taught, and that I should have embraced.
"The physical pain from the car accident has long healed. But the pain in my soul is more complex and unsettling...."
To view the remainder of the article, click here.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Post No. 143b: Speaking of Connecting the Dots....
We're always somewhat amused when prominent members of the public declare that the heads of leaders of certain agencies or industries (be they government leaders, business people, bankers, or military / intelligence officials), should roll for their failure to properly adhere to some complex and constantly moving standard.
More specifically, in the case of the recent Christmas day Pampers terrorist attempt, many have complained that US intelligence officials failed to "connect the dots," and anticipate that a terrorist attack was about to take place.
We've often joked that few people have the ability to "properly" manage much in their personal lives, particularly their marriages involving only one other person, and yet seem to have the wisdom and arrogance to readily criticize others in charge of large bureacracies.
Thomas Friedman of the New York Times recently wrote an op-ed piece entitled "Father Knows Best," which outlines the thoughts and actions of the Father of the alleged "Underwear Terrorist." In reading it, we thought about how many parents are able to "connect the dots" concerning activities involving their own kids, and even after the event, take responsibility for their kids' conduct.
Should parents be fired, or resign, following their failure to prevent anti-social conduct or behavior on the part of their kids detrimental to society? Would that be letting them off too easily? Should business and government leaders be forced to clean up their purported messes, or should we just fire them or allow them to walk?
This is interesting reading.
"Surely, the most important, interesting — and, yes, heroic — figure in the whole Christmas Day Northwest airliner affair was the would-be bomber’s father, the Nigerian banker Alhaji Umaru Mutallab.
"Mutallab did something that, as far as we know, no other parent of a suicide bomber has done: He went to the U.S. Embassy in Nigeria and warned us that text messages from his son revealed that he was in Yemen and had become a fervent, and possibly dangerous, radical.
"We are turning ourselves inside out over how our system broke down — and surely it did — in allowing Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the would-be suicide bomber, to board that airliner. But his father, in effect, told us something else: 'My family system, our village system, broke down. My own son fell under the influence of a jihadist version of Islam that I do not recognize and have reason to fear.'"
To check out the remainder of the article, simply click here.
Monday, June 2, 2008
Post No. 14: A Tribute to Mel's Mother
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
In my Article No. 6, entitled A Few Thoughts on the Qualifications for Parenthood, I raised some theoretical issues which a prospective parent, or a governmental entity regulating the conduct of parents, might consider in a carefully orchestrated, Utopian world. Of course, it was simply an intellectual exercise designed to stimulate thought.
However, during the course of writing the piece, I was reminded of an article written by Patt Morrison of the Los Angeles Times some years ago in the vicinity of Father’s Day. Morrison recounted a number of newsworthy stories about failures in parenting, and their unfortunate consequences. She then went on to thank her parents for being “normal.” Of course, she did not define normal, other than to say that whatever they did worked, and resulted in Morrison being a positive and productive member of society.
At the time that I read Morrison’s article, I thought about the various ways in which parents confront parenting issues. Parents can take affirmative action in certain regards, thus encouraging their children to explore the world outside the family. They can also take affirmative steps by placing restrictions on the conduct, or engage in protective or punitive conduct. They can also choose not to take action, or not respond to certain conduct on the part of their kids.
Morrison spoke of how we hear so much of the parents who fail, and so little about the successful ones. I thought of that Saturday when I received word from Mel, my friend of thirty years, that his 93 year old Mother had passed. In his brief, but eloquently worded message regarding his Mother, he noted, “Throughout her life the one attitude I never saw her manifest in anyway was "Why me?" Even during her darkest hours she was only able to see the many blessings God had given her.” That’s a pretty powerful statement for one to choose to describe the essence of one’s Mother.
I never met Mel’s Mother. However, I tried to envision who she was by thinking about Mel, and how his Mother’s influence must have had a significant and positive effect, on Mel, and who he is as a human being. In my workshops, I often describe the antithesis of Mel’s Mother’s attitude as the “victim mentality.” Lots of things come with thinking of oneself as a victim. Blame is inappropriately directed to others. One’s own responsibility is typically difficult to recognize. One’s functioning as an adult become problematic. Mel is none of these things. He’s just about one of the most responsible guys that you would ever want to meet. And there are some other positive attributes which Mel’s Mother obviously passed on to Mel, consisting of Mel’s irrepressible positive energy, his ability to laugh, his ability to appreciate the world outside of himself, his internal consistency, and his refusal to think negatively of others. I always felt that Mel was genuinely surprised at the dark side of humans, when he witnessed it.
By simply reflecting on this one brief statement by Mel, I realized the power that a parent can exert on a child, in a positive sense. Stop and think about that each time that you engage your children, or the children of others, and you are in the midst of anger, condemnation, jealousy, spite, or you feel that you have been treated unfairly or discriminated against. Take the higher ground, like Mel’s Mother. It will have far more positive, long term ramifications.
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
In my Article No. 6, entitled A Few Thoughts on the Qualifications for Parenthood, I raised some theoretical issues which a prospective parent, or a governmental entity regulating the conduct of parents, might consider in a carefully orchestrated, Utopian world. Of course, it was simply an intellectual exercise designed to stimulate thought.
However, during the course of writing the piece, I was reminded of an article written by Patt Morrison of the Los Angeles Times some years ago in the vicinity of Father’s Day. Morrison recounted a number of newsworthy stories about failures in parenting, and their unfortunate consequences. She then went on to thank her parents for being “normal.” Of course, she did not define normal, other than to say that whatever they did worked, and resulted in Morrison being a positive and productive member of society.
At the time that I read Morrison’s article, I thought about the various ways in which parents confront parenting issues. Parents can take affirmative action in certain regards, thus encouraging their children to explore the world outside the family. They can also take affirmative steps by placing restrictions on the conduct, or engage in protective or punitive conduct. They can also choose not to take action, or not respond to certain conduct on the part of their kids.
Morrison spoke of how we hear so much of the parents who fail, and so little about the successful ones. I thought of that Saturday when I received word from Mel, my friend of thirty years, that his 93 year old Mother had passed. In his brief, but eloquently worded message regarding his Mother, he noted, “Throughout her life the one attitude I never saw her manifest in anyway was "Why me?" Even during her darkest hours she was only able to see the many blessings God had given her.” That’s a pretty powerful statement for one to choose to describe the essence of one’s Mother.
I never met Mel’s Mother. However, I tried to envision who she was by thinking about Mel, and how his Mother’s influence must have had a significant and positive effect, on Mel, and who he is as a human being. In my workshops, I often describe the antithesis of Mel’s Mother’s attitude as the “victim mentality.” Lots of things come with thinking of oneself as a victim. Blame is inappropriately directed to others. One’s own responsibility is typically difficult to recognize. One’s functioning as an adult become problematic. Mel is none of these things. He’s just about one of the most responsible guys that you would ever want to meet. And there are some other positive attributes which Mel’s Mother obviously passed on to Mel, consisting of Mel’s irrepressible positive energy, his ability to laugh, his ability to appreciate the world outside of himself, his internal consistency, and his refusal to think negatively of others. I always felt that Mel was genuinely surprised at the dark side of humans, when he witnessed it.
By simply reflecting on this one brief statement by Mel, I realized the power that a parent can exert on a child, in a positive sense. Stop and think about that each time that you engage your children, or the children of others, and you are in the midst of anger, condemnation, jealousy, spite, or you feel that you have been treated unfairly or discriminated against. Take the higher ground, like Mel’s Mother. It will have far more positive, long term ramifications.
© 2008, The Institute for Applied Common Sense
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