Take Care Of Every Obligation And Every Responsibility

Loving parents will detect when a child desperately needs focused attention, even if at a time when the parents feel least like giving it. Just what is focused attention? In short, focused attention makes a child feel like the most important person in the world in his or her parents’ eyes. Some may think this is going a bit too far, but take a look at Scripture and see how highly children are regarded. A child ought to be made to feel he or she is one of a kind. Few children feel this but what a difference it makes in that small one when he or she knows what it means to be special. Only focused attention can give that realization and knowledge. And it profoundly affects a child’s ability to relate to and love others. Focused attention, in my experience, is the most demanding need a child has, because we parents have extreme difficulty in recognizing it, much less fulfilling it. We do not recognize this particular need for many reasons. One of the main reasons is that other things we do for a child seem to suffice. I found it a real temptation to use this type of substitution because favors or gifts were easier to give and took much less of my time. But I found over and over again that my children did not do their best, did not feel their best, and did not behave their best unless I gave them that precious commodity, focused attention.

Drive Forward Through Misfortune

The Tyranny of the Urgent Why is it so difficult to give focused attention? Because it takes time. Even if you could give 24 hours a day, seven days a week, it is virtually impossible to fulfill all of your obligations. That is a true statement. It’s not possible for you to take care of every obligation and every responsibility in your life as you would like it to be done. You must face up to that fact. If you don’t, you naïvely will assume that somehow everything will get taken care of, and when you assume that, you will become controlled by the tyranny of the urgent. Urgent matters will automatically take precedence in your life and control your time. Take the sacred telephone, for example. I say sacred because it takes precedence over almost all else. The ringing telephone must be answered regardless of time, place, or situation. Your family may be having a few wonderful moments together at suppertime. In our home, when our children were with us, that time was of the highest importance to me.

When The Time Comes

But if the telephone rang, we gave it almost a sacred right to interfere with, disrupt, and even destroy our family fellowship. It shows how the tyranny of the urgent wins out over the important things of life once again. There’s just not enough time in our short lives to be controlled by the urgent and still be able to look after the important. We can’t have our cake and eat it too. So what can we do about it? I’m afraid there is only one answer. And it isn’t simple or easy. We must determine our priorities, set our goals, and plan our time to accomplish them. We must control our time in order to take care of the important things. What are the priorities in your life? Where does your child fit in? Does your child take first priority? You must determine this! Otherwise, your child will be a low priority and suffer from some degree of neglect. No one else can do this for you. A spouse cannot determine your child’s priority in your life. Nor can your minister, counselor, employer, or friend.

Burn That Candle

Only you can do this. So what is it, fellow parent? What and who gets priority in your life? In almost all families that have found contentment, satisfaction, happiness, and genuine thankfulness among all family members, the parents possess a similar priority system. Usually their first priority is of an ethical nature, such as a strong religious faith or moral code. They use this stabilizing relationship to influence all other relationships. Their second priority is the spouse, as discussed previously. The children take priority number three. These are essential. The remaining priorities are important, of course, but these three must come first. I have talked with many people who sought contentment in such things as money, power, and prestige. But as they experienced life and discovered real values, they sadly realized they were investing in the wrong account. I’ve seen numerous wealthy persons who spent their better years making it.’ Tragically, they had to seek counseling when they realized that, despite their wealth and power, their lives were pathetically and painfully empty. Each would weep and consider his or her life a failure because of a wayward child or a spouse lost through divorce. People who are terminally ill, I’ve noticed, come to the same conclusion. As they look back on life, they know that the only thing that really matters is whether someone genuinely cares for and unconditionally loves them. If these individuals do have such loved ones, they are content. If they don’t, they are to be pitied. I once talked with the wife of a minister, a beautiful woman who had incurable cancer. She was such a radiant, wholesome person. As we talked, she explained how, since she had known of her illness, her outlook on life had been transformed. With the knowledge of impending death, she was forced to change her priority system. For the first time she realized there was not enough time in the life of any parent to provide for the needs of spouse and children if less important things were not resisted. This minister’s wife gave her husband and children first priority, and what a difference it made. This does not mean we should neglect other areas of our lives, but we must control the time we spend on them and their influence on us.