This afternoon my twelve-year old, Noah walked into the bedroom where I was working.
As is far too often the case, my head never raised up from my computer screen to acknowledge his arrival. I’m usually too fully absorbed writing posts like this or answering urgent emails or seemingly debating the future of humanity (or watching silly dog videos) to respond.
“Hey Dad, wanna go throw the football?” Noah asked.
“Sure.” I replied.
He made a fist, curled his bicep to his body and shouted “YES!” and then bounded out of the room and down the stairs.
At first Noah’s enthusiasm shocked me as it didn’t seem proportionate to the occasion. He acted like he had just won a prize, and I soon realized that in his mind, he had:
He’d won time with his father.
I remember how much I treasured the times with my dad when I was his age; how everything was an epic adventure when he and I were together, and how important and loved I felt no matter what we were doing. Looking back, none of it seems mundane or routine now. It was the sweet stuff of my childhood, sewn into my young heart and part of the deepest places of who I am today.
As parents, it’s so easy in the midst of our exhausting ordinary days to lose the plot.
Most of us perpetually worry that we are failing our kids, that we’re missing the mark, that we’re dooming them to hours of costly future therapy. We worry that we aren’t providing enough or that we aren’t the kind of parents we imagine other adults to be, and as a result we spend most of our time feeling like incompetent impostors whose fraudulence will soon be exposed and publicly ridiculed.
But the truth of it all, is that being a good and successful parent comes down to one simple, free, yet incredibly costly thing: Presence.
It is in simply being available that we perform the greatest act of love a mom or dad can toward their children. We are telling them that out of all the people in the world, we choose them; that out of any place on the planet, this is where we most want to be.
Parents let’s face it, when it comes to money and stuff and the material trappings of life, most of us never feel like we’re quite there do we? It never feels like we have enough breathing room to give ourselves permission to rest from the work and the striving. Maybe we should remember that as we frantically chase it all in the name of being good caregivers to our kids; as we sacrifice time with them in pursuit of far less valuable things.
Moms and Dads, there is nothing as precious to your children as you, even when they fail to acknowledge it or believe it in the present. You know from seeing your own childhood in the rearview mirror what a treasure time really is. Don’t undervalue it in these days.
Be a consistent, interested, loving presence in your child’s life, and regardless of the path you take as a family or what kind of adults they become, you will have been a great parent. Your success is not dependent on how your children respond, as that is ultimately their decision. It is in your willingness to be there; to show up every day and do the difficult, thankless, ordinary work of loving them and letting them know that they matter that you succeed.
I can’t give Noah all the material stuff I think he deserves right now, but even if one day I can, I hope I never forget how excited he was today when I told him I would give him my total attention and a few minutes on the front lawn.
Moms and Dads, yes you will mess up, yes you will drop the ball, and yes your kids might indeed end up in therapy one day, but right now you can give them something priceless; something they will treasure more than gold or game systems when they are your age.
Give them your presence.
