An Audience Of One

It's so hard to discipline and feel like you are doing the right thing when you have an audience. Whether the audience is your family or friends, it's still really difficult.

And it seems there is no "right way" to do the right thing by your children and do you know how frustrated that makes me feel? I want concrete answers and how to's. I want an exact algorithm for raising happy, healthy children who are set up for success later in life.

I hate it when I lose my cool and yell at my kids. I hate it when I allow myself to get so frustrated that I forget who the two year old is! I really really hate it when I feel like I am not enough for the people who need me to be enough. I hate to feel like I'm failing.

Okay, there it is. I hate to feel like I'm failing - my children, my husband, my self. It sucks.

But you can only fail a test, something that there has been a bar set for. Where you have a least amount and a greatest amount possible to be earned. Instead, in parenting, we're just doing the best we can. I listen, I hear what my Father says, and then I give it a try. Sometimes I feel pleasure about the way a particular situation turns out and sometimes I feel despair. But in the end, it doesn't matter. I am enough for my children, with all of my faults, the way that the Lord, with all of His perfection, is enough for me.

One day they will grow and that dependence and need will be transferred to their Father. That is my goal.

I parent to an Audience Of One. His opinion of my skills is all that matters. He brings Chuck and I together on issues and He enables us to support one another. He gives me the insight when I sometimes lose it and act like the toddler instead of my children. He gives me the strength to start over and try again instead of running away. And running away is indeed what I have been tempted to do time and time again.

Instead, I stay and parent to My Audience of One.