Instant Gratification...or...No Long Range Plan

Sometimes you just want to scream and force your children to make the right choice instead of the stupid one.  They need to learn that in real life every choice has a consequence and it's not always a fun one.  But, sometimes it takes a lot of tongue biting to keep from making the choice for them.

Certain children in our home make EVERY choice based on what makes this moment better...don't care about later even when they know what will happen later for that choice...I want to scream 'Plan ahead!'  'Think Long Term!'

I can talk until I'm blue in the face about consequences and thinking before they act, and they will STILL choose five minutes of pleasure now over hours of suffering later.

A teacher who works with ADD kids explained to me how children (and adults) who are very right-brained, creative types have a problem with the concept of later.  The right sides of our brains have no concept of time...time is kept on the left side, so if you are in your right brain, there is need to worry about the random concept of later, because right now is all that exists.....

I still don't get it...how can you be given a choice-one you have all day to ponder-not some spur of the moment didn't really think it over thing....and STILL choose the choice that makes the next few days easier, but the whole next year difficult?  Don't you care?  Do you think it won't really happen? 

We've been listening to a parenting series called 'Loving on Purpose'. It's great.  It really makes me strive to be a better parent.  But being a better parent does not mean saving my kids from their mistakes, it means loving them even when they make mistakes.  It's about letting them learn from the choices they make, not trying to control their choices for them.  It's about trying to be more like the parent that God is to us...providing us with every opportunity, but allowing us freedom to make good or bad choices and walking with us no matter what mess those choices lead us into.  It's not easy.  And the author of the series swears that our kids will surprise us with their genius ability to make better choices when they've screwed up once...but so far, I'm not seeing it...

Please, please, please listen to our advice and learn to make choices that are good for the long run instead of providing yourself with instant gratification!!!

I will love you no matter what, but the choices you are making daily make no sense to me and I am not going to bail you out when they cause you to sink.  You will have to live with the consequences.