Be Careful What you Say!

This photo from "All About Women" has inspired today's blog entry:

I had wonderful parents growing up, in fact five of them because my three siblings were teenagers when I was born.  I always knew I was loved, and was taught the important values of family, and respect of self and others. Many of the words from those formative years molded the person and Mother I am today.
I adored my older siblings, but they were kids themselves during my early years and some of their words have affected my life all of my 44 years. "Stop chewing like a cow!" grew up to sound like this in my self talk; "you are fat and eat too aggressively!"    I also remember being a very chatty child and it was not unusual for me to hear "could you stop talking for 5 minutes??!!" - making me wonder if what I had to say was important to anyone.

I also remember always being asked "did you do your best?" If I didn't get the highest grade on a report card, or win a competition, I would be asked, "did you do your best?"  What a gift that was, because it taught me to compete with myself and give my best effort for my own sake.

As a Mother of my own two children, I try to be the best role model I can - the best of what I had as a child and more, if possible. Because I am a passionate person, sometimes my words come out more harsh than I would like. I have a chatty daughter and while trying to concentrate on writing or work, I have caught myself telling her to "shhhh" or saying "please be quiet or go to another room". I spend a lot of time backtracking, apologising and trying to show them that mistakes are made, sometimes the wrong thing said but it is never too late to try to fix it.

The picture from "All About Women" and it's message have reminded me today to put myself in my kids' shoes. Once again, one of those old sayings shows its relevance today. I want my kids to feel that their thoughts are important to me, and encourage them to always share them. Funny how when they are babies, we work so hard to get them to talk, then as children we want them to be quiet. When they become teenagers, once again we work hard to get them talk and interact - to keep them safe and stay a part of their lives.

My lesson for today - I need to be mindful of my words and actions around my children and ask myself how what they see and hear might affect them. Don't know if this made any sense to you or rang true in your own life but today, it was a good reminder for me ....

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