The Self-Driven Child
Rating: 10/10
Review: This book is extremely informative. The authors address many things parents want advice on, including:
- technology use,
- anxiety,
- learning disabilities,
- standardized tests,
- college decisions, and more.
I took lots of notes, but here are 4 points from the book I loved:
- Make enjoying your kids a top parenting priority. Your kid needs to feel the joy of seeing your face light up when you see them because you are genuinely happy to spend time with them. This has a powerful effect on his/her self-esteem. It helps your children become JOY-producing people. If you don’t enjoy your children, reflect on why. Are you angry? Under pressure from work? In a difficult marriage? Reflect and do you best to work on the barriers that are keeping you from enjoying them.
- Look for opportunities during the day to let your mind wander. This could mean just sitting quietly for a few minutes looking out the window or at the clouds. It could mean engaging in activities you do mindlessly.
- Talk as a family about the importance of going off-line and giving yourself truly free time. Tell your kids that it’s only when they aren’t focused on anything in particular that they can really think about others and themselves.
- Always know your kids passwords to their device(s). If you are paying for the phone, make it contingent on them being respectful online and putting it away at night.
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When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I couldn’t stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learned in seven years.
Mark Twain.
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Bear Town by Fredrik Backman
Rating: 7/10
Review: A novel about hockey. The setting is a hockey town; the characters live and breathe hockey. I recommend this book to those of you who…(shocker) love hockey.
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The Wise Woman Knows by the Help Club for Moms
Rating: 10/10
Review: A wonderful devotional written by moms, for moms.
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The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom
Rating: 10/10
Review: This is one of my favorite books of all time. It’s the biography of Corrie Ten Boom. Her family helped countless Jews during WW2 and ended up in a concentration camp. It’s a beautiful story of survival, forgiveness, and redemption.
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What have you been reading this month? Leave me a comment!
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