Soul Food for Teachers June 2009

An excerpt from The Catholic Vision for Leading Like Jesus by Owen Phelps, Ph.D.

In the Family: Prove It to Yourself in Just a Minute

To confirm that actions speak louder than words, try a little experiment. It takes just a minute. During this minute you should close your eyes, sit back, and relax. But first, read the next paragraph.

• Here’s how to spend your minute: Think about your relationship with your parent who has had the greatest influence on your life. If both have had an equal influence, pick one arbitrarily. Imagine yourself with that parent. Where are you? What are you doing? Mentally envision the scene. What do you notice? Describe to the sights, smells, and sounds. What do remember most about this parent? What do you appreciate most? What really stands out? Think about his or her lasting impact on you. What matters most about them?
• Now close your eyes for about a minute and begin the exercise. You can have someone time you, set a timer, or just estimate the time. When you are done, open your eyes and read the next paragraph.
• Now ask yourself: Was I thinking about things my parent said to me or things my parent did? Did I recall things they told me or the sacrifices they made, the cheerfulness they displayed, the affection they shared, the focus they had, the pies or cookies they baked, the love they gave me, the confidence they showed in me? After you have thought about this, read on.

I have been conducting this experiment for years, and except for two very special cases, the answer has always been the same. We remember what our parents did. We remember how they lived.

Isn’t that surprising? After all, good parents are giving directions constantly. “Do this! Don’t to that! Yada, yada, yada.” Yet what sticks and continues to shape our lives long after our parents are gone is not so much what they said, but what they did. (In fact, if what they said contradicted what they did, we rejected their advice as hypocritical.)

If you are a parent who fears that your children don’t listen to a thing you say, this new awareness may give you some consolation and reason to hope for the future. It’s not your words so much as your deeds that matter to your children.

Of course, if your behavior needs improvement, there’s no better time to work on it than right now — before it does further harm shaping your children’s long-term development.

Click here to order Leading Like Jesus by Owen Phelps, Ph.D. ( 144 pages, hardcover, $14.95 plus S&H)»