Take the family on periodic “spending fasts.”
As an exercise, go a day, a weekend or a week without spending any money. Make due with what you have.
Encourage participation. Tie in spending fasts with holidays, lent or in support of a cause.
Grandpa always said everything boils down to how you treat people.
Always treating people with kindness and respect is the most important lesson he wanted to get across to us.
“Your goals will kick you in the shins and steal your lunch money.” -Jon Acuff. You have to fight back, even though some days you lose. Failure is part of the process. Keep going.
Work the problem backwards. Start with the solution (desired outcome) and count down from there each step. Some steps will be small, some big. But you’ll get there!
Change always brings feelings of unease. It’s easy to confuse that feeling of unease with the feeling that something must be wrong. Give yourself time to adjust before deciding if a new thing is bad..
Other peoples’ expectations are the guard rails on the road. They keep you safe and guide you he way - literally. They keep you from driving off a cliff. So if you want to be safe, and if you do that’s great, stay within the guardrails. But if you want to fly, you’re gonna have to run right over them.
Read biographies. So much to learn and discover by reading about the lives of great men and women. Ducksters.com is a great resource. Amazon and The Learning Well also have great lists. Just Google "biographies for kids."
Share Brene Brown's short video on Empathy vs. Sympathy: Be the bear, not the goat. Fantastic 3 minute video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Evwgu369Jw&feature=youtu.be
“Whenever you think that some situation or some person is ruining your life, it’s actually you who are ruining your life. It’s such a simple idea. Feeling like a victim is a perfectly disastrous way to make go through life.”
— Charlie Munger
Grandpa didn’t drink coffee, but when he was in Korea he used to drink it just so he could hold the cup and keep his hands warm. (During the Korean War be enlisted in the Marines with a bunch of his buddies right after high school.)
Ask them to think of foods that taste good and also foods that make them feel good. Involve them in lunchbox decisions, dinner planning and prep, etc. so they’re empowered by their food habits.