Content

At 2:00 in the morning, I started having a coughing fit and it woke me up.  Brand was laying in bed next to me watching TV, and we ended up staying awake until 4:30 chit-chatting.

We talked about a myriad of subjects, but we inevitably (as we always do) ended up talking about our kids.

Obviously as the years go by, you become concerned about different things.

We've been out of the baby/toddler/preschooler phase for a long time…we'll be back there soon enough!  But I've been thinking a lot lately about what exactly my ultimate role is as a parent and what things are important to me and what things really don't matter.

I think it's important to be able to constructively criticize your kids, to let them know you're proud of them, to be honest with them, to realize that they're not always going to agree with you and that they're going to make mistakes, and to help them have realistic view of the world.

Having realistic expectations was something that took me a long time to learn.  The world is filled with corruption and injustice, and life is not fair.  We all have to deal with it.  I don't want to raise spoiled, entitled brats.  I want to raise responsible, considerate, gracious adults.

Even though there are days that I want to pull my hair out, I'm to a point where I'm really happy.  I am by no means perfect.  I'm still paying for past mistakes and making new ones all the time, but I think I'm doing okay.

Being content is a good place to be.

Word, Abe.