Sweating the small stuff

Don’t sweat the small stuff! I remember my mother reading a book with the same title when I still lived at home. I had always thought I steered a rather good line past the minor issues of life, focussing on things of importance, but now I am not so sure...

It took a line from a film trailer to wake me up. The film was titled, ‘The Tree of Life’. The film has Brad Pitt in it, but my wife turned her nose up at it. The brief snippet involved a mother shouting after a father and son, who were walking away together. She yelled something to the father about teaching lessons their son could understand because he was only a child.

 
It struck me how often I try and get my children to get everything perfect all of the time. Many of those things being the small things like hanging up towels, not complaining about unpacking the dishwasher, cleaning their rooms, etc. I cannot believe how frustrated I become when they fail to get these things right. Perhaps it’s because the small stuff still goes wrong despite numerous repeated requests for change. Even more likely is that I have allowed the small stuff to take over my life. Where it has become more important for everything to be perfect and stay perfect.

Though strangely enough, I am not perfect at all...

The effort required to continuously focus on all of this stuff is enormous. The shouting, tempers, and frustration is ludicrous. I like consistency in the way things are done and in the way I discipline. Yet consistency for the sake of consistency is a rather pointless exercise.

My oldest son’s penchant for walking around without tying his shoelaces may be a minor safety issue but certainly will have no bearing on him growing up into a man of character, values, and love. As parents, we only have so much time with our offspring, surely it should be spent focussed on the things that will make a real difference in their future. As a parent with over ten years experience, I am continually surprised at how much I still have to learn.

Time to step up and let the little things go!