Several years ago when Emma and Max were small, I heard that on average, fathers spend 5 minutes per day with their kids. This seemed impossible.
Yet this morning, after being away all last week, while Patty & the kids were having breakfast, I was answering email.
Why?
Partly just habit now… maybe it grew from a pattern of mine: When I feel overwhelmed, I retreat and make myself busy. When there’s “too much going on” (ie, normal family chaos), I retreat to the office and get on the computer…and maybe now I’m just used to hanging out at my desk?
But I have this sense of the window closing – the time when the kids WANT to be with me is growing shorter – and I’m feeling a bit sad and anxious about this. Those important, valuable, unpleasant feelings are leading me to wonder about the choices I’m making.
As I wrote in my Heart of Leadership book, of all the “hats” I wear, the one that feels most significant to me is “daddy.” But at the same time I recognize that I short-change that role as I allocate the hours of my day. I believe I am a good father, and my kids seem to be wonderful — complex — challenging — strong — amazing — people.
And I fear that they’ll grow up and say, “Our dad is a good person, it’s just too bad he was gone so much.” I hope they’ll say, “We admire how he was always committed to making a difference and sacrificed to make the world better…” But this is a fine line, and I’m not sure I’m able to land firmly on the latter.
I just added a line to our home page about making a positive difference — everywhere, all the time. To me that’s the commitment and promise of EQ. By using this intelligence, we are, every one of us is, able to add love, hope, possibility, vision, and energy (to make a positive difference) in every interaction, in each moment, in every sphere of our lives (everywhere, all the time). And, as I think about how I’m spending my time, I wonder: is there enough to go around?
It’s a rainy day here on the California coast. I’m home in front of the fire listing to Jack Johnson. And in this kind of quiet moment, I am totally confident there is — there is enough, there is abundance. The challenge, I suspect, is to hold onto this certainty amidst all the “noise” that comes into the small moments.
My boy just came home — so I’ll get off the computer now!
Joshua Freedman
Part of the Six Seconds' founding team, Josh is one of the world leading experts on emotions, change, and performance. One of a handful of people with proven experience creating organizational performance through EQ, Freedman leads a world-wide network of EQ change agents. (sd)
Hi Joshua,
Appreciated your comments as a Dad. My son is in early thirties but when he was a small kid, I had a scheduled time with him each evening when possible,which helped me a lot.
Quite a few years ago I found myself saying to myself, “wherever you are,Be there”. Again, not easy,smile, but the schedule and the self directed verbal reminder are helps to do our hearts desire. Warmly, Alan
Hi Josh,
Balancing parenting and work roles is and will always be tricky. I was a single mom for a time in my children’s lives and I had to work and be a mom at the same time. They had no one else but me.
I believe the quality of the relationship and the constant conversations whether on the phone or face-to-face and we have even learned to talk using instant messaging(now that they are in college)really helped in strengthening the emotional bond and their self-confidence.
My sons, now 21 and 23 have become my best friends.
Hi, Josh.
I have 8 years daughter and this 4 March is her birthyda. I agree with Gig for Emotional Bonding every time we get home.
Your story is inspiring me that reflect myu life as well.
Touched a nerve Josh, I have felt the same myself recently as my two young children and I come to terms with our family unit being broken up; I have never been more aware of ‘being there’ in the shortened time I now have with them.
My son, Harvey is a mad on Spiderman right now and just last weekend we were watching the film and a extract heightened my awareness of my struggle to maximise my impact as a human, it said ‘with great power comes great responsibility’. Wow I thought, id never want to look back on my life and think I could have done more with my ability and knowledge. I am certain that this passion for helping others provides a good role model for him and he recently said he ‘loves me more than Play Stations’; so I must be doing something right.
I say plan, not just time but development with your children and play full out all the time, no matter who you are with – It doesn’t spend energy it creates more of it.
Mark
Josh,
To say I was moved and perhaps inspired by your story is an understatement. I do not have children so I am looking at this from an outside of the snowglobe perspective. There are two ideas here that fascinate me. The first being the manner in which you “confessed” your realizations of how you could be better. A more attentive parent, more in the moment, a better role model for your kids and family. I believe the only true power we have is the ability to realize that we are not perfect and take steps to fix what could be better. There is freedom in confessing – or owning up to things.
The second idea is what you have stated at the end of your article. “Making a positive difference everywhere – all of the time.” That certainly puts it into perspective, doesn’t it? Social and Emotional Learning can happen anywhere at anytime and it’s teachings should not be absent in any part of us. An overwhelming idea at best – but the truth. If we absorb EQ and let it seep into our every day and touch our every person, that is when we can make the positive differeneces – even if we are unaware of it.
Thanks for letting us inside your story. (Jack Johnson IS good for reflection!
)
Jennifer
Thank you all for the comments!
It seems to me that in “times like these” when so many of us are stressed by the daily bad news and all the uncertainty of the economy, that it becomes both harder and more important to step back and reflect so we can take charge of what we can make better.
Warmly,
- Josh
Dear Josh,
Great to read from you after such a long time.
Indeed I am a regular visitor to your website and had read the initial piece you put few days ago. I then wondered how similarly we are afflicted by the malice called time constraint that seems to eat up into the time we have for our families.
Just as I was reading your piece, my four year old daughter was standing by my side with her notebook asking “Daddy, can you please help me draw this flower?” Then she asked “Daddy, what is 19 minus 5?”. I then quickly took off my eyes from the computer to assist her.
I do recall that in 2004 when my wife was pregnant with her and the labour pains seemed to be on and off I was faced with the decision of having to travel for an official duty about 800km away. Since we lived within the hospital premises I took the decision to travel and advised her to move over to the maternity ward if/when the pains increase. I then travelled. This did not seem to go down well with my wife. By the time I was 600km already on the trip, she sent me an sms that the girl had arrived. By the way my wife is a professional Nurse.
I came back from the trip after three days and she still did not look happy. When I carried the baby and the baby cried my wife made a comment that it’s because you abandoned her when she was coming into the world that she is crying. I felt very guilty then though I talked to my baby that I could not have and will never abandon you.
Such are the challenges that we as fathers have to juggle and ensure we make a positive difference in the lives of our family members and all those we come in contact with.
Keep up your excellent work
Warm regards
Ebong
Your commentary caught my attention because the underlying force in my life has been the growth of personal consciousness, and so I greatly appreciate other’s attempts to stop for a moment and take a look at what really is going on. As a matter of fact I am usually astonished when I meet people who even attempt to do that.
From my perspective I see way too many hours of our lives spent trying to beat a system that past generations have developed and passed on to subsequent generations. This system contains it’s own rules for happiness and sadness, success and failure, and we learn early on how to respond. We were taught the system in such a way that for us it is reality and not man made. Thankfully the human heart cannot be fooled – it is not man made, has it’s own clear understanding, maintains it’s own voice and knows precisely what makes it satisfied – and nothing can change it. To even attempt to hear what our heart is saying is a monumental feat in this day and age as most people don’t see economic value in doing so- and they are right!
Satisfying the heart can make someone happy but not necessarily put money in the bank. Unfortunately responding to the heart is not as optional as we seem to think. Unless we take time to do so, the feeling that something is unaccomplished will continue to nag no matter how accomplished we become in our self created system.
Interesting dilemma. Either spend an entire life trying to win the game and ignore the heart, or listen to ourselves and get satisfied for real. Not that both can’t be done, but we have to admit that the two are far from balanced, and it is almost always the heart that is sacrificed. To listen to our heart is our choice and is the one real battle that every human on the planet faces not only every day- but every moment they are alive no matter what their culture, religion or ethnicity.
Pretty awesome.
Josh, your honesty always warms my heart. Thank you.
Josh, I have many echoes as a father and parent similar to yours. Not only was this a struggle for me as father, but the situation you write of is a frequent topic among fathers I have known and worked with.
This same topic about fathering/parenting for me also is parallel to attending to my own self-care, recognizing that this overlaps with parenting. How do I establish the balance of desired attention to myself as well as to my children, my spouse, and “work?
Josh,i feel i am constantly facing the same issue, i am always questionning my self if i am a good mam or not, am i spending enough time “quailty time with my kids”, am i present physically but not in my mind and feelings and thoughts.
after attending the EQ certification course and reading in 6seconds site, i stated putting as strategy for the way i deal with my kids.
I am asking my kids more about their feelings. i play with them physcially in the park ” and i am enjoying this so much”
I found it interesting yesterday reading to my little 3 years old angelina a story that has shows feelings of exchitment, saddness, fear and i love to watch my daughter face changing as my voice and facial expression change to express each feeling.
EQ is amazing and being more aware of my emtions surely makes me a better parent and a better manager.
all the best EQ surely is a life changing experience
so, i have 2 kids. one is just 6 weeks old. all that i can say is thank you. it is 1:40 am and i am going to go hold my baby daughter. thanks.