I Want To See My Child Fall

Every man has the right to risk his own life in order to save it.

Jean Jacques Rousseau

I’ll be the first to admit, I wasn’t an easy kid to deal with. I still remember the trouble I got in when I got home after my first school fight. My mother was furious. Her disappointed glare will forever be etched in my memory as she repeated over and over phrases like “Violence is never the answer” or “I raised you better than that,” and “Wait till your father comes home.” She didn’t take into account the fact that this was an older kid who constantly bullied me and my friends or the fact that I had already told a teacher about it. Keep in mind this was a long time ago, long before the whole anti-bully school programs and long before the “everyone’s a winner” mentality that is so common now days. Back then, “boys will be boys” was the norm for issues like these. That fateful day, the kid picked on the smallest one of my friends and I just reacted. All my mother could see was the black eye, the swollen lip, the ripped shirt, and my tainted school record.

As I waited in my room, grounded for life, I ran all the possible scenarios in my head of what would happen when my father got home. Just so you know, waiting for a punishment is a lot more torturous than the actual punishment. My father walked in, curiously calm compared to my mother. He just looked at me and asked a simple question. “Who threw the last punch?” The last punch? I was expecting to be asked who started the fight, not who ended it. Fearfully I admitted it was me. He looked at me and smiled proudly and left.

“What the hell?”

I had not realized it then, but the day of that fight I learned one very important lesson. I had the power to stand up for myself and for those around me. Sure, it meant I got hit hard several times and was grounded, but I realized that not standing up for myself because I was afraid of getting hurt means you are already hurting yourself. Backing down out of fear no longer became an option in my life.

Some of the best lessons my father taught me were actually the ones where he let me get over my head and get hurt. He saw me get climb the tree from which I fell and needed stitches. He saw me make that jump on my bike from which I fell and broke my arm. He saw me go out with a girl for which I fell in love and ended up with a broken heart.

He also saw me stand up afterwards, dust myself off and try again later; sometimes by my own volition and other times thanks to his “motivation” pep talks. (read as him asking if I was “done feeling sorry for yourself?”)

Back then, I just thought my father would let me get away with almost anything. Now that I am older and a father myself, I look back and realize it wasn’t that simple. He always looked out for me without me knowing. He would “make” me compete without my noticing, thinking it was my own idea. From those contests I not only learned that wining was awesome, but I also learned the humility that comes of defeat and the importance of trying again after said defeat. He gave me enough space let me get into trouble, knowing that the only way to grow old and wise is if you are first young and stupid first. He would make me “pay-up” for whatever “stupidity” I did (and there was plenty of that in my youth), never bailing me out. You learn accountability really quickly that way.

I never knew back then all the magic he worked behind his calm façade. As a father myself, I can only now relate to the self-control needed to keep yourself from going to your kid’s rescue, giving them an easy way out. Every time you do that, the person learns there is no responsibility for their actions and someone else will always be there to solve their problems. As a husband, I can only imagine the countless arguments he must have endured dealing with my mother’s overprotective nature, as he fought to keep me from being mollycoddled into an entitled spoiled brat.

I learned more from falling and failing and getting hurt than I did from any of my successes, as I was given the opportunity to learn that failure wasn’t fatal but not learning from it was. They also taught me that a life of not doing anything for fear of getting hurt or losing isn’t really a life. It’s merely an empty existence of underachievement as you lack the 'cojones' to get your act together. Life will constantly challenge you, and you are meant to meet them head on with your head held high and your chest out. Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose and sometimes you get hurt in the process of both. That’s life and if I want my kid to be strong enough to meet these challenges, I need to be strong enough to let him fall.

The Brotherhood Of Fatherhood

Being a father is a choice. Staying true to fatherhood is a duty.

Joan Ambu

Brothers, and I am honored to call you brothers, to you I raise my glass.

You have faced the most terrifying and exhilarating instant in your life, and stood firm in your position from the day you found out you would be a Dad. You might have stumbled from time to time, questioned yourself in every instant of solitude you have, questioned every action you have taken since that day. We all do, and will continue doing. This is the ultimate life path as it’s a journey that never has a final destination.

It will teach you respect as you teach respect.

It will teach you patience as you teach patience.

It will teach you perseverance as you teach perseverance.

It will teach you to be a better man as you teach someone to be a good person.

To you I raise my glass and call you my brother.

The Dad who can’t wait for his 8 hour shift to be over, just to see his kid.

The Dad who has taken on the challenges of a stay home parent.

The Dad who embraced being a father to someone else’s child.

The Dad who set aside any issues with his ex-spouse because… fatherhood.

The Man who chose to be a foster parent because someone needed a Dad.

The Dad who might no longer be with us, yet his memory still teaches us what a Father is.

I also raise my glass and call my brother,

The Mother who has taken it upon herself to be a father as well.

The Grandfather who came out of retirement when his grandkids needed a Dad.

The Older Brother who became a man the day he understood the importance of being there for his younger siblings.

And lastly I raise my glass and call my brother,

The Uncle, the coach, the teacher, the mentor, and every other man who has served as a father figure and male role model to every kid out there who needed a father at one time or another.

I am proud to call you all my brothers.

The Word Earned

Boys can make babies. It takes a man to raise them.

Oprah Winfrey

Dad. Really sounds like a simple word as it gets thrown around and stuck on every kind of cheap coffee mug, preceded with the phrase “World’s Greatest.” But is it really that simple? As the world changes, so has the image we expect from ourselves as Dads. No longer are we willing to accept our role as a simple provider or are we willing to be that bumbling idiot or the babysitter when mom’s not around. Now we are a parent, doing parent things with our own dad flare. So if you are expecting to receive that coffee mug, you damn better take action to earn that prefix before the word Dad.

How do you do that?

By realizing that fatherhood isn’t a label attached thanks to having children. It comes attached with the actions you take because you have kids.

It’s not about being able to buy them a bike, but taking the time to teach them how to ride it. It’s about taking the time to read them a bed time story when all you want to do is go to bed yourself. It’s about all the games you don’t miss and the plays you attend instead of the lessons you paid for. It’s about all the homework and school you do together and not about all the tutor fees you can pay. It’s not about being able to post magazine worthy images of your kids in social media, but about living a storybook worthy life with your kids.

It’s about that costume you made or the fieldtrip chaperoning you did. It’s about understanding that bad grades and bad behavior isn’t a sign of a bad kid, but a call for help about some other issue. It’s about willing to look for answers and understanding instead of worrying what will the neighbors think. It’s about putting aside whatever issue you have with the child’s mother as you place priority on the child. It’s about willing to drop everything and relocate if needed to make sure the kid has a better chance at life. It’s about making sure you talk WITH them, not TO them.

Do any of these actions guarantee a “good” kid? No, but it sure improves their chances.

And that is what being a Dad is all about. It’s about giving your kid a chance to be a better man or woman in a world bent on breaking them. It’s about letting them know that no matter what, they can count on you. It’s about letting them know that even if they don’t yet believe in themselves yet, you do.

Paradox of Fatherhood, #DadUp

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They came through you but not from you and though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

Khalil Gibran

One of the first lessons a father has to learn is that his son is his own person, that we cannot expect them to simply be a do-over of who we are. They will grow up with their own interests, their own dreams and their own desires. And we, as fathers, should respect these dreams as they are the stuff that will fuel the man your son is meant to be. This means giving them the space to spread their wings and make their own mistakes. Even if we say we don’t want to force our sons to continue your journey where you left off, we have to be careful and weary of our actions and approvals. How often do you tell him he is his own person, yet your reactions and encouragement say something else?

As a father, this is not always easy.

So, if your son is not to follow suit on your experience, what can you teach him? When your son’s road is completely different from your personal experience, how can you be there for him? How can you guide your son without telling him who to be? Simple. Show him what kind of man he should be.

We tend to tell our sons how to act, how to behave, yet our own actions are far from what the expectations we place on them. How can you tell them to be honest, yet we constantly lie to those close to us. We tell them that stealing is wrong, yet we do it every time we can in the way we conduct our business and do our taxes. We tell them to stand up to the bully, yet we remain seated and silent when confronted with injustice. We tell them never to be an abuser, yet will take any opportunity place in front of us as a way to strut our own power over others. We constantly teach under the ideology of “do as I say, not as I do.” There’s a word for this kind of behavior.

Hypocrite.

If you want a son who is honest, show him what an honest man looks like. If you want him to stand for himself, show him what a man standing looks like. If you want a son who grows up into a man you can be proud of, be a man he can be proud of. Stop telling your son who he needs to be, but rather show him the kind of man you want him to become.

Whatever path he chooses after that, he will walk it with the character and virtues founded on the example you set. Sure, he might not become a doctor, or a ball player, or your heir to the family business. What he will be is a man who can make the world a little better than it was before. I think that is something the world needs more off.