LYH66: How to Raise Your Children to be Leaders (Part 3) [Podcast]

Play

Show Agenda

  • Featured Presentation: How to Raise Your Children to be Leaders (Part 3)

Featured Presentation

Welcome to this final part in this series on raising your children to be leaders. In the first two parts, we examined what it takes as parents to develop children who are leaders in their generation. And, we have discussed the importance of having an individualized lens as we train our children—adapting our efforts to  their unique gifts. The first two lessons focus on the action that we are encouraged to take in training our children. This final part, however, helps us as parents to accept or live with the choices our children make and the direction God moves them.

In our feature scripture (Proverbs 22:6), we parents are instructed to “Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.”

The final part of this verse  is the payoff. Ultimately, taking a healthy stance toward your child’s own leadership development may best be accomplished through 10 best practices that encourage the psychological and relational maturation necessary to become the leader that God has ordained.

10 Best Practices to Help Your Child to Spiritually Mature

  1. Show love
  2. Maintain a long-term perspective
  3. Stay present in the moment (appreciate life’s seasons)
  4. Don’t overreact
  5. Adapt your style of engagement to their life stage (Know when to let go)
  6. Be a guidepost (stay consistent)
  7. Pray for them daily
  8. Encourage incremental improvement
  9. Give yourself grace (forgive yourself)
  10. See yourself as a student (you are developing as a leader too)

I’d love to hear what you have taken from this series. Which of these things do you find easiest and most difficult to implement? Leave a comment.

Get your FREE copy of the “10 Proven Steps to Extraordinary Influence” at haroldarnold.com

Please do me a huge favor and click HERE to go to iTunes and leave me a rating and review. It will only take 2 minutes of your time. And, it means so much to me. And, just for you, I’ll give you a shout out on the next show.

LYH65: How to Raise Your Children to be Leaders (Part 2) [Podcast]

Play

Show Agenda

  • Featured Presentation: How to Raise Your Children to be Leaders (Part 2)

Featured Presentation

The duty of parenting is to create a leadership culture in your home. In Part 2 of this three part series, we closely examine the importance of tailoring this leadership planning based on your child’s gifts. Based on the biblical guidance in Proverbs 22:6, parents are instructed to”Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it.” In Part 1, we examined the first part of this instruction. This episode dives deeper in examining a key qualifier in how a parent is to train up a child—which is based on knowing “the way he should go”.  This qualification is critical because it gets to the uniqueness of your child. You cannot employ a same size fits all approach to parenting.
Here are the five ways to train up a child in the way he should go.
  • Step 1: Follow the signs
  • Step 2: Support core subjects
  • Step 3: Focus on strengths
  • Step 4: Push more social
  • Step 5: Embrace the struggle
Be sure to tune in next week for part 3 of this series where we will focus on the final part of this verse, “and when he is old he will not depart from it”.  Looking forward to sharing these insights with you.

Get your FREE copy of the “10 Proven Steps to Extraordinary Influence” at haroldarnold.com

Please do me a huge favor and click HERE to go to iTunes and leave me a rating and review. It will only take 2 minutes of your time. And, it means so much to me. And, just for you, I’ll give you a shout out on the next show.

LYH29: 10 Practices for a Dad to Maximally Influence His Daughter [Podcast]

Play

Show Agenda

  • My Week in Review
  • Featured Presentation: 10 Practices for a Dad to Maximally Influence His Daughter
  • Resource: Strong Fathers, Strong Daughters by Meg Meeker (affiliate link)

Featured Presentation

You can find the full blog post on this topic at haroldarnold.com/dadsanddaughters

Ten Practices for Father’s to Maximize His Influence on His Daughter 

  • Practice #1: Spend quality time with her
  • Practice #2: Hug her often
  • Practice #3: Tell her how beautiful she is
  • Practice #4: Listen to her talk
  • Practice #5: Encourage her gifts rather than role stereotypes
  • Practice #6: Teach her how to love well
  • Practice #7: Protect her from abusive interactions
  • Practice #8: Validate her options as a homemaker and/or career woman
  • Practice #9: Treat her mother well
  • Practice #10: Show her faith

So there you have my ten best practices for a father to maximally influence his daughter’s life.

We have a tremendous opportunity and responsibility to guide our daughter’s lives from the earliest days of their lives. It is a duty that cannot be outsourced. Only you can be her father. Only you.

I’d love to hear what other practices you would add to this list and hear your comments about my ten. So, definitely leave a comment and let me know.

Now, go be a great dad. Leave me a comment and let me know how you or your husband connect with your daughter.

Click HERE to  leave a rating or review of the episode on iTunes. It tremendously helps the show.

How to Truly Apologize and Recover Your Relationship

There is a lie that we learn as early as kindergarten. We even have a little song to help cement it in our consciousness. “Sticks and stones may break my bones. But, words will never hurt me.” It’s meant to help anesthetize us from hurtful encounters with other children and help us develop “thicker skin”. And, yes, it may indeed serve that purpose to some extent. The problem, however, is that as we age, we forget the tremendous power that words do have. They can give pleasure. But they also can hurt. Very deeply. Often worse than sticks and stones. In fact, when even one negative exchange happens, research shows that it takes as many as five positive ones to offset it. We see then that words not only have power. But, that negative words are actually more powerful than positive ones. When you find yourself having offended someone important to you with your words, here are five phrases that show you how to truly apologize–a key step to restoring the relationship.

Since 1862, appearing first in an African Methodist Episcopal Church publication called the Christian Recorder, the famous “sticks and stones” phrase has become intertwined in the American lexicon. More recently psychologist Dr. John Gottman, in his work with couples has found that it takes a ratio of five positive exchanges to counterbalance one negative exchange. In fact, it is this ratio that Dr. Gottman and his team can predict with 94% accuracy which married couples will divorce and which will survive. But, the principle of the five to one ratio extends far beyond just marriages. It is the nature of being human-certainly in Western culture.

Whether we are talking about relationships between husbands and wives, parents and children, friend to friend, or co-worker to co-worker, the reality is that hurtful words will happen. Negative exchanges can happen even in good relationships. Sometimes, it happens because we speak without thinking. Other times, we let our emotions get the best of us. Still other times, we react before understanding the full context of the situation. The end result is that we damage the relationship, usually without intending to do so. There is distance and friction.

10 Habits for Raising Academically Successful Kids

I enjoy the summer. It is a good time for family outings, more relaxed schedules (relatively speaking), and no homework. As summer winds down and Fall approaches, it’s time to turn our attention to school matters again. It’s fun—full of hustle and bustle. There is the excitement of new school clothes, getting those school supplies, and making sure all the school-assigned summer reading has been completed. And, then its finally here, the first day of school.

I have a routine with my daughter, Kyrsten, now a high school senior. The first day of school is always a picture in front of the house. Yes, that’s her in the picture above. So, yes, it is a fun few days with the feeling of another “new beginning”. But, preparing your children to return to school is more than a new hairstyle, shiny new boots, and a backpack. Too often in our zest to check items off the “Back to school” list we miss the one most important element—attitude. We need our children to return to school with a success mindset. The mindset is the difference between excellence and average. Though it can be difficult with our harried lifestyles and often disinterested kids, every parent has the responsibility to fully invest in the child’s success mindset for school. What grade would you give yourself?

I have two children. I’m proud of them. My kids are very different in personality, extracurricular interests, academic strengths, and study habits. I play around with them a lot—acting silly. But, they both know when it comes to education I’m a dictator. They think I’m crazy. They’re right. But, the right kind of craziness pays dividends. 

My son, Quilan, is now a 3rd year graduate student at Ohio State University. During secondary school years, my son was the athlete with a penchant for science and math. He was selected by Concerned Black Men as their Student of the Year during his senior year. He graduated high school with a 3.8 GPA and a full merit-based scholarship to Penn State University. Now he is on a graduate assistantship at Ohio State University that pays his tuition and gives him a monthly stipend.

My daughter, Kyrsten, is artistic (writing, photography) with a more liberal arts bent. She has a 4.1 GPA. She’s ranked in the top 11% of her class in a highly competitive class in a Philadelphia suburban high school. With two years of high school left, she has already been captain of the dance team and active in several other extracurricular clubs. She’s been selected twice to represent the Philadelphia chapter for National Black MBA Leader’s of Tomorrow business case competitions held in Boston and Houston. She has already identified her preferred college (Bentley University) and has been cultivating a relationship with the admissions representative. She will get a full academic scholarship somewhere (hopefully Bentley).

I give you this background on my kids to make a single point—academic excellence is a priority in our home. My wife and I have worked since they started elementary school to instill a success mindset in our children—particularly as it applies to school performance.

So, as we start another school year, I encourage all parents to reinforce these 10 habits into your own home. I believe that most of these habits are important for all homes. But, they are particularly important for those parents who have college aspirations for their children.