Posts Tagged ‘children’

October17

Making people happy, it’s good for them, it’s better for you!

By: RirianProject

I recently had a chance to go to two different events, although opposite in spectrum, at the end of the day they were really about the same thing, honoring and celebrating what you love and expressing how you feel about them. The first occasion I attended was a wedding; obviously, a day of celebration, a day to tell your new bride how much you love her, to tell your friends and family, and new family how much you love them, and a day to thank all of those who helped you get to this great day. All of the emotions were appropriate for a wedding, all of the emotions and love I am more than sure were sincere. All in all it was a great day filled with love and happiness as it should be. A few days later I unfortunately had to attend a funeral, a day that was not so happy, but in its own way a celebration none the less. It celebrated a life, and like the wedding there was an outpouring of emotion for this person, for all that he had done, for all that he had meant to his wife, children, nieces and nephews, friends and coworkers. And for all the differences in the emotions of these two days the similarities struck me even more. At the end of the day both events gave people a chance to express how they felt about someone or someone’s they loved.

After the funeral I started to wonder how often people really told the people they care about in their life how much they mean to them. I decided to run an experiment in my own life, I was going to show the people that mattered to me the most how much I cared. Now, I wasn’t going to run right home after the funeral and express to everyone my love for them, that is too obvious and too easy. Over the next few months I set a deliberate plan to let the people I care about know at the most inopportune times for me, how much I loved them. My first test was my wife, I had a day where I was particularly overwhelmed at work, made a huge mistake on a project I was working on, and felt that I had let all of my coworkers down. All I wanted to do was go home, have a drink, be left alone and sit and watch TV. Instead, I called my wife told her to get a babysitter, brought her flowers, made reservations at her favorite restaurant, and spent the entire evening letting her know I loved her, I appreciated the amazing job she was doing raising our children, admired the type of friend she was, and let her know just how lucky I felt. The evening was all about her, and for no particular reason.

Each time I felt down, for whatever reason, I repeated the same type of thing, with my children, my parents, my in laws and even coworkers. Whenever I felt overwhelmed or depressed about something I went out of my way to make someone I cared about feel special. The result? You can’t imagine the difference it made in my life. Not only did it take away my immediate unhappiness by giving to someone else, it made me a much happier person on a day to day basis. There is something incredibly freeing about letting the people you care about know it, and letting them know for no particular reason, no wedding, no funeral, no college graduation, just because. I am sure I made all of those people happy on the days I made the effort, I could see it in their eyes, I knew by the way they treated me afterward. But, however I made them feel, I promise I did not make them near as happy as I made myself by expressing my feelings. The old cliche it is better to give than to receive is never more true when expressing your feelings to the people you care about most.Give it a try, give to the people you care about when it seems the most difficult, and watch the difference in your own life.

Posted in: Self Improvement1 comments

July29

Understanding Anger and What It Makes of You

By: Ririan

Understanding Anger and What It Makes of You

Understanding Anger and What It Makes of You

I recently saw something I won’t soon forget. Two women stood in a parking lot, screaming and waving their arms around fighting over a parking spot. Even though there were plenty of other spaces available, they kept at it until they were reduced to name-calling. As their own children watched from the car, a crowd began to gather around. Needless to say, it had to be embarrassing to the kids – and it would soon be embarrassing to the ladies themselves, too.

Everybody gets angry. Sometimes it’s over something as simple as a parking space, while at other times the issues are more serious. However, anger in and of itself never gets anything done. It is simply us losing control of ourselves in heated situations. However, in its effect on ourselves, anger is only a letter away from danger – literally and figuratively. Acting out of anger can make us look immature and lose a variety of opportunities in life.

It would be unfair to simply judge the women in that parking lot because we will almost always act equally foolish at one point or another in our lives. Anger pushes us to do things we would normally think to stop ourselves doing. The effects are similar to being drunk, in that we often don’t see ourselves becoming angry, but all of a sudden, find that we are. Of even more concern is the fact that once we are angry, it can be hard to calm down before we do something we regret.

Identify what causes anger. Almost always, it boils down to someone not acting as we wanted them to. The point of this is that anger is a reaction, not an independent action itself. Try to think of any time you got angry and it showed, but had something good come of the situation, and chances are you’ll come up dry. You wouldn’t let someone else control you, but when you get mad, you’re letting your anger do just that. Above all, ask if what you are upset about will matter in a year, a month, or even a day.

How do you get rid of anger? By getting control over yourself. Try to model Buddha, who said “Holding on to anger is like holding on to a red-hot coal, you’re the only one who’s going to get burned.” Indeed, he was right. Anger only harms and never helps. Nobody benefits from anger, and it’s certainly not worth winning an argument. As much as you might want to do otherwise, it would help to simply try to bite your tongue.

Posted in: Self Improvement7 comments

July8

Three Reasons to be Yourself, Good, Bad, or Ugly

By: Ririan

Three Reasons to be Yourself, Good, Bad, or Ugly

Three Reasons to be Yourself, Good, Bad, or Ugly

As children, we are constantly told to “be ourselves”. Adults claim that we are unique and that the only one who can ever be us is us. For a time, we buy into it. Then we find ourselves smack dab in the middle of Junior High School. That’s the point in life where being ourselves isn’t good enough. We have to start being like other people. We look to role models, some of them our peers who, unbeknownst to us are desperately seeking for their own sense of identity. We forget how to be ourselves, and we learn quickly which secrets to tell and which secrets to keep.

By the time we are in our mid 20’s we are usually happy in our lives or else terribly miserable and usually that is based on the secrets we have chosen to keep. For up to ten years we wrestle constantly with the choice to tell our secrets or not to tell them. We find ways to indulge our private paradoxes; those things we enjoy despite being told we should not. All the while, we fear being caught and yet wish to live free. The funny thing about it is that we think we are alone. There is a reason that so few claim to love Barry Mannilow, but so many of us know every word to all of his songs. This is the time of life that the majority of gays and lesbians “come out of the closet”, and why so many others, unwilling to confess to being themselves find themselves in despondency, often to the point of suicide. All of this pain and sadness can be avoided, but first we need to find the value in choosing to be our complete and honest selves.

The primary reason that we need to simply be ourselves is that when we are anybody but ourselves, we can never truly know that anyone loves us. They love a put on version of us that isn’t truly the totality of who we are. To be anyone other than who we are with the people we love is not only fraudulent, but bases their love for us on a false premise. Depending on the secrets involved, some of the people we love might love us differently or not at all. This is of course, why we are so afraid of honesty, but it’s also why we must be honest. The fact is that if someone we know might not love us if they knew, then they already don’t love us truly. They simply don’t know it yet. You owe it to them, and to yourself, to force them to make a choice regarding their love for you and how they will manifest those feelings.

Secondarily, we need to be ourselves because the consequences of faking our way through life, lying about who we are leaves us short tempered, prone to depression, and overall unhappy. Unhappy people have unhappy lives. Choose happiness. Those who choose honesty find themselves happy. It’s amazing how often a gay, lesbian, or transsexual person will claim happiness that fell on them in waves the moment they chose to be honest and to act as their genuine selves.

The tertiary reason for being ourselves at the risk of personal expense is that when we present ourselves as flawless, others feel the need to appear flawless as well. When you are honest and forthright about who you are, you open the door for others to be honest with you. You offer those whom you love the liberty to reveal their secrets, to find happiness themselves, and that is a tremendous gift. You might lose some relationships as the result of your honesty, but you will likely find richness in your relationships like never before. Happy relationships make for happy people.

May you find your true happiness, true love, and truly open and honest relationships.

Posted in: Featured, Self Improvement7 comments

May21

Making A difference in an overwhelming world

By: Ririan

The world is an overwhelming place and it is changing faster every day. Pollution, wars, disease and famine ravage entire countries while individuals across the world are beset by violence, poverty, and a world that is generally indifferent to all of this. The world itself is even threatened through global warming and nuclear war.

Through all of this there is a natural human desire to help. A desire that can be held down by any number of reason but one of the most common is that the problems just seem to large. 30,000 children a day are dying from starvation, and more die in genocides and wars. There is simply nothing that can be done.

There is a story of a prudent businessman who worked near the beach. He would walk along the boardwalk each day and think about the world. He was an average man who understood the futility of trying to change the world.

One day as he walked out he noticed that the entire beach was filled with starfish. He didn’t understand why, but he knew they were going to die and as he walked along the boardwalk he watched them. He tried to imagine what anyone could do. He saw bulldozers pushing them back into the water but knew it was impractical.

Then as he walked he saw a young boy the boy was franticly running along the beach picking up starfish and hurling them back into the ocean. The businessman stopped and watched him for a moment and then walked down to talk to the young boy.

“There are too many, you’ll never make. A difference,” the businessman said as he approached the young boy.
The young boy grabbed another of the starfish from the beach looked at the man then threw the starfish as hard as he could into the water. “It made a difference for that one,” He said.

The story does not say what the businessman did with the lesson he learned. Some hear the lesson but it falls upon deaf ears, other hear but find other excuses. A few though understand the lesson and take it to heart and one of those men not only change the lives of those who they help, but those who understand why they are helping.

The world is an overwhelming place. The problems of this world cannot be solved by the richest or most powerful of men, and they certainly cannot be solved by us. Instead, we must learn a truth greater than that of the size of the world. We must learn that each time we choose to make a difference in a single life we save the world for that person.

Posted in: Self Improvement9 comments

March26

Your Developing Child

By: RirianProject

The first five years of a child’s life is extremely important. I’m sure that most parents or parents-to-be are aware of the different milestones by which the doctor’s will monitor the progress of their child, but how many people really understand what is happening in those first important years?

In the first three years alone, you can really think about your job as a parent as one in which you must build your child’s brain. The substantial amount of development that is taking place – including the formation of brain connections – is phenomenal.

Building your child’s brain is so much more than just having and introducing educational toys, or reading to your child. In addition to just teaching your child – colours, shapes, animals, etc – you must also address the emotional security and social interaction of your child. You’ll be teaching your child that he is a part of this world, and you’ll need to show him or her how to live within it. This type of teaching will give your child a solid footing early on, and will help him to thrive later in life – like when he or she goes to school.

Children also need to have their language skills nurtured. From the moment your child is born, it is very important to talk around your child – and to make a conscious effort to do so. Long before your child can begin to say, or even understand your words – it’s important to spend your days surrounding our baby with words. This doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to have the hottest new product for teaching your baby how to talk, it simply means talking to your child every day – all through the day – and ensuring the rest of the family is doing the same.

Doctors have narrowed down segments of time within your child’s first few years in which they seem to really “take on” a particular emotion or social issue. Knowing and understanding what your child’s theme is can help a parent to better understand and address their child’s needs.

In the first two years of life, a child is learning about his or her sense of security and developing language. Your baby will learn security when you come to him or her when they cry; by keeping them warm, dry, and fed; and by holding them. Speaking to your child throughout the day is very important – as is speaking to them in a soothing and cheerful way.

At the age of three, your child is focussed – and sometimes obsessed – with being with you. In those first three years, your child’s brain develops very rapidly. As they move from the “terrible two’s” most parents find their three year old to be a very cooperative and loving child who loves to spend time with their favourite grown up. Still inquisitive as ever, your child wants to learn how everything in the world works. You’ll notice a lot of “whys” at this age! Your child is able to understand language quite well, so now is the time to really capitalize on their good natured ways. Talk to them – learn about them – and most of all, love them!

At the age of four, your child’s world begins to expand as they prepare for school. As their ability to understand letters, numbers, and other such school related skills, they seem to be drawn in by any school-like activities. And at five, they are transitioning to a brand new stage of childhood as they enter kindergarten.


Photo Credit

Posted in: Uncategorized0 comments

© Copyright Ririan Project. All Rights Reserved.