Growing Up Joyfully

It's joyful to give. But for people who want to take advantage of you, you're kind of an easy mark.

To pursue joy is to lose it. The only way to get it is to follow steadily the path of duty, without thinking of joy, and then, like sheep, it comes most surely, unsought. Joyfulness keeps the heart and face young.

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A good laugh makes better friends with ourselves and everybody around. Style is joyful if you allow yourself to have joy. Find a place inside where there's joy, and the joy will burn out the pain. Joy is what happens when we allow ourselves to recognize how good things are. Joy is not necessarily what happens when things unfold according to our plans. Your path to it is through anything that replaces thinking with pure flight, pure joy. The journey is all that there is, and it can be very, very joyful.

Joy is not the absence of suffering.

It is the presence of God. More on active listening and labeling and how hostage negotiators use this here. We can overcome that with good habits. Thinking through these methods is taxing but acting habitually is easy, once habits have been established. How do you help kids build lasting happiness habits? Carter explains a few powerful methods backed by research:. More on developing good habits here.

Self-discipline in kids is more predictive of future success than intelligence — or most anything else, for that matter. Kids who better resisted temptation went on to much better lives years later and were happier. This is at least in part because self-discipline facilitates learning and information processing. In addition, self-disciplined kids cope better with frustration and stress and tend to have a greater sense of social responsibility. In other words, self-discipline leads not just to school success and sitting nicely at the dinner table but to greater happiness, more friends and increased community engagement.

Help kids learn to distract themselves from temptation. One way to do it is to obscure the temptation—to physically cover up the tempting marshmallow. When a reward is covered up, 75 percent of kids in one study were able to wait a full fifteen minutes for the second marshmallow; none of the kids was able to wait this long when the reward was visible. More on increasing self-discipline here.

Category: growing up

We read a lot about mindfulness and meditation these days — and both are quite powerful. Most kids already practice mindfulness — fully enjoying the present moment — when they play. Researchers believe that this dramatic drop in unstructured playtime is in part responsible for slowing kids cognitive and emotional development… In addition to helping kids learn to self-regulate, child-led, unstructured play with or without adults promoted intellectual, physical, social, and emotional well-being.

Unstructured play helps children learn how to work in groups, to share, negotiate, resolve conflicts, regulate their emotions and behavior, and speak up for themselves. No strict instructions are necessary here: Budget more time for your kids to just get outside and simply play. More on the power of playing for kids and adults here. Your efforts will be constrained by time and effort, while context affects us and children constantly.

• The Times and The Sunday Times 2012/2013 Football Opus.
• Step 2: Teach Them To Build Relationships.
• Deaf Eye Ministry.
• Joyful Sayings and Quotes.
• Duty.
• Parenting With Respect!

Sociologists show that happier people tend to watch considerably less television than unhappy people. But we do know that there are a lot of activities that will help our kids develop into happy, well-adjusted individuals.

More non-television happiness activities are here. Sometimes all science does is validate those things our grandparents knew all along. Yes, family dinner matters. Studies show that kids who eat dinner with their families on a regular basis are more emotionally stable and less likely to abuse drugs and alcohol. They got better grades.

Kids — Joyfully Growing In Faith

Tears pinged my eyes as I smiled at her. Every day I get to watch you grow a little more beautiful. You are growing into the most beautiful person I know. She smiled wistfully as she rested her head on my shoulder. She needed to hear these words. I needed to say these words and remember that as my child grows, I can help her not just to grow up, but to grow beautifully and the first way I can do that is to acknowledge her. Put her first when it counts. Slow down and listen. See what it is she is trying to tell me. And show her love.