Being Grateful and Admitting Our Mistakes

As I'm working on being more intentional and on controlling my grumpy tendencies, God has brought a lot of material across my path.

A book I recently started reading, 25 Ways to Communicate Respect to your Husband, mentioned being grateful.  When we express our gratitude for the blessings in our lives on a regular, consistent basis, it's harder to be discontent and therefore grouchy.  When we view our spouse, our kids, our home, our friends from an attitude of thankfulness - as the gifts from God they truly are - plus LITERALLY thanking God for them - we get much more "JOY" in them - even in the midst of irritating circumstances.  However, if we neglect such gratefulness we can easily become quite the opposite and the grumblies surface all the more.

Another aspect that I just read today on the blog 'The Better Mom' presented something that I think all us moms need to hear. Not only hear, but believe and accept.

In a nutshell:  we. are. not. perfect.

We all fall short.

We all 'blow it' - literally - when it comes to angry outbursts with our families.

However, it's what we do with this information; with these shortcomings that make or break us.

The blog post, 'Three Ways to Conquer the Inner Ugly' mentioned something that I have found to be SO useful; SO productive.

It's a concept Techno and I had learned from a parenting class when we were pregnant with our oldest child.

It's genius.

It's logical.

It's practical.

It's humbling.

When you 'explode' or are wrong in your words and actions....................................................................

Admit it!

Say "I'm sorry!"

What a lesson for our kids.  I think it's hard sometime for us moms - parents really - to ALLOW our kids to see us as 'imperfect'; not always all together.  To. Admit. We. Mess. Up!

But..... we do.  It's good for them to know that. To know that when you do blow it, you can make amends.  You can say "I'M SORRY!  I messed up.  I shouldn't have done that.  Please forgive me."

That way, WHEN they mess up in their own lives; with their own spouses; with their own kids; with their friends; they have a model -- a good model -- of how. to. make. it. better.

In addition, they realize WE (their mom and dad) are not perfect (which they really already know), but they also realize we don't THINK we're perfect. That we too need grace and forgiveness.  How much easier it will be for them to realize they too can have such wonderful gifts bestowed on them when they mess up.