Should Parents Cast Vision to the Next Generation?
Quote of the Week
“There is nothing more admirable than when two people who see eye to eye keep house as man and wife, confounding their enemies and delighting their friends.”
-Homer
FAMILY INSIGHT
Does a Family Team Expect the Next Generation to Follow the Same Vision?
When are we giving too much vision to the next generation?
When are we giving too little?
This balance is difficult to get just right and requires being in constant relationship with your children.
The answer can even be different depending on which child you’re parenting.
Some of your kids are built to be radically aligned to the vision of previous generations while other kids are going to expand the family vision by exploring an entirely new vision.
On the latest episode of the Family Teams podcast, I discuss Derek England from Family ID the challenge of finding the right balance.
Jeremy
Family ID has a fantastic tool for assisting each family to discover their family’s personality. There are 16 types of families. Take their assessment to get a snapshot of your family’s identity along with a list of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats that may impact your type of family team.
ONE IMPROVEMENT
Parents today aim at making their kids happy.
But instead of asking if your child is happy, ask if you’d want the child you’re raising to raise your grandchildren.
If not, then there’s work to do.
When you’re raising your kids you’re raising your grandchildren at the same time.
This perspective provides the vision parents need to curb selfish patterns in their kids' character to prepare them for future fatherhood or motherhood.
CONTENT CORNER
Jeff recently jumped on the “De-Influenced” podcast to do a deep dive on family and to discuss his new book “Fighting Shadows”. Check out this fun and helpful conversation!
April and I walk through an encounter we had with a gay couple and their decision to hire a surrogate to have a baby. We wrestle with the ethics of this growing practice in the West.
I also host a podcast over at 1000 Houses and this week I had a conversation with my favorite disciple-making strategist Isaac Steckbeck. Isaac has a dynamic ministry in Israel and in SouthEast Asia and shares a fascinating perspective on why disciple-making movements succeed or fail.
PERSONAL REFLECTION
Sociologists have pointed out that today’s grandparents in the United States are the wealthiest generation in the history of the world.
But they are perhaps the generation that feels the least responsible for helping or partnering with their children in growing their own families.
This generational disconnect is an enormous tragedy.
You may not be able to change this upstream but you can make very different decisions downstream.
Prepare now to put yourself in the position to maximally support your kids not simply with their education but more importantly when they begin to have their own children.
Families were designed to help one another across the generations.
Jeremy