I call my son for dinner, as agreed... Five minutes later, he’s still gaming.
That’s fine. I won’t remind him again - as agreed - and he’ll end up with a cold, hard pizza. “Natural consequences" as they say in parenting books: he’ll be upset, lesson learned. I feel good about my level-headed, no-fuss approach.
And it all goes to plan—except for one thing. He doesn’t get upset. And somehow, that annoys me. So I’m snappy and make him do all the cleaning, which, annoyingly, he does without complaint. Who’s the level-headed one now?
It makes me think about how emotions are contagious. Anger, frustration, excitement, even joy—sometimes they seem to want to be passed on. I wonder how noticing this could be useful: in parenting, work, or life in general. For a start, I might learn to be okay with cold pizza.
Author: JD
Image by Andreas Riedelmeier from Pixabay
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