Consistency
“Therefore, my beloved brothers, be steadiest, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord your labor is not in vain.” – 2 Corinthians 15:58
My kids can be black and white in their mood. They can be laughing and playing in one moment and then completely fall apart in the next. We can ask them to go to the stairs until they have a happy heart, and they can turn off the tears immediately. The only thing consistent about that behavior is that it happens more often than I would like. In talking about consistency this week, I definitely wanted to address this issue. To look at consistency, we started to take a look at opposites. I asked them to tell me the opposite of short, big, open, day, black, hot, loud, etc. I told them that opposites are like two extremes. That was a new word for them. I said it’s not being consistent if you are going between two extremes. I then asked them to make faces.
Really peaceful vs. really angry
Really happy vs. really sad
Really peaceful vs. really goofy
It was then my turn to act, and I acted really erratically. They thought I was hilarious because I was pretty extreme. However, I don’t think they recognize how close I was acting to their behavior sometimes. I was switching back and forth between some of the emotions above. I started explaining how sometimes they’ll be playing and then freak out but can get control of their behavior again if prodded. Right as I was explaining this and Kenzie was laughing about the lesson, Corban reached over and grabbed something of hers. She immediately freaked out. What a great opportunity to teach the very lesson we were trying to learn. You could almost see the light bulb go on. I wanted them to make sure they know it’s OK to feel, experience and express all of these emotions, but going back and forth in the extremes is no way to live. For the rest of the day, I’d call them out on consistency if they were demonstrating the dramatic behaviors.
