Why George Washington?

   When it comes to parenting methods, raising a George Washington is a wonderful thing to discuss. In my many years of working with delinquent youth, I knew I was in for trouble whenever the kids were really bored. Those type of children tended to be naturally angry kids, anyway, and when they got bored it almost always led to big trouble. In some ways, it is the same with families. Your kids might not break the windows or burn down the house, but during these times you still go backwards in your battle to raise your child to be all they can be.

   I have found that the best defense for situations like this is a good offense. Get a project in mind. Be aggressive with better ideas for things your family can do. That is the best way to fight boredom, rather than the problems that boredom produces. As I have said many times before, when everyone is fighting over a dirty old bone, it's time to get out the steak. You'll never get arguments with that kind of an exchange. Besides that, raising kids is sort of like cooking meals: the better the ingredients, the better the outcome.

   Raising someone like George Washington isn't easy. But look what he amounted to. Talk about successful! It was amazing to me to find out that George started when he was a boy with 110 Rules for Civility. Those rules domineered his entire life, and played a big part in producing one of the most successful people to come out of the eighteenth century. What were those rules? They cover a wide range of topics from personal manners to relationships with other people. We thought it might be an interesting project to take a look at one of them right here on the blog every Friday, beginning tomorrow.

   Then we decided to go one step further and practice the rule in our own homes throughout the following week, and then talk about whether or not we noticed any significant changes. Sort of a “Raising George Washington Project” that we can all participate in together. Why? Because we believe if we can come up with ways to encourage our children of today to practice these same rules, we would be thrilled at the change in atmosphere around our homes. So, tomorrow will be our first session of “George Washington Fridays.”

We hope you'll come back and see how it all turns out!