Life as a parent can be full of challenges. But as much as we are going through, our children also feel anxious, frustrated, hurt, and unsure at times, too. They are having their own tests and difficulties just as we have ours. After all, this is what life is all about. There is one thing that can always help, though. Love. Love can make things oh so much better, even if only on a heart level.
You may not be able to fix a problem, but you can love someone while they are dealing with it. You may not be able to make everything better but an act of love can help, no matter how small. Love makes people happy, and who doesn’t want to make their loved ones smile a bit more?
Love binds people together and allows us to feel secure, hopeful, and full of joy. We all benefit from love – giving love and receiving love. But sometimes when life gets stressful, we feel rushed. With anxiety and frustration taking so much emotional energy, we can forget to to let love guide our actions.
What if every moment we lived, we lived with love?
What a world it would be!
Love is at the root of all character traits… so I figure, if we start with love – we’re on our way to developing character in a big way.
Which brings me to introduce the complete series: “Sharing the Love: 100 Ways for You and Your Children to Make a Difference in the World.”
Over the past few months I wrote this set of articles because I believe that character education can help us grow as individuals and also help us serve others. In fact, neither of these processes can be complete without the other. In order to grow into more kind, patient, and compassionate people – we have a responsibility to ourselves and to those around us. The inward and outward manifestation of the virtues are of equal importance… and practicing them will make a difference to everyone involved.
Love is the same way. It’s as much about giving as it is about receiving. And therefore “love” is good place to start the journey of building character at home.
A friend once told me that she saw all virtues as expressions of love, and service was simply the vehicle for their manifestation. All our actions should be acts of service ideally, it’s just a matter of determining the form of that act of service. I love this explanation of how “service” relates to character education. Service is simply an expression of love… when we show love, we are making a difference.
Service can happen in your home, neighborhood, community, or somewhere else in the world. Every person – no matter what age – has gifts and talents that will bring joy to others. Whether our actions are big or small, within the home or outside, we can contribute to making a better world around us simply by showing love.
So let’s love our kids and help them spread that love to others!
Here are 100 ways to share the love:
- 10 Ways To Tell Your Kids “I Love You”
- 10 Easy Ways To Show Your Kids You Love Them {Without Words}
- 10 Fun Love Songs For Kids {Give Loving Feelings + Teach Loving Habits}
- 10 Of The Best Children’s Books About Love
- 10 Ways To Model A Loving Relationship To Your Kids
- 10 Ideas for Building a More Loving Extended Family
- 10 Acts of Love for Your Neighborhood
- 10 Acts of Love For The World
- 10 Hands-On Activities to Teach Children about Love
- 10 Ways for Mom to Love Herself
I hope you enjoy the series and that it gives you a few creative ideas for adding some more LOVE into your family life!
I LOVE this post… it makes such a difference to everyone’s moods and behaviour when we focus on giving love and happiness rather than on ourselves!
Such a beautiful post. You are so right. I’ve been going through such a difficult time recently…and it’s the love my husband and children show me that has helped me.
My husband and I often talk about our ‘love tanks, and we let each other know when they are feeling empty.
I’m looking forward to following the other links in the post 🙂
What a beautiful post. There really are so many ways we can show (and share) love.