1 Thing I Love About You

My kids were arguing this morning and as I walked into the room it was if I walked in to a pillow fight and there were feathers falling all around, only instead of feathers the air was full of hurtful words and tears. This has been happening way too often around here especially in the mornings while getting ready for school. So I decided instead of yelling back at them to get them to stop and then sending them to their separate spaces I would try something new.

I stepped in between them looked towards my son and said okay quickly name one thing you love about your sister. It was amazing how quickly the mood changed. I told them that from now on when I have to step in on them fighting like that they are going to have to stop and tell each other one thing they love about the other person. Oh and the catch is that it can't be the same thing they said within the past 7 days. So they can't just say the same thing over and over again.

My son took a bit too long giving a response and yet he could name 100 things that bothered him about his sister in a matter of 15 sec. I told him that it is quite possible that we spend too much time focusing on the things that bother us about others and not enough time embracing the things we love about others. If we spent more time telling others what we cherish about them it would be harder to see the negative things.