While growing up, a friend of mine was used as a punching bag by his father. He was the daily target of his father’s misplaced rage, disappointment, lack of self-love and respect. His father felt victimized and inadequate. Instead of dealing with the reasons behind his pain he took that out on my friend.

Today my friend is a loving, peaceful, and thoughtful father. Long ago he made the deliberate choice not to be like his father. He chose to break the cycle of abuse. He did so by overcoming issues of abandonment, low self-esteem and not knowing what love is.  He did the personal work necessary to make certain he would not pass on pain to his children, other people, or living things. He wanted to be the father he never had and to teach his children by example what love really means.

Many of us grow up with abuse and misguided ideas of what love is. We are not taught how to express anger appropriately.  We are not shown by example how to solve our differences. We don’t learn that we cannot change anyone but ourselves. Too often we think love is control or ridicule. But, love is not controlling or any other negative behavior.

Love is expressed and received through positive behavior.  To really love our children we must first love ourselves. We must deal with our wounds so we do not pass our unresolved issues onto them. In order to show children how best to live, we must know appropriate ways of dealing with anger. We must know how to peacefully stand up for ourselves and others and how to be accepting of difference. We must know how to choose the people we have in our lives by the common values of appropriate behavior we share such as honestly, loyalty, compassion, trust, forgiveness, etc. We must have self-respect before we can teach others to respect themselves. We must refuse to gossip and ridicule ourselves so we do not talk negatively about others. We must have healthy self-esteem, patience with ourselves and others, and know positive ways to bounce back from disappointment and challenge. We must be able to say no and set boundaries against unacceptable behavior.

Yes, what we say is important. Words can hurt or heal. And, our actions teach others. So, we must care that children learn from everyone and everything they interact with, what they watch, what internet sites they visit, and what other influences they are exposed to.

Abuse, neglect, mistreatment, denigrating women, mixed messages, and judgmental/bigoted beliefs are NEVER love.  To be the change we want to see in the world, we must show children the best way to live. That means we must care deeply about what our behavior is teaching.