Becoming an Influential Father

This was written for fathers, but it is excellent for mothers and grandparents as well.  A really great article.

"............Physical affection can be healing, affirmative, and reassuring. It can take many forms: a pat on the head or arm, a kiss on the cheek, a hug, or an arm around the shoulder. Appropriate physical affection is a great facilitator of bonding between fathers and children.

"...........Showing affection verbally means focusing on the good things more than the negative things. Sometimes, especially when disciplining, it may be easier to comment on the negatives as a way of correcting the wrong. However, even then, when fathers can find ways to focus on what their children do well, praising rather than criticizing, it is helpful. Positive comments will build their confidence, uplift their spirits, and inspire them to be their best. Oftentimes even a negative behavior can be corrected by helping the child see and understand a positive path of action.

"..............As a father reinforces good behavior, he needs to remember that “reproving betimes with sharpness” means with timeliness and clarity, not anger, and always “showing forth afterwards an increase of love” (D&C 121:43). Success in disciplining for long-term behavior and attitude change is directly related to the quality of the relationship a father has with his children.

"............When an opportunity to talk with your children arises, a father shouldn’t just mute the TV. It should be turned off. A father will be more successful if he adjusts his schedule to listen when they want to talk; if he waits, he may lose a valuable moment.

"It takes patience, skill, and sacrifice to listen effectively. Parents must be patient as children take the time to form thoughts and words. If your children respond slowly, you may want to be cautious not to offer answers for them. Often none are needed, and your children will eventually say what they want and need to say.

"..............As Elder Jeffrey R. Holland of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles explains, “We [are] not surprised that when 2,000 children of all ages and backgrounds were asked what they appreciated most about their fathers, they answered universally, ‘He spends time with me.’”2

Loving relationships develop best as fathers take time to play, laugh, work, read, pray, talk, walk, and engage in other wholesome family activities with their children. Parents often must plan and schedule these activities; they likely will not happen very often by coincidence. In fact, children grow up so quickly that if parents do not look for opportunities to change and adapt, to spend time with their children, precious opportunities may be missed."

Becoming an Influential Father
by Jerry Harris
Ensign
February, 2010

How To Search the Ensign Magazine

"There are several ways you can look for material on specific topics in the Ensign online.

• • Go to ensign.lds.org. There are links to the monthly First Presidency and visiting teaching messages, to other articles, and to information on how to subscribe or submit material to the magazine. You can reach the same page by going to LDS.org, selecting Gospel Library, then Magazines, then from the left-hand pane select Ensign.
  
• • You can select either Past Issues or Search Ensign to begin your search. Select Past Issues if you know the date of the item you are seeking. You will be able to select the year of publication, then the month, then the name of the article from the table of contents for that month.
  
• • Select Search Ensign from the left-hand pane to look for material by topic. You will be able to enter key words in a search box to bring up a list of articles on a topic, or to look for a particular article. The more specific your key words, the more likely you are to find the desired article. For example, entering “Ezra Taft Benson pride cleansing” immediately turns up a link to “Cleansing the Inner Vessel,” by President Benson in the May 1986 magazine.
  
• • Would you like to see the article as it looked on the magazine page? From the LDS.org home page, select Gospel Library, then Media Formats, then PDF. Click on the Ensign magazine and you will then be able to select a year as far back as 2001. After you click on a year, click on the cover of a magazine. You will see a larger picture of that cover with a table of contents pane on the left of your screen. In that table of contents, you will find a link to the first page of the article you want."

by Don L. Searle
Ensign
Your Guide to Using the Ensign
January, 2010

Life's True Purpose

"Please do not misunderstand me, brothers and sisters. Of course we need to prepare for worthy work to do. Yes, we do need to do our work well, whatever we choose to do in life. We need to be able to render significant service. And before we can achieve that competence, we need an education. With us, education is a religious responsibility. The glory of God really is intelligence (see D&C 93:36).

"But the learning of man has its limitations. And sometimes, as in our circumstance in rural Mexico, the combined learning of many experts cannot be applied when we need it most. We have to place our trust in the Lord.

"That experience in Mexico taught us another important lesson. It pertains to our ultimate priorities and highest destinies as mortal beings. We learned that a doctor’s ultimate destination is not in the hospital. For a lawyer, it is not in the courtroom. For a jet pilot, it is not in the cockpit of a Boeing 747. Each person’s chosen occupation is only a means to an end; it is not an end in itself.

"The end for which each of you should strive is to be the person that you can become—the person who God wants you to be. The day will come when your professional career will end. The career that you will have labored so hard to achieve—the work that will have supported you and your family—will one day be behind you.

"Then you will have learned this great lesson: much more important than what you do for a living is what kind of person you become. When you leave this frail existence, what you have become will matter most. Attributes such as 'faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, brotherly kindness, godliness, charity, humility, [and] diligence' (D&C 4:6) will all be weighed in the Lord’s balance."

"Neither Trust in the Arm of Flesh"
Elder Russell M. Nelson
Ensign
March, 2010

Individual Worth Reminder

"As a young man growing up in Idaho trying to find my place in the world, I arrived at the following temporary conclusion: I was a better French horn player than Wilt Chamberlain, the best player in the National Basketball Association, and I played basketball better than Dennis Brain, then the world’s premier French horn player. I felt I was unique and, by implication, uniquely good.

This bit of vanity seems harmless, but it hints at a trap into which many of us fall—judging our individual worth by comparing ourselves to others. This view of self-worth results in one of two serious mistakes: either we imagine ourselves better than we are because we think we excel where others fail; or we are too hard on ourselves, thinking we do not measure up to others. Faced with these misperceptions, we may settle into a false sense of self-satisfaction, strain to match the accomplishments of those we believe are ahead of us, or give up altogether. Our vision is clouded when we forget we are not in competition. As children of our Father in Heaven, we are already unique and valuable, beyond anything we can achieve in this world."

By Elder John C. Taggart
"All Things in Wisdom and Order"
Ensign, August, 2010

Faith in the Lord/Trust in the Lord

"Faith in the Lord is trust in the Lord.  We cannot have true faith in the Lord without also having complete trust in the Lord's will and in the Lord's timing.  As a result, no matter how strong our faith is, it cannot produce a result contrary to the will of Him in whom we have faith.  Remember that when your prayers do not seem to be answered in the way or at the time you desire.  The exercise of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ is always subject to the order of heaven, to the goodness and will and wisdom and timing of the Lord."

Elder Dallin H. Oaks
"The Atonement and Faith"
Ensign
April, 2010