Are you a stand in parent?

Think about it for a second I'll wait.... Is there a little boy or girl who may or may not be related to you that you spend a considerable amount of time with? There are thousands of you who may do just that. Congratulations you might be a stand-in parent and not know it. Growing up I have had a lot of good people in my life whom I considered friends. Some of them at some point have had a lot of potential to be great people. The reason I say "had potential" is because they suffered or are suffering currently from a lack of attention. The absence of this has caused them to become emotional wrecks due to a parent of guardian taking a "hands off" approach to raising them. I can only imagine what talents or opportunities lay within them that could have been utilized to better their lives had an actual parent or a "stand-in" parent taken interest in them. Its important to understand that for a lot of children today the perception of a parent is different than the "80's babies" and older. The proverbial "Big Momma's" the ones who kept us in line with their bible scriptures and leather belts :) are dead. We live in a time where parents no longer want to be parents.

The media puts such a focus on holding on to your youth for as long as possible, that parents no longer want the role or responsibility 100% of the time. So what happens at this point? Well in my experience this creates a vacuum of attention. Look at the kids and teenagers today, its as if they are running on auto-pilot and "just good enough" is has become the status quo. Now in case your wondering, I am not a parent yet but my wife and I consider ourselves "Stand-In" parents. We have a couple of "surrogate" kids that we invest in heavily. These are young men and women who we have subconsciously taken under our wings. For the males I am fully committed to them and am always a call or text message away anytime they need insight. Whether its a question about the opposite sex, personal fears, and anything else that they consider important to them.

It is key to always approach your children from a place of relatabilty and not with chastisement or criticism if that you don't agree with everything they say. There is an "old-school" song by Will Smith called "Parents just don't understand" that I related to growing up it explained some of the frustrations that I myself dealt with. It still has some truth in 2009, some parents do carry around as though they were not teenagers at some point in their lives. This disconnect can and normally does cause a communication divide between parent and child. It does not always have to be that way but its up to parents to decide that they want to transparent and honest to their children.

Now there are some cases where the parents may have passed on or it's a single parent household but that is not an excuse to not be fully invested in the children that are under you. There is always something that can be done to keep your kids on the right path. If your a single mother bring your son around positive male role models such as brothers,uncles, and church members. If your a single dad there are girls scouts and many organizations that can show your daughter how to become a respectable lady. My point is that it takes proactive instead of reactive effort, and to those that are doing just that, I commend you. If your not, today is the day to be the positive role model that your child wants and needs to see or else as the bible says "The sins of the Father,will become the sins of the son".