BEING A BETTER GRANDPARENT HAVE YOU ADAPTED TO YOUR NEW ROLE?
There are few roles as coveted as being a grandparent, but today’s grandparents do far more than slip $10 bills and hard candies to their grandchildren. While there are still opportunities for growth, new studies have found that grandparents are taking on active roles and loving it. Here are two prominent lessons on grandparenting in 2022. Positive Progress: Supporting Grandchildren The make-up of American families today isn’t cut and dry. An AARP survey found that one-third of grandparents are a different race than their grandchildren and most would support their LGBTQ+ grandchildren. While many grandparents find sharing pieces of their heritage is important with grandchildren, a 2021 Good Housekeeping article noted that many grandparents who share different ethnicities with their grandchildren welcome new cultures. In fact, many weave their traditions together. When it comes to navigating these waters, Good Housekeeping recommends talking about an approach with parents first. Some may choose to keep or remove certain traditions. Furthermore, grandparents are viewing their roles with grandchildren as active rather than passive. A 2021 Good Housekeeping survey of parents and grandparents discovered that nearly 70% said they were “cooler” than their own grandparents and that they want to babysit, versus feeling obligated. Needs Work: Supporting Parents The 2019 AARP study shares that most grandparents surveyed believe they parent better than their grandchildren’s parents, but it may be best if that thought isn’t vocalized. In contrast to this, the Good Housekeeping survey explained that grandparents “sharing outdated advice” was among the biggest frustrations for parents. Instead, experts at Stanford Children’s Health recommend taking “grandparenting classes,” which provide new grandparents with the latest medical direction that parents are provided. And, if you feel obligated to share advice, ask first and make sure the parent knows it’s only your perspective. In all other scenarios, it’s best to keep your opinion to yourself and foster a grandparenting relationship that supports your grandchildren’s parents. Want to be a better grandparent? Sign up for a local grandparenting class; these are typically offered through medical or community centers.
TRY THIS TRICK TO IMPROVE YOUR FOCUS
MY TAKEAWAY FROM ‘ATOMIC HABITS’
I recently read “Atomic Habits” by James Clear. If you haven’t read it, it is all about how to build good habits into your life and how to get rid of the bad ones.
One of the excerpts in the book talks about how you need to make good habits easy . “Make it easy” is one of the steps to making a desired habit come to fruition. By the same token, one of the keys to getting rid of a bad habit is to make it hard . Pretty simple stuff, right?
For example, if you wanted to start going for a run first thing in the morning (a good habit), you might make it easy by laying out your running gear beside your bed the night before. That makes it more likely that you’ll put it on and go for a run. (For me, this strategy has unfortunately not worked well lately!) By contrast, if you wanted to stop a bad habit like wasting hours every day on social media, you might delete the Facebook app from your phone every Sunday night and have your secretary change your password to your Facebook account. Then, on Friday afternoon, your secretary can give you the new password so you can log back in for the weekend. Ugh … what a pain in the neck that would be! But I bet you wouldn’t be browsing Facebook during every down moment throughout the day, would you?!
One of the portions of the book that really spoke to me was the creation of a work environment that facilitates good work habits. This is part of making productive work easy and attractive.
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