Kiddipedia
From one dad to another, I find fatherhood difficult.
Don’t get me wrong! I love my kids and I love being a father, but nothing humbles me more than fatherhood.
I know I’m far from perfect. I struggle with work/life balance, I struggle with self-doubt and I struggle to be patient.
But as a father, you never give up!
Because, when someone calls you dad, you can never quit!
But wouldn’t it be nice if you could enjoy fatherhood a lot more? I’m not talking about the good parts when you’re playing with your kids for example, but fatherhood in general. After all, fatherhood is supposed to be a gift isn’t it?
Well after having built a community of nearly 3,500 fathers I’d like to offer 3 strategies that will help you take the pressure off yourself so you can start enjoying being a father more.
Let’s start with the most important one.
#1 Accept that it’s okay not to be perfect.
I know this is difficult for most of us men. After all, we don’t want anyone to find out that we don’t know what we’re doing.
What if people think we are weak?
Social researcher Brene Brown says that for a man, being perceived as weak is the greatest “shame trigger” there is. We’ll literally do anything we can to avoid being seen as weak.
3 ways we dads do that are:
- We spend extra time at work, when we don’t really need to, in order to avoid our struggles at home.
- We create a façade and pretend to the outside world that we have it altogether!
- We focus on earning the money and almost abdicate our responsibility as a dad. After all, if raising our kids is our wife’s or partner’s responsibility, then nobody will blame us if something goes wrong.
The problem is that even if nobody else knows we’re struggling; we know that we are! We still have to live with ourselves and our own guilt and shame.
Thankfully, it doesn’t need to be this way.
That’s part of why I started this article with a frank admission that I am not perfect as a dad.
You see, nobody is.
When you accept that there is no such thing as a perfect dad, and you are good enough as you are, your whole perspective of being a dad changes.
You can start to accept that it’s ok not to know everything all the time. It’s ok not to have all the answers. It does not mean anything is wrong with you and it DEFINITELY does not mean that you’re unworthy of being a father.
If you’re not perfect as a father, that means you’re like the rest of us. Welcome to the club!
So stop trying to be perfect.
Instead, recognize that you’re not perfect, but you are a work in progress and that is what makes you a good father.
#2: Give Yourself Permission To Make Mistakes
Once you stop trying to be perfect, you then need to give yourself permission to make mistakes.
This one is again hard for us men. What most of us prefer to do is beat ourselves up for making mistakes.
As a recovering self-beater, I am all too familiar with this pattern of behaviour. You make a mistake. You beat yourself up. You feel worse. Eventually you start to think you’re not good enough as a man or a dad.
How about you stop beating yourself up? Instead, be real.
You and I, we weren’t trained to be fathers.
If you didn’t have a good relationship with your own father, you may not necessarily know how to even be a good dad.
So you’re going to make some mistakes.
Instead of trying to avoid them, intentionally give yourself permission to make mistakes.
You’ll find that the pressure will come right off you and you’ll be able to enjoy fatherhood a lot more.
#3 – Aim to Enjoy Fatherhood
I see so many men who are so busy trying to provide for their families and do the best they can as a father, that they forget to actually enjoy fatherhood.
Be goofy with your kids. Talk to them. Take time to actually enjoy being a father, even if for just a few minutes a day.
Remember, being a father allows us to be a kid again. Don’t be so busy that you miss out on that.
Your phone will still be there…
But the chance to play with your kids, make your heart sing and your kid smile might never come back.
As difficult as being a father is, it goes by way too quickly. Ask almost any man whose kids have left home and he’ll tell you that he wished he took more time to enjoy and savour his time with his kids.
You don’t want to look back with regret and say, “I wish I…”
Instead, you want to look back and say, “Yes, being a father was difficult, but it was also some of the best years of my life!”
Niro Thambipillay
Family Focused Fathers
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