Being in a hurry is my most potent trigger. One Sunday morning, while racing around the house like I was trying to win the Indianapolis 500 so we could get to church on time, my oldest daughter said to me, “Mom! We’re just kids!”
Sometimes I expect my children to put their things away as quickly as I can, come upstairs as fast as I would, or change their clothes in the same time I change mine. But the truth is, kid time is slower than parent time. And we ought to cut them some slack.
In an age when everything is instant — from communication and meals to ordering anything you want with a single click — no one is used to waiting, including me. Waiting has become a lost art. And teaching this to our children is most effective when they see it first in us.