My Kids Aren’t Me

When they were little, we always tried to find things about our kids that were like us. He has your nose, your eyes, or your personality. Now that my two boys are no longer children but grown men I spend more time looking at how much they are not like me and it makes me smile.

I was never an adventurous soul. I was too scared to step outside my comfort zone. In all truth the reason I stayed behind the line is because I didn’t want to mess up or feel like I’d done something wrong. (My run for SOS and Cancer changed all of that)

Now I have two sons who, at the age of 23 and 21 are stepping so far outside the box that I get a lump in my throat just writing this blog.

My youngest son, Jess, left the security of his friends, a wonderful girlfriend and a job to live in a remote corner of Alaska to become a fishing guide. He has little communication with the outside world. He can’t call out, he can Skype a little, but for the most part he has isolated himself and in doing so found himself.

My oldest son Jake leaves home in about a month to study abroad in Argentina. He will walk away from a secure job, sell his car, pack his bags and go to a country where his culture will do him little good as he finds a new culture.

My sons are the bravest guys I know. I would have never done what they are doing. Not because I didn’t want to but because I’d have been too afraid to make a mistake.

The other day my words came back to me in an email from Jess. He said he banged the boat around some rocks a few times as he was learning to maneuver the boat on the river. He wrote and said;” But dad you have to fail if you are ever going to succeed right.” I felt a tear well up in my eye because that is now my life. In many ways my sons have helped me to become the man God created me to be not a chicken afraid to try something new.

Stepping out is not natural for me even though many of you probably think the opposite. For my sons stepping inside the box is more difficult.

They have shown me how to live and now their mother and I get to watch as they go higher, wider and deeper than we’ll ever go.

God, thank you for these moments. They make the tough times so worth it. I can’t wait to see where you take us.

My friends do not allow yourself to be trapped by what you thought. Do not sit back and live life in drudgery. Today, do something outside the norm. Call someone for coffee, take on that project, make the phone call you’ve been avoiding. Come on, this is life; it’s not going to kill you.

3 Comments

• 
  Malinda trautman July 20, 2011 at 6:52 am

  Reading your article this morning brought back memories of our boys going
  to pre school together and play dates. Thank you for the reminder that our children are not like us and have their own special qualities. To appreciate who they are and how God has matured us as parents through all those years of raising them. I am taking to heart today your challenge to step outside my comfort zone (or pride in my case) to show love to someone.
• 
  Greg July 20, 2011 at 11:02 am

  I’ve always hated the box. I wish I had a dollar for every time a leader approached me and said, “look, you need to learn how things are done here” or “you have lived here long enough to know how things work”.

  But But But ! Things change… some one steps out of the box! Some one stated building a new box, the old box is old; crowded, leaky, and broken. Whoa! Sounds familiar..

  Great Article Rick… So when do we start building?
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  Jeff July 21, 2011 at 12:37 am

  Rick, your an amazing father to your boys!