CHALLENGE #1 OVERCOMING SELFISHNESS
GOAL: To decrease selfishness in your children and to help them become more others-focused and God-focused in daily interactions.
Use a multi-strategy approach to address current heart tendencies toward selfishness and create an expectation and obligation of contribution in your home. Use these ideas:
STRATEGY #1: PRACTICE DOING THE RIGHT THING: Use the “Take the Family Challenge” idea to have each child contribute one act of kindness toward your house and another one toward a person in your home, at least once a day for 5 days. Debrief each evening and them seek to continue on in the coming days.
STRATEGY #2: SPIRITUAL APPROACH: Discuss Philippians 2:3-4 and brainstorm practical ways to put these ideas into practice. Talk about why God commands this. Tell the story of John 12.
STRATEGY #3: DEVELOP INITIATIVE: Remember that the goal is to work on the heart. That means helping a child learn to take initiative on their own, not just rely on you as a parent to tell them to be kind.
STRATEGY #4: FOCUS ON THE HEART: The heart contains the tendencies of children. That’s why we focus on beliefs, desires, and emotions during this challenge.
STRATEGY #5: USE A TEAM/MISSIONAL APPROACH: Use the idea of a Family Mission to brainstorm about ways to serve others and be kind to those outside your home. If possible work as a team to do something for others. This will further cement and illustrate the fact that your family is characterized by thoughtfulness instead of selfishness.
Consider these additional ideas to overcome some of the more difficult selfishness strongholds in your home.
WATCH THE WEBINAR: This webinar was created by Dr. Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller, RN, BSN to give you a lot of ideas for addressing selfishness in your home.
INTERACT IN THE FACEBOOK GROUP: Share ideas and questions and receive responses from other parents plus some trained parent coaches, gain a wealth of new ideas for your family. Join the Facebook group
LISTEN TO THE PODCASTS: The links for the two podcast episodes are below. Dr. Scott Turansky and Elena Zwetsloot discuss selfishness and the biblical concept of honor.
ENJOY PARENTING TIPS: Four parenting tips with additional ideas to support your goal of overcoming selfishness in your home have been chosen. Use the links below.
Parenting Tip #1 – Teach Kids to Add Energy to Family Life
Parenting Tip #2 – Honor is Customer Service Brought Home
Parenting Tip #3 – Whiners Need to Become Problem Solvers
Parenting Tip #4 – Sibling Conflict: A Child’s First Class In Relationship
SHARE THE CHALLENGE WITH OTHERS: Practice being unselfish by passing on ideas and even this challenge to other families you know, realizing that all families want to improve in this area and are looking for practical ideas.
CONSIDER LEARNING MORE: Order the HONOR SPECIAL and turn this Challenge into a lifestyle in your home.
Why so many ideas and approaches? Selfishness is a symptom of the sin nature in each of our own hearts. The ultimate solution to selfishness is salvation in Jesus Christ. As we work with our children and grandchildren we recognize that each one is unique and different. Furthermore, each family is unique and different. We never know just what will touch a person’s heart but most often a variety of tools and strategies are needed to bring about heart change and significant growth in our kids.
The National Center for Biblical Parenting recognizes the complexities parents and grandparents face and we’re eager to bring real, relevant, biblical, practical solutions to your home.