Dec 15th, 2021.

DADDY, VISITORS ARE NOT COMING AGAIN

Proverbs7:4 Say to wisdom, “You are my sister,” and to insight, “You are my relative.”

On a certain day, we were in the living room when Zuriel( my second son) said, "Daddy, visitors are no longer coming to our house". For me, it meant nothing to me that visitors were no longer coming. I tried so hard to make sense out of his outburst but I just couldn't. However, my wife knew the point he was trying to make though he didn't say it. My wife told me the reason he was worried about visitors who weren't coming again was because they no longer have money to keep in their piggy bank. I wondered what the correlation was. She further explained that most times, what goes into their piggy bank are monies given to them whenever a visitor come around but since they stopped coming, cash flow into their piggy bank reduced. I didn't know his concern was about their piggy bank. I laughed but I learnt a lesson from that scenario. My wife already developed the skill of hearing his inaudible complaints.

If you want to parent excellently, you need to develop the skill of listening to the inaudible voice of your children. There are certain things, situations, happenings and challenges they might be going through but they may not open up in full either because they lack the right words to express it or they're afraid of what your reaction might be. It is very common to abused children to make incomplete statements that requires further probe or sometimes they may not speak at all. Several times, I've misconstrued simple statements from my children to mean what it is not and at other times, I've disregarded weighty statements that sounded childish yet requires my full attention. In these days of increase in juvenile delinquency, our children may want to explain or report what they might be going through with their peers. Most times, these complaints may not be presented formally to catch our attention but we must learn to pay attention.

In a drama I watched several years ago, a young girl was under pressure to join an occultic group in school. Anytime she wanted to complain to her dad, he'll say "I'm busy, let's talk later". This happened severally. Later, she joined and got her fingers burnt. Looking at how she pestered her dad, a sensitive father will know that there's something bothering her mind. Don't shut your children up whenever they want to talk to you. Make room for their "childish" expressions and complaints, you can pick the inaudible voice of their mind from there and help them out where needed.