Encourage Your Kids While You Can

I was thinking today about encouragement and how important it is to receive it during childhood. I don’t have kids. I did want them but I wasn’t blessed with them. But one thing I was thinking about as I was having this conversation was how important it is to really encourage kids. I know that my parents loved me, but I don’t think they encouraged me all the time like I needed to be. I think they thought they were. But I didn’t feel encouraged to try things and pursue things.

As an adult I am finding I am better at things than I realized. I didn’t pursue education in these things. I just kept doing them because I liked them. Thankfully some of it worked! While my writing isn’t Pulitzer quality, it is therapeutic for me and some people do enjoy it. While my art isn’t on the same level as Van Gogh, I did a painting inspired by his “Irises”.  Below is my painting. I hope you enjoy.

The point to this blog is that I hope parents will watch their kids and see what their interests are and encourage them. It may not be something you have any real knowledge about, but you can encourage them and help them learn more. Maybe you can even learn more with them. Kids need encouragement. It helps them know they can do something. So often we are plagued with others telling us we can’t or we hear our own inner voice telling us that things are impossible. If we have the people we love the most cheering us on, then we can achieve more. This even works in adulthood. Who doesn’t need a cheerleader?

Employed Black Friday Workers

So I have been hearing a lot of people talking about the poor people who have to work on Black Friday and how Black Friday is starting earlier and earlier. There is a Target employee who actually wrote a petition and got people to sign it asking for their store hours to not start so early. It has been on the news and made the Huffington Post http://foxnewsinsider.com/2011/11/22/target-employee-starts-petition-to-fight-back-against-opening-stores-at-midnight-on-black-friday/ on Fox News.

This kinda hits me wrong. Maybe I am politically incorrect for saying it, but I’m going to anyway. Our economy has been in the toilet. There are people who don’t have jobs. There are now people who don’t appreciate the jobs they have. I’m sorry the hours suck, but it IS  a job. My hours at my job suck. I work 11pm-7am every day (and sometimes more), no matter if it is a holiday or not. If the holiday falls on my days to work, I work. If it happens to fall on my day off, well I’m probably sleeping.

How do people think our economic situation is going to change? Nobody can wave a magic wand and things are suddenly better. No, it takes economic stimulation. How does that happen? Days like Black Friday. Why is it called Black Friday? Because most business open on that day are operating in the black instead of the red. (and for the record, that is an AWESOME thing!)

I do understand people wanting more time with their family and I do have some sympathy. But I don’t have a whole lot these days. Today we have to do what we have to in order to survive. And if we want to complain about Black Friday, why don’t we recognize that we, as a society, are the reason for it. Once we did away with the Blue Laws years ago where stores had to be closed on Sundays, then everything else pretty much became fair game. And that includes the holidays.

I think until things stabilize for the nation that we should be thankful there are jobs. A few months ago there were a lot fewer than there are today. (BTW, I have to work Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, and New Year’s Eve.)