HOW IMPORTANT IS FAMILY?

1. Family Basics.

How important is family is like asking how important happiness is.  This section deals with everything from the definition of family to the life expectancies of family members.   It presents exciting relationships from when Homo sapiens walked the earth to the Grecian, Egyptians, Inca, and the Roman Empires. 

Almost every religion perches the family at the pinnacle of its sacred scriptures.

Throughout the world, the average size varies from 2.1 to 4.3, including the parents.  The United States comes in at 3.1.  The size has been going down for the last 150 years.

Life expectancy shows that both men and women in a family live 17 years longer than their non-family counterparts.  

Click on the link below for an interesting discussion of those topics and others with examples.

2. Family Relationships.

This section delves into every aspect of a family. 

Questions like: “Should I marry?” or “Will I make a good parent?” are addressed.  

A fun quiz provides help with choosing the correct number of children.  Nature provides a majority of the critical duties in raising children.  Unfortunately, how to handle children’s peer pressure is not one of them.  The link discusses how to discover who are the bad apples and when to act.  If you have teenagers, there are helpful hints on how to avoid them driving under the influence discussed in the link below. 

Mutual respect is fundamental in creating strong family bonds.  There is an interactive example presented directed to a child who says, “I’m not going to college.” 

Most people do not understand that trust deals with belief and not its truth.  Children observe their parents in little lies that substantiate their lying.  The importance of keeping secrets inside and outside the family is discussed.  Privacy becomes more important when children reach the teenage years. 

Loyalty requires parents to stand up for their children even when they do something wrong.  The link discusses how it can be done without condoning what they did.  It is important not to divide loyalties between several children or allocate loyalty based on who did best in school. 

Lastly, the importance of Traditions is discussed from the wedding ceremony to family dinners and 14 other situations.

3. What are Work Ethics?

This trait is important to one’s health, success, and well-being. 

It is an issue missing in public education. 

It is up to the family to create and develop it from the time the child begins to talk.  The link below discusses the elements of work ethics, including persistence, endurance, health, satisfaction, and punctuality. 

The good news is that the work ethic trait, once mastered, lasts for the rest of your life and may be partially inherited.  The consensus is that work ethic is more valuable and necessary than IQ.