So I decided to try something new in my house and I call it "Make it up Monday" or MUM for short.  The concept is simple...I take an ingredient or multiple ingredients and make up a new recipe with them.  Sometimes this works out great or at least good.  But this week, well...this week was a failure!  My choices of ingredients, wheat berries and tempeh, are good ingredients and very tasty when done right just not on this particular MUM!  

I am just fine with not meeting my expectations on a MUM night, or with any recipe for that matter, it actually makes me more determined to find/create a recipe using those same ingredients that tastes wonderful!  I love that my kids watched and were apart of this recipe flop.  Not because I "failed" but of how I am teaching them to handle situations where they may not succeed the first time.  Picture if I had burst into tears and tossed the entire meal in the trash and grabbed the phone to order a pizza.  What would that have taught them?  My guess, is that it would have encouraged them that it is acceptable to throw a fit and give up.  Instead, I took a minute to think about what I could do or what I could add to make the dinner at least edible for that night.  What did that teach them?  Well, I like to think it taught them how to improvise, accept that mistakes happen, to try again after a little more research, since they saw me online after dinner researching the ingredients for next time.

The same thing can be true in a multitude of situations.  My boys have taken up this fascination with triathlons and running but, I recently learned that my knees cannot handle running anymore.  I was sad about it because I like to "run out my frustrations" and "pound my bad day into the pavement", and running together was fun.  Instead of dwelling on the fact that I could not run, so this was not an option for them, I have decided to have them run on the track by our house and I will walk. 

The point I am trying to make is that it is all about choices and how we handle the situation that determines how others, whether it is our kids, co-workers, friends, or spouses, adapt to the situation at hand.  So, my challenge to you is to let your kids, and others, see you "miss the mark" on something and use it for personal growth and as a teachable moment.  


Rachel



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