Man...it's a scary thought, but children emulate their parents. They mimic what we say, what we do, how we act, what we feel, even what we smoke or drink. I always find it interesting to hear parents say, "I know my child wouldn't do that!" Seriously? Please don't be that naïve. Our children won't do certain things while they are in our presence, but what they will do when we are absent is anyone's guess. Don't take my word for it, read or watch any of the daily news outlets. They are full of sobbing parents who were in denial and didn't think their son(s) was capable of doing such a thing or "we didn't know he had it in him." Really? How could you not know?
I passed by a local pet shop not too long ago and the hamsters immediately caught my attention. I watched the little fellows for several minutes and one thing stuck out as a constant in their lives...the spinning wheel. They can see the world all around them but a glass container prohibits their exit. It seemed to me that when they had surveyed the sights, they would always return to the spinning wheel. They were in constant motion, but never going anywhere and their cycle of life continued as if they were programmed.
Dads many of you are on spinning-wheels, dealing with issues in your lives that have been handed down for generations. In this moment, this is your glass case. You know, the kind of things that families don't want to discuss. Unfortunately it's kept quiet in the closet and another generation carries the cycle yet further. Covering these issues and failing to disclose them are the very seeds that help facilitate a destructive path for our sons.
Listen, you can never break a cycle, until you acknowledge that it exists. There are some who smoke because their dads smoked and their dad before them. Others drink, because dad drank and their dad before them and so on. These are the things we speak of openly, but what about the ones we don't speak of. The ones of verbal, physical, and psychological abuse. How about drugs, sex, alcohol and violent behavior. Please...don't act like you don't know. You've lived with this insurrection inside of you for years. Don't believe me? Have you ever done something you knew wasn't right and later asked yourself, "why did I do that?" Sure you have. You are just as much a victim as your sons are now. You've denied this influence on your life and now it's growing daily right in front of your eyes. This young boy has mimicked his creator but the one forgotten factor is...each generation gets worse. So the burning question becomes, are you going to perpetuate the spinning-wheel or will you be the one to acknowledge this curse and make an effort to break the cycle? Are you going to "man up," take a firm stand, recognize the cancer that's destroying your sons, and break this cycle so that it doesn't affect your son and his sons. Now here is the truth of the matter...if you don't do it, someone else will and it may mean visits to a prison complex or worse a cemetery.
Dads open the closet doors, expose the skeletons. What you stand to gain is far more precious than what you lose. Destroy them, or they will control you, your son and his sons until someone breaks the cycle.
Here's a seed for thought. There was a time when I watched a few Frankenstein and Werewolf movies of sorts. The one thing that I found interesting in all these movies was the fact that, after the monsters had destroyed or killed just about everybody, it always returned to destroy its creator! Now, have I got your attention?
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