Ask any young men around, and I bet very few of them would list being a father as one of their life goals. Yet, speaking from firsthand experience, fatherhood is the best thing that ever happened to me. I find it frustrating, exhausting, reinvigorating and rewarding in equal measure.
I wouldn’t give it up for anything.
However, fatherhood hasn’t always been (and in most cases still isn’t) respected or celebrated.
Growing up, fatherhood wasn’t considered a rewarding job. Certainly few men admitted to enjoying it. It was ok to say you were a father but it was definitely not ok to gush about changing diapers, feeding babies or playing with your kids. There was an underlying message those things somehow diminished masculinity. It just wasn’t cool or manly enough.
Luckily for us, and our children, times are changing and fathers today are no longer afraid that looking after their children or spending time with them may demean their masculinity.
Still, we need to focus on modeling and teaching young men that being a father is being the ultimate man. Being present in your kids’ lives, guiding, supporting and mentoring them to become successful, responsible adults is something any man should be proud of.
Importance Of Positive Father Figures
Perhaps if we understood the importance of good father figures in our kids’ lives, we’d do more to promote fatherhood. Whether you are a single, divorced, married, widowed, step-parent or a co-parenting father, your involvement in your child’s life contributes significantly to their development.
Fathers are important because:
• They promote their kid’s emotional well-being. Being a supportive, involved and affectionate father can contribute greatly to your child’s emotional and social health. Children develop a sense of self, learn how to interact with others and also how to take risks in life by spending time and having memorable experiences with their dads. As a dad, you can teach them how to compete in a healthy way, to accept their strengths and weaknesses and also how to cope with losing every now and then.
• They influence their children’s relationships. Your relationship with your child serves as a blueprint for their interactions with others throughout their lives. They learn how to treat others by following your example. This is the basis for their relationships with friends, spouses, colleagues and authority figures.
• They play a role in preventing behavioral problems. Studies have shown that children whose fathers are active and involved in their lives are less inclined towards alcohol and substance abuse, perform better in school and are less likely to develop behavioral issues in life. And people think fathers are not superheroes!
There’s no doubt being a father is a great calling. The trick though is to actually get in the trenches and do some heavy lifting. You have to be present in your child’s life and you have to put in the work to build a lasting relationship with them. Believe me, it’s all worth it.
Best of all, you’ll motivate your sons and inspire other boys to be great fathers as well.
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As father of two and in my the relationship maybe a third, I’ll add that there are two ways of looking at masculinity: first, your own comprehension about it and then the signals you receive from your environment. If the first one is in fit, the second one can only boost it – not diminish.