The John Palm Show

What are you striving for? Quality of Life or Standard of Living?

What’s the difference?

Quality of life is simply how good your life is at any moment in time. Including how content you are, how peaceful your home feels, how much time you spend with those you love or how often you just sit and enjoy a nice meal or converstation.

Standard of living is the attainment of a standard either defined or undefined. Moving up the house ladder, getting a better car, going to a good school, being with certain people, playing certain sports or in certain leagues, or just basically jumping through hoops that you feel your supposed to jump through.

It’s a tricky question. Most people will automatically say “Well, quality of life, of course”. But actions speak louder than words Mr. Quality of Life Guy. Let’s see what is under the hood of your typical day:

• Get the kids up for school
• Shovel in “breakfast” (in quotes because, well, you know how breakfast can be)
• Dad get to work
• Mom get to work
• Pay those bills
• More bills
• Pay those bills
• Kids get home before parents
• Kids find Dad’s Playboy stash
• Mom gets home from work
• Dad gets home from work
• Everybody texts all the people they don’t really care about
• People they do care about are in the next room
• Sports practice
• Homework
• Eat
• Watch TV
• Bed
• Dream about a better “quality of life”
• Back to “Go” and start over the next day.

Oh yea, that is me. Now who is Mr. I’ve Got Such A Great Quality of Life? Makes me want to unplug from all that STUFF and go back to the basics.

Next: The futility of sports driven families and why your child will never make it past High School Athletics.

If Ellen and the Iggy Army can inspire this kind of passion for little dog… shouldn’t we be able to drum up some for our children? It leads me to ask the following questions to myself:

• What am I passionate about?
• How far would I go to defend my family/children?
• Do I inspire others around me to passion toward their children?
• What have I placed in front of my family that needs removal?
• Why do celebrities always want preferential treatment?

Malachi 4:6
He will turn the hearts of the fathers to their children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers; or else I will come and strike the land with a curse.”

Sometimes I think the world would be better if we treated our children like we do our pets.

It is easy for us parents to get overwhelmed with all the text messaging and High School Musical nudie pics to deal with.

So, here is my Parenting for Dummies list:

1. Hug your kid every day. Not a whimpy hug. A big, tight, long lasting hug. Don’t be concerned with being hugged back. That’s not the point here. YOU give the hug. There is no option. Don’t loose that physical connection with your son or daughter. My personal theory is that if I never stop hugging them, it will never be awkward to hug them when they are older.

2. Give your kid at least one verbal blessing per day. Words can tear down, but they can also build up. This can be as simple as placing your hand on their head and saying “bless you”. Don’t let the word “blessing” throw you — this does not have to be some complicated, elequent thing. Here’s some simple examples for us dummies:

• Your going to have an awesome day today.
• I’m so glad I’m your dad.
• Your are my beloved kid.
• I’m so glad your in our family.
• Your special to me.
• More Posts on Blessing Children here.

3. Join the Tickle Club. Talk about a no-brainer. Every one (deep down inside) loves to be tickled. You may not admit it, but a little goochy-goo makes you feel loved like nothing else. Age is NOT a factor here. Some of the best tickles in our club are:

• Bedtime tickle
• On the floor tickle
• Sneak up on you tickle
• I’m gonna get you tickle
• And the make you pee tickle

Join the revolution. Parenting for dummies. We are proud to be dumb. We stand up for the silly little things. And we have faith that the little things will become big deals for our kids.

1. The crowd is almost always wrong. Wide is the road to destruction, narrow is the road to salvation.There is always a better idea. Brainstorming can be endless. This gets me into trouble a lot because it is fun for me but can be annoying to others.
2. Taking action on a mediocre idea is better than doing nothing with the perfect idea. The brainstorming has to stop somewhere.
3. Parenting is a picture of salvation and a form of sanctification. Our children look to us as father as we look to God our father. We are to hand off this role over the course of our parenting.
4. Every thing is overrated and will (in some way) let you down. The only exception is being loved by someone.
5. There is a direct correlation between how many people you love and how good your funeral will be.

I will keep adding to this list.

Dear Fathers:

1. Think more about your family and children
2. Pray for each of your children
3. Teach your children and more specifically disciple them
4. Bless your children every day in words and action (hugs, time and attention)

This blog has gotten a lot of attention from those searching “blessing children” and other similar terms on Google. Please feel free to add your thoughts.

There are some good (free) personality test here. Go to tests.

Personality types are interesting and can reveal areas of your personality that are being used by God (your maker). Likewise, they may highlight areas of your personality that need pruning.

I’m the INTJ (Jung) personality type.  All that means is I’ve probably got you figured out and know exactly what makes you tick. I see past your big talk and right into that big fat hole in your soul.

Only 2% of the population have this personality type. So rest easy Mr. Big Talker.

Free Jung Word Choice Test (similar to MBTI)
personality tests by similarminds.com

• Wally Mark McButterPants
• J. C. “Penny” Pearshape
• Homer Depow Bigintall
• Biggs “Mac” Chomper
• Macy S. Kankles
• J. Crews Armflaber
• K. Mark Potbelly
• Dunkin D. Doublechin