Becoming an Intentional FatherSample

Roadblock #5: ProcrastinationI remember when my oldest son turned nine years old. My wife and I realized that once he’d been with us that many years again, he’d be gone. We’d just crested the hill, and from here, we’d pick up velocity as we sped to the release point.

Have you told yourself the lie, “I have plenty of time”? Think again, my friend. You don’t. As fathers, we must stop procrastinating and get to it. The time flies by so fast, it’s hard to recover those lost days.

One reason we fall for this lie is because we don’t appreciate how fast the “second half” of our kids’ home lives progress. We think since there are nine years in the first half, there are nine in the second. But something diabolical happens to those second nine.

They seem to progress at twice or three times the pace of the first nine. It’s as if the opening between the top and bottom of the hourglass dilates, and the sand plummets to the bottom.

I’m starting to think of it like this: When we hit their ninth birthday, we’ve really hit the 75-percent mark. I don’t have official science to back me up on this, but as my boys have aged, this seems more and more accurate.

I think various factors contribute to this effect:

• We get busier as dads – our careers have hit their stride, and we’re tasked with more at work, so we spend less time at home
• Our children have more inputs – social pressure, media feeds, and part-time jobs accelerate their exposure and learning
• Multiple ages at home – a two-year-old demands more time than a teenager, so the older kids get the short end of the parenting stick

Whether the acceleration is real or imagined, I know this: Our time to be influential dads runs out quickly. We must seize the day and invest in their lives aggressively when they’re still under our roof.