Day 5 Give Warm Greetings and Farewells

{My Sixth Splendid Truth holds: The only person I can change is myself. It’s so tempting to focus on the changes that other people should make—but we don’t get to hand out assignments. So generally, I make resolutions only for myself.

However, in complete contradiction, I did make an exception to my Gretchen-only policy. I asked my family to adopt the resolution to “Give warm greetings and farewells.”

I’d noticed that we’d fallen into a bad habit; when a family member came home or left, we barely looked up from our games or homework or books or newspapers. I wanted to have a more attentive, more loving atmosphere in our home.

“What would you think about us all making a resolution together?” I asked them. “We could resolve that when someone comes home, or is leaving, we all pay attention to that person, to give a warm greeting or farewell.”

Somewhat to my surprise, my husband and two daughters immediately agreed.  But would we remember to do it, without nagging? I didn’t want a resolution meant to boost our feelings of affection to turn into a source of conflict.

In fact, without much effort, we all began to follow the resolution (most of the time). It feels like a natural thing to do, and the more we do it, the more engrained it becomes. 

As a consequence, several times each day, we have moments of real connection among all members of our family. 

Resolve to “Give warm greetings and farewells.” This simple action will make you feel more connected to the members of your family.}

Honestly, Jeff and I do this one great. But today I did focus on it. Made sure this morning (along with kisses) to give him a big hug - two armed hug - standing up one (",)  I love those kind of hugs they make you feel great from head to toe.  I'm not sure how well I did at lunch though in the greeting department, I'm gonna have to step it up tonight when I get home from work.  I like the way I feel when I get a hug from someone. When someone walks me to the door after we've been visiting and when they greet me with a smile when we come to visit. I love it even more when I'm making a point of doing that for someone else and focusing on our relationship with warm greetings and farewells. It's funny how something so simple can be so big and mean so much.