Written By: A.J. Rounds, Chief Marketing Officer at RevRoad
Responsibility in family. What a fantastic topic. Families come in all shapes, sizes, and varieties.
Cultures and societal norms can play a big part in what defines responsibility in every family. In other words, it can be defined in many ways.
Most can agree that parents have a responsibility to care for their children’s well being, while children have the responsibility to learn to be responsible family members, good citizens, and demonstrate responsible behaviors.
Teaching Children Responsibility
One of the ways in which children can learn responsibility is by watching and emulating the examples set by parents.
Being responsible means taking action.
It is beneficial for kids to learn that helping yourself, your family, others, and the community is a choice. But taking that first step towards responsibility is not always easy.
Responsibility often requires an act of courage.
Parents have the responsibility to guide and support courageous behaviors.
Taking the initiative to be responsible requires a push out of our own bubble. It requires us to leave our comfort zone for the sole purpose of helping someone else.
Sometimes, the choice to do so is simple. If we see a pregnant woman on the train it’s a good idea to offer our seat. If we see someone struggling with many bags, we should open the door.
These small acts of kindness are essential to creating a responsible society and are often taught within the family unit. But there are other, different types of responsibility that we need to partake in as well — actions that require a little more courage and choice.
These behaviors are often less clear and require value judgements, judgements taught and supported at home.
Recognizing Responsible Situations
Think back to being a kid on the playground. Maybe, as we dangled from the monkey bars, we noticed another child bullying a classmate. The easiest thing to do would be to ignore the incident and keep playing. The responsible thing to do, however, would be to stand up to the bully. Doing so would be scary but show bravery, and ultimately a powerful act of responsibility.
Responsible situations happen daily. There are always opportunities to act responsibly.
What about stepping in to help out a community after a disaster? Or reporting to the scene of a crime? These things can be difficult but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do what we can to help.
Sometimes responsibility means inserting ourselves into situations in order to do good, and teaching family members why and when it’s important to do so.
Let’s make a resolution to find the courage within ourselves to take on responsibilities where necessary and teach family members to do the same. By teaching responsibility in families, we are preparing the world’s next generation of entrepreneurs and business leaders.
