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By Aaliyah

I often times read different stories where people are upset and wanting change. Many people are tired and fed up with society. I even remember my own mother crying over my awful behavior, I see this scene reenacted in many schools. I had a friend whose mother was a teacher at one of the middle schools here in town, she actually left the school due to the awful treatment she received from students. Many people are backed up against a wall when they look out at society today and what it has become.

But my question today is, "What are you doing about it?".

What got me to thinking about this was a conversation I was having with a friend of mine. We were talking about the news and how sad it was to watch most of the stories. So she asked me, "What are you doing to make it better?", she said it doesn't help to sit around and concentrate on the negative. I agreed with her totally. I can think of many times when I could have been calling schools, daycares, and other facilities to get the message out about Character Educations and its importance.

I also looked at myself and wondered, "Did I dress in a respectable fashion, today?", "Did I use appropriate language?", "Was I kind and respectful to everyone?".

I remember a quote by Mahatma Gandhi that said: "Be the change you want to see in the world." and I also thought of a quote in The Peaceful Solution that says "The change begins with you.".

I came in contact with many people today, I didn't speak to them or touch them but, they saw me. They saw the way I was dressed, how I carried myself, they heard the words I spoke. I hope I represented a respectful, humble person along with other positive character traits. I don't care if they saw my facial features, I just hope left a positive impression upon them.

Have you heard the saying; "A picture is worth a thousand words?", well how valuable is our appearance or our presence?

What did you say to those around you today? We are all walking examples and we have to represent the change we want to see in the world. Do we add to the problem or are we a part of the solution?

I have a neighbor who has a small child about 2 or 3 yrs of age. The child was going in and out of the house slamming the door while her mother was trying to have a conversation on the telephone. The mother, who was getting frustrated, yelled all kinds of belittling insults at the child to make the child go in the house and stop slamming the door. I thought of that as a oxymoron of sorts, how can you yell filthy language at someone to make them do the right thing? You can't. So how can we be disrespectful, arrogant, and rude and expect society to change for the better?

By Aaliyah

I remember working in fast food a few years ago, I usually remember the laughs and customers. What I just recently thought about was the disrespect and how irresponsible we were as crew members. Some stole, others were late, and some didn't even show up to work their shift most days. We had no respect for our managers, I remember talking back and half doing the tasks I was given. Now that I think about it, being a manager was hard work!

I also remember different managers accusing one another of theft, no one trusted anyone. Our managers used to bend the rules for some and be strict on others. They were supposed to be our examples and they were tardy to work or were getting in trouble for half doing their work. Do you see where I am going with this?

Let me list some things I saw on a daily basis:

stealing

lying

arrogance

irresponsible

dis respectfulness

......I am sure there are more.

I know my little job wasn't the only place where managers and crew members alike practiced bad habits. Our managers used to find half eaten, unpaid for sandwiches in the weirdest places! Often times we would steal food with the money to pay for it sitting right in our pockets. I don't remember anyone getting reprimanded because what they did was wrong but, because what they did cost the store money. We didn't realize how our choices were due to a lack of Character Education.

My grandmother had no idea I was acting the way I was at work, she didn't know I was so rude or irresponsible. My grandmother just thought I was just fine and that I had my head on straight, little did she know....little do most parents know. Can you guarantee that your adolescent wouldn't steal, lie or be disrespectful to others while not in your presence? I believe many of us hope our children will make the right choices but, put out the possibility of them doing the opposite.

And things haven't gotten better either, a manager I know still has to deal with the same issues. He finds himself often times disciplining instead of being a manager. He shouldn't have to constantly ask workers to pay for food that they have already eaten. These values should already be instilled in workers before they apply for jobs or are eligible to work. I am not just talking about adolescents I am talking about adults also, I remember seeing a fight between a manager and an adult crew member!

I knew it was wrong to steal but, didn't know how much it really affected my character when I did. Each time I stole I was putting it in my mind that this was okay to do. I constantly lusted after things that weren't mine and would think of ways to steal them when the manager wasn't around. To be honest I didn't deserve that paycheck I received, I didn't deserve the job either. I would be late and then  expect to not be corrected about it. Even though, I agreed to that time and shift and knew about it well in advance. The bottom line is I didn't care, none of us did.

I didn't care if someone had to stay later to work because I was late, I didn't care if I messed up the stores money by stealing food. I did not care about anyone but myself. I think we all can remember times when it was all about us, we didn't care about the repercussions or consequences for our actions.If were caught doing something wrong, we would be embarrassed but, never did we think of the big picture and no one around was able to show it to us because they were often doing the same things we were.

Many of us have done things in our lives that were pretty close to landing us time in jail or even worse. From drugs and fights, to promiscuity, we have all taken unnecessary risks at one point or another. For about 2.3 million people, their outcome WAS jail. Currently 1 in 100 adults in America sit behind bars with no freedom. How close were we to being behind bars?

I can think of many times as an adolescent where anger swelled up in me so bad I could have definely made a bad choice if that person was in my presence. As a teenager, I can remember picking up a knife in anger after an argument. Thankfully I couldn't bring myself to use it, but the point is that thought was there. That was many years ago, times have changed a lot since then. How often do you think teenagers today think of killing someone after a day of being bullied, arguing with parents, or breakups? It has become common in our society to yell "I wish you were dead!" or "I could kill you right now!".

Well, many teenagers do have access to the knives, guns or strength and are killing those bullies, parents, or "lovers". "I could kill you right now!" is turning into more than just a saying, people are putting those awful words into action. Many parents often are afraid to discipline their children for fear of the teenager killing themselves or others. And many parents think that it could never occur to their child. I can tell you many parents right now whose children are in prison or dead, said that exact same thing.

There was a story just recently on the news where a young girl about 16-17 yrs. old plotted with her boyfriend to kill her mother. The police where tipped off and the plot was exposed. Could you imagine finding out your son or daughter was plotting to kill you? They had a complete plan and even hired a hit man! I was so shocked and blown away when I saw that story on the news, my first thought was "I would never do anything like that!". But without being trained how to control our negative thoughts, how many times have we had "thought" that could have very well lead to an action?

It is sad how easily most of us could have ended up behind bars over anger that usually subsided the same night or a few days later. We all have gotten caught up in moments but, how close have we been to doing something to someone that could have changed our lives forever? The scenes in the courtroom are usually the same, you have the young person crying and saying "I wasn't thinking!" or "I didn't know he/she was going to die, I didn't mean to kill them."

Anger turns to rage so fast most of the time you can't even tell you have let your emotions go too far. It is a sad reality in America that more and more teens are losing control of their emotions and more and more people are paying the price. Self control is something that is not taught in schools, we shrug off teen problems thinking they will grow out of it, that they will mature. When really our young adults are crying out for help. They don't know what to do with their anger, what to do about certain situations, or how to calm down and think rationally. To be honest, many adults don't know how to control themselves either so how can they teach the children?

So how close have you been to being killed? How close have you been to killing someone? How close have you been to being behind bars for one stupid moment of anger? For most of us, very close.

Download | Duration: 00:12:53

Teach Character and Children Earn Money

I have been thinking of new and exciting ways to teach character to children and teens. I have thought of an interesting way to do it. As you know, children have a short attention span and they retain much more when they are learning something that interests them and benefits them.  I think I have found the perfect solution!

A few years ago I wanted to teach my son about responsibility.  He was about 11 at the time and I let him play a computer game that taught him how to have run a business. It started him out with an “account” of a certain amount of money. He had to buy a lemonade stand, supplies to make the lemonade, business permit, etc. They gave him plenty of options, and each time he would choose his item, that money would be deducted from his account.

Once he purchased all his items, it was time to get out to the streets and sell. Now he had choices as to the city, the street corner, etc. Once he was all setup on his street, the people would come and he sold his lemonade all day long. As long as it didn’t rain, or sometimes he ran out of lemonade and had to close early. At the end of the day he had to total his earnings or losses and figure out the best way to divide the money for the next day.

All of this was great, except for a few factors. It was a just a game so he didn’t feel the true consequences of when he spent his money foolishly. He got frustrated that when he worked so hard to earn his money, again, it was just a game so he really earned satisfaction of knowing he did a job well done (which was fine with me, but let’s face children want to see real rewards, they want us to show them the money ).  Not to mention that many of the customers coming to his stand were half naked women that I didn’t appreciate were being put in front of my 11 year old son; after all this was a game for children and I was a little upset that they had to add that in. 

So, show them the money!

So we come to my idea of how to teach them to be responsible, yet let them receive real rewards and have fun doing it. Take a subject they really love and let them write about it and write about it, and write about it. Their passion, their hobby, their masterpiece of words will be displayed on a website that they made (with the help of you, of course).

So, how will a website with information about my child’s hobby make any money you ask? Here’s how! You see, I have learned that people on the internet seek Information, Information, Information, this is a proven fact.  You provide the information, make creditable recommendations then get paid for referring people. 

Sound Easy? It is and it isn’t!

It is a business, the more you put in, the more you get out of it. It is not a get rich quick way out, it teaches them how hard you must work in order for a business to succeed, but when it does, they will see the rewards of their hard work, rewards that they will really enjoy, money!

I started this program with my son (he is now 15) and let him decide on a subject that he loves, he chose fishing. He is in the process now of building his site. As soon as it is ready, I’ll post the link here so you can see it, as well as his progress. He is doing all the design, all the copy (writing) and all of the work. He is writing about all his fishing experiences, then talking about all the neat places that have really great fishing, recommending the best fishing resorts and when his visitors go to visit the resort, the resort pays him a percentage. This is just one of the ways he will earn money. In a few months, he will start to get paid from his work which will encourage him to work even harder on his site. Here are the benefits I see in this:

• Mom and/or dad get to spend quality time helping them learn and earn
• Allows them to spend time working on positive and constructive work instead of TV and Video games, etc.
• Helps with their writing/English skills (perfect for the homeschoolers extracurricular activity)
• Teaches them responsibility while rewarding them at the same time
• Helps them to save money for their future

There are so many benefits to this, but these are just a few. You never know, this may even end up being the college money! Either way it’s a win, win situation.

So how do I start a website?

You can build a website for free, with Microsoft Live Office. They offer webhosting, website building tools and a domain name all for free, no catch, but no marketing and no visitors, that part you will have to do yourself.  I opted to sign up with Site Build IT, they offer a complete package with Web Hosting, Domain Name, Website building tools and traffic/visitors (SEO) for a very affordable price. What I have decided with my son, as soon as he begins to bring in money, I will deduct a certain portion until I am paid back for my initial investment, again, teaching him another business lesson. Both options offer easy website building tutorials for people who have no website building skills. 

One final note…..

Building a website does take time, and practice, but the rewards are very satisfying. Get your kids and get to brainstorming their website theme, it's so much fun!