Chicken Wasn’t Born in the Store

One of the things we like to teach our kids is: chicken wasn’t born at the grocery store.

What that means is that we don’t pull the trigger of a miter saw or sketch out a plan, then POOF, it’s built. Creating something—anything—requires work and thinking and planning.

And more work.

And focus and determination and all those things. You don’t need to eat more ice cream than you should or jack into a video game for longer than is healthy. Look, I love ice cream and video games seem fun, but neither one is real. They might be realistic, but they are not real. Video games are perhaps the most sophisticated fiction the world has ever known and ice cream, while yummy, isn’t real food like fish, apples or steak.

So when you undertake a project, our advice is to get your kids in the game. Don’t compromise their safety but don’t “protect” them from work either. Enable them to embrace the actual texture of a plant as you weed a garden or feel the rocks under their feet as you build a play-set. Have them mow the lawn, drive the screw, pick up trash, dig a hole.

It actually makes the project take longer, by the way, but it is so vastly worth it.

And it is fun.

And they have to learn it sometime anyway. Why not learn it at your side, from you, where it is safe, and why not learn it early?

Heck, life is hard. Things get screwed up. But we also fix them. And things go right if you persevere, think, and work.

After all, if life were automatic, chicken would be born at the grocery store. But it isn’t. Someone has to bring it there.

So, parents, my chicken-challenge is this: bring it.

Mark

A licensed contractor, tool expert, wood and outdoor enthusiast, and elite Spartan Race competitor, he writes about home improvement and tools for national magazines and websites, and teaches hands-on clinics for other remodeling professionals. Check out his book, The Carpenter's Notebook.

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