The Importance of Spending Time with the Child 

Spending time with your child is truly the most precious thing you give him: because being with him means giving him interest, affection, stability, and being a real family; not toys and other gifts, but spending time together is valuable for the child. Being a good parent means being an involved parent, present in the child's daily life…

About your time with your child:

The significance of the family. The family is the intimate, affective group that offers its members deep relationships and support. Or so it should be… Unfortunately, in today's hectic world, in many families, its members, though so close physically, are so emotionally distant from each other; everyone has their corner and cares about their own.

You all gather at home in the evening, but you don't feel connected to each other. Such a precious family unit is hard to create because each of you lets yourself be taken over by your own life and forget to be truly together, to spend time together, not just next to each other!

Spending time together provides security and emotional stability. The child experiences a sense of security through family, routine, and family activities. The time spent with the regular child, regardless of the actual activity, gives him the stability he needs.

Whether you're just talking, playing a game, going to town, doing household chores together, dining, or even watching a movie - any activity together is precious to the child. Emphasis is placed on spending quality time - getting involved and talking to the child, not just sitting together in front of the TV; but even the latter is valuable for the feeling of family stability.

Transmitting perspectives and values ​​in life. To be a positive influence in the child's life, to transmit values ​​and attitudes to him, you must be an active presence in his daily life. So, you have to spend time with the child: a busy parent, whom the child sees only a few minutes before bedtime, is not an active presence and cannot influence the child's formation by his example! Activities together as part of the family routine ensure that you stay in the child's life, that he does not move away emotionally from you, his family, especially once he creates a group of friends and has more and more activities of his own.

The time spent with the child shows appreciation. Spending time with him shows your child that he is really important to you and that he is a priority in your life. You show him that you appreciate him and that you are interested in him and his life. You don't always have to find interesting or fun activities: the most important thing is to stay with him and ask him about his life, thoughts, emotions.

Support him and be there, next to him, when he needs someone to listen to him. When he sees you too busy and notices that you are only listening to him with one ear, being distracted, the child feels too little appreciated - he sees that you have another priority. So, just be there, an active presence and listening to what the child has to say, who may and wants to put things aside for a while, because the most important thing for the parent is to protect and support the child.

The time spent with the child, therefore, does not necessarily mean looking for special and fun activities: it just means sitting with him and listening to him and talking to him; to be accessible, leaving aside from time to time the rest of the concerns. It means involving him when you do your homework, watching a movie together, but also playing at home together - this for you too.

By playing with the child, not only do you reconnect and get closer, you allow yourself to relax and feel good for at least a while! Being a serious and busy adult is not good for anyone - and the child is the one who can get you out of the stress and boredom of adulthood by giving you moments of joy…

In any case, much more important and precious is to spend moments together every day, instead of spending only one day together at the end of the week, more precious are the moments of relaxation in which you talk willingly and unwillingly than the rare moments when you take him to a fun place… The parent must be a constant presence in the child's life. It gives you security and stability. Of course, on the weekend you can spend more and better time with the child, but try to be present in his life and for the rest…

Time spent with the child means support - everyone, regardless of age, needs a close person they can count on to listen and support. The child needs support all the more - both emotionally, through the feeling that he is appreciated and listened to, and practically, through the help provided, through encouragement and support.

It is very important to show the child that you are always there, that he can turn to you for advice, but also practical help. And if you don't stay with him, don't talk to him, don't care about his activities, don't get involved, then don't show him that you are there for him!

You can't make up for the time spent with your child with gifts: busy parents often feel so guilty that they buy their child lots of presents, take him to beautiful places on the weekends, and allow him to do just about anything he wants.

These, however, do not represent what is truly valuable: but the daily time, those moments, even short ones, spent daily together, that routine of family life, which shows that you are connected, together. Trying to make up for the lack and non-involvement with many gifts and a permissive attitude can not only have detrimental effects on education (the child can take it in his head): these only give him momentary joy - but the child lacks real closeness, stability, the involved presence of his father.

So try to give him a piece of your daily time, instead of trying to make up for it on a day off by taking him for a walk! After all, no matter how busy you are, family is the priority!