Recently I got into a discussion about quality time versus quantity time. We were talking about which is more important, especially with children and family. In today's rush rush world, quality time is talked about and how you schedule time with people and you limit it because you don't can't spend a lot of time with them, but you want to maintain relationships and good development.
I was in a men's class thing at a church that I was going to years back. The speaker, instructor, facilitator was helping us discuss what we were learning from a book about men and family time and all that stuff and raising good kids.
That was one of the questions that he asked, which is more important in your children's lives? Quality time or quantity time with you? Of course, all the men in there were hard chargers developing their careers and everything.
We all said quality time because we want to make sure it's high quality and our kids get the most out of it. The man argued that quantity is more important than even the quality. because when we limit time with our children to 30 minutes a day that's all they're getting and they have no opportunity to just be with us.
Their relationship is limited and high expectations are put on it and if there's failure then it takes a while to recover from that if you can recover at all because the time you have available is already committed and limited.
His point was that we need quantity time with our children and with the people in our lives because the quality will come with the amount of time with more time spent. Now I can argue against that and say That's not always true, especially when it's a bad situation, or when there's pain and hurt involved that develops into anger or tears.
It's an interesting question. I was never one of those extremists that wanted to quit my job and spend all of my waking hours with my children because I personally wanted them to develop and to find upstanding individuals through relationships with me and their mother and others in the community.
That worked out well for us. All of our children did really well and grew up to be great people that I really enjoy hanging out with. But, I also understand that's not always the case with other families.
I often wished that I could have spent more time with my kids because I was working in a job that entailed shift work and prevented me from being there for a lot of different things. But I like the way we did it and I like the way things are turning out.
I love my family and when I get somebody in my life that I want to develop a relationship with, I add more time because my primary love language is quality time.
It was a good discussion and I keep thinking about it.
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