Saturday, July 21, 2012

Their precious little eyes~ how to keep their eyes pure

I felt the need to raise a question on how to keep our boys eyes pure? Now since we have 4 children 3 of them being boys we have been thinking of ways to do this for a while now.

First off I want to talk a little bit about what we think is not ok for their eyes. Grocery day is a big one for us. First off it is summer and VERY hot here 100+ each day so I know that everyone is trying to stay cool but when did modesty completely go out the window? So we go to the store and get out of the suburban and what do we encounter, but a young girl of an adult woman in something that barely covers their under garments. While we walk thru the store you can see so many people dressed in this way. Then we head to the dreaded check out lane Oh man do I hate this time. Not only because it takes forever when you have a family of 6 and buying for 2 weeks at a time. So the wait in the aisle is not fun at all then you eye the magazines on the rack. Who broke up with who, what so and so is wearing and unfortunately since we see these all the time I look at something more interesting and then notice that my boys are looking at a naked woman with just her hands covering her privates. Then after this we head back out to see the parking lot yet again. Now it is worse for our little town I believe because our store is right off the interstate.

1 Timothy 2:9
I also want the women to dress modestly, with decency and propriety, adorning themselves, not with elaborate hairstyles or gold or pearls or expensive clothes

This is just on verse that  explains how women should dress. My thoughts are different then others but I feel you should cover yourself at least most or all of your thighs, not too low cut in the front a modest dip and they should fit not tight to where there is nothing to not be seen. Here is one definition  to propriety  ~ the quality or state of being appropriate or fitting. 

If we are walking through the store or anywhere for that matter we see girls dressed in a way well not lady like our boys eyes can not un see these things. Well, when they see them over and over they start to get use to them and then they become ok. God did warn us be in the world but not of the world. Next thing that happens is that they start to loose respect for this young ladies and in time future girlfriends or wife may not receive the respect for their bodies that these young women deserve even if they never dressed immodest this can still be consequence of our boys being over stimulated sexually by pictures and the way girls dress every day. I know that you may only have a 3 year old but if you train them to not look then you will not have to worry as much for them as they get older.

I have a few ideas, things that we do and I would like to share them with you.

Look the other way

How do we teach them to look the other way? Well this is how we have done this for our boys. When we have the opportunity individually we discuss that it is not ok to stare and also that if you look at a girl in person or see on t.v. and it gives you a funny feeling or embarrasses you  about what they are wearing just turn and look the other way or look in their eyes. This may sound weird to say to you son but if he is 10 or so he knows what your talking about. Always remind them to be care about other feelings you don’t want them to say “Hey mom She is not dressed ok so I need to look away” That would not only be embarrassing you but to the girl he is talking about. We are not to judge and I always want to teach my children not to judge others.

Now if you are training a younger one this is how we have done this for our 2 youngest boys. Every time there is a t.v. show or commercial, bra and exercise commercials are the worst. We have told then to turn and not look. I have told Croix that his eyes are too precious to look and see her not dressed all the way. Have him then  think of how he feels when someone sees him naked and we don’t want anyone to see us. Usually they will feel embarrassed about it and will turn away if they see something they should not. You may have to remind them from time to time to not look.

Its not that we should want to make our kids feel embarrassed but we need to make them understand that it is not okay for them to see because we love them. If we train them to respect girls in this way they will have a better chance in finding a girl that respect herself. Me as a mother wants that, I know you would too.

Turn the magazines

Now this is what I do when we go into the aisle to check out I look to see what the magazines have on them and just flip them over. that simple. Some people think I am silly but it is what I do. I have had other women say “Wow I never thought of doing that!”.

Code words

Code words, this one is fun. So this one came about when I took a trip just the kiddos and I last year. We went to a family reunion in Las Vegas. I knew that there were going to be things I do not want my children to see while we were out to see the sites so we came up with a code word and it was nothing weird we came up with it together and I or my daughter would say it and the boys would look down until we said it was ok to look again. For the life of me I can not remember the word that we used for while we were there.

You do not want it to be something weird to draw attention  to your family and to show disrespect to others. We do not know where their walk with God is.

I know that some of this may sound odd or maybe you think wow this is a great idea *smile* but I want you all to know that I know that everyone deserves respect and love and this is why I do this out of love and respect for my children and out of love and respect for my future grand children. If we raise our kids up to be loving and respectful they will raise theirs this way.

As I was writing this my wonderful husband says “glass house” and I wish that you all could see into my home. We are not perfect even close. But we try our hardest to do what is right. Our Boys are crazy and normal they fight a lot and sometimes even go to bed dirty *oops*. We also have a 14 year old who is trying to find her way in the world. We are letting her make decisions on her own because we trust she will make good ones. We see some that are not what we want and will step in when needed. Clothes are a hard one with girls because of all the things we see daily. Their friends are dressing a certain way and t.v. and much, much more. It is a scary world I wish I could just keep them in a bubble but I can’t that would just be silly to hide them away and set them free and hope they will not stray. They need to learn to make decisions and they need to be in the world but not of it. They need to be confident in making good decisions and that they are loved and respected.

I hope you have all come out with something that you can use in your families. I would love to hear of more ideas on this matter. I do know that we can not change the world ourselves but we can train the next generation up with Christ in their hearts and they will then teach their children and so on.

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