Why is it that some families, even while having limited time to spend together in today’s fast paced world, remain deeply connected and are there for each other through thick and thin, while others simply exist together in a common space and are unable to forge very deep bonds despite spending a major portion of their lives together, under the same roof? Relationship experts and therapists say it is not the amount of time you spend together as a family, it is the quality of the time you give to each other, especially to your children, that makes for true bonding and support as a cohesive family.
The phrase ‘Quality Time’, which has been around since the 1970s, refers to time that is set aside for paying full and undivided attention to a particular person/s or issue. This concept is of special significance in the context of the parent-child relationship, because it is the quality of time that you spend with your child that gives her critical mental and psychological inputs and shapes her emotional intelligence and personality. It is also crucial in forging close family ties which give the child a core of resilience and inner strength to grow into a balanced, happy and successful individual.
Says American entertainer Brandy Norwood: “Your children can be around you all day, but if you don’t spend quality time with them and you don’t pay attention to them and talk to them and listen to them, it doesn’t matter that they’re just around you”.
What is ‘Quality Time’?
‘Quality time’ is time spent doing an activity that is meaningful to the parent and child. It is time when family members really get to know each other. Quality time is spent focusing attention on each other and sharing thoughts and feelings. It is like creating a storehouse of emotional support and mental strength, which will be a bulwark to strengthen the family members in bad times and a heaven of inner peace, love and security in good times.
The concept of Quality Time assumes added significance in today’s world because busy lifestyles and high stress factors are tearing families apart. Says Delhi based psychiatrist Dr. Vimal Kumar, “A family that has omitted to create close bonding amongst its members is highly likely to fall apart under the manifold pressures of contemporary lifestyles. This is where we need to understand the crucial necessity of taking out quality time for the family, even in the midst of punishing schedules and deadlines”.
Why Quality Time?
Children need to know they are loved unconditionally. The cry of children today is, ‘Love me for who I am, not what I do. Love me for being who I am, even when I am naughty, not winning, placing, and showing’. This does not mean that parents have to approve of everything the child does. What it does mean however, is that even though the child misbehaves, we still love and accept the child and provide support. We help children develop positive self-esteem by communicating the value we feel for them. Words of encouragement and love help provide children with the courage to try new things without worrying excessively about not being able to do them. And spending quality time with them is the most effective way of giving them this feeling of being cherished.
Children learn about families from the time they spend in their own families. They learn about birth and caring for another person when a new baby comes home from the hospital. They learn about loss when a family member dies. They learn about marriage and relationships by watching their mothers and fathers interact. They learn about trust at home from their parents, and from being trusted. By living in a family that spends quality time together, communicating these values through actions, children learn to share, how to stand up for their own rights, and how to love another person.
Adding Value and Quality to Family Life
Spending time with our children can be fun and educational for us and for them. The activity does need not be costly, but rather one that satisfies both the parent and the child.
Much of the child’s basic learning takes place in the many informal situations that occur daily in the life of the family. These informal occasions for learning include all the times the family members are together doing ordinary things, such as getting dressed, talking over the day’s happenings, dealing with problems, interacting with people outside the family, taking baths, eating, and so forth. To help children grow and mature well, parents need to help children learn about life and living in today’s society. Thus, the quality time that parents spend with a child becomes all the more important.
As the world becomes more and more aware of the importance of quality time with the family, a recent ‘happiness poll’ in UK shows that the largest proportion of respondents consider ‘quality time with the family’ more important for happiness than material possessions, money and career goals. In fact, for most parents, spending time with their children was even more important than relaxing or luxury holidays.
New research reveals an overwhelming 95 per cent of parents actually believe the key to happiness lies in spending quality family time together. The new research study of couples pre- and post-parenthood has found that mothers and fathers are shunning sports cars, jewelry and posh clothes in favour of what they say is the ultimate luxury—spending time with their family.
Balancing Priorities: Career and Family Commitments
However, research also shows there may still be some way to go before parents are really able put aside work related guilt and spend more time with their families, even though they yearn for it. While they overwhelmingly agree that family time with their children is the key to happiness, two-thirds admit that they had worked hard to achieve financial goals at the expense of it. This proportion is especially high (more than 65 per cent) among high profile professional fathers in urban areas who feel under greater pressure to work hard at the expense of time with their children.
A strong family finds that opportunities for quality time emerge from quantity time: The more time you spend together, the better chance you have of sharing quality experiences. Eating meals together, talking about the events of the day, sharing joys and defeats, doing household chores together and spending some evenings popping corn and watching movies are examples of shared activities. Some families even schedule one evening every week for special family activities. Doing things a child or spouse wants to do also sends a strong message of love.
How much time?
Healthy families keep a good balance between ‘too much’ and ‘not enough’ time together. They spend enough time to satisfy all family members. Children learn to bring balance to their lives when they see their parents setting aside time for what they value.
Where should you start if you’re not spending enough time with your children?
A family meal is a good place to start. ‘A family that dines together stays together’ may be a time-worn phrase, but bears repeating. Having a meal with your children away from distractions such as the TV, video games and cell phones can help start those conversations that you would like to, or need to have with your children.
Ways to Spend Quality Time with Children
The most precious gift that parents can give their children is time. A personal investment in children is much more important to them than any toy, video game or electronic gadget. Some wonderful and creative ways for parents to get together with their children for quality time can be as follows:
1. Help with the homework and school projects
It is the ‘done thing’ today to hire tutors and helpers to help children with the homework and school projects, because parents are simply too busy to be able to spare time for this. However, in some of the most closely bonded families, helping the children with homework and projects is an important part of the quality time that parents give to their children. Says Tanuj Agarwal, a high profile employee in a multinational corporation and father of a 16 year old son and 14 year old daughter, “I always make it a point to take out time over the weekends to catch up with my children’s studies and help them with their weekly projects. I really cherish this time we spend together, and so do the children. My wife prepares a favourite meal and we all connect over food, jokes and the children’s projects.”
When children are young, stories are one of the best ways of forging mental and emotional connects. They fire the child’s imagination, have great scope for role playing and make-believe, and are an excellent avenue for transmitting values and a sense of connectedness and cultural identity to the children. They also open the doors to broader horizons and forge abiding bonds between the parents and children.
3. Plan an outdoor activity/ picnic or a vacation
During the spring and autumn breaks, when the weather is pleasant, it is the ideal time to plan outdoor activities in parks and at popular picnic spots. These could be as simple as playing badminton or cycling in the neighbourhood parks, or more ambitious, such as get-togethers of extended families in gardens open to the public, visits to popular monuments or cultural centres, with a packed fun meal thrown in to enhance a sense of adventure and break the monotony. There is also no dearth of family vacation venues where families can spend time together doing fun activities and connecting with each other.
4. Turn off the TV and spend the evening together
It is frightening how important the television has become in some families. Sitting together and watching TV is entertaining, and sometimes educational, but it doesn’t foster quality together time and interaction. Explore the interests of the entire family for what to do when you turn off the TV and focus on your family. It can be a good idea to set aside at least one night each week for the family and only the family, when you do something that you enjoy. It could be a story night one week f or the younger children, or guessing games/ hobbies for teenagers one week, or even cooking a favourite dish together with mom sometime, or creating a garden or a terrace garden together.
Ultimately, say experts, it is the quality time that you give your children that will figure in their memories of you, and shape their perceptions of happiness and success in their own lives and families.
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