For my latest Zombie Post, I wanted to check in on my own progress. It’s not looking good.

Almost a year ago, I wrote the post below, about my realization that raising a good kid means I’ll need to retrain myself. Being a good parent doesn’t mean you have to change your personality but it does mean you’ll probably need to change some of your behavior. I’m not just talking about the typical adjustments to your swearing and drinking and sleeping. I’m talking about the instinctual behavior you’re not even necessarily aware of, like how you react to things. Because our kids notice EVERYTHING.

I’m a little disappointed to admit that I haven’t exactly succeeded in this endeavor, at least not just yet. It’s no easy thing to alter thirty-plus years of ingrained behavior, but that’s exactly why it’s so important. I need to help my kid grow up on the right track so that when he’s my age and has a kid of his own, he won’t need to reprogram himself. Some things you learn you can’t unlearn, which is why it’s so important to learn the right things early.

So I’ve resurrected this old post to give myself a bit of a kick in the pants. Because I can teach the big things until the cows come home, but it’s the little things that sometimes leave the largest impression.

Original Post: Raising Sane: The Art of the Underreaction