Do Your Eyes Light Up?

As a life-long Oprah Winfrey fan, I have seen a large majority of her shows, and have learned a lot from the many interviews she has done with so many inspiring, wonderful people.  One of the most memorable, for me, was the great Maya Angelou.  When talking about her life as a mother, she told Oprah that she follows one basic rule when it comes to her children, and she recommends the same for us.  She asks us to consider the following question:  Do your eyes light up when they enter the room?

Well…do they? Do your eyes light up when you see your children?  When you walk in the door after a long day of work, what is the image your children see?  Or when they cry out in the night and you groggily walk to their room with your eyes half-closed, what are the words that they hear?   

I know that I, personally, could work on this.  I am always happy to see my children, and I love them with all of my heart, but I know that sometimes the stresses and day-to-day problems in our life take over, and I do not respond to them as I should, or hold them as much as I should, or get down on the floor and play with them as much as I should.  I hope that by admitting this on my blog, and with the help and support of all of you readers, I can make it a priority to make sure that my eyes light up every time that they walk in the room, every time that I drive up to the door after work, and every time that I walk into their room at night.

And for those of you who don’t have children…why not apply this rule to everyone in your life?  Do your eyes light up when your husband walks in from work?  Do your eyes light up when your mom pays you an unexpected visit?  I know that I could work on these things, too!  This is one of my goals with the blog…to remember the good that I have in this life.  And I hope it helps you do the same in your own life.  We never know what tomorrow brings, and therefore we must be careful how we treat the most precious people in our lives, whether they are our children, our spouses, our parents, our friends…or even a stranger on the street!  You might be the only light in someone’s day, so make it count!

Tell your kids you love them, tell them how happy you are to see them when they come running up to you, and when your day is hard and you’re having trouble being patient with the world, remember Maya Angelou’s simple, but meaningful, question…

My precious boys.

Do your eyes light up?