BOOK REPORT

I keep books on my bedside table. I suppose that's not unusual.

What IS unusual is that they are far LESS likely to get read if they are there... because I tend to fall asleep before I get around to reading them.

If I really, really, really, really want/need to read a book (like for the awesome book club I belong to), I have to carry it around with me all day long.

Well, one book that has sat on my bedside table for months, maybe even years, is called The Entitlement Trap, by Richard and Linda Eyre. I have finally gotten around to reading it! Not because I carried it around the house, but because my baby, whom I still nurse to sleep in my bed, has started to ask -- or rather demand -- that the light stay on.

As much as I love to sleep, now that I have read this book, I kick myself that I let sleep take priority over this PHENOMENAL book -- I should have read it AGES ago and solved all of my parenting problems!

The Eyres have been writing parenting books for decades. They have nine children of their own, all of whom have at least a bachelor's degree and have served missions for our church. I have read several of their books and have had the pleasure of meeting the authors more than once. In fact, that very book that lay ignored on my bedside table is signed by them!

Anywho, their credentials are significant, and I probably could have endorsed this, their 46th book, even before I read it. However, I am so glad that I read it. It is simply incredible in its value! It is a succinct summary of their best and most important parenting practices, all compiled in this book for the purpose of helping our children recognize entitlement for the trap that it is rather than being tricked into believing it solves problems.

The authors are so experienced in many ways -- not just with the raising of their nine, but also with the writing of their many books, that this one is like the culmination of all of that invaluable experience, ready for me to put the plans into action.

That's the hard part. Unfortunately, metaphorically speaking, sometimes the ideas and ideals I learn through reading stay on the bedside table of my brain while I opt to sleep instead of making the effort to behave differently based on the book.

Well, this book report is my first step in choosing to act! One of the major themes of the book is goal-setting, and teaching our children to do it by doing it ourselves. So I am putting in writing the goal to write a blog post daily! Hooray! I did it today!! I pledge to do it again tomorrow!