Why are Family Meals Important?
With the crazy lifestyles and schedules that we’ve allowed into our homes, spending time around the dinner table as a family has become something many families have shrugged their shoulders and turned a blind eye to.
While there are times when it is simply impossible to sit down as a family, it should be a habit that is not neglected. These are several reasons why family meals are so important for your family.
Only Set Time Gathered in One Place
Think about it. With the crazy everyday schedule of activities, homework, and work, this is the one time throughout the day where your family is all together in one place.
This is especially true if you have teenagers that head straight to their rooms after school and shut the door behind them. Make sure you create a family mealtime each day and stick with it.
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Strengthens Relationships
There’s just something about getting to know people and open up to them at the same time as enjoying a meal. Why do you think people head to their favorite restaurants when they are going on a date?
It’s a great socializing opportunity and can build stronger relationships within the family. During dinner time, your family members are willing to open up to who they are: the good, the bad and the ugly. This also creates a stronger family bond.
Building Self-Esteem
Family meals also help build your children’s self-esteem. When they see that mom and dad think that what they have to say is important, it also makes them feel important as individuals and builds their confidence.
Informing Each Other
Without conversation around the dinner table, it’s harder to read into your children’s crummy behavior as to why they are acting the way they are. Things that are troubling them will flow out more naturally during dinner time because the opportunity has presented itself.
Without family meals, those conversations may never come about. This holds true for sharing in their successes too. Informing each other of what’s going on in each of your lives, keeps mom, dad, sister, and brother in the loop.
Children Have Their Parent’s Attention
Family meals provide the time where kids can have their parent’s full attention. This is extremely important, because if they don’t have an opportunity that’s available to gain your attention, they will be more willing to get into trouble to get the attention they were looking for.
Without family meals, the chances of your children getting caught up in drugs, drinking, or stealing, increases exponentially.
Influences Children’s Good Eating Habits
Often times, with kids and parents constantly on the go, family meals are just impossible to have every night. This leaves everyone for themselves, and if you haven’t noticed, kids aren’t the best at picking out what’s nutritional for them.
Family meals provide them with better eating habits because you’ve come up with something at least somewhat nutritional to share as a family (or so we hope.)
Do you make it a priority in your family to have family meals several times throughout the week?
If you don’t, do these reasons motivate you to make it happen?
Let me know what you think in the comments below.