Building Strong Men

How developing strong leadership skills at home will strengthen your family and improve your marriage.

The American debates on the welfare state, youth crime, and issues surrounding the maturity of young people have brought about a renewed sense of the importance of fathers in families. The issue is not a father’s availability, but the necessity of taking and active role in leading a family with moral, mental, and emotional growth. The concept of the American family (Mom, Dad, 2.4 kids, dog and station wagon) has certainly changed over the decades. Prior to the revolutionary cultural alterations that began taking place in the 1960s, the concept of the family remained, for the most part, unchanged. Families were traditional. Parents stayed together. Children respected their elders. Dad was the leader in the home. Family members depended upon one another.

As late as the 19th century fathers would even provide job training for their children; teach them what he knew about a craft or career. Families of the 1990s are very different. Parents spend 40 percent less time with their children than they did in 1965. By 1985 that interaction with a child dropped to 17 hours a week from an average of 30 hours just 20 years prior (1).

To make matters worse, men are the worst when it comes to time spent with their kids. The fact is, fathers of two-parent households spend less time with their children than fathers in single-parent households (2). It seems that today, unless a man is forced to take leadership in his home, he may not take it at all.

The lack of male leadership in the home factors into the high rate of crime being experienced on the nation’s streets. Unless children are intentionally taught right from wrong and have a strong sense of values instilled, the more likely they are to rebel. The segment of society where the impact may be worst is the American black family. While many of today’s activists bemoan the plight of the black family, ascribing poverty and racism as the reason for high crime, the facts speak differently.

According to the controversial book, The Day America Told the Truth, studies reveal that well-to-do whites are just as, if not more likely to commit crimes as poor blacks. The authors remarked that America’s moral decline is primarily to blame.

Indeed, this must be the case as during the 1920s and 1930s when black families were at their poorest and without government aid, black crime among all ages was extremely low.

Taking Time
One reason parents, and especially fathers have less time to devote at home is the modern economy as regulated by the federal government. According to William R. Maddox, Jr. of the Family Research Council, “During the 1970s and 1980s constant dollar earnings of American husbands grew less than 1 percent per year compared with a real growth of 3 percent per year in the 1950s and 1960s. Moreover, some occupational groups – particularly non-supervisor workers and males under age 25 – real wages have actually fallen since 1973” (3).

This has forced parents into dual job roles. “Duel” is probably the most appropriate word in this context, as extra time spent wage-earning to support the family actually results in less time spent with the family – the greatest support mechanism of all.

The Men’s Movement
In recent years there has been explosion of interest in men’s issues. While women’s issues have focused on workplace rights, equal pay, sexual harassment and abortion (all issues revolving around independence from men), men’s issues are being placed squarely at home. Leadership, family time, child support and so on, are all issues men are beginning to deal with that draw them closer to home. And for many men, drawing closer to home begins with a weekend away.

The Promisekeepers weekends have motivated hundreds of thousands of American men to seek after greater leadership skills in the home. In 1994 alone, over 230,000 men gathered in 5 cities nationwide for full day seminars on leadership and how to be a godly man. Most interesting is how many women send their husbands and boyfriends out for a weekend with the boys – 50,000 per gathering. Promisekeepers has grown an average of five times each year, thus nearly one million men are expected to take part in 1995.

Promisekeepers is quite unlike sensitivity training where men are taught to accept other lifestyles. The seminar events are a time of serious reflection and recognition of the role men have in the home and society, with a serious challenge to take up a strong leadership role.

Exercising Character
In bodybuilding there is a concept known as “training to fail.” It happens when a weightlifter wants to strengthen and enlarge his muscle mass by continuing to lift the weight until the point of failure when it cannot be lifted anymore. The muscle is stretched, cells destroyed, replaced, and with repetition over time the muscle gets stronger and bigger.

Training to fail is also true when building character and the necessary skills of leadership required in the home. Just as the bodybuilder must push himself to new levels with appropriate time for rest and growth, so too men build character in themselves and their families when stretched.

Here are some ideas and factos to consider to build strong character and strengthen your leadership skills in the home:

• According to author and family counselor Gary Smalley, men and women react differently to their environment. Men are motivated by “doing” and “work.” Women are primarily motivated by a strong sense of “home” and family security. Good leadership in the home takes these factors into account.
• Providing for the family goes far beyond a job with good pay and a comfortable lifestyle. This is especially true with smaller children who would rather spend an hour playing with dad on the floor on in the yard than with new toys. One study revealed that even teenagers wish their parents were more like TV families depicted in the 1950s TV shows like Father Knows Best.
• Leadership does not mean “overseer.” One test of good leadership is not when people or families are forced to follow, but when they, even when they disagree, still follow a leader willingly. Building that kind of leadership takes time.
• Minimize going “out with the boys.” In most cases when a man goes out with friends mom is left to take care of the kids at home. Some of the time spent out with the boys can be used constructively by taking the kids along.
• There is nothing more important than moral leadership. The kind of character kids grow up with will be determined by what you instill in them. Moral leadership is not just setting an example, but genuine training. Regular time to sit together as a family and discuss issues of personal character can transform a child’s life – and a parent’s.
• The lost practice of father’s teaching their children a trade should be reclaimed. As children grow older parents should teach them what they know about the job they do. Consider apprenticing your teens. Even if your son or daughter skips college that training could sustain them later in life, and it could help build stronger bonds between father and child.