{"id":71,"date":"2010-09-27T06:55:43","date_gmt":"2010-09-27T06:55:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/lettinggo\/2010\/09\/new-choices-for-parents-and-children.html"},"modified":"2010-09-27T06:55:43","modified_gmt":"2010-09-27T06:55:43","slug":"new-choices-for-parents-and-children","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/2010\/09\/new-choices-for-parents-and-children.html","title":{"rendered":"New Choices for Parents and Children"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>QUESTION<\/b><\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Is it possible to change my teenage son from being angry and negative? He does not take responsibility for his actions; he blames everyone else and tells lies that he believes. He also shows little respect for adults when he thinks they don&#8217;t respect him. He is getting better, but I really want him to be a light before he graduates high school and goes out in the world. <\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<p><!--more--><br \/>\n<b>ANSWER<\/b><\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>We cannot change another human being; it is not possible. And, it is not our job to do so, thank God. What <i>is<\/i> our responsibility, and what we can do, is continue to work on inviting the Light into our own life. If we will do this, then the same Living Goodness we have agreed to live by (and within) will see to it that whomever is around us will have the chance to make new choices because of God&#8217;s works in our lives. This is the only way we can help those we love &#8212; by increasing the presence of Love in our hearts. This does not mean we pretend to be different. Children see our phoniness and resent us for being a hypocrite. Instead we must embrace what we are given to see within ourselves, and in our willingness to be made new, we become a living example of the Light that changes us. Then, your son, or whomever it may be, has a chance to make a new choice based on seeing its real possibility.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>QUESTION Is it possible to change my teenage son from being angry and negative? He does not take responsibility for his actions; he blames everyone else and tells lies that he believes. He also shows little respect for adults when he thinks they don&#8217;t respect him. He is getting better, but I really want him&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":232,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[191,93,194,51,193,192],"class_list":["post-71","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-family-raising-children","tag-children","tag-choice","tag-hypocricy","tag-parenting","tag-teaching-by-example","tag-teenagers"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>New Choices for Parents and Children - Letting Go with Guy Finley<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/2010\/09\/new-choices-for-parents-and-children.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"New Choices for Parents and Children - Letting Go with Guy Finley\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"QUESTION Is it possible to change my teenage son from being angry and negative? 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His ideas cut straight to the heart of our most important personal and social issues - relationships, success, addiction, stress, peace, happiness, freedom - and lead the way to a higher life. Finley is the Founder and Director of Life of Learning Foundation, a nonprofit Center for Spiritual Discovery. He is the acclaimed author of \"The Secret of Letting Go\" and more than 45 other books and audio programs that have sold over two million copies in 26 languages worldwide. His work is widely endorsed by doctors, business professionals, celebrities, and religious leaders of all denominations. Through Life of Learning Foundation, Guy has presented over 5,000 unique self-realization seminars to thousands of grateful students throughout North America and Europe over the past 20 years and has been a guest on over 700 television and radio shows, including national appearances on ABC, NBC, CBS, CNN, and NPR. The Foundation's popular Key Lesson e-mails featuring inspirational quotes by Guy are read each week by a hundred thousand subscribers in 142 countries. Guy speaks four times each week on inner-life principles at Life of Learning Foundation's home in Merlin, Oregon. These meetings are ongoing and open to the public. For more information about Life of Learning Foundation, Guy Finley, and their life-changing messages, visit guyfinley.org. \"Guy Finley is...one of the leading experts at the forefront of human potential.\" -Nightingale Conant \"Guy Finley has helped millions live fuller, more peaceable lives.\" -Barnes and Noble","sameAs":["http:\/\/www.guyfinley.org","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Guy-Finley-260924340633\/","https:\/\/x.com\/guy_finley"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/author\/gfinley"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/232"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/lettinggo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}