“Our job as parents is not to make our children happy. Naturally, we want happiness for our children, but this cannot be our primary goal, because the result will be an unhappy self-centered person.

Is happiness the ultimate goal in life?

Is doing what will make our children happy always the right course of action?

Is trying always to insulate our children from sadness, disappointment or loneliness the wisest thing?

Loneliness might be the result of having made a courageous choice not to follow the crowd. Disappointment may be an important factor in learning patience. Failure in some area may be God’s way of directing us to another area in life in which we will find deep fulfillment and satisfaction.

The things that your child may feel he or she needs ‘to be happy’ are sometimes the very opposite of what he or she needs in order to mature and learn compassion or integrity or selflessness.

Difficulty hardly ever produces happiness in the short run, but difficult experiences often are vitally important in shaping character.

A parent never wants to cause a child to be unhappy. But a wise parent will remember that he is building for the future. Just ‘being happy’ is too shortsighted, too immature a goal” (From Raising Kids with Character That Lasts, by John Yates, Susan Yates).

See: Parenting questionnaire on discipline