Meet the Havetos

There's this family I know that never seems to be available for casual outings at the park or spontaneous summer cookouts.  Whenever they get invited to a small party, their attendance seems cloaked in "conditions."  They give us "terms" like, we can only be at your party between 6:00 and 6:22 because Johnny has a basketball tournament all day and we have to pick him up before we have go to the neighborhood block party that we have to be at because Annie's best friend lives four doors down from us.  Or something like that.  They tend to answer our questions, with "well, I have to..."  We've found that we have to plug our ears when they talk anymore.  Just too many have to's... And, this is a pretty sad situation since I've come to realize that this annoying family is us.  Or, at least it was us  several months ago.  I'm not sure what did it, but I work up one spring morning and realized that I didn't HAVE TO do anything.  And NEITHER did my kids.  And, yes, I used that emphasis in my morning reflection.  So, I flipped a switch and started sticking with the things we "wanted" to do.  Let me be clear, our weekly schedule, the daily to-do list, the comings and goings of my busy family didn't really change.  But the conversation did.  We started talking about the activities we wanted to do this week, and how we wanted to schedule pickups and drop-offs.  It wasn't really an overnight change, but by changing the words from "have to" to "want to," there were many of those "daily drudge" tasks that started to become...not so drudge!  Overtime, the amazing thing is that, as a family, the change in words led to all of us being more present at a lot of those formerly "have to" events.  We also started talking more about our lives in conversations versus talking about our to-do lists.  As I mentioned, our busy lives didn't really become less busy.  But, our attitude about all those things shifted.  I think we, as a family, became more aware of what our priorities are.  So, rather than just working around all those busy things, we are just a little more aware that we've made choices.  Based on our choices, we have priorities about what comes first in the schedule and what things might slip from time to time.  We've certainly made a priority to carve out family time more regularly and time for each of us to be in our own space.  If you meet my family now, I won't bother you with the stuff I have to do right now, I'll actually stop, introduce myself and ask you about your day.  Don't tell me the things that you have to do.  Share with me what's important.  Tell me what moves you.  These are the things that make us friends without terms or conditions.