It came in the form of this blog, http://drkellyflanagan.com/. I highly recommend checking it out.
Here are two posts that had my full attention.
http://drkellyflanagan.com/2013/06/12/a-fathers-letter-of-apology-to-his-boys-for-fathers-day/
A Father’s
Letter of Apology to His Boys (For Father’s Day)
Dear Boys,
Today, I arrived at
my office door, my mind spinning with countless concerns—house repairs and my
therapy clients and blog comments and how to convince your mother I was right
about something completely inconsequential. I found myself lost in the crowd of
my various identities—homeowner, psychologist, writer, vindicated husband.
But then I found my
office keys and the keychain you made me for Father’s Day and the three big,
brightly-colored letters you inscribed upon it:
D-A-D.
I got ambushed by my
most important identity—Father. And I realized for an entire morning, like so
many mornings before it, I had gotten distracted from my most sacred role by
all of my perfectionism and sense of duty and fear of rejection and desire for
affirmation.
And something inside
of me cracked.
I think it was my ego—the
voice inside telling me if I want to be good enough I have to look perfect,
take care of everyone, win everybody over, and be right all the time.
Boys, I want to
apologize for my fierce but fragile ego.
Boys, I want to
apologize for all of the ways I let my ego prevent me from being the kind of
father of which you are completely worthy:
I’m sorry for every
time you’ve needed an embrace and I gave you something less because affection
requires time and presence and vulnerability.
I’m sorry for every
time the projects in my life have been more important than the people
in my world.
I’m sorry for every
time I’ve demanded respect, instead of earning it.
I’m sorry for every
time I’ve said, “No,” simply because I can.
I’m sorry for every
time I’ve told you to be humble and then turned around and acted like losing
was the end of the world.
And I’m sorry for
every time I didn’t say, “I’m sorry,” because they are, I’m learning, two of
the most important words a father can say.
But mostly, Boys, I’m
sorry for all the times I have communicated in subtle and not so subtle ways
that your worth is conditional upon my approval or my mood or the consent of my
fragile ego.
Boys, don’t let
anyone—including me—convince you that your worth is rooted in anything so
transient as another person’s opinion of you.
Your worth is
conditional upon nothing.
You came into the
world with infinite value and you will leave it in the same way, regardless of
what you do or don’t do in this life. I know this seems too good to be true—in
fact, many people will tell you it is a recipe for entitlement and
narcissism—but if you can learn to trust it, you will be free.
Free from the game of
ego inflation in which so many of us are constantly embroiled.
Free to live what is
written on your souls, rather than what other people have written upon you with
their own brokenness and wounds.
Free to love yourself—and
therefore others, as well—without condition and without limit in a world that
places every kind of condition upon love and belonging.
Free to create beauty
and abundance in a world that seems to be threatened by both.
Free to become
portals of grace in a world that thrives on shame and condemnation.
Boys, instead of
placing conditions of worth upon you, I want to become a reflection
of your worth—I want to mirror the awesome beauty I see in both of you,
so you can begin to see it in yourselves.
In the end, Boys, I
hope you can spend your lives knowing who you are, instead of constantly
proving who you are.
With deep admiration
for who you are, all the time, wherever you go, whatever you do,
Dad
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