What It Means to Be a Father

For Father’s Day, we spent time with both my family and my wife’s family.

And I was reminded…

Being a father is important work.

It’s our job to protect, to provide, to encourage, to comfort, to discipline, to lead, and to love.

I carry out these responsibilities daily. (My youngest seems to want me to carry out discipline hourly, but that’s an entirely different challenge…)

So if you are a father, I exhort you to be the father you wish you had.

The father your boys will respect and emulate.

The father whose qualities your daughters will look for when they’re older.

The kind of father we celebrate on Father’s Day each year.

Remember:

It’s easy to have kids.

It requires effort to be a father.

And even though we all make mistakes, we can keep trying to be the best fathers we can be.

-Ryan M. Healy