The Conversations Our Grandchildren Will Remember
Grandparents have always passed something from one generation to the next. Not only family names, photographs and recipes, but ways of looking at life.
How do you get up again when something goes wrong? What do you do when you have hurt someone? How do you make a difficult decision? What does it mean to be responsible? How do you handle money? When should you speak, and when should you listen? How do you become the kind of person others can trust?
These are big lessons. But very often, they are learned through very small conversations.
Children need more than information
Today's children have access to more information than any generation before them. They can search for an answer in seconds.
But knowing what something is and knowing how to live are two very different things.
A search engine can explain what resilience means. Grandpa can tell you about the time he failed, tried again and discovered that failure wasn't the end of the story. A video can explain saving money. Grandma can sit beside you while you count your coins and talk about why sometimes we wait for the things we want.
That is the difference between information and wisdom. And wisdom is often passed on through relationship.
It doesn't have to sound like a lesson
Perhaps that is where grandparents have a wonderful advantage. You don't need a classroom. You don't need a worksheet. And you certainly don't need to begin with: "Today we are going to learn about emotional intelligence."
You can begin with:
"What happened?" "How did that make you feel?" "What do you think you could do differently?" "Would you like to know what happened to me once?" "What do you think is the right thing to do?"
Suddenly, a conversation becomes a life lesson. Not because Grandpa or Grandma delivered a lecture, but because a child was given the opportunity to think, talk, question and discover.
The conversations change as they grow
Of course, the conversation you have with a four-year-old is very different from the one you have with a seventeen-year-old. When they are small, it may be about taking turns, putting away a toy or understanding why they cannot touch something hot. A few years later, it may be about friendship, disappointment, responsibility or saving for something they want. Later still, the conversations become more complicated: belonging, peer pressure, difficult choices, independence, relationships, work, money and the future.
The questions grow with them. And so must our conversations.
But one thing doesn't have to change: They still need someone who will listen.
That is where Our Time Together began
We created Our Time Together – A Grandparent's Guide to Life's Big Lessons around a simple belief:
Grandparents have an extraordinary opportunity to help young people prepare for life, not by preaching to them, but by talking with them.
Across five books, the series grows with children from their earliest years through to young adulthood.
The situations change. The questions become deeper. The decisions become more important.
But at the heart of every book is the same thing: A young person and a grandparent, spending time together and talking about life.
Because one day our grandchildren may forget the toy we bought them. They may forget what we served for lunch. They may even forget exactly what we said.
But they are far less likely to forget how it felt to sit beside someone who had time for them.
And perhaps that is one of the greatest gifts a grandparent can give.
Tinie & Lynne Terblanche
Africa Institute for Personal Development (AIPD)