It's Fathers Day today (in the UK)
It has been one of the greatest honours of my life to be the father of two incredible young women. From the moment they took their first breath, my life changed forever. I would take a bullet for either of them without a second thought. But I also understood that my job wasn’t simply to protect them: - My job was to prepare them. - To help them become strong, independent, resilient and capable of navigating life long after I’m gone. Like most things in life, I learned as I went: I wasn’t blessed with great examples of fatherhood. I had an incredible mother, but sadly two of the poorest examples of fathers anyone could wish for. One deserted the family. The other was violent and showed little sign of what it meant to be a parent. For many years I could have used that as an excuse. But life teaches us something important. We learn from good examples and bad examples. Sometimes the people who hurt us teach us exactly what not to become. What saddens me is that neither of those men are alive today, and neither took the opportunity to become a better version of themselves. Because that’s one of the greatest gifts we have as human beings. We are not condemned to remain who we are. At any moment we can choose to change. - To grow. - To learn. - To become better. As I look back, I hope my girls have always known how deeply they are loved. But I also hope they’ve seen more than love: - I hope they’ve seen resilience. - I hope they’ve seen courage. - I hope they’ve seen integrity. - I hope they’ve seen that when life knocks you down, you get back up and keep going. And if I’ve managed to pass on even a fraction of those lessons, I’ll consider my job as a father a success. Of course, none of that happens alone. The truth is that I’ve been blessed with an incredible partner in parenting. In many ways, my greatest role model for how to be a parent wasn’t my father. It was my wife. Happy Father’s Day to all the dads, stepdads, grandads, father figures and mentors who choose every day to show up, guide, support and love.