I love my daughter. I would give my life for her.

I am sure most dads would do this for their daughter, too. But, we hope we never have to.

We have built a great relationship so far in her life and we enjoy our weekly “Daddy-daughter Day” time together, where there is no one else but her and I. We share each other’s company for part of a day. We just hang out. Sometimes, we say a lot, sometimes we don’t.

I cherish these moments.

I know I will miss these moments when she is all grown up and embracing her journey through adulthood. I hope it will take up a little special place in her memories of her time with me in time to come. I am looking forward to making more memories with her.

I am sure most, if not all the dads reading this and around the world have their own special relationship with their daughter(s). What a special gift it is to have.

We all know that girls, as well as boys, can go ‘off-track’ in later years, without the right guidance at home. What a responsibility it is for us, parents. I believe it is probably the most important investment, apart from education, that we are blessed to have in our lives.

The best counselling services in the best institutions and schools seldom make up for a lack of guidance from a present, and good father and mother. Some families tackle this responsibility singularly (single-parent families) and I take my hat off to them as I think it is a little easier tackling this huge responsibility as a team.

A father and mother team.

I have learned (from my experience with my daughter and from what I have learned from the hundreds of parents I have met and helped over the last 20 years) that daughters want you be the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the household on some matters only. All the other matters rests with the other co-CEO – her mother.

I believe it is important that daughters observe in her mother a wise, intelligent, caring woman who loves you, respects and can talk to you about all the important issues in the family. She needs to find comfort in a woman’s kind of wisdom and courage and patience in her mother …. That only a mother who tries, can provide.

I am blessed that my daughter’s mother, my beautiful wife – Cathy, is all this and much, much more. My daughter is blessed to have a mother like her, the woman I chose to spend the rest of my life with. Makes me very blessed too.

However, this blog is about daddies …. and daughters. What does she want to see in you – her dad? Well, I think your daughter would want to see in you an intelligent man’s viewpoint about life plus the ability to share the leading role of the household, with her mother in a life-affirming way. A fatherly way that is the essence for you.

Then, she can learn to love you as her father as well as a fine man … a fine, gentleman.

Dads reading this, remember – YOU ARE THE MOST IMPORTANT MAN IN HER YOUNG LIFE. I believe she ought to build her life according to what she sees in yours, or at the very least, give her a skeleton of a framework for her to build on (or subtract from). This can be done in a few areas:

• Your wisdom – to withhold judgement until you have gathered all the facts, with emphasis on patience (which is lacking in the world today).
• Your kindness – and care towards others who have not been able to get along in life due to no real fault of their own.
• Your ability to forgive – those who have done wrong, seeing this forgiving energy flow freely without the need to hold grudges. She needs to see you rise to a higher consciousness level.
• Your courage – to face seemingly impossible odds and the power of your belief and unwavering faith.
• Your uncommon sense – uncommon because ‘common sense’ does not seem common any more. It is an hybrid of all these traits and more.

All these facets of being a dad rests with you, it rests in you. No one else can demonstrate this any better than you can. You need to show this in your actions. If, and this is a big if, IF you put your mind to it and you give it a go.

Her mother can show her all the traits of a fine woman and she can replicate it for her young adult life but you, the father, the daddy, is the proto-type of what her ‘man’ is.

Your example of what a good man is like, will be priceless to her …. Even if you sing off tune in the car every now and then or have the accidental fart leak out that would make even skunks run for air.

Tell her when you make a mistake, that every good superhero is a little flawed. Tell her that you are a flawed superhero and that you learn from your mistakes. Tell her that you grow the most through your mistakes, your failures. Show her how not to fear, failure. Tell her that you succeed through failure. Tell her that you’re a constant ‘work-in-progress’ but that you will always do and be YOUR BEST for her.

Just because you love her.

Being a good dad is fun. Being a great dad is a challenge. Being a dad is a blessing. Do the very best you can … and cherish those “daddy … daughter” moments.

It’s these moments that you will take with you in to the next realm when you depart this life. Your soul will carry it away … when you’re gone, but you can hope that these moments will remain in the heart and memories of your daughter(s).

That hopefully, will remind her (when everyone else forgets), that you were once here and walked this planet with her.

Until next time,