My younger son once said to me, “You don’t have to tell us what you think. We already know.”

Curious (and slightly defensive), I turned to my older son. “Is that true?”

His response was clear. “Yes. After all these years, we already know what you think and how you’ll respond. Now we learn how to live by watching the way you live.”

That moment changed me.

I suddenly felt the full weight of my actions. My sons weren’t moved by my lectures, reminders, or sage advice. They were learning from my reactions. My actions. My tone. My patience. My choices. By watching the way I lived – and I’m sure the same was true of their father – they were absorbing what to do… and what not to do.

I remember thinking, when I was young, that I would never say the things my mother said to me. I would never lose my temper the way she did. I would do better. That was a deliberate choice. But I wasn’t always successful. There were moments when I heard her words come out of my mouth before I could stop them, and instantly I wanted to grab them back. I wanted to pull them out of the air and swallow them whole. Too late.

Over time, I learned something even more important: how to apologize. I learned to say, “I was wrong. I’m sorry.” I learned to admit when my frustration spilled over. That, too, was something worth modeling.

The tapes of our youth play in our minds. We can’t erase them. The voices, the reactions, the patterns are imprinted in our brains. But we can become aware of them. We can pause. We can choose differently. We can lower our voices. We can soften our responses. We can try again. Every generation carries forward both wounds and wisdom.

Our children are always watching. And whether we intend to or not, by our actions and reactions, we are teaching them how to live.