Be my echo.

(Image credit: sxc.hu user Ayla87)

Working from home with your spouse and a toddler in the home comes with its fair share of challenges. When you work in an office outside the home, you can have a bad day, listen to some Journey on the way home in your car, rock out, come in smiling, and your spouse and children will never be the wiser. (That's totally how it always happens for all of you, right? *wink*)

When you work from home, you are right there all day, nerves exposed. Everything is all mixed up. Your toddler will ask to watch Ernie & Bert videos on your laptop at the precise moment your client will send you a grumpy email demanding immediate attention. Your spouse will want to vacuum in your office when you are trying hard to actually focus for once and make some sort of a cohesive work plan. Your dog will go ballistic over the poodle next door while you are leading a conference call on speaker phone. It just happens. And sometimes, you might get a wee bit testy as a result.

Recognizing that all this stress is impacting our love for one another, my husband and I have begun reading a new book called The Love Dare which gives us daily assignments to strengthen our marriage. We're only a couple of days in, but it's good! Yesterday our assignment was to be abundantly patient with each other, and not to say anything negative to each other all day long (as in complaints or criticisms).

So in the morning as we were discussing what to do about a certain work issue, we were making an effort not only to say nothing negative, but to be positive and encouraging.

"That's great, honey, good job." I said.

"Good job!" our toddler parroted back.

A few moments later he said, "Good thinking!"

"Good thinking!" our little one rejoined.

It struck me: how much more important for me to try to speak words of encouragement in our home, when she is right there soaking it in every day? And even better, she is joining in, echoing it back to us. Even more than just being cute, it actually feels good to have someone say that stuff out loud, even if they are not yet two and don't quite get what's going on. As humans we thrive on those words of love and support. We crave them. We wither without them.

Of course, I'm going to slip up - probably a lot - and she's going to hear that, too. She's going to watch how I recover, how I apologize, how I give grace to others and myself. I think that's important for her to learn.

But it just seems a little easier (and definitely more fruitful) to be a voice of encouragement when I know that's what's going to be echoed back to me... and the echoes will reverberate in her life for a long, long, time.