What is a Family anyway?
Well everyone has their opinion about family, some say it is about blood relation, some say about emotional connection, and many more such as love and tradition. I am not going to discuss about family definition in this post, let say I will use the most generic definition which is a family is where you feel you belong...
So My topic here is about eating... because I like to post about foodie and foods stuff...
Everyone must eat to survive, else they will die of hunger. So a family as a group of people, should eat to, individually or in a group. That's what I want to share in this post, should you as a family member, eat together with your family or eat by yourself...
As an Asian and raised with strong old fashioned tradition, eating together is something that we must do as family. During my childhood, whenever I rejected to eat together, let say I ate first, my mom would yell at me saying whether I was a chicken or cat, which she should just threw some food and I ate it myself alone.
Maybe this sounds harsh for most people around the globe, but for people who grew up in old fashioned Asian tradition, this was something that supposed to be common practice here. Although I have to admit that the younger generation family tend to not follow this tradition strictly.
The Tradition And Bonding
There are many reasons why many Asian family in the pass doing this, forcing all family to have their meal together, which mostly was dinner. I believed people in other region such as America and Europe were doing it too.
Having dinner or breakfast together gives some opportunity to strengthen bonds. The occasions are the natural conditioning for an organic conversation. Family members will share some stories, let say their children tell their experience in schools, or hearing parents talk about their day. All family members listen, talk, learn and laugh together... or maybe share their concern and worry and cry together. These create experience that build strong bond and relationship within the family.
People believe that families who hold dinner together regularly tend to have deeper communication, good eating habits, and better emotional well-being. And for their next generation, the children, this is the most organic thing that bond them together and end up in better study or academic performance and more proper and controlled behavior.
This dinner together is one of form of having a sharing meal in bonding experience. We can do this on breakfast, or maybe during certain condition such as weekly family meals on Sunday noon. Or the worst one is having a birthday meal feast together.
IT is not about making the perfect event or ocassion, it is about the consistency and presence. Cal me old fashioned but I still believe this is a tradition that worth to be kept and nurtured.
Getting together for the whole family, just to let each other know good things that happen that day or share their burdened thought are the the key in creating bond within your family members.
Let's create our dinner time as something that more than just eating. It is the family event, more precisely it is a family ritual. Do this while your family members are still exist, before God call them. Make your dinner as the right time to connect each other...
Thank you for coming and reading my post. I live in Jakarta, Ex-Capital City of Indonesia. I used to live by making money online, that's why I like being here, on HIVE, and in #PIMP - (Paper In My Pocket) community.
