He Used Money To Buy Friends!

Yesterday, Ace came home and pouted... Cos he said he quarrelled with his friends..

I asked him what happened and he said that he quarrelled with J.

Apparently, Ace told A and B that he wanted to walk home with them and J was there too. And J told them.. "Don't lah.. come follow me. I buy ice cream for you.."

And so, Ace was very upset that his friends left with J.

I asked Ace what was he so unhappy about. He said, "How can he use money to buy friends! That's wrong! He thinks just because he has money, he can do anything.. He always like tat.. say want them to follow him.. he will buy them ice cream.. if not ice cream he will buy soft drinks.. if not soft drinks, he will buy them snacks..."

I tried to put it into perspective for Ace and asked him... "If he invited you along, would you have gone with him to eat free ice cream?"

"No!" He snapped. But when I asked him why.. he brushed me off with a "I don't want to talk about this anymore.. I don't like to remember unhappy things.."

Wahahaha... sounds like a mightly weak NO to me:)

And then I explained to Ace that it is possible also that J genuinely wanted to be generous with his friends and share with them and not that he wanted to use money to buy friends.

Also, granted that using money to buy friends is not a correct thing to do... it is a personal choice. It is not something we can FORCE everyone to do. Because it is a personal choice.

Buying things for friends is not wrong... it is the intention behind it that makes it right or wrong. Besides, the world is like that.. whoever has money and can buy things, they will have alot of pple gathering around them... But of course,  this sort of friendship is often not real and not lasting because they will leave you one you have no more money.

I  once had a friend who made a million dollars doing business. He told me that once he had money... many people or so called friends came up to him and be friendly with him so that they can ask for loans or ask for favors... or ask for investments. He lost his million within two years because most of it went out and never came back again and these friends disappeared after he lost his millions.

But I understand how this is difficult for self righteous Ace to understand...

One of the biggest challenge I find in parenting is teaching children the GREY AREA. The other day, I was out with my god daughter and she wanted to share my drink. Her mum did not want her to drink too much cold and sugary drinks and so I told her that if she completed her work (why a 4 year old has holiday homework I also dun understand.. haha), I will share little bit with her. In the end, she did not complete her work and so did not get the drink and she wailed and cried and stomped her feet.. and kept repeating..."You must share! You must share!" Because apparently, that is what her parents always told her.

She could not understand why she had to share and other people did not?

It is a huge challenge to me as a parent to explain the finer details of how something I say does have exceptions and under what conditions these exceptions will take place.

I remembered having a conversation with Ace about using money to buy friendship and I remembered telling him that that is not a right thing to do because friendship is built using one's heart and love. So that is why to him, one SHOULD NOT buy friendship with money.

It is either black.. or white.. There is no grey! ;) I think Ace is starting to understand that there are grey areas in life but given his very self righteous nature, it will take alot more knocks in life before he will really be able to say that he is ok whether things are black, white or grey:) hahaha...

Previous Post: I Got Work Hor!