Hi, I am Gabriel.
My first sentence in the “About Fathering Champions” page reads: “Sadly, to many fathers, children are often considered distractions and burdens.”
Admittedly, I was one such father when my eldest, Michael, was born 14 years ago.
I was a self-centred young executive determined to “conquer” the corporate world. In the process, both wife and child were neglected. In fact, I was working late in the office the night that my wife’s water bag burst and it was our neighbour who had to rush her to the hospital for Michael’s delivery.
In a sense, I did conquer the world within my tiny corporate kingdom. But I soon realized that I had lost it at home when my wife, one evening, expressed that both mother and child have been made to feel like burdens to me.
It was to be a full two years before I finally realized in my soul that I had become a father.
Fast forward to the present, I am now a proud father of three sons, Michael; Caleb and Joseph. I indicate this in all my resumes to prospective employers: “Proud father of three boys”.
I have come a long way from being one who felt absolutely lost in the company of any child (who seemed more like aliens to me) to one who simply adores children of any ages. The fact that I am even blogging about fatherhood would have seemed totally out of place for me just a couple of years back.
The parenthood journey together with my wife had been filled with treasured moments and at the same time interrupted with moments of scares like her near death experience after delivering Joseph, Joseph’s fall from the baby cot and hitting the floor head-first and Michael’s road accident among other events.
I face the same challenges of fatherhood just like my contemporary peers: work-life balance, being the main (in my case the sole) breadwinner and the constant new discovery (often by trial and error) of what it means to be a father.
I embrace these core values in mentoring my children:
- to live God centred lives
- to discover and maximize their natural strengths
- to serve society building on the foundation of the first two core values
For my professional profile, please visit my LinkedIn profile.
