Gene Simmons Quotes

If you want children to keep their feet on the ground, put some responsibility on their shoulders.

If you're trying to raise a son, it gives you a chance to say things like, 'Chop your own wood; it will warm you twice.'

Work is one of the best educators of practical character.

Kids have been let down by adults - we've tried to give them too much, we've tried not to impose discipline. We've tried to make their lives easier and, in doing so, we've taken something away from them. Kids like boundaries, they also like to be pushed, need to learn what failure is all about, need guidance.

When you're younger, you're trying to understand and make sense of what your parents are trying to instill in you, which is ultimately life experience. I remember being 17 and my dad trying to teach me the importance of responsibility.

In the end, it's not what you do for your children but what you've taught them to do for themselves.

Dad was certainly a free spirit and had his own ways. He was very proud of my golf achievements but more proud of the person I've turned into. He brought me up to lead a very balanced life.

I think I started learning lessons about being a good person long before I ever knew what basketball was. And that starts in the home, it starts with the parental influence.

The parents have not only to train their children: it is of at least equal importance that they should train themselves.

Adolescence, that swampy zone between safety and power, is best patrolled by adults armed with sense and mercy, not guns and a badge.

Nothing makes it easier to resist temptation than a proper bringing-up, a sound set of values - and witnesses.

One thing I think kids need to do is more chores, and take care of their own rooms. Responsibilities are really important to start them with. If they have animals, they have to feed them and care for them. That's the only way I think I could do it.

Children may be born angels, but with all the temptations out there in the world, it takes work to try to keep them that way.

This year has been full of lessons learned and soul searching and realizing I'm an adult. It's time to take responsibility and not take the easy way out.

My kids, they're like nine or ten years old right now so you give 'em responsibilities just to keep them up on things. It ain't just all about getting on the skateboard or putting your Heelys on, and swimming in the pool all the time. You gotta do stuff like wash dishes, take the trash out, feed the dog.

Being able to take care of myself is something that my mom really instilled in me.

I think self-reliance and self-responsibility and self-accountability will help you as a parent, a teacher, as a citizen as a friend.

Knowledge has outstripped character development, and the young today are given an education rather than an upbringing.

I see my upbringing as a great success story. By disciplining me, my parents inculcated self-discipline. And by restricting my choices as a child, they gave me so many choices in my life as an adult. Because of what they did then, I get to do the work I love now.

Growing up in Oklahoma the way I did, and being raised the way I was raised by my parents, gave me such a strong foundation to go out into the world and fly, so to speak, the way I was able to do.

The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.

I think that getting responsibility and structure are huge parts of growing up.

You have to trust your kids. They have to experience life, and you just hope you've provided them a foundation for what's right and what isn't.

I feel that if you shelter your kids from everything, one day they are going to be out in the world on their own, and they are going to have to figure it out. You can't give them a test if you never taught them anything that's on the test. They're going to fail.

I was ironing my own clothes when I was 11 years old. My mental strength goes back to those days.