Yeah, sure. We want to keep their clothes clean. We want them to get good grades. We want them to learn good behavior. We don’t want them to make a mess when we’re out or behave in a way that causes problems for others.

All this matters, sure…a little.

There’s a haunting scene in Terrence Real’s must-read book US (grab it at The Painted Porch), where an imperious and harsh father named Steve looks back over his shoulder in the car and finds his carsick kid trying to hold in vomit for fear of upsetting his parents. In that moment, the fear he saw in his son’s eyes stunned and shamed Steve—it was, as it would be for all of us, the exact opposite of the kind of message we’d want our kids to internalize. “I realized all at once,” Steve recounts. “It’s not about me. It’s not about the damn car. It’s him; it’s about him!“

The white walls in your hallway don’t matter. The money doesn’t matter. The fact that it’s 2:00 in the morning doesn’t matter. In the end, the only thing that matters is them, right? That they’re safe. That they know you love them. That they came to you. That they can be themselves.

It’s not about the stuff. It’s not about anything. It’s about them.

P.S. You can grab copies of Terrence Real’s Us—which we can’t recommend highly enough—at The Painted Porch. It’s filled with science-backed relationship advice from Real, a renown family therapist.