I've been raising kids for 24 years straight now, and still have about 10 years to go.<p>Here's a few things I've learned.<p>- kids are an exercise in what happens when you have intelligence without wisdom. It can be a horrifying and cruel combination as well as charming and lovely.<p>- aside from certain extremes, you don't have a lot of influence on how your kids are going to turn out. Kids have certain predispositions, and fighting those is frustrating and futile. Let them grow, they'll figure it out eventually. Or they won't.<p>- kids pretty much raise themselves and should be free to do so. Make sure they're appropriately safe, have quality nutrition, avoid sugar, and then provide a safety net for them.<p>- one of the biggest failures in parenting, and one of the most difficult to overcome, is imprinting an image on your child of who you want them to be.<p>- my approach to parenting is this: keep it simple. Teach honor and the reasons for it. Apply discipline to reinforce core concepts of being honorable (don't steal, lie, mistreat, etc...). Other than that let them figure it out. Provide guidance on the rare and exceptional moments when they come to you.<p>My last note of advice is this: you'll never stop worrying, so get used to it. My oldest child is 24 and my youngest step child is 9. I worry <i>all the time</i>. I also recognize that I'm not the star of their story, they are.<p>So I keep my distance, worry like hell, watch them make avoidable mistakes and do my damnedest not to meddle.