The Value of the Family Services You Didn’t Think You Needed


trees

The Value of the Family Services You Didn’t Think You Needed

If you’re familiar with K’nafayim, you may be aware that we provide family services for the frum community, like marriage counseling, parenting help, and the like.  And you may be happy that these services exist but feel you don’t need them yourself.  If your shalom bayis is where you want it to be, we’re more than happy to hear it!  At the same time, perhaps there is something we can offer you nonetheless.  In fact, we’d like to suggest that our services have much value to offer you, even if you thought they don’t.  How so?

What We Do

For starters, we aim to help folks who are doing well, not just those who are struggling.  If you’re married, we offer marriage workshops to help refresh, revitalize, and improve your relationship even if there’s nothing wrong with it.  After all, if you’ve been married for any length of time you are probably well aware that marriage is an avodah, and it takes time and conscious effort like any other avodah we do.

 

Not married yet but looking, or preparing to start looking? We can help you plan out the shidduchim process, think about what kind of partner you’re looking for, prepare for a productive approach to dating, and figure out how you know when you’ve found the right person.  Already engaged? Mazel tov! There’s not a rav out there who wouldn’t say that premarital counseling is a good idea.  We offer it at a low cost that makes it an affordable option, even if you consider it a luxury rather than a necessity.

 

If you’ve got kids, we can help with parenting issues and family counseling as needed, or offer proactive workshops to gain parenting skills that will help new and seasoned parents alike.  We also provide abuse prevention education for families, so you can learn how to speak to your kids about keeping themselves safe from those who might do them harm.  We are working towards bringing a formal abuse prevention program to our local middle schools, which unfortunately remains as necessary as ever.  This education, of course, is a valuable community service not only to anyone who has children but anyone who has grandchildren, nieces, nephews, etc. We all want our loved ones to be safe!

 

For Everyone Else…

 

What if you really don’t need any of these services personally?  We believe we can be of great value to you nonetheless.  First of all, we all know that kol Yisrael areivim zeh lazeh – we have a responsibility to our community to help those in need, even if (or especially if) you’re not one of them.  Contributions to K’nafayim go towards helping those who need marriage and family counseling but can’t afford it, towards keeping children safe, and towards all the services mentioned above for families in your neighborhood.

 

Most importantly, these issues affect you more directly than you know.  You may not need our help, but your neighbor might, or your chavrusa, or your students – any number of people you interact with on a daily basis may be facing troubles in the home you have no inkling about. (I have personally heard the most expert educators on the topic of abuse relate how even they discovered to their surprise that it was happening unbeknownst to them in families they knew well.)

 

And again, we must consider our children and the children of those close to us.  Your kids, grandkids, and other children in your lives are all in school with those youths whose home life is not as stable as yours might be. Parents in conflict, divorce, sibling trouble, and abuse affect those children terribly, and these children often go on to pass their stress on to others, in the form of bullying, negative social behaviors, peer pressure and more.  When you help us help others, you help us help you.

 

One more bonus worth mentioning – we’ve developed an app that we’re passing around for free to benefit the community in one more small way. It silences your phone when you walk into shul (or any other location you designate) and turns it back on when you leave. Never worry about your phone going off in shul again!  You can find it at www.knafayim.com/shtok.

 

How You Can Help

 

To raise needed funds for these services, we’re running a $100,000 raffle in collaboration with the Chofetz Chayim Heritage Foundation, a worthy organization which we are honored to partner with and which offers programs that dovetail with our own mission, including lessons on interpersonal relationships and anti-bullying education.  There are lots of prizes available for the taking (check them out at www.knafayim.com), so if the great mitzvah of donating to our cause isn’t enough to get you going, maybe these prizes are!

 

We know you’re stretched thin already – we all are.  We respect your choice of where to donate your hard-earned maaser money (many poskim permit using maaser money for a raffle – but ask your own posek; see also Igros Moshe OC 4 Ch. 76:2), and we hope that the work we aim to do will inspire you to buy a ticket.  Or, pool some money together with friends and purchase together! We appreciate any contribution to the cause. Please – help us help the community.  Help us help you.

comments powered by Disqus