To achieve personal growth, to marry and have children is a sure bet (another sure option is to start your own business). However, the primary responsibility of a parent is to awaken the spirit of the child, and all too often the experience of the child is everything but. Indeed, many kids have their spirits broken instead.
The Sorry State Of Parenting
When measured by results and outcomes of parenting, it's clear we have in this country and around the world outstanding and poor parents at the same time. That said, in sheer numbers, poor parenting seems rather the more popular of the two. This sorry state of parenting is at least in part due to parents' inability to respond to the challenge - parenting looks easy from the distance, yet is hard in actual practice. Many politicians and religious leaders (leaders?) are making matters worse by declaring, in effect, that values are not a question of principle but of circumstance, that obstruction is the smart thing to do, and all choices are either-or and you cannot have both.
The Challenge: An Unknown Future
People who are now in their 50's can expect to live another 50 years. (By comparison, as mere 200 years ago the average life expectancy was 37 years, and 100 years ago it was 47 years). And as creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson points out - in the enclosed TED talk (click here), he challenges the way we're educating our children - children starting school now will begin to retire starting in 2070. How do we parent ourselves and our children for so much future and for so many unknowns? I believe security in the future will increasingly come from confidence in the ability to grow bigger than our challenges. Material possessions, acquired knowledge, status and past successes will remain important, but less so.
Yet Every Day Is Another Chance To Be Better Parents Ourselves
Every day we are given a new chance to be the best parent we can be - for our children and, as importantly, for our inner child. It is easy, too (all things being relative). To "awaken the spirit of the child," it is enough to learn to look at yourself through kind eyes. If you do, you will naturally catch yourself doing things right more often, rather than focus on mistakes much of the time, and build on strengths, rather than correct deficiencies. Kind eyes will bring about the care and understanding needed to nurture your spirit. Kind eyes work equally well for your children, of course, provided you keep in mind that you are not living through your children. Your kids have been given their own spirit and their own path. Awakening and nurturing their spirit does not mean to gain control over them. Kahlil Gibran sums it up beautifully in his poem, "On Children." To read it, click here (then click on the "View Full Screen" icon located in the upper right). Alternatively, if you're interested in how dolphins do their parenting, click here.
Relevant Quotes
- “Cherish your visions and your dreams as they are the children of your soul, the blueprints of your ultimate achievements.” - Napoleon Hill
- “We go about our daily lives understanding almost nothing of the world. Except for children - who don’t know enough not to ask the important questions - few of us spend much time wondering why nature is the way it is.” - Carl Sagan
- A four year old child’s next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the old gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his father asked what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, “Nothing, I just helped him cry.” - Anonymous
- “It's difficult to make forecasts, especially about the future.” - George Bernard Shaw
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