Is there a deeper love than that which a parent feels for their child?
It's incredible to think about the responsibilities that we place upon ourselves, the sacrifices we make, the sense of devotion we feel, towards ensuring that our children live better lives than our own.
It is a cycle of progress that we simply take for granted, that we will be better off than our parents were, that we in turn would do more for our kids than had been done for us.
We expect nothing less from ourselves, than to discover how to love our children more, than we were loved as children.
Or do we?
I still remember looking into the eyes of a classmate in my early high school years, a kid who's parents didn't love him. They didn't hate him, they just didn't love him; they didn't care one way or the other whether he lived or died, and had told him so. When I tried to talk to him, he would matter-of-factly relate why he never made friends, why he constantly skipped classes, why he wrecked his body and mind with the things he put into it; he hadn't been taught to care.
There was nothing in those eyes as they looked out into ours; there was a coldness, an empty indifference that chilled my 13-year old soul.
The lesson I learned, but constantly forget and keep having to relearn...: caring, connecting, loving, are acts that are taught as much as they are learned.
4 comments:
I love your work, and you are so right about the deadening of souls starved of love:
Oxytocin Dearest
Great video :-)
Here's another video-- the mother of a suicide bomber expresses her "love" for her child-- it also shows the bizarre values of the Palestinian "militants".
Wow, Krishna109, that is one sad video.
A haunting comment from the mother stopped me in my tracks:
"I love my son, and want to choose the best for him. The best is not life in this world."
That about sums it up, doesn't it.
Thank you, both, for the compliments.
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