In an age that is sometimes nowadays frightening or confusing, we feel reassured by the almost parental-like authority of experts who tell us so clearly what it is we can and cannot do.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
When I write from the point of view of a child or a young person, I am trying to tell the truth as an adult voice sometimes cannot. We are so often wrapped in the garment of trying to reassure ourselves that we are not afraid.
The challenging part of parenting for me is to make sure that an individual person is an individual and not some sort of cookie-cutter version of me. At the same time, I want to make sure that I impart my sense of the world as an adult.
When you are young you don't always realise how full of doubts everybody is.
We are all, in a sense, experts on secrecy. From earliest childhood we feel its mystery and attraction. We know both the power it confers and the burden it imposes. We learn how it can delight, give breathing space and protect.
Parents have become so convinced that educators know what is best for their children that they forget that they themselves are really the experts.
As parents, we're human beings, too, but sometimes we're not as understanding as we'd like to be.
Perhaps life is actually more confusing and unknowable to an adult than a child, but grown-ups have learned to deceive themselves and act as if they understand what's going on; and some are elected to high office on the basis of their ability to create this impression.
Grown-ups never understand anything for themselves, and it is tiresome for children to be always and forever explaining things to them.
As kids, our experiences shape our opinions of ourselves and the world around us, and that's who we become as adults.
Whether it's 18 years old or 40 years old, we think we know what's going on. But if you're lucky enough to continue the journey, its amazing how we keep learning how much we didn't know.
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