Parenting

To be a parent is a great art. Anybody can give birth to a child. All animals do that. They give birth to so many even without grumbling. But we give birth to two or three kids but still keep grumbling. It’s easy to give birth. But being a parent is very difficult. It is an art. Only when we are capable of being a parent we can give birth to a child.

We ourselves are not emotionally matured. We ourselves are hurt so badly. We are constantly judging one another. How can we teach compassion to our children? How will we teach them to grow holding hands with others?  Every parent is in a turmoil. He knows pretty well that he has not live his life wisely. His life is not what he has planned or wished for. So he tries to impose his wish on his children. He starts to use children as a medium for attaining his wish. The child starts seeing the world through its parent’s eyes. It will carry its parent’s thoughts and wishes. It will be a Xerox copy of its parents and parents starts feeling proud of their children. But actually what we are doing? We have crushed their individuality and taming them instead of helping them grow. Now this child whose wished remains unfulfilled will again impose its wishes on its children and the circle continue. So what have we actually done? We have crushed a whole bunch of beings.

As parents we can teach them only how to see and it is up to them to decide what to see and what not. We can show only the path but it is their responsibility to decide the direction. The problem with the parents is that they always identify them with their children and they are not seen as a separate individual. Nobody respects the individual. They have already decided what is right and what is wrong, and for all.  The children need privacy. They need more freedom, and freedom can happen only when they are true. But no children are allowed to be true. Parents don’t recognize their true identity. They see only their replica in their child. 

The criterion is that the real parents will give freedom. They will not impose themselves upon the child; they will not encroach upon his space. From the very beginning their effort will be to help the child to be himself or to be herself. They are to support, they are to strengthen, they are to nourish, but not to impose their ideas, not to give the shoulds and should-nots. They are not to create slaves.

Being a parent needs so much courage. Open the doors of unknown to the child and let them explore. Don’t teach them anything. Let them learn, for what you teach is your learning it need not be true or need not be false also. Let them learn. Don’t threaten them with concepts of failure or success.  Help the children to ask lot of questions? But don’t answer the question. Teach them to seek answers. Even if you tell answers, just say “It is my experience. It need not be the same to you. You seek what you want”. ‘Unless you yourself know, your knowledge is of no use; it is dangerous. A knowledge which is borrowed is a hindrance.'

To imitate is to destroy your own self. It is an act of suicide. You are killing your individuality. But all the parents encourage this. They keep on saying to the child to become like someone else. They child is condemned and rejected in every possible ways, told directly, indirectly that 'Whatsoever you are is not right, whatsoever you are doing is not right.' You have to be following some example, some ideal and the child starts imitating. This world is full of imitators, that's why there is so much misery, that's why there is so much uncreativity and so much insensitivity, so much ugliness.

We don’t allow the child to love his self. For that matter as parents we also don’t love our child as he is or love him with so many * signs (conditions apply). When a child is not able to love his own self how can we expect him to love others. You can give to others, only what you have. Only when you have some few penny with you, you will be in a position to give others. So is love. Only when you love yourself, you can love others. Every child is born with the potential of blooming and growing but as parents we destroy them in the name of love and concern.

Your child is trying to climb a tree; what will you do as a parents? You will immediately go and stop the child and tell him so many reasons why he should not climb a tree and you also claim that you say so because you love the child and want it to be safe. You convince yourself that we are good parent. But actually we are stopping a child from growing. Teach him to climb trees safely. Help him to grow. If he is stopped he will lose the joy and beauty about it. And once in a while, falling from a tree is not so bad either. Rather than being deprived forever.

This has been the greatest calamity in the whole history of man. No other slavery has been as bad as the slavery of the child and no other slavery has taken as much juice out of humanity as the slavery of the child, and this is also going to be the most difficult task for humanity: to get rid of it."

To be a parent is a difficult job, so unless you are ready to take that difficult job, don't become a parent. People simply go on becoming fathers and mothers not knowing what they are doing. You are bringing a life into existence; all the care in the world will be needed. We many a time think that role of parents starts only after giving birth to a child. No. the role of parents starts right the moment we are ready to make love. When a husband and a wife are ready to make love, they are also ready to become parents. Make love only when you are ready. Be in a meditative space. Treat the place as a sacred place and two bodies as house of temples. Enter the room where you make love as you enter a very sacred place. Creating a life is more sacred. But don’t make love for the purpose of procreation. Do it in a meditative way without thinking about results. Do it as beautifully, as aesthetically, and as joyously as possible. When a child is formed in such a meditative way, it will possess the meditative qualities. 

But your role doesn't stop here. Once the child enters your life respect him. And when you love a person, you cannot condition him. When you love a person, you give him freedom, you give him protection. When you love a person you would not like him to be just a carbon copy of yourself, you would like him to be a unique individual. And to make him unique you will arrange all the conditions, all the challenges which provoke his potential. All that a real parent will do is to help the child to be more and more playful, to be more and more joyous, celebrating. And the parent should help the children to keep that quality intact for their whole life; the child should never disappear. The child should always flower and flowering should become a part of their nature.