Trust The Process

There is little in this life harder than realizing that you are responsible for another life. I don't mean another adult life; that of your partner, your friend, your lover. I mean a child's life -- your child's life. That responsibility is a weight of extraordinary importance and it's a heavy one.

But what is harder than being responsible, is realizing that sometimes you aren't. Sometimes you wish you were. Sometimes the hardest thing is watching them stumble and fall, be angry and depressed and silent and morose, and have to stand silently by, unable to infuse them with your calm. Moments like that make you realize that although we can stand side by side in this world, give support or take it, everyone is ultimately alone. Everyone has to deal with their own internal landscapes.

It's hard for me to accept this. I can accept it for everyone else in the world, but my child? It's harder to accept that the beautiful child that came from my body and into this world -- the one that looked up at me with such innocent eyes -- is only partially within my control.

I used to think that the kind of parenting a child was given was pretty much totally responsible for the kind of adult they became. The whole nuture idea. But the longer I was actually a parent and watched my child grow from infant to toddler, preadolescent to preteen, and now into a teenager? I don't believe that much anymore.

You find out as they grow that the person they are becoming isn't necessarily the one you had hopes they'd be. Every parent hopes their child is a kind, giving soul, happy and willing to believe that life is a joy that's worth it no matter what sort of pain they run up against. Every parent hopes their child can see life's richness and savor it. Every parent worth their salt endeavors to teach their children those very things. You give them an environment rich in love and expressions of affection and rules and discipline to show them that they can depend on being safe. You hope this is enough.

You can do all this, and yet.....

Nature will out. The nature part of the nature vs. nuture is by far the more powerful of the two. Ah, the randomness of genes at work. Nowhere is it more apparent than when two children, raised the same way, turn out so differently. One, from the moment of birth, was smiley and curious and affectionate, and the other was reticient and cautious, shy and retiring. Or compare identical twins and one finds that more than physical looks are similar. Personalities and preferences are also markedly so. Why? How much of personality is hardwired and how much can be manipulated or guided?

In my own case, my daughter is not the child I pictured her to be when I first saw her soft trusting eyes. I admire so many of her traits -- her strength, her ability to believe in herself and what she thinks -- and wish they were my own. I am proud of her in those moments. But just as you don't like everything about everyone, your children are no different in that regard. She has a disregard for other people that embarrasses and angers me. She is selfish and inconsiderate. You may say that many teens are this way and yes, they are -- but many are not. She seems prone to sinking into a depressive state of mind, something that I do and my mother does as well....genetics again? And she does not feel comfortable expressing affection of any sort. Her coolness scares me. I wonder, though....perhaps this is me, needing her to let me know I matter to her.

And last afternoon I saw her cry when she realized how badly she'd hurt me. Perhaps in time she'll learn showing affection is important. I can only hope.

In some part, yes, what your children are and who they become depends on you. Whatever parts you can control or guide or teach, you have an obligation to do so. You try and help make them the greatest "themselves" that they can be. But ultimately you just have to trust the process. You hope that you've been the best parent you can be and that they'll walk through their own internal landscape without getting lost. And that they'll remember -- somehow, somewhere, somewhen -- that you gave them a beacon to follow should they do so.


((Song: "Trust The Process" by John Taylor. Lyrics here:
http://www.thebassgod.com/home.html ))