I, along with a lot of you, saw my grandson leave for college. We all waved him good by and knew that his dreams were just beginning.
But then we all had the realization, that as he was heading for the land of the unknown, he was on his own for the first time. He didn’t have mom , waking him up, pushing him to get out of bed, or to be home by a certain time. We had let our little fledgling be sent out to the wolves. The only protection he was carrying with him, was the wisdom we tried so dearly to put in his mind, as he grew. From the time that he took his first steps and fell, to this time we hoped we were doing the right thing. Now hee will now be taking larger steps and falling, and learning to pick himself up, and keep going forward.
The question is, “How Well did we teach him to pull himself back up, after the fall?”
Did we run over and pick him up and hand him band aids, or did we let him survey the damage, and then find that he had to try to get up again, and this time without too much damage and without help? The only way he learns how great he can be is to learn who he is, and what he is capabable of in adversity.
The greatest gift we can give a child is the capability of learning that he has power. That he has a brain, to evaluate his situations. He also will pay the consequences of his bad choices, or glean the rewards of the good ones. Hopefully there will be more of the latter.
On his own he will be exposed to the partying, and the other things that freedom has to offer. Which way he chooses and what direction he goes in, is all on him now. I am just glad that no one monitored my past when I went to school. But I can honestly say the greatest gift my parents gave me was the full knowledge that if I didn’t do well, it was all over, no more money, that they worked hard for and, when I returned home I would be looking for a place to live and a job.
Probably not a cushy job either, without the education that I was priviledged to be given, and decided to take for granted.
The worst thing that we can do as parents, is evaluate their lives as we evaluate ours. They aren’t us! they are entities that are individuals, and they were given their own soul. It didn’t have strings attached to ours. Someday we will no longer be avaialble to them. We each have our own path, and we each decide how to go down it. We either go down the rosey path, or the barbed wire one. But it is a choice that we each in our soul have to make for our journey.
They can’t pack everyting you would like them to take on their journey, they will pack what is comfortable for them.
All we can do is pray, put them in God’s hands, and stand by.
Sandra