Sometimes giving sucks
December 21st, 2011 -- Posted in family, parents | 4 Comments »
I recently came across a post about how to model “giving back” for your kids (it was for work - I don’t just troll mommy blogs on my own). Which got me thinking about how important it is to embed these types of norms from an early age. I’ve written before about how I assumed certain things as a kid - like “everyone goes to college,” or “no one opens multiple (or even one!) credit card” - because they were certain issues that were foregone conclusions while I was growing up.
In some ways I admire this commitment to brainwashing - in many of these situations I didn’t even have a chance to make a bad decision because I had no idea there was a decision to be made. Granted, there was a balance - I never rarely felt controlled or manipulated. Looking back I see that I always got just enough rope to feel like I was roaming free, but not enough to hang myself. (Imagine my surprise as a freshman at a private college when I discovered - gasp! - some people were there of their own intent and not via a road that had been paved with mom and dad’s intentions. But that’s really quite another story.)