“I think not touching a child for decades at a time is a form of injury. I think withholding any expression of love until a young boy is a grown man is a form of emotional violence. And I believe that the violence men level against themselves and others is bred from just such circumstances.” ~ Terrence Real, I Don’t Want To Talk About It
“If you have difficulties with your son or daughter, you may have the tendency to say: “You are not my daughter. My daughter would not behave like that” or “You are not my son. My son would never do things like that.” If you look deeply at yourself, you will see that these negative seeds are in you also. When you were young you made mistakes and you learned from your suffering. When your child makes mistakes, you need to help him understand so he will not do it again. When you can see your own weaknesses, you can say: “Who am I not to accept my son?” Your son is you. With this insight into non-duality, you can reconcile with your children.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh, No Death, No Fear
“I know many parents whose children, when they are eighteen or nineteen years old, leave home and live on their own. The parents lose their children and feel very sorry for themselves. Yet the parents did not value the moments they had with their children. The same is true of husbands and wives. You think that your spouse will be there for the whole of your life, but how can you be so sure? We really have no idea where our partners will be in twenty or thirty years’ time or even tomorrow. It is very important to remember every day the practice of impermanence.” ~ Thich Nhat Hanh, No Death, No Fear
“The child wants to go out while it is raining and wants to dance in the rain: ‘No! You will get a cold.’ A cold is not a cancer, but a child who has been prevented from dancing in the rain, and has never been able again to dance, has missed something great, something really beautiful. A cold would have been worthwhile—and it is not that he will necessarily have a cold. In fact, the more you protect him, the more he becomes vulnerable. The more you allow him, the more he becomes immune.” ~ Osho, Fame, Fortune, and Ambition
25 Beautiful Mother’s Day Quotes That Will Warm Your Heart
Excerpt: To mothers, we are eternally grateful. Check out our list of 25 Mother’s Day quotes that will warm your heart and make your mom smile :)
Read More »25 Beautiful Mother’s Day Quotes That Will Warm Your Heart
“Make the child aware of the mystery. Rather than giving the answer it is better to make the child aware of the mysterious that’s all around, so the child starts feeling more awe and more wonder. Rather than giving a pat answer it is better to create an inquiry. Help the child to be more curious, help the child to be more inquiring. Rather than giving the answer, make the child ask more questions. If the child’s heart becomes inquiring, that’s enough; that’s all parents can do for the child. Then the child will seek his or her own answers in his or her own way.” ~ Osho, The Art of Living and Dying
“If you were a role model to millions of children who closely followed you and your life choices, how would you change your behavior? …What if only your own kids were noticing you and being affected?” ~ Gregory Stock, The Book of Questions
“When you know your direction and are living it fully, your core is alive and strong. Your children will naturally feel this. They will respond to your clarity and presence differently than they will respond to your ambiguity – an ambiguity that results from having detoured from your deepest purpose because you think it’s ‘right’ or ‘fair’ that you spend time with them. A short period of time with a father who is absolutely present, full in love, undivided inside, and sure of his mission in life, will affect your children much more positively than if they spend lots of time with a father who is ambiguous in his intent and has lost touch with his deepest purpose, no matter how much he loves his children.” ~ David Deida, The Way of the Superior Man
“Yet we are what we read. We are the educators of our own personalities. Certainly we have great influence in the crafting of our children. If we brought half the intelligence to the making of souls that we bring to the making of machines, we would be people of character and imagination. We would be sharp and therefore less inclined to kill and cheat each other. We would know where to find the deep pleasures, so we would be less desperate for shallow entertainments and the ephemeral gratifications of gadgets.”
Thomas Moore, Original Self | ★ Featured on this book list.
“We are a population that is satisfied with sound-bite news, instant and opinionated political analysis, manipulative popular psychology, and insubstantial novels and magazines. At the same time, and understandably, we feel the absence of meaning and are speechless when we learn of atrocities in our society. We don’t know how to think about them because we don’t know how to think, and we don’t know how to think because we don’t believe that thinking for its own sake is worthy of our attention. We educate our children to make a good living rather than to become thinking persons, and often we honor as celebrities those who have not made a genuine contribution to society but who mirror our own madness.”
Thomas Moore, Original Self | ★ Featured on this book list.
“When we teach a child to make good decisions, we benefit from a lifetime of good decisions. When we teach a child to love to learn, the amount of learning will become limitless. When we teach a child to deal with a changing world, she will never become obsolete. When we are brave enough to teach a child to question authority, even ours, we insulate ourselves from those who would use their authority to work against each of us. And when we give students the desire to make things, even choices, we create a world filled with makers.”
Seth Godin, Whatcha Gonna Do With That Duck?
“The very idea of bringing up children is nonsense. You can help at the most, you cannot ‘bring them up.’ The very idea of building up children is nonsense – not only nonsense, very harmful, immensely harmful. You cannot build… A child is not a thing, not like a building. A child is like a tree. Yes, you can help. You can prepare soil, you can put in fertilizers, you can water, you can watch whether sun reaches the plant or not – that’s all. But it is not that you are building up the plant, it is coming up on its own. You can help, but you cannot bring it up and you cannot build it up.” ~ Osho, Love, Freedom, Alonenss: The Koan of Relationships