Reflection 132 (teach)

Let's teach

Let's teach our children 
Not the history of conqueror-mass murderers
but the glory of humble servants to humanity

My heart worries if I see award giving ceremonies
for children achieving excellent results in school

The all important scoring of As
Maybe we have to stop the madness

Let us stop and think for a while what we want most for our children
Any reasonable parent would answer:
I want them to be first and foremost happy people, if possible happier than myself.


But there are so many unreasonable parents out there who give a wicked twist to the above into:
I want my children to be first and foremost high achievers, achieving higher aims than myself. (and higher aims means more money, more power, more influence, something for parents to be proud of). There is nothing noble about ignoring what the talents and true ambitions of your children are. I have met medical students who were not interested in Medicine at all. Some of them dreamed of becoming movie directors but were pushed in medical school by their enormously egoistic (or/and unintelligent) parents

Let us stick to the happiness ideal for our children.
Happiness is so closely linked to basic values.
Let us teach them values first before we teach them that being first is all that's valued

Let's teach our children
the long lasting happiness that lies in humbly serving
Let us put that as priority number one.
to be able to help and serve in an optimal way they may need to work hard, to achieve

Let us teach them to serve and help friends along the way and never make achievement a lofty aim by itself...