How can I be a good mentor to the youths?
Some talk about a generation gap… I think it’s not so much of a gap of years per se.
It’s about how we’ve grown OUT of it, feeling silly when looking back, and not wanting the next generation to be as silly as we were.
Yet we so often forget how hard it was for ourselves not to be silly back then. How we adamantly believed that we were right and those noisy naggy adults were wrong. Why, we knew ourselves better than anyone else. Duh. Of course we would know what’s best.
Funnily, this very fact always seems to elude us as we mature. We tuck them memories away in a little dark corner of our heads and hearts, conveniently forgetting how honestly silly we used to be and can be.
As much as we don’t like nags, we nag. Yes, because we care. Even when humans can be just so unlovable.
And I when wonder why some cared about me, the nasty kid with the nasty mouth, I realise that it is a privilege to be cared for. I’m grateful. But human pride does do a great deal in being ignorant and self-sufficient. Until we learn the hard way.
I’ll never again proclaim that I’ll never be a naggy parent in future. (Like our parents.) Really, it’s an art.
Still, there surely is a way out of this.
