Growing up, did your parents, a teacher, or another adult tell you that anything worth doing was worth doing well? Yeah, that struck a nerve, didn’t it? There’s no escaping the teaching and chidings that you often heard. You can’t forget them; they are woven into your soul.
Initially, they were just words you heard them amid all of the caution, advice, and well wishes you absorbed on your path to becoming an adult.
As you matured and faced your own life obstacles, it seems one of those phrases of wisdom would creep into your mind about the time you were faced with a challenge. Think back to when you were in high school, and you got your first job. Your parents most likely reminded you that maintaining your grades was your full-time, and most important job. Along with this other job—whether at a local a store or restaurant—they expected you to keep up your grades.
Isn’t it amazing how those little sayings you and your sister and brother used to snicker at when the elders were out of sight? Someone in the family was a historian; they may have been the ultra religious one, the strange future foretelling one, and the one who could see things in you.
Now as a parent, you’re surprised that some of what you always relegated as “that old folks’ stuff” is coming to your mind. You actually blurted something out to your son, and as he turned to see who you were, you actually laughed out loud and told him to go on—pushing him out of the room. You reached for the phone and called your brother and shared this with him. You both are now in belly-holding laughter, tossing one and then another saying back and forth.
Well, now you know the power of words, tradition, and how life becomes ingrained in folks. Never as a 14-year-old would you have believed you’d find yourself saying some of the things you and your brother laughed about back in the day. That saying has come full circle, because you knew you were the product of everything these elders poured into you, and now you are doing the same thing with your kids.
Speak Your Mind