Just try to be a human being. Don't try to be an idealist and don't try to be a perfertionist. All perfectionistic people are neurotic. A sane person is never a perfectionist, Whatsoever he can dn, he does, and then it is finished. So simply be yourself. And one thing for you and for everybody else here: the relationship between the child and the mother is such that it can never be perfect - it is impossible. Some problem will always be there. You rhange one problem, another will arise, because the very relationship is such. The child is helpless, the child has no individuality yet. The mother has an individuality. Shc is not dependent on the child, and the child is dependent on the mother. Both are not equal ... cannot be. The mother has power and the child has no power. Now this is natural ... you are not responsible for it. If somebody is responsible, maybe it is god. If you give too much freedom to the child, he will die from freedom. If you disriplinc him too much, you will kill him from discipline. And there is no way to know where the demarcation line is. So whatsoever ynu do is going to be wrong. Of you give too much freedom, the child will be spoiled. If you don' t give enough freedom, the rhild w il l bc spoiled. nd down the ages people have tried all alternatives.
particularly chosen you, so not only are you respnnsible she is also responsible. Now just be natural and
be happy! Whatsoever happens out nf happiness is good. And whatsoever creates misery in you, drop all that nonsense. Now you have becnme so miserable. Rather than
Sometimes they have tried to disripline thc child
being happy
absolutely. Then whatsoever comes out is an Adolf Hitler, nazism, fascism; that's what happened in Germany. For a hundred years they had been trying to bring up the child according to the perfectionist ideal obedience, order, discipline - so the soul was destroyed. A very very powerful german rare was created, but there was no soul. Now that failed. The pendulum has moved in A m erica. Seeing that it failed.. it created Japan - Japan is a very very disciplined country - and Germany ... seeing that they created such havoc in the world, such hell, the world mind moved. Intellectuals started saying, 'No more o rder, no more discipline - freedom!' So freedom h a s created the new generation — the flower children, the hippies, the yippics. Nnw if they win, the society will be destroyed completely, because no technology can exist with hippies; no clean, hygienic society can exist with t he hippies. No sort of family can exist; everything wil l be simply topsy-turvy. They will create annther ugly world, and again seeing what hippies have dnne, people wiii start moving. They by that time they will have forgotten Nazi Germany, and Hitler; they will again start thinking about how to disripline the children. This is how it has been happening down the ages again and again. But whatsoever you do goes wrong. So my feeling is: please don't try tn do anything. Simply love the rhild, and leave everything else to god. I ove the child, and whatsoever you can do, do, But that doing should not become such a deliberate act as you are trying to do. Simply love! You are a human being with all the flaws and limitations of a human being, and nov what. can you do?
that you are a mother and a child is there, you
'he child has chosen you to be her mother — it is not ' just your responsibility. The child is also responsible. She must have some karmas to be born to you, otherwise why? She could have chosen ... There are so many women always ready to receive. She has
O sho Wings -
J u l / A u g / S ep t
becom ing miserable. Your misery will certainly be reflected in the child, The child by and by will become aware that her mother is miserable because of her. Your guilt will be reflected, and you w il l create a complex in the child. Forget about it! Dance with thc child, lnve the child, hug the child .. and be natural! Don't listen to the pundits and the experts — just be natural! Don't ynu see all the animals? Nobody teaches them how to be a good parent; there exists nothing like transactional analysis and they are good parents. Who bothers? Only man is very difficult. There have been societies where the child has not to be hugged, because that destroys the child. Ton much hugging makes him sissy and limp, spineless, He should be strong f'rom the beginning, he should be forced to stand on his own feet. And there are societies which say to hug the child, otherwise he will miss the human warmth and he will never be able to love anybody. Now what to do? In the morning, hug, and in the evening, discipline? What tn dn? Hnw tn div ide? One hour hugging, one hour discipline? But then the child will be confused. And he will become very suspicious of the mother —that she seems to bc schizophrenic: onc hour she is just sweet, another hour she becomes such a great disciplinarian. The child will become very worried — she will not know w hat to do with the mother. Whatsoever you are, that you have tn share with the child. And whatsoever happens to the child, the child has tn take her own responsibility too! Now, in the American mind, this is such an absurd nntinn — you go to the psycho — (continued on page 13)
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