Categories
All Around You and Me (Relationships)

Conversation with my son

Just finished a phone call with my 22 years old son. Max called and we had 30 minutes conversation. I realized that he is one of my greatest teaches, challenges, inspirations. He is my blessing. It is interesting, people say that we will always see our children as kids. Today I understand that it is not a case with me and my son. I do experience him as a young man – smart, risky, passionate, outrageous, emotional, searching, growing.

I remember one day somebody told me that 18th birthday is a much bigger celebration for parents than for kids, because it is a celebration of independence from consequences of kids’ choices. I think the biggest gift and pleasure of having an adult child is the opportunity to have a unique relationship with him – open, honest, challenging. Max made a lot of choices that I didn’t do in my life and that looked for me as a total stupidity. He put himself through a lot of challenges. Through last months I learned to let him live his life, experience all the consequences of his choices and to love him and appreciate him for who he is. I also learned to experience and appreciate my consequences for choices I make in connection with our relationships. It is liberating. It is not always easy, but it is liberating.

My golden nuggets from what Max said today, not his exact words, but what they ignited in me:

I don’t believe in idols. I believe in inspiration.

We all people and we all have our ego, and we all selfish. But as human being we have a unique quality to overcome this selfishness in order to serve a greater good.

Pride is a double edge sword: bad pride comes/breeds arrogance (one thinks low about other people, one think that he can be noticeable only if he puts down everybody around himself) – it is either me, or you; right/wrong. Good pride comes from self confidence (I know who I am and I acknowledge and value all my talents and gifts, I think good about myself), good pride is “we all together.”

I don’t count what I don’t have, I count my blessings.

Categories
My Favorite Quotes

Art of Living

“A Master in the Art of Living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both”.

Francoise Rene Auguste Chateaubriand.
French writer and statesman
(1768 – 1848)