55. Your Children Have Lessons to Teach

"Your children have important lessons to learn,
but even more important ones to teach.

What can they teach?
How to pay complete attention.
How to play all day without tiring.
How to let one thing go,
and move onto another
with no backward glances.
How to move and sit
with no tension in the muscles,
no stress in the bones.

Thus the wise parent learns,
and grows
younger every day.

How happy would your life become
if every time you taught your children
a new idea or skill from your world,
you stopped and watched until
they taught you one from theirs?
What will you learn from them today?"

There is a story I read once, about an older sibling who would go into the nursery to visit their newborn sibling and say, "Baby, tell me what God feels like. I'm starting to forget." Sometimes I want to say the same to my daughter. One day, when she asks me about God, I'm going to tell her about this story. Whatever she comes to believe about a higher power, I want her to understand that she, like all of us, comes from a divine source.