Yesterday I was babysitting my two grandsons Hamish and William and was wondering of their future possibilities and the hidden potential in both of them.
This led me to thinking about the responsibilities of being a good parent in bringing up children, being accountable for my actions and being a responsible person in today's society.
Its not easy.
However, one of many things my parents taught me was to be responsible for my own actions, abide by societies rules and regulations and help others.
How did my parents know if they were doing a good job or not, they didn't. They just had the experiences of their own personal lives to call upon to know what to do. If they were hit as children, then this would have been 'their normal'.
Luckily for me this wasn't the case.
Last night on the news I watched a small community in the Eastern States implode as the parents of a bunch of kids were allowed to walk around with knives...to 'protect themselves'. The kids were aged between 10 to 14.
When they become parents I wondered what they will teach their children. I am assuming it would be based on their own personal experiences, and so the cycle continues.
The question then is how this cycle can be broken? I don't have the answer.
I think this can be changed partially through what I know as the African saying that 'our kids are brought up by the village'. This relates to when the menfolk left home for hunting expeditions, the women and mothers were left to work in the village and care for everything that happened there.
Foraging for food, collecting water and many other chores required the kids being left to others to bring up the children, but with the trust and knowledge that everyone worked to a common cause.
With this in mind, I'd like to think that teachers, school carers, child-minders, creche's and the such like are part of that village and play a major part of bringing up those children.
They become the so-called surrogate parents who have a highly-underestimated role in showing a better way of bringing up children, much the same way as all our current and future leaders do in today's society. That's a lot of responsibility.
However, what a great opportunity of beginning the change in a young persons life and potentially 'breaking' an ongoing cycle that can only see peoples lives shattered through violence with love and care.
People need to stand up and challenge the normal. Be leaders. Take on responsibility and in doing so, you might never see the benefits of the seed you plant, but in doing so, if every person does their bit, who knows the changes in society each one of us could accomplish as a whole.
I am role modelling every day in what I believe about changing someones life somewhere, somehow...are you!
