People have been have been living successful lives for centuries.
Yet there is no methodology to follow to succeed. Everyone is unique and requires a subtly different lifestyle to be happy.
But the basics are the same, physical safety, financial security, a handful of people who love them, and a place that you can always to come back to called home.
Whether you are nomadic or a homebody needing people to love support and guide you are essential. This is commonly referred to as your network. Networking has been coined as one of the most important tools in a successful person’s repertoire.
Yet the essential social interactions that lead to a diverse and supportive network are not taught in school, or passed on from parent to child. Every individual is left to fend for themselves and strive for their best with out a net or a network to catch them if they fall.
In many cultures children belong to the neighborhood, rooming in packs from house to house, being cared for and looked after by the whole village. North Americans teach there children to fear non-familial adults and are shameful of their children being seen as latchkey kids. There is nothing wrong with a child having their own space, independence, and learning to be a good judge of character. But telling them to lock the door and stay inside until you get home from work is probably not the best solution to your scheduling difficulties.
In Canada and the USA it is expected that once you leave your parents house, you get a job, partner up, buy some type of home, have babies and raise them with all that knowledge your working parents imparted to you! How are two working parents and a daycare supposed to single handedly raise a child or three? Simple don’t go back to work. Wrong answer according to most women even though daycare is expensive and you no longer get to spend the day with your baby it remains the most popular childcare choice. The cost of childcare is way out of whack with the standard income and we have not even touched on the standard of care that children are getting. Yet it is still financially necessary to get back to work to have the money coming in even though more than half of it ends up going to daycare. With so many couples desperately trying to get pregnant and have babies, it makes me wonder why those couples are not more active in raising the children and bringing reform to childcare in our culture. Perhaps it is more about the status of having kids than the journey of raising future contributing members of our society.
Kids are adorable and the most magnetic they will ever be – yet we shy away from letting strangers coo and awe over them, and we actively train them to avoid talking to strangers (ie. networking). Is it that parents want to keep these precocious little beings to themselves? Or perhaps we are just so afraid of strangers imprinting their ways on our progeny. People will say it is all about Stranger Danger but statistically speaking you will never encounter a person who will want to steal or hurt your child. Sociopaths exist and it is terrible when one of them gets their hands on a victim but chances are slim to none that they live, work, or play in your upper middle class neighborhood. See Penn & Tellers Bullsh!t episode 609: Stranger Danger for more details.
My point I guess is that there may not be a right way to raise kids but it takes a village to do it no matter which method you choose. Use your network and teach them to build one of their own!
