Importance of Struggle

(Excerpts from an article in HT titled ‘Parents should realise importance of struggle in life of their children’)

* I drive down the same route through an urban village to my office every day. In the mornings, an old man carries a packet of grain and pours a fistful under a tree. How nice of him to leave grain for the birds, I think. Then comes an afterthought: The birds will soon be conditioned to finding grain under the tree. Then, over time, they will forget how to look for their own food. Ultimately, they will lose the desire to work for their food. What happens when one day the old man dies and there is no grain under the tree? Why does the old man give grains to the bird? Is it his need to do ‘good’? Is it his protective instincts towards something he feels is helpless?

* Many would have heard the story of the boy who helped the butterfly out of the cocoon by cutting it because he felt very concerned seeing the butterfly struggle. The butterfly emerges with a swollen body and shriveled wings and tries to fly but is unable to and crawls for the rest of its life. The struggle out of the cocoon was necessary to push the fluid to the wings and make the wings strong enough for it to fly. By helping the butterfly, the little boy made it dependent for life.

* Dr Mark D Seery, a professor of psychology at the University at Buffalo under the State University of New York, did a study in 2010 to see how low levels of adversity could impact a person’s coping skills and emotional stability as opposed to no adversity. He concluded that adversity can help people develop a “psychological immune system” to help them cope with the slings and arrows that life throws, while those with no experience of adversity may have a hard time dealing with tough times. The one thing we can be sure of in life is that there will be adversity and struggle. The nature of that adversity may change over generations, but it will be there.

* Many mothers stand in waiting while their kids study, ensuring their every need is taken care of so that they can fully concentrate on their studies. Life’s not like that. Chances are that our attention will be required in multiple areas at the time of our most busy and important working period. Most of us would be able to recall times when we have been stretched in multiple directions and everything was urgent and important. No angel turns up to take care of everything else while we take care of one thing. The only angel is our will power and emotional stability. Getting our children to do some work and take care of their own needs independently while studying for exams will prepare them better and help them learn prioritisation and multi-tasking.

* We fail to realise that it is the trek up the mountain that makes us a winner versus simply arriving at the summit. As Friedrich Nietzsche, the German philosopher said, “What will not kill me will make me stronger”. We need to expose our children to struggle so that they become strong and when adversity strikes, which it will, they won’t need us to save them.

P.S.: Link to the HT Article: http://www.hindustantimes.com/education/parents-should-realise-importance-of-struggle-in-life-of-their-children/story J5uXrV80L2yFuJMt8vzWUL.html