Inspiration & Paradox 41: Who can we best learn parenthood from?

As a child, I had a very difficult relationship with my mum. Basically, I could not agree with anything she did and I gave her a hard time. And when I had my first baby, I went through a very "blue" period. Strange enough, I did not have any natural mother instinct to tell me what were the expectations of a good mother. Having no mental picture of what an ideal mother should be, I was very fearful, felt very helpless and lost.

I realise that by the time we know well enough what is correct parenting and learn how to act and communicate like good responsible parents, it is the end of parenthood, our children have grown up and entered into parenthood themselves, and they start to wonder what they are supposed to do as responsible parents. And this vicious cycle of parenting struggle goes on and on. It seems that no children actually have known or seen before or could even envisage in their mind what perfect parents should be like. If this is really so, how can we learn to be perfect parents when parenthood cannot be repeated there will never ever be perfect parents for us to model after?

Inspiration & Paradox 40: Be glad when you feel lonely?!

I have friends who see loneliness as an emotional pain and fail to see any possibilities of good things springing from it. They undermine their sense of self-worth and feel they are not sufficiently loved by others as a result of feeling lonely.

But only as we thoughtlessly throw ourselves into the maddening mass, and start to compulsively secure relationships with all our might, fill our agendas and crowd every single bit of our own space, we then realise what we actually need after all.

Loneliness could be a place of solitude to discover your true self, a clue to help us find that stable inner security which will build us meaningful friendships, an amplifier to help us hear that still small voice within us telling us which direction to go, and an energising potion upon which we depend to engage in life pursuits.

Inspiration & Paradox 39: The Liar Paradox

If you love paradoxical statements, take a look at this one -- the Liar Paradox which revolves round a self-referential sentence:

(A) This sentence is false.

The statement in itself is a contradiction. If (A) is true, then (A) is false. On the other hand, assume (A) is false, then (A) is true. Since (A) is true if and only if it is false and (A) is one or the other, then it is both -- true and false, which is not possible!