HOW DO YOU make someone you truly love know that you are honest about your feelings towards them?
This is something that I have struggled with all of my life. I have managed to push away the few people I care about because I tended to be blunt in everything I said and always pointed out that they could have done much better than what they achieved.
Because of this I have been viewed as cold and uncaring, and not wanting to celebrate their success. But the truth is the opposite.
I was always happy for them, but I didn’t think I should applaud mediocrity when the individual was capable of achieving greater heights if they worked harder. I believed then, as I do today, that this is why so many people, especially young adults, tend to think they “have arrived” and are stars in their respective career pursuits, when in fact they have only just begun to attain the competence needed to accomplish lasting success.
I’m not saying that you should not praise people and wish them all the best. But you should not “big up” people to the point they think they are the next best thing when in fact they are now scratching the surface. Such praise is why many people in this country who achieve a little something walk around thinking that they are so great. And it is why in just about every aspect of life in Barbados the country is not doing as well as it should be.
I feel very strongly about this and perhaps this is why I am alone today.
I have two adult children but they have no time for me. As far as they are concerned I am aloof and don’t appreciate them. They feel so because I told them I don’t think they genuinely pushed themselves at school or university. I believe this because they were always just satisfied to pass. At secondary school, both got mostly grade two passes at CXC when with a little more effort they could have landed grade ones.
At CAPE they received Bs and Cs, when with greater discipline and application they could have got As and put themselves in line for exhibitions. And they went on to university and got upper second class honours. Again, second best.
At each juncture when I asked if they could not do better as they had the potential, I was painted as never being satisfied with them and not liking them, and so on.
Neither ever seemed to think I wanted them to maximise their abilities and be the best they could be. Rather, I was portrayed as a harsh taskmistress.
So today I hardly hear them and don’t see them. Yet they are my world; I love them so much. I have been telling them this for years and they seem not to believe me. They just ask me why I never showed it if I love them so much.
I tried explaining that I did by pushing them to succeed, by being there for them in every way as their father had abandoned us. But to this day they have rejected this explanation.
However, they are closer to their father who left the island and did not look back at me or them. He never sent one cent to help raise them from the time he walked away with one child being five and the other, three years old.
But now they are in their late 20s he has returned and managed to convince them their way of doing things is fine. One particular saying which he told them and they often repeat is that “living is about being happy with who you are and not what others want you to be”.
The last time I saw the two of them in January for my birthday, they told me that. Of course, they are saying that I wanted them to be something they were not when I should have allowed them just to be happy and enjoy themselves.
They just don’t get it that if you accept you are only good enough to be a follower you will never seize the initiative to become a leader, even though you have the ability. It seems I can say nothing to change their perspective.
Every day I keep asking myself why I have to be the way I am, why I always feel I should push myself to the limit and strive to reach the stars rather than be content just “getting through”, as the saying goes.
The only thing I can do to console myself is to recognise that it is up to my children to want more from their lives, and work to achieve that. And despite all the love I have for them as their mother, I cannot push them to do anything they do not consider important.
As a parent this is the one thing we must realise about our children and the choices they make.
