Five years ago an event took place that, while it may have lacked earth-shattering historical significance, had a deep impact on my personal life. Five years ago I welcomed the extraordinary gift of my first grandchild.
It is not that the arrival of my own children did not affect me deeply; but there was something about the birth of a grandchild that took me completely by surprise.
The problem with my own children was that, when they were born, they brought with them for me a huge bundle of internally generated expectations. The moment I held my first beautiful little daughter, I experienced an overwhelming burden of responsibility all tidily wrapped in my own enormous insecurity. I wanted desperately to be the best dad who had ever changed a diaper. But I knew I was woefully inadequate for the task.
It is not that I could not change a diaper. But I was certain as a young dad that my children were going to grow up to be degenerate ne’er-do-wells and it was going to be all my fault.
As it turns out, despite my parental ineptitude, my daughters have defied all expectation and grown into luminous, healthy, sane adults.
Looking back now as a grandfather, I wish in my early years as a father I had trusted more deeply the incredible resources born into each of my children.
As I look at my grandchildren without the burden of my neurotic need to be the best father in the world and, released from my determination to make sure they become the embodiment of human perfection, I am surprised to see something I missed at first in my own children. With my eyes more fully open now, I see in my grandchildren the innate beauty and power for goodness and truth with which they were born.
Children come into the world filled with light, strength, and truth. If these qualities are given room to prosper they will sustain a child through the uncertainties and trials will face, even the many errors of well-meaning parents.
I understand that, as a parent I was responsible to do everything in my power to provide a safe and nurturing environment for my children. But it was not my job to shape or control my offspring. Instead, they needed me to provide circumstances in which they could find their deepest identity and learn to exercise their true freedom.
I will be able to fulfill this role as parent only when I discover within myself the strength and light that I see so clearly now in my grandchildren. Life-giving parenting begins when we adults start doing our own spiritual work.
When we live honestly, our children will be encouraged to find their own honesty. When we live peaceful, balanced, integrated lives, the children who spend time around us will connect with their own potential to live in harmony. When we live rooted deeply in the eternal unchanging truth of life, our children will discover there is nothing of which they need to be afraid.
Good parenting begins with good living. When I live gently, respectfully, and lovingly, I will be a person around whom others may find their own deep and natural flourishing.
I wish I had not waited until I became a grandfather to trust the strength and beauty embodied in my children.
This post first appeared in the print edition of the Times Colonist
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Christopher Page is the rector of St. Philip Anglican Church in Oak Bay, and the Archdeacon of Tolmie in the Anglican Diocese of B.C. He writes regularly at: www.inaspaciousplace.wordpress.com
