GROW UP AND DEVELOP!
Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter
My dear encountered couples:
Parents who do everything for their children do them no favor. Friends who do all the thinking and make all the decisions for their friends are really not good friends. People who are always bailing out other people and cleaning up their messes are quite possibly doing more harm for them than good. All these loving and well-intentioned people not only risk spoiling those they do so much for, but they also risk retarding them.
We all must grow. I’m not talking about physical growth, of course. Food takes care of that problem. In fact, many of us could do with less growth in the physical realm. I’m talking about character growth, personality growth, mental and spiritual growth and development.
We all must grow and develop. And to do that requires that we put forth individual effort on our own. We must be allowed to learn to think on our own, make decisions on our own, act and do on our own. We must be given the privilege of being able to make mistakes and suffer the consequences of our mistakes. And believe me, it is a privilege. For we will never grow, we will never become worthwhile people deep down, nor successful at anything, unless we are allowed to make mistakes and experience failure.
Having to go to what is called the “school of hard knocks” can be the greatest schooling we can get. Personal responsibility, and the experience that comes from personal responsibility, is more beneficial to us than someone taking care of our every need and cleaning up our every mess. Little success comes without facing difficulties and making mistakes.
We all must be allowed the favor of strain and pain in our lives if we are ever to amount to anything.
