Syndicated Columns

Putting your children on paths to tomorrow

Posted July 22, 2006

Q. Can you offer any words of wisdom on "letting go" of my 17-year-old son? -- C.M., Boca Raton

A. Letting go of your child can be a joyful or painful experience.

Choose the path that helps you trust that he is in God's good care.

Practice listening and allow him the space to ask for your guidance. Surrender to the natural process of separation.

And read below, Kahlil Gibran's sage advice from his book The Prophet. May it bring you quiet acceptance.



On Children

Your children are not your children.

They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.

They come through you but not from you,

And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love but not your thoughts,

For they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.

You may strive to be like them,

but seek not to make them like you.

For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

You are the bows from which your children

as living arrows are sent forth.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,

and He bends you with His might

that His arrows may go swift and far.

Let our bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;

For even as He loves the arrow that flies,

so He loves also the bow that is stable.

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