There are two facts that all children need to disprove sooner or later; mother and father. If you go on believing in the fiction of your own parents, it is difficult to construct any narrative of your own.
Interpretation
Children must eventually challenge their perceptions of their parents to develop their own identities.
This quote by Jeanette Winterson highlights the inevitable journey of children as they grow up and start to question the ideals and narratives created by their parents. It emphasizes that believing in an idealized version of one's parents can hinder personal development and the ability to create one's own life story, urging a process of disillusionment and self-discovery.
In practice
During a parenting workshop, to illustrate the importance of developing one's identity, one might quote this.
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
I'm a dad, I'm a husband, I'm an activist, I'm a writer and I'm just a student of the world.
There have been times when I wanted children and other times I've been grateful not to have them. I am a mess if I have to say goodbye to my dog for longer than five days. I don't know how I would deal with kissing my children as I left for work. I know there are women who are able to do that. I don't know if I could.
My father wasn't a hard guy. He was a well-liked guy. He had a lot of compassion about things in life. There were rules, but there was also flexibility within those rules. He didn't push me when it came to golf: he just taught me the right way to play the game.
~My instinct is to protect my children from pain. But adversity is often the thing that gives us character and backbone. It's always been a struggle for me to back off and let my children go through difficult experiences.~
Who of us is mature enough for offspring before the offspring themselves arrive? The value of marriage is not that adults produce children but that children produce adults.
The legend engraved on the face of the Jewish nickel- on the body of every Jewish child!- not IN GOD WE TRUST, but SOMEDAY YOU'LL BE A PARENT AND YOU'LL KNOW WHAT IT'S LIKE.
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