Parenting Tao

[Taken from The Parent's Tao Te Ching by William Martin]

Your Greatest Legacy

If you want your children to succeed,
show them how to fail.
If you want them to be happy,
show them how to be sad.
If you want them to be healthy,
show them how to be sick.
If you want them to have much,
show them how to enjoy little.
Parents who hide failure, deny loss,
and berate themselves for weakness,
have nothing to teach their children.
But parents who reveal themselves,
in all of their humanness,
become heroes.
For children look to these parents
and learn to love themselves.
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Ahhh. I needed that. For all the love I have in my heart for my children and for all of my intentions of peace and bliss, I step outside the mother I want to be from time to time and when I admit my failure, express my sorrow and convey my love, they see the humanness in me. Perhaps that exposure softens the edges when I veer from my path.