Raising our children

Dear Friends

I have just read a book -The Book On the Taboo Against Knowing Who You Are by Alan Watts.

It is a very enlightening book for those going-to-be or already parents. He tells us some of the traps that we - if we follow the usual way of raising our children - easily fall into.

In order to make good citizens out of our children (as he calls it: ‘Genuine Fakes') we teach them to follow some rules - some of which are impossible to follow.

An example:

“…The social double-bind game can be phrased in several ways:

The first rule of this game is that it is not a game.

Everyone must play.

You must love us.

You must go on living.

Be yourself, but play a consistent and acceptable role.

Control yourself and be natural.

Try to be sincere.”

He shows us how we actually DEMAND our children to be spontaneous ….How to be spontaneous on command?

To me, who, ever since my birth, has been rejecting that double-bind-game my parents and my society tried to force me into, reading this book is extremely fun.

He also states one of my hobbyhorses - which people usually refuse to accept:

“The alternative to a community based on mutual trust is a totalitarian police-state, a community in which spontaneity is virtually forbidden.”

No one seems to be able to see that this ‘police-state' is exactly where we're heading.

Alan Watts also leads us through the discovery of ‘who we really are' and how this world is build up and why it works the way it does.

And here he states this:

” In the words of a Chinese Zen Master, ‘ Nothing is left to you at this moment but to have a good laugh!'”