They say death is the great equalizer, and I'm sure its true, but I'd like to believe that age is one too. Unfortunately most people in today's society don't look upon the elderly with any real respect. I guess it's always been that way with some, but in the past we held our elderly to a higher esteem. We listened to their advice as hard earned experience, and welcomed their knowledge of history as it lived compared to how it was written. But today it seems that the older you get the less useful you are to the younger generations. I have found personally, that even with friends, when I'm telling them the truth as I see it happening to them, they don't listen or stop wanting to talk about it at best. And at worst get angry and call my advice bad armchair psychology. (Cue RUSH song).
But as a friend, what they forget, is that I am only trying to help them not make the same mistakes I made. Weather it is getting Crazy Girl Brain over a man who is perhaps acting like a boy, or just doing what he thinks is right for the moment. Or when it's hiding the truth from themselves about a way that they are expressing themselves in a negative manner, always seeing the worst instead of finding the best they can.
You see I don't give advice on topics or situations where I have no experience. For I am on a journey too and learning everyday. But when I see a friend or loved one going through something I myself have had to face, I can't help but try to give them some insight. Usually I do it by telling them a story about my past. But sometimes the need is so great that I have to resort to treating them they way they treat others. Which almost always causes a temper tantrum. And adult version but still the same type of acting out.
Have I mentioned that I'm a nanny and I am not moved by temper expressed in any form? Its my business to be good at defusing situations, and thankfully for me it has been a lesson learned from experiences. Hard experiences. And yes I can look back on all of my life and be thankful for those experiences. Because I like who I have grown up to be. Even if the road was sometimes dark and treacherous, scandalous, or even when the road seemed to be deteriorating beneath my feet on an impossible up hill climb. I always saw light at the end. I hung on and reached out to hands willing to help me up and out. With their hard earned advice. I always found my way out and back to an easy path because on a basic level I am an optimistic person. And I have faith in myself that I can do anything I set my mind to. But that too was learned from tying. Trying scary things that I never believed I'd be strong enough to do. Like leaving home for the first time, having and raising children, divorce, surviving my parents deaths, moving to a new place and starting over--not just once but many times. And I've had some very scary things thrust onto me, things I didn't choose that I also survived, like rapes, illness and lost loves.
So having lived a full life, and knowing the fun's not over yet, I feel like I have learned some lessons, and I also feel its an obligation to pass on what I know to others that I love. I welcome their stories and experiences, and don't understand why they wouldn't welcome mine. But I find, with age, they do not. So I've decided to just shut up. I've decided that the negative people out there have won. And I'm frankly tired of trying to help people. So from now on my important advice will be kept for the ones who ask for it. My knowledge of human experience will be for the ones that want to know, and you know what, they are all under 10 years old. And they look at the world with the eyes of a child, and people as well. They look at them the way I looked at my friends. Knowing they would never hurt me and that they trust me and my love as I trust them. How foolish I've been to think adults would be like children. Like I am. But you see, that's one thing life taught me. You must look at the world with a child's trusting and honest eyes. Or you will be deceived and hurt by adults who only want and never give.
My name is Jill and it means ever youthful. Perhaps that's why I survived, I'll always be young at heart and I highly recommend it. Stop making yourself depressed with problems you can't solve, and solve the ones you can. You'll be surprised how quickly everything around you changes when you love yourself the way a child does. When you trust your loved ones the way a child does instead of thinking the worst of people you have chosen to be close to. I hope your holiday is filled with childrens laughter and I hope it comes from your own hearts.
Cheers
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