Over this last weekend I had the opportunity to see a number of my cousins, many of which have young children. One moment in particular stuck out for me. One of the mothers asked for some sort of cream or lotion to give her child. The child specifically wanted what I believe was an anti-histamine cream to relieve some itching, but the mother knew that anything with roughly the same physical properties would fill the child's real need; to have their problem attended to and be given a simple solution.
Children are obligated to go to their parents to fix the majority of their problems. In infancy they have only the one signaling mechanism to do this, crying, and deploy it whenever they experience discomfort or want so they can obtain the attention of parents that will then fix the problem. As children get older parents teach them more sophisticated signaling mechanisms (such as 'using their words'), but the drive is the same, get the attention of mom or dad so that they'll put in the effort to fix my problem.
I also witnessed the impotent rage and anguish children experience when this process fails, or even more horribly when mom or dad suddenly turn and become the cause of vexation (like being told to leave the swimming pool). The wise parents I was with simply weathered the tantrums and softly prompted their kids to learn to manage their emotional responses with greater aplomb. The lesson will hopefully be learned by these children, though it will probably take a few more years of experience and cerebral development.
What struck me was the inborn drive represented by this, and the realization of how often this thinking expresses itself throughout society. We are constantly turning to figures of authority and power hoping that with their attention and efforts focused on us our problems will get fixed. We get angry when those we think are supposed to fix our problems do things that stifle our enjoyment and comfort. At another point I also discussed with my father, a professional
psychological counselor, how so many want a pill to fix their problems
and prefer that solution despite numerous benefits therapy has over drugs.
We can be active and fight to better our lives when possible, and feel the disappointments of unfortunate but unyielding circumstances without letting that sadness or anger hijack our mind. I'm taking a class in pharmacology over the summer and the lesson that comes up over and over is that all drugs have side effects, and therapy is always just a matter of handling one thing with a cost that's deemed acceptable. As Thomas Sowell put it, "All that goes with the territory, that is with a universe we did not make having constraints we cannot escape, and offering only trade offs however much the intelligencia and the politicians proclaim solutions."
The realization that there are no easy solutions for the biggest problems in our lives and that we're doomed to an eternal existence of managing (as opposed to fixing) the obstacles in our personal lives and our community is sobering, indeed. It is also what we must accept if we want to truly gain maturity beyond the child yelling, "Fix it, mommy!"
