The author’s argument that you as an individual need to find what you are looking for in life and not feel the need to live up to other’s standards is very uplifting and inspiring. She encourages going against the behavior society expects you to have to find your own way of life. Let go of what your parents, friends, or society want you to be and start being yourself. The hardest part is finding yourself first.
Obviously, there can be no individuality between people if everyone is perfect and precise with their actions. Limitations have held people back from progressing in the direction of individuality and happiness. The author explains “nothing important, or meaningful, or beautiful, or interesting, or great ever came out of imitations”. The point is, no one should stop you from being yourself because your uniqueness is what makes the community a better, more meaningful place. Order and strict policies make everything predictable and more importantly, boring. You were brought into this world and you should determine your own fate, not rules.
She also argues how parents may lose their want for a happy child and replace it for what they think a happy child would be. Parents want more for their children than what they had growing up. That could mean they want their kids to have better grades to get into a higher college than they went to, or they want their child to be involved and successful at sports because the parents wish they could have been greater in that area. Parents sometimes forget what being a kid and growing up is like. The author, as a parent herself, confesses that it is a difficult job to uphold. Parents have to remind themselves that happiness does not automatically come with success, money, or reputation. It comes with accepting who you are and what you think is successful in your own terms, not what the people closest to you or society think. At the end of the day, the only opinion that matters is you own because you have to live with that opinion for the rest of your life.
If you try to be “perfect” according to your family, your friends, your community, and your society, the chances of you being truly happy with yourself is very slim. There will be something missing inside of you and that will burden you worse than if you had let any other person down. The author explains there is so much weight on everyone’s shoulders to be perfect and everything everyone wants you to be. She uses the metaphor of a backpack full of bricks to demonstrate the heaviness of society on your shoulders. She explains that if you just take the backpack with all the heavy bricks off, everything will seem so light as a feather, especially life. Take a chill pill and enjoy life instead of packing everything up. This is a genius idea and illustration to show people the importance of relaxing and not stressing about the world.
No comments:
Post a Comment