Speaking of Children...

So recently I've been thinking back to a lazy Saturday years ago when my best friend David and I spent the day discussing a wonderful book I’d never heard of before called “The Prophet”. It was written by Kahlil Gibran, a poet, philosopher and artist originally from Lebanon and I loved it.

For some reason today I was compelled to look up again what Gibran wrote through his character the Prophet about his insights on children. I guess really had no recollection at all as to what he would have written, but as I suspected, I was once again delighted. Maybe you will be too?

And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said,

"Speak to us of Children." And he said:

"Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness;
For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.”