At what point does the persistence in such effort become futile? How do you know when to cut your losses and throw in the towel? Or are there some things that are worth fighting for, no matter how dismal the future?
I know some parents who have essentially thrown away their children, and it breaks my heart--that's one thing I think they gave up on too quickly. Maybe they think that they're still trying, but frankly, it's just not going to be good enough to matter. The effort is far too little, and it's growing too late to matter anyway.
How do we measure that in our own lives? How do we know what things to fight for and what to let go? It's so easy to see from the outside what a huge mistake these people are making, but I don't think they see it. I think they assume they're going to be able to fix it soon, but they're wrong. Perhaps there are things in my own life that are similar--things that I'm not working hard enough on, things that I'm not making quick enough progress at, things that I should have given up long ago, or things I never should have let go.
Only one thing is certain--it's after 1:00 in the morning, and I need to throw in the towel on the thinking and head to bed. I'm finally tired enough that I think my brain will be quiet, finally! :)
2 comments:
Winston Churchill gave a great speech. I think near the end he said, "never give up - never, never give up".
I think that is the answer, never give up. I am confident if the parents were in their right minds they would never treat children in that way.
In economics there is something called the law of diminishing returns. I used this to decide how much to study. :-) (Not much!)
The hard thing with kids (one of...) is that you work and work and work and get nothing and make no progress for a looooong time. It can be discouraging. Sad to watch kids suffer, though.
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