As I spend time with my young granddaughters, I come in direct contact with how their world is slanting their thinking. They want all games to end in a tie. No one should be declared an absolute ‘Winner’ that it is not important to try to do the best you can to win.
An interesting conversation with the almost 10 year-old went like this: “Grami, if you are in a race and are about to win and the person close to you suddenly stops to tie her shoe, would you stop to help her?”
I, of course, replied, “No, I would finish the race to win. What would you do?” She told me that she would stop to help the person. My husband mumbled in the background, “With that attitude, she will be a perpetual loser in life.”
It saddened me to realize that she is being taught that excellence is NOT to be achieved; that one must sacrifice for others rather than ‘win the race.’ I did not have an opportunity to pose this question to her : “Let’s say you have been training your whole life for the Olympics, costing your parents money, time and sacrifice. Now you have qualified and are in the race for the gold at the summer Olympics. Would you still stop to help the other person tie their shoe, thereby losing the most important race of your life?”
What my well-intentioned granddaughter fails to understand is that personal responsibility trumps charity. It was the other person’s responsibility to see that her equipment functioned correctly so she would not have had the problem. It was NOT my granddaughter’s responsibility to sacrifice for the other person’s negligence.
This attitude reflects the current schooling in our country that excellence is NOT rewarded; everyone must ‘dumb down’; no one can stand above the others; it’s O.K. to be needy, unaccomplished, a taker and a user.
Since I am not raising her, I have little influence to counter this unbelievable way of thinking. I am fearful that she will have a life of always giving and rarely having her needs met and never fully reaching her potential.
The fact that she and her sister do not have the benefit of a Christian upbringing is the saddest thing of all. That is where she would learn a moral responsibility to herself, to reach her God-given full potential as a child of God with Jesus Christ as her savior.
My daily prayers are for her to find our Lord Jesus. I love her no matter what but am so sad for her, nevertheless.