Parents

Technically, our parents are two random people who neglected to use proper birth control. But their genes as well as the temperaments, values, social class, etc. of those who raised us play a large and confusing role in our lives.

All but the oblivious and tragic are eventually confronted that the epiphany that our parents don’t know anything either. We are stuck with dealing with and sorting through the intentional and unintentional garbage they instilled in us. The self aware do this in an effort to make sense of the interplay between ourselves and the world that surrounds us. The rest just try to cope. Either way, those who get this far inevitably end up trying to figure out, “Who am I?” and, “What do I want to do with my life?” Once you realize you are what you do with your life whether you want to be doing it or not and finding what you want to do is a crap shoot, you are ready for life’s Master Class.

It is impossible to separate or distinguish yourself from those who have and currently surround you. Humans are intensely social creatures, and nothing raised without human contact will ever have anything that resembles humanity. The gestalt of everything that is our being can never truly be broken down into its component parts except at a very superficial level (i.e. you got your mom’s eye color). I do think it is important to recognize our personality habits. While finding things to blame our habits on leads to a comfortable delusion that we’re not responsible for the actions we feel guilty about, I am of the minority that does not value blame over guilt.

The advantage of determining the cause of an error is to decrease the chances of the error being repeated. The problem with blaming others is that we can’t do much about them. My life alone gives me enough to worry about. My parents had their chance to try and make my life turn out right, and now it’s my turn. And since I only have my own life to worry about, I have a far easier job.