Obedience, Fear, Guilt…just don’t feel right to me
October 8, 2010
It seems to me that it should never be about obedience, fear or guilt. It should be about love, trust and respect.
When I think about relationships of all kinds- marriage, parenting, friendships- if a person expects obedience or uses fear or guilt to get me to do something…it just doesn’t ring true to my spirit. It just can’t be right.
If you love someone and respect someone and trust someone which is what marriage, parenting, friendship should be built upon..then the needs of the relationship should be met. I should want to do things for you. I should want to make you happy. So therefore you do not need to use obedience, fear or guilt to get me to do something for you.
My mother, a single working mother of four, somehow did this miraculously with us. I don’t know if she did it consciously or subconsciously, but I never remembering “fearing” my mother or her using words such as “you must obey.” I just simply had this love, trust and respect for her that was so strong that I cringed at the thought of disappointing her or hurting her in any way. She was (is) such a good person, so why would I ever do anything that would hurt her. She spent more time showing us how to be compassionate, happy, joyful then obedience. Yet, and here is the OA Twist, we were all four extremely good kids through our youth. Of course, we each made a few bad calls as all youth seem to do, but as my Mom will tell you, we were really good kids. Love, Trust and Respect work my friends.
