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"You can grow up to be anything you want!" Really?

verso

verso

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So, I've been thinking a lot about this lately; We often tell our children that they can grow up to be anything they want. Do we really believe this to be true, and is it true? Are we not born into some station in life, limited by money, connections, intelligence, even, and hence able to reach only so far before inevitably coming up empty?

I feel like it's sort of an americanism, or more of a western idea, maybe, that one can pull himself up by his own bootstraps and make whatever it is he wants of himself, provided one works hard and is determined enough to succeed. I'm interested in hearing from anyone and everyone but especially those in other parts of the world and those with children.
 
We also tell our children that an old jolly man brings us gifts each year; that if we put a tooth under our pillow, a fairy will give us money; that a rabbit comes in the spring and gives us chocolates/candies; ... Need I go on? 8)

Seriously though, we are limited by our situations to an extent. Just because you're born into a blue collar household doesn't mean you will be blue collar. There's a high likelihood you will be, but birth doesn't guarantee it.
 
You can be anything you want with limits of course. Its mostly talking about occupations. I dont think its a western thing because in India they put alot of pressure on kids to succeed. If you dont get 99-100% in your final exams you are considered to be a disgrace to the family.
 
If if it is realistic.... you are only limited by your mind.....

Sounds corny but all the really successful ppl I've met really believed they could do what they wanted and did do it
 
cire113 said:
Sounds corny but all the really successful ppl I've met really believed they could do what they wanted and did do it
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See, that's the rub in all this. What you don't generally find are people who succeeded but are thoroughly convinced it all just fell into their laps by accidents of circumstance. You can imagine yourself doing this, but I'm willing to bet if something incredibly lucky did happen to you entirely by accident, you'd probably find a way to convince yourself you earned or deserved it, that is wasn't just an accident after all. And indeed, maybe it wasn't. Maybe everything does happen for a reason. That's irrelevant to the point I'm making, though, which is about your view of what happened to you and how it fits into the rest of your life.

You do, on the other hand find plenty of people who believe they were never masters of their own destiny, and lo and behold, never made real any of their dreams or aspirations. So why not believe you're bound for glory? After all, not all people who believe they're on the road to success may really be, but believing you're not on the road to success virtually guarantees you're not.

I dislike the phrase "anything you want", because it implies the making of choices in a random, capricious, context-blind way that's affectedly fate tempting and makes mockery of the complex dynamic push-and-pull relationship between our inner selves and the outer world which takes place any time we make any decision, especially an important one. So no, I would never tell one of my kids, "You can grow up to be whatever you want." I would instead tell them that there are a lot of doors out there with something good for them behind them, and if they listen enough to the world within and the world without, they'll learn which doors are worth knocking on.
 
Maybe for a tiny percentage of people, but most people have neither the ability nor the means to do anything they want.

Like the "American Dream" this saying is basically bullshit.
 
If you are determined to make a million dollars you probably could. But at what cost? You may make your million but lose the best years of your life, your vitality, your friends and family, in pursuing this dream. This idea that you can be "anything you want" is just social bait to encourage the child to play the game of society.. just like saying "you're number 1", "you're special" etc.

If parents said to the child, "well realistically you stand a chance of ending up on the same economic level as we are, working a slightly toxic job for some dickhead you don't care about and who doesn't really value you.." I think a lot of children would probably ask themselves whether the game is worth playing. Tell the truth to a child and they would probably end up quite depressed.

To summarise, it is nothing more than bait.
 
"whether you think you can or you think you can't, you're probably right."? i think so.

i think the statement the op discusses succinctly reminds us that the main impediment to our success is ourselves.

alasdair
 
hmmm...wanting to be enlightened and being enlightened cannot, in a dualistic sense, be considered the same thing because the desire for enlightenment is one of the most insidious obstacles, desire being a conscious, or sub-conscious, recognition of feeling incomplete or discontent in some way.

By "dualistic" I mean we're talking about it in the conventional sense, not in the ultimate "irreducible oneness" sense because, in that case, all those things would be true, in addition to their opposites, and the mere utterance of a phrase of any kind would obscure any real understanding.

Tight rope walking Simply Live. Mother-fuckin tight ropes.
 
Don't you think you could grow up to be any number though? What if you get surgery to make yourself half of a circle?

Then again we should define what it means to "be" something, really, in light of the fact that humans can be many things at once. Otherwise this thread's got no direction.
 
CoffeeDrinker said:
hmmm...wanting to be enlightened and being enlightened cannot, in a dualistic sense, be considered the same thing because the desire for enlightenment is one of the most insidious obstacles, desire being a conscious, or sub-conscious, recognition of feeling incomplete or discontent in some way.

By "dualistic" I mean we're talking about it in the conventional sense, not in the ultimate "irreducible oneness" sense because, in that case, all those things would be true, in addition to their opposites, and the mere utterance of a phrase of any kind would obscure any real understanding.

Tight rope walking Simply Live. Mother-fuckin tight ropes.
Click to expand...

How do you know you're not already enlightened but just haven't realized it yet? It's like having a deja vu moment; you realize that you've done this before, you just can't remember when and why you can remember it.

I like my ropes tight. Easier to walk on than ones that sway in the wind.
 
That expression means we are condemned to be free but with that freedom comes great responsibility. Many are unwilling to face the responsibilities and sleepwalk through life. One has to lose everything before they can gain anything. Leap of faith. What's the worst that could happen?
 
fridgebuzz said:
That expression means we are condemned to be free but with that freedom comes great responsibility. Many are unwilling to face the responsibilities and sleepwalk through life. One has to lose everything before they can gain anything. Leap of faith. What's the worst that could happen?
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The worst that can happen is second best compared to what was tried for -
I've had to notice this, so yeah understanding yourself and taking responsibility
for your actions, not needing to worry...setting goals as high as possible
can not be half-bad.

* someone needs to do it
for now thats me
 
What I was saying is that life is all about deciding whether to take the red pill or the blue pill. We can be the deciders of our destiny if we stand up and face our selves. Apathy and fear are the enemies. So I think the excuse that people are just born that way is absurd.
 
fridgebuzz said:
What I was saying is that life is all about deciding whether to take the red pill or the blue pill. We can be the deciders of our destiny if we stand up and face our selves. Apathy and fear are the enemies. So I think the excuse that people are just born that way is absurd.
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this is what i thought you were saying - no pills

standing up for yourself, means soon having to honestly face yourself

honestly having to face yourself, is maybe not understanding your destiny, but how to best reach that point.
 
Simply_Live said:
How do you know you're not already enlightened but just haven't realized it yet? It's like having a deja vu moment; you realize that you've done this before, you just can't remember when and why you can remember it.
Click to expand...

Are you talking about satori?

To the OP: Maybe ;)
 
fridgebuzz said:
What I was saying is that life is all about deciding whether to take the red pill or the blue pill. We can be the deciders of our destiny if we stand up and face our selves. Apathy and fear are the enemies. So I think the excuse that people are just born that way is absurd.
Click to expand...

Apathy and fear are not enemies. They are there to clue us in on situations that can be harmful, like taking either one of the pills. We simply take it too far on being worried and fearful about situations. We need to be in-touch with these emotions we have so that they can benefit us in the greatest way possible.

I do, however, agree that being born as a specific way, no questions asked, is absurd.

I'm opting to take neither pill.
 
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