Lately, I like to make an analogy about the relations between the Jewish world and the state of Israel by comparing this connection with the connection between parents and their kid.
Any one of us who have kids, especially when your kids are already after their teenage, know how complicated and uneasy this relationship can be and how challenging it is for us as adults, as parents and as educators and role models for our children. This tight but so fragile connection is our responsibility and we have to be very clever and wise in order to keep it a healthy and supportive connection. We want to guide our kid and help him make no mistakes, but on the other hand we want to let him make his own life and grow to be an independent person. We want to be a part of his life but again we do not want to be a burden. We want to continue having good parents-child good relations and we have to find the best way to do it. Our kid is the center of our life. We brought him to the world to be a good person that contributes to the world and can live a healthy, meaningful, happy life. We have to see that this will happen and we have to find our way to be there for him. To help him when he needs it and if it is necessary to tell him that he is wrong, but always in a way that will sustain a good relationship.
And the responsibility of our kid ? Of course he also got responsibility for good relationship with his parents, but we have to remember – as parents – that he doesn''t know really much about us as we really know just a little bit about his life, his challenges and his thoughts. He is our kid but we are different.
And another very important issue: I will never stop believing in my kids and I will also never give up of trying to put them on the right track in life. After all, I am their parent !
Chami Zemach
The Israeli Family Project