What role do children play in the roles of adults?
As I consider our friends who have children, they seem to stay more planted and tend to be more mature than those who do not have children.
Jordan and I have moved a lot. Had we children, I don’t think we would have moved half the number of times. If any.
Jordan and I look at many others similar to us (many years out of school and working, no children) and our friends with children seem to be more grounded in reality than whose who are not.
Children seem, therefore, to have a stabilizing effect on their parents.
Children are entirely dependent on parents. Thus parents must sacrifice (not a comfortable thing for anyone, but harder when you don’t have as good a reason as “my child needs it”) to be able to support those children.
Children also seem to catalyze an emotional maturing process in their parents. Parents who are selfish and critical become softened by their love for their children.
So what is incumbent on those of us without children? Find ways to develop the same positive attributes children bring to their parents.
Not having them is no excuse for not developing those attributes.