Stop helping

If I have learned anything during the last few years it is- stop helping. I believe it is good to offer concern and even sympathy, but the only way another person grows is to find solutions to their own problems. My biggest challenge during my entire life has been helping too much at the cost of my own well being. I now have learned that the other person usually does not appreciate the help and will probably assume that I was trying to live their life for them. 

I grew up with parents who didn't offer much support, especially after I graduated from high school. Perhaps they were right. They did their job and it was up to me to take over making my own decisions, right or wrong. I do think they went a bit far though when neither of them attended my first wedding. It is true that the marriage to a womanizing jackass only lasted thirteen years, but too offer no support was uncalled for. Now that I think about it my father didn't even attend my high school graduation.

It is true that every action has a reaction. We are free to make our own choices but we are not free to escape the consequences of those choices.

My three children and four grandchildren are all adults and I am done. I did my job. Whatever they do with their lives is up to them. I owe them nothing more.