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What is Ethics? How does it relate to parenting? See our About Us page (click on the link above) - yes, it is true, that no matter how well-read we are , there is no map, no compass - in the end there remains as beacon, no more, but certainly no less, than our own instinct and perhaps, in the case of parenting, the instinct/experience/advice of others who care. And many have cared enough, over the Ages, to bring us some of their thoughts and feelings on this subject. That which is beautiful is moral. That is all, nothing more. — Gustave Flaubert, French novelist (1821-1880) Ethics is the activity of man directed to secure the inner perfection of his own personality. ~ Albert Schweitzer Ethics is not definable, is not implementable, because it is not conscious; it involves not only our thinking, but also our feeling. ~ Valdemar W. Setzer "A man who wants to lead the orchestra must turn his back on the crowd." (Max Lucado). Ethics is a subject whose texture, form and identity are intensely personal. It is a fabric that covers all and yet remains largely hidden in the irrelevancies of our everyday activities. Its loom is one at which we sit, first as children/teenagers/adults ourselves, then as parents, spinning a thread composed simultaneously of Faith, Instinct and Experience and the finished garment is ever altered, seams taken out, or taken in, hems lowered and sleeves shortened to fit the always changing figure it clothes. If we seek to describe it, we hesitate, stumble for words, look upward and inward and use such terms as Honour, Courage, Truth, Right, Faith, Discipline, Chivalry, Morality - sensing always that we fall somehow still short of the mark. Whatever we try to thus describe, seems too far above us, too far within us, to reach and yet, so intimate that we assume this personal interpretation of Ethics almost as the closest thing to our Real Self that we know - as close as a lover, as close as a child, as much part of us as the child we once were, or that which we were before we were that child. It is a secret to us, as our own child must always remain a secret - that which we know at once best and least - that which is at once forever given - and lost, to us .
Some alternate Viewpoints: - Bertrand Russell - "Love is something far more than desire for sexual intercourse; it is the principal means of escape from the loneliness which afflicts most men and women throughout the greater part of their lives."
La Rochefoucauld - 'If we judge of love by its usual effects, it resembles hatred more than friendship'.
Bruyere - 'At the beginning and at the end of love the two lovers are embarrassed to find themselves alone'
de Unamuno - 'Love is the child of illusion and the parent of disillusion'. Bartels & Zeki, Neuroscience - Love really is blind or, actual research in PDF - The neural correlates of maternal and romantic love
Conclusion: "This suggests that strong emotional ties to another person inhibit not only negative emotions but also affect the network involved in making social judgments about that person. Overall, the results lead us to conclude that attachment processes employ a push–pull mechanism that activates a specific pathway of the reward system of the brain. At the same time, circuits that are responsible for critical social assessment and for negative emotions are deactivated." Classic Love Poems and Submitted Love Poems |
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