Nature And Nurture

I was watching a baby the other day. His thighs were the fattest I'd ever seen, truly one of the stars of what I call "Deprived Child Syndrome" or "Michelin Man Syndrome" that healthy breastfed babies get. He was happy, bubbling bubbles, totally fascinated by his toes.

And I thought how cool it is that we come into life expecting to be taken care of, expecting to be loved and for the world to revolve around us.

Every mother I've ever talked to confirms that each child is born with an established personality. I have yet to hear a parent say "oh my....this baby is exactly like my first one." Usually it's the complete opposite- we think we have it down but the new one comes to confound us, reminding us,once again, that we have absolutely nothing to hold onto in terms of ego in parenting.

And every time I remember new second time parents marveling, I wonder how it is that we can think we are simply some Skinnerean experiment. How is it that we think that we are solely a result of our conditioning and environment? No way.

With the gabillions of chemical responses, hormonal influences, thousands of neurons firing, personalities that are clear before labor, individual responses of newborns to the exact same environment...how could we possibly think that we are born blank slates with nothing inherent about who we are?

I'm not saying who or what it is that we are when born or what we bring in. I'm not vying for some specific story of the model of the universe or creation. You won't hear me saying that some god on high has given us a task here to complete, our fates set in place the moment we are conceived. I don't care how anyone else explains all this to themselves. I simply notice what mothers have known for centuries.

I'm not arguing that nurture plays no role in our development. I am suggesting that we come in with our own unique makeup to respond to what's in our environment. One person might shrivel and die in an abuse situation. The other in the same family, may end up using that experience as a tool to create amazing, positive things in their lives. How each responds has nothing to do with the outer world. It's their inner world that creates a particular outcome.

I love the mystery of this. It makes for total lack of control and, for me, wondrous opportunity for creation because of the wild cards of our own unique nature's response to our nurture.

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