This morning I got out of cases in the bank and decided to continue reading the documents and other necessary Talmuds in the Big Park nearby. A few weeks later, I will move to another new country and a new city, but for now, I breathe with fresh Geneva air and listening to the singing of birds in La Grange.
There is a few: several people spread out in a huge park on the grass. On the tracks between the trees and the lungs walks the pair of old men and the old woman, which is lucky, apparently, behind her a man ... Maybe a son, or maybe just "Nannies". Nanny ... The most commonly found public is Thai and Phillipin women from the European species of children. Such tandem minutes for 10 walks from the entrance to the park to the shop, which landed, I met four. Children in wheelchairs or older, in fact, provided themselves. Nannies, looking carefully, so that the child does not hurt or did not start eating grass, they are enthusiastically told on the phone, probably with its loved ones. In the contrast of this minutes after 20 in the park, a British or American with two children appeared - one in the stroller, the other ran around her. With a child older, she exchanged some kind of phrases, supporting his game. The younger was lucky, shaking in front of him.
Photo: Nadezhda Eremenko
Perhaps this my post is the thirty-year-old hormones and years of internal and external criticism. But it seemed to me such an obvious difference between the light in the eyes of children who walked with mandatory and neat babysitters, and here this boy run around his mother. His eyes sparkled from the pleasure of seeing new on a walk, from interaction with loved ones. He, of course, does not think about it or thinks, but not exactly with these words. And it is unlikely that in adulthood will be analyzed if it helped him of these walks and mother's attention to learn to actively love life and be interested in her, whether they have added the development of the talent to live playing and enthusiastically. Nevertheless, it seems to me that these seemingly "not such important little things" in the end form a child or a warm and open, or a closed thing in themselves, which is angry at the world, because no matter how hard it tries to feel it, nothing can feel.
In Switzerland, according to the legislation, maternity leave, including prenatal, is 4 months. This means that about 2 months the child passes to babysitters and on artificial feeding. Sometimes the child will be brought to his mother to feed, and mom returns to the working station. And the child is to the Phillipin, Ukrainian or any other nurse.
It happened that between my Swiss and new work in another country I was betrayed for some time beyond the corporate environment. Without working, without having sales targets and ten parallel projects. And this after 10 years of corporate race. First time I could not understand - what to do? "... it is necessary to do something! Otherwise, what am I? Who am I? In general, why am I then, if I do not do anything, but only dinner cooks a man's beloved! He will get tired soon! No, I remember that in smart books I wrote - it is necessary to develop and be different ... Now running running ... zzzzzzzzzzz-zzzzz ... ", - and such noise in my head began to drive me crazy. I understood why women are so hurrying to return to work from the decree, without even having a justification in the arsenal of strict Swiss legislation: many of us it seems that, having activities, we suddenly acquire value, and then we "someone." And if at home we sit and grow children (or God even do not even grow children, but just live!), Then we are boring clubs.
Photo: Nadezhda Eremenko
And nonsense that work is not joy, and we skip the smiles of our children. The first words and steps they do in society indifferent nanny, not receiving admiring views and quietly convinced with infancy: no matter what they do is not of interest. I think our trouble (trouble building "imaging strengths and cool corporate leaders") is that we do not speak art just to be. Doing nothing, sitting on a bench in the park or on the sofa at home. Nothing initiating anything, but simply being close to Lie loved ones, with children. Without creating any visible Added Value. Thanks to this experience, I understood why many top managers, which I know, sincerely love and happy with your "nothing" wives. They have a gift - just be. And in this being - incredible power. Regenerating, accepting, not criticizing. In this power there is a skill to take on the human level. It has space and place for birth and growing children. Yes, yes - precisely essential. In the presence, acceptance, support and warmth. Does not mean, of course, that I urge everything to quit everything and "just be in Zen", but to be able to stop and remove the masks and attribution to your activity - invaluable. Only in this state there is a place to take others, and, I think, only in this state there is a place for the birth and raising children. And yes, I would like to be with my children after their birth at least a couple of years. Even if then it will be more difficult for me to go to a professional marathon.