

Facing Empty Nest


2) Assure yourself and your child that you still are family and that you are there as back-up as they move forward in life. In other words, they are on their own but not alone. The same is true for the parents. They are alone but not alone.
3) As parents, your job is to let them go and let the child know that their job is to stay in touch.

In all of this please take solace in the fulfillment of your role as a parent. Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet put it so very eloquently:

On Children
by Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,

You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,
which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite,
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies,
so He loves also the bow that is stable.
