they fuck you up

This Be The Verse

BY PHILIP LARKIN

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.   

    They may not mean to, but they do.   

They fill you with the faults they had

    And add some extra, just for you.

But they were fucked up in their turn

    By fools in old-style hats and coats,   

Who half the time were soppy-stern

    And half at one another’s throats.

Man hands on misery to man.

    It deepens like a coastal shelf.

Get out as early as you can,

    And don’t have any kids yourself.

so i woke up and this poem was ringing in my head.i suppose we are a construct of narratives of our childhood and this perpetuates in who we are, our neurosis, fears,how we handle our setbacks.

of course it'd be easy to lay blame for everything on our folks but truth be told we will never completely remove the damaged parts.

take my poor parenting as an e.g. i'm sure much of what the kids are and are phobic about had something to do with the mistakes i made with them. their fear of poverty for one must have something to do with the days we struggled to get by when they moved in with me. they witnessed the austerity of our lives and now they are careful with money to the point of frugality.it isn't so bad but i do feel sad thinking how they control too much of their own freedom.

as for me, i know my propensity for isolation has a large part to do with the negativity of my childhood, how i was always made to feel bad about who i was, or not being good enough for something, which made me withdraw and later overcompensate in my later years as being callous and impulsive. this has shaped me into being a sort of recluse with trust issues and clear boundaries of how much i want to give to others. i sought approval from elsewhere when i got none at home which led to really bad decisions in relationships, spending, externalising everything which i felt inadequate about inside.i think i projected too much of this on my public life and this has really conflicted quite significantly to my true self.

anyway, retrospection aside, it is good that i've become self aware and it helps in my final journey to some sort of liberation from all these constructs. i now become a needlessly numb individual free from what the rest of society expects or controls. i want to spend my remaining years simply being true to who i am, holding on to nothing but my light, centered and focused.