Christopher vanDyck
To tutor, to inspire, and to challenge

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Wed 11 Mar 2009
Posted by Christopher vanDyck under at 11:17 am

I think love requires a common purpose. And I think that it would be a good definition of what love is - to say that it is seeing another human being's approach to a task. This may be hard for some of you to accept, given the schmalzy definition of love that we have come to hear regaled in popular music, for example. But I believe that if you muse about it a bit, you'll see that there is always is this common denominator wherever there is love.

There is one very profound kind of love - and that is the bond between people of different age groups. And given my model, I would say that the reason this is profound is that there is a natural purpose which is always there and doesn't need to be established from some external circumstance. That purpose is to help the younger person achieve her or his own aptitudes... and to move forward in life.

In this kind of love there are two sides of the coin. And I'm going to define these things according to the perspectives of each individual. Each person is admiring the other, so that's where their focus is. There is the role model, and there is the budding flower. The younger person has an intense admiration for his mentor because he can study a person who is really adept at approaching a certain task. That approach has many many nuances... and there's always parts of approach you don't see but you can deduce. There's a very engaging and enriching mental excercise.

The mentor is enriched in a different way - He sees the learning processes of this young person. And in that - he can anticipate what this person will do in his future - both for himself and for others. And also, he can study the social interactions between this young person and his peers, and that gives him insight into both society today, and society as it will be tomorrow, when those kids grow up and and come into their own in their thirties. Furthermore there's an opportunity here to be a catalyst to help social things come together, and not only to help one young person achieve personal growth.











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