Friday, February 6, 2009

Malcolm Gladwell's book, Outliers: The Story of Success, is a great book for anybody who loves books about why we are the way we are. Being in the right place, being born at the right time, having opportunities (and taking advantage of opportunities that are available to us), being comfortable around authority, asking for what we want, and cultural legacies all contribute to the different successes we have.

I loved the book. A couple weeks ago, I was at a dinner with four other women and we talked about the difference between growing up in an authoritarian household where we were "trained" to respect and defer to our elders, versus the environment we're raising our children in, where they participate in decisions and negotiations before they enter preschool.

Our children will go farther in life because they're taught to trust their decisions or to learn from consequences of bad decisions. When I was growing up, I wasn't allowed to make wrong decisions (or decisions period) and I didn't learn to take risks or to risk falling down by speaking up for myself. To be direct with someone was to be disrespectful. Now that I'm officially middle-aged, I feel the effects.