READ MY NOTES: No filter

"When you put a paper and pen before a child and ask them to draw a house, all of them, all of them, will draw the little square with the triangle roof, the door in the middle, and the two windows on the sides. A chimney. Maybe a sun and a flower. But the house is always the same," a psychologist once explained to me at a party. "Now, this child needs to inhabit this house. It's where the child belongs. There are no other options. So, imagine this child walking to the house to get home and the front door is closed. Locked. The child can't get in. Well, then the child will try the right window. If it's locked too, the child will try the left window. If that is also locked, the child will try any other option. Even the chimney. Once the child has learned that the chimney is the way into the house, this will always be their entrance. It doesn't matter that it takes a lot longer, that it's dangerous and inconvenient. It doesn't even matter if the front door and the windows are later flung open - the child will always choose the chimney." 

I am a big believer in placebos. It may be a sugar pill, but while dissolving on your tongue, it releases hope, one of the most effective balms in the existence. In some way, I believe hope should be listed as a main biological imperative. Without it, all the other biological imperatives - territorialism, competition, reproduction - don't matter. Hope that you will be loved, that you will be heard, that you matter, the your pain has purpose, and that your life has meaning. But sometimes, the fact that tomorrow is another day is all the hope you need. 

People seem to understand that being beautiful is neither an accomplishment nor a fault. It is a gift. Generally, if you are given a fig or something of a great value, your responsibility is to make use of it. When a person is born with an athletic or artistic ability and becomes a celebrated athlete or artist, we don't shame them for using their gift. If a child is intelligent, we encourage them to get an eduction, to study hard, to develop their gift of intelligence as much as possible, and then use that gift our in the world. Developing their gifts is seen as their responsibility. Wasted talent is a waste of potential. But when your gift is beauty, developing it is considered vain and narcissistic. 

There is nothing wrong with wanting to be a full-time mother. It truly is one of the hardest, most fulfilling jobs. When my children were little, my modeling or acting jobs became my vacations. But it also dawned on me that being married and being a mom is a full-time job in which the rewards are only emotional. How many men would be willing to take a full-time job in which their only form of payment was sticky kisses and the acknowledgment one day in the far future that they did half the parenting? 

Knížka je k dispozici třeba zde. Jinak v češtině ji má v plánu vydat brněnská JOTA na jaře tohoto roku.