Stop! Before Someone gets hurt…
There it was echoing in the room, that classic parenting cliche of “Stop, before someone gets hurt”. As the words left my mouth, and I smiled wryly to myself at the irony that in some way, at some point, we all end up saying those things we never thought we’d say, I realised that there was a really good life lesson hidden in that phrase. Usually parents speak these words into a situation where children are escalating their scale of interaction, usually of the physical variety, and the parent’s experience can see it going down the route of probable pain unless boundaries are implemented. Which got me thinking about the fact that the closer we get to someone the more we expose ourselves to the potential of relational pain. When we become vulnerable and show more of ourselves to another we give something of ourselves away, communicating that we trust the other person with knowledge of something new, deep and more personal. As children play more with each they become more comfor