When children are young, parents push them to walk faster.
When parents grow old, children push them to walk faster.
Sometimes, running isn’t the answer.
As I got off the train at Tanusanlage station in Frankfurt on my way to the office last week, I noticed a well-dressed woman urging her four-year-old daughter to walk faster.
It was clear she needed to drop her child off at Kindergarten before heading to work.
But then the little girl said, “Mom, why do I need to pace up every time you go to the office. Why can’t we walk at my pace?”
A week later, a friend shared the opposite frustration: he was frustrated on a trip in Europe with his parents.
“We couldn’t see half the places I planned.
They can’t walk that fast anymore.”
And I thought what an irony.
When children are young, parents push them to walk faster.
When parents grow old, children push them to walk faster.
If life is only about keeping up the pace,
We’ll always be running and not walking together.
Maybe the secret to building lasting relationships
at work and at home
is knowing when to slow down for others,
and trusting that when our time comes,
Someone will slow down for us,