From Jeff Sabo...

...unschooling dad extraordinaire...this is from the middle of his (long but well worth reading) post entitled: "Great" Expectations. The post is directed towards dads, but I think it applies to everyone...

But here's the creepy thing; I think we actually have more control when we unschool than if we don't. We like to think we can control things like what a child learns, what job they have, how happy they are, how healthy they are. We infuse our children constantly with what our expectations of them are. And then we send them to off to school, where we have no control over what they learn; we send them off to college, where we have no control over the direction their lives will take; we control what they eat in our house, where they only spend 20% of their waking hours; and we control what activities they participate in in pursuit of happiness. What we do not do is give them the trust and tools they need to make their own choices and set their own course, thereby putting them in the exact same position as we were once in - unsure, fearful, with the parent's definition of happiness and success. And then, when they become parents, they'll have to start at the top of this page and read the whole damned blog just to catch up. We create the illusion of control for ourselves and our children, and then we use it to build a house of cards that we pray won't fall down until the kids are too distracted to notice.

I love it...the whole control thing really hits home. And how we really can't MAKE our kids be/do/say anything. They are their own people, even if they aren't "allowed" to be them until they're "grown up" and making their own choices.

Thanks, Jeff, for the inspiration.