Our Parents

As I sat there in my bed, the night before this speech was due, my mind started spinning. What topic interested me? What topic would captivate my audience? After not being able to think of a good topic, I began to think about my previous speeches. I remembered asking my parents what their opinion was on millennials when I was in the midst of writing that speech and with their answer it led me to realize how different our mindsets are. And with that thought in mind I had a topic to write about.

Everyone’s parents are different. Some parents are strict in one aspect and very relaxed in another while another set of parents can be strict with the things the other parents are relaxed in. Some parents believe that their children shouldn't have a smartphone and if they do it should be filtered while other parents think that if the child is old enough to have a phone than they are old enough to be trusted and don't need a filter on it. There is one thing that we can all agree our parents have in common, there are times when they just don’t understand us.

Our parents come from an older generation where the things that are acceptable for us now isn’t something that even a troublemaker in their day would think of doing. When we go to our parents expecting them to understand us and they don’t, it can get very frustrating and at times can lead us to say things to them we don't mean as well as definitely not something we should have said. In their day if they yelled at a parent it wasn’t something they got away with so easily.

Our parents grew up in a generation that didn't have all the technology we have access to. They grew up in a time when they needed to open up a dictionary instead of just searching the word definition on Google. Many of their elders were survivors of the Holocaust and therefore they felt bad asking for more than what they needed. There was a more mature mindset in the earlier years. People didn't have the sense of entitlement which many of us teens have nowadays.

The sense of entitlement can come from many things. As I mentioned in my last speech about millennials, many of us feel that we deserve whatever we would like. If we think for any reason that whatever it is that we are asking for can help us in any way whether it is big or small, we feel like we are deserving of it. What many people don't understand is that, we really don't deserve whatever we want. Good job for babysitting your siblings, it doesn't mean your parents should buy you a new MacBook. You washed dishes for your family? Very nice of you but again your parents don't have to reward you. You are a member of the household, and therefore you should be helping out when asked. Another reason that there is such a sense of entitlement is because many people see their friends have things they don’t have and they feel less superior to their peers which is obviously a feeling they don’t like and try to get rid of it by demanding things of their parents. On the most part, people from older generations did not have this mindset and find it “a disgusting thing in teens nowadays."

Our parents want what is best for us and at this stage in our life, they know a lot more than we do and everything they say or do that involves us is just them looking out for us. Many people develop a feeling of resentment toward their parents during these years because our mindsets are so different and our opinions on things are very different.

Now, when we are growing into adults and trying to find ourselves we need our parents more than ever to help us become the people we are trying to become. Yes our parents are from an older generation but therefore they are wiser and their advice is something worth listening to.What I believe parents need to realize is that, we know that they are smarter and know better but sometimes all we need is a comforting shoulder to lean on and not always advice.