I was listening to an episode of Elizabeth Gilbert’s podcast, Magic Lessons, the other day, and was truly struck by something she said. Let’s be honest, though….it’s freakin’ Elizabeth Gilbert, and I’m always blown away by her absolute brilliance and eloquence! But, I digress…
Although the podcast had nothing to do with the topic of being gay (she was actually talking about finding the time to create in spite of having a lot of family obligations), the gist of it is a universal theme about how children look to their parents for validation. This is what she said:
“You know how when you’re on a bumpy plane ride and you get really nervous and you always look at the stewardesses face to see how she’s doin’? And if she’s cool, then you’re sort of like, oh, I guess we’re not really about to crash. Cuz if we were about to crash, she probably wouldn’t be sort of laughing with another passenger. So, I feel like, kids look at their parents faces to see if the plane’s going down.”
Exactly, Elizabeth! EXACTLY!
And coming out to our parents is no different. We look to them as if to ask, “am I ok?” Their reaction to our coming out is a make-or-break moment. It just is. The dream that we all want is to have that moment of unconditional love and support shining back at us. If we’re lucky, we get that.
And if we’re even luckier, we get the experiences that “everyone else” has: introducing our boyfriend or girlfriend to our families, getting engaged and married, buying a home, having kids….all of the things that everyone else has and we probably never thought we could (but we can). And along each milestone, we want nothing more than to know that our parents accept us and consider our relationship as valid as any other committed relationship. We listen to their words…we read their body language…we look into their eyes as if to ask, “Am I ok?”
Whether we’re four or forty, we ask. Even if we aren’t conscious of it, on some level, we are always asking.
Now, don’t get me wrong, we don’t need anyone to validate ourselves and our lives, but we do hope for it. It’s only natural. We may or may not get it but, deep down, we want it. Anyone would.
