One of the top secrets of being a parent—one that few parents ever admit to their kids, though the kids learn it themselves before long—is how insecure parents commonly feel toward their kids  Even when the children are young,  parents know  they will grow up to judge them, just as they themselves have judged their own parents.  This is humiliating to contemplate because you know your kids will know some sides of you best of all.  Their verdict will be the truest.

But awareness of this painful truth can lead us to a further awareness that there are many ways in which other people see us more clearly, more truthfully, than we see ourselves.  Can facing this truth open a place in our self that is less full of ego, that might be a step or two further on the trail of spiritual evolution?