aspirations for children Quotes

In praising or loving a child, we love and praise not that which is, but that which we hope for.

I think the worst atmosphere for a six-year-old is one in which there are no expectations whatsoever. That is, it's worse for the child to grow up in a vacuum where "whatever you do is alright, I'm sure you'll succeed." That is a statement of disinterest. It says, "I really have no fantasies for you at all."

For a mother the project of raising a boy is the most fulfilling project she can hope for. She can watch him, as a child, play the games she was not allowed to play; she can invest in him her ideas, aspirations, ambitions, and values - or whatever she has left of them; she can watch her son, who came from her flesh and whose life was sustained by her work and devotion, embody her in the world. So while the project of raising a boy is fraught with ambivalence and leads inevitably to bitterness, it is the only project that allows a woman to be - to be through her son, to live through her son.

I think me getting into performance stems from my mother's inability to do those things. I guess you have these things you want your kids to do that you couldn't do, and you have to start early to do them.

When you look into your baby’s eyes,” Lacy said softly, “you see everything you hope they can be…not everything you wish they won’t become.

I think back to the day I drove Michelle and a newborn Malia home from the hospital nearly 11 years ago - crawling along, miles under the speed limit, feeling the weight of my daughter's future resting in my hands. I think about the pledge I made to her that day: that I would give her what I never had - that if I could be anything in life, I would be a good father. I knew that day that my own life wouldn't count for much unless she had every opportunity in hers.

As I contemplate the kind of future I want for children-my own and other people's-I believe we must look inward to God for guidance and strength and backward to draw on the values and legacies of our families, ancestors, and communities.

China was the most optimistic place I'd ever been. Everybody I met was pretty much convinced that their children would have it better than their parents had had it. It was like being in America in the 1950's, with this deep optimism about the future because everything was getting better, and that fascinated me.

The central struggle of parenthood is to let our hopes for our children outweigh our fears.

Be what you wish your children to be. Parents have perpetuated by precept and example their own stamp of character to their posterity.

I don't want my kids to be like me, I don't want my daughter to date a guy like me. You know, for a guy like me success is to take care of my children to take care of their life and make 'em cushioned. I don't want them to be around people like me. You know, success for me would be that they never have the opportunity of being in the presence of someone like me.

Once people get a taste for whatever you want to call it - economic independence, a better lifestyle, and a better life for their children - they grab on to that and don't want to give it up.

We really don't rest if we think our kids are drifting, or if we think they don't have the right work ethic. It drives us crazy. Because we ultimately want them to succeed and, until they do, we feel in some way that something is not complete.

I wonder if other mothers feel a tug at their insides, watching their children grow up into the people they themselves wanted so badly to be.

My goal as a parent is to prepare you for the future, not to make you like me.

Everyone has these two visions when they hold their child for the first time. The first is your child as an adult saying "I want to thank the Nobel Committee for this award." The other is "You want fries with that?".

If I had a child and she was a girl, I'd hope she'd do something different from me.

The master never seemed to have his fill of gazing at his firstborn child. "What do you want him to be when he grows up?" someone asked. "Outrageously happy," said the master.

This is why I had children: to offer them a perfect dream of childhood that can fill their souls as they grow older.

I don't know if it's better to be close with your daughter or make sure that she has a better life than you do.

My main hope for my children would be that whatever profession or calling they choose in life, that they pursue it with passion.

The skies were blue when I was coming up. I want my kids to have the same opportunity, if not better, than I had.