Clara Rodriguez Irastorza

Educator. Mother 

“Everybody talks about how to leave a better planet for our children, but we should think better about how to leave better children to our planet” 

Clint Eastwood

So much has been given to us freely, we have received so much (life, nature, family…) just for being born, that sometimes we forget how valuable the gift is. It seems that what doesn’t cost is not valued. I was reading the other day to a friend that perhaps it is just a gift to us because it is priceless.

To realize the value of everything we have received moves us to share it. Who doesn’t celebrate good news, an important event with others? And by sharing it, we can become aware that, in the end, it is not ours. Rather, it is ours and everyone. From all of us who, in some way, is one.

I am one with my husband because what is good for him is good for me. Literally, apart from any romanticism, there is no doubt that his happiness is good for me. I am one with my children because I suffer when they suffer and I am happier when they are. This may be obvious, but it is a truism we all see.

What we may not see as easily is that with the rest, we are also one. Also with the other inhabitants of the world. Humans and non-humans.

Sometimes it seems that being in solidarity is something altruistic because we understand that we give while we lose. I give my time, my money, my resources, so that others, who are/have less can be/have more. To be more like me…

However, anyone who has ever been supportive knows that what he gives is multiplied. He feels that acting for the good of others is always acting for the good of oneself. That the other is happier with what I do, makes me happier. And he has experienced that indisputably, we are one. We are all brothers. We are all part of the same thing.

And conversely, anyone who has become aware that he is one with everything has no choice but to improve what surrounds him, to care for others, to contribute what he can to make everything better. Even in a selfish way, because he knows that when “everything” gets better, I get better.

Losing the perspective that we are part of something that is much bigger than ourselves, makes it almost impossible to live and transmit values such as solidarity. Who is going to change things if he thinks that his actions do not impact the world? Who is going to share, to give what only he has come to contribute? Who is going to take care of the world without understanding that the world goes beyond its own limits? 

Like any mother, I try to educate my children to become good, happy, and free men and women. 

And I can’t think of any other way to do that than by making them feel like citizens of the world. Unique individuals who are part of the universe. Responsible for contributing the only thing they possess to make the world more diverse, more complete, juster, more balanced…better. Solidarity. And, as a consequence, free. Not subject to any obligation but responsible to act. And therefore good, because they will wish and do good.

My brother used to say that the best gift our parents have given us is to become citizens of the world. Able to be happy here, in Cuenca or in Sebastopol. 

May we, parents and educators of today, achieve the same with our children and young people and be able not only to leave better children for our world but children who love, care for, improve and give themselves so that, as citizens of the world, they love, care for, improve and share it.

Clara Rodriguez Irastorza

Educator. Mother of the family 

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)