Growing up, many of us had the basics: roti, kapda aur makaan. Sometimes, that came with conditions. There were promises we held on to like prizes at the finish line - a new media player if we topped the class, branded sneakers or a festive outfit if we "earned" it. We learned to wait. To work toward something. To defer gratification. Patience was a life skill, not a luxury. It stretched us, sometimes uncomfortably, but it shaped us. Today, that word feels almost alien to many young children. Patience has been replaced by immediacy. Waiting replaced by wanting. Earning replaced by expecting.

Cut to now: we listen differently. We respond differently. We show up differently. We sit for hours listening to our children's emotional outbursts - decoding feelings, soothing anxieties, untangling invisible fears. We pause life to help them make sense of their world in a way no one ever did for us. And we find ourselves wondering: would our parents have done this, or simply asked us to "go play in the park" and figure it out?

Something has shifted. Dramatically.

Our parents built our strength through exposure: "The world is tough, become tougher." We try to build resilience through conversation: "The world is tough, talk to me about it." Neither is fully right nor........

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