Cycles

So often we, as humans, fall into cycles and find it hard to break free.

Many of our parents began dating, got married, had children and began a cycle of being. They didn't love each other or maybe even their lives, but they continued the cycle. Each week, the same thing. Get the kids ready for school, go to work, come home, make dinner, clean, get the kids to bed, watch TV, go to bed. Over and over and over. If either one was unhappy, it didn't matter. Many other couples did this and stayed together, so they would too. Breaking out of the cycle to be happy wasn't accepted. Obviously now it's more socially acceptable, but you get my point.

Raising children brings up another cycle many of us follow without question. There is weird and there is normal. Normal is acceptable from the beginning while weird becomes unacceptable after a certain age or limit is passed. Who decides what is normal and what is not? Our parents. They are the ones who teach us to scoff and the little boy who goes everywhere dressed as Batman or groans when two men kiss on TV. All of the adults talk about how bullying needs to end, but who is it teaching these bullies to bully? The parents. Until a generation comes about that is totally open will we really begin to see any changes in the world. We're getting closer, but we're nowhere near there.

I had to bite my tongue at Thanksgiving this year when my family started talking about politics. The two older generations were discussing everything with such a closed mind. At one point when someone made a horrible comment about a gay man, I spoke up only to be shushed by my sister. SHUSHED. Apparently speaking up and standing up for what's right isn't acceptable because that's the way things are. Well, I spoke my mind and got quite a few opened mouth stares for saying what I thought, but they need to realize that the closed-minded people they're talking about are staring back at them in the mirror.

Cycles rule our lives. Sometimes no matter how hard we want to break free of them, we just can't. Either it's too hard  or it's something that would be frowned upon. No matter how comfortable we may feel continuing the cycle, we need to realize when it's time to break out of it. Younger generations are on the brink of many chances to do this, we just need to find the courage to stop the cycles our parents, grandparents, etc have begun and that's when the change will really begin.

Sorry if the voice in this sounds different from my own, but I just watched a movie set in England and I can't seem to stop talking like them. It's quite infuriating, honestly.