David Brooks

but it's also moral security, a sense that you have a sense of what's right and wrong.

It's a sense of spiritual security, financial security.

You need that secure base.

And so I think what I did reasonably well and what their mom did reasonably well was to provide that secure base.

Trivial example, my kids happened to gravitate, despite my gene pool, they were all good athletes, and they gravitated toward positions that were maximally humiliating.

So my two boys were pitchers,

And when you're a pitcher and the other team is scoring runs, you're just alone out there on the mound.

And then my daughter was ice hockey and she played defense.

So you're standing there and they just scored a goal, gone around you and scored a goal.

And so my role was the world may be criticizing my kid for this or that, but that will not be me.

I'm just there to support.

I'm just there to support.

And one of the nice things that I did, we didn't really push them, pressure them into this meritocratic madness.

We let them have their own lives.

And so, you know, and I see this in my students, I'd say 20 percent of them.

When they do something the mom and dad think is right and will lead to a prestigious career, the beam of love gets strong.

And when they do something, of course, that mom and dad think will not lead to success, the beam of love is withdrawn.

And so that's called conditional love.

The most important relationships of their life are conditional.

And those students are fearful and risk-averse because they don't have that secure base.