Recently I came across an article from the Naples Daily News entitled "Your kids should not be the most important in the family" and I found the content to be very interesting. In this article, the writer John Rosemond asks a married couple with three children who the most important member of their family is. Not surprisingly, their answer was "our children." Rosemond then asked them why they gave this answer, and the parents could not give a definitive answer. At first, I found this alarming. Everyone who has loving parents or guardians would naturally assume that they hold a great place of importance in and to their families, but why?

Most children of my generation, the millennials, remain the apple of their parent's eye well into adulthood, but is this a healthy way of thinking? I do not believe so. Being raised believing that you hold more value than anyone in your family can lead to several setbacks in adulthood. For starters, thinking this way can lead a person to expect all their friends and loved ones to put off their needs and wants in order to fulfill yours. It can also lead to an extremely short-sighted and selfish attitude as a result of being raised to believe that the world is here for you.

This can become problematic very quickly because a person who believes they hold a great deal of importance will have their confidence thwarted very quickly upon entering the work force or a place like a University, beyond the reach of mom and dad. They expect things to be done on their time and for their benefit, even though that is not how the world works, and when it does not happen that way some people seem to fall apart.

Do not misunderstand, I would not be writing this if I did not believe I have been guilty of it. I believe it would be very healthy for all millennials to take a step back for a moment and evaluate our attitudes. Let me get down to the facts: when you are born into this world you have nothing to do with it and would die if left alone, young children cannot have careers and are incapable of providing for a family because of ignorance, and lastly, there are billions of people on this planet and only one you.

The first fact is self-explanatory, but allow me to further convey my point. We are born into this world helpless and naked and would quickly die without the care of an older human. This is an undeniable fact which means that from birth your parents or caretaker holds much more importance than yourself because your very life is in their hands. Even when our motor skills develop and we are able to hold coherent conversations, we are still ignorant of the world and how it works.

As a result, we rely on the wisdom of our teachers and caretakers to teach us the information needed to survive, making the teachers of our lives much more important than ourselves. Perhaps the most humbling of these facts is that as an individual, you are outnumbered on this planet by several billion.

We like to put ourselves and our achievements on a pedestal and believe that we have made great accomplishments, but in reality how many people die every day that we never hear of or care about? if this makes you feel small it should because after reading this article I realized that the world is a big place and it does not bend to my wants and needs. In reality, quite the opposite is true meaning that in order for life to thrive on this planet individuals have to bend to the needs and wants of the entire population.

I feel like this concept has been lost on our generation, which is why we are often viewed as a generation of whiners and participation trophy recipients. These allegations often make me angry, but I cannot truthfully deny them.

Let us evaluate ourselves and make a change as a generation, putting aside our pride to appreciate the unsung heroes in our lives. Our parents, pastors, teachers, role models, professors, employers, and just our fellow humans. Every life has value and no one life is objectively more important than another, but it can be. We should strive to be the generation who learns to look past ourselves, to lay down pride in the pursuit of excellence, to perform every task in an exemplary manner, and to dedicate our lives to the betterment of the world, not to mediocrity. If we were to live our lives in this manner then our misconception would become accurate, and we could become the most important care provider, teacher, healer, protector, or role model in the lives of many people.