Evening star., 1940-05-02
Experience Is
Youths Best
Teacher
Friction Between
Generations Due
To Conditions
By ANGELO PATRI.

1here is always friction between
the older and younger generations
but at present there seems to be
more than usual Conditions of liv-
ing are unusual, work is scarce
money hard to get and of less value
than it used to be. Heads of fam
lilies are worried beyond anything
known in our experience as a Nation
There seems to be more of difficulty
than of ease ahead for the young
people and that alone would account
for the anxiety of their elders and
their irritation, so incomprehensible
to their children.
Youth lacks experience and age
has it. Experience tends to give the
elders certain sets of mind and in
their anxiety for the safety of the
youth they try to impress those sets
on their minds and actions. They
push hard to help them and because
the response is grudging or missing
begin scolding and threatening and
nagging.
Why don't you study? If you set
youi lAlAllo VA oolllCtllAllS Wol Gll
while instead of this nonsense about
going here and going there you'd
get somewhere. You ought to take
a course instead of bothering with
f1ddling jobs that have no future.
Go look for a job intelligently, why
don't you? Think somebody is COM
ing up to hand you one? When I
was your age I was supporting a
family. So on and so on, not mean
ing to be harsh and irritating but
meaning to be helpful.
One must be patient with young
people, more patient than ever be-
fore because their lot is more diff
cult. And one ought to be less cer-
tain of the suggestions and orders
given young people for their guild
ance. The experience of the past
may have benefited the ore who had
1t and it might, If put to use, benefit
another, but the bald fact remains
that youth must find its own way,
make its own way, always. The
experience that helps inform the
mind and discipline the character
must be personal. The young peo-
pie must experiment, fail and sue
ceed and experiment again and
again until some way is discovered
that leads to success and we must
know that success is individual and
is not handed down from father tc
son, from teacher to pupil.
What the young people need and
can take from his elders is encour-
agement for the efforts they make
Too often they meet with criticism
instead. Why did you go in for art?
Don't you know artists are starving?
Maybe he was so full of the idea OF
art that he could do nothing else
What business have you with chem
icals? You don't know anything
about chemicals? Where do you
expect to get? He doesn't expect tc
get to any particular place just now
He is feeling his way toward some
goal that Is hidden from him-and
from you-and he is following the
inner voice of his being, a much
wiser course than following the voice
of some loud-spoken well-wishine
outsider. Praise every effort. With
hold advice and direction until you
are asked for it.
Immediate earning Is a necessity
for most young people today and
they are often forced to take work
that they dislike. Encourage them
Teach them that no experience In
real work is ever lost. It adds its
weight of power to the mind and
the skill Of the worker, and in time
q worker reaches the place Of his
choosing If he has chosen his own
work.
We are not to be troubled by the
fact that young people often think
of work in terms of dreams. Com
fort them when they are shocked by
reality and keep before them, and
before ourselves, the truth that
reality will not harm any of us
especially young people, as long as
it is met with understanding and
the will to overcome.