Linkin Park, Numb

My children listen to Linkin Park. Through them I have become a fan of the band. The song below (and currently playing if you have volume on, unless you are reading this more than a few days after I posted, in which case it will be on my top playlist below, somewhere) really stuck with me the first time I heard it. It made me think of children, and how we have so many expectations for them, expectations that are supposed to fit into our mold of how they should be, instead of letting them become who THEY are meant to be. Our children were not put here to be little mini-me's.

I felt a lot of disappointment from my father growing up. I just never did things right or well enough for him. I was smart, but didn't apply myself and get good grades. I lived with my now husband and got pregnant before marriage. All these little things that I had made a choice to do were disappointments to him. I think sometimes we also get into relationships as adults and feel we disappoint those we love. We feel like we have to constantly live up to someone else's expectations or maybe they won't love us anymore. In the meantime we lose ourselves.

I hope I don't put these kinds of expectations on my children. That I expect them to grow up and be like me or do what I say is right. I hope they have been given the freedom to find who they are and believe what they want to believe. I hope they never feel I have been disappointed in them or that they have disappointed me. I have felt numb, I hope they never do.

Numb

I'm tired of being what you want me to be

Feeling so faithless lost under the surface

Don't know what you're expecting of me

Put under the pressure of walking in your shoes

(Caught in the undertow just caught in the undertow)

Every step I take is another mistake to you

(Caught in the undertow just caught in the undertow)

I've become so numb I can't feel you there

I've become so tired so much more aware

I've becoming this all I want to do

Is be more like me and be less like you

Can't you see that you're smothering me

Holding too tightly afraid to lose control

Cause everything that you thought I would be

Has fallen apart right in front of you

(Caught in the undertow just caught in the undertow)

Every step that I take is another mistake to you

(Caught in the undertow just caught in the undertow)

And every second I waste is more than I can take

I've become so numb I can't feel you there

I've become so tired so much more aware

I've becoming this all I want to do

Is be more like me and be less like you

And I know

I may end up failing too

But I know

You were just like me with someone disappointed in you

I've become so numb I can't feel you there

I've become so tired so much more aware

I've becoming this all I want to do

Is be more like me and be less like you

I've become so numb I can't feel you there

Is everything what you want me to be

I've become so numb I can't feel you there

Is everything what you want me to be