Admittedly, there are a few situations every now and then in which it is difficult to accept your grandparents one hundred percent. When grandma complains about the Internet again or complains about the fact that young people only ever look at their cell phones. Or when Grandpa raves about how much better the world used to be and how, as a boy, he could have snowball fights for weeks in the winter because there were still real winters. In moments like this, it’s tempting to just let the two of them talk and let their words pass you by. But even these moments shouldn’t blind us to the fact that our grandparents are people who have a lot ahead of us and can teach us!
What Grandma and Grandpa are ahead of us
On the one hand, there is the obvious: life experience. Grandma and Grandpa have more behind them than we do, so they are smarter, wiser and more mature. Your advice and sayings may not always sound like brilliant wisdom to us straight away, but sooner or later the day often comes when the light dawns on us and we realize: Grandpa was right!
Secondly, our grandparents grew up in completely different circumstances than we did. They were forced to save, think sustainably, and improvise with what they had. They had to help themselves and couldn’t constantly buy new things, have them repaired – or google them. The very fact that older people have lived their entire lives without the Internet should make us realize the knowledge and ingenuity they must possess.
And thirdly, Grandpa is right in some areas: some things used to be better. For example, there were more insects and less meat was eaten. Our earth was healthier. And that also has to do with a change in attitude that we have gone through. Some people today may see it as progress that they can eat an egg and bacon for breakfast, a schnitzel for lunch and salami for dinner – but in reality this is decadence and decay. The abundance in which we live is not an achievement or merit, but a waste of time, means, creativity and resources. Our grandparents knew that quality is more important than quantity. It’s better to save up for something that will last a lifetime than to keep buying cheap new ones. We should take this as an example – then perhaps we will one day be role models for our grandchildren.
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