Conditions for Rearing a Human Being

Education means giving one the means to build oneself.

If you want to build children by yourself, you are not building, you are forcing and coercing.

We must not tell them, “Do it this way and not another way.” Orders are for taming animals, not for rearing human beings.

With a human being, you must explain, set up the conditions—an environment that consists of books, friends, and educators who will bring a child to the point of free choice in life.

This should begin at a very early age, before children are aware of what is happening to them. Even then, we must build around them situations from which they will learn, and through which they will educate themselves.

Only if a child is repeatedly impressed by the environment and receives from it the importance of the next step in one’s growth will he or she be motivated to advance toward it and grow.