The question posed yesterday in relation to a piece of bog oak; what can I make out of you, has very wide implications. It’s a form of fundamental disrespect that is pandemic where we want to change others and conform them to our expectations. Parents often exert subtle pressure on their children to become something that they are not in order to look good themselves. Our education system, especially in the past, forced conformity rather than promoted self-expression. In close relationships, like marriage, couples are often engaged in trying to get the other to conform to their expectations rather than exercising the essence of love that is giving the freedom to be. For one person to expect another other to be true to them is a trap. Even to expect the other to be true to the relationship is to make it into a prison while trusting the other to be true to themselves, therein lies freedom.