Anyone who has siblings has at least once experienced a mixture of feelings within himself that ranges from sweet to bitter. And it is that, who, if not your brother, to teach you how you can love with great devotion one day and be disgusted the next?
Lessons Siblings Can Teach
They are our great teachers, those beings with whom it is necessary to share, from the love of parents, long days of games, mischief and complicity. Through the relationship with them, we acquired the first lessons :
Strengthen empathy
Through the relationship with our siblings, those people with whom coexistence is mandatory, we learn respect and consideration for others, in terms of differences focused on the way of thinking and around their feelings.
Faced with friction, experiences and possible disagreements, we come to understand that you can love another unconditionally even when they are different from you. They awaken in us, to a large extent, a protective instinct that, despite the differences that may exist, will always prevail in certain contexts.
On this aspect it cannot be generalized because each dynamic between siblings has different characteristics. Some are related in the midst of continuous conflicts while others maintain a quite harmonious and loving climate. However, the fact that they openly maintain a tendency to disagree, does not constitute a basis on which it can be argued that love does not exist.
Faced with an external threat, the most characteristic figure of the brotherhood immediately appears: the instinct of protection. This is a natural reaction and can be observed as soon as one of the brothers receives an attack or is placed in front of any type of danger and the other reacts to protect him in a forceful way.
Older siblings generally focus on the well-being and guidance of the younger ones. Despite the conflicts or fights that may arise and the competition for the love of parents, this feeling always remains.
Teamwork
It is one of the great learnings and contributes even to our maturation process. It is one of the first scenarios where you understand that unity is strength.
Although it is true that all people have the capacities and skills to achieve and specify what they propose individually, teamwork multiplies the possibilities of achieving success.
With our brothers we understand that, by joining our knowledge and agreeing on strategies, the path is made easier for us. Maybe our first teams are to carry out some mischief without being discovered but it is a rehearsal that will serve you for life.
The moment you have to join groups or form one of them, you will have the knowledge, although in a very brief way, of how you must conduct yourself so that the team works. You will know that it is necessary to distribute the tasks so that the work goes forward, perhaps to lead and contribute.
A forgive
It is simple, with few people we will have as many conflicts throughout our lives as with our brothers. If you are a big brother, there is a possibility that you lost count of how many of your precious positions were destroyed by them and yet it was something that you surpassed and that is in the past.
Probably during your adulthood you will even smile when you relive these moments. If you are one of the minors, it is possible that you have been a victim of abuse of power by the elders and despite them you never stopped admiring them.
You forgave them and you always will in spite of everything because the bond of brotherhood is unbreakable.
Be complicit
They are our first great accomplices of mischief, games. With them we usually form unbreakable teams to hide any act not allowed from our parents.
There is no better ally than your brother to cover your back when you break the law at home and fear being discovered. They are our first great friends and if you can cultivate and maintain that relationship, you will have a partner for life.
The tolerance
You learn to live under the same roof, even to share a room with a person who, although it is your family, is very different from you in terms of temperament, attitudes, ways of thinking, among other aspects. Therefore, you develop the ability to accept differences and to live among them.
You develop respect for others in terms of possessions, feelings, and spaces. You come to value them despite the incompatibilities.
Respect for hierarchies
The family is the first scenario in which you will learn that each member occupies an order within the system which must be respected.
In the family nucleus, everyone is important and occupies a place that is irreplaceable. Parents occupy the highest positions and each child will have a place according to the order of birth.
To share
It is in the family and with our siblings where we learn to share and raise awareness that the available resources are to be distributed among all.
The games, the toys and the room will belong to everyone equally. Celebrations and negative events that can affect the family also affect everyone.
Bargaining power
Surely there were countless occasions when you had to give in and negotiate with your siblings the time when it would be up to you to watch TV or a turn to swing. By living under the same roof, where resources must be shared among all, the possibility always arises of establishing deals to conquer spaces in which everyone wins.
Patience
It is the virtue of knowing how to wait for your moment, your turn because you are not the only child; there are others around you who also require parental attention. For parents, it is sometimes difficult to distribute love and resources in a balanced way in a space in which everyone wants their demands to be the priority.