Being highly invested and preoccupied by an emotionally consuming mission tends to steal resources from other aspects of your emotional life.

Your friends will need you, too, someday. Maybe not in the same way, maybe not in cash and shelter, but they'll need you - to listen without judging, to invite them over when they're lonely, to show up for their events, to register in whatever way matters to them that they matter to you. Be on the lookout for these opportunities to give back, and do whatever is in your power not to miss many of them.

Of course the thoughts and awareness are there, but it's all incomplete and often fanciful - kids know there's something to know, and they fill in a bunch of the blanks with their imaginations if their parents haven't had the conversations and/or established themselves as sources of information. It's rare that the kids know nothing at all, and the somethings they do know are often only partially right or flat-out wrong.

When you fail to see something, that doesn't mean I'm hiding it.

Minimizing exposure to miserable people is nothing short of a life strategy.

Apparently you have ample proof from experience that you're not going to stop world evil by debating your in-laws into submission, so it's okay to choose not to try.

You can't make someone agree with you, not even when you're 100 percent sure you're right.