On the Opinions of Others and Stepping Outside the Box

The other night, my husband and I watched Dead Poet’s Society, a movie I remember loving in high school. I loved it just as much this time around. It is a phenomenal movie with phenomenal writing and acting.

But.

It struck me differently this time around. I’m a parent now. I cried—no, I sobbed—great, heaving sobs—when a boy is so beat down by the box his parents put him in—telling him who they expect him to be, what his career choice will be, what he absolutely cannot do, which happens to be...