Perspective Tuesday: Nurture vs. Nature.

Photo by Yeshi Kangrang on Unsplash

One phrase that is still heavily controversial today is “Nature vs. Nurture” which basically means, does your upbringing depict who you will be or your environment? Truthfully speaking, your nurture means nothing if your environment does not match. There should be no versus between the two, but a balance between them.

Nurture.

The denotation of nurture is the process of caring for and encouraging the growth or development of someone or something. Which basically means, how you were taught and or raised. In terms of people, we are all raised differently for many different reasons beyond our families being different. Different cultures, religions, ethnic groups, and history play a part in how we are raised. But what I want to emphasize is nurture comes in numerous forms. You have some of us that grow up spoiled, some of us grow up receiving tough love, some of us are being adults as well as being a child. So forth and so on. But what makes this “nature versus nurture” theory so compelling is that as we are being nurtured, our nature is raising us as well.

For example, let’s say a child growing up in poverty who has little to nothing but the essentials in life, has a good mother, father, and family but has an environment similar to a jungle, more than likely they are bound to become a wild animal. Why is that? Because we mostly learn the world around us through our five senses. Nurture means nothing when you are out in nature because nature holds many more components than nurture. Such as diverse people from all different walks of life, natural environment ( neighborhood), intricate complexities and interactions, and more importantly understanding yourself in your environment. In simpler terms, nurture is the basis of our individuality.

Nature.

Nature is basically the external factors that influence our individuality such as experiences, interactions, communication, and natural environment. When it comes to understanding ourselves better we figure out who we are through nature. Interaction with all sorts of symbols, communicating with others, and going through life, and learning from experiences. Which means, nature has a greater effect on us than nurture. Even though our nurture is still the same, our nature will not. For example, a child…