Peter Pan

Parents are the last people on earth who ought to have children.

Back when we was in school in Mississippi, we had Little Black Sambo. That’s what you learned: Anytime something was not good, or anytime something was bad in some kinda way, it had to be called black. Like, you had Black Monday, Black Friday, black sheep… Of course, everything else, all the good stuff, is white. White Christmas and such.

I was shy when I was a kid, I was very shy, but now I think I’ve improved a lot. I can speak OK with the media and with the people. My English is still bad but I feel a little bit better now than before.

I am convinced that every effort must be made in childhood to teach the young to use their own minds. For one thing is sure: If they don’t make up their minds, someone will do it for them.

What we want is to see the child in pursuit of knowledge, and not knowledge in pursuit of the child.

We all acquire damage as infants and children and we work on removing those scars all of our lives. You won’t heal everything, but what’s important is the work.

I was born on a plantation, and things weren’t so good. We didn’t have any money. I never thought of the word ‘poor’ ’til I got to be a man, but when you live in a house that you can always peek out of and see what kind of day it is, you’re not doing so well. And your rest room is not inside the house.

The problem is when that fun stuff becomes the habit. And I think that’s what’s happened in our culture. Fast food has become the everyday meal.

They say that every child learns from their mother – it’s ingrained from babyhood.

And let’s be clear: It’s not enough just to limit ads for foods that aren’t healthy. It’s also going to be critical to increase marketing for foods that are healthy.

It is the bliss of childhood that we are being warped most when we know it the least.

We can aim to create a culture, where kids ask for healthy options instead of resisting them.

If you’re bringing up kids, you just want to smother them with love and praise and enthusiasm. So I don’t think you can mollycoddle your kids too much really.

As a kid, I was making a building with blocks in our playroom. I didn’t have enough. So I asked my younger brother Robert if I could borrow some of his. He said, ‘Okay, but you have to give them back when you’re done.’ I used all of my blocks, then all of his blocks, and when I was done I had a great building, which I then glued together. Robert never did get those blocks back.

The idea of kids helping other kids is such a great way to introduce children to being involved in charitable causes and volunteer work, setting them on the path to doing good for others throughout their lives.