Parents' Hearts, Unknown to Their Children

This time, in response to a reader's request, I'd like to take up the proverb "Oya no kokoro ko shirazu" - "Parents' hearts are unknown to their children."

The love and concern a parent feels rarely seem to reach the child, who simply goes about acting however they please - I suspect quite a few people reading this are nodding along, thinking "Exactly!" Those with children going through their rebellious years probably feel this especially keenly. In my own household, with a son in high school, things are much the same.

Of course, I do think my son senses his parents' feelings in his own way. He doesn't say so, and it doesn't show in his attitude, but every now and then, in a slight change of expression or mood, I sense that he understands. Moments like these are a joy. It feels as though something has gotten through, as though some connection has been made. Though, admittedly, such moments don't come along all that often.

Even so, I think "Oya no kokoro, ko shirazu" is a remarkably apt phrase. The single word kokoro (heart/mind) is packed with a multitude of emotions: unconditional love, endless worry, expectation, and trust. Yet, the child remains shirazu - unaware of these feelings. The feelings simply don't get through; they aren't understood. It is precisely because this proverb so accurately captures this frustrating, inevitable disconnect that it has resonated with so many people and continues to be used to this day.

But think about it. Misunderstandings in human relationships happen anytime, anywhere, almost as a matter of course. So why is it that only the parent-child relationship has a proverb like this? There's no saying like "a wife's heart, unknown to her husband" or "a husband's heart, unknown to his wife." Nor is there "a boss's heart, unknown to their subordinate" or "a subordinate's heart, unknown to their boss."

This is purely my own speculation, but perhaps it's simply that the parent-child bond is that special. The bond between mother and child, in particular, runs deep. After all, this is a child who came from within oneself. A mother, it's said, feels the child as an extension of herself, a part of herself. The sheer scale of the love poured into such a child is, in a real sense, immeasurable. And so when that love doesn't seem to get through, the disappointment, the grief, the frustration that follow are bound to be all the more intense - precisely because the desire for the child's happiness is so vast.

A child is a separate person, with a personality distinct from the parent's own. Parent and child though they may be, they are still two separate individuals. This is something we understand in our heads, but find hard to truly accept in our hearts. If it were a stranger who didn't understand us, we could shrug it off - but somehow, when it's our own child, we can't let it go so easily. And yet, in terms of simply being "a different person," a stranger and one's own child are exactly the same.

Even between parent and child, personalities differ. And as long as personalities differ, completely understanding one another is difficult. This applies not just to parent-child dynamics, but to all human relationships. Yet, perhaps it is exactly because of this difficulty that the joy of truly understanding someone is so profound, making life all the more interesting.

How a child receives their parent's feelings is entirely up to the child. It's simply not something a parent can control. What matters, then, isn't whether those feelings get through, but rather what kind of feelings one holds in the first place, regardless of whether they're understood. And in the end, I think those feelings come down to nothing more than respect and gratitude for the other person's very existence - toward one's child, and of course, toward one's parents as well.

As a side note, in the traditional Edo Iroha Karuta (a Japanese playing card game), the card for the syllable "O" was precisely this proverb: "Oya no kokoro, ko shirazu." It’s fun to imagine what the people of the Edo period were thinking as they savored these words during a game of cards. Perhaps a child muttering, "Parents' hearts unknown to children? No way, it's children's hearts unknown to parents!" Or an adult, thinking of their own parents back home, murmuring, "I really put my parents through a lot back then..." Times may change, but people, in the end, remain the same. I suspect that parent-child relationships back then weren't all that different from what they are today. What do you all think?

Reflecting on it once more, "Oya no kokoro, ko shirazu" is a wonderful proverb that makes us to think deeply about the parent-child relationship from the perspective of both the parent and the child. I would like to take this opportunity to express my deepest gratitude to the reader who suggested this excellent topic.

This article was published in the September 2026 issue of Views, the newsletter of the Japan Business Society of Detroit.