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Reader question: Please explain this sentence, particularly “double-edged sword”: Teenagers need more space to rebel and reinvent, away from the double-edged sword of the adult gaze. My comments: This means parents perhaps shouldn’t pay too much attention and care to everything their teenage children do – perhaps they should let them grow on their own a bit more. Too much attention might suffocate them, so much so that they wouldn’t be able to be and feel free – at that rebelling age, teens need not only the food to grow in height but the space to grow spiritually as well. That’s, at any rate, what it means to say that the adult gaze is a double-edged sword. A double-edged sword, as a sister saying goes, that cuts both ways. A double-edged sword, you see, is sharp on the edge on both sides, unlike the common kitchen knife that is sharp on only one side. If the kitchen knife is double-edged and sharp on both sides, well, the chance for inadvertent self-inflicted injury will increase, it is safe to say. Safe to say, then, that the single-edged kitchen knife is safer to handle and work with. Safe, sorry for sticking with the word safe when we are talking about knifes and blades but I do believe it safe to say that the double-edged sword is less safe to handle and work with. One has to be more careful with it. Even though actual self-inflicted injuries by sword players are virtually unheard of, the metaphor remains widely used and often quoted – beware of the double-edge sword, beware that it cuts both ways. | 
