Helpless and Stuck.

As the mind develops, we move from a world of sensory perception to a world of causality.

An infants initial experience of the world is simply what it perceives in its immediate surroundings- its mother, father, sights, sounds, feelings, warmth, emotions, pain and hunger.  If the child does not experience something it does not exist.

This is wonderful because it is an immersion in experience.  It is simple, direct, empirical.

But an infant is helpless because it doesn't know what to do with the things it is experiencing.
Pain is pain.  Hunger is hunger.  Fatigue is fatigue.  Warmth is warmth.

An infant who is hungry doesn't worry about anything else.  At that moment, hunger is the child's world and it doesn't know how to fix that. 

A parent who cares knows how to soothe a baby and it teaches it how to soothe itself. 

Somewhere along its development, the infant starts to realize that things still exist even if they cannot directly experience them.  This is called object permanence and it marks the beginning of a rational, logical mind.  It is the beginning of a mind that can plan and act based on intention. 

This is a grand development, but not without its own problems. 

Neither of these two ways of perceiving the world are true seeing.  If your world is your experience and nothing else you are helpless, failing to understand the significance of cause and effect.  A world in which we operate within cause and effect but get wrapped up in its objects and we get stuck.

A parent who cares teaches their child how to get unstuck. 

Teach your child to get unstuck, how to solve a problem and how to avoid getting wrapped up in a mess.  With that skillset, their innate curiosity coupled with the ability to choose and act will carry them to places that you could never imagine. 

Which is pretty scary, as a parent.

That is why you need to teach them to get unstuck.