As he spoke to me last night and the night before I was thinking about this same stuff in life:

We’re adults. We’ve got all the credentials and scars to show for it. … But a grown-up is supposed to possess himself, to be his own person, to make decisions according to his wishes and his best judgment.
Too often we find that this is not the case with us. Frequently we are so limited by habitual ways of acting and thinking, so needful of the approval of others, and so afraid of their disapproval that we don’t own ourselves at all. We are like a corporation that has gone public, and other people own controlling shares. And for many of us in that position, the biggest shareholders are our parents. [...]
The parent-child relationship is a primary source of who we are, and the mutual emotional attachments are derived from countless interactions, conscious and hidden memories, and profound feelings that go back to our days of oneness with them.