Push Button,
I too paid for every flight hour I took, studied the books myself and kept my head down and pressed forward one small step at a time, slept in cars and a lot of couches along the way too. I would do it all again in a heartbeat if I could. Along the way I learned what perseverance, focus and determination meant. Couple that with self respect and that fact that no one gave me a career on a silver platter makes me feel pretty damn good about my accomplishments. I also know that I can do whatever it takes to see a task through to the end. Why is that a bad trait to pass along to your kids? Personally I don't think you do kids any favours by giving them everything.
The first 8 years of my earnings were just about enough to live rent free and pay for food and the odd drink on a date.
I've flown a lot of dinosaurs as well starting from a C47 and slowly working my way up to something with a working heater. We were expected to help mechanics if we broke down on a job and I still have the frostbite and scars to prove it. It was an adventure and more importantly it was MY adventure, not one daddy handed me.
That was the way it was in my day. Today I have to endure complaints from certain individuals because they had to start right seat on a 777 and not a 380. If you mention electromechanical instruments, radial engines, carb heat, dilution, freight loading, floats etc, they wonder if your speaking greek.
However, the experience you get from flying in summer without weather radar, or winter without working de-icer boots or remote locations without legal reserves gives you a very good foundation for survival and airmanship that just cant be written into the books for the "slaves to the magenta line" generation to understand, that has to be experienced.