As kids, we want to play all day long. We want to be with our playmates, we want to grow up fast so we’ll be able to achieve our dreams and experience what adults can. As we grow old, we tend to realize that the world is full of games we wished we never played. Cheaters and unfairness are everywhere. No one wants to be your playmate and you’ll fight the game alone without reaching victory. We all know we can’t go back to being kids playing old happy games, so what can we do? We can look back. Yes, we have to look back and we can see small minds and hearts ready to open for us. If we want to learn things, we should not underestimate the capacity of a child to teach us. In a world where we’re stressed and suffocated by negativity, ask a child why he or she smiles.
I agree that experience is the best teacher and adults are far more experienced than kids, but as we focus on learning in our own way and from other people older than us, we tend to overlooked positive energy from small things which the children could be our best teacher. At my age, I still hang out with kids. My sister, even my cousins often asks me to babysit their children and believe me or not it’s fun and I learned a lot of things from them. Sometimes they are really frustrating because they are naughty but that’s part of being kids.
Being grateful for small things is one of the most important things that I learned. When I gave them a small reward for obeying me, for having a star on their works at school, or even just for sleeping at noon, they are really grateful and their smiles and laughs are priceless. Another thing is they appreciate little compliments such as very good, you did well, you’re cute and others. Kids also have this sense of confidence and ability to stand up as they fall. I remembered when my niece joined a quiz bee contest, she didn’t win the contest and I thought she’ll cry because I saw her struggle and work hard for the quiz. She chose to study than play so I think it’ll be devastating even for a 6-year-old kid. As we walk our way home she told me, “Aunt, I’ll try again next time what important is I joined today” then she flashed a sweet smile on her face. If a kid with a small mind and less experienced can think like this, can be this positive and grateful, if they can, what’s hindering us to do and feel the same? Another is, my nephew is quite smart for his age, his reasons, and the way he figures out things really amazed me. I am not saying he’s a real genius. One time when we are cleaning our house, he’ll complain and say “Why do we have a lot of plates and mugs and a lot of things that we don’t even use? What’s the purpose of keeping all this?”, we are all speechless for a moment and then we laugh for the realization that he’s right. This concept thought me, why do I keep things that have no use in my life, why do I keep toxic ties, negative memories, if these are just useless why do I keep them? Also, this is when I decided to use what I have, if I have a lot of positive things to say, a lot of love and care I can show, just like the plates, what’s stopping me to use it? Basically, my nephew taught me to throw away those negative and show those positives instead. Another thing is they can see goodness in different kinds of people. We have a neighbor that is mentally disabled (literally crazy), we witnessed him throw stones and such and of course, we’re afraid. Then one time he told us that they are friends, of course, I asked him how and why they became friends knowing that entire person’s previous actions, then he told me “We’re friends and he’s kind now, stop asking me a lot of question please”, after that, I just shut my mouth. We can’t tell a person’s whole story just by observing some of their actions, we will not be able to understand them if we start judging them right away.
We can’t go back to those times as a kid, but we can find comfort by talking and being with them.
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I hope you learned something from this. Thank you for reading❤
This is my entry to @Dolores photoessay contest.
https://read.cash/@Dolores/photo-essay-event-updates-78336e4e
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OBhqnR6SFib-nboQxO7xKIgaQ3V4DRXd/view?usp=sharing