The things we do to our children. The lies we tell. We furnish them with dragons, tooth fairies and Santa Claus. We foist religion on them.
Then we ridicule them for believing things or enjoy ripping their world to bits. We take away the tooth fairy, Santa Claus and dragons and ridicule them for daydreaming.
A shame we didn’t take away the religion too!
Perhaps we should let that childhood imagination blossom?
Pete summed it up in his cartoons from 1971.
I wholeheartedly agree with you! It’s a wonder that children can grow up with any sense of trust at all with their favorite childhood stories and characters being lies from their parents. And the religious any sense spectacular resonates with me, as well. I’ve often wondered how a parent would go about raising a child without telling them made up stories about Santa Claus or the tooth fairy. It seems easy enough to simply not tell the kid, but the child is bound to hear about them from outside influences. Our society is so saturated that these things are being taught in schools as if they have any educational merit. The world would be better off without religion but that’s a long ramble I just don’t want to get into.
Too true Rima. Good to hear from you.
‘Perhaps we should let that childhood imagination blossom?’ I say yes! Mine did. And I grew up healthy, wholesome, trusting, with a strong spiritual foundation. My home was loving and nurturing. Neither was I sheltered or protected from seeing the darker side of life. And with age came the wisdom to discern my own truths out of the fertile ground which was my growing up. Adult minds overthink things – there is a richness of learnings and teachings in the fables, myths and tales we grow up with. It is a part of the wonder and magic of life.
Children can bask in the pleasure of simple things and natural wonders in a way that adults find hard. It is great to see the wonder in a child’s eyes as they watch a butterfly bob around a flower.