Learning from Children

I believe that we can learn from our children.

My kids teach me things I’ve forgotten. As an adult, I forget that life can be simple. I want my worries to be small. When you are a kid, your biggest worry is whether the school lunch will include cake. When you are a kid, your worst day happens because your best friend stayed home sick and Davey said that your parrot drawing looked like a clown with a pointed nose.

Watching my children play teaches me something that I’ve forgotten. Sometimes the lesson is a reminder that I need to laugh more. When my daughter Brittney was four, she put Elmer’s glue all over the bottom of her shoes so they would be shiny. Another day, my daughter Megan decided to change her name. “I’m not a Megan, I’m a duck,” she said. “What do ducks say?” I asked her. She replied, “Crap crap crap.”

Sometimes I find out how smart my kids are. My little son Jake informed me that his heart was in his head, and his brain was in his chest. I tried to correct him and let him feel the beat of his heart in his chest. He patted his chest and told me, “No, my brain is here because it is too big to fit in my head.”

Sometimes I find out that I’m not as smart as I think I am. One day in the car, my son Zach pointed out a bunch of birds sitting on a telephone wire.

“Why do those birds sit up there?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” I replied.

“You said that moms know everything. You don’t know everything then, do you?”

When I watch my kids, I learn that I can live for this moment. Right now, I can set aside the laundry and go outside and play. Life goes by too fast for me to spend it worrying about issues that won’t matter next week. So for today, I want to tuck away my worries. I want to find a swing set and swing as high as I can, until my stomach flops from the rush. My stress falls away when I stop and learn from my kids.