I only have to leaf through the pages of a child’s storybook to remember why children are the happiest people in the world. They have a robust sense of wonder. The tiniest and most mundane things somehow have reason, too. They have a joy that is innocently and deeply woven in the fabric of their hearts. Nothing can take that away from them.
It is different for grown-ups. Time and the many punches that life sends us coat our hearts with dust. True, we become resilient. We learn slowly and sometimes oh-so painfully how to make lemonade when life sends us lemons but in the process, the pain and the mountain of hurt succeeds in stealing much of the purity of joy. Happiness becomes a thought dangling over our heads like a wish list waiting to come true, so fleeting and so attached to many if’s and if only’s. We have unintentionally morphed something so real and beautiful into a thought, an ideal, which we chase after. Even if at the onset God meant happiness to be something we should keep deep within us no matter what, no matter when.
If an adult were to read the escapades of Harold, purple crayon in hand, he probably would (at the very least) enjoy it for what it is – a good story. The stuff children’s dreams are made of. Yes, he will appreciate the once familiar feeling of fascination. He may at some point be reminded that he too possessed that sense of wonder, he may even have a fleeting glimpse of the child he once was. But that’s about as far as it goes.
Although it makes for a happy feeling, it is a feeling easily brushed off because it is just fiction. It almost feels wrong to linger with a feeling rooted in something dreamy and far removed from reality. It is pure fantasy, too good to be true and there is no point relishing or basking in the glow cast by the mystery.
Don’t you wonder why we spend so much time trying to make sense of each event in our life, especially the sad ones? We try to dissect the details, leaving no stone unturned. We forget that that there will always be people, places, things, situations that we will never understand, try as we may. Our lives will always be peppered with mystery. Sad events may come in different shapes and forms but we recognize them when they’re there. All too often we cannot simply let them be.It is easy to get stuck in the man-made game of trying to decipher life’s intimations.
Children, on the contrary, are delighted and intrigued by mystery. They have this unapologetic way of embracing things as they are. They marvel at some magic trick, watch an egg hatch, relish the thrill of a roller coaster ride, enjoy the discovery of a hermit crab in the smooth pockets of a seashell – enthrallment marks their world. They delight in hints of truth that leave patches of gray areas for uncanny yet charming possibilities. No, children are not dumb. They can grasp what is real and differentiate it from what is fantasy but they are secure enough to let many of life’s fuzzy details cast a happy glow on their world.
I read that the moment we lose our childlike captivation with the mystery of life and its truths, we lose our innate sense of gratitude to God. Children and the way they beam over the most trivial things remind us to be thankful for little things we take for granted. In our insatiable quest to learn the why’s and the how’s we let our sense of wonder in our hearts slip away.
We do not have to be escapists, dreaming the fantastic, hoping for the unreal. But we can allow ourselves to embrace life’s mysteries knowing there is a God who anchors all that we cannot humanly comprehend.
Whatever we face, good or bad, it is just another bead we add to the string of life. We can wake up each day and be sad about whatever we still do not have, material or otherwise.
But we can also wake up and choose to be happy. Allow nothing and no one to take that feeling away from we.
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