Life is beautiful

I love kids and the aura of innocence they carry. A sublime epitome of God’s greatest creation, they render a presence in our lives, which overtake the essence of being into something so meaningful and beautiful, that there is no equal to it.

As a parent to young children, I am perpetually in awe of their learning abilities. Be it my toddlers’ first words or my big kids’ first on stage performance. The pride I carried was unmatched. Conversations with friends and acquaintances circled around the excellence of kids and their abilities. All of us so merrily indulge in the marvels of our kids that we are out to prove that the other is better.

Thinking back, I sometimes regret my decision to push my kids in limelight. Am I instilling a false sense of competition in them? Isn’t this the very behavior I was against building in my kids?

As a child, I recall the sheer competition and peer pressure I had to deal with and I had made a silent commitment never to subjugate my children to the same abuse. Yet, I am trying to inculcate a similar pattern in their lives.

Recently, two four year old kids brought me back to enjoying just the simple things. As I was walking, I noticed parents of the two kids trying to push their children to beat the other. After a few moments, one kid turned and said, ‘its’ just a game, not an exam, can we just be friends and not anything else?’

In everyday life, competition is so compelling, somehow we forget to let the children be kids and start dictating adulthood to them. Does it really matter if they did not win? Does it matter if my child is just average? Why the false pride and animosity? Can’t we let the children be and face the world on their terms?
In some ways, I have now terminated my involvement with competition. I have begun to tell my child to participate in activities to just make them a well rounded individual, not a shining star to rave about. Ultimate pleasure is in seeing your child happy, not a super star in the making!

Be a child with your child. Live your second childhood, here’s your chance. Make quirky faces, play mindless games and crawl on the floor to the door. Spill ice cream on your white clothes, dig mud with your bare hands, and chuckle at silly jokes. Enjoy the natural ways of stress relief and get a blissful sleep. Life is beautiful, keep it that way.