There is a famous saying “There are no one happy in this world except the small kids and saints.”, if you have spent time with kids below 5 years of age you would understand how true it is. As long as they are awake they will be active and keep running around the house, they would be doing something or other but they never sit idle. I often wonder how they are active all the time. These small kids who can’t pronounce most of the words even clearly, they are yet to see the world and are able to spend their entire time so happily. From the time I spent with my son, below are the key takeaways. Every child is different but below are the common qualities for the majority of the kids I observed.
Play it:
For a 3-year-old kid, everything is a game it may be eating food, singing a song, watching a rhyme, riding a bicycle, fighting with parents, talking to someone or anything else. They just play everything as a game and as good as they can. Whatever they are doing they do with excitement and involvement. If they are not interested, no matter what you do they won’t even attempt to do it. Give a set of LEGO blocks to a kid who loves running and jumping around, he won’t even consider it as a toy, take the same kid to a park he will surely enjoy there restlessly to the full extent. It is evident that most of the schools are now following the same method of teaching kids through games. Same way whatever we are doing in life if we can do with same excitement and involvement as if we are playing a final match in a tournament we will first enjoy doing it and we will start giving our best effort in doing it. Treat life as a game and play it the best you can and results will follow.
“Necessity may be the mother of invention, but play is certainly the father.” - Roger Von Oech
“We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing.” - George Bernard Shaw
Results:
Kids when doing the things they like they don’t think and worry about the result. When they like to jump from the bed they just do it, when they want to play a game they just play. Yes, there are both good and bad results by doing so but that’s how they learn. If a kid evaluates the entire scenario what will happen if he jumps from a bed like how he jump, where he will fall, where he will get hit, what damage to himself & surroundings it will cause, he will never jump at all and if he never jumps you already know he will never learn. When you play cricket with a small kid who doesn’t even know how to hold bat correctly he just tries to hit every ball as hard as he can and even if he misses most of them he doesn’t worry why he missed, he immediately grabs the ball and asks you to bowl again and he tries to hit again. This is how they learn, the same applies to most of us instead of worrying about the outcome of the work or result of the exam, first we need to try as best as we can and put in all the effort we should. Once we give our best effort the results will follow. Instead of enjoying only the result we should learn to enjoy the process of doing a task firstly.
“Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it.” -Greg Anderson
"It is good to have an end to journey toward, but it is the journey that matters in the end." ― Ursula K. Le Guin
Apology:
Kids are new to this world they don’t know what is correct and wrong, they keep doing things as it comes to their mind. When a kid was explained what he has done was wrong and why he should not repeat the same, they apologise without hesitating. Once they apologise they immediately leaves that topic and goes back to what they were doing. How amazing our lives will be if we don’t hold on to our ego’s, hatred, jealousy and simply apologise when necessary and forget the past. If you keep worrying about yesterday when will you enjoy today? It is good to apologise and learn from our mistakes than to hold on to our ego. Taking everything to ego will ultimately hurt us first before hurting others.
"The stupid neither forgive nor forget; the naive forgive and forget; the wise forgive but do not forget." - Thomas Szasz
“Apologising doesn’t mean you are wrong. It means you value the relationship more than your ego.”
Love:
The purest form of love is a kids love when they love someone they just show it. They never forget to hug their parents once they wake up in the morning, no matter what/where they are, the first thing they need is to hug mom. They will be much happy when their parents hug them back than playing with any toy. They will be dull only when parents are dull and they try everything to make them normal. They cry/ request/ shout until parents take them into their hands. All they need is the mother should be smiling and hug them when needed.
Our lives are so un predictable we never know whether we will get another chance to do the things which we wanted to do. If you love your parents/partner/children/friends just let them know, express with them who knows what happens the next moment. If you can call up your parent now, then just do it. If you want to hug your partner just do it never wait for the right moment to express love the moment you think of your loved one’s it is already the right moment. If you are near them, hug them if you are far, call and speak with them, if you can’t call them mail them or message them.
“Love is a fruit in season at all times and within reach of every hand.” ― Mother Teresa
Ask:
On average kids ask 500 questions per day which includes from basic necessities to everything else, whatever they need they simply ask. They don't hesitate or get scared to ask no matter what. Why the fan is to roof only, why bike has only 2 wheels, why to pray to god, why to share food with others and so on. When they are hungry they simply ask or when they want something they just ask. This I feel a true gift of children where they don’t hold on to past grudges/ ego’s/ shyness and won’t limit themselves in asking and learning things.
Our life depends on the quality of questions we ask ourselves daily. If we hesitate to ask we will always be at same place and at same situation or even worse. Questioning is the first step of new inventions. Long back wright brothers questioned themselves why people can’t fly like birds and they invented flights, people questioned themselves how to travel faster than walking/running and invented all modern transport vehicles, people questioned themselves how to communicate faster and invented letters, telegrams, mobiles and so on. Same way as long as we don’t question ourselves why something is happening in our life, firstly we won’t understand why we are in that situation and secondly we will never get better. It applies to everything in our life.
If you are not happy with your job ask yourself why you are not happy? What is it you don’t like about it? what to do to get your interest back? Should you change your job itself? Surely you will find answers. If you are not asking about your own problems why anyone else would care about you? If you are not happy with your relationship ask yourself what is not happy in your relation? Why is it not happy? How to make it a happy relation? Then discuss with your partner.
The basic difference between humans and monkeys is questioning itself. If the first human would have never questioned himself what he was doing, why he was doing, is there a better way to do what he was doing? then we would all still be in caves and forests with monkeys…
“Millions have seen apple fall, but newton was the one who asked why” – Bernard M Baruch
“If you don’t ask you don’t get.” – Mahatma Gandhi
Share your personal learning from kids which we can follow in our day to day life.
Thanks VV!!
