Hazel's prayers have been fairly focused recently; good dreams. She does wake semi-frequently crying at night, and sometimes she voices that birds are chasing her or something nonsensical. All normal I suppose for a child her age.
Tonight, the plea was for something positive, "please help me to have dreams of ponies and Charlotte dreams of lammies, and mommy and daddy happy dreams too."
This request brought to mind just how young and innocent my kids are. Deep down, the things they fear are often mythical. It truly exposes how sheltered they have been. I don't feel bad about that. We do speak openly about war, murder, embezzlement, etc. It's hard not to do so when reading about the wars in the scriptures (most recently from the Book of Mormon), or explain to them what Jari and I are discussing while we prepare dinner and reference current events or talk about politics.
It does bring to my mind a trend that I see in society today to allow or even force kids to grow up and face the harshness of the world as early of an age as possible. Santa is not real, the Easter Bunny does not exist; this is how it starts. Innocent? Sure. On the flip side is the question of if it is ethical to preach lies as truth to a small child all for the excitement of the Christmas or Easter seasons? Maybe not but that is not the focus of discussion here. Little by little our kids see the world for what it can unfortunately offer them. They watch TV and movies that portray content that for some reason is considered OK for an adult, but not for a child... but they have to grow up someday right? 'Roll up your mental sleeves and take it in kid' seems to be the normal response. We even role model crude or coarse language in our homes, movies, music, sports, etc. and consider it expressive, open, or modern. We tolerate this example to our kids by thinking, "At least my kid isn't closed-minded. This exposure is good for them." And in the name of open-mindedness, childhood and purity slowly die. This is evident whenever I pass groups of kids walking home from school or at soccer practice, (age 8-12) using profanity or telling jokes. Well done America...(sarcasm there if you could not tell).
I do acknowledge that we do indeed need to grow up. My child cannot live in a fairytale land of butterflies and ponies forever. Nor does my sheltering of her or allowing her to be this way deny the reality that the world IS full of ugliness and harshness. My criticism is not the allowance of growth and coming of maturity, but in the way society (parents) now walk their kids through the process. Instead of dad sitting down with little Johnny and talking about what words he heard at school today and role modeling good language and corrective actions he can take with his friends, we abandon our own sense of the sacred and join the masses in normalizing crass, attention-seeking speech. We are abandoning what makes a child wondrous to behold and rewarding to love in exchange for a little person who makes foolish use of his or her tongue. It's sad to me and honestly rather disappointing.
So tonight as Hazel prayed, then enthusiastically showed me that her pony Rosaline could fold her arms and pray (ref the picture below), it made me consider who I am, what I fear, what I consider to be normal or OK. I will step outside of the progressive or open-minded thinking crowd (which is really just group thinking and crowd following rather than true personal expression if you ask me, an argument for another day maybe?) and offer up these thoughts:
1) There is a reason Christ referenced children when considering the content of the Kingdom of God. (Ref Mark 10:14 of the bible). If the Kingdom of God is one of peace, growth, development, and intelligence, why do we rush away from the purity of children from our children and ourselves? Christ did not say "shelter yourself and never face reality" - he knows we all come to see these things. Yet there is an ideal that is in the child that he wishes us to grasp.
2) Course or harsh language does not speak well of your intelligence. A man who I love and respect said this better than I ever could:
https://www.lds.org/general-conference/2007/04/the-tongue-of-angels?lang=eng
I know some will read this and laugh and say mine is the mind of religious brainwashing. I don't wish to open a contentious argument on the topic, but am open to discussion. I only wish to say that during my short 32 years on earth, the people I have gravitated to the most are not those that condemn or belittle, but those who use their speech to lift and carry others.
To be honest, I do not fully meet this ideal. I am far from my childhood.
But tonight, a nearly 3-year-old reminded me that perhaps it is time for each to examine their own hearts and ask where they are on this. Ask yourself next time you speak or watch a movie, am I edifying others? Am I reflecting goodness on myself? my boss? my organization? or my society?
Food for thought and open for discussion.
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