Perhaps the most difficult role a parent has to do is to create an elaborate tent of myth to sustain the growth of your children’s imagination. Sure, I’d want to tell my kids the truth and teach them the value of being true and sincere with whatever and whoever they choose to be. But handling the truth about Santa, princesses, and heroes require, you know, kids’ gloves. Are they gonna be better off if we let them crash into the ground until they learn the concept of balance or are they gonna learn better with training wheels? The answer is much much more complex and if it’s gonna be aided only by odds (something like 80% of kids without training wheels perform better…) and not by something absolute, then it means you’d have to find things out for yourself and hope that the result followed the trend.
What I like about my daughter is that she has learned how to Google. At 4, she started fact checking things on her own. She already has accepted the truth about Santa, fairy godmothers and superheroes. The thing is, it did not seem to put a dent on her imagination or dreams of being a princess, a symbolism that we need to keep lit. She is able to stir her colorful imagination and still able to distinguish the hues painted in. She makes it easier for me to tell the truth knowing that she will be able to grasp it. She makes it easier for me to tell her the beauty presented by legends and myths because I know she’ll be able to sort the message through.
Some people say imagination is a gift. I believe imagination can also be like this gift wrapper that makes it better for us to appreciate the gift of truth.
Imagination has always been a great way for us to find a better way to live.
danDAman 