Forever under-10!

Nurturing the child in you will keep you going, no matter what the circumstances are.

My birthday just went past. And many people asked me how I felt. I have figured out that the one way to stop feeling – and worrying about – your age is to ignore the second digit of your age, and relate only to the first digit in terms of what attitude you bring to Life. That way, even when you are 100, you will still feel like a 10-year-old – always curious about Life and brimming with energy!

Being childlike is a great quality. And it is very different from being childish. So, when you live this way, you feel enormously empowered to face Life. You don’t judge people or events. You take it as it comes. You shrug off set-backs and keep re-engaging with immersive experiences. Nothing in the world scares you or restrains you.

Way back, when I about 10 years old, I used to go for swimming lessons at the Taj Coromandel Hotel in Chennai. We lived in the neighborhood, on Josier Street. A Japanese businessman, Yoshiro Kizuka, about my father’s age, who was a long-staying guest in the hotel, used to come swimming at the same time as me. We became good friends. I asked him if I could teach him English and if he, in turn, could teach me Japanese. So, we began teaching each other, sharing and learning from each other. The few words I know in Japanese or the very elementary understanding I have of Japanese culture, was embedded in me, thanks to this experience. When the time came for Kizuka-san to go back to Japan, he invited my family to have a meal with him. After the dinner, he told my dad, in his smattering of English, “Your son ….vely, vely, goth…hmmm…stoodenth…He iz…goodth…learning…” What he may have meant is that I was curious, seeking and had a willingness to learn.

Kizuka-san’s words have stayed with me. And I have internalized that philosophy, as I have grown in Life, to always nurture the spirit to seek, to unlearn and learn – from everyone, and from every event. This, I believe, comes from nurturing in me the child that I once was. This approach hasn’t helped me change my current realities, it doesn’t solve my problems either, but helps me immensely in remaining undefeated when Life rages on, as it does now, unpredictably, inscrutably! Biologically, none of us has a choice about growing older. But we can arrest the ebbing away of our enthusiasm by believing that we can always retain the spirit of the sub-10-year-old that we once were!  

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If you are walking around a puddle and not through it…well…the child within you is dead!

Awaken the child in you. You will never have a problem living__and you will never feel old!

While it may be a good idea to choose a successful adult to be a role model for our dreams, ambitions and professional aspirations, in terms of our attitude to Life__and to practice intelligent living__it may just be a great idea to make an infant our role model too! Children teach us innocence, to forgive and forget, to trust and to be joyful at all times!

British author, known most for his science fiction works, Brian Aldiss painted a bleak, but awakening picture of adulthood with the words: “When childhood dies, its corpses are called adults and they enter society, one of the politer names of hell. That is why we dread children, even if we love them; they show us the state of our decay.” This is indeed the truth. As adults we have stopped being innocent. There’s a lurking suspicion we hold on every encounter, judging motives and evaluating people all the time. We carry baggage of past hurts and often want to avenge insults and betrayals. We are never happy in whatever moment we are living through __ always choosing to wallow in the past or worry of the future.

Look at the children in your family, up until the age of 5 at least. Don’t they deal with people as they are? Never judging. Always trusting. Full of energy and enthusiasm. When you are child-like, and see the world with curiosity, with a raging quest for each new experience, you will find your creative juices flowing, your imagination soaring and you will find bliss in every moment! As the late historian Papiya Ghosh said, “In my soul, I am still that small child who did not care about anything else but the beautiful colors of a rainbow.”

So, if you are walking around a puddle and not through it, if you are worried about what people at the table will think if you dropped sauce on yourself, if you are conscious of people looking at you at an airport while you peer at and count the planes, if you are unable to sleep deeply, peacefully, instantaneously, it’s time for you to go back to your childhood. And do all those things nowthat you did then. There is still the child in you__rediscover your true Self!