Innocence can't be lost, it just has to be maintained. --Jewel
My daughter is headed to middle school in a week. In just days she'll move from the comfort of one classroom and one teacher into the sometimes mayhem of many classes. It's the stuff our anxiety dreams are made of: a mad rush to open a locker, knowing you're one minute away from the tardy bell and your class is on the other side of the school; the vast sea of tweens, all pushing past one another in the hallways, wrapped in a mix of smells that seems cauldron-concaucted--one greasy hair, one bottle of fruity hairspray, one stale gym sock, and two tubes of sparkly lip gloss. Can't you just see the wart-nosed witch clacking her eerily long fingernails together and laughing? "All together, here comes trouble. Watch my cauldron boil and bubble. Everything is different now. You're all mixed up, now go learn, POW!"
After the witch's big green spell-cloud clears, we're all left feeling a bit disoriented--kids and grown-ups alike. We Moms wake up in the middle of the night, heart pounding, convinced that our sweet, innocent baby is going to be swept up in the undertoe of this new environment and pounded by wave after wave of pressures. "They'll lose their innocence!" we worry. The truth is, they will be swept up and pounded by pressures from time to time. It's not easy being tween. They will hear and see things that aren't nice: nasty words, cruel bullying, occasionally exhasperated teachers, and those dreaded moments of being left out. It's enough to make a Mama's stomach hurt.
The great good news, though, is that awful cloud of anxiety, that hangs over our consciousness in times of big change, is not the last word. The witch's cauldron-vision seems so powerful because it's plays into our fears. But just because something feels powerful doesn't mean it's true. The truth is, while our kids may hear new words and see new hard things, they don't have to lose their innocence. Innocence has little to do with what happens to us, and almost everything to do with the lens through which we interpret what happens to us. True loss of innocence happens, not when someone calls us a mean name, but when we believe that name is who we are. True loss of innocence happens, not when we see someone get bullied, but when we witness it but do nothing about it. True loss of innocence happens, not when we're left out, but when we turn around and leave someone else out later on.
In middle school, high school, or adulthood, maintaining innocence is the most important work we can do. It's the work of preserving what is best in our souls, and in the souls of one another. We must choose wonder over efficiency; we must choose love over always being right. We must choose awe over cynicism. Ultimately, we must teach our children to look for the best in people, stand up for themselves and others in kind ways, and to surround themselves with people and ideas that nurture kindness and creativity. Maintaining innocence is the work of nurturing a supple and resilient heart--not allowing our hearts, or the hearts of our children, to harden in response to life's challenges. The witch is right, "everything is different now". We must go and be innocent. That's subversive, against-the-grain stuff. POW!
My daughter is headed to middle school in a week. In just days she'll move from the comfort of one classroom and one teacher into the sometimes mayhem of many classes. It's the stuff our anxiety dreams are made of: a mad rush to open a locker, knowing you're one minute away from the tardy bell and your class is on the other side of the school; the vast sea of tweens, all pushing past one another in the hallways, wrapped in a mix of smells that seems cauldron-concaucted--one greasy hair, one bottle of fruity hairspray, one stale gym sock, and two tubes of sparkly lip gloss. Can't you just see the wart-nosed witch clacking her eerily long fingernails together and laughing? "All together, here comes trouble. Watch my cauldron boil and bubble. Everything is different now. You're all mixed up, now go learn, POW!"
After the witch's big green spell-cloud clears, we're all left feeling a bit disoriented--kids and grown-ups alike. We Moms wake up in the middle of the night, heart pounding, convinced that our sweet, innocent baby is going to be swept up in the undertoe of this new environment and pounded by wave after wave of pressures. "They'll lose their innocence!" we worry. The truth is, they will be swept up and pounded by pressures from time to time. It's not easy being tween. They will hear and see things that aren't nice: nasty words, cruel bullying, occasionally exhasperated teachers, and those dreaded moments of being left out. It's enough to make a Mama's stomach hurt.
The great good news, though, is that awful cloud of anxiety, that hangs over our consciousness in times of big change, is not the last word. The witch's cauldron-vision seems so powerful because it's plays into our fears. But just because something feels powerful doesn't mean it's true. The truth is, while our kids may hear new words and see new hard things, they don't have to lose their innocence. Innocence has little to do with what happens to us, and almost everything to do with the lens through which we interpret what happens to us. True loss of innocence happens, not when someone calls us a mean name, but when we believe that name is who we are. True loss of innocence happens, not when we see someone get bullied, but when we witness it but do nothing about it. True loss of innocence happens, not when we're left out, but when we turn around and leave someone else out later on.
In middle school, high school, or adulthood, maintaining innocence is the most important work we can do. It's the work of preserving what is best in our souls, and in the souls of one another. We must choose wonder over efficiency; we must choose love over always being right. We must choose awe over cynicism. Ultimately, we must teach our children to look for the best in people, stand up for themselves and others in kind ways, and to surround themselves with people and ideas that nurture kindness and creativity. Maintaining innocence is the work of nurturing a supple and resilient heart--not allowing our hearts, or the hearts of our children, to harden in response to life's challenges. The witch is right, "everything is different now". We must go and be innocent. That's subversive, against-the-grain stuff. POW!
