"When you believe in a thing..."

"...believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable." - Walt Disney

I find that I have my most inspired moments in my car. Listening to music, windows down and simply observing the world around me. And today's thought has moved me to write about it because it's something that I feel passionately about, but I often have a hard time putting to words. I'm going to try my best and lay out the inner workings of my brain here, which often confuse even me, so I'm sorry if you get confused.

Something has been nagging at me, lingering in the back of my brain like a bruise that you don't remember getting, but one day you brush against it and think "Ow, when did that get there?" Sometimes it's big and ugly and appears in the strangest of places, like the back of the knee, or your hip, sometimes under your arm (I've had that happen, it was weird). But slowly it's becoming more clear, gaining color and becoming more of a nuisance, so I want to talk about it.

The clearest form of an argument I can come up with is this:

I believe in having a child-like imagination!

I've realized that through my teenage years there was an unspoken stigma that growing up meant you let go of childhood ideals and face the real world and realize just how hard it is. It's a dog-eat-dog world, amiright? You're encouraged to build this tough exterior that when hard times are thrown your way, it's okay because you expected it. No longer can the world be the expansive playground it once was. Princes, dragons, happy endings don't exist because the world says it doesn't. I used to spend hours playing outside because my imagination was so strong that my front yard could be a million different worlds. The adventures I could have with a simple cardboard box, it could be anything! Every other phrase out of my mouth was almost literally "Well pretend like...". But imagination slows down and the brain can't build the same pictures it once did. My spaceship is now just a box that my dads computer came in. My super secret treetop fortress is just the small tree in my front yard with easy to climb branches. My buried treasure is just the hole that I dug in the neighbors ditch. My lake of vicious man-eating toads is only a sink hole with tadpoles. But, to my 10-year-old self, all of those worlds were real.

But then I became obsessed with growing up. With being seen as cool and mature. I began to forsake the world I had built up for so many years to come face-to-face with what the world called reality. Teenage years can harden you and you find yourself agreeing with people who tell you that things are impossible.

People tend to think the world and minds of children are narrow and limited. And I think they're wrong.

I think it's adults' minds who are limited and narrow. For a child, nothing is impossible! They believe they can do anything! What a beautiful world to live in. It makes me so sad to see people distraught because of the place that they're in. Where is the belief that anything is possible and any situation can be turned around? I'll tell you where, in the minds of children.

Now, I completely understand that in life, there is a time to grow up and to be responsible. But I think we've allowed ourselves to become hardened and we've lost what is so important to keep going on. I'm tired of looking at the negative, I'm tired of doing what "realistic". I want to believe in the impossible!

I don't think there's anything with having a little faith, trust, and pixie dust.


Love Always,
Christina