Why do we lie to our children?
When I was a kid, my world was filled with a lot of myths. Storks delivering babies. The Tooth Fairy traded cold hard cash for those teeth that had dropped from my mouth. The Easter Bunny hopped around on the Saturday night before Easter and hid his colored eggs.
When we are born, we start with total innocence. We do not know the concept of evil. We are pure of heart. But slowly, we begin to learn bad behavior. We learn to lie. We learn to deceive.
Where does it begin?
Were there good intentions behind these childhood stories, like the monsters the in our closets? Or being told that crossing our eyes would make them stick? Did these untruths cause more harm than good?
Thankfully, as we get older, we learn and grow further.
Most of us begin to understand the difference between right and wrong. Good and bad.
We learn that kindness matters. And, the innocence of spirit, that inner peace, is still alive within us. It lives deep within our being. In quiet times, we are able to go to this place within.
So.
Those childhood stories.
What is their purpose?
Are they teaching our children the hard truths of life?
Or showing them the path to poor behavior?
Could they be an attempt by our adult selves to hold on to our innocent past?
I wonder.
I sure do wonder.
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“I used to be Snow White, but I drifted.”
― Mae West
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“One must be a sea, to receive a polluted stream without becoming impure.”
― Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra
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“The knowledge that makes us cherish innocence makes innocence unattainable.”
― Irving Howe
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Those stories at three, at four, at five and more.
