Lazario wrote:What would you think if I said the world isn't comfortable either with you talking at length about children's emotions? Think about it this way: how would you know and how would it make other adults or children comfortable seeing that you profess to think so deeply into children's psyches? (Please take a moment and think about what you're really saying here.)
Can you just come out and say what you're trying to say? Because I really don't know. If you're trying to accuse me of something, then do it.
"The world" isn't comfortable with me talking about children's emotions? Can someone else confirm this, please? Because my whole life revolves around children, and the other adults in my life are constantly discussing the actions of those children, whether good or bad, emotional of what have you. No one has ever seemed to be "uncomfortable" with that. Myself working at Disney World, and my girlfriend working as a preschool teacher... I'm around kids all the time, and those I work with feel as strongly as I do that being in touch with your inner child is possibly the most important ingredient to truly enjoying life. Most adults who "grow up" lose sight of such things.
One of my favorite quotes is by C.S. Lewis -
“Critics who treat “adult” as a term of approval, instead of as a merely descriptive term, cannot be adults themselves. To be concerned about being grown up, to admire the grown up because it is grown up, to blush at the suspicion of being childish; these things are the marks of childhood and adolescence….When I was ten, I read fairytales in secret and would have been ashamed if I had been found doing so. Now that I am fifty I read them openly. When I became a man, I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”"
And yet here you are, saying you're uncomfortable with the mere thought that I am "childish". Do you honestly consider that mature?
You ask how I would know about children's emotions. All I can say to that is that one, I was a child not all that long ago, and remember things like discovering the truth about Santa... I literally remember what that felt like to me. And two, what I mentioned above - I'm surrounded by children all the time, and so I feel I have a fairly good understanding of what is upsetting, exciting, etc... to them.
However, I don't try to pretend that I know anything profound about "children's psyches". I'm discussing what is on the surface - the fact that discovering the truth about something that has been as big a part of their lives as Santa can be upsetting to a child, and should not be simply dismissed.
The fact is that there are plenty of people that are completely comfortable discussing something like this, and agree with all these ideas wholeheartedly. Especially the idea that true "childishness" is the fear of childishness itself, as in the Lewis quote.
Yet you're making me out to sound like a some sort of creep or something, who is out of line for even thinking about such things. I'd love to hear if anyone else feels the same.
Sotiris wrote:
Just out of curiosity, how old were you when you found out?
I don't remember precisely age wise, but I know it was right around third grade. So like 7 or 8. The movie "Tooth Fairy" made me start questioning things, and I asked my parents about it. They explained it all to me, and I was crushed. But now I was part of the secret, and I continued to grow up and see the faces my little brother and sister would make at the mention of Santa, and I understood the "magic" of it all. I can't wait to have kids so I can continue to be a part of that.