Today it snowed. Hard. It was NASTY if you had to be on the road.
Since I am stuck inside I decided to do something a bit different. I went out. Spun around in a few child-like circles and caught a few snowflakes in my mouth. Just for a minute or so.
Part of the beauty of children is their innate awareness in the moment. They seem able to tune out the white noise of life in favor of being with what’s right in front of them.
Everything is filled with wonder.
Wonder is an interesting word. Wonder is defined as: a feeling of surprise mingled with admiration, caused by something beautiful, unexpected, unfamiliar, or inexplicable.
How AWESOME does that sound! In Embracing Uncertainty, Susan Jeffers encourages us to use an exercise which gets us out of our worries and into wonder.
Every time you have a worry instead of catastrophizing the outcome-we can simply ‘wonder’ about the outcome instead. (i.e. I wonder if this cake will turn out right instead of What if my cake falls, I was supposed to drop it off this afternoon….).
There is a strange duality to wonder-the child-like kind where we are amazed by the unexpectedly beautiful. And the verb form-ala Susan Jeffers-where we are curious to know something.
Either way wonder has many lessons to teach us. Children are notoriously both curious about unknowns and surprised by everything unexpected life has to offer.
I wonder if we could approach life this way. Just for a moment. Set aside our worries and live again child-like. Just for a moment.
I challenge you to look for one thing you can approach child-like. Dance for no reason, really look at a butterfly or laugh REALLY loudly. What will the wonder in your inner child do today?
I don’t have to wonder at all. It will be amazing!