Perpetual State of Wonder

Ed Beck

It has been beaten out of me. And I assume it has been beaten out of you too. That childhood sense of wonder.

Recognizing this fact in my own life, I decided to go to the source of wonder: the wide-eyed toddler.

Over the past year, I have been intentional about watching my daughter as she experiences the world. Just yesterday, on our way home from daycare, she pointed out the car window and yelled “Daddy, a baby cloud!” Now if you did a criminal line up of all the clouds in the sky, I am not sure I could have nabbed the bad guy, but I leaned in, and yelled “What?! no way!” back at her.

What I felt in that moment was a little bit of the childhood experience. Sure it was just a little cloud that admittedly I did not even see. But just the expression of a little excitement showed me what makes life so special.

Wonder gets beaten out of you, either by bullies or by cultural norms. We just lose the scent of what life is all about. Think about it… It is pretty unreal that we are a moving, feeling, talking meat sack that has endless amounts of experiences at our beckon call.

And shamefully, we barely take a minute to soak in how fascinating it all truly is.

You could say I am trying to become a kid again: forcefully rediscovering life is about the galaxy of spots on the side of a trout, the giggling banter of a three-year-old, and yes, even those little baby clouds.