When a child expresses an impossible dream, listen to it and help her identify small steps she can take toward it. We often squelch the dreams of children because we don’t want them to be disappointed, so we disappoint them now, trying to save them from an imagined larger disappointment later. Odds are that long before you reach the impossible part of the dream, the child will have moved on to a different dream, but she’ll still carry what she learned trying to reach for the first one. And sometimes, if the right groundwork is laid, the impossible becomes possible.
1 thought on “On the Dreams of Children”
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Yes, yes. Let the world do the disappointing, I say. It’s had plenty of experience. I’d much rather be the one who wipes away the tears and helps figure out what to do next.