I’ve recently been pondering personal traits I’d like to nurture and grow along with those being otherwise undesirable I’d rather pare away as I carry forward with my life. As my thoughts meandered along with my footsteps this afternoon, I remember a friend once made comment on my childlike sense of wonder. A childlike sense of wonder I seem to have misplaced in the last couple of years.

This got me thinking of the stigma attached by society at large to behaving as a child after a certain point in ones life. Usually far too early and often right after we discover that the opposite sex is just a little different to us. And attractive in a way we can’t describe; which our parents are oddly hesitant to discuss.

The sentiment against usually runs thusly:

“When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things” - 1 Corinthians 13:11

Unfortunately we grown-ups are a little to quick to expunge the baby with the bath water so to speak; as a whole we may be too quick to jettison the childlike with the childish, a distinction that is fine but vitally important if one is to remain youthful even to the nadir of life.

Childlike is full of wonder, creativity, frugality, exploration and the unfettered joy of simply being. Wonder, creativity, exploration, joy; these are all intertwined and so easily misplaced on entry to adulthood and all the dubious glory of the daily grind. If you’d ever like to recapture a sense of wonder, just find the closest patch of raw nature and look at it.

Now look closer.

I mean really close. Get a magnifying glass, or a telescope if you need one. I guarantee you’ll find details in the simplest leaf or insect that you’ve never seen before. Simply gazing at a clear night sky with the intent to absorb the majesty of the universe is a humbling experience we seldom allow ourselves. A quick trip to the Astronomy Picture of the Day archive will suffice in a surfeit of clear sky.

Through childlike wonder we unlock creativity. When we explore with fresh eyes, we see and make links between the seemingly unrelated, this is the heart of creativity. We need no excuse to be creative and can express it in every facet of life, from a splash of colour or texture in a PowerPoint presentation to the use of a new ingredient for the evening meal. You’ve got nothing to lose, at the very least you’ll be more interesting than the next guy.

Frugality is an interesting thing, but I think a child can be the ultimate exponent of the art. I was privileged to find myself discussing the concept of frugality with Bruce Piasecki, whose book “Doing More With Less” has subsequently left a might impression. Bruce talks of using creative frugality to find an edge in business and create a sustainable future.

If you’ve ever seen a child with a single toy, you’ve seen the ultimate in creative frugality. With a single ball, infinite games and amusements can be had. Children care not for rules; they are constantly inventing new games to play, free of convention. Once we gain the adult ability to acquire new objects without limit, our need for frugality all but disappears, I believe this is the one of the first steps to old age. I challenge you, dear reader to try this one out in your daily life. Next time you think a task at hand requires an additional resource, be it personnel, money, or equipment; Stop. Stop and think about all the ways you could achieve the required outcome - or greater! - with just what you have at hand. The creative process involved leads inevitably to better results and more satisfaction all round.

Of course, as every parent will be happy to say, raising a child can be a nightmare endeavour at times. Pure self-interest, fear, ignorance of consequence and irrationality. These are the times where childish behaviour is in prevalent display. Our natural but irrational fear of the unfamiliar, of thunder storms, or the monster in the closet, is a powerful force. A force motivating tantrums, violent outbursts or a sullen refusal to act.

Unfortunately, at least for me, these fears have not disappeared, but simply changed face and nature. Unemployment, mortgage payments, peer acceptance, the gorgeous brunette at the bar, all are situation capable of instilling a subconscious fear strong enough to prevent us from taking a positive action to change our situation in life for the better.

This is the very essence of status quo, maintaining the current state of affairs, even once they are no longer optimal.

The height of childishness is the ignorance of consequence. Hand in hand with a lack of personal responsibility, this is easily the trait of childishness able to cause the most massive damage in ones life. The unintended, unforeseen and unanticipated consequences of action are rife in our developmental years. This is why my mother was always careful to keep me on leash near high ledges, stoves and the very interesting, but rather dangerous, internals of heavy machinery.

The essence of maturity is the ability to consider all the potential consequence of a course of action, directly positive or negative, the tangental and the potential, before embarking on the realisation of a decision. By accepting that sometimes we have to choose immediate negative outcomes over short term positives, we can make decisions that have a lasting overall impact on our longterm happiness. The GFC was a great example of banks getting this very, very wrong. Leaving a relationship that is sometimes great, but usually abusive is one of the hardest things to imagine unless you’ve been there. By all accounts the pain on making such a decision can be so intense as to be physically felt; however recovery begins soon after, and then, new happiness can be found, pursued and ultimately enjoyed.

I believe the greatest challenge in life is to recapture all the beautiful essence of being childlike, while keeping an awareness of childish tendencies, and in doing so I hope to bring joy, and wonder, and excitement, and creativity to as many people as possible. This is my invitation to everyone to do the same!