“Your children need your presence more than your presents.” Jesse Jackson
We were out and about in the yard today – gorgeous day after a night of thunderstorms, lightening and heavy rain. My Great Nephew followed me around as I puttered . . . helping me with trimming, pulling weeds, killing monsters. All in a days work!
Just before lunch, I pulled out this old metal truck that had been my husbands when he was a child. The little one was just fascinated with it . . . and I was just fascinated watching his imagination take him away! No electronics needed, no fancy new toys . . . just room for an imagination to blossom, flourish . . . and get carried away!
Imagination is something I believe is seriously declining in our youth today . . . and I say that with the fear that I am sounding exactly like my mother, and her mother before her. It’s a scary reality. Our kids now think that we must entertain them, that they must be provided with all the toys and gadgets they desire. Without them . . . they are lost, bored . . . they just don’t know what to do. I’m concerned with where we are taking our kids . . . in to a world of no imagination, because it’s all provided for them in a little box that they are glued to 24/7. Alarming . . . what is the future that my Great Grandkids will face . . . especially when I consider how much the world has changed in just my lifetime.
It’s my perception that there is a serious lack of compassion and connection with others, a lack of desire to self motivate . . . a lack of involvement with ones environment. And when the motivation is there . . . it’s all one sided and selfish. As one who tends to Nurture others . . . and who strongly believes in community, connection and commitment . . . I struggle with what I see . . .
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Nurture Self 365 
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June 24, 2012 at 10:24 PM
Amy
I hear what you’re saying… but I think you only need to spend a few hours with Alex or Ryan to see that imagination is still flourishing strong in young minds! Yes, we as adults (and even teens) are becoming more in tune with electronic devices, but I see every day the miraculous and beautiful leaps that the human mind is capable of. One of our first jobs as parent are to take these unformed, evolving being and give to them morality, sympathy, empathy, that connection to a world far larger than any individual can be. All these “missing” values are easily taught, so easily learned… every individual truly thirsts for a connection to others. Look around, and renew your faith in the next generations…
June 25, 2012 at 9:30 AM
Nurture Self 365 Project
I think I may have generalized too much – because in writing this I was frustrated by the actions of several teenager/young adults in my life. I am continually amazed at the un-adulturated imagination that emanates from the little ones . . . somewhere along the line though that seems to disappear and be replaced by an apathy and introverted attitude where nothing matters except what matters to them. I have to wonder though – if it is a generational thing . . . was I like that?? I don’t remember it that way, but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t that way . . . because our perceptions are so different at different stages of our life . . . I do know that I have seen video games and modern technology slowly sucking the energy from the independent thinking beings we bring in to this world. And I know my parents felt the same way about Television . . . so in putting this out there I’m just trying to come to grips in my own brain with it all . . .