"Curious not Callous"

I’m a huge fan of social networking. It’s an amazing way to connect with others on so many levels: business and personal. I really enjoy reading what others are up to as they “post” information on their personal page.

Recently a long-time colleague from my sportscasting days posted: “I’m so glad my daughter convinced me to go up on the roof with her and watch the Perseid Meteor shower. It was amazing.” The celestial light show, with 100 shooting stars an hour, occurs once a year as the earth passes through a trail of dust and ice particles. It happened in early August this year.

Anyway, the joy and wonderment exuding from this wonderful father and newsman’s posting reminded me of what is discussed frequently during Run to Daylight presentations: the importance of allowing wonderment to win. It’s not easy sometimes with all the demands on our time. It’s so easy to say “no” to something because the benefit does not seem worth the effort.

But, in my opinion, quite often if we make the effort to say “Why not?” pretty cool stuff appears in our world. In my first book, Kids Teach the Darndest Things, I wrote about such an instance: It was several years ago, my daughter was eight or nine, and had just received many gift cards for Christmas. On a Sunday, she wanted to visit a nearby mall to cash in the cards. But it was a Broncos’ Sunday and her old man – me – was determined to park himself on the comfy couch and watch some football. Rachel won that debate.

So we head off to the mall, daughter quite excited, Dad bummed out. We hit almost every store in the place that caters to kids. On the verge of a meltdown – I’ve run three marathons but shopping for more than a few minutes is torture! – we entered the final store. I sat in a chair, whining to anyone within earshot, about having to miss the Broncos game for this!

Finally, my daughter announces, “Dad, it’s time to go.” We head toward the back of the store to pay when my mood shifted dramatically. The clerk was folding a t-shirt Rachie had purchased. Across the front of the shirt in huge letters it proclaimed, “Daddy’s Little Girl.”

This week, keep a curious, not callous, attitude toward life. Say yes when everything inside of you is screaming no. Beautiful experiences might be right around the corner, or up on the roof, to remind you how cool life can be.