Innocence and Experience

Wednesday, February 24, 2010



I witnessed two separate worlds – the World of Children and the World of Grown-ups, at the ‘Get-Together’ I wrote about in my previous write-up. ‘The New Bride’ at the ‘Get-Together’ seemed to have created a bridge between the two worlds by sharing her thoughtful attentions between them. It seemed quite symbolic of her present situation when she herself is progressing from the Age of Innocence to the Age of Experience.


The children are innocent by their very nature. The way they perceive the World, relate to the people around them, and enjoy an uncomplicated version of life, is a gift that God sends them with. In the process of growing-up, most of the children either misplace that gift of God and then forget all about it, or are forced to shirk that accessory in favor of ‘higher’ rewards that await them for excelling in the world where they are made to believe in the theory of ‘Survival of the Fittest’.

The Grown-ups, especially those, who chose to throw away the gift of Innocence in their mad pursuit of experience and success, find their lives revolving around the materialistic aspirations. They perceive the World as a dangerous place and tell their kids that ‘ours is a dog eats dog world’; they relate to people only superficially and think of them as ‘the others’; they make their life a continually complicating gizmo where there is no place for simple joys of life.


There are, however, some Grown-ups who hold on tightly to their most precious gift while learning new things that Life is continuously revealing to them. They are the ones who master the art of not letting a single drop of oil spill from the spoon in their mouth while travelling the whole world and marveling at the greatness of God manifest all around them. Such Grown-ups are the ones who really GREW UP and not just became old. These people leave behind the ‘childish’ tantrums, but never the ‘childlike’ simplicity.