When children come into the world they want to make sense of it.
In fact that’s pretty much what we spend the rest of our lives doing - trying to make sense of a pretty much senseless world. :wacko:
I had been planning to be completely honest and truthful about Christmas (we are non-religious and do not lie to our child about anything no matter how silly it might be). It has always been my belief that lies create more lies and create a relationship you can’t trust. I also despise doing things simply because that is what is done.
However, I have had to change my mind as a direct result of my research on imagination, how it develops, it’s uses and how to encourage it.
The fact is that working out that Santa is a lie is a massive developmental step for children who are making sense of the world. Working out how does he fit in the chimney, how do they visit all the houses on one night, how does he know if we’re naughty or nice, how does he know if we’re on holidays etc requires huge intuitive leaps of logic that they have developed by observing the world around them. Santa doesn’t obey these rules and it actually helps children to understand the truth of reality. The same goes for the tooth fairy etc.
So our decision has been this - we will create an imaginary and magical xmas, easter, toothloss, whatever. He will experience the magic and have the opportunity himself to see flaws in the system and work out what goes against the nature of the world he is beginning to understand.
I will never lie to him when he asks me a direct question. I will instead give him more fanciful questions to answer in the hope that this wonderful magical imaginary experience helps him to push his imagination to extremes and bring him back to think logically and to separate fact from fiction etc.
Of all the areas of intelligence we can work on imagination is the most important. Far more important than reading and maths.
This is how we understand that things could be different - by imagining other possibilities, how we make changes, how we invent things and so on and so on. You want a child who is good at science? - they need imagination, good at maths? - they need imagination, good at cooking? - they need imagination.
It is our imagination that allows us to tap into our genius and excel at any given thing.
I have to say though I know where you’re all coming from. The media and marketing industries of the world have tainted Santa, I never wanted to encourage my child to believe in something that had virtually no basis in fact.
But I have decided that as with God and religion, this will be his choice. All I can do is provide him with opportunity and information and help him develop a brain that knows how to exercise logical thought.
Good luck to you all - it’s a tricky tricky situation.
