Joseph Gergen Works

It always starts with chickens. When I think what should I write about today, the first thought that pops in my head is chickens. Then sheep, then pigs and then bears. Then I think, OK, what should I really write about?

Yesterday when I asked myself what I should write about, I didn’t think of chickens or sheep or pigs or bears. But as I was writing I did find my mind wandering to chickens and sheep and pigs and bears. It just happened.

Perhaps life is best understood through the fables and fairy tales filled with animals. Perhaps it’s my inherent naiveté that drives me to the lessons of childhood stories. Chicken Little, The Three Little Pigs, Baa Baa Black Sheep and so on.

These stories keep life simple, strip away the noise, get to the heart of the matter. But as we grow older chickens change from lessons on anxiety to soup and pigs change from lessons on taking short cuts to bacon. They turn from being teachers to being food. Thanks for the lessons, nom, nom, nom.

I suppose as adults this is inevitable. We understand the cycle of life, the food chain. We leave innocence behind. We think we know all these lessons.

But sometimes I wonder if we do know all the lessons. We remember the stories but not always the lessons. We sometimes equate loss of innocence with growing up or becoming wise. How naïve is that?

Loss of innocence wouldn’t be so bad if it made us wise but too often it just makes us cynical and jaded. We’re all so complicated. What fun is that? When did it become so awful to hold on to childish and simple things? Life is complicated enough. Bring some simplicity back into your life. Read some fairy tales and nursery rhymes. Innocence lost be damned.