Nurture children’s spiritual growth

Friedrich Nietzsche, in Thus Spoke Zarathustra, uses a child metaphor: “The child is innocence and forgetting, a new beginning, a game, a self-rolling wheel, a first movement, a sacred Yes.” Here, Nietzsche’s concept of the child represents the highest spiritual development: spontaneity, presence in the moment, free-spirited playfulness, and creativity. This stirs in me a deeper reflection on children’s spiritual growth in contemporary times.

I grew up listening to my mother’s childhood memories. As a little girl, her days were like an open canvas, all hers to paint. She could spend entire days outdoors, wandering through the vast mango orchard. Together with friends, she could freely explore the seasonal haats and melas. Through these stories, I could almost see my mother as a little girl, giggling and squealing with joy.

Time passed, and life gently guided my mother into adulthood, making space for my own childhood to begin. As a child, time was on my side. I could easily sneak out of the house to play in the neighbourhood. My mother would call me back only when it was too late. I was obsessed with collecting materials scattered around the house that could give tangible wings to my ideas. I used to plead with our tailor to give me fabric scraps and shimmering threads to adorn my creations. I was drawn to role play and was fond of trying outfits far larger than myself. Some days, I would become a doctor who healed magically; on others, a salon expert offering crazy beauty services to customers (my parents and grandparents). Playing “teacher” was my biggest fascination.

Our elders were uncomplicated and encouraging. I fondly remember our New Year home fairs, when we transformed our Dadi’s living room into a lively fairground with food stalls, games, and art corners, all managed by us children. Most eagerly awaited were our riverbank picnics, which brought together our entire extended family to bask in laughter.

My most sacred moments came in boredom, through daydreams. I would imagine my Nani’s elephant in her ancestral home or myself climbing a beam of sunlight streaming through a high window. In times of despair, daydreams became my companion, helping me cope with the loneliness of not fitting in at school.

Now, let us look at the hectic lives of children today.

Children today walk a precarious tightrope. They live in virtual world, burdened by high academic pressures and closely monitored schedules. Parents are bound to become tiger parents, waging strict rules for high academic and social excellence.

The quality of children’s play is declining. The joy of spontaneous, creative, and imaginative play (such as make-believe or dramatic play) is being replaced by mechanistic engagements. Children play mostly with market toys and technologies that come with sophisticated, ready-made instructions and predefined outcomes. While they may offer entertainment, skill-building, or a sense of achievement, they rarely inspire a child to discover something truly new and intimate to her. Spontaneous dramatic play, in that sense, is irreplaceable. Discussing the significance of dramatic play, Ruth Hartley and her colleagues, in their 1952 book Understanding Children’s Play, cited Susan Isaac: “When the child plays at being father and mummie and the family of babies, the giant and the giant killer, the wild animal and the hunter, the teacher and the pupils, the policeman and the bus driver, he is externalizing his inner drama – the various aspects of his inner personality…”

A child’s awakening of spirit is the highest form of learning. In today’s divided and anxious world, the spiritual flourishing of children has become a priority we have largely forgotten. We are raising successful children, but not whole ones. It is more important than ever that we nurture children’s inner life and those quiet, meaningful moments of spiritual growth. Let us take intentional steps in this direction.

deepshikha.singh@apu.edu.in