Living Like a CHILD

Spend an hour with a happy five-year-old and it's hard not to notice they've solved something most adults spend a fortune trying to get back. They're not wiser than us. They just haven't yet unlearned a few things worth holding onto. I keep them in a word: CHILD — Curious, Honest, Imaginative, Loving, Delighted.

Curious

Kids ask "why" until the adults run out of answers. Somewhere along the way we start pretending we already know. Staying curious — about people, ideas, your own assumptions — is the difference between a life that keeps opening up and one that slowly closes.

Honest

Children say the true thing, sometimes mortifyingly so. As adults we get fluent in the small dishonesties that make life smoother and hollower. A little more of a child's directness — with others and with yourself — is worth the occasional discomfort.

Imaginative

A cardboard box is a spaceship. Kids default to what could be; adults default to what is. Protecting some space for play and invention isn't childish — it's where nearly everything good starts.

Loving

Kids attach quickly and forgive faster. They don't keep the elaborate ledgers of grievance we accumulate. Loving more freely and holding grudges less tightly is, I'm increasingly sure, most of the game.

Delighted

The pure, uncomplicated delight of a good puddle. Somewhere we decided joy had to be earned or justified. Letting yourself be plainly delighted by small things is the most underrated skill on this list.

None of this means being naive. It means keeping the parts of childhood that were actually working — and quietly retiring the grown-up habits that aren't.